Heal Your Roots Podcast

Ayahuasca Healing for PTSD and Trauma Survivors

• Heal Your Roots Wellness, Kira Yakubov Ploshansky, Alex Mayrin • Season 3 • Episode 7

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In this enlightening episode, Alex Mayrin delves into the profound impact of Ayahuasca healing on PTSD, trauma, and childhood wounds, illustrating the path from personal transformation to aiding others. He recounts his own growth through Ayahuasca ceremonies and his evolution into a yoga teacher and spiritual guide. The episode also covers the significance of integrating these experiences for sustained healing and the benefits of weekend retreats for deep inner work. Furthermore, Alex offers insights on incorporating therapy and self-care post-ceremony and shares gentle parenting techniques for a more compassionate approach to life's challenges. 

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Alex Mayrin:

After going through an Ayahuasca ceremony, what's what's happened to your brain is actually created new neural plasticity. And so to create change in your life, and to add things in or take things away, actually becomes easier. You know, we're not in the stuck grooves the way that we were before.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Welcome back to Heal Your Roots Podcast. On today's episode, we have Alex Miran, plant medicine practitioner and guide. In this episode we explore how Iosco can help heal and treat PTSD, trauma and childhood wounds. If this is something you've been suffering with, and traditional therapy has not helped, you're definitely going to want to listen to today's episode. Please remember to like, subscribe and share. Alex, thank you so much for being on with us today.

Alex Mayrin:

Thank you for having me.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Absolutely. So Alex, whatever you feel comfortable sharing, but can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got into this space?

Alex Mayrin:

Yeah. So, you know, after, you know, in my early 20s, I was in the military struggled with depression, PTSD, anger issues, you know, typical kind of veteran issues. And after years of trying different therapy, different therapists, a group therapy, nothing seemed to quite act like touch, what my issues were, and it wasn't getting to the root of my issues. So I happen to be watching a documentary. And in this documentary, I mentioned ayahuasca, I work with Ayahuasca primarily. And it's something pains, my interests. They had mentioned something along the lines of like veterans, PTSD, Iowa, Casca. And that's all I took away from the documentary. It was shortly thereafter that a friend of mine had mentioned I Alaska to her brother in law, and he was like, Oh, I know, we're, you know, you can do that. And so it was maybe three weeks or so since I watched the documentary, and I found myself, and then I lost the ceremony. So that's how, that's how it all began, I was searching for something that could actually help. And I was willing to do something completely out of the ordinary. I didn't have any friends that had worked with plant medicine. I really had no idea what I was getting into. But I was hopeful that it would work.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Yeah. And it's tough, because I know that especially with PTSD, right? It's, it's in your nervous system, it's your body, you can't really talk your way out of it. Right, because it's like these instinctual feelings and symptoms that you go through. So I imagine after trying all of these things, and really wanting to feel better, and increase your quality of life, leaning into plant medicine is, I guess, like the next the next thing, and I really believe in plant medicine, too. So it seems like it really worked for you. So I'm glad that's the path that you were able to take. And now you're here helping all these other people with it, too.

Alex Mayrin:

Thank you. Yeah. It really changed my life. That first weekend, it was like a weekend retreat, ended up drinking Ayahuasca three times over the course of a few days. And the biggest thing that happened that weekend was I found hope. So it's not like a magic bullet. You know, it's not it's not a quick fix. But that first retreat really allowed me to see myself in a way that I hadn't in a very long time.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

It sounds really powerful. Yeah, it was

Alex Mayrin:

Yeah. And and just feeling into that now. It still gets me a little choked up, you know. It's life changing.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

I appreciate you sharing that because I know it's, it's personal and it's vulnerable. So thank you for being open to share that with me. So how did what was kind of the journey between you doing it for yourself to find it to find that healing to then now helping other people through this process?

Alex Mayrin:

It was a long journey. Yeah, initially, I I would just, I would go drink Ayahuasca I started incorporating yoga and meditation and breath work outside of the ceremonies and And, you know, my life just started to shift and change, I've gone out drink Ayahuasca, then there'd be a period of time where I wouldn't, and so on and so forth. And, and as it just continued to unfold, eventually I started coming to ceremonies and I would help out, you know, I'd walk people to bathrooms, you know, change out buckets, things of that nature. And over time, like, I started working with a lot of other veterans. And eventually, that led me to go into Peru for the first time. And, you know, I've been drinking Ayahuasca sometimes I'd be helping others, so on and so forth. But eventually, I found my way to Peru. And I did what's called a master plant deatta, which is a form of isolation and a little hot. With no distractions, nothing to do, you can, you can journal you can sing, you can play music if you play an instrument. But basically, you're sitting in a hut with nothing to do a very strict food diet. where there isn't salts, oils, spices, very bland food. And then every other day you drink Ayahuasca, you leave your your hot, it's called a Tambo, and you go to a maloca. And in, there's a ceremony, the Ayahuasca ceremony, and you know, go through the ceremony, the next morning, you go back to your hut. And on the days where you're not drinking Ayahuasca, you're actually drinking the tea of a different plants. And these different plants work on different, you know, different things physically, energetically. And so one day is I lost that one day as the other plant. It was through this first data, that you know, I gone to the jungle, and I was a carpenter. Yeah, builder different things. And during the course of this deatta It was absolutely the most terrifying, difficult thing I've ever experienced in my life. But what it was, is it was working on humbling myself. And I was like, it was so difficult. And, and it was just humbling, it was the most humbling experience with my life is 10 day data. And at the end of the data, I was going to an Ayahuasca ceremony. And I was getting these visuals of, of what, what to do when I left, you know, in the ceremony, I felt completely humbled, completely humbled heart, and I felt relief, like I couldn't. I couldn't surrender my suffering, my suffering was still there. I could accept my suffering, but it was still there. And so all that was left was to let it humble you. And it was after this humbling experience in this journey. I started to get visuals, like this actual vision of what to do. When I left through, I saw myself teaching a yoga class, I'm a yoga teacher at this point. I was like, alright, I'll teach the class. And then it showed me teaching breathwork I was like, alright, teach breathwork. And then, and then I saw myself actually serving Iowa. And I was just like, okay, like, I'll do it. And, you know, I'll kind of fast forward. Upon returning home, I reached out to all of my clients that I had construction projects for, let them know that I was getting out of the business. And I started working with an attorney to set up a church, I figured out how to import the raw materials. And I just, I just began, I started serving Ayahuasca to people that I knew, you know, small groups, one person here, two people there, and it just started to grow. Word of mouth spread, ended up meeting more people and the group started to just build, you know, the group sizes. And I'm coming up on two years of doing that now, on my own, so it's been a beautiful journey. I left Got a lot of details to keep. But yeah, that's that's the journey that began with just needing support, and then coming back and starting to support people, and then eventually stepping out fully on my own.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

That's incredible. That's really proud, powerful story. And I feel like that happens a lot with healers, or therapists, or any kind of practitioner that is in service to help other people is that we're kind of looking for something for ourselves in the beginning. And we find something that helps or transforms us along the way. And then we want to share that. And it sounds like you started to build a community, like you met this community of people who were doing the same thing. And then now you built your own, which is awesome. That's really powerful.

Alex Mayrin:

That's been an incredible ride. Very honored to be able to be doing this work.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Yeah, it's deep work. It's, it sounds very deep and transformation on a lot of people, I'm sure are very vulnerable and raw and open around you. So it takes a lot of trust, I'm sure. In you in the, in the ceremony and the process to you know, allow someone to open themselves up like that.

Alex Mayrin:

Yeah, it's, you know, it all begins with a phone call it also whether somebody you know, through word of mouth, you know, hears about me or Tikun, which is a center that I helped open up with a couple of partners and my wife. And it starts with a phone call. And you know, I'm not, I'm not on a phone call to interview anybody, I really just touch base with them and to make that first connection. And so I would say usually, when people come to Iosco, it's, it's at the point in their life, where they're willing to step outside of what we view as like traditional mental health. So there's something there, you know, so it's picking up the phone and calling somebody that they've never met, that can be very intimidating and vulnerable. So that kind of vulnerability piece begins at that first, that first connection. And, yeah, it's really, really quite special. Then Then I meet them for the first time as they show up for like a weekend retreat. And, and being able to witness this, this process of the moment, I talked to them, the moment they show up, you know, to the first ceremony the than the day after, and there's yoga and there's breath work, and then another ceremony. And by the time they leave, it's it's like the lights are back in their eyes, it's like this haze, this kind of gray haze has been cleared, and they're bright, and their hearts is full, and they're open and sharing and feeling deeply. And it's really just a beautiful, beautiful experience, to be able to witness that process and others, and to be able to hold a container for that type of healing to occur.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

That is really beautiful. And so for a lot of people who have either never heard of Ayahuasca or maybe I've just heard of it, can you kind of share what it is? So they have an idea for listeners we've been talking about, I think they're kind of getting an idea. It's plant medicine, you take it, all of this wild stuff happens. But if you can share a little bit more detail about what it is and kind of what a ceremony looks like,

Alex Mayrin:

yeah, I can do that. So what it is it's a psychedelic but it's not like it's not like acid or mushrooms. It can have similarities, but it's, it's brewed into a tea. It's made from two plants, the Ayahuasca vine and the leaves of the chop Runa. Bush and is brewed into a tea can take anywhere from 26 to 30 hours to brew a batch. So as it's dark colors, it's kind of thick, you know? It's very earthy flavored. Anyway, you drink the tea at the beginning of the ceremony, and, you know, anywhere from like 30 minutes to an hour can go by, depending on somebody's sensitivity level. They'll start to feel sensations in their body. They might start to feel tingling. They might start to get visuals. They might feel nauseous emotions might you know the feeling tone of emotion might start bubbling up in their body already, and, you know, the ceremony was typically, you know, around five hours. Now it could be eight, it could be three, every but everybody's body is going to metabolize differently. And it also depends on how many cups you drink, you know, so if you just take the first cup at the beginning, and you're deep in it, and you don't want any more, it's probably going to err on the side of four hours, you know, if you take a second cup, you know, partway through or a third cup, obviously, can be extended. So you know what happens? It's different for everybody. But what typically happens is people will move through emotions, they'll move through fears, anxieties, they'll start to process and gain clarity on their life. on a physical level, a lot of people purge. That's a very common one purging in the form of either vomiting or needing to use a bathroom. But the purge can also be crying, sweating, kind of shaking, like almost vibrating. Yawn. This is just like its energy leaving the body. Now, I'm sure a lot of the listeners have read or heard about the book, The Body Keeps the Score, right. And so like, how does trauma affect the body? And how is it stored? Well, Iosco can go in and start to shake that energy up to to allow it to move. So that's the perch. They may be going through a mental process of something, childhood, or something like that, and then all sudden, they might start to feel nauseous. And so the mental process with the nausea, it's allowing this energy of this traumatic childhood event actually, often leaves the body as they're processing it mentally. And feeling it as processing.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Wow. So it's like literally dislodging where it's stuck energetically and physically in your nervous system. And I mean, with trauma, right? Like, everything is disconnected. And it sounds like this connects everything, shakes it up, moves it and then releases in whatever way your body sees that it needs to be released. It

Alex Mayrin:

can be that way. Yes. It's not always as just, you know. But oftentimes, yes, it's, it's showing up as a form of a purge or something like that, for some people, they may never actually vomit. Lucky depends on how you view that, but sure. But either way, you'll go through a mental emotional process of, you know, whatever is inside of you, whether it be in your subconscious mind, or trauma that's stored in your body. Yeah, there's a, there's a process that you go through, over the course of this, let's just say four to six hours. And, you know, during the process, it's not always painful, you know, maybe towards the end, you'll start to feel, you know, these emotions, like gratitude, and love and compassion for yourself, and gentleness towards yourself. And, you know, those those types of feelings are hard to feel in our body when there's so much other stuff happening. And so, when you've gone through this process of like, moving these things that are no longer needed, or, or they're just stored there, that allows you to actually feel more yourself than before. So as we move through life, we're just kind of like storing things in our subconscious storing things in our body. And this process of like, kind of peeling all these layers back, you can get back to the like, the root of like, who you are, like before the world told you who you are.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

So imagine you walk in one way and come out a very different experience. And I don't know if it's person because you're saying this is all of these layers being placed and other being taken off, but it sounds like an actual weight lift Get off of you like mentally, emotionally, energetically, physically, right? Like, on all these different layers is just released off of you. And I'm sure there's this feeling of lightness is what it sounds like,

Alex Mayrin:

yeah. So a person can be really physically exhausted at the end of the weekend, or at the end of a retreat. But there's the overall feeling of like uplifted pneus, and lightness and clarity. Now, the thing about it is like, there's always going to be more, right. So after one weekend, you might, you might have just scratched the surface, you know, you may have just found hope, you know, you might have found hope, or compassion or gratitude. But everyone has their own journey. So, yes, you feel incredibly light. But it's not going it's not the cure. All right, so then it comes integration, and comes allowing the pieces to settle and really nourishing your nervous system, because it can be a lot, it can be a lot to move through all of that in one weekend. And, and so to find this place of like steadiness after, it's really like finding a new way of being. And, and that takes time and integration, you know, finding a therapist, or a coach or a guide, or somebody that understands trauma, trauma, sensitive trauma, mindfulness. But working with somebody that can actually help you integrate, what it was you just went through, to make lasting changes, because we can go through an experience like this, but then we're going back home, we're going back home to the same things that were there when we left, so you've changed, but your life didn't change overnight. And so it's, it's taking maybe what we've learned over the weekend, or retreat or ceremony, whatever it is, and applying small changes to our life, you know, maybe adding in different practices, maybe if you didn't have a meditation practice, maybe trying that. If you haven't spent time in nature, maybe trying that, you know, so integration can look different for everybody, you know, somebody with a type A personality, if you give them a list of things to do, after their treat, you're like, Alright, now do this, this, this, and this, they're taking notes, and they're like, Alright, I'm gonna get it, I'm gonna do you know, and so maybe that's actually the mechanisms that they went there to work on. And so if you give them this list, now, it's like they're back in this overcomer, like this, I'm going to overcome myself, by doing this thing, when really what maybe they needed to learn was how to be gentle with themselves. And so it's like somebody like that with a type A personality. That's a real go getter, like that served them probably pretty well in life, you know, as far as jobs and having their life put together, but internally, like they're not okay. And so to actually learn how to then be gentle with yourself, is going to be far more important than like, giving them a list of things to like, go and do, you know, to make it last. If that makes sense how I worded that. Absolutely.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Yeah. So it just depends on every person, right? It's it's customized, it's cater to the individual makes sense for them.

Alex Mayrin:

It's different for everyone.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Yeah, I have a question. So you mentioned when you went to Peru, there was this type of ceremony where you were kind of isolated and then in the ceremony with a group over a course of time, and then I'm hearing you say, there's weekends, and there's retreats, can you share or elaborate a little bit about the difference of if someone's just doing it for one, like one sitting right, like the 48 hours versus a couple of days in a row? Like how would someone make that decision? Based on that?

Alex Mayrin:

I like to suggest people doing like a weekend retreat, you know, because, you know, in that context in that container, they can actually have support, you know, they can maybe try yoga for the first time or meditation or breath work. And so the whole container like a Friday to Sunday, you know, is going to have two ceremonies the first one it can be especially if you're a first timer. You know, you've never worked with Ayahuasca before. The first time to kind of be like what, like what's even happening? You know, you're getting to, you're kind of just getting your bearings about it. Yeah, it could, it could be really deep, really deep experience. But then it's like, you've never done anything like this before. And the next morning, you just up and leave, there isn't a lot of time for the experience to continue to unfold. So then, you know, if that first ceremony is Friday night, and you wake up Saturday morning, you're chatting with all of these other people that have their experiences, and you're all opening up. And you feel this deep sense of connection with people, because you all just went through this. Yeah, and, you know, you might open the day with, like a mindful yoga mat, or meditation or something like that, followed by breakfast, and continued sharing, and maybe a structured sharing group, where each person actually gets the opportunity to share as much or as little, you know, as they feel comfortable sharing. And so it's like, all of these layers just keep getting peeled back, and like tapping into the vulnerability of, of like connection and feeling like this deep intimacy, right with other people, and is, it continues to unfold, and all the layers keep getting peeled back, and then maybe Saturday afternoon, you do a breath work, which is going to keep peeling back these layers, and maybe some downtime in the afternoon, leading up to Saturday evening ceremony. So now you've, you've just gone through, like 24 hours of not just an Ayahuasca ceremony, but deep connection with other people, you know, you've, you've experienced yoga, you've, you've done breath work, and now you're just like, old, you know, and that you're about to drink Ayahuasca again. And so the depth that you'll go is going to be completely different than that first time

Unknown:

first.

Alex Mayrin:

So I do believe, for people looking for Iosco, or looking into it, one ceremony is gonna be better than not, right. So for some people, they can't, they can't commit to a full weekend or a full retreat. And so it's still better to come to a ceremony, you know, have a conversation the next morning, you know, give a little bit of tools and practices that they can take home with themselves. That's still gonna be better than not doing it at all. In my open. Yeah, other people may challenge me on that, and that's fine. So, yes, sometimes we will do just like a single night ceremony or a single ceremony during the day. And, you know, at the end of it, you know, people can go, but the multiple days allows for this container to stretch, which I think is really important for people. We live such busy lives, and you talk to many people, and you start to realize that like everyone's walking around on fields, their nervous systems are shot, you know, the stress to the max, we got bills, kids are getting jobs we've got, you know, so much going on, then we never actually, like slowed down and see what's happening. We're just piling it all on. And so in a weekend, it allows you to, like, shed some of that, you know, unplugged from your, your day to day life, and really focus on you. And I think that's what a lot of people lack in our society is spending time on themselves in the inner work arena. And so the weekend retreat really allows for people to, like really open up and sat down with their care.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

So it sounds like stages, right? I love that. So it's like, the first day is like, you don't even know what the hell's gonna happen. Right? Like, who knows what's gonna come up for you? And then everyone's in this open space and you're primed. And you're building off of that and continuing kind of optimizing on this like energy and openness. And then next night, it's like alright, let's go to the Next level, like a little bit deeper, and you kind of know what to expect at least a little bit like what you might experience or feel or see. And now you're, you know, you've connected with some of these people around you. So there's this little bit layer of feeling more comfortable and safe. And then you go deeper, right, because I'm sure there's some resistance at first, with anything, right? Even if we want to try something to help, there's naturally going to be resistance in the beginning. Once you've cracked through that first layer, it's like a little bit more open, or you're even saying like surrendering and being more humble, to this next stage of clarity or healing. Sounds awesome.

Alex Mayrin:

It really, it's incredible. It's really incredible. I will say that people are typically more nervous the second night, because they've, they've talked to it's true, oh, this, we're actually going somewhere deep within ourselves. But they, but they've been doing the work throughout the day, and you kind of build this, we're all we're all in this together, you know. And so even though you may be more nervous about the experience itself, you do feel more comfortable with the people you're with, you know, you've built a little bit more trust with the facilitators. And, and so even though you may be more nervous about the experience, you ultimately feel more trust in the process. So it's, you know, as you're learning these kind of learning how to surrender learning the art of surrender, what does that even mean? You know, it's like, you can go, I'm gonna surrender. And it's like, that right there, you don't like you don't go accomplish surrender, like, you can't foresee. Yeah, so like, really starting to learn what surrender is. And then it allows you to accept some of the things right, you start to accept it, he starts to become humbled by life, he starts to feel gratitude for life, you know, it's all of these stages. Trust, learning to trust yourself, again, trusting other people, and there's so many layers to this work, and it's all happening. Like, in real time for people. Wow.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Sounds very, very intense. I mean, this is what's kind of what you know, people are signing up for right is that if all these other treatment methods haven't worked, that take a lot of time. And there's a lot of suffering along the way. And there's incremental, I guess, progress. This is like, all at once, right? It's whole body, whole spirit, energy, mind everything. And you're like really being engulfed in this. Like, it sounds terrifying. And also, very freeing and liberating. And it's like, you know, the human condition is always like this contradictory experience. So it makes sense why it would be like kind of on both ends of the spectrum. Yeah.

Alex Mayrin:

It's, you know, I go back to like, my own personal journey with it. Traditional therapy, you know, like, nothing was actually getting to the roots of what it was, you know, I thought my life was messed up because I was in the military. Well, it turns out these these beliefs that I had about myself that were stored in my subconscious, those came into play when I was a child, the military, and my life just made those things bigger. And so we can actually start to see ourselves through who we really are, right. So, you know, it was my experience with traditional therapy, you know, throughout my 20s. Like, most of the conversation was just trying to figure out what the issues were, like, it took all of this like digging to even like, find out what was happening. So you could address it. Oh, Oska, it's going to just bring you there. So now and address it. Now you can feel what it is you need to feel you can process the things that you weren't able to process. And then when you couple that in with therapy, you couple that in with spending more time in nature, meditation, prayer, whatever your practices are. The healing and growth occurs at such a deep level that your life begins to change rather drastically. Ah, quickly. So yeah.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

There's like a part of me that really wants to do it. The other part is like terrified

Alex Mayrin:

that, yeah, you're seeing yourself and, and that's scary to people to see yourself and feel, maybe we live our lives like in resistance to feeling pain or suffering, that we tried to distract ourselves and tell the suffering can become so heavy, that maybe people turn to whatever their coping mechanism is drugs, alcohol, sex, you name it, like food work, like all of that. Eventually, if you get to the point where you can't outrun it anymore, it's there. And now you actually have to feel through it. And process what, what's causing it, that doesn't mean you're going to relive a traumatic event necessarily, but the feelings of, you know, not being safe in your body or, you know, whatever it is, you're going to move through the feelings. And and it has scary to people, like, my whole life trying to this wife died is dealing adequately nom, it's like. So yeah, let's peel back the layers, see what's going on, feel what needs to be felt, and come back to your heart. You know, huh.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Sounds really powerful. And so I know, you mentioned a lot about integrating afterwards, right? Like this event is like, it gets you right there. You're feeling it, you're observing, you're healing, and then you return back, right? And like, that's kind of even in therapy, right? Like when you work on yourself, and you go back to the place that either conditioned you to believe certain things, or you're doing certain things that are continuing to harm you. How do you help people create some of those practices? Or integrate that a little bit more? If you are the coach that they want to continue seeing?

Alex Mayrin:

Integration is such a loaded question, you can ask many different people, you know, what is integration? And you know, what are integration tools, and you'll hear many different things, you know, and so depending on the individual they get, it really depends, like, what they move through what they're working on. But the question is, like, how to support someone, my go to is like, start a daily practice, whatever that is, whether that's meditation, or yoga, or walking in nature, like do something every day, at least try, you know, if it doesn't work out everyday, at least try to implement it a little bit throughout the week, you know, after after going through an Ayahuasca ceremony, what's what's happened to your brain is actually created new neural plasticity. And so to create change in your life, and to add things in or take things away, actually becomes easier, you know, we're not in the stock grooves the way that we were before. So it's the perfect opportunity to implement little things, whether it's, you know, five minutes or 10 minute meditation, or spending more time in nature, or, or doing something that like fills your cup, you know, whatever that is, I will go back to it and say that, like, I believe, personally, the best thing that people can do is really to learn how to be gentle with themselves. Oftentimes, we grew up and adults weren't gentle with us, you know, we've all heard stories, you know, children are to be seen, not heard, you know, like, all of the stories. And, and so, you know, we're being rushed around, you know, parents have schedules, you know, and it's like, a child isn't like, in time, like adults are right there just in play time. And so when you're rushing them around, it's like, they start to get anxious, you know, whatever it is. So, parents, I'm a parent myself, and I've caught myself not being gentle with my children. Like, come on, hurry up. We gotta get going to school. Right and And so like, when we can learn how to reparent ourselves, and be gentle with ourselves the way that, you know, we would have liked our parents to be, like, I think that's one of the highest forms of love that you can have is like, Just be gentle with yourself. Know people go, what does that look like?

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

It's about to ask you if you can share an example.

Alex Mayrin:

So this is where, you know, you're kind of plugging in some of the skills that you've learned with Ayahuasca, surrender, acceptance, you know, maybe if you're really hurried, and you're really anxious, like to stop, and like, take some deep breaths, like, and feel like, you're allowed to feel, right. So oftentimes, as a parent, I can speak from my own experience, right? Like, I lay on the strict layer for time, for whatever reason, I'm not gonna go, you know, but it probably because I wasn't chatting, being gentle as a child when it was time to get somewhere. So yeah, when I'm getting close to the time, I'm supposed to get somewhere, like, I started to get a little anxious. Not so much now, but like I'm talking about years ago, like how I'd be anxious. And I wouldn't even understand that I was a anxious, you know, my wife would be like, rushing me, it's like, I'm not it's like, but your energy is, is because you're rushing yourself. So if you're feeling rushed, how can you be gentle with yourself, by allowing yourself to feel the anxiety, but actually slow down, like, nothing bad is going to happen, you're still going to be out the door, you're still going to get to where you're going, who cares? You might be a couple minutes late or right on time, but being gentle with yourself and actually start to rewrite the story. And soften that anxiety around, oh, my gosh, it's getting close to the time I need to be gone. And so you can actually start to change the narrative in in yourself. So now, as you as you get ready to go somewhere, now you're not feeling the anxiousness you used to have, and it's through being able to slow down, feel was present, take some deep breaths, and relax yourself. Right? So you understand the nervous system that anxiousness is like fight flight freeze? Well, how can we actually be gentle with ourselves was to shift over into relaxation? How can we do that through our breath, like softening your body and breathing and just connect with that, you know, may, you know, 30 seconds like that 30 seconds is going to make you late. So learning how to be jet. And that's just one example. Learning how to employ these little micro practices, like that deep breath in, soften shoulders, soften your body, breathe. That's a little what I call micro practices. 32nd little thing that can help shift us from fight flight freeze, to relaxation, and rest. And so that is, as the adult sitting here. The anxiousness is my belief, the inner child that's anxious, like, you know, because it was rushed. So as the adult, I can, I can sit down with myself, which includes my inner child, and I can breathe. So it's like holding space for myself. Does that make sense? If I worded that,

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

yeah, yeah, absolutely. And so that's

Alex Mayrin:

how you can learn how to be gentle with yourself. Just one piece. There's many tools, many micro practices, many examples but that's one.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

As you were saying that it's really funny. That was like my whole life was just like being rushed. And I can feel the anxiety thinking about like, I'm perpetually leaks of like time blindness and thinking about like, my dad and my mom rushing around just the when you said the energy right? Sometimes you're not even saying like, hey, we have to go, but the energy is so felt like, just frantic or scattered or just like feeling like someone's hovering over you. And just allowing yourself to be like, nothing bad's gonna happen. And shifting right. It's interesting you say these micro practices, because it's not like this one. huge thing that you have to do every day, even though you said, you know, some practices to do each day. But shifting away from constantly being stuck in this fight or flight, or freeze mode, right, because then that's when our body starts to tense up. And that's when things start to get stuck. So it's like constantly releasing these little bits of stress throughout the day allows us to be more open and present.

Alex Mayrin:

Yeah, I, micro practices are game changes, you know, like when you when you become aware that like, Oh, I'm doing it again, I'm rushing myself, I'm rushing my children, I can scroll down, I can breathe, I can, you know, employ this little 30 seconds, or one minute or two minute, whatever it is. You know, if if you're struggling with maybe social anxiety, you know, when you show up somewhere, you maybe you're feeling anxious, but how can you actually ground yourself in that space? Well, you can sit there, you can take some deep breaths, you can look around, you can take in, you can tap into your senses, your sight, smell, taste, touch, you know, you can, you can tap into all of that, and feel your body sitting in the chair, and allows you to relax into the space, which can help with social anxiety. So there's, depending on what it is you're working on, you can employ these little micro practices throughout your whole day. And that's going to shift you from flight, fight flight freeze, through relaxation, dysregulated nervous system to regulating regulating,

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

and then that's a lot of grounding techniques

Alex Mayrin:

that creates spaciousness in so after an Iowa Moscow weekend or ceremony, you know, you've moved energy you mentally process you've, you've felt emotions that maybe have been suppressed, another spaciousness in you. Right. So, meaning you feel lighter, you feel clearer? Well, if you don't make any changes, all the things that went out are just gonna come right back in. And so that's where, well, micro practices, you can continue regulating your nervous system, really nourishing your nervous system, by giving it the rest and relaxation it needs. You know, the meditation, you know, meditation is like opening, the, I like to think of our subconscious mind is kind of like a junk drawer in your kitchen. Or like you're moving through your whole day, and you're just opening it up and you're just throwing stuff in there. You know, meditation, as you're sitting down, you're opening up the junk drawer, taking a little bit of things out, you're organizing a little bit, closing it, right. And so if you can use micro practices to really nourish your nervous system, and regulate system, and then you're doing something for your subconscious mind through like meditation, like, to me, those are like, the most powerful tools that a person can walk away with. But that may not be true to everyone. Yeah, that's what worked for me. And so obviously, if it works for me, that's probably what I'm going to share with someone else. Sure.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

So that makes sense. I really appreciate this. This has been such insightful information and powerful and you sharing your story. Can you share with people how they can get in touch with you or with cocoon to work with you? Or, you know, learn more about ceremonies or Ayahuasca?

Alex Mayrin:

Yeah, so you know, they can visit our website, which is T cool, healing center.org. And then you can I mean, if I tell people not to, like, try to like Google watch, like all these, because it can, it can lead a person to maybe freak themself out. Yeah, but there, there is good information out there. You just have to be willing to read through some things that might sound sketchy. People share stories, and you're gonna hear a lot of projection. So the projection being this after my first weekend of drinking Ayahuasca years ago, I was sitting there like, Oh my God, there is no way my wife could do this. That'd be way too intense, right? That'd be way too much. Well, Uh, each person is different. Yes, she's not going to get the intensity that I had, because we live two very different lives. So one thing that I would suggest to any listeners right now would be, understand that their stories may sound really, really intense, and that might make you friend. Your life is not their life, you may not need that this medicine is going to bring you to your growing edge, it's not going to push you beyond your capacity. And what I mean by like that, what I mean by that is, it's not going to be a traumatic event, whereas, you know, you're actually coming to heal traumatic events or trauma, or wounds, you know, whatever it is. You're not going to leave traumatized by Ayahuasca. But when you read these stories, you might go, Yeah, I can't do that. Just understand that as their story, not yours. But yes, they can find my healing center, Tikun healing center.org.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

Yeah, that was such a great tip. I'm glad you mentioned that the differentiation that you're gonna go there to heal, the experience will not cause trauma within itself and might be intense or a lot or scary. But the point is that it's not going to traumatize you for so for listeners, it's okay to be scared, but also know that everyone's journey and experience will be different. So that's good to know. Awesome. Alex, thank you so much for being on today. I really appreciate your time and your insight and knowledge. This has been an awesome episode. I can't wait for this to air.

Alex Mayrin:

Thank you for having me. It's been fun.

Kira Yakubov Ploshansky:

So if you've enjoyed this episode, please like, share and subscribe, so we can send the message out there. Thank you so much. Thank you. Yay. That was awesome. I'm like, All right. I think I might do it one day.

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Kira Yakubov, LMFT

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