Healing with Plant Medicine (Psychedelics)

[00:00:03] Matt Landsiedel: Welcome to Gay Men Going Deeper, a podcast series by the Gay Men’s Brotherhood where we talk about personal development, mental health and sexuality. I am your host, Matt Landsiedel. I am a counselor and facilitator specializing in healing and empowerment.

My areas of expertise are teaching people how to heal toxic shame and attachment trauma so they can embody their authentic self and enjoy more meaningful connections in their lives. I specialize in working with highly sensitive people, empaths, and gay men to develop a stronger sense of self-worth.

Today’s topic is healing with plant medicine, and we are joined by Brad Wells and Alex the Burj. Welcome guys. Good to have you here.

[00:00:46] Alex Theberge: Thank you.

[00:00:48] Matt Landsiedel: A rare trio episode for me, so I’m pretty excited about unpacking perspectives from both of you guys.

So, in this, in this episode, we’re going to be exploring what is ayahuasca and other plant medicines such as fungus and different things like that, how these can be used in healing.

What is, or how does ayahuasca support healing and what can it heal? Is plant medicine for everyone, or is there contraindications for it? And then we’re going to talk a bit about our personal experiences with plant medicines and how these have supported our own personal journeys, and then talking about healing in communities. So, all three of us work within communities. We bring people together to heal in community. So, we’re going to be unpacking that and then stick with us till the end because we’re going to be sharing a special opportunity for you to explore ayahuasca if this is something that would feel in alignment to you.

So, providing context. So, Brad, Alex and I facilitate and, well, we co-host a retreat together called cultivating pride and authenticity. So, this is how we met. Brad reached out to me. He’s an avid listener of the podcast and reached out to me and wanted to collaborate. So, about a year ago we met and we decided that we wanted to continue the working relationship, and so I wanted to invite them on the podcast so we can share a bit about our experiences of collaborating and working with plant medicine.

The intention of this episode is to share our passion for nature, to heal. Using nature as a healing medium is a beautiful healing medium. So, we want to unpack that and just kind of an asterisk is plant medicine is a huge topic. So, we’re really going to be kind of skimming the surface today. There’s many different types of plant medicines that can be used in different modalities. So, we’re going to be unpacking primarily ayahuasca but we can touch on other, other medicines as well, but maybe not do as much of a deep dive into these as well.

All right, so I figured we could just talk a bit about you guys, learn a bit about you. So, I would like to know, what do you do and what are you passionate about? And why don’t we start with Brad?

[00:02:59] Brad Wells: Yeah. Thanks, Matt.

[00:03:01] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:03:02] Brad Wells: Yeah. Honor to be here.

[00:03:03] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:03:03] Brad Wells: So, I am the founder of Reunion in Costa Rica. We’re a plant medicine center. It’s really all we do, whether it’s Ayahuasca retreats like the one we’re talking about, or a psilocybin retreat. Those are the two plant medicines that we work with. I was first introduced to ayahuasca about eight years ago, kind of unexpectedly, and ended up partaking and just found that, you know, after three ceremonies, it was transformative in my own. I mean, I couldn’t even understand it.

And I was with about 25 other people at this retreat, and each of them was describing a similar experience of transformation and personal growth and insights that they just never had, particularly in a single week. So, it was a real transformative experience. Um, you know, one of the things that it showed me is just how much I was seeking my whole life for. For validation, for self-worth. You know, I worked really hard. I was kind of a serial entrepreneur, still have a number of, of those businesses, but realized that I didn’t have to find my self-worth in, in a career or an achievement. So, through that process, I ended up selling my main business and founding reunion as a not-for-profit plant medicine center in Costa Rica. And it’s been super rewarding just to work with the many people that have come through. In particular, particularly, it’s been rewarding the cultivating pride and authenticity week that the three of us co-hosted together.

[00:04:36] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:04:37] Matt Landsiedel: And what are you passionate about? What gets you out of bed in the morning? What brings you to life?

[00:04:40] Brad Wells: Yeah, I think it’s just this idea of continuing life. You know, I never really woke up with a zealous, you know, our happiness.

You know, I just got up and went to work. So, I think the biggest change in my life is just getting up and experiencing life. You know, it’s. There’s ups and there’s downs, but. But just the experience of it. I think I spent a lot of years being so busy, you know, particularly with work, that the time just went by. So, I guess I’m most passionate now, but just enjoying life, you know, as simple as that might sound and almost cliché-ish.

It hits home for me.

[00:05:21] Brad Wells: Yeah.

[00:05:21] Matt Landsiedel: Thanks, Brad. I look forward to hearing a bit more about your story as the episode goes on.

Alex, what about yourself? What do you do and what are you passionate about?

[00:05:32] Alex Theberge: I’m a psychotherapist and I work. I specialize in trauma. So that’s. That’s really the kind of focus of all my work. I’m also a plant medicine facilitator. So, I started as a therapist for many years and then kind of got, I guess, just didn’t find it as meaningful as I wanted it to be. And it felt very mental and it felt like something was missing in the work. And when I got introduced to ayahuasca and kind of came down this path, things really opened up for me in terms of more holistic healing and understanding, healing beyond just the psychological level, but the emotional, the spiritual, the physical. And so, I became an ayahuasca facilitator. Spent many years training, living in the Amazon to get to that point of being able to facilitate ceremonies. And that’s really what I specialize in. It’s pretty much the focus of my professional life is healing with ayahuasca and trauma healing.

[00:06:47] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:06:47] Matt Landsiedel: Awesome. What was it like living in the Amazon for the time that you did?

[00:06:53] Alex Theberge: I loved it. It was also very hard. I love the jungle. I love being in the forest, being able to walk every day. Just. You’re in the Amazon jungle. It’s so alive. There’s so many plants and trees and animals and everything growing on top of each other. It’s incredible and very kind of rejuvenating in some way, just being in that energy.

But it’s also very hard. Especially where I was, that was kind of an isolated town in the middle of the Amazon where you have very little access to any comforts. The retreats are often no electricity, no Internet. You’re sweltering hot. There were challenges to it, and it was hard work. It was, you know, working in a retreat center full time, year-round.

It’s, you know, it’s hard work, but I learned a tremendous amount and I really did. I love the work. So that that helped me to stick with it.

[00:07:51] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:07:52] Matt Landsiedel: And this was a primarily where you were working and training at a retreat center? This was an ayahuasca retreat center.

[00:07:58] Alex Theberge: It was an Ayahuasca and other amazonian plant medicine centers. Yeah.

[00:08:03] Matt Landsiedel: Okay.

[00:08:04] Alex Theberge: We did other plant medicine diets with different trees and other medicinal plants that the head that had shaman, that was his specialty.

[00:08:14] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:08:15] Matt Landsiedel: Okay, good. So, what was required of you to become an Ayahuascaquero. That’s what they call somebody who facilitates, like, the shamanistic aspect of ceremonial, like ayahuasca. So, what was required of you? What did you have to go through as far to train for that?

[00:08:34] Alex Theberge: Well, I mean, I went through a traditional apprenticeship. You know, people approach this from different ways, but I went through a traditional apprenticeship with my teacher. And it involved a lot of plant medicine diets, which means kind of it’s like an isolated, it’s almost like a meditation retreat where you separate yourself from people, and you’re just drinking the raw vegetables, the raw, raw material of different plants or trees, whether it’s bark or leaves or roots, and you kind of consume nothing else. You have very minimal diet. It’s like rice and fish. Sometimes it’s just fish. That’s it.

And you’re just basically there being with the plants that you’re drinking to connect and develop a relationship with them. And so, it’s a lot of the heavy part of the training is the diets.

That’s where you build your relationship with the different, um, plants and trees that have healing properties. So, you can call on them during the ceremony, and they come and actually do work for you.

And then just the, you know, working in the ceremonies from starting with just taking people, you know, into the shower after they’re, like, overwhelmed, you know, it’s kind of the first steps. And then learning how to sit with people while they’re having a really hard time. And learning how to guide people through the experience. And eventually learning how to sing the traditional songs. And then eventually learning how to basically work with people using the traditional amazonian plant medicine skills that are part of ayahuasca to help heal. And so, it’s a very slow process.

Very slow. It takes years and years and years to really develop any kind of competence with it. And you just need to get hundreds of ceremonies under your belt.

[00:10:26] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:10:28] Matt Landsiedel: Cool.

[00:10:29] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:10:29] Matt Landsiedel: And it sounds like there’s like, you know, we’re not just talking about plant material. We’re talking about, like, the spirit of the plant that we’re working with. And the spirit of the plant can be called on and utilized throughout the ceremony to help people heal. So, your kind of like the conduit between, because you’ve developed this relationship with the plant, the plant medicine, to be able to kind of call that in and work with it within the ceremony. Is that correct? Correct.

[00:10:52] Alex Theberge: Yes, exactly. That that is the role of an Ayahuasquero is you have built through, you know, years and years of dedication and respect and painstaking work and commitment to ayahuasca and the other plant. You know, plants that you work with, you have through that, you have built a relationship where they will actually work on, you know, if you’re asking them to do something, whether it’s cleanse or protect or heal or remove something, the spirit of the plants will show up and do that work. And you can certainly feel that in ceremony. If you’re ever in a ceremony with a traditional Ayahuasquero and they sing, you can feel things happening in your body in response to their singing. And the singing is actually what invokes, directs, and calls on the spirits. And, you know, that only happens if you have that relationship. Otherwise, it’s just, you know, you could. It’s music, right? There’s lots of people who play music in ceremony, but to actually have the spirits of these plants participate and actually do healing work, you need to have that relationship built.

[00:12:08] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:12:10] Matt Landsiedel: I have a story that I’ll share after, about when you were facilitating. Yeah, but we’ll talk about that a little bit later.

Okay, so let’s just go right into what is Ayahuasca? Some people might be, like, wondering, what is ayahuasca? What is it?

[00:12:25] Alex Theberge: Well, it’s a, first and foremost, it’s a vine. It’s a giant vine that grows on, like, the tallest trees in the jungle and just climbs up them.

And so they can be, you know, 100ft long, thick, very sturdy. It’s like a woody. It’s almost like a tree itself because it has a very thick, hard bark.

So, the vine is called ayahuasca. It is also the name for a tea that is made by brewing, basically boiling the bark into a tea and used for medicinal purposes. So usually that. Not always, but usually that is in combination with at least one other plant. So, the tea is called Ayahuasca, but it often includes another plant called chacruna. But sometimes there are different plants that are used instead.

Sometimes there’s more many other plants that are used, and it’s more of like a concoction of several different plants and trees. But ayahuasca is always in it, and the reason why ayahuasca is always in it is because it is the plant that has this tremendous healing capacity and properties, part of which is it is a purgative. So, it helps us to remove things from inside of us.

And so ayahuasca itself has many, many different psychoactive compounds. And if you just drank pure ayahuasca, a lot of it you would have some very subtle visions, but the other plant that is added chacruna and other plants like it have DMT, which is a classic psychedelic. And so together they create this brew where you have very powerful visions and very powerful healing. So, you could just do DMT, but you’re not going to have the healing properties that ayahuasca brings. You could just do ayahuasca, but you’re not going to have the intense, beautiful visions where you can actually see what’s happening in kind of 3d that you have with chacruna.

The other thing is they work together because ayahuasca, some of the compounds in the ayahuasca vine allow the DMT to be absorbed in oral format. So, if you just drink a plant with DMT in it, it’ll be destroyed in your stomach. And so ayahuasca also blocks that destruction, the enzymes that break it down. And so it’s a real synergy between the two that allows the full ayahuasca experience that people know.

[00:15:04] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:15:05] Matt Landsiedel: So, is ayahuasca on its own a psychedelic or does it need to have chacruna to be a psychedelic?

[00:15:09] Alex Theberge: It’s not considered a psychedelic because it doesn’t have one of the classic psychedelics, but it has these compounds in it that are also psychoactive. They’re alkaloids, they’re called the harmalines. There’s several different harmaline compounds in it and they’ve done some experiments where they’ll give very high doses of harmalines to people and they will describe visions, but it’s monochromatic and subtle. And that’s also what happens if you have ayahuasca that’s been brewed with very little chacruna.

Basically, you’ll still have some visions, but they’re very subtle and they’re in black and white.

So, kind of yes and no. It has psychedelic properties, but it’s not a full psychedelic like DMT. Yeah, yeah.

[00:15:57] Matt Landsiedel: Okay. And how long has it been around? How long has it been being used? Obviously, it originates in the Amazon, so I’m assuming tribes.

[00:16:05] Alex Theberge: Yeah, so these are Amazon native plants and because prior to, you know, western colonization, there was no written record in that area. We don’t really know how long because there’s no way to go back in time, but we have evidence of, and has like found remnants of is essentially medicine pouches from medicine men with some of these compounds that are in ayahuasca and other plants that have DMT in them. And those have. There’s some that have been found that are like two, 3000 years old.

So, we don’t have a, you know, a written record, but there’s a very strong, you know, very strong evidence that ayahuasca and other psychoactive plant compounds have been used, you know, for thousands of years.

[00:17:03] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:17:06] Matt Landsiedel: Okay. So that’s ayahuasca, and we don’t need to go into such a deep dive of the other ones. I’m just curious if you can list off, like maybe the top five plant medicines that are used or that you might have experience with.

[00:17:17] Alex Theberge: Well, there’s lots of plant medicines, but if you’re talking about psychoactive ones that are like, psychedelic in nature that create visions, the most well-known ones are peyote, which is endemic to northern Mexico and southern Arizona that’s used and has been used by Native Americans, indigenous people for many, many, you know, centuries, millennia in Mexico.

And then there is also San Pedro, also known as Huachuca, which is from the Andes. And that is the primary visionary medicine of the people of the Andes. And it’s also been used for, you know, again, there’s no records but for a long, long, long time. And then there’s also psilocybin mushrooms, which is been used traditionally still used in Mexico and certain regions as part of their indigenous medicinal practices.

And then there’s also amanita mascara, which is another type of psychedelic mushroom that has a long history in Siberia, again, as a visionary medicine that the shamans use there as part of their, you know, connecting to spirits. So, there’s, there’s, and then there’s iboga. Ibogaine, which is an African tree or bush, really, and that is also used in initiation rites and for other purposes as part of traditional practices in believe it’s Gabon. So, there’s quite a few around the world, and they’re all used in kind of different ways, but they often have a medicinal element to them.

[00:19:03] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah.

[00:19:05] Matt Landsiedel: And for people listening, that might be thinking like, this sounds really out there. I want to just point out that a lot of the pharmaceuticals that we’re consuming nowadays actually are derived from observing the compounds of plants in nature. So, we’re utilizing these things. Maybe it’s just not being marketed in that way and obviously not for psychedelics within, like, pharmacology. But it’s just there’s a very strong relationship between plants and pharmacology from what I’m familiar with, you know, like antidepressants looking at, like, fluoxetine.

Um, and that’s derived from St. John’s wort.

[00:19:40] Brad Wells: Right.

[00:19:40] Matt Landsiedel: So, they were able to look at that plant and see how this compound was able to start to, um, you be able to use it for combating depression. So, then they take that and they put that, that into, um, a pill form, and now we consume it. Right. So, there’s a very strong relationship. I just wanted to point that out, um, because people that don’t know that they might think that, you know, using plants to heal like that sounds really strange, right?

Yeah.

Okay, so let’s talk a bit about the healing. So how does ayahuasca support healing? I know you said it’s a purgative, so obviously we can purge. We can purge things out of ourselves, and then what can it heal? And I’ll turn that over to Alex, and then I’ll want to talk to you, Brad, a bit about you.

What people come to Reunion for? What are common things that people come to reunion for? But we’ll start with Alex.

[00:20:29] Alex Theberge: Well, it’s a big question.

How ayahuasca heals is kind of a mystery because it works in so many unexpected ways and we can’t see what it’s doing.

But I can tell you what I’ve observed from working with many, many people over many years.

So, one element of how it heals, or what it does, is that cleansing part. And to me, this is what makes ayahuasca unique. Among all the other plant medicines and psychedelics that people use, is that you’re ingesting this material that can help, and the energy of it and the spirit of it that can help remove things from inside you. And so, it can actually help you release and expel unwanted, you name it, energies, mental patterns, behaviors, traumas, stored toxins physically in the body. It’s able to do this on all levels, like spiritual, emotional, mental spirit, physical. And that’s really what ayahuasca is. It’s kind of its secret sauce that no one really understands how is it able to do this? But that has a very profound effect. Most people after an ayahuasca retreat, they’ve done several ceremonies, and they’ve had lots of different kinds of purges leave feeling a lot lighter.

Stuff that they’ve been carrying around their entire lives is gone, is released. And so that purging isn’t always, you know, it’s not always vomiting, which is, I think what ayahuasca is known for is like, oh, it makes you vomit. But not everyone vomits, and certainly not everyone vomits. Every ceremony, it’s, you know, the purging can happen in lots of ways, but it’s usually some way in which your body is physically expelling some kind of energy.

And that’s. And, you know, some people actually can see what they’re purging. That does happen where like something is, they throw up and like, they have this vision of this experience from childhood. Happens all the time.

[00:22:34] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:22:34] Alex Theberge: So that’s one way certainly is the cleansing aspect. It’s a big part of ayahuasca is cleaning us out of stuff that doesn’t serve us anymore.

And also healing wounds, emotional wounds, traumas, pains that we carry from childhood, from adulthood, from relationships. It can help us do that.

It is also a master teacher, so it can give us insight about our patterns in our life that are causing us to suffer.

So, it’s able to show us and teach us things we need to change. So often there’s work to do after these ceremonies.

And it can heal trauma. It can help people release the stored pain of traumatic experiences. It can help people relate to what happened and understand it differently. All the things that in western psychology we understand as trauma being healed, it’s able to do in its own way.

You know, I would say those are the big ones. And then the other one, I would say, is really learning to love ourselves and being able to actually feel love. I have so many people who I’ve had in ceremony who. That was their first experience of truly feeling loved.

[00:23:55] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:23:56] Alex Theberge: And like, the fullness of what love is in their body, in their heart, in their mind, and that is life changing. That is a profound experience. So, it can help us to learn about love, be able to receive love, learn to love ourselves. And I think that’s a really important part of what it does.

[00:24:16] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:24:16] Matt Landsiedel: Well said. My very first ayahuasca ceremony, I was 25 and I had the most profound, beautiful experience. That was night one, and I just felt love and my heart opened up and people were playing guitar around me and I could feel each cord, like, in my body. It was, it was pretty magical. The next night, not so much, but I’ll share a bit more about that.

Brad, I’m curious, like, what, what do you think or what do you perceive that ayahuasca can heal? Just, I know you’ve, you’ve sat in a lot of ceremonies and you have a retreat center where people are coming to heal, right?

[00:24:50] Brad Wells: So, yeah, I’ve had the opportunity, you know, really to sit with hundreds of guests because we, after every ceremony, we, we do a sharing circle and people talk about what their experiences are. And then even post retreat, we connect back in with, with guests and it’s a lot of what, what Alex has said, you know, people just really, I think if I say what I’m most looking for beforehand, you know, a lot of just transformation, a lot of maybe breaking through that people have feel, you know, maybe being held back. What’s holding me back?

Looking to let go of some of the trauma that they’ve experienced in the past. That’s, that’s maybe holding them back.

You know, I hear people say I’m ready for what’s the next chapter in my life. Like, you know, I’m at this point now. What’s, what’s my purpose?

A lot, a lot of people come for healing, healing of relationships, healing, you know, themselves from, from trauma for sure.

You know, so it’s just, it’s profound. Like you just hear everyone almost has a unique story, which I guess isn’t surprising because we’re all unique individuals. But there’s such a unique combination of why people come. And really a unique come is, you know, what people receive afterwards is really unique as well. So, it really, if I were to sum it up, I think change, Matt, sustainable change, positive change, you know, in, in our lives is what I hear most people talking about.

[00:26:19] Alex Theberge: Yeah. Yeah, I love that.

[00:26:21] Matt Landsiedel: I kind of think about it like for me, whenever I do have done ayahuasca, it’s like the feeling after I have a really big cry and there’s this expansiveness.

But that expansiveness lasts longer after a big cry. It might be like 24 hours; we feel like that. And then maybe you start to go into a normal state of whatever contraction, wherever your baseline would be. But whenever I’ve done ayahuasca, it’s like I feel that expansiveness for a longer period of time, which gives me a nice window to be able to do different things, see the world through a different lens, observe my patterns more clearly. So, I just think that the importance of integration for me is the biggest piece of the ayahuasca. I’ve had very many profound ceremonies, but until I learned integration of the medicine, that was when I started to notice the real big benefits of this work.

[00:27:12] Brad Wells: So, like Alex said, there’s many different ways to purge. And crying is often a way the people purge. And I hear a lot from people, you know, they say, I can’t remember the last time I cried. I can’t remember the last time I let go of some of these emotions people often share. You know, I had my parent pass away or a close relative pass and I, I just didn’t shed a tear. And they were able to kind of go back into that and let those tears go. Let that, let that crying, you know, and how healing it is for them, it’s. It’s. It’s really amazing to hear.

[00:27:45] Matt Landsiedel: Yeah, it’s powerful. I almost perceive it, like, whenever I’m on, like, a psychedelic, whether I’ve done mushrooms in ayahuasca, it’s like my ego evaporates for the period of time that I’m under the influence, and it allows me to connect with myself without my protector parts constantly negotiating with my reality. It’s like, okay, here I am. Here’s the fullness of me, and I’m able to kind of relate with myself in this, like, fuller way. So, yeah, tears come through fears, like, all these parts that I’ve maybe learned to protect against experiencing. It allows me to access those easier. That’s how I’ve experienced it.

[00:28:23] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah.

[00:28:24] Brad Wells: And in accessing them, letting them go, in many cases, you know, kind of. Kind of going through that, you know, so that’s the transform. Transformation. It’s transformative. You know, think of my own. If I were to say one word for myself, it’s just. It’s just been an amazing transformative experience to feel self-love. You know, my particular case, I always knew I didn’t like myself. I just didn’t realize how much I hated myself until I really spent time, you know? So, for me, ayahuasca has helped go from a deep place of self-hatred to loving myself.

It’s profound, you know? And there’s a lot of gratitude on my part for that. It’s why I open reunion, you know, it’s been so transformative in my own life.

[00:29:10] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah.

[00:29:12] Matt Landsiedel: Tell us a bit more about that. What, what is these? What? Maybe think about, like, the experience that you had when you were using the medicine that really helped you have some realizations or some healing or letting go.

[00:29:24] Brad Wells: Yeah. I think particularly for this podcast to gay men, you know, I had grown in a very religious home. I heard from a very young age that know gay people were going to go to hell, and there was no place, you know, in the world for, for who I knew I was. So, I buried it deeply. Um, spent, uh, you know, 27 years married to a wonderful woman and was living, you know, or trying to live what. What I perceived to be a straight life. And, you know, sitting with ayahuasca, you know, I I kind of had this sense, like, you, you don’t like yourself. And I was like, yeah, I know. Like, I know I’ve never liked myself. And then it was a little bit more of a, of awareness that, no, you really don’t. Don’t like yourself. And I was like, yeah, I know. I really didn’t want to go there. You know, it’s like Alex alludes to, or you mentioned some nights. Some nights are a little more challenging than others. And for me, it was just like, no, you just hate yourself to the core. And I knew that, and I could feel it. And a lot of that for me went, not all of it, but certainly so much of it went back to being gay and trying to hide that, the guilt around it. And working with ayahuasca really let me let that go.

And I would say ayahuasca didn’t out me. Like, in my own experience, ayahuasca doesn’t do something to us that we don’t want. But for me, it allowed me to see things and to be aware that I wasn’t living an authentic life, that I wasn’t living in integrity. And that was important to me.

If I wanted to live a more authentic life, if I wanted to live in more integrity, I had the option to come out and be who I am. So, through the process, sitting with ayahuasca for sure helped me to do that four years ago. Came out as a gay man, and it was with a lot of tears, a lot of traumas, a lot of guilt.

And I’m really grateful for the experience of this plant medicine with ayahuasca to help me move through that.

You know, that’s, I think some of what we saw with, with the retreat that we did, you know, the guys that joined us moving through, for a lot of us, it’s helping to move through toxic shame. That workshop that you did, Matt, was, was really good. And, you know, we have shame in our lives, not just related to being gay, but what was nice about all of us being able to relate to each other is, is, you know, knowing that level of shame that was there because of. Because of being gay and because of this, you know, the way society looks at that.

So, I think that’s the biggest part for me. Yeah. I started my first ayahuasca ceremony as a married, straight CEO and identity. I was trying to wear, you know, pretty, pretty heavily, very tiring to wear that. And now I’m, you know, founder of a plant medicine center in Costa Rica and out and gay and in hosting these retreats and just seeing transformation and continued transformation in my own life, but also with so many of the guests that come down and spend a week with us.

[00:32:35] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:32:36] Matt Landsiedel: Does shame still show up for you in relationship to your gayness?

[00:32:41] Brad Wells: Yeah, it does at times. You know, I think the difference now, certainly not like it did. Right? And I would say that the difference is I’m aware of it. Ah, you know, this is, this is some shame creeping back in. You know, I also know and realize that it’s very easy for me to pick shame back up. You know, letting it go is one thing, and it’s also very easy to, for me, anyways, to invite it back in. So. So the awareness of, you know, what’s coming up for me, I just didn’t have that self-awareness before. So. Yeah, sometimes it does for sure, but. And not just with, with being gay. I mean, you know, certainly different aspects of life, but way, way, just a small, small fraction of how I lived my life before.

[00:33:28] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:33:29] Matt Landsiedel: Thanks for sharing.

[00:33:30] Brad Wells: Yeah, yeah.

[00:33:33] Matt Landsiedel: What about for you, Alex? I’m curious.

Yeah. Maybe if you wanted to share a bit about your healing journey. What. What drew you to the medicine, like, for yourself, for you wanting to use it for healing?

[00:33:48] Alex Theberge: You know, what drew me to ayahuasca in the first place was I was at a point in my life where I didn’t know my path going forward for, like, probably the first time ever and where I really had no idea what to do next. So, I’d already been a therapist for, I don’t know, 1012 years, and I kind of had reached a, I don’t know how to describe it, a plateau or just a flat place in my life where I was dissatisfied. I wasn’t, like, unhappy, depressed, but I was dissatisfied with kind of everything. I wasn’t liking the work anymore. I was not. I was just kind of, you know, dragging myself into sessions with my clients. And I was just like, I need to. I think I’m done.

And I felt the same way about San Francisco, which had changed a lot since I moved there right after college. And, you know, my community had really shifted and people had left and just kind of nothing. Nothing in my life was really felt right. And so, I decided to go on this around the world trip and kind of close everything down and just travel around the world. And I. The hope was that that would help me to find my direction because I honestly didn’t know what I was going to do next. I just knew I was done with therapy.

And in fact, at that point, I thought I had kind of. I’d retired, you know, from the field.

And so in that around the world travel, it was, you know, three years. I was, you know, in Peru, I did ayahuasca on the recommendation of a friend.

And that just opened up this whole journey of really finding out and learning what really matters to me.

Finding my footing in the world going forward, finding my meaning, my purpose, my direction that took was definitely not in the first retreat. That took probably two, three years, actually, to get there.

So, some part of it was really getting to know who I was and why I’m here and what’s my path in this world.

In some ways, it was kind of coming back home already because I had already gone down. Like, I’d already chosen this path. Healing service, counseling, whatever you want to call it. You know, it’s a path where your life is to help others. And so, kind of I came back to it, but in this much, much deeper way, and I would say a much more spiritual way.

And so, you know, that process also involved, you know, releasing a lot of stuff and, you know, working on myself, my emotions. I had certainly a lot of. A lot of emotions, a lot of emotional purges in that time and kind of tidying up things from the past, like past relationships that weren’t fully resolved. It kind of helped me clear the past and find my path forward and find, you know, what might really kind of rekindle what I love, which is community, nature, and healing. And those are the three things that really, I got there and I saw it was like. I just felt like I was just being filled up with love, with nutrients, with all the things that I’d been missing.

And part of that was the jungle and the forest, and it reminded me how much I love nature. So that was very refilling the nature of it, the plants, the trees, and then the community process, like, it wasn’t a solo. You know, I’d done therapy. I’ve been in therapy myself for years. You know, I’d done my work, but it was one on one, solitary, very different when you’re doing this work in community with others and that, I just loved that aspect of it. It just felt very bonded. I felt like I belonged somewhere, like, we’re all in this together.

That was really special, and that’s showed me how important that is to me. I didn’t really appreciate how important the community was to me until living that retreat centered lifestyle.

And then, yeah, healing and service is my path. I mean, it’s kind of naturally happened while I was there without just there as a guest. And then it just very quickly turned into me supporting others and then being asked to work there and then, you know, kind of off to the races on that front. So, and doing it from a much deeper place. You know, I just. I. More than anything, I think I learned. I learned a lot about what healing is in a way that I kind of going through a traditional psychotherapy training program, um, I feel like I learned, like, one narrow slice. It’s kind of mental, psychological version, you know, maybe a little emotional, too, in there. But this really deepened my understanding of, like, the whole human organism, spirit to body, and everything in between and what healing means there. It was profoundly eye opening, is what I would say. And so, when I eventually went back to the US, I was like, there is no way I can go back to traditional therapy. I just. I, you know, I. It had to be more holistic, and I had to continue to work with ayahuasca.

[00:39:21] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah.

[00:39:22] Matt Landsiedel: Beautiful. I love when something comes and it crosses our path and it’s like it changes your whole direction.

[00:39:28] Alex Theberge: Right.

[00:39:28] Matt Landsiedel: It sounds like. Yeah. If I were to reflect what you said in a couple words, it sounds like you got a lot of clarity of purpose, like clarity of the future. How am I going to be moving forward?

[00:39:39] Brad Wells: Yes.

[00:39:40] Matt Landsiedel: Clearing past. So, it sounds like maybe you needed to clear the past before you could get clarity of purpose and to move forward. And the medicine really gave you that?

[00:39:51] Alex Theberge: Yeah, that’s a great way to put it. It was. I needed to clear past stuff that I didn’t even know needed to be cleared.

That’s kind of what ayahuasca is.

It’s magic. It just shows us things that have been there holding us back that we didn’t even know was there. To me, that’s what it’s really.

I’ve never encountered anything that can do that. And so that helped me to then exactly move forward.

[00:40:19] Brad Wells: And that’s the common theme that we hear from guests. It’s that clearing of these things that we didn’t even know were holding us back.

[00:40:28] Matt Landsiedel: Yeah, it’s amazing. Clearing and clarity makes me think. Most of my ceremonies have been clearing. I haven’t really gotten much clarity from the medicine, but I hear a lot of people getting clarity from the medicine. Like, they get messages or they get visions of what to do next or these sorts of things. I think just my past and the things that I’ve been through. I think I’ve had a lot of tension building up inside my body and harboring and holding and guarding and protecting. And I think the medicine for me has been a really profound teacher on breathing, releasing, surrendering, and so the things can clear.

Yeah, I honestly think the medicine for me has really been.

It’s allowed me to develop a relationship with my ego in a healthy way. I think my ego came on board from a young age to protect me. And I had all these protection mechanisms that I was using to navigate a really, like, challenging upbringing.

And the medicine for me, gives me periods of time to be in relationship to my ego in a way that it feels co creative.

And I think that has been a big thing for me. It gives me periods of time to be able to observe my true nature, which is a loving being that isn’t inundated with fear. I think that’s been the periods of time. Not saying that my experiences with the medicine haven’t brought fear to me, but it’s allowed me to maybe even face my fear. Because if an ego comes online early, it’s usually guarding against having to experience those things. So, it’s like if I can start to connect with myself and connect with my fear and look at it and be with it in a conscious way, that’s been the biggest takeaway for me from the medicine.

Yeah, that reminds me of the ceremony that we. That. I think it was the first ceremony or. No, it was the second ceremony that we did. And you came up to me, Brad, and you were known, kind of just coaching me beside me and like telling me that it’s okay. And you were kind of. You were talking with my inner child. My inner child was like feeling a lot of fear and things from the past were coming up. And it was just. It was a really powerful experience to be able to have somebody there that felt supportive at that time, to be able to help me feel safe in that moment. So, it’s like, if I experience the medicine is like.

[00:42:55] Alex Theberge: It’s.

[00:42:55] Matt Landsiedel: It’s giving me an opportunity to experience something from the past, but from a higher perspective, from a higher knowingness in that moment.

Yeah, it’s powerful. It’s very powerful.

[00:43:09] Brad Wells: Safety is one of the biggest issues that come up with guests. Am I going to be in a safe place physically, medically, if I can just say it. Reunion. We have a licensed medical clinic on the property. We have close to 40 acres.

We’re gated, you know, so it’s just us. Costa Rica is one of the safest, if not the safest countries in Central America. So, guests are really in a safe physically place to do. To do this work and to take the medicine. And they’re in a place that’s safe psychologically. And I think that’s one of the.

That’s why we’re doing a gay men’s week. Right? So not only is there the safety of being in that and the acceptance, but a lot of guests said when we were down there, Matt, you know, they’ve always felt like the token gay when they went to these different retreats. Right? I heard that a lot, and this was so different. I think we all felt the same way. You know, we sat in a room with. With 25 to 30 gay men and gay and queer men and just felt, you know, how inclusive that is to do the work, you know? So that’s why we’re. That’s why we’re doing this one in July and another one in August, just to bring the group of guys together again.

[00:44:23] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:44:26] Matt Landsiedel: I was. I just did two. Well, since we met, I did. I’ve done two retreats where I was a participant, and I was the token gay, and I was like, there’s that hesitation. It’s always that little, ooh, like, do I tell people? And I scan. I’m scanning the room so that younger, protective part comes in even still. Right. I’ve done a ton of work in this area and that little protector parts. Always looking, you know, are these people safe? Is it safe to let people know about this really vulnerable, sensitive part of who I am? Right. So, it is very nice. I found that even though I was facilitating at that retreat, I found it very healing being around other gay men. That part of me just. It was able to just rest and sink into itself, and it didn’t have to be hyper vigilant over the course of the week. So, it was nice.

[00:45:13] Brad Wells: It was really nice for me, too. Like, just. Yeah. And for me, I mean, you know, the founder of a retreat center, I’ve never felt more inclusive than our cultivating pride week. You know, that’s why I’m looking forward to continuing this, because it just allows us to go and be comfortable and go deep into some of the stuff that we want to work through.

[00:45:36] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah.

[00:45:37] Alex Theberge: I felt the same way. I’m always the token gay and even retreats that I’m leading. You know, it’s.

It just. It was so special to be in a. In a group where everyone was gay and queer and was there for the same purpose, like, to work on themselves, to do some. Some transformational, some growth, some healing work. And it really. I felt very connected to everybody in a. In a deeper way, and it felt like community, you know, it felt like a real. A healthy community. You know, personally, I’ve never had that in the gay world. Like, any communities I’ve been part of have usually been very party centric. And to be in the space where it’s not party centric, it’s not about trying to seduce someone, trying to have sex with someone. Like, all of that’s out of space for the whole week. Really getting to know people in this deeper kind of true intimacy, getting to know people, their challenges, their soft spots. You’re sharing your soft spots. You’re being seen, you’re being witness and finding how much in common I had with so many people in. I didn’t expect. It was beautiful.

[00:46:53] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:46:55] Brad Wells: Well, and the groups really stayed together. They really still connected. You know, it’s nice to see a lot of them meeting up for dinners and groups. And the communication between. Between everyone is really powerful. That’s what, you know, the name reunion is about reuniting with ourselves, coming back to who we are, but also reuniting in community. So, it was nice to see, you know, that both of that, both of those things were happening from the last retreat.

[00:47:21] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah, I agree.

[00:47:23] Matt Landsiedel: I agree. I’m curious for you, Alex, in the sense of safety, as a trained ayahuasca, what are some of the elements that are essential in order to create a safe experience for people?

[00:47:37] Alex Theberge: Well, there’s all the different levels of human experience need to be safe. So physically, as Brad said, the space has to be safe. That also means having enough people to attend to all the bodies that are there. Because some people might need help. Some people need help in the bathroom. Sometimes people need help calming themselves. The physical bodies need to be safe. That’s one you have experienced. People that know how to do that, know all the things that can happen in an ayahuasca ceremony, and the team is enough to handle that. Then there’s the emotional safety of, like, these are people I can trust that are warm and accepting, and, you know, can. Can witness and support what I’m going through without judging it or criticizing it. And you don’t always get that there’s some kind of harsh people in the plant medicine world sometimes. A lot of opinions about how things should be. And so, you know, our team is extremely supportive, warm, compassionate. It’s about helping people have their own experience, not telling them how it needs to be. So that emotional safety, to really feel like you can go as deep as you need to go, that’s necessary to have that deeper level of transformation and healing, because if you don’t feel that, you’re not going to feel safe and comfortable to truly surrender and truly let go into the process.

[00:49:02] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:49:03] Alex Theberge: And then there’s also a spiritual level of safety. And that’s kind of the role of the ayahuasca, which is to protect the space spiritually and to keep people’s energies kind of where they need to be and keep out anything external. And so, it’s like creating a. It’s basically creating a bubble, an energetic bubble around the whole ceremony space that allows all of our, you know, our purges and all the energies we’re releasing to leave but doesn’t allow anything else in.

[00:49:40] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:49:41] Alex Theberge: And so that’s really important as well, having that spiritual container.

[00:49:47] Matt Landsiedel: Yeah, yeah, I like that. And I also think it’s important, too, that the person that’s like, the ayahuasca has done their work, because I’ve also sat with people where I could feel that they haven’t done a lot of their work and there, you know, so. And I’ve sat with you in ceremony, and I see that you’ve. You’re showing up in integrity and that you’re in alignment to your teachings, which is, in my opinion, one of the most important aspects.

[00:50:11] Alex Theberge: Yeah, I’m glad you mentioned that. That’s probably should. I should have led with that, because there are many people, even in the Amazon and, you know, traditional Iowa schedules, that are. They’re not in integrity, and they’re there to get money, they’re there to use people. They’re there to seduce the women as foreigners. That happens a lot.

[00:50:30] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:50:30] Alex Theberge: And so, you know, it’s like, the true people who are dedicated to medicine is. Is the smaller percentage. Yeah, I agree, you know.

[00:50:40] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:50:40] Brad Wells: And I will say, Matt, that’s, you know, one of the most important things that. That I spend time with. We have very few. We only have three or four people in total that serve medicine at reunion, you know, people who have done the training, years of experience, people who I know and trust very well, you know, and having Alex there as a gay man for this cultivating pride was, you know, was really great. Alex said that, you know, during. During. During the week, and not just the. Certainly, the people serving the medicine, but where the medicine comes from. So, we’re also very aware of serving medicine for ours. These retreats we’re talking about. It’s. It’s ayahuasca and Chacruna. That’s the only substances in. In the tea, in the brew that we serve. And we know where that ayahuasca comes from. We get it directly from the village in. In. In Peru that. That supports us. So, um, yeah, it is important that the person doing this is. Has done the work and is integrity, for sure.

[00:51:40] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah, I agree.

[00:51:41] Matt Landsiedel: It’s like hiring a therapist that isn’t, you know, isn’t living what they’re teaching or what their practices are. It’s, I just think everything’s an energetic transmission from my perspective. So, the person that’s, you know, in residence of the work, the teachings, it’s, we feel it, we feel that vibration. And actually, to tell the story, when, when you were singing the Ikaros above me, Alex, it was like, whoa. Like I was able to go to that next place. Right, so you were channeling something through that I was picking up on.

[00:52:10] Brad Wells: Right.

[00:52:10] Matt Landsiedel: And I think in order to be able to channel, like, you have to be in integrity, you have to be in alignment to your teachings, to the energy that your teachings are transmitting. And so, yeah, I feel very fortunate that I’ve come into collaboration with you guys because it is high integrity from my perspective.

[00:52:29] Brad Wells: So, and a lot of the feedback too from the guys that were there was the same, you know, they felt safe. They felt that this, this was an amazing opportunity. You know, one of the guests said to me, Matt, I think I said this to you, you know, he’d been looking for 55 years for what he found.

[00:52:45] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:52:45] Brad Wells: You know, I thought, wow, what a profound statement. Looking for 55 years for what I found.

You know, it’s not uncommon.

[00:52:54] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah.

[00:52:57] Matt Landsiedel: Um, for people that are listening and they’re like, is this for me? Do I, should I go? Is this something that I would, you know, benefit from? I want to just get a sense. Alex or Brad, either of you that feels called to answer is plant medicine for everyone? Is there contraindications, is there a reason why somebody wouldn’t, wouldn’t come?

[00:53:17] Brad Wells: Well, one of the things that we do is we do a medical intake with everyone that comes. Right.

Most, you know, medications that people are on a health check. Right. And we go through that on the, on the intake process because if there is something preexisting that isn’t safe for, for an individual to do with, with ayahuasca, we want to know upfront and, you know, we don’t have that individual come. They may be on an antidepressant that needs to be weaned off of, you know, before they come so many, many times. They can still come. It’s maybe just some extra preparation beforehand, but it’s also why we have a licensed medical clinic on the, on the property, you know, where we do blood pressure checks and in heart rate monitoring before those first retreats, just to make sure that people are physically safe to do this. So that would be probably one of the main reasons, Alex, to not be able to do the medicine, would be from a physical safety, a medical safety perspective.

[00:54:13] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:54:15] Alex Theberge: Yeah. I mean, the most common issues that come up with wanting to do ayahuasca, but it’s not safe to do is high blood pressure.

So, you know, hypertension, you know, a little high blood pressure can be okay, but above a certain level, it’s dangerous because ayahuasca will elevate your blood pressure in the process of it. And then, as Brad said, there’s a lot of medications that don’t work well with ayahuasca. Ayahuasca is a really complex brew with a lot of different compounds in it that can have unpleasant or sometimes dangerous interactions with prescription medications. So that screening is really important. And I do, you know, I saw myself personally being there, how seriously reunion takes that with a, you know, nurse on site, a doctor that’s the medical overseer, and, you know, checking the blood pressure very thorough. So those are the main ones. You know, there’s also certain mental health conditions that, um, it’s risky to do. Like, if you have bipolar, I disorder, you’ve had a manic episode, you shouldn’t be doing just. It’s not worth the risk to really do any psychedelics, actually. Um, and same with, um, anything in the psychosis spectrum, uh, any kind of disorder where you’ve ever had psychosis or lost touch with reality, um, for an extended period of time, you know, beyond just like a substance you took, it’s too risky because that could trigger that.

[00:55:48] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:55:48] Matt Landsiedel: Okay.

[00:55:49] Brad Wells: Yeah. Safety is the biggest one. And just to add your point on the high blood pressure, I’m on a high blood pressure medication, so I don’t have to come off that. The medication that I’m on is fine to be taken with ayahuasca, and it brings it down. So not all medications. Many medications you don’t have to come off for this week. Guys often ask if I’m on prep, do I have to come off that? No, we don’t. If there’s, uh, HIV medications, uh, the guys don’t have to come off those, you know, so it’s really just. Just the ones that. That are contraindicated for. For ayahuasca that we screen out.

[00:56:22] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[00:56:23] Matt Landsiedel: Good, good. And, yeah, this isn’t a thing where you can just go online and register for this. You have to book a discovery call and consult with yourself, Brad, and then the medical team and things like that. So, it’s very thought out.

[00:56:34] Brad Wells: And, uh.

[00:56:36] Matt Landsiedel: So, okay, one last thing I want to talk about, because I’d be remiss if I talked about plant medicine without bringing up the concept of integration, which I talked briefly about earlier. But let’s touch on that, because for me, it’s one thing to go have a big experience, but then what do we do with that? What do we do after leaving a retreat? How do we use this for me, again, that three-month window? I find it’s about a three-month window for myself. That is where the magic happens. So maybe I’ll get you, Alex, to talk a bit about integration, because I know you do integration work in you. In your practice. What does that look like? What is it? Why is it beneficial?

[00:57:12] Alex Theberge: Well, it’s.

It’s a way of taking what you experienced during the retreat and, you know, the healings, the insights, the wisdom, the shifts in perspective and actually translating that into manifest a change in your life in the future. So, some things, you know, with ayahuasca, some things, you know, you have the purge. It’s done, and there’s nothing else to do, right? Like, there’s a transformational element just doing the ceremony, but there’s a lot of things that come up that need more work. And I would say everyone will have some things that need more work after a retreat. And that work can look like I need to give up. Certainly, you know, behaviors or patterns that I was shown don’t serve me anymore. That’s really common.

I need to fix a relationship, you know, like, tidy it up, apologize, make amends with someone, or I need to treat myself better. I need to take care of myself better, or maybe I need to start therapy. Sometimes that happens where people realize, oh, you know, there’s a lot of traumas here I’ve never dealt with. The medicine showed to me that it’s really affecting me, and there’s more to do. So, there’s usually some work to do afterwards.

My experience, you know, working at a retreat center and seeing people come back year after year, those who really took their integration seriously, they came back, they made the changes they needed to make in their life. They came back much better place, ready for kind of the next thing. People who didn’t, it’s like they came back and they were, like, right back in the same mess. Yeah, because they didn’t make any changes. Maybe they needed to change a relationship or change their job or change how they were living or changed their relationship to substances they were using. They didn’t make any of those changes. So ayahuasca can kind of clean you up and shine you up and you’re ready, you’re sparkling. You go back home. But if you don’t change your environment and your life to match that new, shiny, sparkly you, then over time it’s very easy to get back. You’re rebuilding the same patterns that you just fought to clear. So, integration, I think three months is a good way to look at it, is really important. And actually, Brad initially reached out to me to help with, it wasn’t even to facilitate the retreat. It was to help develop an integration program for the cultivating priority retreat. And so, I put a lot of thought into it. We worked on it as a team. It’s a multi week program with videos and recommended practices and resources if people need them, that we’ve gotten a lot of good feedback on that. And yeah, it is important. You will just go so much further if you’re taking your integration seriously.

[01:00:13] Brad Wells: Yeah, I think what we hear from guests is they’ve had an amazing week, but now they want to have sustainable change.

In the integration program that we’ve put together specifically for cultivating, pride helps to give the tools, if that’s a way to say it, or the support for guys going forward afterwards.

And we incorporate some of that even into the initial workshops during the week, you definitely want to start to hit on what’s it going to be like when you go home. What are some of the practices that you can incorporate that help you with sustainable change?

One of the sessions we do is breath work. Breath work. Something that you can do when you go home.

A meditative practice might, might, might be helpful for people. So, providing some of the tools that people are able to go back home and really keep this change going for them.

[01:01:06] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

Yeah.

[01:01:09] Matt Landsiedel: Well said, guys.

All right, before we land the plane, let’s share with them our offering. What’s coming up? We got some two retreats coming up, July, October. So, I’ll turn it over to you, Brad, to share a little bit more about the cultivating pride and authenticity retreats coming up.

[01:01:29] Brad Wells: Yeah, we have two retreats like you mentioned, the one in July and the one in October. And a lot of the details of reunion can be found on our website and specifically the details of this program. But I think the most important thing in the guys I talked to Matt in quite a few that are listeners to the podcast are, are really looking for how do I take things in my life to the next level? You know, like how, how can I have that change that, that I’m wanting to have? And this retreat is really designed to. To help do that, you know, too. And it’s unique for. It’s unique for everyone. So, you know, the ethos of this is not for profit. So, we’re not doing this for, you know, for money. It’s not. Not why we founded reunion. It’s not why I’ve done it. We need to pay our bills. We need to be sustainable. So, we do have to charge for the week, but it really is to provide a place where people can come in and do this work. Particularly gay, queer, and questioning men can come and do this work in community.

It’s really profound to be able to sit around and do this work together.

So that’s why we’re doing these retreats. We’re going to do two this year. And the hope is, and as more and more people hear about this and are called to it, that we can continue this into 2025 and beyond, because, you know, this is not for reunion. Doing an LGBTQ program is not kind of a checkbox on an organization. You know, we should do this, support this community. I am a gay man, founded this retreat center, and this program is. Is, you know, the core of what I’m involved in. And it’s really exciting to be able to provide this for. For people that want to come and do the work.

[01:03:11] Alex Theberge: Yeah. Yeah.

[01:03:13] Matt Landsiedel: For people that are listening, that are part of the gay men’s brotherhood, this is an opportunity to come in person and do some personal development and healing work with other gay men. A lot of the spaces that we have in our community revolve around drugs, alcohol, partying, cruises, like, all these sorts of things, which. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s very rare to find spaces where you can come and go deep healing work with other gay men. Right. So, I think that’s a big part for me. And the fact that it’s a non-sexual space, and in our very first orientation, we even talked about that. Right. Like, this is not a place to cruise to come to look for your next partner lover. It’s not about that. It’s about to come and be in deeper relationship with yourself while also holding that there’s community here that can be supportive in a platonic way. That, for me, is the integrity of this work, because I don’t want to be part of communities where they’re mixing plant medicine and sex. I just think it’s not ethical from my point of view.

[01:04:15] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[01:04:17] Brad Wells: And we had guys from all over the world, all different sizes and shapes and colors and identity. It was really, it was powerful. So, this is, to your point, it’s not a cruising opportunity. Nothing wrong with that. It’s just. That’s not what this week is about. You know, it’s. It’s an opportunity to be in community and to do our own work in, to have some of these changes that we want.

[01:04:42] Alex Theberge: Yeah. Yeah.

[01:04:44] Matt Landsiedel: So, what can. If somebody does want to, they decide they want to come, what can they expect?

So, they set up their discovery call. Like, just maybe walk through the process and then a little bit about what happens at the retreat. I know it’d be important to share that a little bit about that.

[01:04:59] Brad Wells: Sure. So, you know, going on to reunionexperience.org. dot. That’s our website.

There’s a specific landing page for the cultivating pride program.

And they can book a discovery call. So, they don’t put a deposit down or anything to book that discovery call.

Usually it’s me, but depending on demand, it’s one of us, that book that call, and we can just go more on an individual basis. What is it that the person’s looking for? What are their specific questions? A lot of times I hear people, I don’t want to vomit. You know, into Alex’s point, my own experience, I didn’t want to vomit either. Like, I didn’t sign up for that.

Now, looking at it, I’m. You know, I let go of a lot through. Through those purges, and not everyone purges, so it’s not. Everyone’s going to. Everyone purges. Not everyone vomits, you know, so it’s not. And then I hear sometimes, like, it seems like it’s a really good-looking group on your website, and I’m like, let’s. Didn’t even enter the picture right. It wasn’t. It wasn’t about that, you know, and certainly having us all together. Community was good. So, they come on and book a discovery call if they’re feeling that this is for them. This isn’t a sales pitch. You really do need to feel like, hey, this is something I want to do. I want to be part of this. I want to do this transformative experience.

Then. Then you go on and book and put in your deposit, and then we get you going on the intake, which is the medical part, and then we register. You can go with the single room or. Or. Or a private room when you’re there for the week. Retreats start on the Saturday in first night. Well, actually, we start beforehand. We want to. We want to get everyone on a Zoom call a couple of weeks before just to do an introduction, introduction to us and to each other because that’s the sense of community that we want to be building, you know, so, so you’re going to be spending time with, with these people, these guys. And then, you know, introduction the first night, kind of an orientation on the Saturday when we get there. And, and our first ceremony is Sunday night after some workshops during, during the day on what to expect in ayahuasca. Ayahuasca 101 is what we call it. There are two ceremonies. Monday, sorry, Sunday, Monday. Then we take a night off and then another two ceremonies on Wednesday and Thursday. So, we’ll have four ayahuasca ceremonies during the week.

In July, we’ll also have a sweat lodge, traditional indigenous sweat lodge that is going to be offered. We won’t have that opportunity in October. And then really supportive of the ceremonies are the workshops that we’ve put together. And particular, Matt, your help with the workshops that we do during the day for a couple of hours to really take us into a place of being ready for ceremony, personally in for myself and for, you know, a lot of the guys that were there. The, you know, toxic shame and a shame workshop really set a nice stage for. For going into one of the first ayahuasca ceremonies. Letting go of, of some of that. Letting go of a lot of that.

[01:08:04] Alex Theberge: Yeah. Yeah.

[01:08:05] Brad Wells: You know, and I think having it. Having a group of other, like, you know, all gay men and we’re all in the same boat and sharing the story like, it just, for me, it was just so, you know, nice to hear I wasn’t alone in this. The feelings I had, the things that. The thoughts I’ve had, the stories I’ve told myself. A lot of that was common to everyone in, in the group, you know, and I think just allows us to go deeper into this work.

[01:08:31] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[01:08:32] Brad Wells: So, it’s a full week. We don’t want it to be, you know, two full, because it’s nice to have time to interact and connect with. With. With other people that are there with the other guys over. Over meals. We’re in a beautiful location. You know, we’re right on the ocean in Costa Rica, so, you know, get in and enjoying the, the beautiful ocean. We have a pool on the property as well. So, we. There’s this balance of some deep, transformative work that can be tiring for sure at times, and then some downtime in some individual space as well. There’s. There’s quite a number of places to be by myself on the property if you want to be by yourself, or in community if you want to be connected.

[01:09:13] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah.

[01:09:15] Matt Landsiedel: Good overview of it all.

[01:09:19] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[01:09:19] Matt Landsiedel: And I’ll include the link in the show notes. So, for those of you that are interested and you want to inquire, you want to set up a discovery call, just click on the link in the show notes and everything will be there. And I believe if you. If they submit the promo code MLREUNION you can save $250 on your registration.

[01:09:40] Brad Wells: So that’s beautiful for the podcast, for sure, our community here, for sure.

And thank you for that. You know, I hear from the guests I talked to booking discovery calls just how, how important this podcast has been that you and Michael are doing for so many of them, because I think the reason they’re listening to the podcast is they are looking for something other than the party scene, the bar scene, you know, again, nothing wrong with that. That’s always there. But a lot of the guys I’ve talked to that are listening to this podcast, Matt, are. Are the same guests that, that are looking to come to reunion. They’re wanting to be in community. They’re wanting to, you know, go into their own transformation, into their own healing. And your podcast is really providing a lot of opportunity for people to connect and to relate to a lot of what, what you’re discussing. So, thanks. Yeah, you know, yeah, I was. I was listening to the podcast, you know, and I think I said to you one point, I thought, I think you must have done, you know, I think Matt Stone, ayahuasca, and I’m glad that we connected. And thanks for being part of this program, because it’s been really, really transformative for so many of these guys.

[01:10:50] Alex Theberge: Yeah, yeah.

[01:10:51] Matt Landsiedel: Thank you for that. Yeah, I’m looking forward to round two and three. Let’s do this. Let’s change lives. That’s why we’re here.

[01:10:59] Brad Wells: Yeah.

[01:11:00] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[01:11:00] Brad Wells: It’s a beautiful opportunity to. To come together. And, Alex, thank you as well for coming, being part of this at reunion. It’s. It’s. It’s really amazing to see the changes that, in the feedback from the guys say, you know, that have been through the program. It’s just, you know, it’s heartwarming. The only way to describe it.

[01:11:17] Alex Theberge: It’s an honor to be able to do this and be part of this.

[01:11:20] Alex Theberge: So, yeah.

[01:11:21] Alex Theberge: Very grateful myself.

[01:11:24] Brad Wells: Yeah, it’s exciting.

[01:11:26] Alex Theberge: Yeah.

[01:11:27] Matt Landsiedel: All right, well, we’ll land the plane here. I want to just personally thank you guys for coming on and sharing your stories and your wisdom and, yeah, like I said, I’m looking forward to what July and October have in store for us. It’s going to be great. And, yeah, for those tuning in audience, thanks for spending another hour with me and my guests and link in the show notes. Let us know if you have any questions. You can always email [email protected] or leave comments on YouTube and I’ll make sure that the questions on YouTube and I’ll make sure they get answered.

All right, until next time, much love, everybody.

[01:12:07] Brad Wells: Thanks.

[01:12:08] Alex Theberge: Thanks, man.