before nor thought possible. As we continue to benefit from these ourselves, and and then eventually choosing to serve psychedelics as our career, then I had the privilege of being introduced to a lot of other different medicines, and a lot of them have served me personally very well at different stages of our lives, so we specialize in five meo DMT because it seems to work really well with us. But we’re also now in conversation about adding other medicines to our immersions and retreats as well.

Manon Bolliger  08:02

Interesting. Well, I’ve got to just share this because it’s some of my patients know, or yeah, I can still call them patients even though I’m not licensed anymore. Just correction there in case there’s eave droppers. But yeah, for me, psychedelics had a huge impact as well, and I was quite young because I was graduating what was grade 13 in, I guess, the year I turned 14. So at that time, I was hanging out with older kids, and you know, all of those drugs like well LSD mushrooms oh I don’t remember lots of options there were were available and yeah I had this like curiosity and I I felt and I’ve told you know many of my patients who sort of say well where do you open your mind. How do you start? You know, seeing that there’s more than one way of looking at things, and I just very spontaneously say, “Well, it’s it’s actually my psychedelic experiences because

Helena Zhu  09:15

Wow

Manon Bolliger  09:15

I saw that you can see differently.” Now, some of them were unbelievably stupid, sea wing. Like I was proud to write an A. You know, and it’s like, how did I write an A after eight hours? I don’t know. You know, like there’s things that you know when you’re past it and you look at it and you go, but the sheer joy of creating that A is what life is all about, you know. So there’s also you you know I mean humans create meaning out of everything, and certainly I’m no different. But I find that that really helped. And then the next question asked is how. Did you know you were not going to become addicted? And because of course you know parents come you know with great fear that oh my gosh I think I I you know my kids are taking whatever it stinks so it said oh it probably is marijuana it smells like skunk and I actually hate that that composite, you know. So, but I mean, yeah. What do? How do you? What do you feel about that? Like, who gets addicted, and what’s the risk there?

Sagan  10:36

You know, yeah, it’s a it’s a really good question, and you know the way I see addiction is it’s it’s a short term way of managing our pain, our our psychological pain. It’s an escape from whatever it is that’s latent in our lives that’s causing a background level of anxiety or unsettling, and we’re trying to go for a brief period of time into something else that feels, you know, more peaceful, and really, you know, the way I see psychedelics is it’s really kind of going in the opposite direction. It’s really incredibly courageous act to go into what’s most difficult, you know, it’s not an escape. At least the way that we relate to it, and in ceremony and with intention, you know, the purpose is really to go into what’s the thing that we’ve been avoiding in our lives, and fully confront and bring witnessing and bring space to that. So, you know, yeah, yeah. I mean, we always tell people it’s it’s so courageous to do this, right? You know, it’s not something people are inclined to do, you know, habitually because each time, you know, you have to build up that courage to to to face, you know, whatever it is that’s that’s most most difficult in that moment.

Manon Bolliger  12:11

And I think you know you bring up a really important point here too. You know, we’re so used to the pharmaceutical model of drug taking, whether it’s for pain relief or whatever. I know now they’re experimenting, you know, even in psychedelics, on a you know so-called real way. But there’s nothing real about it if you’re not, I mean, okay, there’s an exception to what I’m saying, of course, because I’m generalizing here. But to be witnessed is huge, whether it’s by your partner or by your higher self. I mean, I think you know, obviously, Sagan, you you managed on your own to get through and to be both the the one who was experiencing and the witnesser of the experience. So it’s not that it can’t be done, but that’s a whole level. I mean, that’s your whole training. That’s your personality. That’s who you know. There’s lots of reasons why I can understand that you could do that, but it’s not a common thing. I think, you know, in community, when you get to bring up what you actually feel and are allowed to go through it, and you have witnesses, you know, that are not judging you, just noticing with you. You know, I think that that is it’s so huge, and this is why so much of this is it’s not addictive. I think I agree it’s courageous, and I think we also misunderstand even with things we call addictive, the the human desire to heal, you know, like humans want to get better, yeah, you know, and sometimes they choose things like it could be alcohol, because it decreases their, you know, their what’s the right word here? Their inhibitions, yeah. You know, but you know it’s maybe not as full and thorough and conscious as, for example, you know what what you guys are using the five MEO DMT, which. I mean, you you see you see exactly what is. You know, there’s no, you can’t play games with yourself about what is. It just is, you know. Whereas alcohol, I think, yeah, you know, it connects so much to. Memories and stories, and you you can really lose yourself without ever getting to the point. You know,

Sagan  15:09

right? Yeah,

Manon Bolliger  15:10

I don’t know if that makes sense to you. I can certainly see that.

Sagan  15:15

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. You know, I I think one of the things, especially when we’re talking about five meo DMT, is that it’s really yeah, it’s not very storytelling. It’s very it’s very direct and to the point, and it really gets us into yeah, it really gets us into the core energy or emotion that we’ve been holding that’s been this blockage in our life, and it’s like okay, you know, 10 seconds. You know, it’s a 10 second onset when you smoke it, so you’re going from you know your your baseline consciousness straight into the heart of the matter, and you know people don’t always. Sometimes people have this sense of, you know, well, what’s the story? What’s the origin? But often people are just like, okay, this is you know, this is what this is the energy that I’m carrying. However, this came here. This is what I need to let go of, or this is what I need to feel, and and then allow myself to acknowledge so that I can you know release it and transform it.

Manon Bolliger  16:21

Yeah, yeah. or witness it, witness, yeah, for real, you know, yeah, yeah,

Helena Zhu  16:27

yeah. As we’re

Manon Bolliger  16:29

go ahead, sorry. Yeah,

Helena Zhu  16:31

as we’re having this conversation, I’m thinking about one of the fears that we can sometimes have as a community or collectively is just fear of our own emotions and each other’s emotions, and strictly speaking, one of our services, which

Manon Bolliger  16:50

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Helena Zhu  17:35

I consider very important is giving people that allowance to express and feel their emotions in our ceremony, people can also have all kinds of projections. I’m not saying that in a derogatory way onto what this medicine can do for them, but it is possible in another era that we may not need the five meo DMT to come together in the exact way we do, and when we host that ceremony, and people are able to by themselves erupt like a volcano or wail deeply for their loved ones. But at in this day and age, five mil DMT seems to work really well for people somehow to give themselves permission to do all of that, but it’s possible the most important healing mechanism, or at least one of the most, is the fact that all of this unfolded and happened in community.

Manon Bolliger  18:35

Well, I certainly understood that. You know I’ve been following Gabor Mate for like quite a while, and and I think it’s all publicly known. But just in case, I won’t say too too much more. But I I’ve enjoyed several of his assisted experiences in the sense that you know, there’s ceremony. There is after now. It’s a very different type of ayahuasca is different, and it takes longer. You know, you’re you’re really there pretty well all night. You know, and then the next day you process right, and and you know I know I wrote notebooks of experiences and and insights and and and everything, but again it was the the group and the facilitation,

Sagan  19:36

yeah,

Manon Bolliger  19:37

which I would say was the the key points you know that that really matter and yeah personally I between the two I I would take five meo DMT any day well especially the way you guys do it which is. And if you could explain that in greater detail, because I’m sure you’ll do a better job than me. But I felt like I had different experiences in the way that it was taken, which allowed different parts of my processing to to come out. So maybe you want to explain that and how short it is for what you actually receive. Either

Sagan  20:28

yeah okay yeah well I mean one of the really the really unique things about five meo is yeah like you said it’s really short so you know a single dose is you know depending on the on the dose and depending on the person, somewhere between 20 to 45 minutes, and then you’re back. And what this means is that each dose is its own experience, and you’re you’re back and you’re you’re in a place to talk about it, to debrief on what what showed up, to share. You know, if we’re in the group, to share with the others in the group, you know, and to really set an intention for the next dose. So, for some people, say there there might be a lot of fear that might come up in a certain dose. That’s you know they go into that fear, they might feel you know overwhelmed, but then they come back and they have that that time to really take a step back and decide to go back in and and face it with a bit more intentionality, a bit more you know because every dose is always optional. You can always end at any point, but it’s always that that choice that people are making each time they take a dose to go back in and and look at what needs to be looked at at that point, and yeah, and our philosophy is to start low and build up. So you know, each dose range, you know, has certain characteristics that are, you know, sort of characteristic of you know the low doses tend to be a little more somatic and energetic. The the medium doses tend to be more about insights into life. They can be more relational, more you know a little bit more autobiographical sometimes. You know, and the high doses can be this real letting go into the sense of of oneness and connection with with all of life and you know the universe. People use these words like non-duality. You know, universal. These are the kinds of experiences that those high doses often connect people

Manon Bolliger  22:31

1. Or if you’re sensitive, like I am. Yeah, I think I I had that you know feeling of total connection in a moderately high, but not high high dose, right?

Sagan  22:48

Absolutely, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Manon Bolliger  22:50

That was um quite quite something. It you know it’s it’s funny. It’s it’s um because with you know this many years of experience, you know helping people myself, you know trauma is a huge part of any service you give, you know, or one ends up giving, you know. But I also recognize that gratefulness and pure joy and pure love and ecstasy, literally. I don’t mean the drug here. You know, are also really suppressed feelings. You know, they’re not so acknowledged either. And and I remember feeling it’s like, oh my gosh, you know. I remember you whispered to me, “Mum, that’s because that’s who you are,” and it’s like, oh my god, you know. But I remember that feeling of like, wow, you know, we we can live so fully, you know, and you know, and I think when I look at the potential for this, you know, I I don’t really think that there’s harm to be had. You know, I was afraid. You know, which I admitted. You know, it’s like I was afraid. You know, it’s like I hate taking any drug. Like I don’t do well with anything, and I hate anything artificial. But so it’s like for me, oh my god, I’m gonna have to do this. I swear I would never do anything that wasn’t at least plant based or whatever. But but I can see the purity of things looking at it just from another point of view. That if you’re not you know mucking around with frog biology, it is frogs, right?

Sagan  24:57

It’s toads, actually. Toads. Okay, sorry. Yeah.

Helena Zhu  25:01

Yeah, there is a frog medicine called yeah. That’s right. That’s right. Yeah, that’s right.

Manon Bolliger  25:05

Okay, toads. You know, you’re you’re bound to. It’s purer in that sense. You know, there’s nothing wrong with chemistry per se. We are, you know, biology. We’re chemistry. We’re energy. We’re so many things, nothing is in and of itself bad, right? Yeah,

Helena Zhu  25:28

it is a real joy talking with you about this because yesterday we were talking with our massage therapist for our retreat. As you know, we’re looking for a new land and space to house our lives and house our work. And she shared a lot of wisdom with us. And I was reflecting, you know, we love this work and we made it full time for us. But strictly speaking, we’re young healers and we’re new healers. And our friend, she’s been a healer in multiple modalities for 20 years, and you have been a healer professionally for decades, and maybe unprofessionally for a long time, as many healers often are in their families or just in their lives.

Manon Bolliger  26:18

Right.

Helena Zhu  26:18

And I was reflecting yesterday about what does healing actually mean? Because there are the individuals, in your case, patients, and our case, you can call them journeyers, clients that we work with, and at the same time, it’s being a healer for the society and collectively, and what we need to offer. So, as we’re facing some regulatory challenges from our local authorities, I am recognizing how much bravery and courage our journeyers bring to our space, such as you yourself saying that you were scared. Lots of people come here holding onto our couches when they’re not ready, or I mean, they are ready, but they don’t think they’re ready, right? They don’t. They they are very scared about what will happen to them after spending a few days with us. And I’m letting them know that I really don’t think there’s anything to be afraid of, and we’re being welcomed into some communities that way too. We’re about to visit the land that we’re most interested in, and our friend there said it’s gonna be fun. And I don’t really know if I felt that way, but I’m recognizing that’s the energy of how we welcome people in, and it’s possible now. It’s our turn to offer our very wild courage to move to somewhere new to discover that for all of us, because we’re gonna be bringing our community there, and it’s gonna be a land that’s more sovereign and that allows us to live with more dignity and with more bravery because we we all are aware of this one life and have the opportunity of life and I hope we and other people can live the best possible life they could.

Manon Bolliger  28:14

Well, you know, you you bring a an important point at the beginning of this. I mean, the whole thing was, but when you talk about healing, and I think that’s a fundamental part of this. Of you know, you’re in fear as as long as there’s no part of you that can see the healing potential that you might go into, you know. So, in other words, a lot of people are afraid of change. Now, you know that’s a more common known fear, but the ability to go with the change and to flow with it, not to resist it because it is. It’s what’s happening. It’s like okay, you know, resisting it never. It’s not healthy, right? You need to go with it. It doesn’t mean become whatever you call it, an obedient little slave. I’m not talking about that type of obedience. I just mean flow with it. See, okay. So this is what’s happening now. I have choices. I can fight, or I can, you know, move and then deal with this. But all of it has a healing capacity. All of it is for your Ultimate emancipation and your ultimate connection to divine love and freedom. I mean, it it’s really it is your sovereignty. You know, I see it that way. You know, whereas you. Bending things and twisting things and dealing with this. I mean, it’s another journey, and sometimes that is the the path, right? But you’ve got to really be aligned. Is it? Does it? What? How do you see healing? You know, and and and that’s why, like for me, I was scared when I took it first because I, in the same way, to Gabor Mate, I said, you know, I’ve put on some weight. Do you think I’m going to have a heart attack? You know, just like. And he goes, I haven’t seen that happen. You know, and then with you guys, I thought, oh, maybe I’d stop breathing, you know, or something, right? You know, because I thought, you know, whatever. If you know a bit too much in in medicine, it can get in the way of just letting go. You know, so it’s like, but but those are because neither of those, you know, having a heart attack or stopping breathing have anything to do with healing, right? They are pathology symptoms. But once you kind of let go and go, okay, you’re not going to create a pathology here, at least from a medical mind, right? And it’s like, ha, what else could happen? Well, healing, all healing, because whatever is going to come up, whatever is going to be exposed, whatever you’re going to release or connect to, is something you didn’t have. I mean, you might have had but didn’t recognize before. You know, it’s like it’s it’s almost new to you, right? You know, so I, I don’t know. I guess I see change, the ability to go with change, as extremely healing.

Sagan  31:51

Yeah, yeah, I really appreciate that that perspective, and you know, I think that, yeah, that idea of being willing to let go of rigidity and and to flow, and there’s something very there’s something very sort of egoless about that. I think because you know our egos hold on to well, this is how it is. This is how it’s supposed to be. Right. And there’s that sense of control and that sense of you know the the particular form. But to be to be like water is to be you know willing to follow the contours of you know of of the vessel, follow the contours of the land, and you know and see what what form is actually being called for, you know, by the world.

Manon Bolliger  32:39

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, and I think that’s how we we listen best, you know, the ability because, you know, as a as somebody who offers healing of anything, or being a vessel for healing to take place in, or a womb, you know, it’s yeah, it’s the ability to to really receive information without judgment. It’s like wow, interesting. You know, like it’s just it’s going with it. You know, that’s

Sagan  33:18

yeah,

Manon Bolliger  33:21

yeah. I mean, you know, our our time is up, but I’m happy to keep going on on healing. It depends on how you go.

Sagan  33:29

Happy to go as well. Yeah, that

Helena Zhu  33:30

sounds great.

Manon Bolliger  33:31

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. No, I was thinking, what are the obstacles to healing? What are the things that get in in your experience, you know you’ve you have helped now a lot of people. What are the things in general, obviously?

Ending

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