Jay Godfrey and Richard Meloff: The Business of Psychedelics

Hey everyone, welcome back to Make It Happen Mondays, where we talk about sales, business, entrepreneurship, personal growth, mental health, and everything in between with guests who I truly respect and I think make a positive impact on the world around us. This episode puts a high focus on mental health and the world of psychedelic therapy with two people who are really trying to make a difference, Jay Godfrey and Richard Meloft, the co-founders of Nushama, a ketamine-assisted psychedelic therapy treatment center. Now Jay comes from a real interesting background of investment banking and then was a fashion designer with his own brand that was worn by some of the most famous actors in the world like Jennifer Lopez and many others.

And Richard comes from starting on Wall Street as an M&A lawyer and then getting into the cannabis industry where he focused his main efforts on building out sales teams. Now both of them learned about the benefits of ketamine-assisted psychedelic therapy and became passionate about bringing it to the market to help people with all sorts of mental health issues like depression, PTSD, and much more. In this episode, we talk about their backgrounds, why they got into the field and where it's going. We also discussed the stigma behind psychedelic drugs and where it comes from and the positive impact it has on people when used the right way under controlled settings and professional supervision.

We then dove into the business side of the house where we discussed the industry itself and what the opportunities were, especially from a sales perspective. And it was pretty obvious to me at the end of this conversation that this is an industry that is just getting started and the opportunities from a business perspective are significant, but the opportunities to really make a difference in people's lives were even greater. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. Let's make it happen. What's happening, make it happen, family? Big shout out to our partners today, Gong, Vidyard, and Chili Piper. Gong's data is more than valuable. It's cornerstone in any organization looking to collect the data that's going to tell them where they can improve and where they need to spend their time making changes.

Vidyard makes it easy for people to use videos anywhere. No matter whether you're sending videos in email or on social media, posting them somewhere or sending them in a DM, Vidyard has got you covered. Our friends at Chili Piper are so much fun to be around. They make it easy for people to get on your calendar. And every sales rep has got to have this function locked in. It's one of the most important things we can do as a seller. How can I get you on my calendar easily? Chili Piper can make that happen for you. Be sure that you're checking out all these great tools. And now let's pass it over to John to find out who's joining him today. See you soon, everybody. All right. Jay and Richard from Nushama.

How are you guys today? I'm looking forward to this conversation. We're great. And so are we. Yeah, it was this is I was telling you, you know, the kind of the background on this one for everybody listening right now. You know, I've been introduced to a guy, Chris, who is writing a book on gratitude. And some of y'all might have listened to Chris Shumbo's on our on our previous podcast. And it was cool conversation. I had followed up with him. And right after, you know, on the follow up, he had just come out of one of these sessions with you guys. And I was absolutely fascinated because ketamine, which is the drug that we're going to be talking about today. And the benefits of the psychotherapy component of it and the business side of it scared the crap out of me a long time ago in my clubbing days.

And so I was like, wait, I got to learn more about this. So let's talk before we get into like all the cool shit that we're going to have a conversation. Let's go a little bit of background here. And Jay, if you maybe want to start us off, because you've got a real interesting background as I looked into you. Like you went from what investment banking to fashion to now doing psychotherapy with kind of like talk to me through this journey here, man, because that sounds real interesting to me. Thanks, John. It's great to be here and kind of surreal that I'm sitting in a psychedelic wellness center, you know, right in the middle of Manhattan after a fairly long day of seeing people come through our center and look to get treated for depression and anxiety and PTSD and alcoholism.

So I was one of those people who went to college, the dreams of becoming an investment banker. And I went to Wall Street. I actually grew up in Toronto, Canada, went to college at McGill in Montreal, arrived in New York with very big dreams, you know, to be an investment banker. And after about 14 months, I was like, no, this is not to me. This is, this is, excuse the expression, the fucking torture. And, um, you know, I did what every investment banker does after recognizing that this is no fun is I applied to the Parsons School of Design to become a women's fashion designer, which which is kind of insane. Like what, like what back? Cause you, well, you did go to school though. Like your, did you go to school after the fact, but you did, I thought you went to school before with that in mind to a certain degree, because what was that leap from investment banking?

How did that even happen? Well, it was definitely a leap. I was willing to jump out of anything to get out of, uh, investment banking, probably, you know, doing harm to myself, if that all kidding aside, but, you know, I, I had a profound love for, you know, you know, I wanted to create a brand. Um, I loved fashion at the time anyway, and I thought it would be a great career and it was a great career. I was in the fashion industry with a brand, um, named after myself selling at the greatest retailers in the world, um, dressing all these celebrities and great parties. You know, in about 2015, I recognized that all my dreams had come true and something didn't feel right. And so there was a, uh, I, I felt like I, something was missing.

I felt something like something wasn't right, as I said, and I went to therapy for three years from 2015 to 2018. And what I quick, not so quickly recognized after going every single week for three years and spending, I don't know, $350 per session every single week in Manhattan, um, I recognized that I had some great strategies and coping mechanisms, but I wasn't getting to the underlying feeling of why I wasn't feeling good, why I was, I was lacking worthiness, why I was lacking confidence, why I didn't see myself as others saw me. And, uh, I was, you know, I had a change your mind by Michael Pollan had just come out. It was recommended to me 20 times over. And I said to myself, why the hell am I going to read a book about drugs?

I don't, I've never done any drugs. I think I smoked pot in college, maybe four times. And I really didn't, you know, it wasn't, I didn't love it that much. And so I figured to myself, I, okay, fine, I'll read the book, but I'm not sure what benefit I'm going to get from it. And after reading it, um, I said to myself that there was really no doubt that this was going to be the future of psychiatry. And it was only a matter of time that the old system of medicating people with benzodiazepines like Xanax or SSRIs like Prozac were really, really going to be a thing of the past. Um, but this was just theory for me, you know, I just read it in a book. And shortly thereafter, as I started talking about how to change your mind to friends of mine and acquaintances and kind of other founders and CEOs of businesses, I was really, really fortunate that, that I met a guy who recommended a shaman to me, um, that was, uh, administering plant medicine and, you know, all the classic plant medicines, including psilocybin and ayahuasca.

And what was fascinating to me was I was so reluctant because I was afraid. I was afraid of, you know, I'd heard for years and years and years, you know, uh, just say no, and these things are addictive and they'll fuck you up. And all these things that are part of our, uh, societal discourse about drugs. Uh, and I certainly believe them, but I was willing to give it a shot and go on a journey as, as the treatments called. And after my first experience in August, 2019 with psilocybin, I sat there and I did, I did it in a ceremony in a beautiful outdoor location. And I was looking up at the sky thinking I'll never be the same again in the best possible way. And I had just uncovered things that I couldn't uncover in three years of therapy.

And that is when I, I really started to recognize viscerally that this was a game changer. It was a game changer for me. And then I would later recognize, uh, in a journey in May, 2020, as my fashion business was totally hitting the shit because nobody was wearing dresses anymore and going to cocktail parties or weddings or bar mitzvahs. And I was sitting at home with this new sense of awareness thinking that, well, what's going to be next. And in May, 2020, I went into this journey and I felt truly selected to do this work. And in that journey, I downloaded that, um, there had to be a way in the medical context, um, in the here and now, I was aware of the fact through Michael Pollan's book and through various media outlets that MDMA and psilocybin and LSD and BMT and Ibogaine were all being studied to treat mood disorders like PTSD and depression and anxiety and alcoholism and other addictions.

But that was in the future. Like what was going to solve, what was going to help people now? I was looking around and seeing people freaked out because of COVID and unable to leave their home and, and really just living a life, uh, from fear. And after doing this work myself with plant medicine, I was looking around like, am I, am I the crazy one who's feeling, or is it everybody else? And in May, 2020, I had this, this experience that this really needed to be brought into the medical context right here, right now. And we were very, very lucky to, um, to, to recognize it was a molecule in ketamine that if administered at the right dosages by the right physician, um, to a properly screened perspective patient, and that patient went through proper preparatory sessions to prepare for the psychedelic experience.

And after they were done properly integrated their experience, gleaned a key insight from it, that there was a real, not only opportunity to help a shit ton of people like myself, but also build an incredible business. That's part of this broader psychedelic movement. Oh man, that's, I mean, that, and when you feel that calling, I want to get into kind of that, that epiphany or, and also what it feels like, but before there, you know, Richard, you, you have a, like another interesting background getting here, but it's a little bit more of a connective dots with the cannabis industry, right? Yeah. So I, I started like Jay, I, I graduated, I went to law school. I became a lawyer on wall street.

Uh, it only took Jay, uh, 14 months to realize investment banking wasn't for him. It took 36 months for me to figure out that, uh, that I wasn't, uh, put on this earth to, uh, to be a lawyer. And, um, I, I was involved in a lot of different entrepreneurial ventures. And then I was given an opportunity to join the senior executive team of a public trade, a cannabis company back in 2019. Uh, he really did a great job of, uh, tip talking that market or top ticking, excuse me, that market. Um, but it was an unbelievable learning experience. Uh, you know, it's not often that you get to, uh, be in an industry that goes from illegal to legal, right? Like the last time that happened was, uh, with, uh, alcohol prohibition, you know, 90 years ago.

So it was incredibly exciting, uh, learned a lot of valuable lessons, paid a lot of tuition as it were to learn those lessons. Um, but you know, it was interesting. We, we did, you know, the Canadian, uh, Canada is one of only two jurisdictions in the world where cannabis is legal federally, uh, across the entire country. And, but the way it got there was through the medical channel, meaning it was first, you know, uh, legalized for medical use and then rec followed, recreational follow. And primarily the medical use was for, uh, war veterans, uh, that were coming back from Afghanistan. They had tremendous, uh, suffering with PTSD. And so, uh, as a compassionate program, it made a lot of sense to allow these veterans to access medical cannabis to help, um, to help you with their symptoms of PTSD.

And what was a little shocking though, was that some of these prescriptions were like five to 10 grams per day of cannabis, which is simply a staggering amount. If you, you know, I mean, they're very, and that's a lot of weed. It's a lot of weed, right? It's a lot of weed and, and, and sort of like, uh, an amount that would, you'd be stoned from the minute you woke up to the minute you went to sleep at night. Right. And so to me, that was like, okay, it's better than the alternative. It's better than self-harm. It's better than, but it is not a solution. It is not, it is just letting people cope. It's not dealing with the underlying issue. So, um, I'm reading like Jay, how to change your mind.

And of course it's doing exactly what it says it's going to do. It's going to change your mind. And, and you realize that there is an opportunity out there to, um, actually get to the root of the issue, to the root of the matter and not just cover up the symptoms with band-aids. And so, uh, I've known Jay, we went to McGill together. I've known him for a quarter century and I, we saw each other at a, at a, at an event and we started talking about our, our mutual exploration of this, of the space. And that's, that's the genesis of how, of how this came together, where I said, you know, I, I feel like there's this opportunity to really help people in the here and now. And, um, more than what we currently see with, with, uh, with medical cannabis.

As good as it is, it's sort of like, you know, it's, it's a stepping stone. It's on its way to something even, even better. And so I left my position, uh, um, at the cannabis company to, to start a new Shamba with Jay. And, uh, yeah, it's been a, it's been an incredible ride, uh, since we started, um, in April of 2021. Yeah. It's, I mean, it sounds like the, the, uh, opportunity to help is massive. Can, can I get your perspective on why, um, we are where we are with the drug mentality, right? I mean, Nancy Reagan, you know, don't do drugs and blah, blah, blah. I know that, but is it, is it truly a political thing? I, cause the more I've researched drugs, the more I've realized that the majority of the reason that they are illegal has nothing to do with the actual physical pros or cons of it.

It's because of racism. It's because of oppression. It's because of all these different things. So isn't it really just a societal thing of a perception, um, because it's like the fact that for instance, marijuana is a class A is just absolutely asinine. The fact that it can't be studied and learned, even though all the, you know, you see all the benefits of epilepsy and, you know, people like stopping all these different things. Like you see it even on videos and such. So what, why is it that almost all of these drugs have this perception that it's any drug is almost bad unless it's a medical thing that is FDA approved here in the States. Can you just, can you just kind of enlighten me a little bit on that?

Cause it's just such a frustrating thing for me to listen to people who have such a negative perception, yet they go and drink, you know, a glass, you know, three glasses of wine a night. You know what I mean? It's like, what the fuck? So where, why are we where we are with this shit? You know, uh, that's a great question, John. And you're right. It is rooted in oppression. It is rooted in, uh, racism in actuality. That's how the drug war started. Yoann Hari wrote an excellent book called chasing the screen, which I highly recommend for anybody who wants a different, different perspective on the, um, total and colossal failure of the drug war, as well as how addictions themselves have been mischaracterized completely, um, and criminalized.

And it, you know, look in the United States, they consider a schedule one drug as having two main aspects to it. And the reason it's a schedule one, according to the authorities is number one, there is no medical use and number two, it can be highly addictive and dangerous. Now, if you look at the schedule one drugs that actually might be accurate for some of them, for example, methamphetamine, it's certainly not of use in medical context and it is sure as hell is very addictive. Heroin is another one, but it is not a one size fits all. Uh, we've law, as you said, cannabis, uh, has a utility to manage symptoms of epilepsy, of, of certain pain conditions, of insomnia, of pains associated with cancer.

So there's a utility there and there's no reason why marijuana or cannabis should be a, um, schedule one drug turning to psychedelics. It becomes even more absurd. Why? Because not only are psychedelics an incredibly powerful tool to treat psychiatric disorders like depression and it and anxiety and PTSD, but here's the kicker. They also treat addiction because they allow the patient or journeyer to recognize through playing the witness or playing the observer during their experience. What is the reason they, they continue to turn to these addictive drugs to numb their pain? They see the source of their pain. They re-experience it in a new light with compassion and love. And after they do it, they often can, after they use psychedelics for psychiatric, they can, they can transcend their mood disorder and their, and their addictions.

So, um, these, the drug war has been a disaster. Um, we're slowly starting to see the de-stigmatization of certain, uh, drugs, thankfully, mainly cannabis and psychedelics, although they're very, very different classes of drugs. And, um, I think the world is starting to wake up through how to change your mind on Netflix, through companies like Neshama, who are treating people day in, day out and, and helping people heal, that, that psychedelic medicine is the future. And it's here to stay as a modality for treating these mood disorders. I would, I would add, John, that stigma is a, is a, is a, is a hell of a thing, right? And the very fact that something's illegal stigmatizes, right? So it, there's a whole swath of people who just don't want to break the law and with, you know, it's good reason that's, you don't, you don't, you, you view yourself a certain way and you want to be on one side of the law or the other side of the law and the laws.

So for a lot of Canadians with, in the context of cannabis, the fact that it became legal, opened the door for their, to the, to use it because now it's, now it's legal. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I don't have to go see a, somebody on, in a dark corner and, and make a deal with, for a product. I'm not sure it's provenance, right? What was it sprayed with like a, with a, with something or, you know, was it adulterated in some way? Right. So there is confidence in legality. There's confidence in having like a proper supply chain that you have, that you can believe in. And that, you know, um, just like you don't buy like unpasteurized milk from somebody on the corner, you know, you, you, you would want to have some confidence in what you're, in what you're doing.

That's the beautiful thing, part of the beautiful thing about ketamine, you know, it is, it's legal. It is, so you overcome stigma right away from that, right? Just the fact that it is legal, that it's made in a pharmaceutical grade environment. It's perfectly safe. The supply chain is very well understood. And so that's an important aspect of it. It's almost like a tautology. I, it's not stigmatized because it's legal, but it's legal because it's not stigmatized, right? So you, you have, you have, we have to break that cycle. I would also say that historically, some of the people who were the biggest advocates for psychedelics kind of turned it into a bit of a clown show, right? And, and so that played into, they played into their opponent's hands, right?

By, you know, and I listen, I love Ken Kesey. I love Timothy Leary. I love all these people, but the Merry Pranksters did not help, um, with the marketing of this to, you know, um, the, the great middle class, right? It, it, it, it was easy for Nixon to sort of demonize, right? He, they gave them all the tools necessary to, to demonize it. And they did. And it was an effective political cudgel to use against his opponents. And that's politics. And it's, it's, it's bad. And it's, it's, it's, it's, you know, it's historically upsetting, but that's, here we are. So our job in part is to say, look, the stigma is on inappropriate, um, and look at all the benefits and, you know, we, we're advocating for its therapeutic use.

We have no judgment on its recreational use, but, you know, to deny people, um, these opportunities for healing is, is deeply cruel. Right. And we, that's, that's another important message that, that there, that there is a huge aspect of compassion and, and, um, associated with this. What's up everybody. I know you're enjoying this conversation. John does a great job with genuine curiosity on these episodes and our guests consistently bring the heat. We want to take a moment here and let you know that you've got an opportunity, an opportunity to become better than you were yesterday. And you can do so by gaining access to all of JB sales content, all of their training tips, techniques, tactics, and takeaways can be yours for $1 a day.

$365 for the year gets you annual access to everything, including our private Slack channel for members only, which you get access to all of us directly a hundred percent of the time, 24 hours a day. And then at the same time, you're going to get access to our bi-weekly ask me anything sessions where you can bring real deals to the table and get the help that you need where you need it. This is very, very important. Sales reps that invest in themselves are often found at the tops of their leaderboards. Join us today and get the help you need to become the seller that you deserve to be. That URL one more time is joinjbsales.com. Let's get back to the show with JB and our guest for this week. Well, the other stigma that you guys are fighting and we're all fighting is the stigma that can't be quote unquote legalized or unlegalized, which is just mental health in general, right?

I mean, the stigma of having mental health issues. I mean, I live in a world of sales, right? And it's like, oh, it's everything. Let's go get it, get it, get it. But the amount of stress and the lack of discussion around the drug, like the illicit drug use in sales, for instance. I mean, you go to any conference and you find Coke pretty much in any bathroom, in any conference when it comes to sales because it's this Coke. I mean, you guys were in investment banking. I'm sure you literally almost had it on the tables for crying out loud. I mean, I didn't have it on the table, but I did see it in the cubicle beside me. Right. And so there's that part of it, but the mental health aspect, and it's encouraging to see now that mental health is coming to the forefront.

Right. And people are at least having conversations. Celebrities are opening up about it and everything else. But I mean, we're fighting two things, the stigma of drug use and the stigma of mental health. And if we could just remove those, I mean, the amount of positive things we could do could be incredible here. So it's through legislation, it's through having conversations like this, it's through continuous positive examples of it and just keep chipping away at it, right? Because until it's universally legalized across the board, like something like, what is it, Portugal? Portugal's legalized almost everything, right? They've decriminalized everything. Yes. Decriminalized everything. Yeah.

And treat it more as like an addiction as opposed to a crime. Yeah. It's a health issue versus a criminal issue, right? And actually chasing the screen, the book Jay references, talks a lot about the Portuguese experience and what they've done. What I would say, though, is that we do have a legal psychedelic, which is ketamine, but there is still stigma and there is still an educational hurdle that has to be overcome, right? So even while we're waiting and we're optimistic that MDMA, which is more likely to be the first, you know, schedule one psychedelic that becomes rescheduled and then psilocybin will likely be the second one. We expect that in 2023, 2024. You know, ketamine works right now, right?

And, but even it has, there's like a huge chunk of people who've never heard of it. Then there's a chunk of people who have heard of it, but heard of it because it's a horse tranquilizer or it's a, it's special K. That's great. Like in my clubbing days, you know, friends did ketamine. It was like, oh my God, you went down the K hole. And it was like, I am never going anywhere near this drug. Right, right. And, and then there's people who've heard, who actually, you know, know it as an anesthetic or an analgesic, right? They know it in the medical context. Um, so there is a huge amount of education, uh, that has to happen. And that, and then as things become normalized, the GD is out of the ball.

Like you can't put it back in. Once, once people, um, experience this and they see like, um, you know, I, history moves slowly and then quickly, right? Like this from, from the civil rights movement to Barack Obama being president was 45 years from the March on Washington to Obama, from the Stonewall rebellion to gay marriage was about 40 years. Right. So from, we're looking at right now from the war on drugs under Nixon, 1970, so we're at 52 years. So, you know what I mean? It's like history took a long time, but it's going to go really fast from this point forward. And so, um, I, I'm optimistic that as just like, you know, people's attitudes towards sexual orientation changed. They had an uncle, they had a child, they had a best friend.

It was like, what, you know, this is, this is, these are people I love and, and, and it's, it's, it's not relevant. Like, it's the same thing here as you see, like my son has treatment, not my son, but imagine your son had treatment resistant depression. Do you, do you, are you worried about stigma or are you worried about results? You know, and you, you want to get them to help. They, and, and we see that all the time. And all of a sudden it becomes somewhat viral. Uh, oh my goodness, you look so different. What, what did you do? Well, I, I went to a ketamine clinic for my depression and, and you know what I mean? So it's almost at the, at a, at a person to person level, it becomes normalized and, and, and, and more associated with health and healing versus partying or, um, you know, or recreation, shall we say?

Not that there was anything wrong with recreation, but, but, but that this is really about, you know, um, at the moment about the therapeutic benefits. And as it should be, and I think this is where like kind of transitioning the conversation from a business standpoint, I think there's, uh, I would actually, you know, before we get into the, the, the benefits from a business and leadership standpoint, what does ketamine help me understand what it unlocks? Like Jay, you had said that you'd gone to therapy for years and, and some, and ketamine like unlocked something. Could you just, I mean, try to dumb it down for me that I'm not a scientist here. Like what's the barrier that it allows to break through that allows for that?

I'm glad you used the word barrier. And I'm going to use that one too, because every one of us between the ages of zero and seven experiences something that maybe a Freudian psychologist might call a trauma and others would call a wound. And it could be something, a big trauma, sexual abuse, physical abuse, death in the family, a divorce, something bad happened. That's a capital T trauma. And then there's kind of lowercase T traumas, which are much more common. You didn't make the second grade soccer team. Somebody told you, you were too tall, too short, too fat, too rich, too poor, too whatever. And it made you, and it left you with a sense of not feeling good enough. And that feeling of not good enough gets brought into adulthood.

And we start to develop a protective mechanism or barriers, as you say, or walls called ego. And ego is something that is there to serve us, but it protects us from getting hurt again. And it really manifests itself in our search for validation when we're justifying our arguments or providing evidence for them. You know, when we're dominating somebody else or we're searching to be dominated. You know, when we're righteous, these are all examples of ego. And again, they're there to protect us. So how does ketamine work? And how do all psychedelics work? Well, quite frankly, psychedelics have been shown to quiet an area of the brain called the default mode network. And that's the area of the brain that houses your ego.

And so what it does is it quiets your ego for the duration of the experience so that the barriers come down. The walls come down. The resistance and the suppression comes down. And in that experience, you can play the witness to what's coming up. So a lot of people will re-experience the traumas. A lot of people will, you know, but they'll do it in such a way that isn't frightening to them. And they come to it from a very compassionate, loving perspective. And they recognize that, yes, while it might have happened, they're ready to let go. They're ready to recognize that it wasn't five-year-old or seven-year-old Jay that is doing the talking now. It's 42-year-old Jay. And they're ready to let it go.

And that's what all psychedelics do. They allow those barriers of ego to come down so that you can transcend your mood disorders. I think it just gives you, I mean, from my experience with mushrooms, for instance, I remember vividly, like, I, so here's a quick example. Picasso, right? It's my favorite artist. I never understood cubism. Never understood it at all. I couldn't wrap my head around it. I studied it. I loved it. But I remember one day, and I, begrudgingly, I was like, I'm only doing natural. I started smoking weed late, you know, late in college. And then I was like, all right, I just want to stay with the natural stuff. And I remember sitting there one day and everything digitized.

And I saw Picasso like that. I immediately understood it. And I started to immediately look at the world in a different way than I had been before. Obviously, and I think this is what you guys are doing with the treatment center, is you have to have a good environment to be in. Because if you're not in a good environment, it could go bad. It could go south, right? Like, if you're around, you know, negative vibes, or if you're not in a good space with a good environment, I think it could go bad. But you control that environment. That's right. That's where it starts to unlock a lot of things, right? That's right. And as part of our treatment, you know, everybody gets a full medical intake. So, you know, you want to make sure that everybody's medically cleared to do this.

Otherwise, it's not going to turn out well. You know, so that's number one. Timothy, we really talked in the 60s that the two most profound ways one could impact the quality of a psychedelic or mystical experience is through set and setting. Set referring to the mindset of the journey or patient going into the experience. And the setting, of course, is, you know, just that, the place, the environment in which you do it in. And, you know, every day at Nishama, we focus so much on preparing our members and our patients to calm their bodies and minds as they go into that and really set an intention about what they're going to get out of their experience. What is it that they want to look into? What's, you know, what do they want to accomplish?

And that's one great way of influencing one's mindset or set. And, yeah, we do do it in an absolutely beautiful environment that is nurturing, that feels more like a warm home or a hotel where, you know, you get served delicious snacks and green tea. And you really want to hang out because it's such a super chill place to be. It doesn't feel like a doctor's office and doesn't feel like a cold hospital. So we pay a lot of attention to set and setting. Let's, Richard, let's talk a little bit about the business benefits of this, right? Sure. I want to talk about the business benefits and then I want to talk about the business opportunities in this field and where this field is going. And because one of the things I use this podcast for is to try to open people's minds up to opportunities in business.

Because a lot of sales rep is, you know, you know, they're out there, they're selling, but they might not believe in what they're selling. And so from a cannabis standpoint, for instance, I did an interview with this woman a while back where the cannabis industry was an industry that I said, hey, this could be a great industry. If you're not, you know, if you're not really believing in what you're selling right now and you're just kind of going in motion, well, the cannabis industry is a very purpose-driven, mission-driven industry. Like almost everybody you meet in the cannabis industry has had some type of positive experience and they want to pay it forward. But let's, so let's talk about the business benefits.

I understand you have some, you know, your wife has some anecdotes here from a sales standpoint, leadership. What are some of those areas where, you know, if I'm a sales leader right now, I could look at and say, who cares? Like what benefit can this bring me? I mean, psychedelics is literally the Latin for mind manifesting, right? So, so much of sales is belief and it is commitment and it's easy to, in sales and in other, I mean, in other aspects of business to be incredibly hard on yourself, to beat yourself up. Negative self-talk can be a big part and for some people it drives them forward, but ultimately at a cost, right? And I think what psychedelics can do is, is to really allow people to, to not be quite so hard on themselves psychologically, right?

To understand, to have this confidence that it's going to be good, right? If I do the right things and I do them in the right ways, the outcomes are going to be good. I also think it, it really can assist in unlocking creativity, which is the key part of problem solving. So much of what executive functioning is with respect to sales and other aspects of leadership is problem solving. I mean, I think, you know, a historical view of sales might be, you know, you got to have a massive funnel and we're going to break down doors and all this thing. And I think, I think more modern look at sales is really about curated approach and, and, and, and, and, and really solving problems that maybe the customer didn't even know they had, right?

So that creative aspect is a real, a real critical thing. But, um, I think really it's, it's about, you know, being able to, to not be like, to not be so hard on yourself in the, in the bad ways, right? It's good to be driven. It's good to be motivated. What, where, where you see, why you see people, you know, doing, um, demonstrating, I would say unhealthy behaviors is partly of a function of, you know, there's a relatively high failure rate. So it's like baseball, you know, you, you, you get a hit three out of 10 times, go to the hall of fame in baseball. That's still a high failure rate. If you close three out of every 10 deals you did, depending on the industry you're in, you're, you're, you're a hall of fame, right?

But that still means you're, you're, you're, you're failing quote unquote, um, a bunch of times. And that's, that's very difficult to, uh, on, on, on one's, uh, sense of self. Right. And so I think this, you know, in terms from a business point of view, it can really help not give you a false sense of confidence, but, but a, an accurate sense of one's own worth. Right. And that, that you're not less than or unworthy that if you're not number one on the leaderboard, it's not like you're failing. Right. Cause there's, so I think there, I think between the, the, the, the compassion for oneself and the creativity that it can unlock. Um, it's really a very powerful tool, which is why you read reports about Steve jobs being very into psychedelics and other prominent, prominent business leaders who've understood that the value of the mind manifesting of psychedelics.

And that's, and, and that's, what's interesting about the ketamine stuff is, and, um, you know, what we've been talking about as far as almost stepping outside and being a witness to what's happening as opposed to being the protagonist or whoever it's. So, you get, you get, you kind of macro out a little bit and it, yeah, you do a zoom that you zoom out, right. Instead of zooming in so much, you like, you could take a holistic view and that is, uh, that's valuable. Is it fair to say that, that with the ego conversation, that it breaks down ego, but, but builds confidence? Cause to me, I talk a lot about the confidence ego barrier where, you know, there's a fine line between those two. Right.

And, you know, you know, in just without the medical component to it, you have to cross the ego, you know, you have to cross that line every once in a while to understand what the difference between confidence and ego is. Right. But does it help shape that confidence in yourself and feeling like good internally so that you can handle all of this stress? I think what it does is gives you tools to handle slings and arrows in a much better way, right? We are all going to get knocked on our ass. The, the idea here is not to not feel sad when you're sad, right? Like it's to have appropriate emotions to appropriate, like the, the, the response should be appropriate to the stimuli. You know what I mean?

So to not, uh, not over index when, when the deal falls through, that's not necessarily within your control that the deal fell through. Right. And, and to beat yourself up, it's also, um, you're not the greatest thing in the world when the deal goes through, right? Like there's a certain, a sense of, you know, equanimity. And, and as I said, like this idea that, that I've, that I've got this right. And that, that, that's a different kind of confidence. That's the kind of confidence that, you know, in a relationship with, with a spouse, you'd want it. Like that's attractive. That brings people towards you. Right. And, and we know in sales that people want to do business with people they like, right?

Like this is a truism. And so when you, what, what, what you get is this, um, you know, I, I think we all familiar with the book, the secret it's, it, it sort of helps build that, that muscle of attractiveness. Right. And that is, uh, that's incredibly valuable for any business leader, sales or otherwise. Um, I mean, really this, these molecules help people, people are, people are salespeople, but they're fundamentally, it helps people. Yeah. And I think that's the key is, is getting to that, that place of self-worth, getting to that place of confidence that you can, that you can ride the waves. You know what I mean? Like I, I, I got advice early in my sales career, which is never let the highs get too high and never let the lows get too low.

Right. You know, you're as good as your best deal. You're never as worse as your worst deal. So by that wave. And thankfully for me, my parents instilled a level of confidence in me and those types of things to be able to handle it. But a lot of people don't, you know, and a lot of people get, you know, you know, really tied down in that stress and self-reflecting and don't let themselves experience the joy of just being. If you were a child and, and you had been, you know, told you weren't very good and that, that can carry through into your career where you're, where you're always sort of beating yourself up. Right. And I think this is a, this is an important, the psychedelics can help so much with that, that, as I said earlier, like negative self-talk is like the most destructive thing any of us can really do, where we just, we flagellate ourselves, where we're just flogging ourselves for our perceived inadequacies.

And, um, it sometimes feels good to sort of punch yourself in the face, but ultimately it's unproductive and, um, and you know, it's, it's short-term bad and it's long-term bad. Right. So to, to get away from that is, is incredibly liberating. Yeah. So, you know, as, as, you know, we work with salespeople and I have certainly in all the aspects of my career and I think that there's a certain attachment, uh, that, that any, uh, uh, professional has to the scoreboard. You know, where am I this year versus last year, where am I this year versus, you know, my colleague sitting to my left or my right. And it's, it's that game of comparison that people play. And what I think psychedelic medicine really does effectively, it breaks through all of that because, um, are you going to judge yourself based on a scoreboard of, okay, I made a million dollars of commission this year.

But my colleague to the right made 1.2 million dollars of commission this year, and I'm a loser and he's a winner. And what I believe the, the medicines really do is when they allow your ego to quiet, they, you really recognize your essence and that our essence, uh, in our purest, highest forms, we're all quite loving and compassionate and kind. And, you know, the behaviors of competition and jealousy and envy, these are learned behaviors that happens and that happened as a result of trauma. And so once you can unshackle yourself from those manifestations of ego, you become a much more magnetic person. And so how can it help a salesperson? How can it help someone trying to actually put up, uh, numbers on the scoreboard?

Well, if you look at, uh, Michael Phelps, Michael Phelps, isn't busy looking at the lanes on either side of them. He's focused on his inner work while he's in the pool. And that's why he's a winner. Well, and this is why I like the Simon Sinek infinite game, right? I, I, I, a lot of that to me is like, I don't play the game to win against you. I play the game to stay in the game and win this game of life. And so that it's the bigger picture, it's the, you know, perspective. And again, it sounds like a lot of this kind of mean stuff gives that perspective or at least unblocks some of the things that aren't giving you that perspective. Where's this industry going? So let's, let's now kind of switch to the, from a business standpoint, like opportunities here.

You've obviously, Jay, you said, look, this is, this is an opportunity to help. Like it was, it was a journey for you and a realization, but also a little bit of a forcing function with COVID and basically tanking your fashion business. So it was like, I got to do something, you know, this seems like a good thing and I can do some really good stuff here, but like kind of like the cannabis industry too. Like it's, it's just a brand new, like, what are the opportunities here to start businesses from a sales standpoint? What are the technologies that surround this industry that can be involved? Like, where are we right now in, in this field and where do you guys think it's going to go? You know, the, the main difference between psychedelics and cannabis, just to start with, is that fundamentally cannabis is consumer packaged good, right?

You go into a store, you buy, you can buy a gummy, you can buy a beverage, you can buy dry flour, you can buy a pre-roll. There's a whole range of consumer packaged goods you can get, just like going to a liquor store, right? You can get tequila, you can get gin. There's also accessories. There's all sorts of accoutrement in the cannabis space and it lends itself well to a retail solution. At the moment, we, I don't see that. I mean, maybe we'll get to a point one day where you can go into a store and buy different mushrooms that'll do different things, but we're, we're a long way from, from that, I believe. So I think there's a, that's a fundamental difference. I think the main similarity is that they're both industries that are overcoming stigma.

With respect to psychedelics, I think it's really, you know, it's really well within now the ambit of the healthcare industry. So what are the opportunities? Well, you know, we've, we've looked at the clinics opportunity as, as, as essentially distribution. So there's all these novel drug discovery people working on different molecules. They're going to need a methodology of getting their product to market. We believe it's going to be through our clinics or clinics like ours. I think for others looking to join the industry, so there's, there's tremendous business development opportunities. I believe within the novel drug discovery realm, people who are interested in medical sales and pharma sales will find themselves.

I think, uh, really invigorated by this industry because it is a different approach and a different take. And I think people interested in technology would find it fascinating. There's so much virtual reality happening with, uh, with, with, with psychedelics. There are, um, various wearables that remind you about your intention setting and all sorts of different aspects of, you know, the, the journey that don't involve necessarily the actual medicine. Right. There's the pre-work, the post-work. So, I mean, and Jay can round this out a little bit, but I really think that between the, you know, the, the classic sort of drug pharma model and then the technology side, plus the, the, the clinic side.

And then there's, you know, those people who are interested in, um, in marketing and lead acquisition and lead conversion, you know, we, we have a sales function. I mean, there's no, there's no shame in saying it when leads come in, somebody has to call those leads and convert them to a, to a paying customer. Um, people are endlessly calling us and emailing us. I'm interested in this and interested in that, but how do you actually convert the lead into a, into a customer? That's why I mean, I, it sounds like there's a lot of kind of qualification of like, are, is this even for you or not? Right. Right. For sure. 100%. Yeah. I read somewhere that you turned down 10 to 20% of the people that come to you because they're just not, they're not suited for it.

They don't have the support structure at home. They don't have, you know, whatever it might, or they're, they don't have that, that purpose, that, that intention, if you will. They're just more curious about it. Like me, for instance, like if I came to you, I don't have really anything I'm trying to unblock here. I'm just super curious about what this would do, like how my head would explode if I put these things on and see what happened. And I'm guessing that's not exactly like the, you know, that's, you're not trying to help somebody like me, unless, you know, I got some unseated thing that I don't know is blocking me. But it's, it's a qualification process too, right? You know, you asked about, and this is a good segue or a good way of kind of answering what you're talking about right now, which is what does the future look like for people like you without diagnoses?

You know, how will mood disorders like depression, anxiety, and PTSD and addiction be treated in five, 10 years? Because what we're doing now in the medical context is just not working, obviously. So I foresee, and I think Rich is on the same page with me on this, that kind of within five to 10 years, you'll see lots of clinics like ours, not only using ketamine, which is illegal right now, but adding MDMA for PTSD, adding psilocybin for depression, and potentially even LSD for chronic pain and LSD for anxiety, as well as a number of new, what they call new chemical entity molecules, these are molecules that would be based on a classic psychedelic, like an LSD or psilocybin, but altered in such a way that might be, that might provide for perhaps less hallucinogenic effects, or in some other cases, provide for a shorter journey duration.

So the world is really our oyster as it relates to how psychedelic medicine can impact society, but also at the moment, we're treating people with diagnoses. But a fundamental question we ask ourselves at Nshama all the time is, why should people have to wait until they're depressed, or until their anxiety turns into a panic attack, or until they lose their job and they hit the bottle, or drugs, or whatever. So we believe in the very long term, psychedelic medicine will be preventative care, it'll allow people to dissolve their ego, to look within, to find out what has happened to them, and to move on from it so that it doesn't manifest itself into one of these really unsavory, diagnosable conditions.

So I work with a friend who's in cancer treatment, but not to look for the treatment of it, but to look for the cause of it, right? Because everybody's trying to treat cancer after you get it, but let's try to figure out what is causing it in the first place. And there's so many millions of variables and such, but if we find the cause, the root causes of it, and prevent it from happening in the first place. But the problem is, and this is where it goes back to the medical community, and pharmaceuticals and everything else, the problem is that there's no money in a cure. There's no money in fixing the problem, there's money in treating the problem. So do you have confidence that with the war on drugs, with the pharmaceutical industry where we are, that they're going to allow things that actually prevent issues in the first place so that they don't have to treat them?

I mean, I think you're going to see the pharma industry get into this space. I think they're not going to want to fight it. I think they're going to want to co-opt it to the extent possible. And as I said, I think the genie is out of the bottle. And to be honest, you know, these aren't problems that you're one and done, or you're six and done, and you never have to, like, you know, revisit this. Ketamine, there's definitely a period of afterglow. And after the six core sessions, you know, you're in a very good place for a period of time. But you can start to backslide, and you come back for a refresher or a maintenance program. Just like you don't, you know, you go to the dentist multiple times a year, presumably, for cleanings or for checkups.

It's not that, oh, you did your teeth once and you're done. So it's work. The biggest, I think the biggest challenge, like, with all things for North American society is, you know, a desire for a silver bullet. Oh, if I could just take a pill and lose weight. No, you've got to change your eating habits and maybe go to the gym with regularity, right? You know, if you will. But, like, it's work. And work, and people generally are, you know, work avoidance is a big part of people's existence, right? So it's easier to sit on the sofa and watch a show than to get off the sofa and do something specific to improve one's position. And so SSRIs like Prozac were sold to the public on the basis of you take this pill and your depression will be gone.

Well, we've learned the hard way that 30 plus years later, that's not the case at all, right? So I think there's now enough skepticism that what, you know, Big Pharma was selling was not exactly what we needed. And that it may very well be that a different path is required. And, you know, it doesn't take much of the population to sort of pivot to have a massive market for this stuff, right? So from a pure business point of view, do we need 100% of the mental health market to be, as an industry, to be phenomenally successful? No, we do not, right? Will we eventually come to be the dominant player in mental health? I believe so. But it need not happen overnight for this to be a tremendous opportunity.

Love it. Awesome, guys. Well, I could keep talking about this for hours here because I am... As could we. But to keep it under the hour mark, as we usually do here, where can people find out more information about this? Because I really, I hope this conversation got people to think a little bit differently. But where can they follow up on more information? I know you got the New York location to go to, but where else do you want to send people to educate them on this? Definitely. On our website, nushama.com. That's N-U-S-H-A-M-A dot com. Our Instagram is at nushamawellness. That's all nushamawellness, all one word. And, you know, there's a lot of great educational material out there at, for example, at maps.org.

That's a multidisciplinary association of psychedelic studies. Great information, not only on current legalities of psychedelics, but also what's coming down the pipeline in terms of clinical studies and clinical research. So it's a very, very exciting time to educate yourself. I think reading How to Change Your Mind is a great place for people to start or watch it on Netflix, just so you can see how these, you know, these molecules have been incredibly helpful. And, yeah, I think that's a good start. Real quick, Chasing the Scream. Scream, as in, like, yelling. Chasing the Scream by Johan Hari, H-A-R-I. And he also wrote a brilliant book called Lost Connections, which is about why we have the mental health crisis that we have right now.

So he's been a remarkable journalist and chronicler of both the war on drugs and the mental health crisis. So it's really quite – and he's often on Bill Maher. Bill Maher has him on a show with some frequency because he's a great guest. I would add also for your audience, LinkedIn is a remarkable forum for psychedelic discussion. It's really quite amazing. And there are some very successful entrepreneurs like Christian Angermeyer who have huge followings on LinkedIn. Maps has a very big following on LinkedIn. You can follow Nushama as well on LinkedIn. But there's an unbelievable community of psychedelic researchers, entrepreneurs on LinkedIn. And I know your audience is very, very active on LinkedIn, and I think it's a great place.

And they've been a wonderful forum for not shutting these discussions down, right? They've really allowed them to blossom and flourish. That's fantastic to hear. So awesome, guys. I really appreciate you coming on here and having this conversation. I think it's an important one to have, and I think hopefully we'll keep having it here. So thank you. Wonderful. Thank you for what you're doing, and good luck moving forward here. Let's keep breaking down those stigmas and breaking down those barriers here. Amen. Thank you, John. Take care. Thanks so much. And everybody, thanks so much for listening. Hopefully, this got you to think a little bit differently and maybe just maybe change your perspective and help spread the word a little bit here.

And like I always say, go out there and make somebody smile today because no matter how bad your day went, if you make somebody smile today, you know you had a good day, and the world needs a lot more of that right now. So thank you all very much for listening, and I'll see you on the other side. Thank you so much for your time today and listening to the podcast. I hope you enjoyed the conversation as much as I did. With your support and our incredible guests, we're one of the top sales podcasts in the industry with over a million downloads, and I can't thank you enough. To keep the momentum going, if you could go to your favorite podcast platform and leave us a five-star review, I would greatly appreciate it.

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