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5-MeO-DMT, the Ego, and Non-Dual Liberation | Martin Ball - The Entheogenic Evolution
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We welcome Martin Ball on the podcast today. Martin is a pioneer in non-dual entheogenic education, an author, musician, podcaster, teacher, artist, and integration consultant.
He is an expert on 5-meo-DMT therapy and was the person who coined the term "The God Molecule" when referring to its powerful properties when it comes to healing.
As you will see, Martin is a wealth of knowledge on all things psychedelics, non-dual therapy, 5-MeO-DMT, and the all-important integration of these experiences as it comes to liberating ourselves from the clutches of our ego.
As Martin teaches, the goal is not to destroy or annihilate the ego, but rather to learn how to use it in our daily life and tasks, but not let it take hold and ruin our lives.
Connect with Martin:
- Website: https://www.martinball.net/
- The Entheogenic Evolution on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-entheogenic-evolution/id272825477
- The Entheogenic Evolution on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@EntheogenicEvolution
- Patreon: http://patreon.com/martinwball
- Integration services: nondualentheogenicintegration.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/martinwball/
- Books on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Martin-W.-Ball/author/B00DVPL2FI
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Transcript
Introduction to Dr. Martin W. Ball and 5-MeO DMT
00:00:01
Christian Yordanov
Hey folks, ah Christian here again, welcome back. Today i' am so excited to have our special guest Martin W. Ball, PhD, on the show. Briefly about Martin, he is...
00:00:18
Christian Yordanov
one of the pioneers in non-dual energetic therapy and 5-MeO DMT. He basically is the guy that ah coined the the nickname for the molecule, the God molecule, similarly to the spirit molecule with DMT.
00:00:36
Christian Yordanov
So you know that's, I think a lot of people know that as the God molecule. So that's the dude, we have the dude that coined that phrase here. He's also an author. I think you've written like, i don't know, like more than a dozen books at this point.
00:00:49
Christian Yordanov
Musician, podcaster, host of the Entheogenic Evolution podcast.
00:00:50
Martin
Yeah.
00:00:56
Christian Yordanov
He's a teacher, artist, integration consultant and photographer. And he's all around a fun guy. If you listen to him talk, if you listen to his books, it's just you can see there's this playfulness to it.
00:01:07
Christian Yordanov
So he's not taking himself too seriously. He's clearly not...
Misattributions and Academic Journey
00:01:11
Christian Yordanov
allowed the ego to to hijack his journey and without further ado Martin welcome to the show man
00:01:21
Martin
Oh, thanks for that introduction, Christian. I really appreciate that. And um I appreciate that you mentioned that I'm the person who coined the phrase, the the God molecule, because actually, as we are speaking, I have a short video that I'm uploading to YouTube where I'm explaining that.
00:01:38
Martin
And this has got 13 minutes left. So I hope it doesn't interrupt with our transmission here at all.
00:01:43
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Yeah.
00:01:44
Martin
um But it's it's something that now that that phrase has kind of spread around the world, that I've seen it misattributed to other people. And usually it's just not even mentioned, like, where does this phrase come from?
00:01:56
Martin
So yeah, I appreciate that you mentioning that. And I've got a little video explaining that on its way to YouTube right now.
00:02:01
Christian Yordanov
yeah Yeah, man. And actually, I'd love to actually, before we get into the meat of the discussion, I'd love to get a little bit of your background just for the listeners. I feel like I know you pretty well because I've actually, since I did my, like I told you, I did my second Bufo journey about three weeks ago. And the next, the very next day, ah this was in Mexico.
00:02:26
Christian Yordanov
The very next day, i I discovered one of your books, the integration book. Then i started listening to that. And then I bought the the facilitation book. And then I bought what was that that that one you always point ah beginners to?
00:02:43
Christian Yordanov
The entheological paradigm? No, the other one, liberation. Sorry. So I hope have those two and your bio.
00:02:49
Martin
and
00:02:50
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Yeah.
00:02:51
Martin
Okay, cool.
00:02:52
Christian Yordanov
so So it feels like I know you well, but I'd love to get into your background a little bit. And maybe you can give us how you started in terms of, so I believe you were a little bit of an atheist, but you also, you did, you you have a BA in philosophy, a master's in religious studies and a PhD in religious studies.
00:03:09
Christian Yordanov
So even though you started out as an atheist, you still pursued those things. So maybe if you can weave that into your kind of ah background.
00:03:15
Martin
Sure. Yeah. So i'll I'll tell you the story of me. I was born in Southern California in Santa Barbara. and That was way back in 1972.
00:03:28
Martin
And ah my parents, they had grown up in the San Francisco Bay Area in California. They both went to UC Berkeley. That's where they met. And they were they were not hippies, they were not counter-culturalists. My dad was a chemistry student, my mom was an anthropology student, and um my dad was doing like a postdoc at UC Santa Barbara when I was born.
00:03:51
Martin
Then we moved to Chico in Northern California when was a few years old. We spent summers down first in Santa Barbara. My dad would teach chemistry summer school at the university there. And then eventually he started teaching chemistry summer school in UC Santa Cruz on the coast in California.
00:04:11
Martin
And so I grew up in, you know I would describe as a secular scientific materialist household. you know there There was no religion, no spirituality. I definitely didn't feel that there was anything lacking there. um Certainly, i grew up around a lot of what I would describe as fundamentalist Christians, you know people who read the Bible, literally, um people who didn't believe that dinosaurs existed. that i I actually had somebody tell me once that um dinosaur fossils are just chicken bones and you can arrange them any way you want.
00:04:44
Martin
And I was when I a kid, was like, oh, okay, you really think that? And I went through a phase, I think it was in sixth grade, I went through a phase of kind of rebelling against that. And I had, you know, the school binder and I wrote all over the cover. I wrote atheist rule. And I did that when i was actually in ah the bathroom one day and I could hear other students outside the bathroom saying, oh, Martin doesn't believe in Jesus. Martin doesn't believe in God. Yeah. He thinks that we evolved from apes. So then I came out as like yeah, atheist rule. So, um you know, I, I leaned into that identity as being an atheist and,
00:05:24
Martin
but I was proud of the fact that I took a scientific materialist view of the world and didn't just blindly believe, you know, what's what's in this ancient book that contradicts itself like all over the place and and has a lot of values that I don't really support. But anyway,
00:05:40
Martin
um
00:05:44
Martin
in high school, as ah in my English class, there was one point where we started reading books Greek philosophy.
Philosophical and Entheogenic Exploration
00:05:54
Martin
and we were reading Plato and Socrates and Aristotle. And for me, like a light bulb went off. And my response was, you mean people could get a job where they think about stuff and like that's that's their job?
00:06:08
Christian Yordanov
Okay.
00:06:09
Martin
They just think about what's right and what's wrong and what's the nature of reality? And like I want that job. So that got me interested in philosophy. And um also around this time, you know, in high school, I had some friends who became connected with some ah white Rastafarians in Chico, in Northern California, you know, these white guys with dreadlocks. And that's where we got our our pot from. That's where we got our cannabis from. and um I started experiencing, I think I was like 15 years old when I first experienced cannabis and I had already experienced alcohol and gotten drunk to the point where I had to crawl across this field because I couldn't walk. And my my friend is like walking me like a dog. And I'm you know i'm crawling on my hands and knees. I'm like, oh, I love you, man. Thank you so much. And he gets me back to my house. He's like, I'm going to throw up. And he's like, don't you throw up in my car. So he pushes me out of the car. And I throw up. And you know I crawled inside, literally had to crawl inside. And I crawled into my sister's room. And i was like, Jessica, help me. And she came. And she gave me a bucket to throw up in. And then she cleaned up everything so that my parents didn't.
00:07:19
Martin
see it in the morning. And at that point, I decided like I don't want anything to do with alcohol. I'm not interested in that. But then it was after that that I got to try cannabis for the first time. And I just felt enlivened and inspired. And you know as a budding musician, just listening to music, was like, oh my god, this is awesome. And at that point, yeah, started getting into like Rastafarian culture, reggae music.
00:07:42
Martin
um Never joined the Rastafarian church or or anything like that, um but was kind of interested.
00:07:48
Christian Yordanov
I'd love to see you in dreads.
00:07:49
Martin
Yeah, I used to have long hair, but my hair is too straight to to form dreads. um But anyway, ah was kind of curious about um sort of the the, I was attracted to, I would say, the social and political aspect of Rastafarianism, you know, Bob Marley, get up, stand up for your rights, that kind of thing.
00:08:11
Martin
um But it was when got Graduated high school. So I had one of the, I like to share that I had one of these teachers at high school that was like one of these cool teachers that you could talk to about anything and really kind of considered her a friend. And so the day after I graduated high school, 17 years old, and was walking through the school and the door to her office was open and I walked in and she had this book on her desk that was Zen Mind Beginner Mind.
00:08:40
Martin
And she said, oh, Martin, I think you'd really like this book. She said, I think this would be right up your alley. So why don't you borrow it? So I took this book home. And at the that point, I didn't really know anything about Buddhism at all. But I read this book, and I was really surprised that to me it appeared rational, it made sense, there was there was an explanation for everything. And that's that's what really didn't appeal to me about the Christianity that I was surrounded by, was that there was no explanation other than, well, this is what it says in the book.
00:09:15
Martin
versus this book talked about how to clear your mind, calm your mind, how to get out of your own way, how to ah develop focus and attention and how to relax into the process of being.
00:09:15
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:09:27
Martin
And i was like, wow, this this really does resonate with me. So at that point, I really started exploring Buddhism. And went off to college at Occidental down in Los Angeles, California, and started out as a philosophy major, going back to like, yeah, I want to think about stuff and have that be my job.
00:09:47
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:09:48
Martin
But I really wanted to study Buddhist philosophy. And that's what originally brought me into religious studies because most philosophy departments really should be called Western philosophy rather than just philosophy. Because anything that doesn't come from religion Europe or North America, that gets slated over into religious studies. So you can't study Buddhist philosophy in a philosophy department. I think the University of Hawaii actually does teach that, but it's the only university that I know of that does that.
00:10:20
Martin
So that's what brought me into religious studies. So I ended up developing um my minor as an undergraduate in religious studies. and then went on to UC Santa Barbara for graduate school in religious studies with the intention of studying Buddhist philosophy.
00:10:38
Martin
um But it was in maybe my second or third year where I was studying Sanskrit and also teaching myself Navajo because I wanted to do field work at the Mescalera Apache Reservation in New Mexico.
00:10:54
Martin
and there are no materials for learning Mescalera Apache, but it's very closely linguistically related to Navajo and there are lots of materials on Navajo. So as I was studying Sanskrit and Navajo at the same time, after a year of that, I decided like, this is a little bit crazy.
00:11:10
Martin
And the university had, um One of the professors who taught Buddhist philosophy had moved on to another school, I think University of Chicago, and we did not have a new professor yet teaching them that area. So I decided like, okay, I'm going to drop the Buddhism. And later we did get a professor who formerly had been a Tibetan Buddhist monk studying under the Dalai Lama. And he also had his degree in physics. So he was like totally up my alley, but he came a little bit late in my time at UC Santa Barbara and so ended up really emphasizing Native American traditions. Now, backing up a little bit further, given my interests, um in my first year of college, that's when I had people saying, hey, Martin, we really think that you would probably enjoy psilocybin mushrooms.
00:11:57
Martin
given your interest. So was the summer between my first and second year of college that I got to experience psilocybin mushrooms for the first time.
00:11:59
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:12:06
Martin
And really it was my my first experience I just thought it was weird. My second experience, it kind of dawned on me like, oh, maybe this is what people mean when they talk about, quote, the spirit world is this experience that I'm having now.
00:12:22
Martin
And So at that point, I started reading everything I could find about psychedelics and in particular reading a lot of anthropological materials because I wanted to see how they were used in traditional cultures that had a longstanding tradition and understanding of these things. And also started kind of investigating that question of what is the role of psychedelics in religion in general? And at that time, this was in the mid nineteen ninety s There were hardly any research documents about this, but we now know, here we are, 2026, there's been lots of research done by scholars, um biblical scholars, anthropologists, historians, where we now pretty definitively know that entheogens have been used in religions for thousands of years, not just indigenous cultures and tribal societies.
00:13:10
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
00:13:13
Martin
But in Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, i mean, it's just it's across the board. But I had to study that kind of all on my own at the time because it just wasn't taught in class and there just weren't a lot of resources.
00:13:29
Martin
So that's where all of this started for me.
00:13:32
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, and I think that triggers so many Christians because I like i i know you you're not a fan of like the whole reincarnation thing and we can unpack some of that for the listeners later, but that I did interview someone you may have heard, um Dr.
00:13:41
Martin
Yeah.
00:13:49
Christian Yordanov
Christopher Beige.
00:13:50
Martin
Mm-hmm.
00:13:50
Christian Yordanov
He wrote one of his most popular books now would be the LSD and the Mind of the Universe. So I... um I interviewed him about that book, but I read his his first book or I guess his second book in from 1990 or so about um basically the reincarnation life cycles.
00:14:10
Christian Yordanov
right It was called Life Cycles. And then I forget the subtitle. It was about the the whole thing that he did all the the research and the study of... um of she oh am i I'm sorry, it's very late in the day here. I'm blanking on the names. But the guy that was basically...
00:14:26
Christian Yordanov
studying thousands of cases of children that remember past lives. And so in in that book, he was talking about how in more esoteric Christianity, they actually, at least a long time ago, they were talking about reincarnation. So that's another thing that also triggers the the the Christians where they're like, no reincarnation is bullshit, which again,
00:14:47
Christian Yordanov
I think there is evidence for it, but it's not important for our our own personal development in this lifetime. And similarly, like you said, it's clear that entheogens were used in all these other religions, but Christianity as well. And that's another thing I think a lot of folks don't want to accept because, again, they take...
00:15:07
Christian Yordanov
something like the bible way too seriously when it was meant to be poetry and just ah allegory and there's deeper meanings to a lot of those texts that are lost on the basically the great unwashed if we can call the the populace at large that are consuming this document if if we could say that
00:15:30
Martin
Yeah, well, of here, I'll put on my Religious Studies hat for a minute just to talk about the Bible and about Christianity. So one of the most important things to understand about Christianity is that in the first several centuries of Christianity, there was no such thing as the Bible as it exists today.
00:15:46
Christian Yordanov
Thank you.
00:15:53
Martin
There were multiple Gospels and They were all authored by different people. None of them are authored by the people whose names are on them. And that early Christian communities were incredibly diverse. Most only had access to one or two gospels. And there eventually became a number of different libraries ah of these different gospels. And they have very different views on the nature of reality,
00:16:27
Martin
nature of jesus mean it's important to emphasize that in some of these early gospels um jesus is not a person jesus is understood as a spiritual figure or teacher but not a historical person that mostly came later um and they these early gospels they don't agree on whether there was a crucifixion they don't agree on whether there was a resurrection they don't agree on who are the heroes and who are the villains They don't agree on what was the message or what was the purpose. So there is multiple different forms of Christianity. And what got consolidated into the Christian Bible came several hundred years into the history of Christianity. And then that is when doctrinal um heterodoxy and orthodoxy was determined, where most of the gospels that were written about Jesus were left out of the Bible.
00:17:21
Martin
And there's only, what, there's only like five in there. But there's something like 80 or 90 different gospels written about Jesus. So there was a lot of different competing views about what it meant to be a Christian, what was the purpose of Christianity, who was Jesus. And again, there there were some groups of early Christians who would be offended if you said Jesus was a person who was born and lived and died on the cross, that they would say, absolutely not. this is We're not talking about a historical person. So what has passed down through the centuries into what is modern Christianity is extremely different from what this really diverse collection of early Christians were doing and thinking. And some of them ah were much more influenced by the mystery cults in ancient Greek culture and much more influenced by Greek philosophy. And there, like if we read Plato, Plato does say that
00:18:23
Martin
there is ultimately there is one God. So this is where some Christians say, oh, he's a proto-Christian because there ultimately is only one God and that the soul goes through these processes of returning to God. And according to Plato, only philosophers are reincarnated or nobody else gets reincarnated. But, you know, this was part of the ancient world. And also just on the entheogen front, that the Greek mystery cults were consuming entheogens. They were having entheogenic and psychedelic experiences. And ah some of these early Christian groups most likely were using various entheogens as well.
00:19:04
Martin
And we can also see this in Judaism and we can see this in branches of Islam. So there's just a lot ah lot more diversity and most modern Christians, I would say, they're just not aware of the actual history of Christianity and how this thing called the quote the Bible came into existence and how there's lots of competing versions. I mean, it's kind of like now in the modern media conglomerates where, um you know, like when Disney bought Star Wars, for example, they had to take into consideration, well, there's all this fan fiction and there are all these you know subsets of stories within the Star Wars universe. But now that Disney has bought Star Wars, we're going to need to decide what is considered, quote, canon and what is now excluded from the canon.
00:19:53
Martin
The same thing happened to Christianity, where it's like, okay, if we're going to make this book and say this is the divine word of God,
00:19:56
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
00:20:03
Martin
Most of these gospels do not agree with each other. They say contradictory things. It's just like if we have multiple versions of Darth Vader, multiple backstories of Darth Vader, we have to decide, well, which one is going to be like the real one? And it's a marketing decision ultimately. And it's a who gets to control what the story and what the narrative is. so I mean, that might seem flippant to people, but that's literally what happened in Christianity.
00:20:30
Martin
We had multiple versions of these stories and in consolidating into a Bible, the council in Isaiah um had to decide what are we can going to consider as the actual Jesus versus what are we going to say like, no, this is no longer canon.
00:20:33
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:20:49
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, and we have multiple versions of the Bible. you know I actually have like maybe three or four different ones, you know obviously King James and there's other ones. so but you know It's funny, but if I played a clip of what you just said, i have some Christian friends, they would just say, well, what the hell does this guy know? He's just like a psychedelics guy. And then i' I'd be like, yeah, but the guy freaking studied religious studies as as a master's and then a PhD. So come on. You know what I mean? like like you Certain people simply will not be convinced no matter how much information you give them. But that's fine. I think we still love them. Still love them. I think they're great people. um Let's get into, since we're on the subject of the one God.
00:21:32
Christian Yordanov
I know you talk about that a lot. It's such a fascinating thing to experience. It's Why did you call 5-MeO-DMT the God molecule, bro? And maybe interweave into that what happens in the best case scenario if one were to use the medicine?
00:21:52
Martin
Yeah. Okay. Great question. And i'm I'm happy
First Full Experience with 5-MeO DMT
00:21:55
Martin
to address it. So um My first, what I always call my first full experience of 5-MeO-DMT came in January of 2008. And eight and ah prior to that time, I had pretty ample experience with psilocybin mushrooms, also in the The years previous to that, I had really gotten into working with Salvia Divinorum, which is a pretty obscure psychedelic. Not a lot of people are very familiar with it.
00:22:26
Martin
um And also had kind of cultivated a self-identity as, you know, oh I'm some kind of mushroom shaman kind of person. Um, and so I, a little bit mixed that I, so I had sort of this mushroom shamanism kind of identity. And then I would describe myself as a philosophical Buddhist or a philosophical non-dualist, but not necessarily as a practicing Buddhist. Cause you know, I practiced Zen meditation. um But I didn't you know strictly follow the Eightfold Path or or anything like that. Didn't join a monastery. Didn't do all the Buddhist stuff. But I leaned towards Buddhism. And I also like to point out that I was one of these people who was really uncomfortable with the word God.
00:23:13
Martin
I didn't like it. I was i was happy to talk about, you know well, let's talk about the Buddha mind. Let's talk about universal consciousness. And also As I mentioned, I was a self-described philosophical non-dualist, meaning that philosophically, I agreed with the proposition that I think there probably is only one universal consciousness and that we are all somehow expressions of that.
00:23:39
Martin
But it was philosophical in the sense that I intellectually agreed with it and thought it was correct. But I would never say definitively I've had an experience that would confirm to me that this is something that is true.
00:23:53
Martin
But I think it's true. um So anyway, I wasn't comfortable with the word God. But um I moved up here to Ashland, Oregon in late 2007. And shortly after moving here, I was invited over by this guy saying, hey, you know i've got this I've got this toad stuff.
00:24:13
Martin
And it's ah it's a rocket ship straight into the heart of God. And I was like, oh, sure. I'll give that a try. So anyway, I went over to his house and he did this big ritual and then he had um some Sonoran desert toes and he had milked them. So he had some of the secretions and he wanted to give me an experience. And then also he wanted to have a little bit so that he could have an experience himself. So, you know,
00:24:39
Martin
Me first, then him. So anyway, he vaporized this stuff in this kind of fancy proto, what is now known as the lamp, but this this was the early version of the lamp.
00:24:51
Martin
It was an argon gas vaporizer. He vaporized it for me and I took a hit and I laid back down. He had a mat for me to lie on and I laid there for, I don't know, like 20 minutes or something like that.
00:25:04
Christian Yordanov
Thank you.
00:25:04
Martin
And then eventually I sat up And he's kind of looking at me really expectantly and he says, okay, wow, what where did you go? And I said, nowhere. like Oh, well, what what was your experience? I was like, well, you know, you said it was a rocket ship straight into the heart of God, but hey look, I've been working with Salvia Devinorum and that's a,
00:25:26
Martin
short acting, extremely powerful psychedelic. And what you just shared with me is nothing compared to salve de vernorm. So then I like gave a counteroffer. said, you come over to my place and let's try some salvia because this toad stuff you gave me, like it's a little bit dreamy and yeah, I felt some energy and stuff like that, but nothing to write home about. Like this was not an interesting experience.
00:25:49
Martin
And it was it was just too little. It was just a little tiny bit, really. um i don't even know what the milligram dose range was. But anyway, like a month later, he was really disappointed. He was like, oh man, I got to get this guy Martin, right?
00:26:02
Martin
um And especially at the time i had just started my podcast, the Entheogenic Evolution. So he's like, yeah, this is someone I really want to turn on to 5-MeO because he's going to tell everybody about it on this podcast. He invites me back over and he says, okay, this time we're not going to be doing some toad. I've got some pure freebase 5-MeO DMT.
00:26:22
Martin
And at this point, he had the next version of the lamp. So these are quite famous now. And the friend who served me, he's the one who gave it the name of the lamp. So these these argon gas vaporizers where you have a ah glass cylinder and there's a ah stopper up at the top.
00:26:41
Martin
And then the cylinder is filled with argon gas, which is an inert noble gas, which means that there's no oxygen present. So that when you heat up the material, it's not going to burn. It's only going to vaporize. So this chamber fills up with this milky white vapor.
00:26:59
Martin
And he brings it over to me. And that you know there's this little metal um tube that comes off of this. So I'm taking this hit, and it's going down like this. And I can see this as I'm taking it in. And I only got to right here. I took maybe two-thirds of what was in the chamber.
00:27:18
Martin
And at that point, as I'm inhaling, like the first thought is, Oh my God, it's God. o my God.
00:27:29
Martin
And then I just started saying thank you just over and over again.
00:27:30
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:27:32
Martin
And i was saying thank you to God. I was thanking the person who served me. i was thanking myself. I was thanking Rhea. I was thanking everything. It was just this overwhelming experience of absolute gratitude.
00:27:46
Martin
And so within seconds, okay, so now what I'm going to describe what what I like to call the divine grace experience. So this answers your question of in the best case scenario, what are you going to get from 5-MEO DMT?
00:28:00
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:28:01
Martin
I got it from that very first experience.
00:28:01
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:28:03
Martin
And I don't count the first one with Toad because it just wasn't enough. Okay. But this was enough. So within seconds, my entire sense of self was dissolving and I could you know After that thought of, oh my God, it's God, is this sense of, I think I'm dying and I am now merging with the infinite.
00:28:28
Martin
And deep, deep, deep inside me, there was just this resounding, overwhelming, yes, I'm going to allow this to happen. like And also this recognition in those very first few seconds of,
00:28:42
Martin
Holy shit, this is exactly the experience I've been looking for my entire life, but had no idea that this is what it was. So all sense of individuality was just dissolving.
00:28:56
Martin
And this wave after wave of gratitude. And then it it it was like, it was like an orgasm that just got bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. And just when you think it's done, it just goes to the next level. And then it goes to the next level. And it was just like this overwhelming sense of absolute unconditional love, that there is nothing but this energy of love where there is no judgment, there's no right, there's no wrong, there's no good, there's no bad, and there's no separation.
00:29:24
Martin
And I perceived that and understood that as God because it was a supreme intelligence. It was alive. It was conscious. It was aware.
00:29:37
Martin
And it was everything. It was everything that could ever possibly exist. It was all space. It was all time. it was all potential. It was all manifestation. And this, quite importantly, I recognized in that very first experience, this is part of the big holy shit, was It's me.
Insights and Challenges with 5-MeO DMT
00:29:56
Martin
This is what I am.
00:29:59
Martin
I have identified as this person known as Martin, and I am that person. But this is the real me, and that thing known as Martin, that's just a manifestation of this infinite being and consciousness and awareness that is reality itself.
00:30:19
Martin
And so I was just basking in that. And as this happened, my entire sense of my body completely dissolved. The room I was in completely dissolved. My eyes were wide open. I did not see anything at the exterior level because it was like this living starlight was just washing over me in this beautiful mandala, this perfectly...
00:30:42
Martin
um radial geometry that was the geometry of all being. It was like this fractal manifestation of everything all at once. And it just enveloped me and it it was me. And it was, I'd also describe it as looking into the absolute nature of the self. It was looking into the mirror of the self and this immediate recognition, this is what I am. Because at the core of this experience this is this resounding, I am.
00:31:10
Martin
Not I am Martin, I am not, I am the glass of water, i am the dog, I am the tree. It's just, I am. And then as the energy of that was starting to wear off and die down, I could distinctly feel like layers of my individual identity come back online.
00:31:31
Martin
I could feel that internally. And so there then eventually there was a sense of, oh, I am a person. I have no idea who I am. I don't know what my name is. I don't know where i am, but I know I'm a person. And then at the exterior level, that's the point when I was able to identify, oh, there are two human forms here. So there was two people there. is the person who served me and the the woman who was my girlfriend at the time.
00:31:58
Martin
And I was, and so first it was like, okay, two human forms. And then next was that one's a male, that one's a female. Still, I don't know who they are. i don't know what their names are, but that one's a male and that one's a female. And then, oh, I'm in a room.
00:32:12
Martin
And then, oh, that's how, that's, Maya. Oh, I'm Martin. That's right. I'm the person known as Martin. And it was like it was like a rocket coming down through these layers of the atmosphere where it's like one layer at a time, I was able to reestablish my identity. And then eventually it goes all the way back down to zero. And then I'm Martin again.
00:32:36
Martin
And just left with this, holy shit, there God is absolutely real. And I always like to distinguish that I did not suddenly become religious at this point.
00:32:49
Martin
Because I also, having studied religions, is like I don't think any of them are talking about this properly. like this This is beyond that.
00:32:55
Christian Yordanov
you
00:32:56
Martin
And also, like I don't think the Buddhists have it right either. um Even though I lean towards Buddhism. Because this was not... like the quietude and emptiness of the Buddha mind. Like this was the raging orgasm of infinite ecstatic love of this infinite intelligence. And like the Buddhists, they're not describing this correctly. um And also it was at that point that I will say that that was the first sense that I had, like, cause I had kind of leaned towards reincarnation, but
00:33:29
Martin
At that point, it was really like this grain of sand, you know, like when it gets in the the oyster, like this grain of sand that's going to turn into a pearl. Like this something is really irritating me about reincarnation because if I just experienced myself as God, and if God is everyone and everything, then that means I don't have a soul. i don't have some kind of spirit.
00:33:57
Martin
I'm not... I'm not something that has like separated off from God and then gone through this process of incarnation. I am the universal being in consciousness. And if I'm that, that means everyone is that. And that means we're all the same and they're there is no such thing as a soul. So at that point, I started to play with this idea and this phrase where I'd say, the only one that reincarnates is God.
00:34:20
Martin
And God is everyone that exists right now, every living being that exists right now. It is every living being that has ever existed and is every living being that will ever exist because it is reality itself.
00:34:32
Martin
And that because this being is everyone and everything, that also means that some people might, quote, remember a past life.
00:34:46
Martin
But here is where the ego attaches to that and says, oh, that was me, but you're God, you're everyone and everything. This is just one instance of information from, quote, one life transferring to the next. But because this being is everyone and everything, we all potentially have access to all information in that sense. And so sometimes these reincarnation experiences show up in people's experience and they might say, I remember something from a past life.
00:35:17
Martin
And that's where, again, I just like to remind them, well, it's actually only God that reincarnates. That's not you as the person you are right now, because right now you are God. You just don't know it. You don't realize it. And the ego attaches to the identity and says, oh, that was me, but that's the ego speaking.
00:35:36
Martin
That's why i say that, yes, we can account for remembering past lives, but it's not an individuated thing that we don't go through a a series of incarnations as an individual.
00:35:49
Martin
Because we're just God. So I like to say, look, reality is a multi-character game, but there's only one player. Or it's a multi-character movie, but there's only one actor playing all the parts simultaneously. So from that experience, it radically started to change my view of what was real, what was not real, what is the nature of existence. What is the nature of being? And it really initiated an ongoing process of awakening and a transformation within me that culminated in the spring of 2009. But that ultimately, that that what I'm just describing right now is pretty much the apex of the 5-MeO DMT experience. And something that I always like to communicate about this is that
00:36:41
Martin
I, like many other people who have this experience right off the bat, I mistakenly assumed this is what everyone will experience. It's so simple, just give them 5-MeO, they will have this experience.
00:36:50
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. yeah
00:36:53
Martin
And then it's later through additional experiences of my own, but primarily um getting the opportunity of going back to this temple of awakening divinity and getting to observe other people have their experience, that then I really quickly learned Most people actually aren't having the experience I had. Some of them do.
00:37:14
Martin
This is the fullest potential of this experience. But there's a lot of other things that could go on here. And particularly, there's a lot of ways that the ego might resist this, either consciously or unconsciously, or might co-opt it, or might divert it, or might indulge. And that...
00:37:32
Martin
While this really is the pinnacle of the experience, it's not the automatic response. And so my understanding of it ah really deepened over time. ah But that was my mistake my mistaken assumption from that first initial experience was nothing could be easier.
00:37:45
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:37:48
Martin
Just give someone 5-MeO DMT within seconds, they will be able to say, you know what? I'm God, you're God, it's God, that's really all that there is. But um that's not what happens to to everyone.
00:38:02
Martin
at least not right away.
00:38:02
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, man. It's so interesting when um I started listening to your books, and this because I got stuck in Mexico because of the you know the cartel stuff that happened.
00:38:12
Martin
Yeah.
00:38:13
Christian Yordanov
So i say I stayed an extra four days. So almost immediately after that that second journey I had there a few weeks back, almost immediately after, i was like, I'm completely back to normal, almost to the point where i was like,
00:38:27
Christian Yordanov
Well, last last year I was like, there was a lot. I was like, um had the afterglow for like a couple of weeks. But as I came home and kind of slept properly a couple of nights and rested a little, I felt safer.
00:38:34
Martin
Yeah. Yeah.
00:38:41
Christian Yordanov
man i'd i'd walk I'd be walking my dog in the morning in the sunshine. And I'd be listening to you recount some of these experiences you had with with the the molecule. And i would get like these surges of energy coursey like going through me, man. It was absolutely incredible, you know. But at the same time, whats in that time, even though I'm like...
00:39:09
Christian Yordanov
experiencing these minor reactivations and I feel good and like things are like I feel like I'm showing up in a better way for my family and I feel like I release so much energy like you say so much traumas and and and and just stuff down emotions at the same time I'm also like noticing my mind you know my egoic mind Just kind of worrying about the stupidest shit.
00:39:39
Christian Yordanov
Like, ah for example, well, I feel good now, but like, what if I have an accident?
00:39:40
Martin
Yeah.
00:39:44
Christian Yordanov
What if like a loved one? What if I die? What if someone I love dies? What am I going to do then? You know? And even if I die and and I merge back with God, that that's great for me. But like then my my wife would be alone and like, dude, like this is like every single fucking day, this shit.
00:40:01
Christian Yordanov
ah Not that it's like constant, but like I'm like, it's almost like ruining what could be like a very meditative, calm, almost like euphoric walk with my dog in the sun. I'm like, why the fuck are these thoughts coming into my mind? So can you maybe like talk about how does,
00:40:20
Christian Yordanov
So what are some of the ways the ego just try to fucking co-opt the experience and like hijack it for
Ego and Post-Psychedelic Integration
00:40:27
Christian Yordanov
its own purposes? and why do you think that happens?
00:40:29
Martin
Yeah. So that's a ah really rich area of exploration. um First thing I just want comment on is what you shared there is also very, very common that um when people read my books or when they hear me talking about it, if they've had the experience, me sharing about it often will generate certain levels of reactivation within people.
00:40:53
Martin
um it's kind of It's fun a little bit how that happens.
00:40:57
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
00:40:57
Martin
um that that also like I've had people mention, like oh, i was listening to your book in the car, and then I almost drove off the road. So you know just fair warning that this happens.
00:41:05
Christian Yordanov
yeah
00:41:07
Martin
And it's because ultimately, as I'm sharing this, not only have you had the experience, but I would also say it's because the energy of truth comes through in my voice and that it activates people.
00:41:20
Martin
and i'm you know Here, we're talking about the ego. I'm not trying to be egotistical about that. I'm not trying to claim something special. it's like, look, this is just the way that it goes. This is the way that it works, that everything is energy. So now let's get back to the ego. The ego itself is also just energy. So everything is energy.
00:41:38
Martin
But I don't mean that in some kind of fluffy new age metaphysical kind of way, that if we think about what is the ego, it is patterns of energy with which we have become ah habitually identified over the course of our lives. And by that, I mean ways we think, ways we act, ways we choose to express ourselves, the ways we use our body, our tone of voice, the way that we communicate, the way that we either allow or suppress our emotions. These are all just energies. And and literally, when we're talking about thoughts, this is electromagnetic energy in the brain.
00:42:19
Martin
we are producing brain waves. We can measure this stuff. I mean, there's nothing metaphysical about this. When we're talking about emotions, usually we're talking about sensations in the heart. where when we're feeling scared and nervous, our heart rate goes up.
00:42:33
Martin
And our heart also produces an electromagnetic field. that that What produces our heart rate is an electromagnetic charge. These are just energies. And then also we have the gut, where we feel you know things. at the the The gut is also primarily made out of neurons. So we have the brain is made out of neurons. The heart is made out of neurons. The gut, the intestines, are also made out of neurons. and that this is all a highly sophisticated electrical system.
00:43:04
Martin
So sometimes I like to say, look, as a human being, we're we're godbots. That's what we are. And we have sophisticated enough mental software that we can develop a sense of self-awareness. And that's the point around which the ego revolves. And so the ego is just this collection of patterns of energy.
00:43:24
Martin
And those patterns of energy start to be developed when we're very, very young, just as infants. And as we're developing that self-awareness, and then especially in context with others, when we see, oh, if I cry this way, Mom reacts that way.
00:43:40
Martin
And so we learn that it's this, as we're creating our sense of self, we're also creating our sense of the world and our sense of otherness. And then how we relate through our internal expression, what we express outwardly, what we feel, then we develop these patterns of behavior, patterns of thought, patterns of emotions, patterns of responses.
00:44:03
Martin
then if we've had anything traumatic happen, then we also develop trauma response patterns. And again, those are just patterns of energy. But once we get once we take them all together, so the the ego is not one thing.
00:44:19
Martin
So for example, when people say, oh, I have a soul, that's the real me. They think that that's a thing, that's this one thing, but the ego is not one thing. It's all these little bits and pieces. When you put them together, it creates the impression of a particular self. Here is a place where I like to point to particularly character actors, where you can if you have a good character actor, or just a good actor in general, as that actor plays different roles
00:44:52
Martin
they will take on different energetic patterns to give the impression of being that character. So in other words, a good actor, when they're playing different roles, they might use completely different body language from one role to the next.
00:45:03
Christian Yordanov
Thank you.
00:45:07
Martin
They might change their tone of voice. They might change the way they speak. They change their facial expressions. They change their movements. And then altogether we can say, oh, that's what makes the character. And then people who do impressions, what they're doing is they're ultimately, they're looking at what are the energetic patterns of this person?
00:45:25
Martin
And then if I imitate those patterns, I give the impression that I am that person. So when when we do this, I like to call it like energetic shape-shifting, that we can take on different personas, different roles, different identities by adopting these patterns and then mobilizing them through how we are expressing and embodying ourselves.
00:45:47
Martin
So that's what the ego is. So it's just a collection of patterns of energy. And they're all limited, meaning I do this, I don't do that. I think this, I don't think that. I feel this, I don't feel that.
00:45:59
Martin
But when we go through the 5-MEO experience, there is this sense of this infinite expansion of energy where everything goes to the infinite level. where from the body perspective, it feels like everything is just expanding and dissolving and that all separation, all sense of this, that, the other thing, all of that dissolves, a sense of totality of all space, all time, all possibilities, all manifestations.
00:46:26
Martin
And in that state, the ego can't really maintain itself because it's these limited patterns of energy. So they get temporarily transcended.
00:46:37
Martin
Now, What's also true is that even though 5-MeO is incredibly powerful, because it's just an amplification of you, it cannot violate your free will.
00:46:51
Martin
So if any part of your ego, and here we should also distinguish that there are conscious parts of the ego, and even more, there are unconscious parts of the ego.
00:46:53
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:47:03
Martin
And if any of those parts say no
00:47:09
Martin
Even in this overwhelming onslaught of energy, the ego can fight and can hold on. So sometimes the conscious parts of the ego let go, but there's an unconscious part that's like, no fucking way, like not going to happen, not doing it.
00:47:22
Martin
And then that's that's going to be a difficult experience for someone. um or there can be deep traumatic energies that are residing within someone and before that part can say yes, um all of that needs to be cleared out. That's where we get a lot of screaming, we get a lot of somatic processing, there can be vomiting, there can be all kinds of things coming out of people and that's where these um suppressed energies, sometimes they need to be cleaned out first before everything can open up. So there's lots of different ways that
00:47:57
Martin
someone might not open up to the full potential of the experience. Some of it might happen at a conscious level, some of it might happen at an unconscious level. Okay, but eventually, regardless of what happens, the energy is going to die back down at some point.
00:48:13
Martin
The medicine's going to start to wear off. And at that point, The ego can either come back fully in one instance, which does happen with some people where it's just suddenly like click, everything just goes right back into place and they're like, whoa, what's going on?
00:48:31
Martin
But at that point, you're still experientially tripping harder than at that sense your ego is there. You're like, I didn't know it was possible to trip this hard. i Like seriously, I didn't know it was possible. Like I'm really, really tripping hard right now.
00:48:47
Martin
um But then for others, like I described for myself, it's more one bit at a time. So a lot of it is related to how much can you stay relaxed and open within the process. But we have to keep in mind that the The ego really is an evolutionary adaptation.
00:49:05
Martin
The job of the ego is to maintain itself across all energetic environments. So in other words, when the tiger is chasing us, we want our ego there saying, dude, get the fuck away. Like, get away. This is really terrifying. Or if you're looking over a cliff, the ego says, hey, step back.
00:49:23
Martin
Like this shit's dangerous. Or when you see someone that you are sexually attracted to, the ego and the genes say, hmm, yeah, let's reproduce. Like this is what we do as animals. So the the ego in our sense of self, its job is to maintain itself. And even at the deepest level, I do like to say, look, the job of the ego, it's got to be really, really sophisticated because the the job of the ego is to convince God that it's not God, that it's just this person.
00:49:53
Martin
So it's got to be good. It's up against the ultimate opponent in a sense. It's playing the ultimate game of hide and seek. So um the ego will just naturally reestablish itself. And because so much of the ego was formed and constructed when we were very young and we were not really consciously making decisions that we're just we're having an experience, there's some kind of input, and then we're reacting, and then that becomes a habituated pattern.
00:50:25
Martin
After we go through this massive opening and cleansing that happens with 5-MeO, it's often the case that the less functional parts of the ego will overreact and try and hook our awareness with, I'm thinking about stupid shit. I'm obsessing about stupid shit. um So this is where I do like to say that there there are different parts to this experience. One is the experience with the medicine itself.
00:50:56
Martin
The next part is the immediate days and weeks afterwards, as we are continuing to process and feel a lot of that. And then the ultimate work is i I need to appreciate that this experience is going to highlight, amplify, and possibly even bring to the surface aspects of my egoic character that were just operating unconsciously.
00:51:21
Martin
And then the ego will react and act out. And that gives me the opportunity to become acutely aware of the less than optimal patterning of my ego so that I can start to choose and make conscious choices to format myself in a different way so that I am more relaxed, present, focused, less caught by the... So like what you were describing, those are projections where the ego is moving out of the present moment and projecting what about this in the future and then...
00:51:56
Martin
behaving as though that future is actually happening and getting all upset and emotionally entangled in that rather than saying, okay, I'm goingnna want to take responsibility that my mind is jumping away from the present and I'm investing a lot of energy into a hypothetical that is not actually happening right now. Now,
00:52:13
Martin
This ultimately, see, this is a useful function of the ego because we are self-aware. This is what allows us to ponder things that are not. So we can think about, well, what about this? What about that? What about this potential? And that is what allows us to be creative, to have discovery. to have new insights and new ideas and to imagine things as different. And then we can go about perhaps shaping the world and reality so that that thing that we're just imagining that becomes reality at some point. But when it becomes pathological is when we can't stop it, when we can't disengage from it and it becomes an obsession or it becomes a pattern that is now running us rather than us using the pattern for a particular end. So,
00:53:01
Martin
This is a normal part of working that when we go out of the ego and then come back in, the ego will tend to overreact and will also tend to try and use whatever it can to lock us back into those old familiar and safe patterns.
00:53:19
Martin
Even if the patterns are dysfunctional, it still feels safe and comfortable to the ego. So it's this deep encounter with the self at the ultimate level and also at the personal level And I like to describe all of it as if we're really engaging with it, it's a process of energetic reformatting and that the goal is not to get rid of the ego.
00:53:41
Martin
The goal is to energetically reformat the ego so that it is highly functional and in alignment with our deepest truth and deepest energies but not that we're getting rid of the ego because we use the ego all the time we want a good ego we just we don't want an ego that's fucking with us we want an ego that works with us and for us and that's what this what i would call non-dual energetic therapy with 5meo That's the goal.
00:53:56
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:54:12
Martin
That's the aim. That's what we're working towards is a highly functional ego that is in alignment with our deepest, most authentic energies.
00:54:21
Christian Yordanov
Well, what really well said, man. Really well said. I'm just curious, Martin, and and you don't have to share if if you don't want to, but just ballpark figure, how many times do you think you've done five meo over the last, you know, whatever, 17 years?
00:54:38
Martin
Yeah. So here I do like to make a couple of distinctions. So from that first experience that I had in January of 2008, over the next year and a quarter during that time period, um, I was having one large experience with five MEO once every month or two months. So within that window, i did it maybe 10, 11 or 12 times.
00:55:04
Martin
I also started attending the local Santo Daime ayahuasca church at that point. Drank a lot of ayahuasca. Also did a lot of work with Salvia Devinorum, some work with MDMA, some work with DMT, some work with psilocybin mushrooms. But it was all part of this ongoing energetic reformatting and processing that I was going through. um So it was all...
00:55:30
Martin
It was like taking different classes, but it was all part of one graduate program in that sense.
00:55:35
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
00:55:35
Martin
um But during that time period, again, it was only like maybe 10 to 12 full experiences with 5-MeO DMT.
00:55:36
Christian Yordanov
yeah
00:55:42
Martin
Then in the summer of 2009, I got a hold of my own supply of 5-MeO DMT for the first time.
00:55:54
Martin
And I had already started doing what I was calling non-dual energetic therapy work with people. But I was i was actually, I was i either working without any entheogen or I was doing that with salvia divinorum, with clients.
00:56:08
Martin
And then when I got my own supply of 5-MeO, then I just brought that in to the energy work that I was doing with people. And my modality of work was, in that capacity was that I would usually offer three full rounds of medicine to every client.
00:56:25
Martin
That's just on average, or you know three rounds and that I was always taking it with them to energetically sink in with their experience and work with them in that mode.
00:56:31
Christian Yordanov
Wow.
00:56:39
Martin
And so from the summer of 2009 to the summer of
00:56:46
Martin
I often had like three to five clients per week. I only worked with one person a day. um And then we're usually doing like three rounds of medicine. So I did a lot during that time period.
00:56:58
Christian Yordanov
Oh, wait. for Until you said, right?
00:57:01
Martin
Yeah.
00:57:03
Christian Yordanov
So that's like six, seven years. Holy
00:57:06
Martin
Yeah, was about is seven years long. And doing it several times a week, several rounds.
00:57:09
Christian Yordanov
cow.
00:57:13
Martin
And I always like to distinguish that When you're doing it with and for someone else, it's very different than just doing it on your own for yourself. So I never considered those as being experiences for me.
00:57:27
Martin
That was for – I'm amplifying my energetic state so that I can more – intuitively work with this person and going into these non-dual states with that distinction between, oh, this is just me and two different bodies and we're working together as one combined energetic unit.
00:57:46
Martin
um
00:57:46
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
00:57:47
Martin
So then when I retired from doing that in late summer of 2016, then it was actually quite a few years that I did not take any 5-MEO.
00:57:58
Christian Yordanov
At all? at all
00:57:59
Martin
No, just no not not at all. Felt like... you know, because I, my process ultimately reached a point of completion.
00:58:02
Christian Yordanov
wow
00:58:07
Martin
So I wasn't really looking for anything. And at that point, actually, I really started exploring MDMA. And I, I did a couple years of what I would call my psychedelic cocktails, where I was working with MDMA in combination with 5-MeO-MIPT or 4-ACO-DMT and a little MXE and mixed with cannabis.
00:58:26
Martin
And so I was exploring like these different cocktail combinations. And that was just pure solo work. It's like, I'm just doing this because it's fun and it's really fascinating and I'm really enjoying it.
00:58:32
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
00:58:37
Martin
Um, and then more recently, um, ah maybe it was even two years ago now, year and a half, so sometime.
00:58:48
Martin
i think it was a year and a half ago, I was contacted by some people who were developing 5-MeO DMT injections. And they said, hey, if we come to Ashland, can we can we give you an injection of 5-MeO?
00:59:00
Martin
I was like, oh yeah, I've never tried it that way. um So they came and I got to experience that. It is a 17 milligram dose of an injection of 5-MeO.
00:59:07
Christian Yordanov
what was that like?
00:59:09
Martin
um it was It was amazing. I really, really loved it. ah It was 75 minutes from start to finish. So it's a much longer experience.
00:59:20
Christian Yordanov
wow
00:59:21
Martin
Very, very intense. 17 milligrams, that's a very high dose. It's very significant. um But I really enjoyed that. There's a video of that.
00:59:29
Christian Yordanov
and do they inject you free bass? or is it the salt form that they inject?
00:59:33
Martin
Yeah, so you have to use one of the salt forms. So there's there's a lot of different variations. So just for the listeners, you know when we're dealing with a pure molecule of 5-MeO, not coming from you know toad secretions, that they the free base is best for vaporizing.
00:59:51
Martin
And then there's various salt forms. So there's HCL is just the generic salt form. And then there's fumarate and
00:59:58
Martin
there's succinate, there's fumarate. there's these different forms. And those are the forms that you would use for an injection, but it must be very, very pure. should be like 99, 98% pure.
01:00:09
Martin
And then it's in a liquid suspension and that's what's injected. You should never inject free base that is much harsher on the system. It can be very, very painful is my understanding.
01:00:20
Martin
But with these succinate, I think it was a succinate form that I was given.
01:00:25
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:00:26
Martin
um it was like nothing at all in my arm. So it was just like, it just got a shot in the shoulder. And then within a couple minutes, was like, OK. But rather than the rocket, like if you're vaporizing, it's like, boom.
01:00:38
Martin
This was more like, I called it like the escalator. It's like, OK, so this is the escalator. It's going like this. But I can tell it's going to the same place. Like, we're going to get there eventually. So it's a much longer come on. It's a longer peak. And then it's a longer come down. And then also prior to that, um We did have in 2020, maybe it was 2020, 2021, sometime right in there, was Bill Atkinson, who was an executive at Apple Computers. He is the person who first developed the 5-MeO DMT vape pens that he called Jaguar vape pens. And he had contacted me.
01:01:18
Martin
I didn't know who this guy was. And he said, Hey, I've made these new vape pens. Can I send you some? So he sent me a bunch of his, uh, five and me, O DMT vape pens in the mail. And so I had experimented some of those pens. So that was in 2021, 2020, around in there.
01:01:35
Martin
And then with a Mindscape Institute, where I teach a facilitation and integration training class, I participated in the first in-person training with that.
01:01:46
Martin
That also was a couple years ago. And for that, I did so'm like some 5-MeO, and then most recently with some of my students, I was in Iceland and did quite a bit of 5-MeO there.
01:01:59
Martin
um But the bulk of my 5-MeO experience comes from 2008 to 2016. And again, the the majority of that was not personally for me.
01:02:06
Christian Yordanov
And
01:02:10
Martin
It was for working with clients or working with others.
01:02:12
Christian Yordanov
yeah, so we're talking like easily hundreds of times.
01:02:15
Martin
Yes.
01:02:16
Christian Yordanov
It's insane, man.
01:02:17
Martin
Oh, easily.
01:02:17
Christian Yordanov
It's absolutely, because just holy cow, because just for me, it's, it's I can, like after the the last session, i said to my wife, you know, like, man, I can see how some people are saying it took them a year to integrate that session because it's, It's so powerful, but I'm just um curious, what what is it like, let's say after the Iceland um um a trip, what what is it like for you?
01:02:18
Martin
Yeah.
01:02:34
Martin
Yeah.
01:02:44
Christian Yordanov
Has it changed the the the actual experience and then the after effect and that that integration, if you if you want to call it integration, has that changed for you since you know back in 2008, 2009, what was happening?
01:02:56
Martin
Okay, just just hold on one second. ah The pool guy walked past my dog's barking. I'm just going to try and see if I can quiet her down. You can see her. Look, there she is right there.
01:03:04
Christian Yordanov
yeah she's so cute okay
01:03:04
Martin
has Yeah, I can see if I can quiet Moxie down. Hold on.
01:03:09
Christian Yordanov
okay okay
01:03:20
Martin
Okay, so here I'm just going to back up a moment. So I... hit a point of ultimate transformation that occurred within me in the spring of 2009. And at that point, the way that I would describe it is that not only did I just completely open up to the reality that I am God. And I don't mean that in the egoic sense of like, I'm opening up a church and I'm putting my picture up on the front and I'm going to have people come worship Martin.
01:03:52
Martin
No, it's not that. It's that really accepting that this is the reality. Each and every one of us is God. And that at that point, I was able to fully trust it.
01:04:04
Martin
And I also gave up any attempt of trying to control myself or control my experience and just trust that this is reality and I'm just going to go with it.
01:04:17
Martin
And at that point, that was precipitated by one final session with 5-MeO. And essentially, it just didn't stop. Where then for like the next three months, it felt like I was tripping 5-MeO to some degree. You know, it fluctuated. It went up and down. But it was like I was i was just in it at that point.
01:04:38
Martin
And so in a sense, from that point on, there was nothing left for me to integrate because there was no longer any resistance. There was no struggle. It was just like, this is me. I accept that this is what I am. This is reality.
01:04:55
Martin
And I'm just going to go with it. So now, you know when I work with psychedelics or if I work with 5-MeO, Usually, right when I take the hit, it's like, oh, yes, this it's me again.
01:05:09
Martin
This is what I am. And then after that, I mean, it's not that there's anything for me to integrate because I've already integrated full acceptance that this is just reality. So it doesn't blow my mind.
01:05:23
Martin
anymore. Which isn't to say that, I mean, it's it's astounding.
01:05:25
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:05:28
Martin
It's absolutely astounding. So I'm not trying to say like, yeah, it doesn't have any bang anymore. Like it absolutely has bang, but it's just, I've completely accepted like, yeah, this is this is reality.
01:05:40
Martin
So it's like back when I was doing sessions with people, my clients, usually afterwards, my clients were just in this state of awe and they're like, oh my God, like this, this is incredible. And you get to do this every day. Like, oh my God, this is amazing. And what, what I would say to them is like, I know this is amazing for you and it is amazing, but it's just another day in the office for me, really, because I've accepted like, yeah, this is reality.
01:06:16
Martin
So i don't have I don't go through an integration period. I don't go through ongoing, like spontaneous reactivations and things like that. like I can slip in and out of the state very easily.
01:06:31
Martin
And it just it happens to me.
01:06:31
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
01:06:32
Martin
So it's it's just the way things are. right I've really just accepted, like yeah, this is reality. it's not It's a big deal. Yes, it's a big deal. But it's also it's it's not a big deal because it's just the way things are.
01:06:46
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, that's beautiful, brother. um Is there any psychedelics that you would not encourage the use of in between sessions? Let's say someone is doing you know couple of session sessions a year or one every quarter for ah for a period of time. And if they want to work with stuff, is there anything specifically you wouldn't recommend using?
01:07:11
Martin
Well, here, let let me answer first with this. One of the things that's very important to know when working with 5-MEO DMT is that And this is sometimes it's hard for people to hear if they haven't had 5-MeO DMT, but I would just lay it out because, again, this is just the way things are. This is not about good or bad or right or wrong. 5-MeO is way more powerful than any other psychedelic molecule that exists in reality.
01:07:43
Martin
This is the top of the line. It is the God molecule. It is the crown jewel that this is the top of the line. It is energetically so far beyond any other psychedelic.
01:07:55
Martin
And what happens is once you've introduced that level of energetic opening within your system through ingesting 5-MeO, you become far more prone to those big openings.
01:08:12
Martin
So what that means for many people is that after a 5-MeO experience, if you go and then have mushrooms...
01:08:24
Martin
there's a really good possibility that that mushroom experience will not be like any mushroom experience you've had before. And suddenly it'll be more like five hours of 5-MeO DMT. And so 5-MeO has this potential to ultimately dominate and transform any other psychedelic.
01:08:43
Martin
And this is really important because, for example, I had a woman who came to me for integration with And she told me about how she and her sisters and mother would often take five grams of mushrooms together. They would each take five grams of mushrooms. She was super comfortable with five grams of mushrooms.
01:09:07
Martin
Then she took 5-MeO. And then she got together with her sisters and her mother. And she said, well, I think I'm just going to take one gram of mushrooms. And she took one gram of mushrooms and she said within a few minutes of having ingested it, she was flat on her back and she said it was like five hours of 5-MeO. It was so much more powerful than any five gram mushroom experience I've ever had before that those five gram experiences seemed like kiddie play, right? That was like kindergarten compared to this. And so I like to use that as an example because this happens to lots of people. So it's not so much like don't work with this, that, or the other thing, but just be aware that anything else that you go to after 5-MeO potentially could turn into 5-MeO. And then for for fewer people,
01:09:58
Martin
What can happen at least for a time period is that other psychedelics might seem so mild and so tame by comparison that it doesn't really register as having a big impact on someone. So this is where it gets really odd where somebody might say like, yeah, well, I took seven grams of mushrooms.
01:10:20
Martin
But I just kept thinking like, well, this is nothing compared to 5-MeO. So it doesn't have the same sort of potential as it might have had beforehand. um Now, at the...
01:10:33
Martin
Potential interaction level, i mean, one of the things that we do want to highlight is that it's very important that 5-MeO not be taken with a monoamine oxidase inhibitor. And so this is where it's a little bit risky where we have retreats that are offering ayahuasca and then bufo or 5-MeO in close conjunction with the ayahuasca.
01:10:53
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
01:10:53
Martin
There, it really is important that ideally at least 24 hours should have passed between taking them because 5-MeO is so potent that a monamine oxidase inhibitor ah makes it more potent.
01:11:08
Martin
And that's where it can get dangerous, where people, ah on rare occasion, people have experienced serotonin syndrome. But that is specifically, that's been with people who have been consuming Bufo, toad secretions, with a monamine oxidase inhibitor.
01:11:23
Martin
So I don't know of any stories of people drinking ayahuasca and then taking Bufo and having this experience, but that's a potential. So that's, it's just something that you really want to be careful of, of not combining a monamine oxidase inhibitor.
01:11:37
Martin
And that includes like some herbs that people take, like I think St. John's wort is MAOI.
01:11:41
Christian Yordanov
Yes, I think that's a um ah sir selective no non-selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor potentially.
01:11:50
Martin
Yeah. So you do you do need to do your research.
01:11:51
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, yeah.
01:11:53
Martin
that you don't You don't want to be mixing these serogenetic things with 5-MeO. But your body metabolizes 5-MeO very, very quickly. So the main thing is that you don't want to take it in immediate conjunction with 5-MeO.
01:12:07
Martin
And then I don't think this is much of an issue, but since you asked, I will just go ahead and say it that um personally, I just don't recommend working with the solanaceae plants.
01:12:19
Martin
the nightshades, so that would be like Datura, Brugmansia.
01:12:20
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
01:12:23
Martin
um Just in general, these are potentially toxic. They are potentially deadly. um But they're not very popular in the psychedelic world. But since you asked, like I would just stay away from those in general.
01:12:33
Christian Yordanov
yeah
01:12:35
Martin
Sometimes those are combined in ayahuasca. um But those are or potentially neurotoxic. People can die. People can overdose if they take too much of those. But other than that,
01:12:47
Martin
um Really what I do recommend is just make sure that in in going to additional psychedelic experiences after 5-MeO, as I already stated, be prepared that it might be significantly more powerful than what you were expecting. It might be more like 5-MeO than what you're used to from that psychedelic. And it is important to pace yourself and that there's I just want to remind everyone, there's no rush into becoming fully yourself because you're already yourself.
01:13:19
Martin
You don't need to rush it.
01:13:19
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:13:20
Martin
You can take your time and simply pounding the ego more is not necessarily going to help. And that within that, different people have different paces that they go through.
01:13:33
Martin
For some, um like especially when it comes to 5-MeO, I like to recommend people just just wait. That one day you're going to wake up and it might be might be two years from having taken 5-MeO and you will feel you have this overwhelming sense of, you know, I think it's time to do it again.
01:13:52
Martin
Or now I'm ready for the next medicine. Now, that might be a few days later. It might be a few weeks. But again, it might be months. It might be years. And that you don't need to rush through any of this. And simply taking more medicine or taking more psychedelics is not necessarily going to progress you on your path if you're not taking the time to really be with yourself, to integrate, and to consciously transform. So here I do like to say, like this is pretty crude, but Through the ego, through our resistance, through our attachments, our projections, the ways that we suppress and repress energies within ourselves, we're kind of like a toilet that's been clogged and won't flush.
01:14:37
Martin
Because it's just things aren't working. i'm I'm trapped in my depression. I'm trapped in my anxiety. I'm trapped in my continually recreating dysfunctional relationships or whatever it may be. So your system, it's clogged.
01:14:48
Martin
If we take 5-MeO, it will unclog the toilet. All the pipes will be open and all the energy will be moving through. So it's very good at bringing about a dramatic initial change.
01:15:04
Martin
But If we're not then, say, using the toilet metaphor, if we're not attending to our diet or our bathroom habits or our exercise, if we're not attending to these other features, there's a good chance that our toilet is just going to get clogged up again. And we've got to go take the the cosmic plunger and plunge, plunge, plunge.
01:15:23
Martin
But if we don't want the toilet to clog up, Again, that's where we need to take conscious attention and really look at where am i choosing to change myself so that I'm not getting clogged up. so And I like to describe this as a process of really becoming more authentic with yourself. So through the ego, let's say through the ego, I decide that it's not good for me to express these emotions. So then I just repress them and I shove them down.
01:15:56
Martin
And then something small happens and it triggers me. And then all of those emotions come flooding out. And that's, you know, I explode at someone. And then I realize like, wow, that was really disproportionate.
01:16:07
Martin
Like that person did not have that coming, but I really laid into them. And that's because I wasn't authentic with the energy of my emotion when it first arose. I suppressed it. I pushed it down. I tried to transmute it.
01:16:21
Martin
So if we pay attention to how can I get clean and clear with my energy, in terms of my thoughts, my emotions, my behaviors, my actions, my words, my gestures, my choices, the more we get into alignment with that, then the cleaner and clearer our system is going to be. We're not going to be obsessing over thoughts. We're not going to be suppressing emotions. We're just going to be present with what is. And the more we do that, then the more we're in alignment with our true energetic authenticity. And then the less likely we are to have a whole backlog of shit that needs to be addressed.
01:16:54
Martin
But that's how we've all been programmed through our societies and our parents and our our our experiences that you've got to keep that shit to yourself. You can't be like that. You've got to be what people want you to be. You've got to perform. You've got to you know be a man, be a woman, be whatever. right we we We put all these expectations on people. So society...
01:17:18
Martin
trains us to not really be ah our authentic selves. But the more we practice being our authentic selves, the less likely we are to need a massive energetic purge and clearing through doing psychedelic work.
01:17:32
Martin
So that' that's, again...
01:17:32
Christian Yordanov
what if your're What if your authentic self is like a real cunt though?
01:17:38
Martin
Okay.
01:17:40
Christian Yordanov
I'm messing bro.
01:17:44
Martin
this you know mean that This is a good question, right? Because this is something that can really confuse people. um Here, I think a good thing to do is to look at small children.
01:17:58
Martin
They're not assholes. Small children have a natural sense of sharing, a natural sense of empathy, a natural sense of connection with others. In other words, people learn to be assholes. People learn to be a cunt. People learn to be sociopathic. they Those are egoic responses that they learn over time. But that's where...
01:18:30
Martin
I think if people really get in touch with their authentic selves and their authentic energy, they'll find that those motivations are no longer present. And so, i mean
01:18:41
Christian Yordanov
You really handled that. It was a joke, obviously, but you really actually handled that question very well.
01:18:49
Martin
yeah, well, it it it is a serious question because, this This is important for people to get. that So the authentic self is grounded in the recognition.
01:19:01
Martin
i am you. You are me. There is no real separation. This is all one being interacting and experiencing itself. How I treat myself at the interior level is reflected on how I treat people at the exterior level. How I treat people at the exterior level is reflected on how I treat myself at the interior level because it's really all the same thing. So if I'm going around being an asshole to other people, that means I'm also being an asshole to myself.
01:19:30
Martin
And when we start to nurture ourself with that energy of unconditional love, we learn That's pathological.
01:19:41
Martin
That is not healthy. It's not healthy for other people. It's not healthy for me. And if I love myself. I'm not going to be that way. And this is where, mean, you asked earlier, we haven't really talked about it, how the ego co-ops us.
01:19:57
Martin
And this is one of the ways that sometimes people go through this experience and they say, oh, well, my authentic self is, I am just a jerk.
01:19:59
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
01:20:04
Martin
So I'm just going to lean into that. It's like, no, that's that's the egoic character that you've constructed that you're attached to. That's not the real you.
01:20:15
Martin
That's not really authentic. It feels authentic. You think it's the real you, but you're attached to a particular character that you've created. It's not the real thing. So this is where the more we get in touch with our authentic energy, I think it does bring about natural compassion.
01:20:35
Martin
And also... It helps us establish um our own sense of boundaries, our own sense of self-responsibility, our own sense of sovereignty, our own sense of autonomy and agency, and increases our sense of responsibility that, yeah, I am free to act however I want.
01:20:57
Martin
But so is everybody else. There are consequences. If I'm a jerk to someone, there's consequences for that. And there's also, that impacts me as well. It's not just about what I'm doing to other people, because it's always an expression of what I'm doing to myself at the interior level.
01:21:13
Martin
So if, as I reorient around this relationship to myself, I will naturally reorient or in my relationship around others. And that it brings us into more harmonious existence. And that the more agency I allow myself to be myself, the more I'm going to grant that to others as well.
01:21:35
Martin
So it just, it builds on itself. But, you know, there there are people who psychologically understand Yeah, they are sociopaths.
01:21:47
Martin
They are psychopaths. I don't know if that's really fully learned behavior, that that could just that could be an innate mental structure.
01:21:49
Christian Yordanov
Narcissist, yeah.
01:21:53
Christian Yordanov
Mm.
01:21:57
Martin
But I think that's also an open question.
01:21:57
Christian Yordanov
Mm.
01:21:59
Martin
Like, could someone who has been identified as a sociopath, could they actually move into a more compassionate state of being? Could they transform that? I think it's is potentially possible.
01:22:08
Christian Yordanov
Mm.
01:22:10
Martin
um But I think at at core, People who are jerks, they're that way because they've been wounded and they're acting out.
01:22:18
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
01:22:19
Martin
And that as that gets healed, they're not going to be jerks anymore.
01:22:19
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, yeah.
Personal Psychedelic Journeys and Emotional Release
01:22:22
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think, yeah, maybe the thinking that one session could do it maybe is not enough because there's so many layers to, like you said, this ego is layers and layers, sort of energy, like and ah like a massive ball of yarn that has been developing since you know you're four years old, well into your adulthood ah and beyond.
01:22:31
Martin
Right.
01:22:44
Christian Yordanov
So it it can take... multiple sessions potentially but what i noticed for me personally from my last session now that's the so just a quick background so the first time i did it was a year ago with the same guys in mexico and i was dude i was so scared that i what my friend uh charlie was going before me it was his second time so he was like let's go it's gonna be awesome and uh dude as uh bareheart our facilitator shaman
01:23:03
Martin
Yeah.
01:23:16
Christian Yordanov
I was kind of talking to through the whole thing and what to do and splay out like you know the symmetrical you know the starfish and just allow and all that stuff dude I was crying already I was so scared I was crying like and I couldn't control it um and then this year when we went I was there with one of my clients um who's now a you know brother for life so I sat with him during the week and as he was about to do his session I was just a sitter there you know a witness again I started crying dude I just And again, this anxiety and sort of fear. So I had cried myself out by the, so that was Tuesday, by the Friday, when we sat down with my other bro, Johnny, to do it. He went first. So i couple of tears, but but I think by then I had processed a lot of the fear because both of them had very sort of relaxed, easy sort of, let's say, experiences.
01:24:07
Christian Yordanov
So I did two two rounds. of the medicine dude and the first sort of minute I suppose it was just this bliss and then i started laughing i was like you know like wow and then it just went into crying 10 minutes of crying and then I was like again then bliss so bare heart was like do you want to go again i was like yes I do just a little bit though so again it was just more crying but dude there was basically two 10-minute sessions of crying and just energy getting out of the body i'll tell you if that's all I got from that 30-minute or 45-minute session that we that yeah I was a part of if that's all I got that like I told you before that was more healing than all of my other psychedelic work over the last you know seven eight years however
01:24:24
Martin
Yeah. Yeah.
01:24:56
Christian Yordanov
the The beautiful part is that it continued, especially when I discovered your work and started integrating it more and thinking about the kind of how can I integrate it more into life? But what I noticed immediately after the next days and and weeks is the way other people would sort of... the ah the entire There was a very subtle change in the interactions between people. I felt like because I didn't have so much of this... You know how you can sense other people if they have like negative energy or if if they're like in a bad mood, you can sense these things. So to me, it seems like...
01:25:30
Christian Yordanov
getting that out of the body releasing that and having this lightness now when you approach other people that we don't treat those energetic blocks probably don't trigger each other as much so i've noticed people i've not had like um i've not dealt with like rude people with like customs and the airports and shops and and like the couriers it seems like when i'm looking at people now we we make more eye contact and there's this like just kind of bond human to human
01:25:43
Martin
Yeah.
01:26:00
Christian Yordanov
that I feel like has increased since getting all of this kind of pent up because I had a lot of stuff. Dude, if I'm crying for 20 minutes, you better believe I've been suppressing a lot of stuff as an adult man like you're supposed to.
01:26:15
Christian Yordanov
So it's pretty amazing, this work. I have to say it's absolutely life-changing, but it can probably take more work to fully dissolve all of this stuff that's kind of congesting you, I would say.
01:26:28
Martin
Yeah. Yeah. That's a really beautiful share, Christian. Thank you for sharing all of that. And it really ties in with exactly what I'm sharing here. So what you're describing is very common for a lot of people where it's often the case that if you've done it once, you're going to be more scared when you go back in the next time, because now you really know, like, this is so far beyond anything that I can really control or manage.
01:26:49
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:26:54
Martin
Like, that This is huge. So it's typical for people to have a bit more anxiety when they go back to it. But then exactly what you're describing here with crying, like even you're in the presence of somebody else. And so you're starting to feel that and you're starting again, these are just energies and you're allowing that to move through. And this is something that's really common for a lot of men where men have been conditioned that you can be angry.
01:27:21
Martin
But you really shouldn't be expressing any other emotions. And certainly it's not manly to cry or to be seen as weak. And so there a lot of men suppress a lot of those emotions and it's difficult for them to tap into them. So here's where if your ego had the better of you,
01:27:40
Martin
It would get in there it like Christian, don't cry. Come on, man up. Like you're looking weak in front of these other people, but you're allowing that. That's what I mean about allowing the authentic energies to arise and not get in the way when they're there.
01:27:53
Martin
And a lot of people cry through their 5-MEO experience. And it's interesting because a lot of people who do that will often say, I don't know what I was crying about.
01:28:05
Martin
I can't identify what was the source of it. And that's where I like to say it really doesn't matter because your system was clogged.
01:28:11
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
01:28:13
Martin
This is the process of those that backlog of energy, wherever it came from, is coming up and out. And it's now moving out. But once we've cleared all of that, and yes, it often takes multiple sessions. This is not a one-off experience. This is why I like to emphasize this idea of this is ongoing non-dual energetic therapy. Your ego is encountering the unitary nature of the self and is energetically reorganizing around that reality.
01:28:42
Martin
And it's therapy, not necessarily in the sense that there's a therapist directing it, but in the sense that this is an ongoing process. It's not just about the immediate medicine experience. It's about what I choose afterwards. But once we've cleared ah all of that out, then we become more acutely aware as we start to put it back, like,
01:29:01
Martin
That's when we can say, oh, there's the pattern of me suppressing my emotions. There's me getting mad at someone disproportionately. There's me feeling sorry for myself for creating the story of a victim for myself.
01:29:15
Martin
So that then we have more agency around saying, you know what? i'm not going to do that i'm going to choose something differently and usually that is i'm going to be more energetically authentic with whatever is arising in the moment so if i'm angry in this moment i will feel my anger if i'm sad i will feel my sadness if i'm happy i will feel it but i'm not going to project it or attach to it or try and suppress it i'm going to be present with it in the moment and then move on and then be present with the next moment and be present with the next moment after that and that's a ah learning process because we really do have to recondition ourselves from all of those expectations and conditions that were put on us throughout our lives and particularly when we were kids and then we adopt those and we internalize them and then we become our own
01:30:07
Martin
prisoner and our own prison guard and we
Family and Spiritual Beliefs
01:30:10
Martin
are the jail. We're all of these things. So as we learn our authenticity, we go through big emotional events.
01:30:13
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:30:17
Martin
We go through confusing mental stuff that's happening. But if we keep working at it, keep paying attention and keep coming back to what ah what am I authentically experiencing in this moment, we bring ourselves into more and more alignment with our authentic self.
01:30:31
Martin
And then it just becomes second nature. It's just like yeah, this is me.
01:30:34
Christian Yordanov
yeah
01:30:35
Martin
This is the authentic me. And it's not a performance. It's...
01:30:38
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, yeah man. So i hope ah I'm really curious, let me just give you the the context of the next question. So my daughter is four and just a few days ago we were you know just in the kitchen and my my wife, you know we were just chatting about something.
01:30:46
Martin
Mm-hmm.
01:30:58
Christian Yordanov
And my daughter, we're talking with my wife, my daughter just interrupts us and she says, yeah, but her father, that her dad is dead, like about my mother, you know, because her father passed away three years ago.
01:31:13
Christian Yordanov
So it's like, yeah, but it's just like, you know, four-year-old kid, like, yeah, her dad is dead. Like, yeah, we know, we know he's dead. And we just kind of, my wife is like explaining, you know it's not good to bring that up to someone because if it's another kid and their parent has died, then they might feel bad.
01:31:31
Christian Yordanov
But like over the last, you know, when kids start um learning about death and asking questions over the last, even before I did my my ah boofo a second Bufo journey three weeks ago, I'm trying to, tell her yeah well because we are all in god and and god is everything we don't we we like the body might die but we don't actually die we are eternal in consciousness if she's a little bit She's a little bit too young to understand some of it, but she definitely like when I, because when she asked me questions that are too impossible to explain to a four year old or or in general, I say, well, because God made it that way.
01:32:04
Martin
Yeah.
01:32:08
Christian Yordanov
And, you know, because that's what God did. So she's kind of interested in God. So but that was the context because I am kind of thinking how can i explain some of these things to her without creating an aversion to thinking about death and things like all these stigmas that are really unhealthy. So I'm just curious, how do you talk to your son about the fact that he's God, everything is God and the whole death thing? How how do you approach that with you know your family?
01:32:39
Christian Yordanov
you know family
01:32:40
Martin
Yeah. So ultimately i let him lead that, that um you know Just the same as myself, that my son, so my my youngest son, he's about to turn 13. I have two older kids. um My daughter, Miranda, she just turned 24. My son, Ethan, is about to turn 19. And they were really raised by their mother because I left when they were pretty young.
01:33:09
Martin
And with my current wife, Jesselyn, we have our son, Jaden, who's about to be 13. But anyway, you know, he's been exposed to religion and Christianity and he you know he knows that i'm not religious his mom's not religious and he is um very much oriented as sort of a ah naturalist right he really loves birds snakes fish he's really into nature and so when when people talk about god or religious ideas that for him it's like you're talking about nonsense like i don't i have no reference for any of that
01:33:48
Martin
um And so he has stated a few times, like you know God's not real, like that's just a myth. And it's interesting because you know a deep part of me also fully agrees with that. like Again, I'm not religious. I don't think that there's any religion.
01:34:03
Martin
like Sometimes people ask me, like well, if you would say which religion do you think is best, it's like, well, definitely none of them, like none. like i that I am not interested in religion. And so when when he says, yeah, this is this is all just like mythological thinking, it's like, yeah, I'm right there with you. said, but
01:34:24
Martin
there's there's still God, the reality of what our experience is and what we are, but it's something that I don't press with him. You know, that sometimes, you know, both both my wife and I sometimes we will make comments and it wass like, mm, It's fine. He can have his own disagreements. that um
01:34:46
Martin
if there is a point where he says, Hey dad, I'm interested in more. I mean, he, he looks at my book titles, you know, that there was one point where he's like, he's looking at the books and like, what is this five thing that's on, on your book titles? Like, what is that? And like, what is, why is your book about God? Like, it's like, but dad, you're not religious. It's like, okay, right. But even at 13, he's not really ready to understand it yet.
01:35:13
Martin
And, I have no urgency for him to understand. And so like in this case with your daughter, <unk>s like, I think it's it's great for you guys to respond um and that she's not really gonna understand. But even even understanding is an illusion because this is where, again, id like to go back to my first experience of 5MEO. I was a philosophical non-dualist. I was a philosophical Buddhist. I had an intellectual understanding that I thought was correct.
01:35:42
Martin
The experience was, oh, all of my ideas were just ideas. That's all that they were. Now, how do I reform my my ideas based on this experience that I've had? And I think that's one of the reasons that I love 5-MeO DMT so much is that it provides the opportunity for anyone who has the genuine curiosity.
01:36:06
Martin
It gives them the opportunity to explore this directly. And it's not based on, well, what did I read? What did i think? What influencer did I listen to What talk did I go to? What workshop did I attend? It's this direct and immediate entry into the deepest nature of reality. And then we all get to decide for ourselves. So I personally, I have no attachment. i mean, I would definitely be concerned if any of my kids said, hey, yeah, i joined this religion. Then I'd put on like my PhD hat and I was like, well, let's talk about it. um And that both my older kids, yeah, go ahead.
01:36:37
Christian Yordanov
Well, I... Oh, sorry, go ahead.
01:36:39
Martin
No, go ahead.
01:36:39
Christian Yordanov
it was more To me, it's more the the whole idea of death as as you as you're just kind of forming your ego, then you suddenly realize that that ego, that sense of self will die.
01:36:46
Martin
yeah
01:36:56
Christian Yordanov
So I think that is what the thing is. ah it's ah It's a little bit of a touchy subject because you don't want to you don't want to introduce... stupid shit like don't worry you're gonna go to heaven unless you've been bad then you go to hell the shit like that you don't wanna introduce that into a kid's mind but at the same time so i want to allay fears like yeah check it out though yeah yeah we the human form disappears and merges back in the earth but the consciousness that we are truly that is eternal and that never dies so like I'm just curious did did your son ever when maybe it's obviously it's been a while since you know kids have these questions but did you ever like think if he's asking about death and stuff did you ever think of interweaving that or you said you know what it's not time to discuss these things?
01:37:44
Martin
You know, I don't think my son has ever really asked me about that. um Mainly, okay, so this is this is family information here. Mainly our conversations around these kinds of topics tend to revolve a lot around um my wife's mother, who is really deeply indoctrinated in New Age views. And so where these kinds of conversations come up, so Her mom you know thinks that the she's in spirit communication with the dolphins and when the dolphins come that they bring her messages and that she also believes that her dead dog came back to her as um a brown booby on a boat in Maui. And this is the kind of stuff where, again, like my son is like really oriented around nature and naturalist ah perspective. And for so for him, a dolphin is a dolphin.
01:38:42
Martin
Like they're not in spirit communication with you. And like dead spirits don't come back in the form of a bird to bring you a special message. And and she tries to share this stuff with my son.
01:38:53
Martin
And he's just like, he doesn't know how to respond.
01:38:56
Christian Yordanov
Not having it.
01:38:56
Martin
So we have a lot of conversations around that about beliefs and identities and meaning making. And so that's kind of where the conversation goes with him is um,
01:39:08
Christian Yordanov
Gotcha.
01:39:09
Martin
You know, like we we joke a lot because we go out birding together all the time. And, you know, I've shared with him the joke about how, you know, if we see an eagle and I i published the photograph, sometimes people ask me, you like I posted on Facebook, it was like, oh, what message did the eagle bring you? Or like, what's what's the shamanic meaning of that? And my response is, the meaning is that I was at the right place at the right time with my camera to get this picture.
01:39:35
Martin
And that's where my son is like, yeah, that's what it is. So he's very tuned into what is happening as a phenomenon without, he's he's really acutely attuned to where do we add layers of meaning, layers of projection, and how does that feed into our desire of what we want to be true?
Modern Mythologies and Spiritual Growth
01:39:58
Martin
Um,
01:39:59
Christian Yordanov
Wait, wait, wait, wait. So are you telling me i am things are not going to be okay because I saw 2-2-2 on my oven clock today?
01:40:11
Martin
No.
01:40:12
Christian Yordanov
No?
01:40:13
Martin
that Yeah.
01:40:13
Christian Yordanov
Shit. I got to tell the wife.
01:40:15
Martin
Yeah. Yeah. That's another one that Angel, like literally we've had this conversation because Okay, so I live in Ashland, Oregon. There's a lot of new age spirituality around here. And so one time my son asked me, I was like, why are people so obsessed with repeating numbers like that? Like the 111 and 222 and 333.
01:40:35
Martin
And I gave him a really easy explanation. and said, oh, Jaden, that's because we now live in the digital age that back when I was a kid, we had clocks that had, you know, they were analog clocks and the arms went around. And so we didn't see these digits.
01:40:51
Martin
But now that we all have digital clocks everywhere, and that now that this belief has been entered into the culture that if you see these numbers, it means something special, we unconsciously look at clocks when they line up that way and then think that there's something special about it. um So we've we've literally had that conversation. it's like And for him, he's like, oh, that totally makes sense. And then I show him an old analog clock, and he's like, whoa, those are weird. But he gets it. He's like, okay, so this is just part of...
01:41:22
Martin
these sort of mythical themes that kind of permeate through culture and that people make meaning out of it.
01:41:25
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:41:29
Martin
So we we definitely have a lot of conversations like that about where are we going beyond the immediate into meaning making storytelling and that really helping him identify and do you see how this actually contributes to someone's ego, their own sense of self and specialness and purpose?
01:41:30
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, yeah.
01:41:46
Martin
And he's like, yeah, I get that. And he he tries very hard not to do that. And you know someday he probably will ask the the big questions about life and death, but we haven't really gotten there yet.
01:41:52
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, and I have... Yeah. yeah And then youll you'll you take out the Jaguar pipe and like, son, are you sure you're ready?
01:42:01
Martin
Yeah.
01:42:01
Christian Yordanov
yeah No. Okay. Damn. with Okay, yeah. So i just to kind of share, I definitely... Man, I've seen this back in 2020. I started, you know, microdosing some stuff and just... Then we went to a huachuma ceremony with my wife, with like a ah dude from Peru. It was beautiful, dude. He had this really awesome eagle feather. And, you know, we had the crystal on the altar. And then, man, it was actually like a really beautiful ceremony, you know. But like that dude grew up in that. And that's kind of part of his culture. So what what does a regular...
01:42:38
Christian Yordanov
Westerner do when he comes home, do do do ah where to buy crystals ah on DuckDuckGo. So there I am buying crystals and then you know buying this other stuff. And there was a great video.
01:42:51
Christian Yordanov
ah Do you know what the JP Sears? He's like a comedian, dude.
01:42:54
Martin
Yeah, yeah.
01:42:54
Christian Yordanov
yeah so he I don't know if you've seen the video, it's so good, but how spiritual people make money. And then they're like, one of them was like, so what do you do? Well, I hold space. And then there was it cuts to another scene where he's like, I think I'm going to be an ayahuasca shaman.
01:43:03
Martin
Yeah. ah
01:43:07
Christian Yordanov
So I'm like, I can see so many of us, like you were exposed to this culture of, let's say, could be ayahuasca, could be peyote, whatever, like vision quest. with Chuma. It's amazing. It's interesting. It's beautiful.
01:43:18
Christian Yordanov
It's mystical. And then you go off and you're like, I think I'm going to do this. I think I feel a calling to do this and bring this to the Western people. And ah like in hindsight, and I've done a lot of stupid things over the years.
01:43:31
Christian Yordanov
So not that that's like the worst thing I've done of in terms of like dumb dumb ah stuff, but I'm like, man, in hindsight, like, That is just yet another way the ego, you go have a beautiful experience, then the ego now must create a narrative, a story, and then weave that into your identity. And I think with Five, five especially the way you kind of, again, I'm so glad...
01:43:54
Christian Yordanov
I cannot you know speak um highly enough of your work. And you know ah with my guys that we did the Bufo in Mexico, I was basically spamming our Telegram chat with all of your books that i that i as I was getting them you know a day or two later. Because that really helped me...
01:44:16
Christian Yordanov
avoid that this time, where I think if we actually approach any medicine work, obviously 5MEO being so powerful is is amazing, but any medicine work, if we just approach it in order to basically just kind of ah release the energy of course very important but then like as we're kind of reintegrating just to make sure that we we work with the ego like you would with um like I suppose like a wild horse as you're trying to kind of calm it down and kind so you don't let the wild horse trample all over you and you don't try to muscle the like you can't overpower a horse you have to be sort of work with it be fluid with it and just kind of
01:44:49
Martin
Yeah.
01:45:01
Christian Yordanov
partner with it through this experience of life that God has given us and another thing I love that you said in one of your books I don't or maybe on one of your podcasts is like God in this infinite beauty and and and and intelligence created this amazing world for us and then he put us here and he's kind of like you know creating this amazing theater and this amazing show and then we when we a lot of us when we get sort of feel the calling to do some inner work with the medicines we are just trying to escape it we're trying to kill the ego we're trying to get out of um um you know the the cycle of samsara and into nirvana so instead God is like bro I created this amazing thing for you to play here and you're trying to get the fuck out what is like we're fighting the very reality that we are in so it's amazing that you kind of bring that up especially when a person is a little bit more open to
01:45:36
Martin
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
01:45:56
Christian Yordanov
To kind of the ego kind of pulling, I'm going to be an ayahuasca shop. I'm going to be a Bufo facilitator. And it's actually, no, you just have to be who you are and do what you should do instead of trying to just now create a new identity out of ah an experience or two you've had.
01:46:11
Martin
Yeah. Just to jump on that last point that you made that I think that that's really important, that we see a lot of that in the psychedelic world, the new age world, the health influencer world, the the workshop world, where people think that by reformatting their identity and taking on like, oh, now I'm wearing feathers. Now I'm using crystal.
01:46:34
Martin
Now I'm eating vegan food. Now I'm practicing yoga. Where really people are shopping around for what's the new identity that I can create for myself. So rather than bringing themselves into alignment with their authentic nature, as we've been discussing here, they're really just swapping out one ego construct for another. and usually this is happening now at a very conscious level right where again as we've been talking about most of the ego forms when we're young children we're not really conscious of that but as adults people think that oh if i just change the way i look and change the way i identify and create a new identity for myself now i am more spiritual i'm more liberated i'm more enlightened And really all they've done is they've swapped one set of illusions and attachments out for another that they've identified as being better or more spiritual. And this is where it it definitely is problematic.
01:47:31
Martin
for non-Indigenous people, for example, to start just adopting Indigenous attire or style. Because when you're raised in it, it's just the way things are, and it's not really feeding people's ego identity in the same way versus if you're an outsider, it's, oh, this is the exotic other. And so I'm going to become more like the exotic other so that I can make this new version of myself that then I can sell on Instagram that's going to get me more clients and make me feel good about myself because now I'm fulfilling my purpose. And this is what is going to help me ascend or whatever. So it's it's way more problematic than if you were just raised in it.
01:48:12
Martin
um because it it feeds that need for meaning, for identity, for value. and this is where, as we've been discussing, that I like to view this model of let's strip away the bullshit.
01:48:27
Martin
Let's not just swap out one set of bullshit for another.
01:48:28
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:48:31
Martin
Let's strip it all away so that you're more of this raw human being. and discover your authenticity from the inside out.
01:48:37
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:48:40
Martin
and It's not about what you're adopting from anywhere else. And it's definitely a huge, huge issue in psychedelic culture in general.
01:48:51
Martin
um It's such a fundamental part.
01:48:52
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:48:54
Martin
And going back to what you said, even in psychedelic culture, where we're having these deeply embodied experiences through these psychedelics, that there's still that sense of, oh, I want to ascend. I want to transcend. I want to go to the next level. I want my next incarnation to be this, or you know I'm going to activate my DNA so I can vibrate at a higher level and then I can interact with the angels and the spheres. And yeah it's just That's all just the ego feeding the ego, creating meaning, creating purpose.
01:49:27
Martin
And it's a distraction from just being present here. And going back to what you had mentioned in my own books where I do say, look, reality, this physical reality we're living in, That's where the party's happening.
01:49:32
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Yeah.
01:49:40
Martin
This is where God has invested itself for billions of years to evolve into these forms that can be here. And then the ego's like, how do I get out? How do I get to the next level? Like we think it's like a video game and we want to i want to level up to the next level of the game versus how do I learn to really be here so that more of that infinite, compassionate, loving God energy actually can come through me here in reality?
01:49:50
Christian Yordanov
yeah
01:50:07
Martin
not in some transcendent realm, but with my kids, with my family, with my neighbors, with my dog, with the birds that live in the yard with me. right It's really it's about being here.
01:50:21
Martin
And going back to the point of death, I also like to say that It's death ultimately that brings meaning to our existence.
Death, Meaning, and 5-MeO-DMT as Preparation
01:50:30
Martin
that So the ego thinks if I do this, do that, do that, do that, that will bring meaning.
01:50:36
Martin
And if I achieve these levels, that will bring meaning. Or if I get enough money, that will bring meaning. Or if I write enough books, that will bring meaning. Or if I sleep with enough people, that will bring meaning and value.
01:50:48
Martin
No, the only thing that actually brings meaning and value is death because even though the being that we are is infinite and eternal and immortal, our experience of being this human being is temporary.
01:51:04
Martin
And that knowing that this embodied human experience is coming to an end, That makes every experience I have valuable, whether it's good or bad, whether it seems negative or positive.
01:51:19
Martin
It's still only temporary. And so knowing that this experience, this embodied human experience is going to come to an end, that gives meaning to all the experiences of my life.
01:51:31
Martin
and makes it a valuable gift that I have this little window. i may be God, I may be infinite and immortal, but there's only this little window that I will experience myself as Martin, or you will experience yourself as Christian.
01:51:42
Christian Yordanov
Mm-hmm.
01:51:44
Martin
And what you do with that time is what gives you meaning.
01:51:50
Christian Yordanov
That's so beautiful, bro. And actually that segues to my next question. And unfortunately, i it's probably too late to crowbar in a joke how I just canceled the Amazon order with the eagle feathers as you were talking.
01:52:03
Christian Yordanov
But hey, I just crowbarred it.
01:52:03
Martin
Yeah.
01:52:05
Christian Yordanov
But like I have to say, i will not be getting rid of my crystal collection, nor my shaman drum, not that nor that shapaka that I ordered or all the other ah To me now, actually,
01:52:16
Christian Yordanov
i'm I'm so fascinated by this sort of the whole ethnobotany and I'm so fascinated by all these cultures that i to me it's actually a study the way I kind of ah listen to your books and I'm absolutely going to be buying them for my physical book collection that's always growing. but and like I have you know um ah mycelium running and all the, the what's the name, Stamets' says books.
01:52:42
Christian Yordanov
So to me, it's like studying these cultures and and it feels like that we have a lot to learn. like I love the the the sort of the whole Iboga Bwiti tradition stuff.
01:52:42
Martin
Yeah.
01:52:52
Christian Yordanov
I love their music. So me I'm actually studying it now, but I'm not i'm no longer um like, oh, you know one day I'm going to become a facilitator and I'm going open a center. and like All that bullshit narrative,
01:53:04
Christian Yordanov
That's gone. For me now, it's it's just a great... Because at the same time, and and this is a joke I used to do with my sister because she's like, you have a lot of crap, you buy a lot of stuff, very materialistic.
01:53:12
Martin
Yeah.
01:53:14
Christian Yordanov
I'm like, yo, I'm in the material world. God put me in the material to experience it. so I kind of ah and know it's a joke, obviously. because she's more of a minimalist and doesn't want to you know pollute and whatever and recycle. But like, no, this is, it's it's okay to, I think it's okay to study this and just appreciate. It's like the way, like um I used to love bird watching as well as a kid. i had these massive binoculars. I couldn't even hold them up. They were so big. got my parents to buy. So it's like studying nature, but this is kind of studying nature, but humans are a part of nature, especially more indigenous. So to me, it's a beautiful thing of learning, but I'm no longer,
01:53:50
Christian Yordanov
you know I think because I found my way of what I want to do in terms of like how I want to help people. It's more like with their physical health and nutrition and and stuff like that. so I'm kind of just, ah it feels like all these narratives died away. And again, i have to credit just the very sober um material that you interweave through through your books. it's not It's not just that, but it just kind of really helps to, you you talk about this big powerful experience or someone that had like ah actually your... um
01:54:21
Christian Yordanov
your experiences with Salvia were fascinating to listen to because I've done that a couple of times it was just what the actual F is going on here.
01:54:27
Martin
Yeah, yeah.
01:54:28
Christian Yordanov
So it was so interesting to to hear. But like, then you you kind of, you you wrap up this sort of ah experience section and then you're like, here's some, cold, sober truths, how to actually take this practically and not again ah create these dumb narratives that so many of us do.
01:54:42
Martin
Yeah.
01:54:46
Christian Yordanov
And not that's not to say there's not that there's not plenty of people that are you know doing amazing work as healers and shamans, I love all that. um But because just to kind of get to the the the whole question of death and you know death giving life meaning here, I was actually going to ask you next as we were wrap today, um i just couple more questions. But that this question is, do you think when we so begin the process of dying, do you think it's a similar process as the 5-MeO experience? Just curious.
01:55:22
Martin
Yeah. And I'd really emphasize what you just said there, that it's a process, that dying is a process that sometimes people ask, do you think that 5-MeO is what life after death is? And that's where I say, well, there isn't really life after death. I mean, there's just, there's life. And then we have the process of dying. And that's where I think if we can enter into the dying process,
01:55:46
Martin
willingly in the sense that we're not like clinging onto like, no, I don't want to die. right but we can say, okay, I'm dying. I accept this. And we use that to expand and release and let go. That that was certainly one of my first impressions of 5MEO. That from that very first experience, I concluded that, oh, I think this is what it's going to be like when I'm dying.
01:56:10
Martin
As I am dying. passing away and my individual identity is dissolving. And so in a sense, I'm kind of looking forward to that because then there's no coming back from that in the sense that that's the end of the the personality known as Martin.
01:56:24
Martin
That's the end of the ego um that I've identified with.
01:56:25
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
01:56:28
Martin
And that that's something that actually I can look forward to because there is a release there. There's that sense of, ah, I can let go of everything.
01:56:39
Martin
And now for people who are fighting with their own death, who are afraid of it, who don't want to let go, i think that's also where we can see in people's 5-MEO experiences, which they would later describe as traumatic,
01:56:52
Martin
that's what's going on there is that parts of the ego saying, no, no, don't don't make me dissolve. I don't want to go. Because this is something I always like to emphasize with 5-MeO. It doesn't matter how many times I've done it.
01:57:06
Martin
If I take a strong dose as it is coming on and as as as it is happening, every single time I have to tell myself, this is it.
01:57:18
Martin
I'm never coming back. I will never see my wife again. i will never see my children again. i will never see my dog again. i will never take another photograph. Like this is it. I'm never coming back because it presents that way.
01:57:31
Martin
And then later the ego comes back and you're like, oh oh, bonus time. I still get to experience being me.
01:57:35
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. ah
01:57:37
Martin
This is so sweet. I didn't think that. But see, that's the thing is that it's so overwhelming that no amount of intellectual understanding that I know I'm going to come back.
01:57:47
Martin
I know I'm not actually dying. But in the moment, it sure seems like it. So this is where I do think that 5-MeO is the ultimate practice for dying. If you can learn how to trust, relax, surrender, and let go in 5-MeO, I think you are priming yourself to having a more ecstatic death and the one that you will not fight against and resist. And you know there is room for fighting against death in the sense that if if you If you muster enough energy in that moment, you might come back.
01:58:22
Martin
And then it's a near-death experience. And then you might have a lot more life left. But, you know, if you're 90 years old, body doesn't work anymore, i mean, that's what I'm hoping for myself. I hope I make it that far.
01:58:36
Martin
And I hope that I am aware enough that I can say, hey, you know what? It's been a good life. I love my life. I love my family. I love my kids.
01:58:48
Martin
But I don't need to hold on. And their lives are going to be their own. And so I'm allowing myself to dissolve in this experience. And I'm allowing it to be ecstatic and blissful.
01:58:58
Martin
So that's what I hope for for myself. That's what I hope for for other people. And in between now and then, yeah if i if I face the moment of death, I probably will fight with it unless I'm able to decide like, look, there's no point in fighting.
01:59:11
Martin
Like you're done for. Then at that point, I hope that I will just release and let go into it. And then, i yes, I do expect it to be perhaps even identical to a 5MEO experience.
01:59:22
Christian Yordanov
Wow. That's good news, folks. Just letting you know.
01:59:26
Martin
Yeah. Yeah.
01:59:28
Christian Yordanov
It's gonna be awesome. But you know, it's it's kind of crazy and I don't mean this like you know at all, at all in a disrespectful way, but um five five years ago my my grandma was basically dying and um my mother was like struggling with her and just... She was then in hospital and it just, it was like this... I could see her, they were in this COVID time, so they were in Ireland, we were here and...
01:59:54
Christian Yordanov
I was just like, and I i meant it, from man, i I swear to God, I meant it from the heart because I just told her, um my mother's like, you tell her some words of encouragement and um and and comfort her. And I'm like, i so I said, ah grandma, you're going to die and it's going to be awesome.
02:00:13
Martin
Yeah. Yeah.
02:00:13
Christian Yordanov
And I meant it, man, because I, like, I knew enough, even though I hadn't had the full sort of final MEO experience, I, from, so like, psychedelics work, and, um, I, I, yeah I, knew i knew that you know we are eternal consciousness because i also like i was into buddhism and i've been kind of like so a little bit studying the stuff for for the you know since my late teens so i was like it's gonna like it's gonna be it's gonna be awesome and now after doing bufo a couple of times man genuinely think the only suffering
02:00:53
Christian Yordanov
there other than of course like an actual painful suffering death the only suffering is ego created it's the fear the anxiety and then what will my ex so and so so do when I'm gone or what will my children do without me and that's 99.9% of it you know um so I think
02:01:02
Martin
Yes. Yeah.
02:01:10
Martin
Yeah. Yeah.
02:01:17
Christian Yordanov
i think um it's it's it's so important if more people knew that because like you say it yourself, you know, like a lot of the the egoic, let's say energy derangement and and and a lot of this balls of yarn that sort of get created, a lot of it, a lot of that is centered around fear of death at the end of the day, isn't it?
02:01:39
Martin
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's such a core issue. And that's where just from a therapeutic perspective, if if we just looked at and said, look, if we could get everybody trained for death during their life, that would release so much fear and so much anxiety and allow people to be more present. And when you think about so much of our action is guided around this deep core of the fear of death.
02:02:06
Martin
So the choices that we make, the things that we plan for ourselves, the anxieties that we generate. And so if we could just relieve that, then it gives people the opportunity to be more fully alive when they're alive and really accept that this death thing, this is a natural process. This is part of life. And if we can even reorient around the idea that It's a gift.
02:02:30
Martin
It's actually, I know it's hard, but it's a gift that the fact that I'm going to die gives my transitory experiences meaning and value.
02:02:41
Martin
And then without that, because, you know, the opposite, let's imagine I lived forever. If I lived forever, what would it matter what I accomplish on any given day or what experiences I have?
02:02:54
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Yeah.
02:02:55
Martin
Because there's always another experience. There's always another day. And so the fact that time is limited, that's what brings meaning to things and brings value. And so I can say, wow, I'm really proud of the work that I did today because there might not be a tomorrow.
02:03:10
Martin
But if everything is infinite forever, it just, it's incredibly boring. There's no motivation. There's no meaning. And and that's why...
02:03:21
Martin
Sometimes people ask they're like, well, why did God create reality if it's so blissful in the oneness? Because this is where everything happens. This is where we get to experience difference and things and pleasure and pain, and that has value.
02:03:37
Martin
But if you're basking in the ocean of oneness forever, it's infinitely boring because there's no difference. There's no, it's like I used this in and a podcast the other day.
02:03:50
Martin
somebody was interviewing me and I said, it's like if I were tasting chocolate in my mouth all the time every day, before too long, it would just fade into background noise and I would no longer taste chocolate because it would just be, that's just the taste of my mouth.
02:04:04
Martin
But since chocolate is a limited commodity, when I take a square of chocolate, I'm able to say, mmm, yummy. Oh my God, I love chocolate. But it has to be temporary.
02:04:17
Martin
It has to be an experience of chocolate. But if it was chocolate all the time, then it wouldn't be chocolate anymore. And so that's what life is, is that these series of temporary events and relationships and experiences, and that brings us meaning. And so and it's death that allows for that to be the case.
02:04:35
Martin
which is awesome. So death is great.
02:04:36
Christian Yordanov
bro.
02:04:38
Martin
I'm not rushing forward to it. It's not like, come on, I want to die today. you know I'm not suicidal in any capacity, but in a weird way, I'm kind of looking forward to it because also life is hard.
02:04:49
Martin
I mean, we have to make hard choices, hard decisions.
02:04:51
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Yeah.
02:04:52
Martin
We got a struggle. There is pain, there is illness, there is loss, there is regret, there's disappointment, and it's all part of the rich tapestry of life. And that you know when we can finally die, it's like, again, this is like the moment as 5-MeO opening up and you think I'm never coming back from this. There's this profound sense of relaxation of like, oh, I don't need to worry about anything anymore. i can just let go into this.
02:05:18
Martin
And when that happens to people, it's really common when the ego comes back, people will say, i thought I knew what relaxation was.
02:05:18
Christian Yordanov
yeah
02:05:27
Martin
But I didn't because this was more relaxed than I've ever been. And now I realize that every time I thought I was relaxed, I've actually been holding various levels of tension. Because life is a tension. Life is a, whoa, what's happening?
02:05:42
Martin
There's a natural tension that comes with being alive. And so death brings that ultimate relaxation. And hopefully we can all surrender into it. And hopefully it won't come too soon for anyone and that you get to live out your days and have all your experiences.
02:05:55
Christian Yordanov
course. Man, was so lucky because but we were at the Anarchapulka conference. They were doing the Bufo sessions every day for those interested. So every day of the conference there, I was getting body work, man. I was working like all this tension out of my body. So then the final day of the conference on the Friday, that's when I did, ah we were the last session of the week.
02:06:16
Christian Yordanov
So I think that allowed me probably to the even more release, more energy because they're like working like really well on me. And then the day after they did more work on me, another three hours, the guys there that were doing it.
02:06:31
Christian Yordanov
And then I also got a craniosacral massage, dude.
02:06:33
Martin
Yeah.
02:06:33
Christian Yordanov
That was heaven, man. So I think if you if you couple this, especially with like, somatic body, I think, um like you've been talking about that a lot, like the whole somatic piece, if you couple this and then with some kind of physical practice, be that, you know, yoga, pilates, whatever you like, Tai Chi, Qigong, whatever you like, I think the two are a match made in heaven because this helps you work kind of the more energetic side of things in terms of like things you like the the psyche level, suppose you can't even, not palpable things, then if you combine it with like some physical body work and being out in the sun in nature, just the two, just you You almost like... i swear to God, dude, i as I was coming back from the first um um
02:07:14
Christian Yordanov
ah hit ah from the pipe, it felt like I saw sort of I remember have very early memories, like when i was three, i would it would be dark and then ah it would be I could see the room back in that apartment we we were living and then it would things would be dark.
02:07:34
Christian Yordanov
And then I would see that again. And then sometimes my mother would kind of pop her head in and like early, early memories.
02:07:39
Martin
Yeah.
02:07:40
Christian Yordanov
And when I kind of opened my eyes, And I looked up at the tree and there was like these there was like these two flies or insects that were like doing a they were flying in a figure eight. I was like, that moment, it it almost felt as I was like just kind of a little baby being born again. i Just kind of seeing the world anew. Such a beautiful thing, man.
02:08:03
Martin
Yeah. I'd really love to emphasize something that you said here is that everything that happens in your lived experience, it happens in your body in some capacity. That this is another area where, you know, in the psychedelic world, the spiritual world, people tend to disembody. They tend to project into astral realms and, you know. metaphysical spaces and stuff like that. But everything that happens happens in the body.
02:08:29
Martin
Every feeling you've ever had has been in your body. Every thought you've ever had is in your body. So the embodied experience and how we are inhabiting the body and living through the body is the ground through which all of our experience happens. It's the The ego is not disembodied. Our psyche is not disembodied. Our soul or spirit, if you believe in those things, it's not disembodied. Like it's all happening right here. So how we are living in the body, how we are embodying and living ourselves, it's it's all right here. And this is it's all accessible to the body. So I think it's it's tremendously important how how we are living and how we are being.
02:09:09
Christian Yordanov
yeah man so thank you so much for your time martin i want to wrap i would just have ah one more question more of a fun question and then of course you want to tell the listeners all the different places they can find your work and connect with you but i'm just curious so the sonoran uh uh desert toad now this creature the way bear heart the are the shaman guy there The way he kind of introduces the medicine to everyone is like he tells you the frog you know lives you know nine, ten months out of the year, deep underground in this dissolving state.
02:09:15
Martin
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
02:09:41
Christian Yordanov
So when I looked at some pictures of the toad and I looked at it, these eyes are like this black and this yellow. I'm curious, do you think this toad is like 24-7, 365 tripping balls?
02:09:55
Christian Yordanov
What do you think its kind of state of existence and consciousness is like?
02:10:00
Martin
Yeah, no, I think it's just living a toad life. You know, it's not.
02:10:04
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Yeah.
02:10:05
Martin
It's just not even thinking about any of this stuff. like That's anthropomorphizing and kind of projecting the human experience of what that toad represents to us. that The toad is just living its life. and it's it's you know If they could speak, it'd probably be like, fucking humans, like well why why are you making a big deal about me? like I'm just living my life. I live underground because I live in the fucking desert and there's no water and I need water to live and to reproduce. And so when it rains, I come out.
02:10:32
Martin
and it just so happens that yeah i've got this incredibly powerful entheogenic molecule in my secretions but i didn't make this for you i didn't make it for any of your purposes for me this is just protection um so i think that the toad is just living the toad life you know just doing toad things and it's thinking like insect eat that and then especially when they come out it's like mate that's their number one no well they have two things eat mate
02:10:56
Christian Yordanov
Yeah, have babies. yeah have babies.
02:11:00
Martin
That's what they're doing. Yeah. So they they're just living their toad lives. um
02:11:04
Christian Yordanov
So, but how do you think, how do you think then we discovered this medicine?
02:11:11
Christian Yordanov
The first people.
02:11:11
Martin
That's, well, you know, that's a real question. Ultimately, we just got to recognize that as human beings have explored the planet um over the many, many e eons, that humans have always been curious and then are always like, huh,
02:11:27
Martin
What does this do? Can I do something with this? And um you know there's no unambiguous and clear evidence that any indigenous cultures in North or Central America ever used toad secretions as part of their traditions. There's no evidence of that. But toads have been important in iconography in Mesoamerican cultures for a long, long time.
02:11:54
Martin
And so it's part of, you know these substances are secreted. So someone, somewhere along the way, probably what happened is it like some like spilled into a fire and then maybe somebody inhaled and they're like, whoa, like I'm feeling something here. um
02:12:11
Christian Yordanov
Hmm.
02:12:12
Martin
But the you know the the story is that a um an American man white guy was told like, Oh, the Cherokee Indians or something like that. Use this toad secretions. Now there's no evidence that Cherokees or any North American culture ever used toad secretions. And so some, then somebody tried smoking it or vaporizing it And it was like, Oh yeah.
02:12:38
Martin
this works. So it started with the this this idea that the Native Americans were doing it. But again, there's no evidence that they were. So how that started in the first place, I don't really know.
02:12:51
Martin
I don't think anybody really knows. What we do know is that now toad secretions have been introduced to a number of cultures in Mexico and in the southwestern United States. So they use it now.
02:13:03
Martin
Did they use it 30 years ago, no evidence that they used it 30 years ago. How about 100 years ago? No evidence of that. 200 years ago, no evidence of that. um So it is.
02:13:14
Martin
It's an open question. In the same way that like ayahuasca is the combination of two plants, who figured that shit out in the first place of what two plants to put together?
02:13:20
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Yeah.
02:13:25
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Exactly.
02:13:27
Martin
But you know way back when, I think it was Weston Labar,
02:13:27
Christian Yordanov
Yeah.
02:13:32
Martin
an early ethnobotanist who wrote his book, The Peyote Cult. I think it was him. I could be mistaking the author now for who said this, but basically said that proto-Amor Indians, meaning people who migrated into North and South America from elsewhere in the world, were predisposed to seek out entheogenic plants, fungi, and substances.
02:14:01
Martin
And therefore, see, more entheogens and psychedelics have been discovered in North, Central, and South America than anywhere else in the world. So he was saying, well, they were just predisposed that they're going to try everything and see if it affects them.
02:14:16
Martin
And so they tried every plant, they tried every mushroom, and some of them killed them, and then some of them, okay, this one worked.
02:14:17
Christian Yordanov
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
02:14:22
Martin
So that they just kind of went in. in you know the the The Americas have been maybe inhabited for maybe 30,000 years at the most, based you know on archaeological evidence that we have.
02:14:35
Martin
um So those early... people who were exploring these continents, they basically, they tried everything out. So maybe somebody discovered it at that point, but maybe it is just much more recent.
02:14:47
Martin
But all we know is that there's no clear historical evidence that proves definitively that any indigenous cultures ever used the toad. and And it honestly, it could just be that chemical analysis was done first.
02:14:57
Christian Yordanov
Yeah,
02:15:00
Martin
So 5-MeO-DMT was first discovered in the early 1900s and it was found to be psychedelic. And then chemical analysis was done of the secretions and said, oh, this one has 5-MeO. And so somebody said, oh, so if I smoke that, it's going to do something.
02:15:16
Martin
um You know, so that the science may have come first.
02:15:17
Christian Yordanov
man.
02:15:19
Martin
But it's basically, it's a mystery wrapped in an enigma, as they like to say, that we just, we don't know.
02:15:25
Christian Yordanov
yeahmen Yeah, it is Well, whatever it is let's just thank God that it's there.
02:15:33
Martin
Yeah.
02:15:34
Christian Yordanov
That's all I can say.
02:15:35
Martin
Yeah, that's what i I like to say that too, is like, the key to unlocking the mysteries of the universe exists in reality. It's called 5-MEO-DMT. And and yeah it's in some plants and in some grasses and in some seeds and things like that. And it's in a toad and like no one suspects a toad. Like who would have thought that the key to understand a reality is in a fricking toad.
02:15:59
Martin
That's pretty cool. And for me, I like to think that it just points to the ultimate ironic humor of God and existence. It's like, yeah, no it no one would ever think to look in a toad, but that's exactly where I put it. yeah
02:16:14
Christian Yordanov
oh martin thank you so much brother um just as we wrap can you tell uh folks all the places that they can connect with you and and find your work and podcast everything else
02:16:24
Martin
Yeah. So my main hub online is just martinball.net. That's my personal webpage. And from there, you can get to my Amazon author page. You can get to my podcast, which is the Entheogenic Evolution, which also has a YouTube page. It's on Apple Podcasts. It's on Spotify. You can also find my music there, which is also on Apple Music, Spotify, YouTube Music, Amazon Music. Just don't confuse me, Martin Ball, who makes trippy electronic acoustic world fusion alternative music with the Martin Ball, who makes Christian christian praise and gospel music. Our music has been combined together online in some outlets.
02:17:01
Martin
um Also, ah that also has information about my integration services and the classes that I teach with Mindscape Institute. Then, of course, you can find me on Instagram, on Facebook. Then I have a website, Non-Dual Entheogenic Integration, which is specifically for people who are looking for integration of their entheogenic experiences. I specialize in 5-MeO-DMT, but I'm not limited to that in any way.
02:17:26
Martin
And you can find my podcast, The Entheogenic Evolution, wherever you find podcasts. you know, it's distributed online. everywhere out there and i also have an art web page that i don't mention very often but it's called fractal imagination.com and that just has you know my my photography and my digital fractal art and stuff like that and yeah i'm pretty spread out around the web because i've got you know all these different things going on but martinball.net is the main central hub and welcome people to contact me through there
02:17:57
Christian Yordanov
Awesome. Well, thank you We have all the links, of course, down below to anyone listening. And yeah, Martin, man, this was ah an amazing pleasure. And I'm hoping that we can have you again on in the future to discuss, because this is such a huge topic and your experiences with the medicines and and helping people, you know, do this work is is so extensive that um if if you're happy to come back at a future date, I would more than love to have you on.
02:18:20
Christian Yordanov
Again, you're always welcome here.
02:18:22
Martin
Sure. Anytime, Christian. Yeah. Thanks so much for having me on today, for inviting me to have this conversation with you. I've appreciated all that you've shared and inputted into this conversation and all the questions that you've asked. It's been an absolute pleasure for me to speak with you today. So thanks for having me.
02:18:38
Christian Yordanov
Thank you. Yeah, I wanted to let you speak because I know most of the listeners don't know about you. There's obviously like ah multiple points in time because you you share so much in, ah you know, let's say of a five minute time period. So at any point in time, you can kind of interject and add things and take it a different direction. But I thought just for this first time, let the listeners hear from the horse's mouth.
02:19:01
Christian Yordanov
What is this medicine? How do you use this medicine? Because it's you've you had a long time to really nail down and distill it in such a, you know, in five minutes, you can really like put like a a chapter of a book in five minutes through through the medium of audio.
02:19:18
Martin
All
02:19:19
Christian Yordanov
So it's pretty amazing. So once again, brother, thank you so much.
02:19:22
Martin
right. Thanks, Christian. Have a great day.