Kevin O'Donoghue and Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:00:23
Hi everybody, this is Kevin O'Donoghue, Licensed Mental Health Counselor and I am Niseema Dyan Diemer, Licensed Massage Therapist and trauma specialist. And this is The Positive Mind where we bring you some ideas, concepts, and guests to help you lead a more positively minded life. And we had to bring back Charley Winenger the author of the book "Listening to Ecstasy: The Transformative Power of MDMA" because I left, Niseema, last week's show with a warm heart and I want more of it. So I want to welcome Charley Wininger back to talk about his book, his break through book, that is coming out in November 10th on Amazon.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:01:04
It came out. What am I saying? And what day is it? I know it seems like a year ago since the election, but what a way to celebrate the election either way, if you had it either way, it comes out. "Listening to Ecstasy" is the first book you need to read post election because it will warm your heart. "The Transformative Power of MDMA". Charley we want to welcome you back to the Positive Mind
Charley Wininger
00:01:30
Thank you. That's wonderful to be here,
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:01:32
You know, Charley we want to create now for a full hour. I know, I think 15 minutes until our last show, I said, I have the fantasy that we would have a one hour show where we felt what it was like to be on an MDMA experience. Let's try and do it for the full hour. So I'm going to add, I'm going to quote your book to get you started again: "I cannot unsee what I've seen or unknow what I've touched and felt with my own hands and heart. I cannot unenlightened myself after I have trespassed the Gates of Heaven and had the angel wink and shoo me inside for a look around."
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:02:15
Have you seen angels on MDMA and how is it inside there?
Charley Wininger
00:02:21
It helps me get in touch with my better angels. And I believe that one reason that we are here on earth is to pull heaven down closer to earth. And I do believe that I have seen or tasted what Nervana is like. And one of my personal experiences with MDMA or group experiences with MDMA I know that that Heaven is possible here, it already exists in our hearts and MDMA helps remind us.
Charley Wininger
00:03:07
So it certainly reminds me of that. This is what we are here for. We are really here to help each other and to love each other and to contribute to each other's lives.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:03:21
And I don't want to rehash last week's show when you talk a lot about how MDMA as a real heart connector in a way, of ridding ourselves of this trance that we're all separate individuals, but actually we're all really very connected. But Charley, before we go there, I just want to reiterate that again, you're not promoting or selling MDMA and that you are only encouraging taking it responsibly.
Charley Wininger
00:03:52
And I'm not even, I mean, I'm not evenencouraging taking MDMA responsibly. I am not here to promote the use of MDMA. It's an illegal substance. You could potentially get into trouble obtaining it or having it on your person. I'm here really, and the book is written, really to just testify as to what it is it has done for me. And what it has done for my wife and many of our friends. I can't say it's definitely gonna do this for everyone. And this is as a personal testimony.
Charley Wininger
00:04:33
And that's what it's about. Well, right.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:04:36
I'm glad you said you cleared that up and you said that very straight. I do wanna make my own. I believe that it is going to be legal at some point. It's certainly prescribable and all the investigation and research on it points in that direction. But your book is such a nice personal account. Have your journey with MDMA, yours and Shelley's together. And since we covered a lot of ground last week, I wanted to talk right off the bat about some of the do's and don'ts how to take it safely. If you are going to go get it, and you are going to use it as a life enhancer, what should the person do in preparation and post experience?
Charley Wininger
00:05:24
Yes. So if you are going to do it, and then again, this is outlined in my chapter about the guide for use in the book, you have to pay attention to several details. First of all, you've got to make sure that your about to ingest Pure MDMA, something sold as ecstasy or Molly. That's called MDMA and isn't necessarily that. So the way to guarantee that you are having pure MDMA is to go on the online and go to dancesafe.org, and order a testing kit, which is not too expensive.
Charley Wininger
00:06:09
It's about $65. And it's legal. And you know, you get that testing kit and you test it before you buy it. And certainly before you use it. And so you're only using pure MDMA. You also need a scale, so to measure your dose. You don't want to do more than 120 milligrams. And if you're older, like I am, maybe a hundred milligrams or 90 milligrams, because as we get older, we get more sensitive to drugs. So you're regulating your dosage, you're making sure its pure.
Charley Wininger
00:06:52
You have to have careful attention to set and settings set, being your mindset going in. And if you were in the middle of a Nintendo Crisis, it might not be the best time to do it. And if your setting has to be...this setting is just surrounding. So you have to really make sure that you're in surroundings that are in your control the first time that you do this and preferably at home and only with the people that you want to have there. And you have no other responsibilities for the day and you have no responsibilities that night and nothing to do the next day, the next day should be there that night.
Charley Wininger
00:07:37
You should sleep it off. And the next day should be one of calm reflection and the integration. You don't do it on a Sunday when you have to go to work on a Monday. If you do it on a Saturday you have the Sunday. So these are harm reduction protocols for the safe use of MDMA.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:07:56
And what about hydration in water? Because a lot of them,
Charley Wininger
00:07:59
Yes, thank you. You want to keep yourself well-hydrated during, during the time a good if, if it's normal temperatures and you're not sweating just to drink a good leader of water during the entire time of the, of the experience with that five to six hours and not that much water, or just to stay adequately hydrated at night before you go to sleep at night, before you go to sleep, take a hundred milligrams of 5-HTP, which is cheap and legal to obtain this over the counter or in any CVS or RiteAid store.
Charley Wininger
00:08:41
It's a supplement that helps replenish the serotonin in that you lose it in the course of the experience.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:08:49
I want to talk a little bit about testimonials from people who have done it and about integration. Can you give us a picture of what integration looks like? What would somebody say and an integration experience? Because I think integration is critical. It's not a drug, it's not a substance that you want to do on your own. I mean, you can, and you, when you do it with your wife and you do it with men and you do it with groups as well, but to me, it's, it's such a rich social experience that I think the integration aspect of it is just as important as the experience of it.
Charley Wininger
00:09:29
Yes. And without the integration, it can just be a very nice experience, but it doesn't necessarily have to improve your life. It really does enhance your life, you need to integrate it into your life. And there are many ways of doing that. That one wonderful way is by being in Psychotherapy or at least having a therapy session planned within a few days of the MDMA experience so you can talk to a Therapist about it. And if you're not in therapy, you have a good friend or family member who you trust, who was not going to judge you and to share your experience with and somebody who can just listen and receive you and understand what I can help you understand, what you've just been through.
Charley Wininger
00:10:24
Also a meditation is a wonderful way of integrating the experience into your life and a way to maybe do some reevaluating of about what you want your life to be. I've used it to reset my compass from time to time, my direction, my GPS about where I wanna go, what kind of life I want to lead and how I want to lead it. It has to do also with improving my relationships. And so, one way I integrate this into my life is realizing that if I have static between me and a friend, if there is something that is left unsaid that is getting in a way of the friendship, and to find a way to say it in a way that the other person can really hear it, and clean up my relationships the muck that's in the way, including of course my primary relationship with my wife, or if there's any static in the way, to just get it all out there and improve my relationships, because it's the quality of my relationship that really, that really matters.
Charley Wininger
00:11:36
And that helps improve the quality of my life and of course the life of the people who are there, those of the people that I touch.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:11:49
Have you heard people sort of say, well, this is from their experiences. In your book, you do have some testimonials. But have you heard people say, "this is the first time I've ever heard
Charley Wininger
00:11:59
Ever felt," yes fill in the blank. Yes like I said, the first time Shelly did it, my wife, it was like, she came out of a long sleep. The first time you've ever felt completely a safe and alive and completely comfortable and her body, it was the first time she ever really was able to accept her body. She has a weight issue. I'm like a lot of people and she was very open about this, so I can talk about it. And she realized that MDMA has helped her accept that.
Charley Wininger
00:12:41
Yeah, I might be some pounds overweight, but I'm really a beautiful person. That I am really physically a beautiful woman and I can love myself and my body. It's helped her accept herself and alter and mute the harsh, critical voice that she absorbed from her mother.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:13:09
It is a psychedelic that you can look in the mirror. There's some psychedelic shit. You are advised not to look in the mirror, but this is one where it's okay. And you share in the book where Shelly looks in the mirror and she says, "you know what? I am beautiful. I'm a beautiful person. Yes, I look beautiful."
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:13:26
Well, it sounds like it gives you both experiences. One of being able to connect to others, but also to be able to connect to yourself in a way that maybe you've never connected with, with the same sort of acceptance and love, and maybe central pleasure that you haven't ever experienced. So it kind of makes sense that it is kind of a two way experience. It's not only out, but it's also in.
Charley Wininger
00:13:50
That's right. And as you know, what is in effects what is out there. The way you relate to yourself is going to have an indelible influence on the way you relate to the people around you. And so if you can shift your relationship to yourself in a positive way, and MDMA is a medicine that can help, it helps me do that. It helps you really do that. So many people I know that, and it can help shift our way out the way we relate to others.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:14:20
Somebody said it in your book, "I've struggled with shame all my life, especially around claiming my authentic self, but now I'm able to say, this is who I am." So it's one of the things I could hear during an integration is "I feel like I've come home. I haven't been home in myself or my body
Charley Wininger
00:14:43
Ever." Yes and no.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:14:45
So now I've had this experience, and for me I think it's the first time I felt not afraid of other people. I mean, I wasn't even aware that I was. I had this layer of fear, of guardedness around other people. What was most amazing to me was the sense of "that's gone. Yes I don't have any fear. Nobody is going to come at me and hit me. "
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:15:13
Well, that's because it actually does have an effect on the amygdala. You know, we've talked about the amygdala a little bit. That's the sort of a crocodile brain. That's all about sort of protecting and finding where the danger is. And in our society, we were so like a amygdala heavy on a certain level of like, you got it, you got to do, and somebody is out to get you and you get to succeed. And he got to beat the other guy and all of that, it's amygdala heavy, and a lot of cortisol heavy. And this is found to sort of tamp down the amygdala and the hormones that it secretes, which are really damaging to the body in many ways.
Niseema Dyan Deimer
00:15:54
Right. And so it's just, it's very interesting. Well that it makes sense that that would be the feeling. If you are amygdala sort of stands down, then you can be more in your prefrontal cortex more and your limbic system enable to connect and feel safe.
Charley Wininger
00:16:11
Yes. And that transforms your relationship to the world. Because as I believe it was Anais Nin who said, "we don't see things as they are. We see things as we are." Right. And so if you can have this profound experience and that you're really safe, that the world can be a wonderful place and full of people who are as aching for truth, love and connection as you are, then you can start seeing people not as threats, but as potential allies.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:16:52
And this also links to a show, a couple of shows that we did around emotional dampening syndromes like alexithymia and anhedonia. And I can imagine this would be a way to start to open that because again, like those brain centers aren't firing or maybe the amygdala's too much. And I think it provides an opportunity for people who maybe experience something very different who might be so depressed in their social or emotional
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:17:20
chronic stress can create alexithymia now to anhedonia. So if you want to know what it's like to not be chronically stressed or, try an MDMA experience like Charlie says, they used it in couples therapy back before it was illegal and you can do six months of couples therapy in a day. And you might just awaken your senses enough that you don't have to, you won't be alexithymic or you won't have alexithymia. To me is that is like not having words for my emotions. You'll be so in touch with yourself that now I can identify, Oh wow. I do feel anger. I do feel happiness.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:18:00
I do feel fear. So MDMA could be an agent that reawakens these things for you. And I want to remind our audience, the FDA is on the verge of making it legal. It has called it a breakthrough therapy. MDMA assisted psychotherapy for PTSD and psilocybin for treatment resistant depression, a breakthrough therapy. So Charlie told us in the last show that it's scheduled, it's on target and hopefully there are no detours on the way. I want it sooner. But 2023 looks like a realistic estimation of when it will be prescribable.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:18:41
Is there any chance for that to speed that up? Charley
Charley Wininger
00:18:46
So just to speed that up.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:18:48
So you did, you know the current president,
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:18:52
Well, just to sort of dovetail on that, they are deep into research for using MDMA with substance use disorders, anxiety and/or depression associated with terminal illness, post traumatic stress and obsessive compulsive disorder. So yeah.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:19:08
And I'm just wondering why wait til 2023? I'm asking Charley is there a way that this is going to happen sooner? Or why is it going to take this last phase?
Charley Wininger
00:19:18
Well that you know, that the FDA is, I don't want to criticize them. They are very slow and methodical in their ways because they don't want a bad medicine to speed through the regulatory processes and hit the market. And so they're being very careful as well, as I think they should be. There is a now expanded access, which means that a very limited number of people can use MDMA right now through their doctors and in applying to the FDA for approval of, for use. But it's a very limited. It's like only about 50 people right now are allowed to do that.
Charley Wininger
00:19:58
It is no way to really open it up until it becomes a legal prescription medication and is probably going to take two to three years.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:20:07
Where can someone find any active clinical trials? Are there any going on?
Charley Wininger
00:20:12
Well, Yes, they're going on right now. And if you want to be part of those trials, you get in touch with MAPS and that's maps.org and go on their website and I believe they are still taking the volunteers
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:20:30
It's aid for you as a psychotherapist, you mentioned this ability to be more receptive now and empathize more a bit talk first about fear, Charley. The opposite of fear is joy. Because you do mention fear in the book quite a bit. MDMA is really an aid in seeing how fear can really be an illusion as well.
Charley Wininger
00:20:57
Yes, I don't. No fear is always an illusion that might be a signal that you might need to pay attention to some kind of danger in your life. Right? The thing with fear that I've had to learn is, as we say, in the psychedelic community, when you get the message, hang up the phone. And so, if you're feeling fear or it might be in your body telling you this, some danger that we might need to attend to, and then some action you might need to take, fine. So take the action and then relax and set the fear aside. My mother used to call me a worrywart when I was growing up.
Charley Wininger
00:21:41
I think I was looking back on it now where she was suffering from some inter-generational trauma, that I was born in 1949, just a few years after the Holocaust. My relatives understood how at risk all of us were for a time. I absorbed a lot of fears from my parents and grandparents growing up. And of course I was raised in the fifties and sixties where there were all these things to be afraid of whether it was a bomb or violence of various types and various struggles. MDMA helped me help balance the cortisol in my system with the anxiety, with the serotonin and the oxytocin.
Charley Wininger
00:22:29
And that piece of wellbeing that they bring and realize that fear is one of emotion and that, but when I'm high on MDMA, I get in touch with the joy of simply being alive right now in a human body and feeling absolutely glorious, although that's chemically induced, I can anchor it in my body for future reference. And it also gives me a whole other sense of what it's like to be alive.
Charley Wininger
00:23:15
I liken it to that metaphor of the fish that swims around in the ocean all its life, and one day jumps out of the water and its in the air. And then it jumps back in. And for those few seconds, that fish, and from speaking philosophically here, of course, understand it used to think that all there was water. And it just to think of it as water to jump out of that water for a few seconds, you realize, Oh, there's a whole other world out there. There is a whole other way of being and after you taste that whole of a way of being, you're never quite the same.
Charley Wininger
00:23:59
Again, you realize that your life can open up at any point in your life, and you can have new experiences of exploration and discovery, including at a ripe old age. And so these are some of the revolutionary or evolutionary aspects of using MDMA that I have discovered
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:24:24
The opposite of fear is joy and you're describing really joy. And I couldn't help but think about the birth canal. We did exist in water as this as beings, at one point that it was idyllic and beautiful. And then we moved and then the water broke. And then we were brought into a whole another reality, but maybe MDMA, you can get us back in the water, even though in your metaphor was getting out of the water. But I couldn't help but think about that. But that's a good part of the book. You do talk about fear to a good degree. And I, again, my experience was that it was the first time I experienced total absence of fear.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:25:05
And that in itself was enough. I guess I could say that I have potential for joy. Though I didn't get there in that experience, but I could certainly see the potential for me.
Charley Wininger
00:25:25
Yes. I believe joy is our birthright. And it really is. We are here, I would like to say, to bring heaven to earth and to realize that we are all connected and that people want and need to connect. And, you know, I live in this marvelous, awful, terrible and astonishing place called New York City and where it looks like everyone is just wants to keep to themselves. But I have noticed that when they come out of that trance and I reach out to a stranger on the subway or on the street to just say hello, or just offer my seat or just to have a kind word or a smile that they respond.
Charley Wininger
00:26:22
A lot of people, that's what they want. They really want to connect. People are hungry for connection.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:26:30
And again, you are talking about that miraculous shift from, you know, being ruled by the amygdala to coming into your prefrontal cortex and recognizing that human beings in life, isn't all danger. That's a big shift. That's a really big shift for a lot of people to even imagine and maybe even experience MDMA. Yes. That's well put and MDMA, and this is the experience of pronoia, which is the sneaking suspicion that the universe is out to do me good.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:27:13
Yes, that's right.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:27:14
Which is a sneaking suspicion that somebody is going to stab me in the back. That's wonderful, Charley. You're listening to Charley Wininger talking about his book "Listening to Ecstasy: The Transformative Power of MDMA" here on The Positive Mind. We're going to take a musical break and we'll be back in a moment.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:27:34
And we are back.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:28:30
I'm Kevin O'Donoghue Licensed Mental Health Counselor
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:28:34
And I am Niseema Dyan Diemer licensed massage therapist
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:28:36
And you're listening to the Positive Mind where we have our guest today. Charley Wininger and his book coming out "Listening to Ecstasy: The Transformative Power of MDMA." And if you want to reach Charley, you can go to his website, Charley, with an E Y c-h-a-r-l-e-y-w-i-n-i-n-g-e-r.com. Charleywininger.com.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:29:02
He also has a very informative YouTube channel "Listening to Ecstasy." So subscribe to that, if your interested in learning more in hearing from Charley. He's on weekly, and he has lots of great information
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:29:15
And we were talking about Ecstasy again, and this is our last half hour. Charley thank you for being here for over an hour and a half now. People can listen to the show, The Positive Mind Radio Show. Let's talk about America. Let's talk about normalizing MDMA because so many people have memories of psychedelics from the sixties and seventies, and you know, the horror stories back then, and now what, you know, we've learned that all of that fear and worry, wasn't really that warranted and psychedelics can actually be used to cure yourself, get cured of certain mental health conditions, but also to enhance your life.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:29:56
I mean, America, we're kind of consumers in the first place. We have pretty hard driving addictions when we compare ourselves to other countries. And in your book, you talk about the use of drugs in America, through the mouth like cigarettes, like caffeine, like alcohol. Why not MDMA when we were doing all of these other things. I mean, how does MDMA compare indamage that cigarettes could do? So, could you talk a little bit about this part of the book where you mentioned America as using some of these potentially very harmful drugs
Charley Wininger
00:30:32
And alcohol? Of course, it doesn't have to be harmful, but it can be of course, any common drug, like caffeine can be harmful when it's overused. And certainly cigarettes, nicotine is very harmful. And I like to say that the people who say, Oh, well, I drink, but I don't do drugs. Well, excuse me, but you drink your drugs. That doesn't mean you don't do them, right. America is moving towards liberalization in the reform of these prohibitions against psychedelics, and people are voting these measures now into use.
Charley Wininger
00:31:15
Psilocybin mushrooms are now legal in Oregon. Cannabis was just legalized in New Jersey, and the District of Columbia liberalized some laws. So the country is moving in that direction, but I say in the book, we all draw a line somewhere when it comes to drug use and some people draw the line at legality. I draw the line at efficacy, at practicality and what drugs are useful and what drugs are not. And I find MDMA, and this is me, I'm not saying that it's going to be your experience, but MDMA for me is, when used appropriately with attention to the guidelines, I find it a very beneficial and in a multitude of ways.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:32:10
I just wanted to comment that this is a very brave sort of book to write. I mean, it's about a personal journey with a substance that isn't legal, with us as astronauts, assort of an exploration of a new universe. And, you know, I really appreciate it. And Michael Pollan had his book where he experimented with multiple psychedelics and that also, I think, opens the minds of people to just be open to this, just to start shifting your dependence on pharmaceutical companies or to move towards things that are really, truly, potentially integrative are helpful in making that shift.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:32:56
So you're also with alternative medicine and alternatives being more accepted, you have to take a certain responsibility as a client, patient or person on this journey to do the things that are going to help you and follow up with it, like that integration process, that you're on a journey. And if you want to heal and feel better in yourself, you can take these steps and follow up and get support and feel connected. Yeah.
Charley Wininger
00:33:27
I would like to call it an existential medicine and we're only here on this planet once. Maybe there was being co-ordination. I don't know if I can. Yeah.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:33:37
I'm hoping you're not a time. I'm just getting it right now.
Charley Wininger
00:33:41
But if we can't, we can bet on it or we can't count on it. So I'm here to live the best life I can. And that means sometimes living a life outside the box, and I'm making bold choices about taking charge of the chemistry in my body. And so I decided that I'm here to live the best life I can. And so I'm going to experiment responsibly with these medicines to enhance my life. And it's been a successful journey for me.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:34:16
And some psychedelics have been used for people with cancer, right. And to alleviate the existential anxiety of death. Yeah.
Charley Wininger
00:34:25
And is there, they had done very successful experiments there in Johns Hopkins with end of life anxiety with psilocybin mushrooms where it does not cure them of the cancer, but it helps them accept that they're dying, it helps them communicate and wanna communicate with their families who don't want to talk about these issues, about the fact that they're about to lose a loved one with their loved one. But after an experience that many people who are experienced as one of the most profound experiences of their life, it helps them deal with the fact that we're all here temporarily and it helps them accept their dying and alleviate their anxiety, which is so much of the pain of dying is the anxiety around it.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:35:25
Right. And you even say in the book, "when I identify what's eternal in me and therefore indestructable, I'll be less afraid of it." Meaning death. Yes. If it's true,
Charley Wininger
00:35:39
These substances, these medicines have helped me accept my mortality, at least more than I used to accept it. It's still hard for me to accept them because they've also made me feel so joyous and grateful for being alive. I don't want it to end. Right.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:35:58
Right. But you had so many decades of struggle. Then you discover this substance and it's like, now I know what joy feels like. Don't take it away from me. I could at least give me as many decades where I was struggling to have where I've experienced joy. That's my feeling about it, but the universe, isn't it.
Charley Wininger
00:36:19
I think it's something that Niseema said. So you really touched me before, when you said that it was a great book to write. As I think we discussed in the other, the first installment here about joy being the opposite of fear. I felt such a joy with my MDMA experiences that helped me overcome the fear of writing the book, in coming out of the chemical closet and being open to it. I couldn't stand hiding anymore. It was painful to not be all there, not to misrepresent myself by this lie of omission. That I'm really a person who values sobriety above all things.
Charley Wininger
00:37:04
Well, I don't, I spent most of my time sober, and I know what it's like to be dangerously unskilled, but because I have had brushes with bad drugs in the 1970s. But I know that the judicious use of good medicines, like MDMA, can really improve my life when I'm talking. I was tired of hiding about it and, and not being open about it. And the joy of these experiences helped me overcome any fear of writing the book.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:37:37
And it's kind of the ultimate connection, right? We are sending this book out to hundreds of thousands of people and connecting your experience. Sharing one's experience is the best way to connect. Yeah.
Charley Wininger
00:37:52
Yes. Thank you. I would say it's my gift to the world, and I hope it will be of use to people.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:38:01
Well Charley, before people buy the book can they get an excerpt of it? Cause I want to emphasize, again, the style of the book, one of the things I liked most about the book was the style. That it was a book you could put down and pick up and be back in the trance of this book. And I think mostly that is attributed to the style of the book, your kind of informal way of talking about your journey and your experiences and everything. Is there a way people could get an excerpt of it? Right?
Charley Wininger
00:38:32
Well, there was an excerpt online on Amazon, an excerpt from the prologue that you can get.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:38:41
So that's a perfect place to start. I love the style of the prologue. It brings you right into the book. Again, the name of the book is "Listening to Ecstasy: The Transformative Power of MDMA." It is on Amazon right now, as we speak. And you can get a sample of the style of this writing, because I want to take up a little bit here, Charley. Your experiences as a therapist, because you say a lot of important things as a therapist and how it's transformed your practice. Your way of being with clients. I'd just have to put a plug in for a woman called Denise Rue, who wrote an article on psilocybin and her use of psilocybin.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:39:21
And she took a megadose of psilocybin. 10 grams, which we know is a lot of psilocybin. And have you heard of this article by Denise? If you
Charley Wininger
00:39:29
Haven't, but I would never, personally, I would
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:39:32
Never do 10 per year. We wouldn't have been in, she deliberately did, but she talked about it being such a transformative experience for her as a therapist, that it was really a true spiritual experience, and that it made her much more of a receptor of her clients. Now you said, and I could definitely see that as an experience on that much of psilocybin 'cause it can be like a spiritual experience. And I think some of these medicines can get people so in touch with their mortality and this fear of death, that it becomes almost a spiritual experience.
Charley Wininger
00:40:17
Yes. And to be in touch with the part of me that's beyond my personality and beyond my body, even a part of me that was here before I came into this incarnation and will be here afterwards.
Niseema Dyan Deimer
00:40:32
And how does that effect how you are with clients?
Charley Wininger
00:40:36
You know, I really believe intellectually that it's a quality of my presence that matters more than any particular modality or technique I use. And my presence is effected in that I can be more receptive and more empathetic and compassionate with clients because I can have a more heart centered approach, but when I'm with them I don't, and I prefer the term client or patient, because clients that presupposes a more equal footing with the person, and I'm not like the healthy doctor treating a sick patient, I'm just one person in the room with another person in the room and we're meeting each other person to person.
Charley Wininger
00:41:22
And I'm there to listen in a deep way.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:41:27
It kind of makes me think of the anchoring experience because of the MDMA that you are so anchored through that experience of being at peace and calm and that a client can't help but pick that up when you're with them. A lot of times we can feel our therapist is reaching for things to engage us more deeply and nothing works more than the presence.
Charley Wininger
00:41:55
Yes, yes. And the type of therapy I'm trained in Gestalt therapy, it's all about the here and now and its all about the I and thou and the relationship between me and the client and really connecting with them and not trying to impose my agenda on them and trying to get them to change and in a way that I want, right. But to help them, help them come out of themselves and speak so that their own solutions become readily apparent to them. Right.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:42:31
You say, "when I use my empathic skills to listen to a client, I'm also listening into and through them feeling my way intuitively into their being." Yet now you've been a Therapist for 30 years before MDMA. Were you doing that before MDMA?
Charley Wininger
00:42:57
Not as much. No I've learned to do that more so with the help of MDMA and I know I've done it between 65 and 75 and 65 and 70 times over the past 20 years. And it has a cumulative effect over time. It has subtly altered my chemistry and because I've had so much, so many experiences of being in the profound moment, the "hyper now" I would like to call it and being there in a whole, in a heart-centered way that I've anchored that into my body and you can call upon it during the therapeutic session.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:43:45
And it sounds like the cumulative effect is a kind of trust that you've developed in the "hyper now" in that that's a real experience. That that is a real beneficial experience.
Charley Wininger
00:43:57
Yes, yes. And let's face it. The only place healing can occur is in the moment and being in the profound connection with a person, that's what people need. And then I call MDMA that "chemical of connection" because it helps you connect with yourself and it urges you towards connecting with people, right there in your in your presence.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:44:26
Charlie, you have a really interesting prayer as it's called, A Prayer For The Journey Here by Rich Orloff. I think a friend of yours, preparatory to taking MDMA and I thought it was really beautiful. So I want to just read some of that. I welcome you into my body and soul. I welcome your teachings, your inspirations, your healings. And I welcome all parts of myself that may rise and visit me during this journey. I welcome the place where I connect to more than just to me, I already know. I welcome the place where I connect to others then to a divine place, they may not be able to define, but which I am open to knowing.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:45:16
I invite all of me to participate in this journey.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:45:21
Right. I could almost think that would be a beautiful prayer for every day. And I mean, imagine that if we can just wake up and say that I invite all of you to participate today. My journey today.
Charley Wininger
00:45:35
Yes. It's the practice of radical acceptance and being all that you are and saying yes to every part of you.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:45:46
And it is unmistakably a journey. We take other medicines and other drugs and we are not guaranteed a journey. But I think when you take MDMA you are guaranteed a journey. And I like this prayer because it says to welcome it at first. It brings your mind too, with intention. When we take these other drugs we are not necessarily entering with an intention, but here where entering with an intention to, and recognizing that, I have certain parts of me that I don't know maybe so well and that they might come out in this journey and that's welcome. All parts of that
Charley Wininger
00:46:27
Are welcome. That's all right.
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:46:29
And it starts with a receptivity, you know, I'm taking this in. I think we don't know how to receive in our culture. It's all about give, give, give, and we end up empty
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:46:42
The trust. Right? I am trusting this. So I thank Charley, thank you for that. And I think Charley, for the last part of our show, I would like you to revisit what we talked about in the first show about it's an enhancement for you and your wife and for its potential for couples and people in general, as couples, let's say let's, let's limit it to that. Cause we don't have as much time as I'd like, can you revisit that? Right,
Charley Wininger
00:47:09
Shelley and I have found that, at least for us, and the other couples that we know that MDMA can act like emotional, super glue for our relationship, bring us down to a deeper, more heartfelt and profound connection beyond our personality, beyond our differences, a soul deep level of connection and helps bond us in that way. And after doing it so many times together, we are very bonded and in a place of heart and enjoy.
Charley Wininger
00:47:50
And it also play playfulness. We play like two babies sometimes in the pen, in the crib and it's quite a quite joyful and without any of the armour that I might have had with other relationships in the past,
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:48:17
I can imagine it. It's like, just hearing you talk about that. I think, and reflect on couples that come to, because we've done these safe conversations workshops and things. They come with so many wounds, childhood wounds, you know, relationship wounds, these things are so, you know, they muck everything up in so many ways. And you know what you're saying is like, you can take this in somehow, cut through all that and really see and accept the other in some way.
Charley Wininger
00:48:52
Yes. Because this is a joy that I speak of. This Love, this playfulness, these could all be transformative, for a lot of transformational experiences. And when you do it with a partner and you realize that you can bond on that, that primal place of where they're at that before you learned how to adjust to the rules of society and it tends to heal those wounds, at least temporarily and with the integration work and more and more permanently so that you are not just two people sparking off of each other from your wound to their wounds.
Charley Wininger
00:49:42
And that's why discussions devolve into fights. And then the fight becomes about the fight and you're off to the races. And next thing you know, you have to spend a lot of money on therapists like me. Instead, when we found that we have an MDMA experience under the right settings and with the right protocols in place and knowing how to do it safely so it's a controlled experience that we can bond on this heart-to-heart level that that goes beneath the wounds.
Charley Wininger
00:50:22
And it can be very, very healing. I could see a part of the play would be, let's
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:50:28
Say, I'll bring my five favorite CDs and you bring your five. Where does music fit in here at, Charley? Is there a Music
Charley Wininger
00:50:36
Oh, music is part of the wonderful part, wonderful role to play within the MDMA experience because to use is number one, using music a trip hop John WRA of music or Buddha Lounge and that type of music is a very exotic type of sensual music, which we found this grateful love making actually. But it's also great to just have in the background doing an MDMA experience because it supports this feeling of peacefulness and wellbeing.
Charley Wininger
00:51:16
Also, you can use MDMA to dance your butt off. A lot with electronic dance music or any type of music with a strong beat, because when I'm dancing on MDMA, it feels like I'm being danced. Like the MDMA is a marionette and I'm just sort of dancing across the dance floor in almost weightless. It's a thrilling experience that I had never thought I could have at age 71.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:51:49
And you do this in public.
Charley Wininger
00:51:54
If I'm around a lot of other people we've gone to all night experiences and I'm to regional burns. In other words, our regional, a breakaway from a Burning Man, the annual festival in the desert where we've gone with just a thousand of the people and spent the weekends dancing and having all these wonderful experiences with other revellers and in the MDMA manners, we found to be an incredibly versatile substance, right.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:52:34
And we were reminded that it was legal back in the early eighties, I think, and then couples counselors were using it with their couples. And that on our last show, Charley said that you could do six months of therapy in one session with MDMA properly used.
Charley Wininger
00:52:51
I believe I could. Yes. And I look forward to the day when I can do so. And, but they are doing clinical trials now with couples. And, and to do that kind of like therapy,
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:53:05
I want you to say why Charley, I mean, how can it be so effective in one session between two people and a therapist,
Charley Wininger
00:53:13
Because it helps you drop your guard and helps it flood your body with serotonin and oxytocin so that you feel this profound feeling of safety and wellbeing so that you can imagine being with your partner, especially as a partner that you've had a lot of attention with and being able to feel completely safe with them. And then with you in getting back to the Love that brought you together in the first place, and it can just resuscitate and rehabilitate a relationship that has been in trouble.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:53:55
And it didn't occur to me that we could say to couples now the first time how guarded are you without the use of MDMA. Who would have thought that it is a question, that this is the obstacle. I am so hurt and so protecting myself that I have no room to look at the relationship, nevermind feel positive about the relationship or contact the times when it was positive. Yes. And MDMA can take away all of that so that we can get right back down to what our original feeling for each other, or was it still might be there
Charley Wininger
00:54:31
The core of the Love that brought you together and that as well as that spark of joy that you had at the beginning with the infatuation at the beginning, and get in touch with the chemistry that brought you together at the beginning. Shelley and I have been blessed with both kinds of good chemistry between us in the course of our relationship.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:54:57
Well, we look forward to when it does become legal, most reasonably in three years from now in 2023, but hopefully sooner. Even because our two hours with you Charley has convinced me of really the magic of MDMA, the potential of this substance for people and the relative lack of harm to it. It seems.
Charley Wininger
00:55:24
And if one does it following the guidelines, if you don't know what you're doing, please don't do MDMA. You've got to have only Pure MDMA, you've got to weigh it out correctly, you got to have the attention to set and setting the mindset going in, and on your surroundings, you have to be adequately hydrated. You've got to know the safety protocols. And if you don't know them, you have to say, then you shouldn't do it. You have to respect that this was a powerful medication, and it can only be done under the right circumstances.
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:56:04
And all of these protocols are in the book. The book is called "Listening to Ecstasy: The Transformative Power of MDMA." And, you know, we were going out on a limb here and talking about something that is not currently legal, but will be, and that you really done an act of courage putting this out there before anybody else in such a big and dramatic way. And I want to thank you for the book. It was a wonderful read. And again, it's "Listening to Ecstasy: The Transformative Power of MDMA" I'm Kevin O'Donoghue licensed mental health counselor
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:56:42
And I'm Niseema Dyan Diemer, licensed massage therapist, and we just want to make sure that you've got all of Charley's information. You can contact him at charleywininger.com. His book is on Amazon and he also has a YouTube channel that is a very helpful resource, "Listening to Ecstasy" on YouTube. Thanks
Kevin O'Donoghue
00:57:06
For being with us folks. We'll see you next week. Thanks
Niseema Dyan Diemer
00:57:08
Again, Charlie. Thank you. .