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Drugs For Christmas
76 Plays1 year ago
Most people spend the holidays with their families and loved ones. Me, I spend it by myself, tripping on a heroic dose of psychedelics. You don't need presents. You need PRESENCE. Find out why the greatest gift you give yourself is a rocket ship through the deepest parts of your psyche.
Note: I am not endorsing drug use of any kind. So shut up, narc.
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Find Alex:
Website: https://www.hoopercomedy.com/
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https://twitter.com/hooperhairpuff
https://www.facebook.com/alex.hooper.334/
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Transcript
The L.A. Christmas Experience
00:00:01
Speaker
It's beginning to look a lot like December, unless you're in L.A., where it looks like every other month of the whole year.
00:00:14
Speaker
I mean, it's still 70 degrees out there.
00:00:17
Speaker
That's not Christmas-like at all.
00:00:20
Speaker
But I'm here to tell you.
Alex's Unique Christmas Tradition
00:00:22
Speaker
about how I spend my Christmas, or at least how I have for the past 10 years.
00:00:28
Speaker
And before I do this, I'm going to let you know that in no way am I endorsing the use of psychedelic drugs unless you're super cool and aren't a narc, at which point I am definitely endorsing the use of psychedelic drugs under safe conditions for the user.
00:00:48
Speaker
I call it Alex's Introspective Christmas.
00:00:53
Speaker
And it started about 10 years ago when my wife decided that she was going to go home for Christmas back to Cleveland where her family is.
00:01:03
Speaker
I was at, in LA by myself.
00:01:07
Speaker
I don't like traveling around the holidays.
00:01:09
Speaker
There's just a lot to do, but also we had just gotten our first pug.
00:01:15
Speaker
So I had to, it was my first Christmas alone with him and I wanted to watch him just so we wouldn't have to give him to a sitter.
00:01:27
Speaker
And I decided that,
00:01:29
Speaker
It would be advantageous, since I had the entire apartment to myself, to take a large dose of psychedelics.
Psychedelics and Self-Exploration
00:01:40
Speaker
The reason I did that is because when I'm on psychedelics, I cannot hide from myself.
00:01:48
Speaker
There is no lying to me about my current state.
00:01:53
Speaker
It's basically like hiring an excavation team to go inside of me and figure out what am I not paying attention to?
00:02:03
Speaker
What is happening within the annals of my brain?
00:02:08
Speaker
deep down in the ruts, in the crevasses, the Marianas trench level depths of my noggin.
00:02:18
Speaker
And mushrooms, psychedelics, will do that for you.
00:02:22
Speaker
They will bring up feelings and emotions that maybe you didn't know were there or maybe you did and you were a little too afraid to tap into.
00:02:31
Speaker
But I will tell you this, as I was tripping with my pug,
00:02:37
Speaker
I had this beautiful revelation that all of the work I'm doing out here in LA is worthwhile.
00:02:48
Speaker
The life I've chosen is worthwhile.
00:02:52
Speaker
And sometimes it's easy to lose track of that.
00:02:57
Speaker
And my pug and I sat there.
00:03:00
Speaker
I cried a lot.
00:03:01
Speaker
He stared at me like, dad, are you okay?
00:03:04
Speaker
As I went through all of it.
00:03:07
Speaker
But of course the beauty of psychedelics is even when you go through it, you're always going to come out on the other side with a new form of appreciation, a little bit of enlightenment and afterglow.
00:03:21
Speaker
I like to call it where everything has a little bit more clarity.
00:03:26
Speaker
And I'm more grateful.
00:03:28
Speaker
So that began a tradition where every year I would do a heroic amount of psychedelics.
00:03:35
Speaker
Maybe it was two tabs of acid with a little bit of ketamine on top.
00:03:40
Speaker
Maybe it was a couple trips into the world of DMT.
00:03:45
Speaker
You know, whatever my chosen substance was, there was only one rule.
00:03:52
Speaker
Do it by yourself and do a little bit more than you're used to.
00:03:57
Speaker
So I would set up my apartment in a way that felt very safe, where I would just put on music and some warm lighting, no TV, anything like that.
00:04:08
Speaker
That's not what it's about.
00:04:09
Speaker
It's about going into your brain and letting it show you what it wants to see.
00:04:13
Speaker
And some people say you need an intention on psychedelics.
00:04:17
Speaker
That helps.
00:04:19
Speaker
For some people, sure.
00:04:21
Speaker
It does.
00:04:22
Speaker
For me, I didn't want to set an intention.
00:04:25
Speaker
All I wanted to do was think about my past year, how I've grown, what I've learned, what I've accomplished, and why I should be excited going into the next trip around the orbital sun.
Reactions to Psychedelic Christmas
00:04:43
Speaker
Over the years, my friends, very close friends, found out that this is how I was spending my Christmas.
00:04:49
Speaker
And a couple of them were like, Alex, that's sad.
00:04:52
Speaker
You're doing drugs on Christmas?
00:04:54
Speaker
You're supposed to spend that day with your family.
00:04:58
Speaker
That's one way to interpret it.
00:05:00
Speaker
And then a couple of other, my friends were like, uh, no, I get this.
00:05:04
Speaker
I completely understand.
00:05:05
Speaker
I think that's a brilliant way to spend Christmas because you are celebrating yourself.
00:05:10
Speaker
You are celebrating the life that you have chosen to live.
00:05:13
Speaker
You are reinforcing your decisions and figuring out how to make everything have more value.
00:05:23
Speaker
And something about that is absolutely beautiful.
00:05:28
Speaker
Eventually I had two pugs, Carlton and kimchi.
00:05:32
Speaker
One year I did it while also hosting their cousin Lala, a little black pug.
00:05:36
Speaker
I had three pugs and I was tripping balls.
00:05:41
Speaker
What a Christmas.
00:05:43
Speaker
I wasn't around my family eating a glazed ham and opening random presents.
00:05:48
Speaker
I wasn't having those connections, but I was connecting with myself.
Emotional Processing and Healing
00:05:53
Speaker
And understanding what I needed to move forward to continue to find joy in every facet of my existence.
00:06:03
Speaker
That's so important.
00:06:06
Speaker
One year, a couple of my friends were like, we're not going home this year.
00:06:09
Speaker
We want to join Introspective Christmas.
00:06:12
Speaker
So there were five of us that year doing Introspective Christmas.
00:06:16
Speaker
And we all had a great time.
00:06:17
Speaker
We went out to dinner afterwards at an Italian restaurant.
00:06:21
Speaker
It was really lovely.
00:06:22
Speaker
The next year got a little too intense because the next year, almost none of my close friends went home.
00:06:28
Speaker
So I had 15 people in my one bedroom apartment, all tripping on different substances.
00:06:33
Speaker
And that's...
00:06:35
Speaker
But it's not what introspective Christmas is all about.
00:06:39
Speaker
Because there's a difference between tripping with a group or other people and tripping on your own.
00:06:46
Speaker
Because on your own, you can really let the feelings come up.
00:06:50
Speaker
You can really get in there.
00:06:54
Speaker
You can mine what is supposed to be in there.
00:06:57
Speaker
You can release everything.
00:07:00
Speaker
A couple hours of introspective Christmas, I'm usually crying my eyes out, bawling.
00:07:05
Speaker
I don't know when it's going to come.
00:07:06
Speaker
I don't know how it's going to happen.
00:07:08
Speaker
I'm usually a little confused, wondering what have I done to myself?
00:07:11
Speaker
Was this a good idea?
00:07:12
Speaker
Should I be terrified right now?
00:07:15
Speaker
And next thing you know, I'm in this beautiful, beautiful sob fest.
00:07:21
Speaker
And just letting out all of this negative emotion, just purging sadness, fear, resentment, anger, bitterness, jealousy, all of it flutters out of me.
00:07:38
Speaker
And I'm left soaked in a puddle of myself.
00:07:44
Speaker
Not in some gross way either.
00:07:47
Speaker
in a magical sense, in a healing sense.
00:07:52
Speaker
And I've had so many perspective shifts because of introspective Christmas.
Shifts in Perspective and Personal Growth
00:07:58
Speaker
I used to be terrified of being a father and having children.
00:08:03
Speaker
And one introspective Christmas, as I was really going through the motions, I remember thinking, if I spend all this energy putting out
00:08:15
Speaker
like love into the world toward other people, attempting to shine my light as brightly as possible upon others.
00:08:22
Speaker
I do that for strangers.
00:08:25
Speaker
What would I do with my own child?
00:08:27
Speaker
What if I poured all of this energy of love into a single being or two little beings, maybe what would they become?
00:08:38
Speaker
What kind of love would they grow up with?
00:08:40
Speaker
What could they do?
00:08:43
Speaker
How would it manifest within them?
00:08:45
Speaker
And suddenly I was like, wow.
00:08:49
Speaker
I not only want children, I'm ready for children.
00:08:53
Speaker
That came from introspective Christmas.
00:08:56
Speaker
A lot of things come from introspective Christmas.
00:08:58
Speaker
My love of comedy is always apparent when I do it because this can be a frustrating business.
00:09:06
Speaker
The world is always trying to collapse in on us and there is so much negative energy floating around the particles and the microbes in the air and it will infect you.
00:09:18
Speaker
It will get inside of you.
00:09:22
Speaker
But you can release it.
00:09:24
Speaker
You can release it.
00:09:24
Speaker
And so once a year, usually it's Alex's introspective Christmas.
00:09:29
Speaker
I do psychedelics completely by myself.
00:09:32
Speaker
And I'm not encouraging you.
00:09:36
Speaker
to do drugs, but I am encouraging you to reflect because as the end of the year is coming up, a lot of different things are happening inside of you.
00:09:45
Speaker
You're looking forward to like, what did I accomplish?
00:09:48
Speaker
Did I do anything this year?
00:09:50
Speaker
How did I grow as a person?
00:09:51
Speaker
And look, no matter what you did, you did a lot because you are still here and
00:09:56
Speaker
Maybe if it doesn't feel like it, take a little inventory.
00:09:58
Speaker
Where did you travel?
00:10:00
Speaker
What books did you read?
00:10:02
Speaker
Where, what sporting events did you go to?
00:10:04
Speaker
What concerts did you see that blew your mind?
00:10:07
Speaker
How did you grow deeper into a friendship with somebody?
00:10:11
Speaker
How did you experience or release love?
00:10:15
Speaker
What was your favorite thing that you ate this year?
00:10:17
Speaker
What was something that you never thought you would do and suddenly you did?
00:10:23
Speaker
When you look back, you did so much this year.
00:10:25
Speaker
And I know that because there are 365 days in a year and you didn't spend it doing fucking nothing.
00:10:31
Speaker
I know you didn't.
00:10:32
Speaker
You grew.
00:10:34
Speaker
You are a different person now than you were at the beginning of last year.
00:10:39
Speaker
And that takes a level of appreciation for you.
00:10:42
Speaker
And you need to focus on that for at least a little while at the end of this year.
00:10:46
Speaker
Because this can drum up a lot of weird feelings.
00:10:50
Speaker
We're seeing our families or we're not seeing our families.
00:10:53
Speaker
It's the holidays.
00:10:54
Speaker
People are gathering.
00:10:56
Speaker
People are taking inventory of what they did wondering, was this year okay?
Reflecting on Recovery and Achievements
00:11:05
Speaker
My year was spent, I called it bouncing back.
00:11:08
Speaker
That was my journal this year.
00:11:09
Speaker
Every single morning I journaled, well, six days a week anyway.
00:11:12
Speaker
I gave most Sundays off.
00:11:14
Speaker
But bouncing back because that's what I was doing.
00:11:17
Speaker
I was recovering from being in the hospital.
00:11:20
Speaker
I still had cancer.
00:11:21
Speaker
I still was attached to antibiotics because of sepsis.
00:11:24
Speaker
At the beginning of this year, I was a completely different person than who I am now.
00:11:29
Speaker
I was a cripple.
00:11:30
Speaker
And now I'm playing tennis, walking on slack lines, doing comedy sets about to film a new special.
00:11:34
Speaker
I am a different fucking person.
00:11:37
Speaker
And I need to take gratitude in that even on days when I'm not really sure what to do with myself or if I have really moved past that area.
00:11:46
Speaker
I'm still processing.
00:11:48
Speaker
And I'm thinking about all this because I'm about to go back to Baltimore for a week.
00:11:52
Speaker
My brother and his wife are coming in from Alaska.
00:11:54
Speaker
I'll see my sister and my niece and my mom and my stepdad and some other family members.
00:12:00
Speaker
And it is a time to reflect on what I've done this year, but also how good I feel and what I want to do in 2024.
00:12:13
Speaker
What am I going to call my journal?
00:12:14
Speaker
Is it leaping forward?
00:12:16
Speaker
Is it capturing the moment?
00:12:19
Speaker
How am I going to stay present yet continue to build on every single thing that I've done?
00:12:26
Speaker
Because I walked through fire this past year.
00:12:31
Speaker
And even though it looks like I got burned, that's just the eczema.
00:12:35
Speaker
I didn't.
00:12:37
Speaker
I'm stronger than I was before.
Year-End Reflections and Future Plans
00:12:40
Speaker
And I don't know when my next introspective trip is going to come.
00:12:43
Speaker
I did one in October when my wife went to Mexico and it was beautiful.
00:12:47
Speaker
Two tabs of gel acid straight to the dome went fucking deep.
00:12:53
Speaker
And I'm ready to do it again.
00:12:55
Speaker
Because that is my own version of...
00:12:59
Speaker
a masogi of a challenging experience that will make me a different person.
00:13:03
Speaker
It's a Japanese term that I just learned from a book called The Comfort Crisis.
00:13:09
Speaker
What are you going to do next year?
00:13:12
Speaker
But more importantly, why are you proud of yourself from this year?
00:13:17
Speaker
Look back and even the tiniest accomplishments probably have a lot more gravitas than you're giving them credit for.
00:13:25
Speaker
So take a moment and be very proud of yourself.
00:13:30
Speaker
Because you're still here.
00:13:32
Speaker
And there's a lot of people who can't say the same.
00:13:35
Speaker
You are growing.
00:13:36
Speaker
You're developing.
00:13:38
Speaker
You are blooming.
00:13:41
Speaker
Like an onion at Outback Steakhouse.
00:13:45
Speaker
$8.99.
00:13:47
Speaker
Go get yourself one.
00:13:49
Speaker
I'm sure they're still delicious as ever.
00:13:54
Speaker
Hear more.
00:13:55
Speaker
HooperComedy.com.
00:13:57
Speaker
Got dates coming up.
00:13:58
Speaker
Filming the special, everybody.
00:14:00
Speaker
And January 7th at the Hollywood Improv.
00:14:03
Speaker
Very excited because I'm running my hour before I go tape it.
00:14:06
Speaker
January 10th at McGuby's in Baltimore.
00:14:08
Speaker
I'll be there running the hour.
00:14:10
Speaker
That's only two days before the special taping on January 12th where I'm doing two shows in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
00:14:16
Speaker
And...
00:14:16
Speaker
December 14th this week.
00:14:18
Speaker
If you're listening, Comedy Store producing another episode of Perfect Dose with my main homie, efficient of my wedding, Jerry Brandt.
00:14:26
Speaker
We have an incredible lineup coming at you.
00:14:28
Speaker
It's only our second show and we're really excited about it.
00:14:32
Speaker
I'm not telling you to do drugs, but I'm also telling you to put only the fun ones.
00:14:40
Speaker
They're good for you.
00:14:41
Speaker
I'll see you next week.