22 Years of Therapy in 2.5 Hours. On Psilocybin. | Lazy Leverage #129

We mention a lot of books on this show and never write them down. Fixed that.61 books, 39 essays, 88 episodes, free: https://lazy-leverage.saganpassport.com/

This conversation describes personal experience and is not medical advice. Several substances discussed are illegal in most of the United States.

Christian Ruf says he did twenty two years of therapy in about two and a half hours. He flew for the 160th Night Stalkers, the most elite special operations helicopter unit in the world. Both he and Jon spent years being drug tested by the government. Now they sit in ceremonies guided by Hoot.

Christian got out of the military and two years later he was going downhill fast. Medication was not working and therapy was not working.

Hoot came out of television, had what he calls a dark night of the soul, and found his way here through meditation.

In this one: why Jon hands over every decision the moment he enters the space, including his own dose. What set and setting mean, and why Hoot runs ceremonies outdoors. Why the music is the medicine, and what happens when whoever is choosing it gets it wrong. The night the clouds cleared over Colorado and a meteor shower arrived at eleven. And the part both of them say matters more than the ceremony itself, which is what you do with it the next morning.

Chapters:00:00 - Intro01:30 - Welcome to Lazy Leverage03:22 - Who Hoot Is06:10 - Christian's Road to the First Ceremony09:48 - Twenty Years of Anxiety and the Backpack12:20 - Why This Is Not a Concert15:06 - Harmony, Hoot's Partner18:42 - Set and Setting23:16 - The Music Is the Medicine27:34 - Releasing Control32:19 - Not the People You Would Expect35:12 - They Should Have Sent a Poet40:07 - The Ancestors Rooting for Me46:01 - The Night the Clouds Cleared49:37 - What Hoot Does During Ceremony53:30 - Integration Is the Whole Point

References Mentioned in This Episode -

Books:Sagan, C. (1985). Contact. Simon & Schuster.

Quotes Referenced:"They should have sent a poet," from the film adaptation of Contact, which Jon takes as the closest anyone has come to describing the experience.

People & Frameworks Cited:Chris Berg, whose post on X led Christian to his first ceremonySet and setting, as studied at Johns Hopkins and Imperial College LondonThe backpack every man carries, and what it holdsThe ski tracks image for integration, and Hoot's answer that if you stare at the tree you hit the tree"The psychedelics are not the medicine. You are."Reality with a capital R,