🎙️ Episode 1 – The Fungi Academy Podcast: Mushrooms, Motherhood & Community

In the very first episode of the Fungi Academy Podcast, I sit down with my sister from another mister, Fungal Partner in Crime, Karena Beana. For a heartfelt and expansive conversation about mushrooms, motherhood, and the power of community. 🌱

Together we explore:

Karena’s journey from despising mushrooms to embracing them as profound teachers of healing and surrender
How psychedelic and medicinal fungi shaped her path into leadership and motherhood
The importance of rites of passage, initiation, and community support in modern life
Reflections on leadership, conflict, and the balance between democracy and decision-making in intentional communities
The evolving role of elders, role models, and intergenerational wisdom in raising the next generation
This episode weaves personal stories, cultural insights, and philosophical reflections into a rich dialogue about growth, responsibility, and the lessons mushrooms continue to teach us.

✨ Whether you’re curious about fungi, community living, or the deeper initiations of life, this conversation offers inspiration and food for thought

Support this podcast by becoming a Mushroom Member

TRANSCRIPT

Jasper Degenaars (00:00.558)
What’s up everybody, welcome to the very first Fungi Academy podcast. It’s been a long time in the making. We’re talking about the whole situation a little bit. very stoked that you’re here and that I was joined by my dear sister, Karina Bina. We are having an amazing conversation. And just gonna let you know about our versions. We have our upcoming National Cultivation Course, our staple, January 14th or 21st, 2026. And then the ladies, Naz Alice and

Jasper Degenaars (00:39.361)
The class for mushrooms we have Dennis Bacana, Julianne Friese, William Padilla Brown, so many more epic teachers, cool community, lots of extra goodies, somatic classes on a monthly basis.

Lots to check out, links are in the description, in show notes, and without further ado, welcoming to the first ever Funky Kami Podcast.

Fengjai, Fengjai, Fengjie. Ah, connection, his community, his family, his rebirth and death and rebirth and death over and over. Wow. I wasn’t ready for that question right away. What do you think I was going to start with? It’s like, oh, you’re liking the weather today? Yeah. Who are you? What’s your name?

yeah, but it’s okay. That’s my, that’s my first, that’s where we’re starting. No, it’s great. Fantastic. I like to just get it in with the good questions because that bike breaks the mold of mundanity and it gets directly to the core of things pretty quickly. Yeah. So I think that’s you do it. That’s how you do it. I think most people know who you are at this point.

So we’re not going to talk about that, but like this is going to be the first podcast of the Fungi Academy podcast. Although it’s not the first one we recorded. It was called the Fungi Show in its first iteration that never aired. What are we calling it now? The Fungi Academy podcast. The Fungi Academy podcast. I thought about a name for a very long, that was going to be smart. And then I was like, no, let’s just call it the Fungi Academy podcast. Simple. It’s simple. Everybody knows what it’s about.

Jasper Degenaars (02:35.486)
We’re back to simplicity. Doesn’t always have to have a fancy name. Exactly. We got the brand awareness, the mug happening already. Yeah. So especially if people don’t know who you are in Fungi, well, I’ll do an intro first as well. So you don’t have to do a full who you are. But what’s your story with mushrooms? There you go. That’s a…

East hole and I can get myself into. So my story with mushrooms. It’s been a while since I’ve fully shared this story. And if you’ve been to our courses, sat next to me many times, you’ve heard my mini take on it. But my relationships with mushrooms started hating them, as you know.

I despised the texture and the taste. My mom would have to pick the mushrooms out of my bolognese because they would just completely gross me out. Many years later, when I was 19, I was introduced to psychedelic mushrooms at a festival as maybe many people have had this experience.

That opened me up to obviously the world of mushrooms. I had a very profound experience that reminded me that there was more to life. And of course I had one of those moments where I dropped out of university, changed my career path because of insights I received on the mushrooms. But it led me down a

a journey of discovering not just the psychedelic benefits, like the immense healing that they had. And I was at a point in my life, I received some medical information that

Jasper Degenaars (04:48.239)
really shifted everything that I thought of about myself, my trajectory. And I had a dear friend of mine told me to look into different mushrooms from reishi to turkey tail to agaricon, saying that there was studies coming up that they could potentially help me. And this sent me down the rabbit hole.

that most people go down first being introduced by Paul Stamets and his podcasts. And yeah, just reading articles and articles and blogs and finding different Instagrammers and influencers who are starting to talk about it. But it felt like still like, you know, it was still very unknown. It was very mystified for me. And then when I was in India,

I was sitting on the Ganges River on acid with a friend and she was telling me about a community in Guatemala that I should go check out. So was really craving more connection and more community and people who were like healing, but like with the earth. And she was like, there’s a community called Fungi Academy. You should go check it out. It’s in Guatemala.

Uh, took me some years to get here, but, eventually I made it here. And that, um, really was what sent me on a like cascade of this. This is. This is epic. This is epic work. And, and my whole life became it. This is about 10 years ago. Now I was 19. Yeah. 20. Fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. It just shows that like the mushrooms.

call us. And what’s funny is that like, think a lot of people didn’t feel like mushrooms growing up. My mom reminded me as well that I didn’t like much eating button mushrooms with the genus Agaricus, especially when they’re out of a can. That’s I think how most people got them growing up. It’s pretty gross. I feel the generation before us just wanted to serve us, you know, what they considered healthy food. They didn’t really know how to prepare it.

Jasper Degenaars (07:05.207)
in ways that were, yeah, desirable for children because Finn loves mushrooms. And I think it’s also, I learned the mistakes from my parents and I’m introducing foods that would be considered icky for them. And yeah, just doing it in a way that is is elevating them, know, elevating their, their taste, their textures and.

in a good way. so again, like coming back to that, like mystification, I feel like that also comes in because we just like hand over these slimy canned mushrooms and it’s like, what are these weird things? Yeah. And also like within the bolognese or like people got them raw and yeah, I think there’s also things have changed, right? Like Brussels sprouts apparently used to be more bitter than they are now.

Those are my least favorite vegetables. I love them so much. They’re so good. So you talk about motherhood as well. So how have mushrooms guided you on the path of motherhood? Like how do you express motherhood except for taking care of your son? Well, I like that you go that little bit at the end because I mean, I feel like I’ve always been the mushroom mama.

here at Fungi Academy. It’s like a role that I embodied before birthing life and creating life within me in that way. I love leadership. love taking care of the household and Fungi is my home in many ways. I think that is the mother archetype is tending to the family and making sure all the

the family members are feeling cohesive and coexisting and co-working together in a way. And that was, you know, in the beginning stages, like of my leadership role at Fungi, huge part of that was mediation and navigation of building a community, you know, in a different way, building this family in a different way after, you know, the…

Jasper Degenaars (09:29.067)
Father Fungi passed away after Oliver passed away, you know, and so we had to take on those roles as mama and papa. so, yeah, like I’ve always had that in me that…

That mother archetype, I like leading, I’m a Capricorn. It’s just something that I… Yeah, I like to take control. And I’ll be honest, my past self didn’t do that in a good way. There was a… Yeah, it was a little bit icky and I was looked at as like a…

bossy and all those names that we like to call people in power that like to control or have their ways. I had to learn a lot and I feel the mushrooms supported me in that way. Community supported me in that way. Softening and being more adaptable to changing. I was stuck a little bit in my control ways and the mushrooms.

you know, help you surrender and leading that into motherhood a bit. Mushrooms have been a huge part of my motherhood journey as you know, and I do talk about a lot. Whether it’s microdosing or even like macrodosing, I had an incredible journey in my pregnancy and the theme was surrender.

And that was a huge part of my preparation for motherhood and birth was learning how to surrender. So yeah, I’m grateful for the mushrooms and being that teacher for me. The teacher of surrender. The teacher of letting go. Letting go and allowing for change.

Jasper Degenaars (11:37.082)
And for, yeah, new ways to come through and flourish and yeah. Allowing for things not to go as you envision them in your dreams. Exactly. You’ve also been a big part of that. Me? In what way?

Jasper Degenaars (12:00.381)
Yeah, we’ve had our conflicts and when it comes to both being stubborn in our ways and I think even seeing you soften to like allowing things to flow and I do feel like community and mushrooms and also being around a lot of parents have helped you like soften into that in your men’s group.

It’s probably good too. Probably. think relationships also, I think it’s also part of being becoming older, especially as a man. I feel like for lots of young men, it’s all about like you and like the older we get as men, think the more our lives start revolving less around us. And I think it’s a big part of the initiation of why I think.

was missing in our society so much is initiation for young men. Cause like a lot of us like trying to break free from our parents, but then like, how do you actually integrate that breaking free into being in service? And for a lot of people becomes just this really selfish act of me, I’m going to make more money, create my life as I want it and fuck everybody else. And I think the, the capitalistic system that we live in kind of enables that as well.

but I do think it’s, you know, you have extremes in that matter, but I think for most people, for most male bodies, that identify as male, at least they, we go through this phase of, you know, like a lot of selfishness, especially like in our teens or post-teens. And like, of course we have that first wave when we were like a little kids, and everything needs to be about you. then, but I think that’s.

ambiguous for all genders and sexes and body types. I think that’s like, I’m just speaking from like Western North, like culture, right? Like global Northern culture, because I know it’s not like that for everybody. And definitely not like that here in the mind highlands, because you know, it’s like impossible if you are intertwined, codependence, interdependent, I like a little bit better with your community.

Jasper Degenaars (14:22.766)
You don’t have that luxury of like, I’m just going to go and travel the world by myself and fuck my whole family. And da da da da. So for us in the West, think it’s part of getting older and growing up is to be less about yourself. And then also understanding that people are in their process and therefore less high expectations on people. think we both struggled with this.

in community because we have high expectations of ourselves and then we project those expectations onto others. Yes, that is definitely a fault that we both came in and not a fault, but like just something we were challenged with. But I do want to go back to something that you spoke about. These honestly lack of initiations and lack of. Yeah, like ritual for.

children growing, growing up in the West. Like, I feel like we’ve been so disconnected from that. And I’m curious from you, how do you think mushrooms and, can be supportive in those, initiations as rites of passages, but like, you know, maybe mushrooms aren’t involved, but like, as a man, like, you know, I’m raising a man and I want him to be surrounded by good men who

are holding this torch and that hasn’t been passed down. know? And you mean psychedelics specifically? It can be, but it can also be other ways. Like, yeah. I think it’s good to learn to grow something. I think that that helped me and I felt a lot of connection. And at the same time, I was making my own because I was lacking that rite of passage. I was making my own, right? So that meant.

doing way too much LSD by myself and like, like finding the edges of like comforts and then also still not having the, peers or the community to like get out of my self created comfort zones. And yeah, I think, you know, as a kid, we are so comfortable and, and that’s

Jasper Degenaars (16:41.194)
Like the mom’s taking care of us and dad is taking care of us. You know, we have responsibilities and have to think about things. then what I think happens is, we.

We have to learn that life is also uncomfortable. that’s what you see generally in most of these rite of passages in indigenous peoples, right? There’s some hardcore ones where all the men of the tribe in masks come in and they rip the kid out of the arms of the mother. then like just asking, crying for the mom and the mom is just sitting there like, no. And then they have to like…

go through this whole nightly ordeal and it’s just intense. I know. But then there’s also ones that are like, okay, you go walk up this mountain with really spiky rocks without shoes and no food and water. You stay up there and then you come back and then we acknowledge you as one of the men and then you get responsibility. So I think a lot of those rites of passages are focused on creating discomforts and like encouraging the young, the about to be man, the boy.

to go through that uncomfort. And I think that is also a lot of people’s feeling process in these psychedelic experiences. So it’s like a lot of the first experience are often very blissful and beautiful and just overwhelmed with love and peace. But then there’s also the challenging experiences that show you discomfort. And there’s actually some strains of thought within the psychedelic scene.

I think that actually the uncomfortable experiences will give the most growth. don’t know necessarily if I agree with that. think both are important. I think both are important. think they’re equal. I don’t think one is necessarily better than the other. But yeah, think a lot of these cultures that have these rite of passages, they have one event.

Jasper Degenaars (18:46.196)
And then they get lots of responsibility after, they’re then recognized as a man in this case. And then like they are also supported by the other men in their tribe to continue their growth. Right. So it’s not like a one-off event and then figure it out. It’s a continuation. Right. And I think that’s how psychedelics can play in as well. Like, okay, like you have that experience and how do you evolve those experiences and the lessons of those experiences into becoming

who you’re destined to become, to speak in like fancy terms. But I think what’s more important than just the psychedelic experience in isolation is that sense of community. And that’s why, like for me, I think, you know, I learned a lot of psychedelics, but like the most growth that happened is my weekly meds or we show up and we make commitments to each other that maybe we try to uphold and hold each other accountable. And like that to me is more…

like impactful in direct growth, then the mushrooms telling me to do something and then like, might not do it. Right. So I might like think my way out of it or, um, like the best example, and the bit always comes back to this, like psychedelics can show you the mountain, but you still got to like walk yourself. Right. And like, you need help with that walk. Yeah. So I think if you’re lost and you’re looking for a way out, like

It can give like at least some clarity because a lot of us in the West, especially, we’re just like surrounded by trees and we can’t see a path. And then it’s such a breath of fresh air when you have a psychedelic experience and you see your way out instead of just continuing like looking around yourself frantically and only seeing trees. feel like that comes back to like the first question that you asked me and my first response was

much fun dryer community, you know, and it’s connection. I, you know, we feel, feel we are in this like, kind of era of like isolation and individualism and doing everything alone. And we’ve kind of come back to, or come to this, remove ourselves from the tribe, the village, and like raise our family units alone and in this, what’s the word?

Jasper Degenaars (21:10.234)
You just said it the other day to me.

Man, I lost it. It’s okay. Yeah, it’s okay. But yeah, just like that individualism. I feel like a lot of the, also the healing after these individual trips or that you go on or experiences this mountain, rocky terrain, you come back and you integrate and and

a huge part of that is like receiving those reflections and from your community to like support that. Yeah, the continuous growth and I think that’s like huge and yeah, I would love to see that happening for young boys especially. There is that like, from my outside perspective, I don’t know, but I can do this alone.

And I see that even just like in partnerships that I’ve had in the past is like, they’ll just handle everything on there by themselves. and I can see the weight being built up and especially when one becomes a father, they just take everything on and they don’t have an outlet or an outsource to, to get that support and reflections from. And, yeah, how, like, how do we teach young boys at a.

at a young age that it’s cool to go sit in a circle with men and then talk and share because there is, know, I look back on my, like my childhood and my adolescence, I couldn’t imagine my friends doing that. They just play video games and talk shit and talk about girls, talk about drugs, talk about, know, and so how do we…

Jasper Degenaars (23:08.142)
create those more intentional spaces for there’s a time and place for playing video games and having fun, of course. then creating those more sacred ritual moments that are cool for the boys. think a lot of that has to do with, and I do want to talk about the female experience as well, but I think a lot of it has to do with having role models, right?

I think one of the big tragedies of our times is that we are kind of ageist. We are forced to hang out with everybody in our age category and then we don’t really hang out with the older people or with the younger people. And I think that’s a shame. And that’s also what I love about the men’s group is like right now I’m one of the younger ones and there’s men in their 50s so I have somebody with life experience that I can ask for advice.

And then also is like they can learn from me of like a younger perspective for in the ways that they are stuck or maybe judgmental of newer ways of thinking and ways of looking at the world. But I also think, especially as teenagers, like it’s kind of weird that like teenager boys raise each other. And then, of course, like what are teenage boys interested in? They’re interested in video games, they’re interested in drugs and interested in girls. And that’s basically it.

Like maybe some other, have like some hobby sports, sports is also a big one. competition. But like, you know, and I think that’s also what makes the rite of passage and these indigenous cultures different is you have that moment that the elders, your grandfathers and your uncles and your dads and your cool cousins, and they come and initiate you. that’s, that’s kind of, I think more what’s missing, but also I think it’s completely fine.

to let teenagers be teenagers for a while and then have that rite of passage when they’re a little bit older as well. I don’t think… We have to make so many big decisions when we’re in the end of our teens and early twenties and I think it’s a little too fast. If I would go to university now, I’d know exactly what I want to do. I would crush it. I would be dedicated and I would be consistent and I would have discipline.

Jasper Degenaars (25:27.22)
Which I don’t have as a boy basically. But can I interrupt? Yeah. Like, do you think that if you had more of these initiations as a child growing up and were more integrated with like a community like that we live in right now, do you think you would have been able to make better choices in that quote unquote normal trajectory timeline?

Well, maybe because like it’s so hard because like, you know, I grew up in a family that I grew up in and like that made me who I am in all of the ways and shapes. So I can’t really see what my life would have been like or because I was also a rebel at heart. Was I that because I was looking for mentorship or was I that because I hated everything and it was just like, I don’t know if I would accept

Even the cool uncle, they take me, needed to, maybe that was my path that I needed to figure it out by myself. I hear that. And I think many of us grew up in a similar way as you. It’s a, feel like it’s like the traditional norm in many ways, of course, with our own dynamics and how we relate and culture. grew up in different parts of the world, but with very

standardized timelines. so I’m just curious, you know, my question, and we talk about this in our education and the system that has been created, it hasn’t been one that really feels supportive for children’s growth. And when you see children here in the community we’re living in, it’s, I’m really curious to see.

what happens with my children, you know, it’s going to be very different. think they’re going to make very different choices and have, um, yeah, very different mindsets going into the world because like we’re doing things very different over here. Yeah. Kids are still going to rebel. That’s the thing though that realized when I was in Australia that like I was at this Dove, which is basically a site trans festival in the middle, like in a beautiful middle of nowhere region.

Jasper Degenaars (27:49.211)
And there was this really cool camp with lots of cool people and they were all a older and they had kids and then like started talking to them about their kids and they were like, yeah, they grew up going through these things and they kind of hate it now and they just want to drink beer with their friends at this like popular festival. like that’s to me was funny because I came out of that scene. I was like, this is so much better. I think it’s part of at least some kids as well to rebel and completely like say no to their parents.

That’s okay too. So are they gonna have better tools? I hope so. I think it’s generally here. I think it was gonna be more normal that Finn is gonna grow up with like hanging out with other people than just his parents, you. Right? So it’s like, I think that’s already a big change. That like, I think we’re just like more choice too. I feel just more choice of like what he wants to.

to explore and learn. But I had all the choice. My parents gave me all the freedom. They didn’t tell me you should be this, you that like and that was overwhelming. Holy fucking shit. did not. You want to be told what to study and I felt like it could have been good. it’s OK. It’s a good example that like I didn’t want to work. And then my dad kind of forced me to work. And I was the one of the only things that he forced me.

to do and then I ended up working at McDonald’s for a couple years. But their job is really good for me because like I finally met friends that like I liked hanging out with and that like also like hanging out with me instead of I had this group of friends from high school that like just accepted me I felt like and I was trying to I never really supervived with most of them and I learned how I learned that I was good at something and like

it was pretty good for me in my personal development to have that job if i would have just like had all the choice myself i wouldn’t have had that experience i think and i think i would have been a very different person yeah so i don’t know always know if complete freedom is the best way to go yeah i feel like we can we can table table this i’m like i feel i feel pretty complete

Jasper Degenaars (30:03.084)
I don’t believe in complete freedom to like freedom, settling and have some boundaries and guidance. think we can weave this in like the community aspect, right? Where like a lot of people wants a community to be a certain way. And I see a lot of people that come to Fungi and not so much these days, but especially back in the day. This thing keeps overheating. That’s kind of sad.

That’s happening. Okay, we’ll cut that out. But then people come in a community, maybe not as much, but they have a kind of a hope that it’s gonna be kind of a DAO, like a decentralized autonomous human organization where everybody’s opinions matter. like, have a completely democratic society and like that’s what people envision it. And then they don’t realize that the moment you make everything democratic, you’re talking most of the time.

about all the things. And that’s exhausting. So exhausting. Yeah. It sounds nice in theory. yeah, it just, I feel like it hasn’t worked for us. Well, I’ve not seen it work for many like places. Yeah. Right. So there’s maybe the one or two, but there’s a good example that I was at like a eco village where they are in the Netherlands where they’re

completely democratic and now a lot of the people that lived there that started at Ecovillage are a little bit older so they’ve done this for a while but also they are stuck in certain ways so there’s a couple of these houses that are free and they like they want younger people to move in but then they also like a part of the community is like yeah but we have to make sure that these people are really allowed and now you basically have these

houses that are rented out for three months at a time instead of having one family move in there, really becoming part of the eco village. And it’s just, you I feel like we’re facing all the things in the democracies in the West where it just becomes a lot of bureaucracy. And then like, I’m not saying we should be more like China, but like China is like just getting stuff done because there’s executive decision making. And I think that’s also why businesses

Jasper Degenaars (32:29.246)
seem to be the most innovative and like making the most impact in our world right now is because they have a CEO that just tells people what to do. And often they’re right now they’re making horrible business decisions. But like there’s also companies that are making humane business decisions and like supporting the people that work for them and they still get more done than fully democratic systems. Yeah, yeah. And like

Yeah, and just in our own experience, the more hats we throw into the basket, just takes so long to get shit done and decide. Sometimes it is important to just make decisions on how things are going to move forward, especially in these communities, especially in these transient communities. think that’s something that’s like, some people don’t understand that

We’ve been here for almost like eight plus years, like eight years. It’s crazy. We know a lot of not just living in this specific property and land, but just how things work. And it comes with a lot of like education and wisdom. that’s again, coming back to like, that’s why we look up to the elders and those who, yeah.

have that wisdom because they do know, you know, and that is why there’s the elders who, and many communities run the communities because they just have gone through so they’ve tried and erred and tried and erred. And I do believe in innovation and having like, especially younger people come in with their innovative ideas. Like I do appreciate when people come and give us ideas, maybe in my past, my…

Old self would have been a little bit more blocked to it, but I feel, yeah, I’m open to trying things out, seeing if it works and if it doesn’t, like, that’s why we have this system and structure that we follow because we know it works and why, you know, change something if it doesn’t need to be fixed or changed. But.

Jasper Degenaars (34:50.193)
There’s definitely things that need to be fixed. For sure. Well, like I think that’s a big part of leadership. is empowering people and giving people the opportunity to step into that power of them and still like giving people the opportunity to learn and grow. And I think also like when we think of, I think of leadership, I think of people that’s, think make decisions not for themselves, but for the collective good.

But now we’re unfortunately at a time, and especially the global morph, where a lot of people are feeling that the people in Bauer are making decisions for themselves and not for the greater good of all the people. like, you know, it’s like macro, micro, all those things are very similar, like from a small team like ours to larger systems. I think it’s important to check in with yourselves. Like, hey, is my leader making decisions that are serving everybody? And that’s…

I think that’s where also the power to the people like, hey, if you disagree, should let people know. like, there’s something different from authoritarian where you can’t talk back and like having like a place and like just take it to fantasy and medieval times. Like a wise ruler of some Elven realms or something. know Karina is deep into the court of Thorin and Rose, it’s Red Mouse. Like that, well, listen to the people.

That’s important too. What is the biggest lessons you’ve learned from… Because this is never how you set into Fongi with the anticipation that you were going to be managing a community that set ruling a kingdom. Queen’s philosophy. Queen’s philosophy. But what are the biggest lessons you’ve learned from having been kind of the mushroom mama for so long? Wow.

Jasper Degenaars (36:47.802)
I mean, definitely coming back to the leadership and like, and this is also eased into like a question is like,

Jasper Degenaars (37:02.98)
taking psychedelics and humbling myself, like telling myself to sit down when I didn’t know I needed it. And I feel the mushrooms also and reflections from community members where it did start feeling, I don’t, feel like it’s too big of a word, authoritarian, that like I’m here just bossing people around.

and not really creating a collaborative environment. That was the hardest feedback I’ve definitely received in my time where people didn’t feel safe co-working with me. Because I was so in that, well, I’m looking at the bigger picture. You’re here and I’m up here looking at the bigger picture. So I’m overseeing if this happens.

you know, then this happens and that was a lot to hold. But then I took it in not in the best way where, yeah, the negative traits of leadership would come out in me and the mushrooms and other, you know, sacred Earth medicines, peyote especially, like very humbling, very humbling.

Most of my mushroom journeys have been very, like you said, that bliss and beautiful. Like I’ve definitely had, of course, my challenging moments, but like we have a really nice relationship. It’s the cactus in Ayahuasca that’s lapped me around and humbled me. yeah, for me,

wanting to create a safe environment where people feel like their ideas matter, their thoughts matter, also their feelings matter was important. So I made a lot of shifts in like coming, creating a very heart centered business. I appreciate those who’ve worked with me many years, including you and Millie who kind of, yeah, you call me out when I’m like, what happened?

Jasper Degenaars (39:23.361)
to business and to come back to those places of compassion. Because I know my mind can go towards those negative sides. So that’s been a big lesson. Yeah. And I guess that was the question that I also had for you. Would it be beneficial if all

leaders had psychedelics, you know, for me it was supportive, but I had the community to support that and also the teachers to support. Well, like I just had a conversation about this yesterday and like we have to remember David Nutter, pretty sure calls them non-specific amplifiers. He was the first one or there might have been another scientist. But I believe it was Dr. Nutt and we have to realize that that means non-specific.

Meaning that maybe for us, it has increased our capacity to be empathetic and be more gentle. But there is such a thing, and I’m pretty sure I coined this, called psychedelic induced ego inflation, which I’ve experienced when I was really young because I saw the answers and I had all the answers. sex with God, no? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, sex with God was good. Highly recommended. But basically, like…

I’ve had those deep experiences and then I felt that I had all the answers and I feel that’s a trap that a lot of people that are really into conspiracy theories also get in. like, I know things that other people don’t know. But I’ve also seen people that are maybe narcissistic and those narcissistic traits can also be increased. They can be justified by the psychedelic experience. I think if, you know, if we would

Like in the old days when you would know the successor to the throne many years in advance, think having the…

Jasper Degenaars (41:25.16)
the foresight to train a leader from a young age. I think psychedelics could be beneficial at that point. But if you have somebody that’s already established, like the current people in power in the United States, I don’t think it’s going to make, I don’t think it’s going to change them or make them suddenly peace and love and we’ll change everything and start giving away all their money or start actually listening to the gospels of Jesus.

I think it’s complicated. think there’s a lot of hope right now for, yeah, but like that could be it because it helped me. know, it’s like, I think it’s a lot of people in the old, the old guard of psychedelia. know Graham Hancock talks about it. know McKenna Brothers talks about this. It’s like, if we just give all of the world leaders like seven sessions with Ayahuasca, we’ll have, I think most of them don’t want to be world leaders anymore, but I think some do.

And I think some would like, because they’re going to do it in their own bubble and they’re going to get back to their own bubble. mean, weren’t many of them taking psychedelics? Are many of them taking some form of substances? I do know some people that may or may not supply the Saudi royal family with psychedelics. And I don’t think Saudi Arabia is very well known for a very…

plays with lots of freedom of speech and humanitarian rights. So, yeah. And I trust this person that told me this. So I think it’s like, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Saudi royal family would be taking these substances and then still executing people and limiting people’s freedom of speech. think they even like…

killed a journalist before speaking out not too long ago. So, you know, as the world isn’t perfect and I don’t think psychedelics are the answer to all of our geopolitical problems, unfortunately. I mean, I feel like that also leads to like psychedelics aren’t the magic pill, you know, and it’s like such a holistic package that is needed.

Jasper Degenaars (43:47.919)
to work with the psychedelics and preparation is one of those. And that includes many aspects. For me, it’s mostly somatic and that’s like breath and body. that was like what drew me into this path before mushrooms. I was introduced to yoga, was introduced to breath work and gear talk.

You know, those are my introduction to like a spiritual. Never seen you at the care time. But that’s how it started. You know, I studied in India like that was. Yeah, my path before where I am now. And I know everyone’s is different, but that’s like what prepared me and opened me up before going into like my first psychedelic journey.

And, you know, five years ago, like five years before I had my first trip, I think I would have had a very similar ego inflation. was not the nicest girl. was, I wasn’t a weirdo when I was younger. And then I wanted to be a cool kid. One of my like best friends in high school, I was reading her, her yearbook.

when I was in the eighth grade, so was like 12 or 13 going through that like rite of passage puberty. And like this cool boy wrote in her yearbook, like, you’re really cool, but you should stop hanging out with Karina because she isn’t. And that like, was really rough to hear. And then, you know, for me to like fit in again, like I became the mean girl.

Like I was not a nice teenager for a few years because I wanted to like find my way back into this friend group that removed me from it because it wasn’t cool enough to hang out with their older friends and go to the parties with them. And if I would have taken psychedelics then I think that would have probably like enhanced those feelings of being powerful and

Jasper Degenaars (46:06.285)
Like at that point, I was now like, like the popular girl and like running like the, you know, the systems of like, oh, these people get invited to these parties and, things like that. Oh, bullshit bullshit, you know, bullshit American drama, especially which is really funny because it’s like, think that’s

The most important thing in that moment, but then like you look back and it’s like, that’s. Man, I, and like, you know, you did talk about wanting to talk a bit about the feminine and, for me, like, I didn’t have those initiations into puberty and for women, you know, I’m not taking it away from men. It’s really intense to go through our first bleeds. It’s very scary. And our, our initiations in my.

like culture in the United States where taking the boys and the girls separating them into different rooms and then having the sex ed talk and talking about the periods and the hair growth and the boys talk about. Wet dreams and shit, really horny and maybe what do you call like like the we called the beard and the trot in Dutch. yeah, you get the Adam’s apple. And so that was the boys talk. I don’t really know much we could talk about it. It’s interesting to like.

I remember ours being together. don’t think they were separate. They separated us. That’s so funny. it just, you know, it really felt like this weird and gross thing that like women were getting these bleeds. And then I remember when I got mine, of course, I was wearing a white pant or white skirt, obviously sitting in my library after school. And I bled through and I freaked out and I didn’t tell my mom. I didn’t tell anyone. I kept it hidden.

And then I eventually told my mom after I think the second or third time, but yeah, like for me, like that is a huge passion of mine. Besides mushrooms, like the mushroom is definitely my life path. Whether it’s, you know, supporting women in the reconnection to their wombs or preparing for birth.

Jasper Degenaars (48:22.824)
like diving into the sister wound because I know I created that for so many women as I shared, like I was the bully and I, definitely ruined and hurt a lot of relationships because of that. Even my own sister. And that’s another topic that maybe we’re not ready to go into yet, but yeah, I, I think when I had Finn, that was a little

sad and I grieved not the fact that I was having a boy. just, don’t know how to raise a boy. I I spent my whole life like learning how to like teach women how to become women and how to connect to their, their wombs and those rites of passages. So like I have those, I have those tools to pass down and now I have a boy. And so I’m regaining those tools. That’s why we spend a lot of time asking because I’m like,

Help me. So anyone listening to this, if you have great tools for boys becoming men, send them our way. We’re going to raise good men here. But yeah, I don’t know if you have anything else you wanted to add to the feminine, but. Well, I think it’s like why men’s circles I think are more important than women’s circles because women already naturally meet more with each other. But we didn’t.

No, not as like a teenager, I think like naturally, I’m not saying for everybody, I’m not underplaying that there’s also lonely women in the world who feel they don’t have any friendships or anybody to confide in. is true. The Red 10, I feel like it is in our DNA in a way. people even say that like our whole language evolved because of gossip. Yeah.

Cause like that’s her thing because you go from like, this here, there to like, you know, that one time that Johnny was by the watering hole and I saw him with like, I don’t know why, like Alicia and Alicia didn’t see the lion and they almost got hit or something. And they have all this more complexity in language that came from talking about there are people in different spaces. yeah, do think that women are.

Jasper Degenaars (50:36.506)
more plant than you have that bleeding, which is a rite of passage, although it’s not treated as a rite of passage. But it is now. I’m in the algorithm. Of course. We’re in a bubble here. We are in like a very unique bubble. then we think it’s so weird that like they’re having parties now. Great. I know. I think it’s cute. I know for like in our bubble. Yeah. But like also you have to remember like in the Netherlands, we just had elections and

Although they didn’t become the biggest party anymore, but maybe they are the party for the freedom by our personal Donald Trump, a hit builders became the second biggest party. I don’t know anybody that would ever consider voting for that guy. It was very anti-Islamic and very anti-immigration. But it’s because we’re in a bubble and like that’s what we have to realize as well. I I wanted to like look back a little bit to the, you know, the downsides of psychedelics because you know, it’s a lot of downsides.

I think it’s also like there’s a Oliver Kapp saying this, don’t stir the shit. I think it was an Estonian saying. And I think that counts for psychedelics as well. If you’re in a good spot, like, and you’re doing well in your life in that moment, like, don’t know necessarily if you need to shake your whole foundation or unearth some trauma that you didn’t know about. And I feel the call to, to work on that.

Then there’s also, you know, that the incidents that happen on psychedelics. I think, you know, I know a couple of brothers that accidentally hurt themselves on mushrooms pretty significantly. then, you know, like Oliver like passed away because he’d made a bad decision that like I told him not to make. A lot of people told him not to make of taking too much LSD at a party. And I think he misjudged the jump and hit his head on the rock. I think he just wanted to jump in the water because he was a crazy man.

But like these stories are sometimes down plates in like this, like the realm of psychedelia and like it’s, they’re not nothing. They’re Completely. think, I mean, you just said it the other day is like knowing when to put the phone down, you know, like, and it’s interesting because being in our bubble, I do find it kind of triggering.

Jasper Degenaars (52:53.313)
because everyone is always wanting to do medicine journeys. Everyone always is like, I need to go sit, I need to go sit, I need to go sit. And I feel we talked about it already, a huge part of working with the sacred medicine is knowing when to sit and to integrate and to do the work and to sit in your men’s circles and fucking talk and do the work and hold each other accountable. I know that’s what you guys do. And I think that’s really fricking beautiful. And that’s like,

it’s been interesting because I feel sometimes as like the title of like Queen’s philosophy and fungi Academy director. I’m supposed to be taking all this medicine when I feel like a lot of the lessons I’ve been learning is like knowing when and knowing when to sit down and knowing and being okay with having like spaciousness. don’t, I’m not like, I would consider myself a psychonaut and I don’t trip like once a month or, you know, maybe a little

little microdose that’s not a microdose will come through sometimes, my more bigger heroic doses come very, not very often is what I was trying to say. And they’re so profound. And I feel like a huge part of my work and that I want to teach is the integration, is taking those journeys and taking time with them and really like,

dissecting them in ways that are needed. Not all of them need to be dissected, but, and to practice what you, yeah, the lessons that you’ve received or wisdom that you received, like not just like talk the walk it. And that’s been a huge part of my journey. Yeah. I it’s interesting because I do consider myself a second note and I’ve also not like gone super deep.

for a while and I felt like I’m not because I know what they’re going to show me and tell me. I know what needs to be worked on. And I find that the software updates as we recently started calling them of like a mini dose. It’s more beneficial than something ground shaken for me in this moment. you know, it’s, think that’s, that’s knowing yourself and knowing when it’s, when it’s time to hang up the phone is Alan Watts said, right?

Jasper Degenaars (55:21.234)
I think there’s a balance and I think some people that maybe are more like that work is more in the spiritual realms or finding a lot more benefit from like sitting in those kinds of containers more often. like you, one of our students also brought it up. It’s like, okay, so you’ve dealt with all this larger shit and then what next? And I think, you know, you can always.

Create more work for yourself. think you can always create like the fascination is like, no, there’s one thing and this close generation, like it’s never ending. It’s like having your own business, right? It’s like, it’s never going to be ending to have like, you always have going to have tasks. And if you think like doing psychedelic work will ever have a moment that you’re completely blank slate and you’re enlightened, you’re just like.

like playing a fool because that’s not how it’s gonna work. And maybe for some, don’t think that that is like how it’s gonna work for me. And I find it more, I get more meaning out of life, but knowing that those realms are out there and knowing that like I’m a spirit of the mushrooms without having the always have these experiences and you know, maybe some people feel that calm more, but I’ve honest, like I was so experimental and I was thinking so

much when was younger, but I feel like I’ve stretched most of what I know can happen in these experiences for now. And then also we’re still young, right? Like some of our students just came and they had their first experience in their fifties and they’re like getting shaken up. like, can wait 20 years and then start over again and then still have like a lifetime more psychedelic experience ahead of people. And I think sometimes

There’s also this rush, right? Like I need to fix myself as fast as possible. I have to fix myself as fast as possible. Yeah. I just want to like touch on that. feel like we’re in this, it’s the same with how we want to like do business is also how we want to like work on ourselves. It’s just, we need to stimulate ourselves all the time. We need to fix, we need to work hard. We need to make all this money. We need to.

Jasper Degenaars (57:42.437)
And it just feels like very overwhelming. need to fill out our our schedules up from it’s not even nine to five. I feel like we’re doing it the moment we wake up to the moment we go to bed and like something I’ve been appreciating becoming a mom is like like actually having space for stillness. Like my meditation practices and most of my like movement practices isn’t to reach this like big goal, but really to just like have quiet.

and peace, like I don’t need to reach this goal, but really to this like, how can I be softer and just like quiet the mind? And I feel a lot of times like, yeah, I feel like we’ve turned psychedelics into this like, merit, like this constant like, another word I really want to use, but like goal oriented, I need to reach this goal and then I need to

then need to reach this next goal and da da da da da. And it’s the same as like, make micro dose so I can be more productive at work and make more money for the man and like the machine. And it’s like that same attitude towards it. Yeah. And I’ve actually been really enjoying. Yeah. I went from like listening to podcasts and books all the time, just constant stimulation to like

We were just talking about this the other day, just being in my garden and not putting on any simulation, no music, no podcasts. I stopped watching my 50 online courses that I’ve bought in the last few years. You know, it’s not only clean philosophy, it’s also keen to buy in courses and books that show up for five seconds. I’m the ultimate…

Customer customer like avatar that we bought and I became that our avatar. But yeah, I’ve put those down and I’ve just been like, like you said before, it was like learning how to grow something and I’ve never had a green thumb. I don’t know how to grow things. I can grow babies. How to grow mushrooms or food or.

Jasper Degenaars (59:55.723)
or plants and this year I’ve dedicated myself into my garden and now I have a full garden and it’s amazing. And that’s what my practice has been in the morning is just like an hour of quiet, well, except for Shen yelling at me and just like hand in the dirt and just like learning, failing and learning. And yes, that is maybe some stimulation in some ways. like, what plant needs to grow next to what plant? Like, which are the, you know, but it doesn’t feel as…

It doesn’t feel as like pressure and competition and again, coming back to the goal oriented, just like more slow, slow pace. I feel like that’s like definitely a theme slash like trend that’s coming up in the algorithm. Maybe it’s my bubble, but slowing down, slowing down, being with the earth and nature and not needing to just consume so much.

Yeah, I I remember always this one indigenous brother told my friend and I don’t know in what tribe, probably from the queen or something, he asked, he was with them in the Amazon and he asked me, what do we do now for integration? And I think the indigenous guy gave him a tree sapling. It’s like, go plant this tree. That’s integration. And I like that attitude and in conversations I’m like, okay, what are the answers to all of these?

challenging geopolitical problems we’re facing. like, like, a friend gave the answers to touch grass, right? Like, forget all these other things that are happening. And for me, it’s always going out in the forest and just looking for mushrooms and trying to figure out which species are growing in the ecosystem. yeah, I think that the answers can be quite simple. And it’s kind of like when scientists are talking about finding the

the universal equation that figures out all those things together. It has to be simple. And I think the answers to a lot of our issues can also be very simple. I agree. Simplify.

Jasper Degenaars (01:02:14.388)
And I feel that’s been a huge part of like motherhood too. And parenthood is like, we overcomplicate things. We overcomplicate parenting. It can be complicated. Don’t get me wrong, but I feel like we overcomplicate it in many ways. And a lot of it is very just like natural instincts and coming back to like, just checking in with your intuition instead of like, yeah, needing to outsource everything and consume.

I feel like all of our

face up here is just overloaded with stimulation and all the ways. Yeah, of course. We’re just like, we’re living in the age of dopamine of anything, right? We have like more stimulation at the grasp of fingertips. Most people feel panicked when they don’t have their phone on them. And I know how to put my phone away for that reason. I’m one of those.

yeah, but like we’re all we’re all slaves of these these machines and I have it still that like Sophie Strand calls it’s like change smoking podcasts where I’m always before I do anything it’s like okay what am I gonna listen to and like it’s I really have to take a conscious reminder like I don’t have to listen to anything and like I noticed this like I try to be conscious of this when I go on a run and actually I ran out of battery of my like running headphones

And then like, ran way better than I was running before listening to high-paced music. think I was listening to. So I thought that was really interesting. It’s just a reminder of like, Oh, yeah, the pace of my own heartbeat. And just the quiet can bring me more into that zone. And that’s with a lot of things, but like, I don’t know. So like, I still face my inner demon of being afraid of being bored that I had as a kid. I’m like so afraid of being bored. And like, I’m actually so.

Jasper Degenaars (01:04:13.396)
Never boards. I don’t ever need to be boards, but I love there was a meme that I showed up in my YouTube. Oh, I was reading through something. was this girl’s like, I’m just intentionally being bored for 10 minutes. And it was like, the tag was like, Jensie invented meditation or reinvented meditation. That’s hilarious. I saw another like seeing on this as well. It’s like a trend right now. People are doing like 15 minutes.

of boredom or at least like 15 to 45 minutes of boredom enforcing themselves and they look so frustrated. I’m like, that’s just, and that’s actually, you know, one of the practices of meditation that I’ve brought in since becoming a mother was the meditation of nothingness. And like, you don’t meditate on a mantra or like a theme. And if your mind starts to wander down these thoughts, you kind of just, or like stop on a thought.

you just like allow yourself to just keep going. And so you’re not like, yeah, it’s, it’s because as a parent, we’re constantly stimulated, you know, by our children and by the next thing we need to do for our children or for the family in the house. And it’s like, there’s so much up here. And so this was a practice that, wow, the fourth trimester, I think is what the book is called. And, she also has a journal from

from others just to prepare for that postpartum period. And it was just five minutes. I know that doesn’t sound like a lot, but for parents, it is a lot. Like set aside five minutes of just like where you clear your mind completely. You’re not thinking about what you’re gonna pack for lunch or who’s gonna pick them up from school or when the next doctor’s appointment is or birthday. Everything is just empty. And I struggle with that, but.

is something that, yeah, like I think I find very, very valuable, especially for someone like me. Yeah. Well, I think meditation, I think that’s why a lot of people that are experienced psychonauts are coming to the understanding of like, Buddhist traditions are maybe a tool to integrate these experiences and like do the work. And yeah, I weave with meditation.

Jasper Degenaars (01:06:36.858)
But now it’s a very simple 10 minutes of just silence, set an alarm and try to like, let every, just observe, right? But like, I’m also, it’s, you know, there’s certain people’s paths and like, I respect the path. And I also, I like a more active meditation running as a good active meditation for me. I just, you know, even being with kids is a good meditation because you’re very present and I don’t have to.

I get to the fun uncle so I have to think about like when is the next doctor’s appointment. Like looking at a kid doing crazy shit and making sure they don’t hurt themselves. Or giving them water when they ask for it. that’s beneficial. So I think, you know, there’s many ways to achieve that stillness. And I think it’s extra crucial of living in community, right? Where you have to like, I think most people like crash out on community because

There’s always stimulation because there’s always somebody doing something or there’s always somebody playing music or in the kitchen to chat with about the other people or what you’ve just been learning and there’s tons of books and yeah, so I feel it’s it’s it’s a house of mirrors for a reason and it’s like the people that find the most struggle in community are the ones that cannot allow themselves to take the moment for themselves. boundaries like personal boundaries with yourself, you know.

And also learning how to set boundaries with others. And Stephanie, how do you set boundaries? Oh, man, I’m I’m I feel like I’m pretty blunt with my boundaries. She didn’t used to be much very American. So Jasper Jasper’s Dutchness rubbed off on me. Is what he would say. I’m just Dutch.

Jasper Degenaars (01:08:30.496)
I think first, like, starting with yourself and that takes like a lot of self reflection is like knowing what your own personal boundaries are. I really dislike when people talk to me before 9am, like without like consenting and they’ll just start bombarding me. I also don’t like hugs before 9am. And, you know, and I teach a lot before 9am. It’s like when I host like my my Mushroom Movement classes.

And people are wired. I guess they’re drinking coffee at like 5 a.m., 6 a.m. And they’re ready to just have a tell me about their dreams and their sleep and their hug me. I’m like, ah, those people are excited to hear. I know. Of course, of course. It’s just our lives. So it’s become. But like I’ve communicated and I’m just like, you know, before 9 a.m., I really like, you know, to honor some sacred silence before my, you know, I teach before. And then.

At breakfast, we can continue this. And you’re off doing your own thing at that time. So I’m over in the communal areas. And even when I was living here, I still had to set those boundaries because as a community leader, there’s a lot of questions that come as soon as you step foot on the communal space. Whether it’s employees or just residents, there’s always something.

yeah. And yeah, I think we’re both pretty good at communicating. Now we’re both good at communicating. We to be really bad at communicating first. We were really bad at communicating first. But shout out to Gabe. Hey, Gabe Dorita. Let’s go. Yeah, effective connections. We learned so much from him and personal work and like group retreats.

human mycelium, authenic relating, all of that was definitely like my biggest lessons in learning how to communicate and hold my boundaries. Yeah. In good ways. It’s different with everyone. Yeah. I’m still learning. I can be a better communicator still, but I don’t think anybody is completely out learned. Right. It’s like, even gave that like,

Jasper Degenaars (01:10:51.978)
Do some work. Everybody can do some work, but that’s the case. Like nobody is like, even the people that teach it are never going to be like perfect. And that’s also the fallacy that we live in with these cult, like this age of social media, where we look at even me of like, Oh, I’m the mushroom dude. And like people think I know everything, like all the mushrooms that I can point out. I’m sorry. I’m now Alan Rockefeller. Who has that? Like, uh,

that extra bit of brain capacity to learn those things. I think, like, we want to idolize people. We want to have these perfect role models. And maybe that’s from a Judeo-Christian perspective of like the ideal God or be more like Jesus. And probably Jesus was also a flawed human being, right? And it’s like we all are. it’s, think, accepting each other’s flaws is and like loving each other in the…

the imperfections is really the lesson of our time and then community and in relationship and in friendship. like, yeah, it’s really easy to love all the perfect aspects of somebody. But like, if you cannot love their imperfections, then like it’s harder to build a relationship, being that a business relationship or like a romantic relationship or community.

relationship or friendship, know, our lives are defined by our relationships. Yeah. Yeah. That was beautiful. It’s the truth. the thing you learn about community because like, yeah, like, you know, living together, you’re working together, you’re playing together. Yeah. Sometimes people are loving together and then like, but you’re always surrounded by those people. And like, I think it’s, it’s a reminder.

That this is our regular state of being to be like surrounded by people, even if we don’t necessarily want them around in that moment. Or have to deal with people, even though we don’t want to deal with those people because like, yeah, and like maybe our regular life, we can avoid those people, but in community it’s not, but there’s lessons in the uncomfortability, right? That’s leaping back to that earlier conversations. It’s like, why is this person triggering me? And you know what? Most people are triggering you because they’re most like you. Yeah.

Jasper Degenaars (01:13:20.553)
Yeah, those ones are always the slaps in the face. Yeah. And I also feel like in communities, like we kind of like find ourselves in these like roles of, you know, like the archetypes of the family, the mother, the father, the siblings. that can be, that can be triggering.

I know that happened many times for us, know, the bickering mom or the scary dad. Yeah, like the teacher. got the teacher too as well. people like I had this mean teacher and you remind me of them. And that’s, it just shows how much our relationships define us and what kind of

personality traits we’re avoiding, right? Like, well, you’ve had that one bad experience with a certain teacher and you’re anybody that like lies slightly reminds you of that person. You’re just like keeping a distance. Yeah. It’s a lot of projection and this is often where like, if somebody doesn’t like you, it’s often not about you. It’s about them and like their projections off you. And I appreciate the people who come through and are open and willing to do that.

that work with those, know, like, we definitely, including myself, have had, you know, people come through that trigger, you know, those projections and then don’t want to engage in like, how do we like move forward and navigate? And then there’s like, we’ve had some really amazing people come through, like willing to like, work through it, you know, and see the other side and like,

the growth on both sides. That’s why we’ve grown so much is like you’ve projected you sound like a father figure in my life and that wasn’t my favorite. Also like the masculine boss too. I’ve definitely had some of those where I struggled with in my past and then

Jasper Degenaars (01:15:41.668)
created like a blockage with you instead of like meeting it, you know, and now many, after many years, like works through that, you know, and cause it was rough. Yeah. think we had some rough points, but that was not long. I I think it was maybe like a year. Not long. Cause now it’s been like five or six years, but when you’re in it in the first year,

It feels long. feels long. Wow. It’s been a year of us trying to figure out how to talk to each other. Yeah. But like, I think it’s also that we tend to look at the things that differ from us. And that’s why so far like racism comes from and all of these other aspects that like we like to strange people because they’re one little bit different. And I always do like to use this example. I grew up in a town where the people that

my town hated the most were literally people that live like nine kilometers away. And if you think of it, like, most like you, but except for one, maybe like, why slight tweak of an accent or stuff like that. So that to me was always hilarious is that, like, we, we tend to look for the differences so much that even people that like have the same ethnic background, the same like, like,

type of melanization of their skin, the same everything. And then there’s the one difference and that’s what they’re focusing on. And in reality, we have so much more in common with each other than what we separate. But if you’re triggered by somebody and looking at those things that you feel separate off, or you want to distance yourself from it. yeah, that’s interesting how that plays out.

I always say that relationships are not necessarily defined by what you have in common or what is going good in the relationship or it’s easy, they’re defined in how you deal with conflict. So they’re defined by conflict. Are you able to deal with the conflict? And that was always how I saw it, even before I was able. And then Karina was often walking away and then I was not able to deal with the conflict.

Jasper Degenaars (01:18:01.844)
was used to the shouting matches or something. Yeah. He likes boxing and I now you like boxing. I box now. I’m like, how about boxing? yeah, days box, but not often, but sometimes. Yeah. Sometimes. And I think those that is beautiful about learning about our humanity, right? And that’s what community is about. And I think that’s what mushrooms are about as well as like learning about our own.

humanity because the most valuable thing I think I get out of that psychedelic experience and I don’t know if that’s anybody like everybody but like I get to look at my own life from a third person perspective and that’s beneficial and that’s why a lot of people that like well I was just an example of smoking because everybody knows I can see somebody who’s addicted to smoking cigarettes or like any kind of tobacco or smoking any kind of whatever and on like a compulsive basis that like that’s bad for them that’s not serving them

But then the person doesn’t think like that. The person that wants the cigarette is like, I’ve had a big day. I really need this to ground or they like, Oh man, my I feel like work for 10 hours. really need this weed to calm me down. And, we don’t see that about ourselves. But like, if we take a psychedelic, we can start seeing those things about ourselves. And this includes how we communicate and how we show up in our relationships. Yeah. I love that.

Yeah, like I said, it’s the psychedelics are really humbling. They show you, they reveal. And many times, like, you know, even in our own conflict or conflict that I’ve had with, know, I tend, I used to tend to focus on how they affected me. And now my like more

you know, maybe sometimes not immediate response because I’m so heated or, or. Swestered or whatever. but I tend to focus more on like, how could I have shown up better in that? And I think that’s like, again, the combination of the, you know, the mushrooms, the psychedelics, but also all of the, work we’ve been doing, authentic relating and, yeah, just really reflecting on.

Jasper Degenaars (01:20:26.917)
Like how am I showing up in this relationship and how did I communicate? I feel I don’t often burn bridges anymore because of my own self-reflection. Because it’s easy to be in the ego and be like, well, they did this to me. And yeah, my journey has been…

Yeah, I’d rather like, you know.

have my community then to hold grudges. And there’s, you know, even if that like the grudge and the healing needs to happen alone and maybe it is, I like what Gabe says, like, maybe, like the relationship isn’t just authentically relating, but authentically choosing not to relate, because you don’t need to relate with everyone. But to hold that energy between that person for me,

is important to release. And recently I had this come up with a sister who we, yeah, we got into a conflict that caused us to not speak and to block and on all the platforms. So there’s no form of communication, but there wasn’t a closing. And I really needed that closing. my intention…

was if it didn’t work out between us to have a conversation to close that was to like ceremonially close it myself, you know? So I didn’t have this like tether, this negative like hold, grudge on this person. Cause I don’t think, yeah. Cause it’s just like a ways on us, you know? And so yeah, that’s my, another great lesson from all of this that we’re doing here. Forgiveness is very good medicine.

Jasper Degenaars (01:22:23.002)
Forgiveness is medicine. And I feel like it’s, I’ve definitely gotten to the point of being able to forgive myself, my other people in my life through working with the mushrooms. And like, gets, it’s funny that like right now, a lot of people are doing parts work or they call internal family constellations and stuff like this. And before I even knew about this, the mushrooms already showed me this. Like, so.

I’m curious how those things lay out because I have a very clear, vivid memory of sitting with my younger self and showing him the life I’m living now and it’s okay and that he doesn’t need to be sad or afraid of people or angry at the world. And then I was gone, my cannabis addiction, my spliff addiction specifically was gone instantly. now we have the tools. I thought that was really fascinating.

there is this concept or this theory that’s practiced within psychotherapy that then without me ever knowing about this, the mushrooms just showed me who felt like natural and easy. And there was forgiveness in that as well. yeah, we tend to want to be right. Like that’s what we learn in the cultures like, fight up for what you think is right and hold on to these things.

That’s also what I had. It’s like, know this way or like, I feel this is just or and now most of the times I’m like, is this worth bringing friction for? Is this worth causing instability because I think this might be more just or more right or I feel like I’m being treated unfairly and that even in that sentence comes a lot of victim mentality. Right. And I think like that’s, that’s what it work is. It’s like, okay, how can I show up better?

Like what did I do wrong in this situation? What can I do better? And taking that accountability and responsibility is actually a big part of the work. Huge. Look at us. I’m proud of us. I’m proud of us too. We sat here like six years ago. Very different. Very different to people. Very different. We should have had one just to compare, but…

Jasper Degenaars (01:24:45.003)
This is the perfect moment. This is the perfect moment. is perfect moment. Six years later, six years later, close to the 10th year anniversary of this project. We almost seven years of being with the project. Yeah, it’s wild. It’s pretty wild. Good job. We’re still doing it. We’re still doing it. And also felt like, what was that? Seven years already? Yeah. Geez. Almost. I’ve been doing this like half my adult life at this point.

Yeah, I would be coming up on six years. So you’d be coming up on seven years. Wow. That’s crazy. Cool. It’s pretty crazy. We just did that. Yeah. And so much has changed in the last always years. Change is the only constant. Yeah. You’re a mom now. You’re expecting your second kid. Those who speak. That’s so crazy. Yeah. It’s amazing though.

I’ve always wanted to be a mom. I loved being the mom of Fungi, but I wanted my own babies. And we had so many babies being born through here that every time a baby was born, I was like, I want one. I have one. like, I want a second one. No more. No more. That’s you said earlier. No, we’ll see. We’ll Exchange, you know. We’ll see.

Yeah. Babies are fun. Yeah. But also it’s hard. Same with our baby here at Funky Academy. It’s also fun and it’s hard. It is hard work. We’ve done amazing in holding it and evolving it into what it is and sticking with it. There’s lots of mistakes and there’s lots of things we could have done better that we can still do better. Yeah.

As long as we’re, you I remember when we were making our, our, Yeah. Agreements, our commitments to the project, as well as our values and our mission. And one of those, like agreements we had was to learn from our mistakes. It’s okay to make mistakes, but learn from them and not repeat them. yeah, it’s always good to come back to those.

Jasper Degenaars (01:27:09.566)
this core values and agreements with ourselves and yeah, the evolution of fungi is always happening. Let’s see what’s gonna unfold. Yeah. No, I’m curious. You know, I do think every time I speak to somebody who’s older, they’re like, yeah, it just gets better. I think to a certain age that the body starts collapsing, but like, yeah, I’m see what the next six years are going to bring.

And what the next six years beyond that and it’s always evolving and that’s I’m just curious. Yeah, maybe we do another podcast in six years. Maybe sooner even can be the yearly checkup. Yeah, I like the yearly checkup. Yeah, what are we talk about now?

All right. I know this is a stretch for penis. He was very nervous before this. was like, my God, there’s a camera pointing at you. Can we cut out the weird things you’re going to say? And you did great. It ended up slowing. Yeah, in a good way. I was definitely nervous at the start, but we talked about all the things I love to talk about. So yeah, leading into like what feels uneasy. Yeah. And like, why is the knees coming from? Yeah. Fear.

Fear of not being perfect. It’s definitely still a lesson that comes up. Yeah. As we all have, right? As we all have. Imposter syndrome. Yeah, that’s an interesting one. I sometimes have that, but not all the time. Not always, but sometimes. Yeah. You know, especially with like, you know, how…

large our community has grown into and the expectations that even others set on us, like I can sometimes feel those energies. so and a lot of it is projection and just my own story. Yeah. And I think just like, yeah, doing this, showing up and being real when people come into the community, just showing up and being real. That’s right. Yeah, it’s definitely.

Jasper Degenaars (01:29:30.323)
A huge medicine for me is just like trying to be as authentic as I can be. Um, I think that’s something that’s really powerful about fungacademy. You know, we still hold it as like the authenticity. Like when you step through these doors, yeah, you’ll meet us in our, our raw forms. You’ll meet everybody in their raw forms. Yeah. And that’s encouraged and that’s the way we are.

instead of this performative version of ourselves that we tend to believe through social media. right, a way, since the podcasting is also like slightly performative, I feel like we had like a pretty normal conversation for our sake, but there is still definitely awareness. We have the mics and the cameras and all the things, but yeah, I think we’re almost out of this. I have a couple minutes. Thanks so much for joining.

Oh, first Fungi Academy podcast. It couldn’t have been any other episode that you having first one. I appreciate you and all you’ve given for this project and all you continue to give for this project and how much we’ve grown together. And I am looking forward to, growing forever more. I’m to be the fun uncle of your little family. I appreciate it. far. Thank you.

I have my own little family. know. then our families will be running around together. We’ll have to train Finn to be better with little ones. But at that point, he’ll be a lot older. Yeah. Who knows? Yeah. Thank you, Jasper, for having me. It’s been a pleasure. Hopefully I get more comfortable in front of these cameras and can start hosting some of my own with a teacher like you.

Yeah, love that. Coming up, the Pony Cammy podcast with Karina Bina. Host Karina Bina. All right. Yay. Thank you so much for watching. I had an amazing conversation. I’m learning how to set it all up, do the audio editing, you name it. So I’m very honored to stick through it. If there’s technical difficulties or weird sounds, hey, that’s part of the whole thing.

Jasper Degenaars (01:31:52.574)
If you want to support this podcast and all the work we do here at Funky Academy, the best way to do this right now is to sign up for the mushroom membership, especially a premium my symmetry to get like a whole library of hundreds of epic master classes with amazing teachers. This month we had Taliogos Iakos, lot of Funky Alchemy, we’re gonna have K Brides coming up next. We have so many incredible people joining us.

So if you want to dive deeper into world of community, psychedelics, mushroom cultivation, mycology in general, this is the place to do it. And you’re supporting our work of creating amazing mycology based education right here on the internet. And also get access to all of our banned YouTube videos that are no longer allowed because we’re dangerous. Look at us, especially Nala over there. Nala’s too dangerous. Okay, thanks again for listening and see you next week.