Transcript disclaimer: This transcript was generated by computer software and may contain errors, omissions, or minor inaccuracies. Please refer to the audio recording for the most accurate version of the conversation.

Psychedelics Today. Hello. I’m joined today by Travis Tyler Flook, EIT, elder in training, and we’re here to talk about mushroom Denver decriminalization.

[00:00:29] Joe Moore: The anniversary’s today, right?

[00:00:31] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, today’s the day that we actually– the vote came in. So yesterday was the anniversary of the vote. Um, do you want me to just start getting into stuff or introduce myself? Well, let’s,

[00:00:39] Joe Moore: uh, yeah, who, who are you?

[00:00:42] Travis Tyler Fluck: Uh, my name is Travis Tyler Flook, and I am a self-described autognostic mycologist.

[00:00:50] Travis Tyler Fluck: Uh, mycology is the study of mushrooms or fungus, um, pretty accessible. And then I took a little poetic license with the autognosis, which is the [00:01:00] knowledge or mystery of self. So my relationship with the mushroom has allowed me to explore the mystery of self. And under that umbrella, I wear a great many hats.

[00:01:11] Travis Tyler Fluck: Uh, first and foremost, the way that I like to say it is that the mushroom has been working with me for about 30 years now. And, um, along my path of initiation, I became an activist and an advocate and a citizen lobbyist and a community organizer and an end-of-life doula and an award-winning cultivator, and I mean, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:01:34] Joe Moore: Outstanding.

[00:01:35] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:01:35] Joe Moore: Um, and yeah, you’ve, you’ve become quite a known entity in Colorado. And, um, yeah, I think a c- cornerstone of the psychedelic community for sure in, in Colorado. And, uh, you’ve been running these kind of microdosing, um, you call it Microdosing Monday workshops?

[00:01:58] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. Talk to me about- I’m a sucker for a- [00:02:00] alliteration.

[00:02:00] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:02:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, I knew they were gonna pass statewide decrim without automatically creating, uh, educational platforms, and I felt like that was just asking for a black swan event. So as soon as I felt like they were going to, uh, implement the law to, uh, you know, the spirit of what the voters voted in, I just started teaching what I considered to be a 101, meeting the psychedelically naive space.

[00:02:27] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, uh, because we’re allowed to gift, I was able to, uh, gift people, um, the microdoses on the tail end of the class. So people walked away with a pretty good, you know, baseline introduction, and they walked away with, um, a mushroom that was lab tested for potency and top-tier quality and lots of love. And yeah, I was just really, like, proud to be able to offer something that, um, even in an unamplified way.

[00:02:58] Joe Moore: Yeah. And I think the [00:03:00] amount of people you’ve taught and touched and allowed to interact with mycology is quite profound. Um, yeah, I know a lot of people who have been to those and always report loving it. I think I started growing in, like, 2007, ’08 or ’09 maybe. Um, I wanted to get into cannabis, but it was too expensive.

[00:03:21] Joe Moore: Yeah. I couldn’t find the genetics. It was super hard to find seeds. It was e- way easier to find spores for me for some reason.

[00:03:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. I mean, there’s that gatekeeping that happens- Mm … when someone realizes they have, like, something worth, like, hanging onto.

[00:03:34] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:03:34] Travis Tyler Fluck: And one of the cool things about, uh, mushrooms is if you get a bag, you can take the spores from the bag and just recreate the culture, um, which is a little bit tricker with cannabis, especially if it’s sinsemilla.

[00:03:46] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, you don’t end up with a seed, uh, to be able to do that.

[00:03:50] Joe Moore: Yeah. And I thi- yeah, just I think… Who got me inspired? I was listening to a lot of Terence and, um, [00:04:00] Dennis McKenna podcast way back on Psychedelic Salon, and I think somebody like Stamets was like, “You can, you can do this.” I was like, “Oh, okay.

[00:04:10] Joe Moore: Let’s learn.” And the simple experiments you can do with your own grocery store bought mushrooms to train yourself a little bit, so, so fun and interesting. Cardboard grows and all that.

[00:04:23] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, it’s reinforcing very quickly, um, which is, I think, a necessarily, like, first step when you are really s- beginning any type of process or, or, like, larger learning.

[00:04:34] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, kind of like, like, like something that seems so foreign and unattainable, there’s these bite-sized pieces along the way, and that’s kind of where my journey started is the PF Tek method, which is, like, brown rice flour and vermiculite.

[00:04:49] Joe Moore: In the little glass jars.

[00:04:51] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep.

[00:04:51] Joe Moore: Um, that guy, I think when I was learning, I, I found out he was in prison, and I’m like, “That’s not great.”

[00:04:58] Travis Tyler Fluck: Professor Fanaticus?

[00:04:59] Joe Moore: I [00:05:00] think so.

[00:05:00] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:05:01] Joe Moore: Um, yeah, no. So I, I started there. I started having success with sterilized grain bags, um, that I had to make myself and get the, the tools- Yeah … and all that. I had some PF Tek success, but it was, it was challenging. And for whatever reason, I moved away from glass as quickly as I could figure it out.

[00:05:21] Joe Moore: Um, but it was, it was cool doing the transfer, like monotub transfer into the tubs and, um, kind of growing it out in coco, coir, I guess which is coconut husk.

[00:05:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep.

[00:05:33] Joe Moore: Yeah, it was super… Just a cool, nerdy thing to be able to do to, like, explore the space that was super underexplored at the time, honestly. You know, like Mycotopia, Shroomery, DMT Nexus were like the main places to get info.

[00:05:50] Joe Moore: Now you can actually go to people and train in Denver and elsewhere.

[00:05:54] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, it’s just proliferated in such a, a huge way and, you know, um, for better or for [00:06:00] worse, because they’re not enforcing a lot of laws, you can just buy ready-to-go cultures, you know, and have them shipped right to your door. Mm-hmm. And that makes it really easy.

[00:06:09] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:06:09] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then based on that success, you can kinda choose where you wanna reenter the process.

[00:06:15] Joe Moore: Yeah. I, I probably would’ve bought live culture. So just so everybody knows the technical stuff, so spores you can buy legally in America for microscopy purposes or-

[00:06:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah …

[00:06:25] Joe Moore: decoration or whatever. They say microscopy on the label, so for your microscope.

[00:06:29] Joe Moore: Um, but those things can easily be grown into Petri dishes, bags, other places, um, and replicated. So you could keep like a really fresh culture for a very long time off of spores that you, uh, allowed to colonize on things. And then these liquid shots, which I, I started making my own liquid culture, like as quickly as I could ’cause it was like, oh look, it can just grow that much quicker.

[00:06:53] Joe Moore: Um, that was great, but we didn’t really see that for sale at scale [00:07:00] until, I don’t know, somewhat recently. I’ve been surprised about how many people are doing it.

[00:07:04] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, there’s this, um, belief that the liquid culture itself does not contain, uh, detectable psilocybin.

[00:07:12] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:07:12] Travis Tyler Fluck: And that’s kinda where the line of the law, that’s why the spores- Mm

[00:07:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: are able to be, uh, bought and sold- Right … at least in 46 states is because they contain zero psilocybin. Yeah. Unlike a cannabis seed, which does contain THC. Um, and I forget which four states, I think it’s Georgia, California, uh, I’m gonna miss the two. Florida, and then the DEA came out, I think almost a year ago, and, you know, reinst- like restated that, yeah, spores are fine.

[00:07:44] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:07:44] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then Florida, um, the legislator, legislature responded to that by then creating a new specific ban for spores. And which is kinda crazy because, uh, I think there’s more cubensis, uh, naturally occurring in [00:08:00] the, in the cow farms of Florida than pretty much anywhere else.

[00:08:04] Joe Moore: Right.

[00:08:04] Travis Tyler Fluck: So another, you know, thing, like if you criminalize nature, are we really free?

[00:08:11] Joe Moore: Right. Like what are… I’d like to go further than that, but yeah.

[00:08:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:08:16] Joe Moore: Um, like what can we criminalize to, um, get in the way of our alleged constitutional rights? Um, there’s plenty of things that have been put in place to do that. Um, yeah. So, so yes, decriminalize everything is where I’m at. I didn’t want to go here right away, but no, I’ll pass.

[00:08:39] Joe Moore: I’ll pass. Maybe if we come around to it, I’ll do it later. But let’s talk about this project to decriminalize mushrooms in Denver. Like, how did that come across your attention?

[00:08:53] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, I was married at the time and, uh, she was in a coffee shop and overheard people [00:09:00] talking about decriminalizing mushrooms. And it was the, some of the people that were part of the proto version of the campaign.

[00:09:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, um, she is, uh, you know, uh, just so excited to get involved. And for two months, every day, she came home and said to me, why aren’t you doing this with me? You’re like Mr. Mushroom. And it’s just, uh, I never fancied myself an activist. And then I was at a meetup that had to do with the Right to Try Act, which says that if you have a terminal diagnosis and a substance has passed a phase one clinical trial, that you can, uh, access it lawfully.

[00:09:41] Travis Tyler Fluck: And at the time there were two people in Colorado that were doing this and they had to grow their own mushrooms in order to participate. And the woman that, uh, opened up the meeting, uh, told her story about her first husband who had a terminal diagnosis and complex PTSD. And after reading the [00:10:00] Hopkins studies, they were so motivated to get him mushrooms and he died without being able to ever access the mushrooms or have the experience.

[00:10:09] Travis Tyler Fluck: And I, in that moment, I recognized my privilege because I knew that at home I had mushrooms, you know, and at that point I went home and I said to, uh, my former wife, I was like, all right, let’s do this. You know, that, that was my, that was my why that, that entered in. And then within a few days, um, I was one of the first four petitioners to go out and collect signatures for this

[00:10:35] Joe Moore: thing.

[00:10:36] Travis Tyler Fluck: And there were three iterations of, um, like, uh, presenting language to the city and county. Uh, the first two times, uh, it was really written by people that have no idea how to write an ordinance. And Denver elections said, we, we really appreciate your effort, but that’s just not how it’s done. So the third time they roped in a lawyer and the lawyer took the [00:11:00] sanctuary city ordinance, which says that Denver will not use its resources to go after immigrants just because the federal government says to, and they replaced the word immigrant with the word psilocybin.

[00:11:11] Travis Tyler Fluck: So it became a human rights issue. And, um, not too long ago, I thought it was really interesting that, you know, in some way, shape or form, uh, Trump by way of ICE, uh, created the little carve out for us to create the language for the ordinance that all this kind of is draped upon.

[00:11:30] Joe Moore: Mm.

[00:11:31] Travis Tyler Fluck: And very quickly, I, I just had an aptitude for what I was doing because I, I was just an embodied advocate for what we were doing, and I also had a, you know, um, run-ins with the, uh, criminal justice system because of drugs.

[00:11:48] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I was motivated to, um, keep people out of jail and, and keep them away from the, the trauma that’s involved with getting arrested for laws that are unjust. [00:12:00]

[00:12:00] Joe Moore: Yeah. It’s important. Um, and having that first person experience- Yeah … is, like, really helpful. I have a number of friends that did time and then came out and got quite active, so it’s, it’s a, you know, it’s a certain way of knowing-

[00:12:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah

[00:12:19] Joe Moore: how bad it can be.

[00:12:20] Travis Tyler Fluck: And y- you know, it’s funny, um, I was collecting signatures out in front of The Fillmore, uh, before a concert, and someone walked by me and they scoffed, and they wouldn’t sign my petition, but they said, “Who gets arrested for mushrooms anyway?” And then I had this, uh, realization that I had been arrested for mushrooms.

[00:12:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: Uh, so that really, uh, became an opportunity for me to show up even bolder than before- Mm-hmm … ’cause now I could kind of bring this, uh, this testimonial in. Uh, do you know about my arrest?

[00:12:51] Joe Moore: No. Can you tell that story?

[00:12:52] Travis Tyler Fluck: So in Pennsylvania, uh, years ago, um, I had a warrant served on my property, and I was living [00:13:00] in a cottage on the back of a 40-acre estate, like literally in the middle of nowhere, and I was in custody in Maryland, um, after a traffic stop where they found cannabis, and they had reason to believe that I was an interstate trafficker, so they radioed ahead to the district attorney, uh, where I was living, and then they served a warrant on my house while I wasn’t there.

[00:13:21] Travis Tyler Fluck: And being in the back of a 40-acre estate, I didn’t really think I needed to like, you know, put away my bongs. So they looked into my window and saw a bong, and that’s how they got in, and, uh, upon further investigation, they found a bay window that I had modified and created an incubator- Mm … for 12 PF tech jars.

[00:13:42] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:13:42] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then, um, they proceeded to sensationalize the story and give the mycelium to an FBI lab person, and it took the FBI lab person three weeks to produce mushrooms from my cultures.

[00:13:58] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm. And

[00:13:59] Travis Tyler Fluck: then they charged [00:14:00] me with, uh, attempt to manufacture a controlled substance, which is essentially like if you were making meth.

[00:14:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: And they claimed that my setup was generating $10,000 a month, uh, that I was growing poison that could kill people, and had absolutely no therapeutic value

[00:14:20] Joe Moore: Is it the state of Maryland?

[00:14:21] Travis Tyler Fluck: Uh, Pennsylvania.

[00:14:22] Joe Moore: Pennsylvania.

[00:14:22] Travis Tyler Fluck: So Maryland is where I was pulled over. I was on my way- Mm-hmm … back to Pennsylvania.

[00:14:26] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:14:26] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, uh, because, uh, we wouldn’t cooperate, they just took it upon themselves to, like, really ruin my life. Um, and yeah, took that extra step. So I had charges pending in two states for a while. Amazing. And the case was just blown up.

[00:14:41] Joe Moore: Ugh. Yeah. Um, psilocybin-containing mushrooms can’t kill you, folks. Um, yeah, it’s, it’s fascinating that law enforcement would be so vindictive for I don’t know what reason.

[00:14:56] Joe Moore: Um…

[00:14:57] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, well, I think there’s an incentive, [00:15:00] you know, to like- They can get

[00:15:01] Joe Moore: promotions …

[00:15:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: no, like, they, you feel like you’re doing your job. Yeah. You know, I was pulled over once in the Midwest, and we were waiting for the dog to show up because I refused to- Mm-hmm … let them search my car, and while I was in the backseat of the car, there was this sticker on the laptop in the police, uh, car, cruiser, that said, um, it was an interstate, it looked like an interstate sign, but it said, “Operation 420,” or something.

[00:15:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. And it just, like, clued me in that they really thought they, they were righteous in what they were doing.

[00:15:28] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:15:29] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? That it was a moral imperative on their behalf. And, you know, much like a hunting dog, when you give them a taste of the blood, they’re like, “All right, let’s, we’re doing this.”

[00:15:39] Joe Moore: That makes sense.

[00:15:40] Travis Tyler Fluck: And I, you know, I can’t imagine how much, um, moral injury that they’ve gone through, like arresting school teachers for a joint, and knowing that they’re gonna ruin a life, but at the same time, following through with it.

[00:15:55] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Yeah. The, the nurse in Indiana was a classic [00:16:00] case. You, you know that one?

[00:16:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: That was really bad.

[00:16:02] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. You know? Um, that was pretty close to the Denver campaign, and, you know, I had a sensitivity to it because I had been caught with a small setup, and it had really kind of been blown out of proportion. And at that point, we, we knew that the mushrooms were helpful, you know, for mental health applications.

[00:16:22] Travis Tyler Fluck: Uh, years before when I got caught, that was not in the zeitgeist at all, at all. Mm-hmm. Um, and then knowing it was a nurse, and, you know, it’s just like, yeah, there’s just a lot of, like, features of that case that I just, like, just felt for her in a real way. You know? That she wasn’t trying to, like, be a mushroom kingpin, and yeah, it’s just, like, sad.

[00:16:43] Travis Tyler Fluck: Uh, and as we’re talking about it, I would love to follow up with her and see how she’s doing now, you know?

[00:16:48] Joe Moore: Yeah. She’s in our orbit a little bit here. Um, but yeah, just a single mom trying to take care of her psychiatric mental health situation, and got popped, and [00:17:00] was just trying to take care of herself.

[00:17:02] Joe Moore: And, uh, that kind of consequence probably happens more than we know.

[00:17:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, there’s the, the kid that got caught in Connecticut where they said he had $14 million worth of mushrooms, but that’s just like a, a case of like d- definitely somebody trying to like, um, capitalize on the situation. Um-

[00:17:22] Joe Moore: Let’s talk about that briefly ’cause it’s- Yeah

[00:17:24] Joe Moore: probably what happened to you a little bit too ’cause in, in cannabis cases, typically they’ll weigh all of the soil, the wet soil, the fully undried plants, and say it was this much cannabis. Like, that’s not an uncommon thing, and they’re doing that in a lot of mushroom cases as well, measuring all of the substrate- Yeah

[00:17:42] Joe Moore: and the bags, saying, “This is, you know, 18 pounds of mushrooms.” It’s not true. It could be like three ounces.

[00:17:50] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, the optics on it, I think are eventually leveraged to, um, like, people that are running for office.

[00:17:57] Joe Moore: I was tough on drugs.

[00:17:58] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, I think that’s how that all gets [00:18:00] leveraged, you know? And when they can make it look way worse than it is, then it, you know, like the fear button is, uh, is our like most effective button to push to get us to do w- what they want, you know?

[00:18:11] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:18:11] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, which is a sad state of affairs, but… And, uh, that seems to be what the media, the, the, you know, the mainstream media thrives on, you know? It’s not the good news, it’s the like, what, what evil’s happening, uh, in your next door neighbor’s house kind of.

[00:18:30] Joe Moore: And the evil’s right- Yeah … on the other side of that wall are immense.

[00:18:34] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:18:34] Joe Moore: Yeah. And troubling, right? That’s, yeah, that’s a good assessment. And, uh, we would see cases here regularly where a guy I was buying mushrooms from, uh, you know, not that I’ve ever bought mushrooms, everybody, but- You know, I think- Disclaimer. Um, he, he got in trouble, um, and roped into this large sting where people were getting in [00:19:00] trouble for, um, like a, a massive date rape circuit that was operating out of these businesses, and cocaine and everything.

[00:19:06] Joe Moore: They’re like, “You’re going down, too.” The… Get this, though. This is, this is actually a miracle. So he, he gets like, um, kinda lumped in as all the press, but like gets transferred to a federal circuit court, I think, in Denver, and the judge is like, “What do we do here?” So him and the DA, the new DA, go check it out and like do some interneting, like, “What should we do with mushroom sentencing?”

[00:19:29] Joe Moore: And all the data was like medical, medical, medical. And he got off with like a week, when initially they were looking at like eight to 15 years or something. So what a major kind of shift that like positive conversations like this can have on future sentencing.

[00:19:48] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, and you touched on something that we learned very quickly, that not many people do get arrested for mushrooms, but when they do, it’s often in adjacency to other larger things.

[00:19:57] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. You know, a mushroom grower will get busted in [00:20:00] proximity to someone that’s selling meth. So when we were trying to produce data, you know, like it wasn’t w- it wasn’t the same case for cannabis that we’re locking up all these people for mushrooms. Um, but it became very clear that, uh, that mushroom crimes are, are a lot more undetectable.

[00:20:16] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. Uh, it doesn’t ha- the dogs aren’t trained for the odor. Uh, you don’t have to recreate the sun in an indoor grow, so there’s no electric meter to check out, and it’s, um, yeah, it’s just, uh, I mean, for a lack of a better way to talk about it, it’s like a white person crime, you know? Mm-hmm. And, uh, there’s, uh, yeah, just not a lot on the books like you’d think there was to leverage that as an argument.

[00:20:39] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Yeah. So feels as though we’re making progress. I remember after the win, um, where mushrooms became decriminalized, feeling a lot safer in Denver as I’m walking around with mushrooms in my pocket.

[00:20:56] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, you know, like when we keep adding on these, these, these [00:21:00] wins, um, it do- it does something to the collective, and it is like the story of a small group of rebels taking on the empire and actually shifting things.

[00:21:09] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:21:09] Travis Tyler Fluck: Which is what the story was. And, um, one of the most impactful features of the win is that we passed for 50 cents a vote. Mm-hmm. Which in that world is unheard of.

[00:21:19] Joe Moore: Really?

[00:21:20] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, most politicians are paying $5 a vote or

[00:21:24] Joe Moore: more. Mm.

[00:21:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And funny enough, uh, mushrooms got more votes than the mayor that year, too.

[00:21:31] Travis Tyler Fluck: So there was… Yeah.

[00:21:34] Joe Moore: Um, so there was a compelling story about how kind of, um, vote night went.

[00:21:44] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep.

[00:21:45] Joe Moore: Yeah. You wanna jump in?

[00:21:46] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, so the day that I had my petition and I walked into my house, I had a, a very clear message come through that if you give this everything, this is possible. So I taught all the volunteers to [00:22:00] say when instead of if, to look for synchronicity, to like really, you know, this is a, you know, you, you’ve heard of grassroots.

[00:22:08] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, we, we brought a lot of, uh, ideology and, uh, philosophy from growing mushrooms into what we were doing to organize- Yeah … in a mycelial way. And it just seemed like we were getting every sign that this was gonna happen. And then the night when the votes came in, um, it looked like we lost. So Denver, because we can vote three weeks ear- or Colorado ’cause be- we can vote three weeks early, the first wave to be counted are probably all the conservative people that have their shit together, right?

[00:22:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: And that right away said that we were losing. And then every hour and a half, Denver elections would update that information, and it just didn’t look like it was… The num- the, the gap was narrowing, but it just didn’t look like it was achievable. So we all went into this space just, like, I guess expecting that our watch party was, [00:23:00] you know, going to morph into a win party, and then when it didn’t, all the air was out of the room.

[00:23:05] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then I started having a… I was, like, uh, disassociated obviously and just having, like, a existential, like, dilemma problem because, you know, my awakening up to this point had, like, taught me to, like, kinda read for synchronicity and stuff like that, and I was just so, yeah, lost. And what we d- what nobody knew is that it was the largest non-presidential turnout in Denver elections history.

[00:23:33] Joe Moore: Whoa.

[00:23:33] Travis Tyler Fluck: So signature collecting, uh, the number that you have to turn in is based on a percentage of the previous mayoral cycle. So the previous mayoral cycle was 92,000 votes, which meant that we had to turn in 5,000 signatures to get on the ballot. And this year, and I don’t know if it was because of the homeless or what, but, uh, because there was a homeless or a camping ban-

[00:23:55] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm

[00:23:56] Travis Tyler Fluck: um, 180,000 people turned out to vote in this [00:24:00] election. So what nobody knew is that there were still 45,000 uncounted votes when we all went to sleep.

[00:24:06] Speaker 3: Hmm.

[00:24:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: And when we woke up in the morning, the media was, you know, like, had just assumed that we lost, and then there was this one article I remember reading that, uh, they were making fun of us.

[00:24:16] Travis Tyler Fluck: They said, “Better luck next time,” and they said something like, “But then again, y’all tried to put a ballot measure together in 2015 to create parking spaces for UFOs.” So that was kinda like how this was being looked at. And then in true Colorado fashion, at 4:20 that afternoon, uh, Denver elections released the final, um, numbers, and we had passed 50.5%.

[00:24:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then, yeah, nothing would ever be the same. And the following day, then all the media had to re-report on it. Like, “Oh, I guess we were wrong.” And yeah, that night, um, we had the party that we shoulda had the night of the election watch, and then we had it at my house, which is where we had all the volunteer meetings, so it was, like, a lot more, uh, appropriate.

[00:24:59] Travis Tyler Fluck: [00:25:00] Um, and yeah, I remember being on the phone with The New York Times that night, and it was just so, like… It was psychedelic

[00:25:07] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm

[00:25:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And, um, we were just, yeah, a ragtag group that no one thought we could do this, and because we were passing a decrim effort, we weren’t getting funded because people couldn’t see how to profit on the other side.

[00:25:20] Travis Tyler Fluck: And our only, um, visible opposition was a member of the, uh, local Christian think tank that was accusing us of passing decrim to create a pathway for regulation. “You’re just doing this to create…” Right. And all of us, minus one person, were like, “That’s definitely not what we’re doing here,” you know? So it’s been cool to like, you know, like mature in the space and be able to really hold true the values that were the impetus for my work in this space.

[00:25:53] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. People shouldn’t go to jail for this stuff. This is a folk medicine. You know, like this medical way of doing [00:26:00] things, um, you know, we should appreciate as a way to do it, but there are ways that we can do this in mutual aid.

[00:26:06] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Yeah. So, there’s so much there. Yeah. Yep. Um, who were, who were s- well, it’s, there’s too many people to give everybody credit.

[00:26:18] Joe Moore: There was a lot of people. I know a lot of them.

[00:26:20] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, at some point, and I was a little bit more charged to do this, is do a people’s retelling of what happened with 301 because the narrative that comes out of it, um, is not, is not really kind of the way it was, way it happened. Um, it was, uh, you know, people will ask me, “Well, how did, how was it done?”

[00:26:37] Travis Tyler Fluck: And I, and the answer I usually give is lentil soup. You know, um, my, uh, partner and I knew that we couldn’t pay our volunteers, so what we did was is we offered them community. So every Friday night, I would cook three gallons of lentil soup, and we would have all the volunteers over to see what can we do with what we have, and that became the prevailing, like, um, [00:27:00] philosophy that’s followed me up to this day in this space.

[00:27:03] Travis Tyler Fluck: What can we do with what we have? Because, like, this way of doing things is not getting funded well enough to really- Mm … do what it could do. So it comes down to people helping people.

[00:27:14] Joe Moore: Right.

[00:27:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:27:17] Joe Moore: Um, so since then, what kind of things have you seen be beneficial coming out of the Denver bill? And can you move this up just a little bit?

[00:27:29] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. So, um, early adopters are the most important part to any movement as I see, right? Yeah. So what it did was I think it was, it just became permissive. Like, oh, this is doable. And within a month, um, Oakland, uh, by way of- Uh, city council resolution passed.

[00:27:48] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:27:48] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I feel like we were already, there was already quick momentum.

[00:27:52] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, and then within 18 months of us passing, the only other municipality to take it to vote was Washington, DC, and, [00:28:00] uh, we had a 50.5% yes, and then they had a 76% yes. So it was just like, it, it was wild, you know, that an East Coast city was that aggressively for something like this.

[00:28:14] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:28:14] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, and it j- you know, just the inertia was, was building on itself.

[00:28:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: And also, you know, pushing this issue of, like, home rule mentality. Yeah. These municipalities could create carve-outs for common sense, uh, ways to, you know, inter- interact with the mushroom here, and that they could be little Petri dishes, if you wanna think of it that way. Little, you know, experiments, uh, on a dialectic level, how these l- localities can handle these things.

[00:28:43] Travis Tyler Fluck: And yeah, it’s just, um, it, it… You know, and then Oregon was also, you know, statewide, even though it was just a regulation-only measure, it just, like, just created a lot of specific type of attention that helped to [00:29:00] shift the narrative, appreciating that it’s a giant boat with a tiny rudder, you know? Mm-hmm.

[00:29:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: But we, um, came to appreciate incremental drug reform, um, even at the, you know, even at the cost of, like, like, progress that isn’t necessarily, like, moving slow enough to be the best form of prog- progress.

[00:29:20] Joe Moore: Right. Yeah. Love that.

[00:29:23] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:29:23] Joe Moore: And you were seeing more and more people get access to help that they needed?

[00:29:27] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, and the, and the permission part, you know? It’s like, uh, when I was collecting signatures for Denver, you know, I heard all of these powerful stories of people willing to risk felony prosecution to access the healing that the mushroom offered, and that was like, that was just so impact- it was visceral.

[00:29:44] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:29:45] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And, um, you know, little did I know that, um, a series of traumas was waiting for me, that I would eventually start to go to the mushroom in that medicinal, uh, kind of way, and reaffirm, you know, in my own [00:30:00] experience what all those, uh, individuals had been talking about. And when you remove the criminality from something, then people are allowed to be curious, and that just changes the climate of things.

[00:30:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: And there’s been, um, so many activities that I now… It’s not that I take them for granted, but, you know, I, like, go to a NOAC meeting and talk about the culture of use of substances when, you know, people are not really permissed to even talk about drugs.

[00:30:27] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:30:27] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Just, uh, without people feeling like they need to intervene and that there’s a problem.

[00:30:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, there’s these really cool, uh, granular conversations that are now happening here. Um, and our, our language around this stuff is becoming less and less impoverished that true, it, it, you know, it is a drug, but like there’s this whole other way, non-reductive way to talk about this thing.

[00:30:51] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[00:30:51] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I think it’s just, uh, you know, it’s, um, when you change the laws, you, you kinda change the, the spatial [00:31:00] qualities of the container, and then the people can kind of like inhabit that space, you know, and nest in it.

[00:31:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I, I really feel like we’re still in neonate, that it hasn’t even started to look like a human yet.

[00:31:13] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:31:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, you know, like the things that we’re seeing are all just like very, um, early, early indicators and interactions of what this is.

[00:31:24] Joe Moore: Right. Yeah, I’d agree. Um, we’ve got a lot of time left. But I, I chatted years ago with, uh, Ethan Nadelmann from, uh, Drug Policy Alliance, I think was his organization, and was like, “Why, why decrim?

[00:31:39] Joe Moore: Like, does it actually make a difference?” And he’s working on the larger kind of drug policy conversation nationally and internationally, and he says, “At the very least, it allows people to operate more safely.” And I love that.

[00:31:52] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. Um, but I will, I will say that it- its, its best case comes with, um, you know, this [00:32:00] responsibility that’s kind of taken up in, in that way for education.

[00:32:04] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Um, because if you just, if you just decriminalize something, um, and you don’t also kind of like s- provide visible support for, you know, either harm reduction or safe use, depending on what side of the pole you wanna play on, it’s just, um, you know, you’re still, um, in some sense, like a victim of prohibition attitudes.

[00:32:27] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm. Even prohibition style harms. So the one thing

[00:32:31] Joe Moore: that’s- We’re digging ourselves out of $1 trillion propaganda drug war, and that’s hard. Yeah. And expensive to like dig ourselves out of it. Um, you know, we’ve been here for education for a decade now, right? So like, it’s… There’s people doing education. But it, the state, like honestly, I, I would love to see some sort of reparation payments, like, hey, let’s actually spend that reparation money, uh, uh…

[00:32:59] Joe Moore: That’s probably [00:33:00] the wrong term, but like let’s get people educated on these things and stop lying to them about these substances and plants and fungi.

[00:33:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, I mean, that’s like such a multifaceted thing because it’s adjacent to so many other things that we’re being lied to about.

[00:33:13] Joe Moore: Right.

[00:33:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: And just even like the, even just the concept of teaching people about propaganda-

[00:33:19] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm

[00:33:20] Travis Tyler Fluck: you know? Uh, ’cause most people have zero idea that they are just in a constant sea of propaganda- Right … um, and have lost the ability to kind of like suss things out, um, with, with their own thinking mind.

[00:33:33] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:33:34] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, but I, I was gonna loop back around for a second and just say one of the, one of the cool things about decrim is it doesn’t ask the government for any money.

[00:33:43] Joe Moore: Right.

[00:33:43] Travis Tyler Fluck: So when you legalize something, you also have to earmark all this extra money, and when you decrim, y- you can make the case like it’s actually gonna cost you guys, the taxpayers, everybody less money.

[00:33:54] Joe Moore: Yeah. The police can focus on more important things like violence, um, as opposed [00:34:00] to punishing and prosecuting non-violent citizens.

[00:34:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. And, um, you know, the, if you talk to the police, they’re like, at least in Denver, they’re like kinda stoked about that. Um, after I got the West Word cover, I went out into the world to find a, a copy of it so I could see it, and I was making a big fuss around the magazine rack, and this person was taking a picture of me making a big fuss.

[00:34:25] Travis Tyler Fluck: And there were these two cops that were on their lunch break kinda watching all this play out, and they were curious. So I held up the, the front page next to my face, and then they, they were like, “Oh my God.” And then we, it, it, it, we wound up talking and they invited me to come and teach the police force about mushrooms.

[00:34:46] Joe Moore: Love that.

[00:34:47] Travis Tyler Fluck: And I was like cons- considering from whence I came-

[00:34:50] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm …

[00:34:50] Travis Tyler Fluck: you know, it’s just like so like psychedelic-

[00:34:53] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm … you

[00:34:54] Travis Tyler Fluck: know? Did

[00:34:54] Joe Moore: you do it?

[00:34:55] Travis Tyler Fluck: Uh, just haven’t yet.

[00:34:56] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:34:57] Travis Tyler Fluck: Just haven’t yet. Um, [00:35:00] but the more that I kind of teach or meet people in, uh, in, in psychedelic naivete or illiteracy, that I, I feel more competent when I go into these-

[00:35:13] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm

[00:35:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: spaces like, like the police and be able to, um, teach at several different angles, you know? And a lot of that is just, um, you know, invitations to, you know, broaden, um, the perspective on things and kind of appreciate the short night- sightedness of why the laws were passed in the first place.

[00:35:32] Joe Moore: Right. Um, that makes sense to me.

[00:35:36] Joe Moore: And these po- yeah, the police are, eh, victims of the same propaganda that we are. And I read, I read something recently, I need to find out if this is true or not, that the D.A.R.E. program was kind of like an MLM- Yeah … like a multi-level marketing deal. Have yous ever bumped into this?

[00:35:54] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, I’ve, I’ve been a D.A.R.E.

[00:35:56] Travis Tyler Fluck: participant.

[00:35:58] Joe Moore: I- You know? I got the training, and that’s when I [00:36:00] found out LSD was very interesting. Um- As a young person

[00:36:04] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, depending on how they like, you know, s- sell the prohibition attitude. You know, there’s that South Park episode where Mr. Mackey passes around some cannabis and, uh, yeah, I forget who ends up with it.

[00:36:17] Travis Tyler Fluck: I think Mr. Garrison ends up with it. Um- But yeah, it didn’t, obviously didn’t dissuade me. Um, but the MLM part is, is interesting. Um-

[00:36:27] Joe Moore: I’ll come… I’ll circle back on if that’s true. Yeah. Everybody don’t quote me on it, but it’s a suspicion. Well,

[00:36:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: well, I think a lot about, like, MLM structure or Ponzi structure- Mm-hmm

[00:36:36] Travis Tyler Fluck: or things like that, and just how to, like, uh, take the each, each one teach one kind of paradigm, and then MLM it, you know, in that way. Mm-hmm. That, like, that if I, you know, initiate you, you know, and, and each one teach one was revolving around slaves and literacy, that if you knew how to read, that it was your responsibility to teach the next slave how to read.

[00:36:58] Travis Tyler Fluck: And I feel like the same way with, uh, [00:37:00] psychedelic literacy or entheogenic literacy, um, is that we have an opportunity to, like, you know, uh, care for the next person down the line and kind of like, you know, educate- Mm-hmm … and create, like, um, visible resources, you know? And that’s one of the things that’s a real blessing in my life is, like, I can gift somebody something and say, “Feel free to reach out to me if anything, if you have any concerns.”

[00:37:27] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. And

[00:37:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: they’re like, “Well, what do you want?” And I was like, “Just reach out to me.” The rising tide will raise all the ships.

[00:37:33] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:37:34] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Yeah,

[00:37:34] Joe Moore: I love that. And you’ve made yourself deeply available to the Denver community in ways that, um, I think are unique to you, you know? Um, you really, I think– I don’t know how you came up with wanting to be this available for everybody, but, um, yeah, do you, do you have a story there?

[00:37:54] Travis Tyler Fluck: It just, you know, it was a byproduct or a self-evident feature of the inner work that I was doing. [00:38:00]

[00:38:00] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:38:00] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And then this just, like, challenge, like, you know, to take an insight and turn it into demonstrable action. You know, people have a peak experience or a unit of experience, but then they come back, and then they don’t act like it.

[00:38:15] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:38:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: So what the, these plant allies have been in training me in is, like, if we’re gonna give you these insights and you embody them, then there’s the coolest stuff is still ahead.

[00:38:27] Joe Moore: Right.

[00:38:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? So there’s been this, like, um, incentive to collect all the Easter eggs, if you wanna say that. And then I guess there’s also been this, like, recognition that there’s something deep inside of my experience that wants to be free.

[00:38:42] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:38:43] Travis Tyler Fluck: And what I’m finding is that my freedom, my isolated freedom is not nearly as cool as if I in, hold this in community, you know? And as a feature is, of all is self. You know? [00:39:00] So, you know, I am another you, and instead of, you know, intellectualizing that, it becomes this embodied practice. And, uh, you know, it just, like, feeds my curiosity as, like, what happens if we just keep following this, you know, this, this, the thread.

[00:39:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. You know? And it just, um, you know, the intervals are, are variable, but the rewards are, like, beyond anything that I knew was on the menu for being a human being.

[00:39:27] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:39:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, the existential- Yeah … relief, um, the path to eldership, which is that kind of EIT, uh, commentary, um, because that’s what I’ve lacked in my life, um, are…

[00:39:40] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know that, you know that book, Are You My Mother?

[00:39:42] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:39:43] Travis Tyler Fluck: So, like, my life has been like, “Are you my mentor? Are you my mentor?” And then I have to deal with, like, the, these people that, that present themselves, I have to deal with a fair amount of disillusionment around, because they are not the embodied big T truth, you know?

[00:39:58] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. And then so [00:40:00] more and more it becomes, uh, obvious that all of us hold that, that big T truth, but we have to, like, take our own vector into that. And I am a big student of, uh, Krishnamurti’s work. Do you know anything about Krishnamurti? So he, um, was groomed to be the leader of this esoteric organization, and on the night of his inauguration, he completely dismantled it-

[00:40:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: and stated that the path to truth is a pathless one, and the mere fact that this organization exists and implies that they are a path to truth, like, there’s hypocrisy in that, so I’m dismantling the whole thing. Um, so I just, like, you know, just there’s all these cool threads that I weave into my worldview and how I put that into practice.

[00:40:44] Travis Tyler Fluck: And a lot of it is just, like, it, it becomes, um, like these, like, uh… It’s like, uh, the, the pranksters. You know? Mm-hmm. Like this, like, this kind of, like, trickstery way to kinda interface with the rigidity of, of consensus [00:41:00] reality, and as I mature in it, I’m learning how to be a sweeter, older version instead of a confrontative, provocative, uh- Okay

[00:41:08] Travis Tyler Fluck: version.

[00:41:09] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:41:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: But it’s fun. It’s like a big life art project.

[00:41:13] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:41:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:41:14] Joe Moore: Yeah. There’s so many directions to go. Yeah.

[00:41:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:41:19] Joe Moore: Um, yeah. Krishnamurti. Everybody read some Krishnamurti.

[00:41:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. And I will say that about, like, when I give people access to me, I’m constantly evaluating my capacity, you know? There are a lot of times that I spend very isolated and introverted so that I can come back out and be as, uh, potent as possible.

[00:41:42] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. But that’s, you know, something that we’re not taught in a, uh, society that values an eternal spring of productivity, is that we need winters, you know? We need to, like, r- you know, come back to a regulated nervous system to be able to do our best work. And if I’m not modeling that out in the world, I’m, [00:42:00] I’m only perpetuating the, the culture, the, the, um, what do they call it?

[00:42:04] Travis Tyler Fluck: The hustle culture.

[00:42:06] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:42:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: But in a different, just a different, um, flavor.

[00:42:10] Joe Moore: Yeah. Every few decades, maybe a forest fire.

[00:42:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep.

[00:42:15] Joe Moore: Um, but yeah, absolutely. There’s cycles and all sorts of interesting trajectories, and yeah, to propose a single path for all is cartoonish, which I think is, um, some of my pushback on the psychedelic ecosystem often is like, “No, all you do is this.

[00:42:34] Joe Moore: This is it.” You know? And perhaps that’s true to lower your PTSD scores in some cases, but, like, what if you wanted to think bigger?

[00:42:43] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, and that’s why I keep calling in eldership, because, like, I need to see an example of somebody that woke up within this context and actually embodies, you know, cosmic wisdom.

[00:42:55] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:42:55] Travis Tyler Fluck: Like, I need that. I need to know that there’s a successful story out there of someone that did it, [00:43:00] you know? ‘Cause we often hear these stories that are like, you know, like 100 years ago, or– And then we have to, like– We don’t get to conjunctively interface with that stuff. We have to take somebody’s word for it that these beings existed, you know, like Ram Dass talking about his guru, right?

[00:43:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: That’s two degrees of separation. Um, and-

[00:43:19] Joe Moore: But you’d like the in-person intimate encounter with that type of person.

[00:43:25] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, to be able to, um, feel into their experience.

[00:43:31] Joe Moore: Mm.

[00:43:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Like, when you’re around a calm person, like, generally you calm down, you know? You might fight it for a second, but it’s just- Mm-hmm

[00:43:40] Travis Tyler Fluck: just the way it goes down. And before I knew anything, years ago, I saw the Dalai Lama speak, and when he would giggle, like, the hairs on my arms would, like, go on end, you know? I didn’t really un- appreciate what was happening there.

[00:43:54] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:43:54] Travis Tyler Fluck: But he was setting the tone, you know, um, from a more enlightened [00:44:00] perspective.

[00:44:00] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, you know, I, I have to, uh, at least in my experience, that this, uh, this, this process of personal evolution is supported in allyship with these plant teachers, that it’s not just, um, feeling better. It’s going beyond that and really getting to the root of where these, um, this suffering is coming from, you know?

[00:44:23] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, and often I’ll, I’ll mention the illusion of separation kind of being the root, but that’s a place that most people can’t follow. Or if we start talking about layers of, um, systemic oppression like colonialism or patriarchy or, you know, like, people just can’t… They can’t appreciate that that’s why the symptoms of depression and anxiety are revealing themselves.

[00:44:47] Joe Moore: Robert Anton Wilson a while ago in one of his talks talked about the How many Buddhas exist today? And his, his, uh, concept based on his read [00:45:00] of the world, he got a good amount of experience in these weird circles, and it’s like more exist now than ever before in history, which I think is interesting. You know, there’s more abundance, less illness, therefore more practice, and community, and sangha, and people can, like keep evolving, which I find interesting.

[00:45:19] Joe Moore: I, I, um… Mike Crowley, have you bumped into his work yet?

[00:45:23] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep. Yeah. So I know, I’m friends with Acacia.

[00:45:25] Joe Moore: Okay.

[00:45:26] Travis Tyler Fluck: And Mike is her lama.

[00:45:28] Joe Moore: Cool. Yeah, he’s a fascinating character. He’s still around. Um, I haven’t spent a ton of time with him, but I’ve always enjoyed my time with him. And you know, there’s… If they’re that in awake, are they really gonna wanna seek any kind of attention?

[00:45:44] Joe Moore: It’s hard.

[00:45:45] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, there’s that, there’s that thing if two Buddhas cro- pass each other in the street, they w- wouldn’t know that they were Buddhas.

[00:45:52] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:45:52] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? There’s not like this, like, virtue signaling around that.

[00:45:55] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:45:56] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And- Yeah … so, you know, like, [00:46:00] I have to like take my conceptual models that are oriented towards what that looks like and, you know, like offer them for recalibration all the time, because I’ve never really been exposed to somebody embodied in that.

[00:46:13] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:46:14] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And then when I am, then I’ll, you know, like it’ll be, like the questions will become irrelevant because it’ll have is-ness. Um, I’m giving a talk on Sunday at Plant Magic Cafe, and I’m gonna introduce people to Ramana Maharshi.

[00:46:28] Joe Moore: Cool.

[00:46:29] Travis Tyler Fluck: Do you know anything about Ramana Maharshi?

[00:46:31] Joe Moore: I, I used to be able to speak about him.

[00:46:33] Travis Tyler Fluck: He self-realized as a child.

[00:46:35] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. And

[00:46:35] Travis Tyler Fluck: then his gift was the transmission of silence.

[00:46:39] Joe Moore: Hmm.

[00:46:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: So these people would travel great distances to go see the enlightened saint and have a litany of questions, and when they would get before him, they would all become irrelevant, and they would just sit in silence for 30 minutes, and they would get up completely satisfied with what they had experienced.

[00:46:55] Travis Tyler Fluck: So there’s these three famous pictures of him, and when we [00:47:00] try to articulate what presence truly is, you know, um, it’s conceptual model of what that is. And, uh, so this guy, when you see a picture of it, you know that he’s just pure awareness looking back at you, and that just, even being with that picture for me is psychedelic.

[00:47:15] Joe Moore: Hmm.

[00:47:16] Travis Tyler Fluck: Knowing that that person looking is just pure awareness.

[00:47:20] Joe Moore: So where do you see psychedelics fitting in with this kind of pursuit?

[00:47:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, they dovetail, you know? But it’s like there’s gonna be a sub- a subsect of this landscape that- chooses the path of a, the initiate.

[00:47:35] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:47:35] Travis Tyler Fluck: And I think that that is where that, that stuff will become very obvious, uh, that the intellectualizations around ascension and, you know, uh, personal spiritual evolution are kind of like, um, revealed in the entheogenic context.

[00:47:53] Travis Tyler Fluck: And if you’ve ever had a, uh, you know, a pretty depersonalized experience, that a lot [00:48:00] of it feels more real than this.

[00:48:02] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:48:02] Travis Tyler Fluck: Right? So I guess there- Mm-hmm … there’s like something to like look into there. Why does that feel more real than this?

[00:48:09] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:48:09] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, a lot of the insights that I’ve received in that state didn’t have to be like argued to me.

[00:48:14] Travis Tyler Fluck: There’s no bullet point. It was just like, “Oh, right. I am a spiritual being having a human experience.” You know? Right. So there’s this mnemonic quality, as Kalindi would say, this opportunity to remember, you know?

[00:48:29] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:48:30] Travis Tyler Fluck: And I think that, um, you know, at least in my, in my journey, my study of esotericism became the substrate, uh, by which the mushroom went in and said, “Oh, you’ve read about a chakra?

[00:48:42] Travis Tyler Fluck: Let’s actually show you a chakra.” Because now it’s conjunctive knowledge. It’s d- Now you’re directly perceiving it instead of taking someone else’s word for it.

[00:48:50] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:48:51] Travis Tyler Fluck: Which is the, if you just consider the economy of direct perception versus taking someone’s word for it, it’s like, you know, it’s exponentially [00:49:00] like, uh, more economical.

[00:49:02] Joe Moore: Right. Yeah. Going and seeing ancient sites is far more valuable than reading about them or seeing-

[00:49:09] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah …

[00:49:09] Joe Moore: pictures.

[00:49:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: It just does something to you. And then it also cannot be taken away.

[00:49:14] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:49:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know?

[00:49:16] Joe Moore: Right. Absolutely. Um, so what else did we wanna chat about? I-

[00:49:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: Aspen?

[00:49:25] Joe Moore: Sure. Let’s talk about that. Yeah.

[00:49:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: So the Aspen Psychedelic Symposium is coming up in a month, and this is the third year I believe they have thrown it, and the first two years I attended.

[00:49:37] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, and as the, as the title, uh, denotes, it is a symposium, and it’s science leaning, and I felt kind of like, um, bummed that the personal use space hasn’t really had an opportunity to, uh, speak about itself. And after attending MAPS last year, I got a very specific depression because, uh, again, I [00:50:00] felt like the personal use space wasn’t given the time of day, uh, to make its case in congruence to the medicalized way of doing this.

[00:50:08] Travis Tyler Fluck: And this year, the Aspen folks invited me to speak. I didn’t even have to apply, uh, just because they’ve been just like watching my work for so long. So I’m gonna be on stage with Mudu Baki. Do you know who that is?

[00:50:21] Joe Moore: Is he one of the… Oh, yeah. Actually, I do. So he’s one of- I follow him. I met him a couple times.

[00:50:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: He’s one of Kalindi’s students.

[00:50:25] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:50:26] Travis Tyler Fluck: And so we’re gonna be on stage, uh, in dialogue around the perspective of the initiate. Looking around at what’s happening here.

[00:50:33] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:50:34] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then, um, I guess last year 400 people attended, and I, I feel like all of my gifting events have been ramping up to this ’cause I was like, how cool would it be to do the Oprah thing and just gift all the participants a therapeutic dose of mushrooms, and tell them that this, I’m giving all this to you for less than the cost of one person going to a healing center for one [00:51:00] session.

[00:51:00] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:51:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then I also saw an opportunity to invite people to participate in a qualitative study where, uh, people self-report on their own experiences with the gift, and then we take all of that storytelling data and aggregate it with a chatbot essentially so that anybody can sit down in front of the data and kinda move through it.

[00:51:20] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then, um, some people showed up in support of that idea, and I realized I could do all of that for less than the cost of one person going to a healing center for one experience.

[00:51:30] Speaker 3: Mm.

[00:51:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: So in its- Hell yeah … so in its most ideal presentation, all 4, 400 people accept my invitation and then self-report, and then we have a huge body of something to look at.

[00:51:43] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:51:43] Travis Tyler Fluck: Uh, if for nothing else to create contrast and to, you know, recognize that, like, the amount of normalized trauma that we deal with, uh, you know, on a daily basis, like the creating access points through this, uh, [00:52:00] regulation transactional model, like we can’t keep up the, with the rate of attrition. You know, the lawn is growing way too fast for us to mow it.

[00:52:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I feel like the evolved version of this is holding these medicines in mutual aid, and the mushroom has proven itself as a very, uh, economic, um, ally in that pursuit. A mushroom once told me, “As long as cows poop, y’all are gonna have mushrooms, so don’t make this a scarcity thing.”

[00:52:28] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:52:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And I, and I, and I’ve just, like really taken that to heart.

[00:52:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then, um, Hunter S. Thompson is local to Aspen, so every time I do a, uh, talk, I dedicate it to Hunter, and he ran for sheriff years ago. Huge inspiration as far as, like how I show up as an activist. And there’s this, uh, style of journalism that he is, um, that they’ve… Gonzo journalism, which they claim he invented, which is [00:53:00] immersive, subjective, and essentially using poetry or hyperbole to, you know, describe, uh, an event.

[00:53:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: And I feel like this self-reporting process is in, in some way, shape, or form a form of Gonzo journalism.

[00:53:14] Speaker 3: Mm.

[00:53:14] Travis Tyler Fluck: So you have all these threads that kinda weave together. So it’s, um, from my optics, it’s an art project guised as a qualitative study.

[00:53:23] Joe Moore: That’s great.

[00:53:25] Travis Tyler Fluck: And so just one last piece, someone was asking me, “Well, how do you incentivize people to actually follow through with this?”

[00:53:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, like, we t- we take these things on all the time, and then we never follow through, and it took me about 24 hours and I said, “Well, I’m just gonna ask people to give me their word.”

[00:53:43] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:53:43] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, when’s the last time someone asked for your- Mm-hmm … word specifically? And then if nothing else, that becomes a data point.

[00:53:49] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:53:49] Travis Tyler Fluck: 200 people gave me their word, but only 10 people followed through.

[00:53:53] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:53:54] Travis Tyler Fluck: So if, uh, accountability and impeccability aren’t core values in what we’re trying to do with this [00:54:00] plant medicine space, like, what are we doing?

[00:54:02] Joe Moore: Sure. Yeah. Well, a lot of different things is the answer.

[00:54:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:54:08] Joe Moore: But yes, I’m with you.

[00:54:09] Joe Moore: I think that’s a really cool way to go about it, and there’s, yeah, how do you incentivize them? Most research I’ve seen people go through, they’re not getting paid for anyway, if I’m being honest. Um, you know, you get the gift ahead of time, you know? It’s-

[00:54:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, I’ve never applied for a study, so I don’t know what that first person perspective is like, but I, in my world, I get to deal with all the people that, um, either don’t qualify for the studies and then come find me, or they see themselves in the studies, not realizing that they would’ve never qualified for them in the first place, and then don’t have the textbook, you know, experience that the- Mm-hmm

[00:54:46] Travis Tyler Fluck: study has promised them, and they’re, they feel like something’s wrong with them. So then I get to, like, meet them in that place.

[00:54:54] Joe Moore: Right. Yeah. So, ugh, well, this is gonna be fascinating. [00:55:00] I love that. Um-

[00:55:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: Are you coming to Aspen?

[00:55:02] Joe Moore: Yeah. I think, I think I’m doing something on, uh, talking to kids about substance, which will be nice.

[00:55:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: Great.

[00:55:11] Joe Moore: Um, and I, you know, I’ve been to the MAPS events. I, I was there. I’m always a little bummed out that, you know, uh, I don’t think drug policy reform gets in the right kind of attention. I don’t think, like, the actual use cases get enough attention. So I was at the Berkeley Psychedelic Safety Summit ages ago.

[00:55:33] Joe Moore: I forget who paid for it. One of the bazillionaires out there paid for it, and I’m roughly glad it happened. Um, I had to pay my own way and all that to participate in their, kind of, data gathering and free labor. But, um, 99% of those conversations were about 1% of use cases, which is, like, clinical trials and the medical model and these state models.

[00:55:55] Joe Moore: Um, but not about what’s happening at shows and kind of healing [00:56:00] spaces that aren’t kind of, you know, where most of the action is happening.

[00:56:03] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. Um, if I have a byway, um, I would like to throw an event the day before MAPS starts next year in a park where people can be barefoot.

[00:56:12] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:56:12] Travis Tyler Fluck: And we can actually, like- Talk about, like, real, real use cases and how this is being held in community, and all the things that have been kind of like, um, not de-platformed, but just the stuff that isn’t getting the, getting put into the limelight, but that people can feel into.

[00:56:31] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. You know? Like, I’m not getting off on a pie chart, but if, you know, someone tells their testimonial, like, I’ll probably need a Kleenex.

[00:56:38] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:56:38] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And that’s real to me.

[00:56:40] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Well, uh, would love to chat with you about that, I think. Um, I’m probably not hosting any workshops, so it’d be free. I got microphones and some big speakers.

[00:56:52] Joe Moore: So, um, I think events outside in Denver aren’t too difficult to put together-

[00:56:57] Travis Tyler Fluck: No … from

[00:56:57] Joe Moore: what I understand. And

[00:56:58] Travis Tyler Fluck: I just like, when I think [00:57:00] about being, like, barefoot, like, that’s just… It’s like duh. You know what I mean?

[00:57:05] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:57:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, which is a totally different vibe. And there’s this, you know, this, this thing that’s really tough to accept is that, you know, um, Maps comes here, and then the high ticket price.

[00:57:17] Travis Tyler Fluck: I mean, they, they let a lot of people in with scholarship, and I am, like, very, you know, grateful for that. But it, it’s just like, I feel like Colorado, uh, should be able to just enter the space, you know?

[00:57:29] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[00:57:30] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, if you’re gonna come here and do the thing here. Um, but I think, I think there’s, like, an, uh, eventually there’s an opportunity for all of us to have our territory.

[00:57:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: Or not territory, but, like, that it all works together, that it isn’t there, there an us and a them and a marginalized and a centered, but there’s this, like, this, this thing that, that weaves in good faith, um, at the speed of trust.

[00:57:54] Joe Moore: And there’s all these niches that need to get built out.

[00:57:56] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. ‘

[00:57:56] Joe Moore: Cause a lot of us wanna have, like, very niche conversations, [00:58:00] and we can’t show up in these spaces to have those ’cause nobody has, like, the fundamental training or experience to have those conversations well.

[00:58:10] Joe Moore: So I think there’s so much room for so many smaller events, too.

[00:58:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[00:58:14] Joe Moore: Because we need to build those conversations. Like, they’re all really important.

[00:58:18] Travis Tyler Fluck: Rudiments.

[00:58:19] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:58:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: It’s how you build up to any complex activity, you know? Yeah. You, like, teach people the, the really basic elements. Um, and one of the things that I do in my share circles or integration groups is, like, we are teaching each other how to hold space.

[00:58:34] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[00:58:34] Travis Tyler Fluck: Which becomes with or without substance.

[00:58:36] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[00:58:36] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And with everybody as polarized as they are, you know, that becomes a really valuable skill out in the world for many reasons. If nothing else, to protect your own, you know, psychic energies and your emotional state, to really-

[00:58:50] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm …

[00:58:51] Travis Tyler Fluck: hold space.

[00:58:53] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, um, but yeah, I’m just, uh, the more time I spend in that consequential area of people that, that are [00:59:00] curious and, you know, me not wanting them to be taken advantage of by people that claim self-anointed authority, that is learned. Like, what are these, what skills do people need? To be able to, uh, create their own, um, like navigational techniques.

[00:59:18] Travis Tyler Fluck: Like, what are the questions to ask?

[00:59:21] Joe Moore: Did you see the recent book by Julian Baney? Um, it’s brand new. It’s kind of just… Are you familiar with him at all?

[00:59:29] Travis Tyler Fluck: No.

[00:59:29] Joe Moore: A British, British witch, occultist who’s been around the psychedelic space for many decades. I think it was one of the most concise and well done, like, this is how you trip with your friends kind of book.

[00:59:42] Joe Moore: And, you know, I didn’t agree with everything 100%, nor should I, but I, I was like, “This is the book a lot of people should have as their starting point.” S-

[00:59:51] Travis Tyler Fluck: so let me ask you this. Yeah Does it, is it contextualized within, like, a British kind of way of doing things? Uh,

[00:59:58] Joe Moore: I [01:00:00] don’t know enough about the British, I guess- No,

[01:00:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: I’m just saying

[01:00:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: to speak to it Does it seem like a c- like a, it’s culturally appropriate for that?

[01:00:05] Joe Moore: For Americans?

[01:00:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: Oh, for Americans.

[01:00:06] Joe Moore: Okay And for British. Like, yeah, I th- it wasn’t too far… Like, I called him an occultist and whatever, but that’s kind of just how he shows up in the world. Um, but he’s, he’s an amazing speaker, amazing lecturer, and it was comfortable enough as a read, I think, for m- your average person.

[01:00:23] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, I would love to read it because- Yeah … uh, you know, like I, in my world, I just wanna grok everything that’s out there. Mm-hmm. Even if I ultimately become, like, not advocate for it- Yeah … I feel like it’s just really good to know, like, what is being said out there because, you know, even a blind squirrel can find a few nuts.

[01:00:39] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[01:00:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, there’s a few pearls that come out of things, and I’m, I’m really good at, um, kind of like collage. I’m like a collage artist in that way.

[01:00:46] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[01:00:47] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, but yeah, I’d just like to know kind of where everybody’s contemplations are because we are in a process of, uh, reintegrating all of this, you know?

[01:00:57] Travis Tyler Fluck: And re- We’re on

[01:00:57] Joe Moore: the tail end of the storming phase and working on the [01:01:00] norming phase maybe.

[01:01:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, we’re still stuck w- at, you know, I’ll use the metaphor of the six blind men that go visit the elephant, the old Persian poem.

[01:01:07] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:01:08] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. We’re still not, like, sussing out that this is an elephant here.

[01:01:12] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:01:12] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, like, oh, it treats anxiety and depression, or oh, you know, like end of life, you know what I mean? We’re meeting all the, we’re meeting this multidimensional thing, you know, where we’re at, and then we’re just staying there. And, um, so yeah, I j- I would like to think that this is all h- like I said, like a neonate.

[01:01:32] Joe Moore: Right.

[01:01:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: It’s still young a- and helpless and has not told us what its needs are and, you know, um, if we were, um, mature enough- And

[01:01:42] Joe Moore: it is variable too.

[01:01:44] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah

[01:01:44] Joe Moore: Like, what are we actually speaking about? Like-

[01:01:46] Travis Tyler Fluck: That’s the elephant

[01:01:47] Joe Moore: part … honestly, well, you know, yes, and, like, I, if I’m talking about breathwork and, and, uh, like Holotropic Breathwork and LSD, it’s like a r- it’s a slightly different or potentially giant different [01:02:00] conversation than ayahuasca and mushrooms or iboga.

[01:02:03] Joe Moore: Um- Yeah … but there’s a similarity, but there’s also a major difference.

[01:02:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:02:07] Joe Moore: Um, so it’s a big elephant.

[01:02:09] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:02:09] Joe Moore: Yeah. Um, but it’s hard to have that conversation even with deep, uh, initiates into those specific traditions, you know?

[01:02:18] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, I think it’s application over time.

[01:02:20] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:02:21] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Just being content with, like, that we had the conversation and that maybe it’ll grow roots.

[01:02:27] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. ‘

[01:02:27] Travis Tyler Fluck: Cause oftentimes when we hear something once and then we hear it reaffirmed in the world, it kinda does s- it concretizes it a little bit more. Maybe, oh, maybe that person wasn’t as far off the mark as I thought.

[01:02:37] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:02:38] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Um, so our, you know, uh, being more mature, you know, people that are a little bit further in this process and, like, wanting, wanting, you know, to create environments for people to arrive at self-evident truth, you know, our tactics are gonna evolve.

[01:02:54] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:02:54] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And just, like, the appreciation of how rigid people’s paradigms are, [01:03:00] and any time you have something rigid, it’s also brittle.

[01:03:02] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:03:03] Travis Tyler Fluck: So just, like, v- really, like, being, bringing as much care into these conversations and dismantling as much righteousness and allowing for curiosity.

[01:03:13] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:03:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: ‘Cause most people aren’t permissed enough to have true curiosity.

[01:03:17] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:03:17] Travis Tyler Fluck: They’ll, you’ll say a big word, and they won’t stop you. And you’ll be like, “Well, I could’ve totally… I would’ve been happy to unpack that so that we can actually be in the experience together.”

[01:03:27] Joe Moore: Right. And I think, yeah, listeners and learners, like, take that to heart.

[01:03:32] Joe Moore: Like, if someone is taking the time to speak to you, and, you know, especially if they’re kind of far along in their experience, like, they want to be sure that you’re not, they’re not, they’re not going over your head.

[01:03:45] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, and then just a, you know, just a precautionary thing here, um, you know what 13th stepping is?

[01:03:52] Joe Moore: Oh, let’s have it.

[01:03:53] Travis Tyler Fluck: So in the AA space, there’s this, uh, outside of the 12 steps, there’s a 13th kind of thing where, [01:04:00] like, just because someone has 30 years of clean time doesn’t mean they know what they’re talking about.

[01:04:04] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm. And

[01:04:04] Travis Tyler Fluck: there could be predatory agenda in that.

[01:04:06] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[01:04:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: So another, another thing is, like, if you’re not in an enthusiastically…

[01:04:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: If you’re not giving consent enthusiastically when you’re interfacing with somebody that has a lot more time in this space, just l- like, look at that. You know? Mm-hmm. Just don’t assume that just ’cause someone has 30 years taking mushrooms that they have any idea what, that they’re talking about.

[01:04:25] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:04:25] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know?

[01:04:27] Joe Moore: Yes.

[01:04:27] Travis Tyler Fluck: So it’s just like this taking power back-

[01:04:30] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm …

[01:04:30] Travis Tyler Fluck: you know, in the dynamic like that. Like, don’t give your power away if you don’t have to.

[01:04:35] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And there’s, yeah, a couple cult warnings. Like, there’s groups out there, folks, that present as plant medicine communities that are, you know, global or national in scope, and they’re not allowing you to ask what is in their sacrament.

[01:04:52] Joe Moore: Um, that’s a red flag AF. Like, they’re saying it’s plant medicine, but it’s probably MDMA, [01:05:00] and that’s not okay. That’s a huge consent issue.

[01:05:03] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. There’s this motivation for people to walk away with having an impactful experience. So the people that are- Mm-hmm … kind of like behind what you’re talking about are- Yeah

[01:05:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: are, that’s their strategy. So they, that there’s this knowledge like, oh, if I put MDMA in it, then they’re definitely gonna have an experience, and there’s, there’s, uh, examples in our landscape here where a camera gets shoved in somebody’s face right as they’re coming down out of an experience like that, and they’re like, “Oh, well give us a testimonial for the next person,” you know?

[01:05:35] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. And/or donate to my cause. Yep. Buy real estate with me. And-

[01:05:40] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep …

[01:05:41] Joe Moore: there’s so much, um, opportunism here, so be careful. Choose your friends well, and cultivate that community, you know? The more you break bread or share lentil soup with-

[01:05:53] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah …

[01:05:54] Joe Moore: the more trust there is there over time.

[01:05:57] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. And don’t be shy about slowing down.

[01:05:59] Joe Moore: [01:06:00] Mm.

[01:06:00] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? I have a lot of people that gain proximity to me, and then they wanna build things with me, and I’m like, “Well, I haven’t seen you move-

[01:06:07] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm …

[01:06:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: long enough.” And they’re like, “Well, we’ve known each other for five years.” I was like, “I’m not, I’m not moving quickly.”

[01:06:12] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[01:06:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Like, there’s, uh, this, uh, way of looking at trust as a non-binary, right?

[01:06:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. So layers of trust. So the first layer would be like, I trust you enough to go to Wendy’s and not mess up my order. But then they- Mm … then, you know, as you move through these concentric layers, then they’re the inner sanctum.

[01:06:31] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[01:06:31] Travis Tyler Fluck: And they’re like, “But I’m not gonna let you into my inner sanctum.”

[01:06:33] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm.

[01:06:34] Speaker 3: And

[01:06:34] Travis Tyler Fluck: I think that’s where, like, a lot of these binary constructs fail us, is it, it either is or it isn’t, and there’s this opportunity to create strata in between the binary.

[01:06:45] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I like that. Yeah. And, um, I’m probably gonna build some consent training in the near term just because I watch so many people get so abused and taken- Yeah

[01:06:58] Joe Moore: advantage of and… [01:07:00] You know, do we actually even know what consent is here, everybody? I, I don’t know.

[01:07:04] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, enthusiastic consent is usually how I frame it. Like, if you’re not 10 toes in, no. Yeah,

[01:07:10] Joe Moore: yeah.

[01:07:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: And no is a complete sentence.

[01:07:12] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:07:12] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Mm-hmm. Like, um, and it, it’s, you know, early adopters’ permission, you know, like just appreciating that, like, people are gonna need this in a world of learned helplessness, and people that just give away their agency and we just, you know, en masse we do that.

[01:07:29] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm. And then we ended up with the, you know, the, the, some of the specific issues that we have because of that.

[01:07:35] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[01:07:36] Travis Tyler Fluck: So yeah, teaching consent is really important, and also, like, it gives people an opportunity to have an embodied experience. What is your body telling you? You know, outside of the pressure to, like, give an answer quickly.

[01:07:47] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah. So I think there’s a lot of hope here. There’s, you know, this thing is so young. It’s gonna keep forming. Um, I want it to stay somewhat [01:08:00] feral for a while- As order gets put on us, I know it’s gonna be challenging. Um, but I think there’s… How do you control people from growing mushrooms or-

[01:08:12] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, the cat’s out of the

[01:08:13] Joe Moore: bag

[01:08:14] Travis Tyler Fluck: there

[01:08:14] Travis Tyler Fluck: consuming

[01:08:14] Joe Moore: after? Like, it’s impossible.

[01:08:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:08:16] Joe Moore: This stuff is never gonna go away.

[01:08:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. Um, and I think in Colorado, we can kinda become a vanguard in how the people can rise to the responsibility that will kind of show that the, the governmental regulated way can’t even reach the amount of impeccability and integrity that we can hold these conversations in.

[01:08:41] Joe Moore: Do you think there’s going to be some interesting battles, um, for decriminalized personal use type spaces from this kind of hyper-medicalized model?

[01:08:53] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, that was our argument when we were opposing the statewide measure, when we were- Mm-hmm … arguing for a decrim first scenario- Mm-hmm … because [01:09:00] lobbying exists.

[01:09:02] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:09:02] Travis Tyler Fluck: So we don’t know what lobbying is gonna look like. When you have FDA approved, uh, psilocybin at $9,000 a dose, you know, it’s, like, in their best interest to lobby to, like, do what they did to medical cannabis and just keep whittling it away.

[01:09:16] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[01:09:16] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Um, so that was, like, already, uh… w- we were already thinking about this, you know?

[01:09:23] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. And, and, um, so the thing that we can constantly do is just, like, take utmost responsibility in how this rolls out and just keep, like, you know, like, having all of that real world e- experience to give testimonial around, you know? Like, don’t create a problem where there isn’t one.

[01:09:40] Joe Moore: Is there any organizing happening ahead of any kind of battle?

[01:09:45] Joe Moore: Like, how I see a lot of this is that the s- state of Colorado set their program up with too much safety and caution, and as a result it became so expensive, businesses are losing out. I could see there being a reaction in that space [01:10:00] to say, “We need to fight decrim back as these poor business users.”

[01:10:04] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:10:05] Joe Moore: Or are you seeing it more from FDA pharma?

[01:10:10] Joe Moore: I guess my, my question is like

[01:10:11] Travis Tyler Fluck: are you- Well, I’m not seeing it yet. You know, like, um, Compass came to Colorado, um, a year ago I guess now and passed the trigger law.

[01:10:18] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:10:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: For… And I, like, raised a fuss, and the-

[01:10:21] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm …

[01:10:22] Travis Tyler Fluck: powers that be told me that Colorado has never said no to an FDA approved medication.

[01:10:28] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:10:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: So don’t wa- don’t waste my time.

[01:10:30] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:10:30] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And I was just trying to make the argument, like, why would you want the… why would you wanna let the synthetic in when we have the, the natural shit?

[01:10:38] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. You know

[01:10:38] Travis Tyler Fluck: what I mean? Why would you wanna, like, even allow it in the same space? Um, but they just weren’t ready for that, you know?

[01:10:46] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, um, so we haven’t really seen We haven’t really seen like, like in Oregon there was a prime example of, um, rule making that happened, um, maybe two years ago at this point, where they added this, uh, [01:11:00] self-policing rule in and said, “If you are licensed, you are not allowed to do anything outside of that, um, scope.”

[01:11:06] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:11:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then they added this other layer that if you know of someone that’s doing something and you don’t tell on them, then you are also, like, subject to criminal prosecution as well.

[01:11:15] Joe Moore: Criminal?

[01:11:17] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:11:17] Joe Moore: Oh, dude. Um, is it

[01:11:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: Baltimore? I don’t know that anybody’s, like, actually-

[01:11:21] Joe Moore: Yeah …

[01:11:22] Travis Tyler Fluck: but, but yeah, I mean, there’s this whole thing of, like, the, the Oregon measure was passed o- on three c- three pillars, and one of them was affordability.

[01:11:30] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:11:31] Travis Tyler Fluck: Right? And they also promised- … that 90,000 people were gonna wanna get services the first year, and then 3,000 did. So I think that a lot of, like, you know, the, the two-year difference between the MAPS conferences is that Oregon kinda showed, like, this isn’t necessarily what we thought it was gonna be, so the enthusiasm is just tempered, you know?

[01:11:54] Joe Moore: Right. Without health insurance coverage or, like, some sort of single-payer care, like, that [01:12:00] model is gonna have such a difficult time, and it’s, it’s shown. These businesses are crashing left and right. You know, we, we had the opportunity to jump in early on training in Oregon and Colorado. Yeah. And at the very last minute we said, “No, it just doesn’t seem like a good situation for us to do business in,” for a number of reasons.

[01:12:18] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, it’s like I think it works really well for the people that can afford those services. Sure. So let’s, like… And, and funny enough, the people with the resources, uh, it, it, there’s some leverage there. If we can- Yeah … like, uh, create, um, empathy in those sectors, then maybe they’ll kind of pitch back to the bottom to bring the bottom up.

[01:12:36] Travis Tyler Fluck: But at the same time, let us have the decrim part. Yeah. Let us hold these medicines in community.

[01:12:41] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:12:41] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, Sam Gandy, uh, forwarded me the… Do you know who Sam Gandy is? Yeah. So forwarded me this, um, article years ago when we decriminalized, um, that was written about the m- Mustek perspective that the mushroom is the medicine for the poor people because they can’t afford doctors.

[01:12:58] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Right?

[01:12:58] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. So then [01:13:00] you, like, have this diametrical opposition of like, no, or this is now, like, a medicine of the privileged.

[01:13:05] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:13:05] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, at least in the safe, regulated, um, you know, permissed kinda way.

[01:13:12] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:13:12] Travis Tyler Fluck: Prohibition 2.0 is how you and I would talk about that. Um, but you know, I love the yes end.

[01:13:19] Joe Moore: Yeah, I don’t want the regulated frame to go away. Yeah. I just want it to be more self-aware and, like, let’s be careful not to put your problems on the decrim frame.

[01:13:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, and to not create draped moral injury around the impulse to wanna help people and do good work, have a good livelihood, which is one of the eight limbs of the no- the path, you know?

[01:13:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. Like, like, the, the impulse to, like, help people is a pure one, but now it’s, it’s corrupted or distorted with all these layers of, like, transactional behavior and kind of the parameters in which to do this, even though, um, the medicine in its pure energetic signature is not that. It is the, you know, the mushroom is a decomposer.[01:14:00]

[01:14:00] Travis Tyler Fluck: So my curiosity lies, well, like, when you bring a mushroom, the mushroom into these regulated spaces, how is it gonna decompose them? Because it will.

[01:14:08] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:14:09] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, it will transmute them and, um, so, you know, like, in my personal work, I am constantly electing things to put on the altar for that decomposition, you know?

[01:14:23] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I usually encourage people to think about bringing– Instead of bringing these medicines into Western medicine, that we bring Western medicine into these medicines to allow them to be healed in the same way. System- systemic healing in the same way that we have individuated healing.

[01:14:42] Joe Moore: We’re seeing a lot of kind of correlation there in the psychedelics and pain association- Yeah

[01:14:47] Joe Moore: where it’s like, “Hey, guys,” like, “look, you, you did a lot of really great niche work developing your fields, but, like, the– they need to have a lot more crosstalk and open to, like… You [01:15:00] know, eventually we’ll get to the point where we need to open to other ways of knowing. But, you know, at first, like, let’s at least have the sciences and medical pillars talk to each other.”

[01:15:08] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:15:09] Joe Moore: Um-

[01:15:09] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, um, Kalindi was real quick to, like, you know, request that the quantum physicists take these giant doses so that they could have direct perception with these things that they were theorizing about. Um, so fortunately in Colorado, we have, like, medical doctors that have had these big experiences now that can, like, have an avatar in that world, but at the same time recognize the bridge opportunity.

[01:15:31] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. And the way Colorado law was written in is that there’s ways to get licensed that will not compromise your, um, medical license, which I think is really cool.

[01:15:41] Joe Moore: I think that’s lovely.

[01:15:41] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, so the two can, like, kind of like, they can dance. There’s so

[01:15:44] Joe Moore: many things in the Colorado regs that I love- Yeah

[01:15:46] Joe Moore: so much. It’s just, like, we needed to make it a little less safe and a little less expensive is kinda where I’m at with it. Safe might not even be the right word, differently

[01:15:55] Travis Tyler Fluck: safe. Well, semantics, what does that mean? Yeah. You know? Right. Like-

[01:15:58] Joe Moore: I kinda hate the word safe in [01:16:00] this world. Like, it doesn’t, it’s really easy enough.

[01:16:01] Joe Moore: We’ve gotta

[01:16:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: qualify it.

[01:16:02] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:16:03] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, like, I constantly am seeking semantic safety in conversation- Mm-hmm … especially around relational words, because we wield these words like friend, and almost nobody agrees on what they mean. Minus going to a dictionary and looking it up or, like, dissecting it on an etymological level word.

[01:16:20] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. But, um, yeah, we don’t, we don’t share semantics, so how the F do we know what we’re talking about?

[01:16:26] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[01:16:26] Travis Tyler Fluck: And so when we use the word safety, depending on your social location and your privilege, that’s entirely different.

[01:16:32] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:16:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: Entirely different. And, you know, I think a lot about Marie Antoinette assessing words like safety.

[01:16:38] Joe Moore: Or cake. Yeah.

[01:16:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:16:40] Joe Moore: Right. For sure. Yeah.

[01:16:42] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then you consider, you know, um, somebody that’s been harmed by the, the, the medical, uh, complex, and now they’re entrusting their body to be safe enough with a facilitator they’ve only spent a few hours with.

[01:16:57] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:16:57] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I just think, you know, it’s just, like, things th- [01:17:00] that I’ve really listened to and tried to take into my, uh, you know, s- when I create solutions-

[01:17:05] Joe Moore: Yeah

[01:17:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: or that type of talk that we bring that perspective in the middle because then everybody gets in.

[01:17:12] Joe Moore: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

[01:17:14] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then, you know, like, when we think about safety, like safety in a colonial context, right?

[01:17:20] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Right.

[01:17:22] Travis Tyler Fluck: Which is like a whole other hour we could get into that type of thing, you know?

[01:17:25] Joe Moore: Safety in every sing- yeah, each container’s gonna have its own kind of lens on it.

[01:17:30] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, if you are doing healing just for the sake of feeling better so that you can participate and still be complicit in the systems, you know what I mean? That’s a level- Mm-hmm … of safety that you can’t achieve if you really let somebody, like, really, um, give access to the, the greater context of what we’re doing here.

[01:17:47] Joe Moore: Yeah. I think, uh, let’s put a, in a safe example, like a BP executive was in charge of that big Gulf oil spill, and potentially was really stressed out about it, kinda unlikely maybe, but, you know, had a lot [01:18:00] of moral injury from his job, and then did a bunch of, uh, psychedelic work of whatever kind to get over it, just to go back to BP to finish out the career and make a lot more oil money for BP.

[01:18:13] Joe Moore: Like, you know, safe example, read through the lines there, folks. But there’s a, you know, this is a thing that we’re all gonna have to think about.

[01:18:21] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:18:21] Joe Moore: And, um, and should be, because there’s a lot of activity happening worldwide that, uh, you know, maybe people need to retire before they get it. But, you know, that’s not how medicine works right now.

[01:18:34] Joe Moore: You know, if you’re hurting the world, you still get, you know, and, and potentially restricting people’s ability to live, uh, in a really healthy earth, um, you get the same medical care, maybe better than, uh, theoretically you would deserve. It’s a complicated thing. I don’t know what to do about it. Yeah. Well- But oil is just safe to talk about

[01:18:56] Travis Tyler Fluck: I, I think one of the first layers that we need to address is our [01:19:00] numbness.

[01:19:00] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:19:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? I, I read a statistic recently that by the time a child turns 18, minus video game, uh, presentation, but they see 20,000 simulated murders before they turn 18.

[01:19:12] Joe Moore: Mm.

[01:19:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Like, we’re just desensitized in ways that, like, allow those, that type of othering and that type of behavior to- That’s before

[01:19:19] Joe Moore: video games?

[01:19:21] Travis Tyler Fluck: Without, without appreciating how many simulated deaths are in a video game.

[01:19:25] Joe Moore: Good God. Yeah.

[01:19:27] Travis Tyler Fluck: I’m just saying, you know? Like- Mm-hmm … so, you know, in my work, like, one of my big griefs is around, like, the numbness. You know, knowing that the human vessel is one of the most highly intelligent, uh, pieces b- biological hardware, you know, out there, but somehow it’s been kind of like, yeah, numbed down to this commodified state of, you know, being and making sense of the world, you know?

[01:19:51] Travis Tyler Fluck: And a lot of, um, like, my first kind of, like, welcome to the world is my mother handing me over to a doctor and they mutilated my [01:20:00] genitals. You know what I mean? Like-

[01:20:01] Joe Moore: Welcome to the party …

[01:20:02] Travis Tyler Fluck: yeah, that’s nor- normalized.

[01:20:04] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:20:05] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. You know? So, like, what is, what is life exist from the more native way of being?

[01:20:12] Travis Tyler Fluck: We’re so far removed from it, you know? Um, I float around this story about St. Patrick. So we celebrate St. Patrick’s Day because St. Patrick drove all the snakes out of Ireland, right? If you go to Ireland, it’s way too cold there for reptiles to exist. So what were they really talking about? They were talking about the suppression of the Druids and the indigenous, and one of the strands of my DNA is Druidic.

[01:20:36] Travis Tyler Fluck: It was 80 generations ago that Patrick interrupted my indigeneity.

[01:20:40] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:20:41] Travis Tyler Fluck: So when I think about metrics and how much collective healing and processing there is to do, like, that’s just, like, one, that’s, like, one bucket.

[01:20:48] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:20:48] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? And I don’t think that u- unless we, like, really hold this in mutual aid networks that, that we can’t make a dent in it in the ways that we are projecting that we can.

[01:20:59] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm.

[01:20:59] Joe Moore: [01:21:00] And

[01:21:00] Travis Tyler Fluck: with this being, like, the miracle silver bullet, um, because most of the healing that we’re looking at is just feeling better to be able to go to work and do the thing.

[01:21:10] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:21:11] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know?

[01:21:12] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Yeah. There’s so much left to do.

[01:21:17] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, and that’s what’s like, I’m, I’m, like, actually happy about that- Mm-hmm

[01:21:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: because it’s like, you know, like, if there was nothing to do, granted we could just be. I think that’s one of the, the biggest lessons I’ve gotten from a mushroom j- a 10 gram mushroom journey, is being in the presence of everything that had ever been done. Um, some folks call that the Akashic records. Um, but in the presence of that, there was, there was no tension to do anything, and then I had this opportunity for the first time in my existence to just be, and almost nobody gets the opportunity to calibrate to that.

[01:21:51] Travis Tyler Fluck: Um, even our, um, perception of what a regulated nervous system is still one that is in some form of fight or flight.

[01:21:59] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. It’s [01:22:00]

[01:22:00] Travis Tyler Fluck: just normalized.

[01:22:01] Joe Moore: Right.

[01:22:02] Travis Tyler Fluck: Normalized, you know, fight or flight. And what’s interesting on a biological level is that the, the more, um- The higher the intensity of the fight or flight, the less executive function that we have.

[01:22:16] Travis Tyler Fluck: So nobody’s actually able to make decisions from a good place.

[01:22:21] Joe Moore: Right.

[01:22:22] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep.

[01:22:22] Joe Moore: Right. And the amount of might behind advertising- You

[01:22:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: know- … is

[01:22:28] Joe Moore: astonishing …

[01:22:29] Travis Tyler Fluck: I feel like every time I get advertised to now, I feel like it’s like an unsolicited dick pic. That’s kind of how I’ve like, just like seen things. They just, uh, you know, you get…

[01:22:41] Travis Tyler Fluck: You can’t scroll more than like two accounts before you get marketed to and suggested. And- I was

[01:22:47] Joe Moore: on Vice and there was an ad every paragraph-

[01:22:49] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah …

[01:22:49] Joe Moore: the other day.

[01:22:50] Travis Tyler Fluck: Where, yeah, but that, you know, like that’s like-

[01:22:52] Joe Moore: That’s how they pay their bills and like, I… It’s hard. Like Meta and Instagram, you guys need some more rules [01:23:00] against you, but-

[01:23:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: Or we need to just use Claude to reproduce Facebook and just go exist in this other, you know, chronological world like it used to exist before all this stuff- Right

[01:23:12] Travis Tyler Fluck: the algorithms. Um-

[01:23:14] Joe Moore: I think this is the year of the great unplugging. Have you heard that term yet?

[01:23:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, the mole people, they come out and they wipe their eyes and they, you know, recognize that there’s a sun out there, and that, you know, we come out of that Wall-E paradigm where we’re like next to each other but texting each other and-

[01:23:31] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm

[01:23:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: you know, but that’s the numbness.

[01:23:33] Joe Moore: It’s one of my favorite things to say. Yeah. I see

[01:23:35] Travis Tyler Fluck: a

[01:23:35] Joe Moore: couple like texting right next to

[01:23:36] Travis Tyler Fluck: each other. Yep.

[01:23:37] Joe Moore: You guys texting each other?

[01:23:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep.

[01:23:40] Joe Moore: Um, but yeah, it’s how do we become more analog? How do we… The… I was chatting with somebody the other day, um, two nights ago actually. No real frame of the timing.

[01:23:55] Joe Moore: Um, really interesting kind of psychedelic Greek person, deep into their [01:24:00] own kind of mystical path and psychedelic healing path, and it’s like how do we make free people? And then how do we fight this AI thing? And it’s, it’s complicated, but I think we need to think about it more.

[01:24:12] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, I think it comes down to being about it.

[01:24:15] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:24:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, then it becomes experiential.

[01:24:17] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:24:17] Travis Tyler Fluck: There was this talk that, speaking of AI, I was, I was lured into a, uh, talk at Maps that Leonard Pickard was giving. Nice. And the title said he’s gonna talk about AI. Didn’t talk about AI. But, uh, at the very end, somebody had asked him about like the blessing that he would give the LSD, like the intentionality part of it, and he went to speak on the microphone and the microphone stopped working.

[01:24:42] Travis Tyler Fluck: So he traded with the pers- the pers- they tapped on the microphone and then they handed it to him, and they put it to his mouth, and then it, that didn’t work. And then he swapped back for the first one that he had, and that didn’t work. And then he swapped out for a third, and it just became very apparent very quickly like this is not gonna be an amplified thing here.

[01:24:59] Speaker 3: [01:25:00] Mm-hmm.

[01:25:00] Travis Tyler Fluck: So because he transmitted that without the microphone, everybody had to shut the fuck up and listen. Mm. And it became an experience. Like everybody, it was like- You know, this is happening Mm-hmm. This isn’t like a, this isn’t like a pie chart that we’re like, you know, trying to wrap our head around metrics of what healing is.

[01:25:18] Travis Tyler Fluck: This is, like, real. And so I was like, uh, very like, just jazzed that I, that, that, that those things can be kind of, uh, invoked and then it’s different. It’s just a different thing, you know? And then the, it’s our job as curators to, you know, um, it’s like a glimmer warning. Like, just to let you know, if you get the chills, pay attention to that.

[01:25:45] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then most of the time they’ll get the chills and then it’ll change. You know what I mean? They’re no longer- Mm-hmm … like, there, there’s no propaganda in that.

[01:25:54] Joe Moore: Right.

[01:25:54] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I think that the how is just like t- re- reacquainting people with how [01:26:00] effing intelligent their bodies are, and then letting them go navigate the world with this new embodied kind of present way of, of like experiencing things.

[01:26:09] Joe Moore: Yeah. ‘

[01:26:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: Cause like there’s this saying, if you wear leather on the bottom of your feet, then the entire earth is covered in leather.

[01:26:16] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:26:16] Travis Tyler Fluck: Right? So if you, if you kinda teach people these, these, uh, paradigm kind of, uh, these skills around, um, paradigm shifting, then they can, everywhere they go, that goes with them.

[01:26:31] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:26:32] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then they can, they can suss it out for themselves. They don’t need someone else to say, “This is the way it is,” and then they need to conform to that.

[01:26:42] Joe Moore: Right. I love that.

[01:26:44] Travis Tyler Fluck: That’s just the how- Mm-hmm … I’ve kind of like looked at as like the first layer, is the reacquaintance. Because all these other things are like, they’re so complex and so symptomatic.

[01:26:54] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:26:56] Travis Tyler Fluck: And we could spend our entire lives addressing symptoms, obviously, and not ever [01:27:00] get to the root cause of what that is.

[01:27:03] Joe Moore: Right. Right.

[01:27:06] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:27:06] Joe Moore: Yeah. Um, so what did we perhaps miss so far that is important to get out as a… working towards wrapping. We can go for a while, but…

[01:27:19] Travis Tyler Fluck: I don’t know. I mean, I feel like we went on some pretty good tangents.

[01:27:21] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:27:21] Travis Tyler Fluck: And the things that are really alive, uh, right now, you know, the, the anniversary of the Decrim and kind of like the legacy part of that. Mm-hmm. And what I’m up to currently and, yeah, I, I feel pretty happy with, with what, what’s come through and, um, yeah, I feel, feel complete.

[01:27:42] Joe Moore: Final question, ’cause, um, this is I think a niche interest of yours.

[01:27:46] Joe Moore: What are we to make of all the weird, um, genetics going on in the mushroom, like the kinda amateur mushroom space? Like, people are doing all these really crazy crosses, like when I look at Enigma [01:28:00] and like other things, I’m like, what i- what is this? Anymore. But you’re

[01:28:05] Travis Tyler Fluck: closer to it than me I mean, it’s a, it, but it’s a vestige of the dominator kind of mindset.

[01:28:09] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:28:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: Like, how do I shape this in my image?

[01:28:12] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:28:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, and early on in my cultivation, I had had a few high-dose experiences, and then I, like, I went to the mushroom, I went to the mycelium, and I was like, “You obviously know more than I do, so why don’t you show me how to grow you?” Right? Hmm. So there’s this big shift, you know?

[01:28:27] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I think we just, uh, we kind of get off on our cleverness, and in the cannabis space, you know, now we have, like, 40% THC, and there’s just, like, this, like, this race for that thing. And then w- what we, w- what some of us have realized is, like, actually, when it came from the earth, that’s where it was, like, its most balanced and awesome and, and this and that.

[01:28:50] Travis Tyler Fluck: And I think it’s just another iteration of that. You know, I won two potency contests year to year, and then the mushroom kinda said to me, um, “Oh, you grew more potent mushrooms? Cool story, [01:29:00] bro.” You know?

[01:29:02] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:29:02] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then I just, like, I stopped wanting to compete in something that was, that that was, like, what was being platformed.

[01:29:10] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:29:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: And more interested in the individual. You know, when I was, uh, a little bit more steeped in the gem and mineral world, we walk into these businesses and you look at the crystals, and then you fall in love with the crystal, and you go to give your money to the person selling them, and they’re a dick, and you’re like, “I love this, but I don’t wanna give you my money.”

[01:29:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I started changing my approach, where I would meet the person first and then look at their wares.

[01:29:34] Speaker 3: Hmm.

[01:29:35] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I’ve been wanting to center the person. Like, “Tell me about you. Tell me about your medicine,” because that will give me more of an insight into what experientially that mushroom is gonna be like than the looking at the profile of the testable tryptamines.

[01:29:50] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Right.

[01:29:51] Travis Tyler Fluck: To me, anyway.

[01:29:52] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:29:53] Travis Tyler Fluck: So, y- you know, like, it’s just a, you know, like, it’s, it’s just a, an iteration of something that we’ve been doing [01:30:00] since we invented agriculture. You know, how can I get this to work for me?

[01:30:05] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Right.

[01:30:07] Travis Tyler Fluck: Instead of allowing it to be what it is and letting it teach you by observation, which is a permaculture, like, thing.

[01:30:13] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, observe.

[01:30:14] Joe Moore: Observe first.

[01:30:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. For a

[01:30:15] Joe Moore: long time.

[01:30:17] Travis Tyler Fluck: And, like, no shade thrown in any of that direction, but I’m definitely not consuming those mushrooms.

[01:30:21] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:30:22] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know?

[01:30:23] Joe Moore: Yeah.

[01:30:24] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, I, like, usually, like, when I meet somebody and they tell me their story and, and then they tell me some, like, very interesting things that are, like, um, kind of clues, you know, into their process and stuff, I’m like, “Yes, I feel like you are in right relationship to this organism,” and, “Yes.”

[01:30:42] Speaker 3: Hmm.

[01:30:42] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, like, there’s this trend to fruit mushrooms in bags, and they have the same metabolic pathway that we do that starts with oxygen, right? So if you’re depraving something of oxygen- Like, what else are you compromising?

[01:30:55] Joe Moore: Mm.

[01:30:56] Travis Tyler Fluck: So I grow all my mushrooms in, like, f- not like free range, [01:31:00] but, like, in a fully…

[01:31:01] Travis Tyler Fluck: Like, they can breathe as much air as they want. In fact, I select mycelium that is air, oxygen hungry.

[01:31:06] Joe Moore: Mm. Interesting. I love that.

[01:31:09] Travis Tyler Fluck: But it’s just a different, you know, like, the-

[01:31:11] Joe Moore: So way bigger filter patches kinda deal?

[01:31:14] Travis Tyler Fluck: Well, no filter patch.

[01:31:15] Joe Moore: Oh, interesting.

[01:31:16] Travis Tyler Fluck: I colonize in the bag-

[01:31:17] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm …

[01:31:18] Travis Tyler Fluck: which does well in low CO2, ’cause that happens subterranean.

[01:31:21] Travis Tyler Fluck: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And then you open the bag.

[01:31:23] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:31:23] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then I have a grow tent.

[01:31:25] Joe Moore: Wait, people are fruiting without opening their bags?

[01:31:28] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep.

[01:31:29] Joe Moore: That’s super

[01:31:29] Travis Tyler Fluck: weird. Well, they’ve been trained the mycelium- Yeah … so it’s like selective breeding. So you’re able to, like, take the mushroom and grow a whole bunch of phenotypes, and, like, one will do better in a bag than the other ones.

[01:31:40] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:31:41] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then you just keep selecting, you know, and then eventually you have mushrooms that will just fruit in a bag. Which is great as far as, like, um, you know, like in Nebraska, if you wanna grow mushrooms and you don’t wanna, like, have the hobby part of it- Mm-hmm … that, it’s great for that application.

[01:31:59] Travis Tyler Fluck: But when [01:32:00] I think about, you know, my, what I’m doing and how it’s sanctioned and, you know, how I can give the mycelium just access to fresh air and space, you know, why not? And then see how these things are different. And one thing that’s interesting about bag fruited mushrooms is they barely produce spores.

[01:32:20] Speaker 3: Hmm.

[01:32:21] Travis Tyler Fluck: So one of the features of defining a living thing is its ability to reproduce, right? Mm-hmm. So if something is less motivated to reproduce, you know, why is that?

[01:32:31] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Like,

[01:32:31] Travis Tyler Fluck: I don’t want my kids born here. Right. But that’s story. Now I’m creating story.

[01:32:37] Joe Moore: Right.

[01:32:37] Travis Tyler Fluck: But yeah, a lot of my philosophy has just been around, you know, like, really listening to what the organism wants-

[01:32:45] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm

[01:32:46] Travis Tyler Fluck: instead of fitting it in my parameters. Yeah. Are you, like, rye better than Milo, even though Milo is, like, one quarter of the price? Like, I’m gonna keep feeding you rye- Yeah … ’cause you prefer rye. [01:33:00]

[01:33:01] Joe Moore: Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Cool. All right. Well, I love that tangent. Thank you. Yeah.

[01:33:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah, and then, you know, one day, um, we’re all gonna be proficient in CRISPR, so who the heck knows what’s gonna happen?

[01:33:18] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know, there’s this, uh, German scientist named Felix Bly who used CRISPR on E. coli to produce psilocybin. Three years later, people in f-, uh, University of Florida did it, but then they got all the credit for it. But I thought it was fascinating, um, that, you know, E. coli produce, reproduces four times as faster by biomass, so you could just create the psilocybin.

[01:33:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then I was listening to a Terence McKenna lecture this morning, and he Was curious about, he didn’t… CRISPR didn’t exist then, but he was curious about genetic manipulation and, and using E. coli to produce psilocybin, and I was like, “Check you out.”

[01:33:55] Joe Moore: Right. I’m still hopeful we can reduce, uh, [01:34:00] violence and rainforest loss through, uh, GE pathways for cocaine.

[01:34:06] Joe Moore: Um- Well- … people aren’t gonna stop doing it, so, like, how do we just get there? Um-

[01:34:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: So, um, again, is using CRISPR on algae or something like that, and just have a, a closet bioreactor. Right. You

[01:34:18] Joe Moore: know? People are working… I hope smart people are working on it. Well- I’ve been putting that idea out there for years, everybody.

[01:34:22] Joe Moore: Do it …

[01:34:22] Travis Tyler Fluck: funny, funny story. I was, uh, at a psychedelic think tank, Shark Tank, uh, opportunity, and I brought that up. And somebody went on Grok and they were able to pull the genetic code, and then I guess there’s a company that’ll just make you that segment.

[01:34:37] Joe Moore: Mm.

[01:34:37] Travis Tyler Fluck: And then you use it in the CRISPR environment.

[01:34:39] Travis Tyler Fluck: So in one way, shape, or form, like, we were like, “We just invented fair trade cocaine,” you know? But it’s all-

[01:34:45] Joe Moore: Dude, is that when they’re all wearing the hats?

[01:34:46] Travis Tyler Fluck: What’s that?

[01:34:47] Joe Moore: They’re all wearing the shark hats.

[01:34:48] Travis Tyler Fluck: Not quite. Okay. But, um, but yeah, it’s all… Like, that technology is like, why not? And especially things like insulin.

[01:34:55] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

[01:34:56] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Yeah.

[01:34:56] Joe Moore: Life-saving essential things. Yes.

[01:34:59] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah. But, [01:35:00] you know, like, um, the, the people that have the most money are gonna have the l- you know, quickest path to those things. Um- Mm-hmm … and fortunately, we have, like, really cool citizen scientist personalities coming out and being platformed on social media so that they can inspire other people to- Mm-hmm

[01:35:20] Travis Tyler Fluck: you know, like, go to YouTube University and learn how to do DNA sequencing and, and all this stuff. And, and, um, so yeah, I’m, I’m just c- so curious to see, you know, these, like, little pockets of, uh, you know, people that learn outside of conventional institutions and are way more proficient actually bec- and not debt-encumbered.

[01:35:42] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Yes, absolutely. Um, dismantling, or what would you say? How do they… Dismounting money from education is a big deal. Like, how do we do that more and more?

[01:35:55] Travis Tyler Fluck: Empowerment of the individual to, you know, like, the… One of my favorite citizen [01:36:00] scientists open up, opens up all of his talks was, “I dropped out of high school because it was ruining my education.”

[01:36:06] Joe Moore: I like that. I like that. And I think- You

[01:36:08] Travis Tyler Fluck: know William Padilla-Brown? I’ll just drop his name ’cause he’s- No … worth dropping, but…

[01:36:11] Joe Moore: Not offhand. I might know the content, but I don’t offhand.

[01:36:15] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep.

[01:36:16] Joe Moore: William Padilla-Brown.

[01:36:17] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yep. Great. Prime example of, like, what you can do if you just, like, apply yourself to the, uh, open source things that are available, and then run with it.

[01:36:28] Joe Moore: Yeah. Hell yeah. All right. Well, where can people find you?

[01:36:34] Travis Tyler Fluck: They haven’t taken down my Facebook, uh, so you can connect with me on Facebook, Travis Tyler Flook. And then my email that you can, um, if you wanna communicate is micromondays@protonmail.com. Mm. S- I like that, Micro Mondays. Yeah, Microdose Mondays was taken,

[01:36:48] Joe Moore: so I had to go with Micro Mondays.

[01:36:52] Travis Tyler Fluck: Cool. Um, Micro Mondays, no special spelling? Nope. Amazing.

[01:36:56] Joe Moore: All right. Well, thank you so much for

[01:36:59] Travis Tyler Fluck: [01:37:00] being

[01:37:00] Joe Moore: here. Yeah, thanks for having

[01:37:03] Travis Tyler Fluck: me. Absolutely. And I was really happy to just come into the mountains and do this. You know, like- I let

[01:37:09] Joe Moore: people come up here …

[01:37:10] Travis Tyler Fluck: I, I have this, um, thing, like, when on Zoom meetings that I just can’t be as engaged.

[01:37:15] Joe Moore: Oh, how can you?

[01:37:16] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Like, just, it just, the pandemic did that to us, and that’s one of the things we didn’t touch on is, like, all the momentum that was kind of happening, and then the pandemic kind of really amplifying apathy and the deferment of responsibility.

[01:37:31] Joe Moore: I like that.

[01:37:31] Travis Tyler Fluck: You know? Mm-hmm. So I feel like, you know, most people are like, “Are you worried about l- this and that?”

[01:37:35] Travis Tyler Fluck: I’m like, “Actually, my biggest enemies are apathy and the deferment of responsibility.”

[01:37:41] Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Please.

[01:37:44] Travis Tyler Fluck: Yeah.

[01:37:44] Joe Moore: Yeah. All right. Well, thank you so much, and let’s do it again.

[01:37:48] Travis Tyler Fluck: All right, yeah. I will accept that [01:38:00] invitation.