The Keri Croft Show
The Keri Croft Show
From Valet Startup to Spiritual Awakening:. Joel Furno on Marriage, Psychedelics & Leadership
This week, I’m sitting down with Joel Furno, the founder of Citrin—a valet company that started with $200 and a dream—and now employs over 700 people across the country. But this episode isn’t just about business growth. It’s about personal growth.
Joel gets real about the shadows behind success—depression, marriage struggles, and what happens when achievement isn’t enough—and how a single psychedelic journey cracked him wide open. We go there: the messy middle of building a company, the healing work that saved his marriage, and why true leadership always starts within.
We talk about:
⚡ How he built a multimillion-dollar company while still in college
⚡ Why employee-first culture is his secret weapon
⚡ The spiritual awakening that changed his life—and his marriage
⚡ The role psychedelics can play in healing trauma and addiction
⚡ Why “marriage coaching” might just be your next power move
This one’s deep, funny, and brutally honest—the kind of conversation that reminds you success means nothing if you don’t know yourself.
💡 If this episode lit a fire under you to get more intentional about how you lead, build, or pivot—come hang with me inside The B Lab. It’s where brave entrepreneurs go to get unstuck, sharpen their vision, and build something meaningful. Interested? Email me at keri@theblab.co.
Hey there, you beautiful badass, badass, badass. Welcome to the Carrie Croft Show. I'm your host, Carrie Croft, delivering you stories that get you pumped up and feeling like the unstoppable savage that you are. So grab your coffee, put on your game face, and let's do this thing, baby. Avena Women's Care is a collective of 40-plus providers that have been serving Central Ohio communities with comprehensive women's health care for decades. They meet women where they are in every phase of life. From fertility services to menopause care, annual checkups to 3D mammography, Avena provides robust services for all. So for the highest level of individualized women's health care, there's one name to remember: Avena Women's Care. Go to www.avenawomen's care.com to request an appointment. Be sure to tell them Carrie sent you. Ready to elevate your self-care game? Boscow Beauty Bar is a modern med spa offering everything from cosmetic injectables, lasers and microneedling to medical-grade facials and skincare. Conveniently located in Clintonville, Grandview, Powell, and Easton, making self-care a priority has never been easier. Use code CROFT for$25 off your first visit. Hey Ohio! Thinking about smoother, brighter skin? Well, fall is the perfect time for laser treatments. With less sun and cooler weather, your skin heals beautifully and you'll be glowing just in time for the holidays, honey. And here's the best part. If you're a first-time client, mention the Carrie Croft show for$100 off your first purchase. Call today and book your fall laser treatment with the experts at Donaldson. So I'm actually courting Lazy right now. Lazy has given me a tentative yes. Okay, nice. Busy basically told me to go fuck myself on DM. He was like, sending, he goes, sending you peace and love. I'm like, busy.
unknown:I don't want to.
SPEAKER_01:Well, you have to surround him. Like you still think you're one of those.
SPEAKER_00:No, busy and I were not done. Like, we're not done. I don't, I am like I'm.
SPEAKER_01:The first no is closer to a yes.
SPEAKER_00:I think it's a salesperson in me. It's like, so you're saying there's a chance. You just said peace and love. Okay, let's see here. Let me. That means I'm gonna put you in my calendar for let's reach out to him in January. Okay, wait, I just sent this to someone because they were like, I cannot. And they were like, please tell me, I need to know the truth. Is this real? Was this fake or was this real? Okay, hold on. Do you think that I really knew that? Do you think that was fake? Do you think it was real?
SPEAKER_01:Did you fake it? I wouldn't have asked you to fake it.
SPEAKER_00:I wished that that would be the case.
SPEAKER_01:But I thought it was sincere.
SPEAKER_00:Do you know what's funny? I still stand by it though. Because when I hear that song, like I I know what dog means, D-A-W-G. Like I'm not, I mean, I'm from the streets, okay? Maybe the streets of Lima, but like I'm from the streets too. Not really. But I mean, I know what a dog means. But when he says it, it felt it felt extra. Like, why'd you kill my dog? Because it was understood that like all of his dogs were dying. So like, why are we? And that's like you killed my dog too. I did a poll. And do you know, surprisingly, and it's probably because it's my demographic, that a lot of people thought it was an actual dog.
SPEAKER_01:What was the ratio?
SPEAKER_00:It was probably a close to 50-50. But again, it's my you know.
SPEAKER_01:There's some people gonna not gonna admit after they hear the actual story. They're not gonna admit that they before they heard it, that they thought it was a dog.
SPEAKER_00:I don't know, but I will say this Thug Nation showed up for me. Oh, really? So this went viral. So Bone Thugs picked it up. Bone Thugs has like a podcast, and they're whoever runs the podcast saw that, picked it up, took that clip out, sent it out. It says, Woman asks busy about whose dog died or asks crazy about whose dog died. There are like, I mean, 300 comments, right? And so one of a meme did they do that. I hope so. I hope so. So one part of Thug Nation said, it doesn't matter. It was the best interview we've heard from him in a long time because she asked different questions. We love it. The other side was like, who's the, you know, sh she shouldn't even, she's not even a fan. She's cosplaying. Like, she, why is she even interviewing this guy? And then a couple people were like, You're interviewing the devil. But I mean, Thug Nation showed out for me. I think for on the for the most part, they were like, it was a good interview. You got you guys take shit too serious. Anyway, this isn't about bone bugs. This is about Joel Ferno, the Joel Ferno.
SPEAKER_01:This is about us. We haven't ever actually had a conversation up there. Welcome to the Carrie Crosby.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, but I feel like I know you. I'm just happy to have you here.
SPEAKER_01:Happy to be here.
SPEAKER_00:So I know you through your angelic, lovely wife, Ashley. How is Ashley? She's doing amazing. Hi, Ashley. I know you're gonna listen to this. I love you, I miss you. I have your number now. It got lost. I don't know how it got lost, but I it's on my list to actually reach out to her.
SPEAKER_01:You should do it.
SPEAKER_00:Is she still just this beautiful?
SPEAKER_01:Is there a halo like following when we're out of the house and then the in the house there's more fangs.
SPEAKER_00:But yeah, there that's usually the case, right? What's your daughter's name?
SPEAKER_01:Uh we have a four and a half-year-old named Ella and an eight-month-old named Senna.
SPEAKER_00:Wait, I didn't even know.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Hold on a minute.
SPEAKER_01:So two big updates. We had Senna in uh November, and then Ashley quit her corporate job that she was at for 15, 16 years. Is she? She's gone.
SPEAKER_00:Is she a stay-at-home?
SPEAKER_01:She is not. I ship for maybe like a week. Uh she already had a project. She's helping a friend with an interior design business since they're doing host around the city.
SPEAKER_00:Very cool.
SPEAKER_01:So uh they actually teamed up. Uh Virginia went to C C A D and was taking some time off to have a family, and Ashley asked her for help when we were doing our house in Grandview. And they had so much fun doing that. Ginny ended up starting a company called Winnie and Co. And Ashley's been helping her out for the last couple of years, and now this frees her up to really focus on her passion while also, you know, spending a bunch of time with our kids.
SPEAKER_00:Well, her second passion, right? Because her first passion is obviously you.
SPEAKER_01:She's pretty driven, like you. So come on.
SPEAKER_00:So you have to live with that then. Well, you're driven too, though. We can't be driven.
SPEAKER_01:I couldn't, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I wonder because my husband is definitely different. He is like holds it down. He is like very structured, very routine-based. He is always admiring, like, I can't believe you're always like, you know, he admires it, but he is not that way.
SPEAKER_01:Well, so there's two kinds of driven. One uh has the crazy ADD, ADHD, OCD gene that I think you and I probably have. Uh she does not have that part. She's driven, but she's organized and she's on top of things and she has checklists and it's like.
SPEAKER_00:I don't know what kind of driven I think somebody would have to psychoanalyze because on that website I sent you, there's a great test. I started reading it. I kind of I kind of like fell off because I've got so many moving parts, but I did get the audible. I started like listening to whatever that was that you gave me. So I've started this little thing called the B Lab. Okay. It's for entrepreneurs. It's the home for brave entrepreneurs, and it's very exciting. So I've been helping entrepreneurs who either want to fix something that's wrong, like start to incubate an idea or kind of scale what they're doing. It's been extremely exciting. Okay. And so that's where I'm like, I really want to get more smart entrepreneurial minds in here to just talk about their business, how they do it, what they're doing. But I feel like this conversation is gonna parlay into a lot of cool things, not just business, but trauma work, you know, psychedelics, marriage, all the shit, which I'm very excited about. But just real quick, let's talk about your business, when you started it, where it's at today. Just give the people in the streets a little bit of an insight.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I started a valet parking company in college uh with$200. Our first restaurant was Typhoon Restaurant in the arena district, which is now BBR and maybe not anything. Did you remember? Were you hanging out in the arena district back in the sugar spice typhoon days? Yeah. Yes, in 06, that was our first restaurant. I was out there parking cars and I was a sophomore at Ohio State. Uh so I grew that throughout college, and then my senior year kind of got a breakthrough as I was kind of questioning if I want to pursue it or not. We went from 15 to 70 employees my senior year at Ohio State after four years of kind of just grinding and parking cars and not making any money.
SPEAKER_00:Aaron Powell So most people in college are like on their porch doing like beer bombs. Yeah, I was that too. Okay, but but then and you're you're doing your best to survive, you're following your class schedule, and you're kind of just like a lot of people are just kind of walking around doing what they're supposed to be doing. What gave you the sort of like light bulb in your head, like, wait, I can actually start a business right now?
SPEAKER_01:I think it goes back to childhood. I didn't like how my dad was treated working for other companies growing up. Uh I didn't, you know, material things weren't very important to us, uh, but I didn't like not having nice things. And I remember telling my dad I wanted to be successful, and he just drilled into my head, it's like, that's great you want to be successful, but make sure you put your people first. And so I wasn't very employable. Uh, didn't do very well working at the mall for minimum wage. Um, having to fold clothes at Abercamber, it was like a Chinese water torture to like an ADD kid. Uh, and didn't do very well in school. Uh also like Chinese water torture was sitting in a classroom all day. Um, so I just felt like I was different. Um, and the idea of having to work 30 or 40 years to have to work 60 hours a week to become an executive in a company. Um, I think in high school I realized that wasn't my path. And my first job in college that I really loved was valeting cars. Um, but I realized that the companies I worked for had gotten so big that they lost connection with the frontline hourly employee. And as a result, service wasn't great. All we have in our business is that 18 to 24 year old who's out there every night in the rain and the elements. And how do we get them to show up in uniform and open doors and not wreck cars at scale? Uh, the answer to that was you really have to pour yourself into them, make sure that they're the most important part of our company. Because that's all we have. We don't have a great pizza or a trinket to stand behind. All we have is that 18 to 24 year old. And so I basically reverse engineered the perfect college job of flexible scheduling, um, trying to communicate, hey, here's all the things we're gonna provide for you. Flexible sketch scheduling, you're gonna drive really cool cars, you're gonna learn how to network, the more you talk to people engage, the more opportunities will open up for you. All we ask is that you're on time, you look great, uh, you offer great hospitality service, you're not here just to park cars. Um, and uh US now can support you. And when you graduate, if you need a letter of recommendation from us or any support, we're here for you. So it was always all it was all about reversing that pyramid and making sure the person on the front lines who are marginalized, who are treated like an expendable resource, um, and three, four hundred percent turnover in the fast food industry is commonplace. How do we make sure that that person has a great job experience? And so that allowed us to offer a better service and more consistent service, and slowly over college the company grew to where we had that breakthrough. Um and uh Third and Hollywood was actually our first big breakthrough.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And that was a huge.
SPEAKER_00:How big how big are you now?
SPEAKER_01:So we have around 700 employees. We're in 14 cities.
SPEAKER_00:So on the surface, it feels like a pretty, I don't want to call any business a simple business model, but it feels clean to me. It feels feels straightforward and clean. Is it what am I missing? Like what's the easiest and the hardest parts of managing this business?
SPEAKER_01:Well, think about scaling a workforce of how do you get, again, 18 to 24-year-olds across the country now to feel like we give a shit about them and show up to do jobs like moving cars, washing cars, working inside car dealerships, which is a growth vertical we've gotten into. And so the answer is starting with the the taking care of your people, your people take care of your clients, and your clients take care of your business.
SPEAKER_00:Aaron Powell So like your number one expense is the people, like paying.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, payroll is the number one.
SPEAKER_00:And then what?
SPEAKER_01:Uh damage claims, insurance. I mean, we're moving a significant amount of liability. Uh we're also doing pickup drop-off services for dealerships. So instead of having to make you bring your car to a dealership, who wants to do that? We can take a house, drop off a lunar car for you, pick up your car, bring it to the dealership. Okay. Um so we're doing a lot of high-risk.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, so that's that's a that's a little bit of a different thing than just valeting like.
SPEAKER_01:Well, so yeah, in 2011, uh we we fell into a partnership with the Germaine Auto Group, our first automotive client. And today automotive is about 90% of our business. We have restaurants, hotels, parking garages, parking lots here in town, but nationally we've scaled within our automotive hospitality. And the idea there is to bring a hospitality experience to the to the service department when you come get your car serviced and support the the dealership to not have to manage this hourly employee workforce. They're not that they're not very skilled at managing.
SPEAKER_00:You see an exit in your future?
SPEAKER_01:I thought about that a lot and seeing private equity destroy my friends' businesses. It's good for the family office and for the original founder, but through the work I've done over the last six years, um I want our business to be a platform. Our tenure vision is to have thous a community of thousands of team members who are thriving personally, professionally, and financially. And so, how can we create this platform that creates wealth and services to our people that they might not have access to? And the idea that you're, you know, a manager in a business and you're working your ass off, and all the equity that you're creating is going to some private equity fund. Uh, it's it's not a path I really uh want to go down. I'm I'm very interested in employee ownership structures and and how do we just how do we create a structure that, yeah, uh, you know, rewards our family for all the hard work and sacrifice, but also all the people who've got us there.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And so sharing equity and finding ways, creative ways to structure things with profit sharing and things like that that can help really our uh employees thrive is huge. Uh Jeff Edwards is a mentor of mine, and um they wrote out a financial literacy program for their hourly employees. He has 7,000 of them. And um, people don't weren't aren't trained in in our high school education system on how to manage money. And there's a lot of predatory practices out there. So, how do we help train our people on financial literacy? Um we hired we partnered with a nonprofit. This came from John Ness, uh, who runs a great business here in town. Uh, we were talking about how do we integrate our faith into our businesses, and he had partnered with a nonprofit that provides uh chaplains. Uh and so we have a care partner that's agnostic, and they go around to every location every single week across all of our business just to ask our people, are you doing okay? Is there anything you want to talk about? And the first two weeks of testing that in Tampa, we had a suicide save.
SPEAKER_00:So unbelievable.
SPEAKER_01:You know, I tell my friends, like, yeah, it's great we're playing this chess game and you know, strategy and investors and growth and acquisitions and all that stuff. But at the end of the day, we have to we cannot forget about the people on the very front lines. And even though that was part of my path, there was still a shadow of uh deep-seated fear that I wasn't gonna be able to provide a great life for my family, that was gonna revert to poverty. Um, that's a shadow that's chased me. And whenever we lose an account or something disrupts the business, that always strikes that nerve. Um and then just the need for validation and subconsciously thinking if I built enough a big enough company, I'd feel better about myself. And as uh cliche as it is, it didn't work. That made me feel more and more isolated.
SPEAKER_00:So now we're we're heading into the we're going into the woods. Grab your satchel. But I want to make sure we can we can have a grab your knapsack and your make sure you're hydrated because we're heading into the woods.
SPEAKER_01:But first, before we go into the cave, uh is there anything else on the business front you wanted to hit on?
SPEAKER_00:I think you've kind of quenched my thirst. Who who's who's John next?
SPEAKER_01:John that sounds uh ODW warehousing. Just a phenomenal guy. And Columbus has been amazing. Um in 2019, I was scared of raising outside capital, but uh Cameron Mitchell has been a mentor and said, hey, if you know, got a bit great business plan. If you need investors, you know, let us know. I'd love to talk to him. Like that, I don't I don't need any uh investors. I I was scared, or maybe it was a pride issue of having to ask wealthy people for money. And through the inner work I began, it was very obvious I should go back to Cameron and take him up on that. So Cameron came in with his four or five friends and they took down a round of funding for a million dollars in 2019. That gave us the the ability to build this infrastructure and get the right people in the right roles.
SPEAKER_00:I'd like to get Cameron in here, have him say yes to me the entire time. Because if he says no, I'm gonna be like, fuck that. He's awesome. You said yeah, you said anything I want, honey. Honey.
SPEAKER_01:He's so funny and so so uh I think we could have a really good off the beaten path comment. He's a party, like he likes to have fun. And he's just a good dude. I love that. Um, and to see a guy who's built uh I mean, he's got the number one culture in the entire country for restaurants. He's got 7,000 employees, and you go to any Cameron Mitchell restaurant in Chicago or even LA, you talk to the bartender and they know Cameron and they feel like Cameron like looks out for him. And so to have mentors that have not just been successful externally, but also have cultures. I think that's what makes Columbus is really unique. You've got Jane with Donato's who is amazing, and you have a lot of people who've really put their people first. Yeah. And it's led to you know, large-scale businesses.
SPEAKER_00:Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Do you have any female uh valet parkers?
SPEAKER_01:Uh we have a small percentage of of them, yeah. So why a wonderful young woman at Butcher and Rose downtown, if you ever go there, she's fantastic.
SPEAKER_00:Why is it so male? Just because it's like they're they're getting in the cars, and it's like it's just not really a few.
SPEAKER_01:How many women are interested in cars?
SPEAKER_00:But is it is the guy really interested in cars?
SPEAKER_01:Really? Because they can drive the car. Yes. That was the first thing I cared about.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, I get to get in this Lambo for like two minutes.
SPEAKER_01:But we don't think that would be no You'd be great because you'd be out there talking to people and car out. I would figure it'd be lower that shit.
SPEAKER_00:I would be like going off on 270 with like ASAP Rocky.
SPEAKER_01:Well that's how I got my first that's how I started my company. It's my first ballet job, I got fired because I totaled a Maserati. That's great. It was a really hard night. Have you ever uh parked a Bugatti? I have not parked it. I don't they don't let me park cars anymore. Except at third and hallway when I pull up with my wife and it's busy, I'd jump out and they'd try to get me in the restaurant as fast as possible. That's amazing. I think I'm helpful.
SPEAKER_00:So let's pivot. Don't you love that word? Let's pivot in this business disc Hey, let's let's um not to boil the ocean here with all the business stuff uh or make it the long pole on the tenth, all the stupid business like chat. All right. Let's pivot into the psychedelic situation because you are the granddaddy, whether you know it or not. Like literally. So you are because the I've talked about this. I've never done anything, you know, and I may never do anything, but I'm curious about lots of things. And I never judge anything. I'm always like, I'll try thing one everything once. And so the couple times I've dipped my toe into like asking or trying to figure out this like secret code to get in the back door, because this isn't something you can just Google, like psychedelics here. It's like, hey, do you know Joel Ferno? I'm like, well, I happen to, yes, I just so happen to know Joel. And it's like, do you know the secret handshake? Okay, so you you I say that in jest, but you definitely have made a name for yourself in terms of you could sell ice to an Eskimo, I think, in general, but I'm pretty sure you have probably put a lot of people who were like looking over the ledge to psychedelics, like you've probably like talked them into doing it.
SPEAKER_01:I hope not talked, I don't think anyone should be talked into doing it. No, they were ready.
SPEAKER_00:I think you probably gave, let's, let's, let's reframe. I think you probably gave them sort of like the you made them feel safe, you shared your experience, and you probably were that nudge that they needed to do it. Because that's a big thing to embark on. So, where did that start for you?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I was struggling with depression since middle school. I struggled with suicidal ideation and had a hard time in middle school. And uh that was pretty formative, and that kind of chased me even through business and through success. That was that wounded middle schooler was underneath whatever wrapping I was able to put externally, right? Um, and so after being on and off ZOA for a number of years and not really finding, I mean, you go to the doctor and say you're depressed and you do a 10 question checklist, and they're, oh yeah, you're depressed, here's medication. And yeah, you should talk to somebody. You know, there's probably a two or three month wait wait list. But that's like the current approach that people have access to, which breaks my heart. In 2018, I heard Tim Ferris and Joe Rogan talking to credible people, people who I felt look up to feel safe with, talking to actual scientists and doctors about psychedelic assisted therapy happening at Johns Hopkins and at these credible universities. Like, man, like mushrooms are always like hippie shit, like all the weird kids in high school did that who like followed insane call ICP. That was like the you think about like yeah, the ICP crew, I always kind of associate that stuff with. And so I freak out with still a little bit of weed. Like, I hate weed. It doesn't do anything for me, and it makes me super paranoid and awkward. I hate it. And for other people, it it works differently, and I wish it worked differently for me, but it doesn't. Um, but when I heard that podcast, I was like, man, if I had an opportunity to do that, I'm 100% in. But where the fuck am I gonna find a place to do this with a doctor in Ohio? And so for the first time in my life, it was like uh something came to me and I didn't try to figure out how to do it on my own. And so much of my life was just like sledgehammering through walls and trying to prove myself and trying to make this business work. And I realized in hindsight that was the first act of surrender. Like I've kind of put that prayer out unknowingly. Like I'm open to that if it were to come to me. Fast forward a year, and Ash and I had just broken up. Uh, I was uh, you know, had my head at my ass. She dumped your ass in, she know what was no, she wanted to get married and it freaked me the fuck out. So you dumped her? And I convinced myself that she didn't love me for the right reasons. Like and what was unknown to me was she was triggering my mother wound, which she loves hearing, every woman loves hearing about, like that that they trigger our mother wound. But um, and nothing against my mother. My mother's awesome. But we all have, you know, these developmental things, and and so there was just a fear of commitment. And the other thing is I had these friends who were so unhappy with their marriage, like, don't do it. It's just it's a trick. You get locked into a marriage, and then the person's gonna be mean to you and and you're gonna have a miserable life. So I'm like, this is I realize at the moment, this is the most important relation of my of my life. And on one path, it's this Peter Pan bullshit of my off in the short north and traveling and dating around and having no commitment and having an empty fridge and just living that batch of life, but freedom, but also being a child. And I knew deep down I wanted to have a family and have kids. Like my my parents were amazing, and I wanted to, I knew there was a deep part of me, but I was just had my I was so fucking confused. I couldn't figure it out. And so yeah, I broke up with Ashley, and like the turning point was her dad came over to the house with a bottle of bourbon. And I thought I thought her whole family was gonna reject me. And her dad came over and was like, we still love you, even if you're not with our daughter. And so uh that was that was a huge moment. And um, around that same time, a day or two around that, I had happy hour at Mikey's place with Zach Weprin.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I need him, I need to get him in here too.
SPEAKER_01:Zach's ass in here, for sure. Um Zach's like, dude, I'm supposed to go on the psychedelic retreat, and I can't go. Do you want my spot? I'm like, I'm a hundred percent in. He's like, great, because the guys who own the Oddfellows are the ones leading the retreat, and they're here right now. So they introduced me to the guys, and um, I filled out a medical survey, which made me feel good, right? I'm filling out a medical, this is like a legit place to do this. And there was like eight guys from Columbus going down. And so they ask you, what are your what medicine you're on, medication you're on? So I had to wean off Zooff. The doctor called me to help me wean off of it safely, uh, because it doesn't play nice with the with the medicine. And then it asks you to set intentions what do you want out of this spiritually, what do you want out of this personally, and what do you want out of this professionally? So my intentions were, is God real or is all religion bullshit? I was I wasn't an angry atheist, but I had a bad day, uh just a not great church experience and left the church, and I was uh conditioned to believe if you leave the church, you're leaving God. You're walking away from God. So I just kind of put all that, left the church in college, and just put all that in kind of like a box and put it on the shelf. Didn't want to touch it. So I'd done zero spiritual exploration, had no spiritual connection, believed in what I could see and feel, but other than that, I hadn't there was no faith, no spirituality, everything was random.
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SPEAKER_01:Uh so that was my spiritual intention. And then it was, is Ashley my soulmate or will she break up? And what's my purpose in my business? And so that's why. So we we took a van down, we pull up at this beautiful property. Um this guy had converted an old boy's uh like a camp into this compound. And you pull up to this guy's place and a gate opens and you drive in, there's wind chimes and day beds, and there's a lake with a pirate ship he built for his kids and this big property. And so you just felt immediately safe. Um, the guides came out very loving, they gave you a hug. One dude's uh his toes were painted. I'm like, what the fuck am I gonna paint my toes? And I remember telling one buddy, man, like if I come back and like change my core values to like love or any of this bullshit, I'm like, my parent, my partner's gonna throw me out of the business. And but there was a lot of fear the week before. I'm like, don't go, you're gonna find out you're just a piece of shit that you always knew you were. That voice was there. It's like, you're fine. Look, you got a business. Like, what are you doing? You're fine. I wasn't even aware that I had issues to work on. I was just confused about this crossroads in my life. So I'd done zero therapy or zero meditation, which is the exact opposite of what I recommend everyone who's gonna start if they're interested in it, is like do some of it, clear out some of the other cobwebs first before you just get cracked open with uh a power, very powerful tool. I don't think you can do it wrong. I just would recommend, you know, uh and since then, like breath work, there's some unbelievable somatic Reiki people in town that I've got come into relationship with. Uh a friend here in Columbus who owns Evolves Tattoo does sweat lodges at his property for free for the community, which he's ordained by a Lakota chief and actually holds sweat lodge ceremony. That's really beautiful and intense and a good kind of rep. Sarah Weller is a local breath work specialist, and we've had some deep, I brought her out to do a YPO event, and we've had some deep, like people had a pretty much a medicine journey with just breath, if you do the right breath. So over the last six years, since I've done medicine, I've found all these other modalities. And like I just like to offer like, here's all the things I've thrown out. I'm I'm a nut, so I had to throw the whole book at it. But here, whatever resonates with somebody. If your soul, if you have a resonance with it, and there may be some fear, but like a calling and a curiosity, then it all comes down to is making sure you're working with a safe guide, which has been kind of these some amazing people have come into my life that are proficient and have studied for decades how to use these medicines properly. And so it really comes down to making sure you find the right guide. And since everyone's interested in this on podcast and hearing about it, but we're in Ohio, like where the heck do we go? My call is just been to share resources of where what's been helpful.
SPEAKER_00:So what are some highlights or memories from that first experience?
SPEAKER_01:So the first thing that happened, um, so that you dual orientation, they created a their program was unique and they create, they use three different medicines. So they create a protocol of three different medicines that uh you take pills over the over the course of an hour. And then as you feel it coming on, slowly you go lay down in your own bed, in your own room with a weighted blanket, an eye black mask, and noise-cancelling headphones with the most amazing soundtrack on. And you get a little prick in the arm, and you're off. And it ramps you up very beautifully. It's not scary. Your heart's opened to receive whatever's coming up. And the first image I saw was just this flash all the uh was of my brothers look smiling at me, locking arms. And I have two younger brothers. I was always off doing my own thing, so there's a lot of guilt that I wasn't a big uh stereotypical big brother. And they were just smiling at me, and this insight came to me as like just focus on the future. Like it's all good. This is the most important relationship of your life. And so all the shame about not being a great big brother was like evaporated, gone. Um, and then I, you know, things came up, some people I hurt came up, but not in like in a re-traumatizing, like a shameful way, just more like awareness. Um, and then the kind of the breakthrough peak experience was this voice, booming voice that was not mine, and words I don't use, said, abundance will be there. Stop stressing it with every ounce of your being. And I realized that I was so scared of losing everything. Um, and that shadow, like we talked about, scarce and fierce, was there. And I accepted it, and I literally saw the Joel I thought I was, positive, negative, neutral, right? All the good, the bad, and my soul separate. And this Joel, this this idea of who I am, like my business, all the different adjectives or the resume was gone. And the only thing left was this internal eternal light that um I believed to be my soul. And so that was the first spiritual um experience I ever had.
SPEAKER_00:So when you talk about this scarcity, this shadow and the fear, I resonate with that too. I think a lot of people have that, this internal dialogue. I can't imagine that it's completely gone at this point. So if that if it pops up here and there, how do you handle it different now?
SPEAKER_01:How has that sort of helped you to be like Well, I'll say that the medicine experience was like going up to the top of a mountain and getting clarity, right? Seeing these things. But we have deep groups. I mean, trauma is passed down generationally in our DNA. They're doing amazing studies with epigenetics to say, like, even Holocaust survivors, there's a unique DNA imprint of trauma in people who have ancestors who were in the Holocaust that has carried through their DNA up to seven generations back. And so those things are not going to be solved by one weekend retreat with anything that you do. Um, so I've done a lot of work around that with a coach, and the a lot of the practice is just noticing it when it comes up and labeling it as fear. It's just a fear.
SPEAKER_00:Is that where does that come from though? So you said you were you had a really hard time in middle school. Where does that like, I don't know if you want to call it less than or there's something you don't know.
SPEAKER_01:It's just like it's just who you were. So with driven people, we either see that the world's stupid and the school's stupid and this whole society is like dumb, or we think that we are. So you might be like, school, this is fucking bullshit, right? I think you're flipped, it flipped back on me and folded in on me that I'm actually the broken one.
SPEAKER_00:Got it. You're the problem. I'm the problem. You're the drama.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So where did the Ashley component come in with this?
SPEAKER_01:So yeah, it was, it was actually funny. It was so so you have a recorder on your chest. Everything that's coming up, you can speak into the recorder. And that way you have like a transcript of what happened. Because your ego is very sneaky. Like the jailer will come back and try to convince you what so it was so obvious we she was my soulmate, I didn't speak it into the recorder.
SPEAKER_00:Did you run back into Ashley's arms?
SPEAKER_01:So it came back and I said, babe, I had all these insights, but I didn't get it into answer for us. It said we're time. I think I came up with a story that our I convinced myself it that she came up and our time wasn't over yet, but I wasn't sure if she was my soulmate. So I'm sure she loved it. And we're gonna decide in this retreat we're gonna whether we're gonna break up or get married.
SPEAKER_00:No pressure.
SPEAKER_01:No pressure.
SPEAKER_00:And she's like, I'm in.
SPEAKER_01:She knew the whole time. You guys are way smarter than we are. Oh, she's gonna be. I think one thing that was huge for her in her 20s is she'd got yoga trained with her mom. And like doing the two days of silence and the retreat and like the inner work. She had done inner work before. I had done none. So she like she was almost like, like, go do your thing and uh try not to blow up your life in the meantime. Cause like I'm like, just dude, make a decision. Like I'm we're getting older, and if you don't want to be with me, just say so. Like, kind of matter of fact, you know. Um, so we go down and I'm calling the dude like a couple days before runs the program. I'm like, I'm gonna break up with this chick, man. She's driving me fucking crazy. Like, I'm I'm done. And he's like, if you do break up with her, this will be the most loving thing for you guys to do, is you can do it. So don't do anything until you get your ass down here. We're driving down. She's like, I don't know why I'm coming down here. You're the one with all the childhood trauma and stuff. She's like, I don't have any trauma to work on. Which is a recurring thing, which is which is hilarious. So we get down there, and the way they set it up for couples is you do an hour and a half in separate rooms. And then they ask you, Would you like to see your partner? You can't take it personally if they say no, good that they're working through their own stuff. Right. So we both said yes. The facilitators brought us together, and we were propped face up 18 inches apart with these like back braces in the bed. And we take our eye masks off at the same time. And it was like looking into her soul. Like all the walls, all of the ego, all the things were removed. And my my journey was like all about a bigger calling for my life. And so I'm like, I saw this huge vision for what my life could be, and she was just like so calm. She's like, Shhh, stop talking. She's like, I saw that, we're gonna I'm gonna have your children. I she's like, I saw that too. But I saw that my purpose is to have your children. And she said, We're gonna have a daughter, and her name's gonna be Ella. And she's like, I saw this beautiful image of a tree, and our parents were the roots, and our kids are the branches. That's right. And her mom's actually taken that and drew it, uh, did an art piece in our own. Were you guys just crying?
SPEAKER_00:I think I'm crying. I'm crying.
SPEAKER_01:Even thinking about conversations, like it was four or five hours, and the next day we had to have a lot of hard conversations. But it it moved all of our walls down, so we're not putting our walls up and our inner child aren't throwing spears, and so it took all the walls down. And the feeling of being fully connected after that last wall was removed and there was complete vulnerability was unlike anything I ever experienced. And so um we our souls got engaged on that date, and Ashley had that date engraved.
SPEAKER_00:That's so cool.
SPEAKER_01:I think it was 531. What was that? She had engraved inside. 6, 7, 19. So she had that soulmate. So we went through that, and then I came back within a week and then asked her dad's permission. I had complete clarity at that point. And when I see when I have complete clarity, I just run really hard at it. Uh the next week I asked her dad's permission to marry her. Um, we decided we're gonna get married in Cabo, which is where we went originally, like our first trip together. Um, I went back to my partner's like, guys, we gotta raise capital. And so I went back to camera and started the fundraising, and and uh so I and then I got my I was off antidepressants. Um I started working with Doug Brackman, who wrote the book Driven that I shared with you. Um I realized in the journey, it's like I need to work with a coach. The medicine is just not enough. Like, I need to have somebody to really help me. And he started having me meditate, and I would just be crying like every day on the on the meditation map. And I would I think when you become more aware, you realize how the quality of my thoughts were of judging myself, judging others. And uh to have to sit with yourself is like one of the hardest things to do. So developed a meditation practice. Um, we bought our dream home in Grandview, started renovating it, it was completely torn apart, and uh, and we got married in January. Oh, and I'm raising the round of funding, and we go from making a little bit of money to burning like a hundred grand a month because we hired the rest of the team. We hired the rest of our org chart, rest of our leadership team. So a ridiculous amount of things happened in six months. Almost, and that almost broke me. Everything was awesome for like three or four months. Like, uh, you know, I was unpacked for my depression, and like um, you know, I saw this big vision, and everything's gonna be we're gonna be shitting rainbows, and then this fear swung back in. And luckily, I had Dr. Doug to catch that. Uh it was like going down a like spending your whole life looking at a river, like rapids, like, man, I really want to go down on a kayak. And you finally have the courage to push yourself in, and it's fun at first. And then you start like, oh my god, I could die. And even all these good things were happening to me, it felt internally I was more aware of my shit and how dysregulated I was. So all these different, my whole my body was freaking out. Uh, and that's that's where true trauma trauma healing comes from is stabilizing your central nervous system and letting go of shit that you've stored. It's not a mental issue, it's the fact that our body holds the trauma on and we put these things in boxes. Yeah. And um, they manifest negatively in our life if we don't have the courage at some point to face them.
SPEAKER_00:How often are you do you like what's a recommended psychedelic cadence for someone? Like, do you do this annually? Do you do it?
SPEAKER_01:So when I that first year I did it four times, once a quarter. And then after that, it's like once or twice a year for annual tune-ups. Um, and a lot of it was community-based, friends wanting to go, so putting together retreats. And so I I did it as a as a part of that. I've since moved into other medicines like ayahuasca, which is a whole different animal. This one's very kind of therapeutic and very comfortable, and your heart's open and everything has a rose-colored lens. Ayahuasca will make you feel everything you've ever done to anybody. Really? Beautiful, very uh never had a uh concept for it, but you feel the intelligence of this like divine feminine energy was fucking terrifying. Like the true power of the feminine in ayahuasca. And so that was, you know, any uh lingering parts of my ego I was holding on to, she just completely wiped that out. Um, so um, so yeah, the medicine's a great tool. I think it is probably a little bit over-glorified. Uh, and there's a lot of ways to develop to to grow spiritually and to do trauma healing that doesn't involve having to take a medicine. Um, to me, it's an awesome tool. And I think in five years you'll be able to go to, you'll be, and this is like this in my friend group. Like, oh I'm gonna go to ayahuasca next week and in Peru. Great, that's awesome. Yeah, you'll be able to do MDMA, psilocybin, which is magic mushrooms and other medicines at a at a retreat. It'll be, I think in five years it'll be very common. And it already is like that in Austin and in the coasts, but in Columbus, Ohio, you know, there's there's only a handful of it out there, yeah. Right? We're like stuck in the state. But there's probably I know at least 80 people in Columbus who've done uh similar experience.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, so many people who've come on the show have done it. And so I'm I'm just like I go deep. Like I just like get like I live vicariously through your experiences. It's so crazy. So let's go back to like the whole idea of marriage and therapy. And I think there is, I think we've gotten better with the stigma around therapy, but I also think when you're married, there's still this like, I don't know, everything's great. Smile for the camera, put it on Instagram, polish everything. Like you were saying before we turned on the mic, you know, it's kind of like having like a tune-up, but like until the like you don't want the car to break down the side of the road. But I feel like that's how people view therapy. They they view it as this very reactive thing that you do, and I'm not gonna say too late, but but you wait too long. And so if if there was like a preemptive thing where therapy was looked at as more of like um, you know how when you're Catholic and you have to do that thing before you get married, what do they call it? We had to do that. Uh there's some kind of thing they take you to for a day. But anyway, something that is proactive and like ongoing, where you actually work together as a team, we're missing that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:I I just think that stigma of therapy and the stigma of working.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, we we only it's like admitting that our marriage is broken if we go do therapy.
SPEAKER_00:But it's not true. No, it's not.
SPEAKER_01:Because every single paradoxically will actually be the thing that will break your marriage. Yeah. I didn't know this uh until recently, but the word spouse in Greek translates to necessary adversary. I mean our spouses aren't makes are aren't supposed to make us happy. They're designed so that we become the person we're supposed to be. But yeah, we're looking for love from the other person when that's already a birthright.
SPEAKER_00:And it's like I see you out there, like, you know, trying to act like you're all shiny and perfect, but it's like crack it open because like what the the the realness of your relationship and how you overcome things and become mirrors for each other and become better and whatever, that's the good stuff.
SPEAKER_01:It is. And it and it's actually becomes fun. I mean, it's it's hard, it's so hard. And the worst is when things are actually going well and you have the marriage coaching. We like to call it marriage coaching. Yeah, and uh things are going great, but there's something that bother you, and yeah, fuck, I gotta bring that up today. Right. So we have an agreement we don't blindside each other in the in the coaching call. But to take a step back, I tell all my friends, like, look, you wouldn't you wouldn't sign a$10,000 contract or prepare your financials or do your taxes without a professional guide who spent their whole life doing that. And yet the most dynamic relationship that exists and one that has the uh biggest force multiplier on our happiness and our overall life, we're gonna think we can navigate this dynamic relationship on our own without somebody who's only studied this their entire life.
SPEAKER_00:It's so romanticized too. You know, it's like it's so and there can be, there are romantic elements to it, obviously. But it's like it's a negotiation a lot of the time. You know, it's like kind of I don't know. I just think of people who just own it and stop being so and the ones that really do try to act so it's just it's funny to watch to me because it's just such a farce.
SPEAKER_01:It breaks my heart. I mean, I just wish it was more um transparency. More transparency. I guess it just takes people stepping up and sharing, like, hey, yeah, our relationship looks great, and it is great. We've got to do some really fun shit together, but there's a lot of hard work that had to go. Like we've had to face our deepest wounds. And as you you mentioned the word mirror, we're mirroring each other's trauma.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Whether it's a father wound or mother wound or whatever it is, but there's uh parts of ourselves that we haven't acknowledged. And so I think that's another part of the of marriage coaches. You have to be willing to do your own work and take accountability. If you're triggering me, that's my issue. And it's at least the question of why is this triggering me.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:I have to own that. Right. I could, you know, I wish, you know, Ash would be nicer sometimes, but I still have to own why is this triggering.
SPEAKER_00:Every husband in the world, which is their wife, would be nicer, trust me. And we could give you some ways for where we'd be nicer too. That's the crux.
SPEAKER_01:What's interesting is I don't know how this was with your marriage, but um Ash and I's love language are like juxtaposed against each other. So I like touch and words of affirmation. She's not really into either one of those, but she likes her love languages are acts of service and quality time. Well, I have ADD, and so I'm just bobbling around all day, forgetting to lock doors, and that she takes that as a personal offense. So we were just like locked into this like thing where she would, I wouldn't serve her the way she needed to be served, or be, you know, a good roommate, leave the towel on the floor, whatever it is, right? Piss her off. So then she would be scornful and uh you know brash with me, which would push me into my cave and withdraw, which would piss her off even more because now there's no quality time, I'm not present with her and all that. So um, Dr. Doug actually, uh one of our first calls, I was I was working with, I think the best way to do marriage coaching, introduce it, is to one person to do it on their own first, and then they invite the other person in. And so I was like, look, I'm gonna work on my own shit, and then I invite her on the call. It's like, hey, why don't you join Doug so you can help Doug help me help you? Because I'm clearly pissing you off all the time. And so we get on the call and she just goes off for like 20 minutes about all my grievances, her grievances against me. And Doug just listened to her. He's like, all right, Ashley, when Joel does something to piss you off, you have two options. You can grab the knife and stab him like and put him into a shame loop, but she already feels like an asshole piece of shit anyway. So you just trigger that. Or you can hold the lantern of awareness. And your job as the divine feminine, as the queen of your house, is to hold up the lantern so Joel be can become aware so that Joel can help help you. That's your job. Because we're dumb.
SPEAKER_00:You guys really are. Like, I mean, it's I don't I don't know if it's dumb, but you're just so fucking one like one-dimensional sometimes.
SPEAKER_01:It's just like we're playing checkers. You guys are playing a four-dimensional chess.
SPEAKER_00:Oh my god, but I can only imagine from the male's perspective how challenging that is too to deal with the dynamics of the queen.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_00:You know?
SPEAKER_01:When you guys have to own your queen. The feminine is not weakness. No, it's actually all your power. Oh, no, for sure. Have you studied the polarities?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Not deeply, but like knowing that like there's feminine and masculine inside of us and balancing those correctly. Um, but the feminine is where we get all of our wisdom and power from. It's a queen who runs the empire, not the king. Of course. We just organize and do what you tell us to do. Right. Right.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:But that's where amazing where both are stepping into like their highest version of masculinity and femininity.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:That's when power. But that that stair step to get there is pretty tricky. Oh, for sure. A lot of stumbling and it's messy, and you just have to stumble through it.
SPEAKER_00:I think it's funny sometimes where I'm like, this is truly like you're in a corn maze with another human being and you're like trying to like figure this shit out. Right?
SPEAKER_01:You know, like it's like and then kids into the clay and go, holy shit.
SPEAKER_00:And that's another thing too. Like, I don't know what you guys are dealing with, but it has to be similar. You have zero time. I mean, like, there's no time. You're you're literally like ships passing and trying to survive and like juggling and doing all that stuff. And so it's, I can see, I mean, it's where people just totally get away from the other and and don't even know. Like you have to really stay connected and do those things. Like, let's put coaching on the calendar, let's make sure we are spending, and you want to say date night, how cliche. That shit's important. Whether it's a schedule, whether it's let's just call it like a 30-minute sit down and hang out, bang it out, whatever you need to do, but like come together even if you don't feel like it. Because I I will also you know admit to that. I don't feel like, you know, having this deep conversation or like doing whatever. I didn't feel like going to therapy the other day. I did it. You know, you it's not always how you feel in the moment. It's like you're setting yourself up in an intentional way and you're doing those reps when you don't feel like it, so that you don't totally disconnect with yourself or the other person because you're really doing a disservice to the kids if that happens too, and yourself.
SPEAKER_01:How's your path been? Because I mean, I just knew you as the badass running SOS with the you know great marketing and all of that. And then it seemed like at some point you started to kind of like do the work. Has that been something in the last five or six years similar to me, or is that something that's been a part of your life for longer than that?
SPEAKER_00:I've always tried to like be, I guess we I I've tried to kind of like the yoga stuff, some meditation. I went to Bali um for 35 days by myself. That was really eye-opening. Did the yoga training with really, really talented uh Alicia Chung. She's incredible. That was really cool. Um, and then I think when the marriage, like the infertility stuff really started to like erode the marriage, then the therapy came in with that. But then I was doing my own therapy. Um, I don't know. So I just I guess I'm pretty, I just have enough common sense back to what you said. Like, how are we doing this on our own and just winging it? There's gotta be people out there who can help set the tone and like make this a better experience or a more elevated experience. And so I just try to do what I can to like improve the atmosphere for myself, for him, for our kids, you know. But it's it's definitely um, you know, it's always a work in progress. I'm always looking for something. Like, again, like I said, I don't necessarily like, I'm not someone to jump into the psychedelic thing. I'm very curious about it. I would all I would like to do it with him potentially, but then I get nervous about like what is gonna come up? Is this gonna freak me out? Like just the regular fears, right? I'm always trying to evolve.
SPEAKER_01:Well, there's so many cool tools out there and resources. And Columbus has a hotbed of like a spiritual community of a lot of really good resources.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:When's your next journey? We don't have one booked. I'm I'm good. I think at some point you gotta stop looking for shit to heal and just live life. And so yeah, like I said, the annual tune-up um is is always good for me and always insightful.
SPEAKER_00:I love that. Um, what else? Anything that you would be that you would leave here and be like, damn, why didn't we discuss this?
SPEAKER_01:Ibogaine.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay, let's talk about ibogaine.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so um there is a particular psychedelic I'm really excited about. Um, and I've been doing a lot of work around. It's called Ibogaine. It comes from a root in Africa called the iboga shrub. It's been used in healing ceremonies with the Buiti tribe and in Gabon, Africa for thousands of years. And I think six years ago, they discovered that ibogaine, which is a molecule inside of iboga, can be used to treat addiction. And it got swept up with in Nixon in the 60s with all psychedelics being uh moved to Schedule One, which means it has no medical purpose and it's highly addictive, which none of these really qualify for. Um so fast forward to the last couple of years is I got invited to join a nonprofit board here in town called the Reed Foundation, and the founder lost his son to addiction in 2019 after spending hundreds of thousands of dollars sending his son all over the to the best clinics, and the best clinics have a 10% recovery rate. Um, Ibegaine is a very gnarly 12 to 18 hour procedure that's a psycho, it's a hallucinic, but it's a it's a gnarly 18 uh 18 hour trip. On the back side of it though, it resets your brain from all the damage done by either TBI or CT, which a lot of athletes are dealing with. And it basically does a full reboot of your central nervous system and and as you of your brain. It also a lot of people report kind of a life review of seeing like kind of your life. Uh and I've talked to dozens of Navy SEALs who've sent them been sent to Mexico to do get retreatment after being on shoved on pills through the VA, who's doing the best they can with what they have. Um and a lot of these guys with these big tattooed like SEALs, badass dudes are like, man, I thought war fucked me up, but it was my relationship with my dad. And I begin to help me go kind of go back to the the the original thorn and extract it because addiction is just a byproduct of of trauma. And so um over the last year, the Reed Foundation has helped um put a bill out in Texas for research and Texas with Rick Perry, who ran Texas for 16 years, the most conservative dude within the most conservative state passed a$50 million research bill to study Ibogaine three or four months ago. And I had the opportunity to be at the bill signing in the state house at the Texas in Austin while the governor was signing the bill, which is pretty surreal. Yeah. Uh and so now uh Rick Perry and Brian Hubbard, who are leading this initiative, have formed Americans for Ibogaine, and uh myself and Jason Block went down to Austin to set up the business the right way using EOS traction, which I think is a great tool for businesses. Um so we set up the AFI with this, and uh we're working on an 18-state coalition to join Texas to do one unified FDA study with the hope that this will be medicalized uh in the next six years. Rick Perry has publicly gone down, he went down to do Ibogaine twice in Mexico. His brain was five years younger after doing MRI scans at Stanford. So from even just like a non-addiction, just you know, he's like, I never had any addictions. I always thought this was hippie shit. You know, you got it's just hilarious that a freaking that Rick Perry ball people are endorsing psychedelics. Right. But this one in particular, with how bad the um uh more people have died of opioids in the last 10 years than every major war we've been in since World War One. And so uh the current treatment model is not working. And actually, pharmaceuticals are recommending pharmaceuticals like Suboxone to treat addiction. So you're you're treating an opioid with an opioid. This is an organic plant that was put here by God and if done properly in the right setting with the right precare and follow-up treatment. Um the stats are eighty, eighty to ninety percent of people come out removed of their cravings and completely reset without having to go through 18-month withdrawal cycles so that I can go into treatment, uh, completely reset and renewed. Will you ever do that? You know, uh I'd be open to it. Right now, it's usually a it's five to seven, 10 days they recommend going down uh, you know, for the pre-care and getting settled in and then doing the 12 to 18 hour experience and then the you know resting and doing integration work. So it's really a seven or ten day commitment and being away from the girls at this point. Like uh I've been blessed with so many good resources. Um I feel like I should do it considering I'm spending a large chunk of time helping uh with advocacy work, um, which by the way, Ohio passed a bill to research it through Justin Bizzuli, he's a 34-year-old uh state representative from Portsmouth, Ohio, who had the courage to put forward a bill. And so that Ohio has passed a bill to be able to research Ibogaine. So it's my deepest hope that this becomes available as an alternative treatment model, that psychedelics and somatic work and all these other things adjacently can be a separate path for healing that's available for people versus just the Western approach, which I think works for many people and is far better than doing nothing. But to have um to have Ibogaine be able uh or the fact that we're sending veterans to Mexico to heal from the war trauma that we caused um is uh is an issue. Yeah. And so uh really excited about that particular one because not only does it provide the psycho-spiritual therapeutic benefit, but also the physical, physiological healing of your addiction, craving, and resetting your brain. Brett Farb just went down to do it for his CTE and his uh Parkinson's. So showing early promise for Parkinson's and MS because of the way it resets your brain. And so we're only advocating for this to be moved to schedule two so it can be researched properly. So if anyone's interested in uh Joe Rogan and uh was on, had uh Rick Perry and uh Brian Hubbard on back in February, I believe, and that kind of sparked a national movement around Ibogaine. So that's something that's really um close to my heart and something I that I I think everyone should be aware of what's happening.
SPEAKER_00:Man, you are just a man about town, aren't you? You just got a lot of shit popping off. My God. Well, Joel, thank you so much for having me.
SPEAKER_01:We were supposed to have coffee for like the last six years and we never did.
SPEAKER_00:You know, I think we'll just follow this up with a coffee. Yeah, that's how good we'll do another. I mean, you know, I think you were trying to get me to join the YPO or whatever you want to call it. What's that called?
SPEAKER_01:YPO.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I was like, yeah, I just then was an EO too, that's good.
SPEAKER_01:So I think peer groups are really important for entrepreneurs.
SPEAKER_00:They are, but they might have to be around people. I'll come to the next one. Thank you so much, Joel.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you for having me.
SPEAKER_00:I love and I love you, Ashley. I know you're still looking. And if you're still out there following your girl, follow me on YouTube, Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcast. Until next time.
