#6: Dr. Rick Barnett: Psychedelic Therapy Pioneer and Local Psychologist

Dr. Rick Barnett is a Licensed Psychologist Doctorate, Licensed Alcohol and Drug Counselor and also holds a masters degree in Clinical Psychopharmacology. Rick has been operating BPS Health which is a private practice located in Stowe for almost 18 years. He is also the Co-Founder of the Psychedelic Society of Vermont and is considered a pioneer in the emerging field of Psychedelic Therapy. Rick has dedicated his professional life to helping individuals struggling with a variety of mental health and addiction disorders. Join us for an enriching conversation with Rick about Psychedelic Therapy and how it is changing the landscape of mental health treatment. 

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Welcome listeners to episode six of the Octagon podcast. My name is Ted Thorndike. I'm joined here by my cohost, Mike Carey, and our guest today is. Dr. Rick Barnett. Rick Barnett is a licensed psychologist doctorate, licensed alcohol and drug counselor, and also holds a master's degree in clinical psychopharmacology. Rick has been operating BPS Health, which is a private practice located right here in Stowe for almost 18 years. Rick is the founder and president of CARTER, which is the Center for Addiction Recognition, Treatment, Education, and Recovery. He is also the co founder of the Psychedelic Society of Vermont and is considered a pioneer in the emerging field of psychedelic therapy. Wow, I was tired just to Sharing all that information. That's a mouthful. You didn't even talk about tennis. Or skiing. We'll get to that. Hopefully. Yeah. Thanks for joining us, Rick. Really great to have you here Yeah. I love that you guys are doing this podcast. it's great to be here. Thanks for having me as a guest. Yeah. most importantly, are you getting ready for ski season? I am jonesing, a friend of ours just bought a, a four day pass at Revelstoke. So I'm going to head out to Revelstoke in February. Never been there, but that's a bucket list item for me. Super stoked about that. And also just, waiting for the snow to fly a little bit more consistently here. I can't believe you guys got turns on October 6th. A few weeks ago, it's snowing out west. My buddy lives in Breckenridge and he's, he sent me a picture today. Big snow banks. I saw that. Yeah. Yeah. It's dope. it's coming. It's coming. It's coming. Cool. we are going to jump right in. obviously, as I mentioned in the intro, you are a psychologist and how did you originally get into mental health work? Yeah. I, it's funny because a lot of people say that people who work in the mental health field get into the field because they've got their own issues they have to work out. They go to school to, to figure their own shit out. I don't know if that was the case for me. I'm sure there's part of that in there, but, actually knew. Pretty early on, I wanted to get into mental health, stuff going through some things in high school and realizing, I wanted to get into some sort of healing profession. Originally it was medicine, so I had actually gone to a pre med program, thinking I was going to go to medical school. But then, Took a left turn, took a, actually a break for a year or two and figured my shit out a little bit more and decided to go for the doctorate in psychology instead of going to medicine. But yeah, no, it was always a passion of mine from a young age. We'll get into some of the other reasons why, I think, as we Continue the discussion here. Yeah. Nice. Have you, have you always just practiced in stow? Have you practiced other areas? Yeah, it's a great question. So I I was in new york city for my to complete my undergraduate degree And my graduate degree so working and living in new york city Little boy from Stowe, Vermont in the big city, getting my degrees there and really, earning my stripes as a counselor, originally in an alcohol and drug facility there, getting a certificate and license in alcohol and drug counseling and then getting my master's degree and doctoral degree. So I did start to work in the field of mental health addiction counseling going back into the 1996 is when I started working in the field. And, Eventually I had a private practice in New York City. And when I moved back to Vermont, actually, I commuted for six months. I commuted one day a week. I'd fly out from Burlington on Monday morning, take the 6am flight at jet blue, head down to the city, see 10 patients, right across the street from Penn station, saw 10 patients. And then I hop on the 10 30 PM flight back here and I was wiped out on Tuesday. It was brutal. So I did have a private practice down there for a while. And, and then when I got up here, I started working in geriatric psychology. So working in the nursing homes with folks who have depression and anxiety, dementia, those kinds of things. And in Morrisville and, in St. Johnsbury and Burlington, St. Albans, all over the place. I worked in the nursing homes and then eventually just opened my private practice here in Stowe. Cool. Awesome. So obviously Stowe is a small town. and you mentioned, having a private practice in New York City. I'm sure it's very different having a practice in New York City and having a practice in Stowe, Vermont. What's it like running a practice in Stowe? It's a small town. I don't know if you run into your patients or just what. What is that experience like? Yeah, definitely don't run into patients too often in New York City, 10 million people. Although it did happen once I saw a patient of mine on the subway, like down the subway car. And I was like, Whoa, that's so weird. it's ah, what do I do now? And so obviously run into people all the time. And it's not just practicing like private practice. Mental health wise in Stowe, small town versus New York city, big city. It's also the town that I grew up in. So it's a whole nother layer where like people know me from when I was a kid. I have like old babysitters calling me and are you taking new patients? And I'm like, that's weird. Like, how do I, maintain those boundaries and figure out like who I'm Who are the people that I really feel comfortable that I could help? And then there are people who are a little bit too close to the inner circle where I have to be like, I can't really see you as a, as your psychologist, but I can, talk to you for, a little bit just to help direct them, So it's, it is Takes a little learning to set those boundaries. And, but I see people all the time, all over the place that I work, have worked with it's one time or another in my practice and it's fine. We just get used to it. I usually have a spiel at the beginning saying if I see you out at like at the, maple fields or something like that, and if you want to say hi to me, that's fine. That's fine. I'm not going to initiate like a hello, Hey, how's it going? in the middle of a public area and because someone would be like, wait, how do you know Rick or whatever? Could be like, he grew up here as I knew him from growing up. Or they're like, he's my psychologist and that could be awkward for people. learning those little nuances is helpful. Yeah, I've never actually never seen a psychologist and then I was at Noah Kahn concert I don't know if you follow. Yeah, listen to Noah Kahn He's big into mental health therapy and he basically said he thinks everybody should have a psychologist Yeah, so for someone like me that's never had one what would be a reason for Me to go see a psychologist. Yeah, no, I think that's a, it's a great question because there are people who come in, actually came up in a session today. Like someone was like, am I normal? what am I talking, what I'm talking about today? Is that what other people like, do I, do I belong here? and I, and everybody comes in with different contextual depending on their, age, their life experience, their gender, their relationships, all kinds of different things. So some people can come in just with general life stress issues. They don't have major depression. They're not on the brink of suicide. They're not having panic attacks. There's no bipolar, there's no like major life. No one died recently, but they're just like, I don't feel right. It would be helpful to just, have a sounding board. let me just go in and Talk to somebody who can just listen and maybe ask a couple of questions and might be helpful for people just to hear themselves say stuff out loud that they might not be able to say to their spouse or to their friends or whatever. It's a third party Objective as, as objective as I can be. so I think people can come in, usually it wouldn't be just Hey, I'm going to check out therapy just for the kicks and giggles. But, if there was something that happened that, for some reason you couldn't quite figure out or meditation wasn't doing it or exercise wasn't doing it, then, talking to somebody that's an objective person can be helpful. Cool. Yeah. Yeah, no, I'm a big believer in therapy. I've been. Probably in and out for the last 20 years. I guess I'm the polar opposite. I have, met with a variety of therapists. I've certainly found it helpful. just. different things that happen in life. And, I think you also just find, which therapists are a good fit. I'll talk to some people and they'll go to therapy once and say, I just, I didn't jive with that therapist. And then they'll call it. It really is. It's important to find that proper fit, don't you think? Oh yeah, definitely. Therapeutic relationship. Yeah, all therapists aren't the same. You can have someone with a doctoral degree who seems very advanced, an expert who's a total like, whatever, just is not a good fit, and you could have somebody that just came out of their master's degree program, isn't even licensed yet, but for whatever reason you hit it off really good. So I don't think the degree matters as much as really just the fit, the connection that you have. And also, as a therapist, I'm the instrument, I'm the tool that's used to be helpful to somebody. So I also have to keep my own shit straight. I need to go to a, I have a, consultation group that I go to every two weeks that a bunch of therapists just talk about, Clients confidentially or talk about their own shit so they can keep their instrument clean and right as much as possible So I think it's important for all of us to let me mean anyone who's a therapist should have their own Therapist or their own sort of consultation group to help make sure that they're not going off in left field somewhere Yeah And I always picture the movies where there's a big leather couch and I'm laying down and you're smoking a pipe Just asking that's what I would picture exactly That's old school. Do you have the leather couch? No, I did that once. I was in training actually to be a psychologist with getting my doctoral degree. I actually did. There was a, I was in a classical psychoanalytic office practice and there was a leather couch and the chair was seated. right behind the, laying down on the couch. I was like, let me just try this for a little while. And I did do a few sessions where I was laying down just with a pillow, like looking up at the ceiling and just talking. Yeah. The therapist is like behind me going, huh. it was all right. That's not how I practice. I don't have a leather, I have a couch, but no one lays down on it really. It's just sitting up. Did a lot of that originate like the Freudian therapy? Is that model? Yeah. The patient lying down. Yeah. Yeah, that's what the movie show, right? That's what I would picture. But yeah, that's not really what happened. some people practice that way. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. So as I mentioned in the intro, you've been a big, as I like to say, a pioneer in the field of psychedelic therapy, really is an emerging field. There are some knowns, there are some unknowns. maybe just give our listeners a feel for the work that you're doing around psychedelic therapy. Yeah, the only legal form of psychedelic quote unquote psychedelic therapy is what's called ketamine assisted psychotherapy or ketamine treatments. Ketamine is a legal and FDA approved drug for major depressive disorder or acute suicidality. it comes in different forms like nasal spray or intravenous or intramuscular or lozenges that you put under your tongue. And, It, it's called a dissociative anesthetic. It was originally approved for anesthesia. So you go into surgery, you get ketamine, and I had a colonoscopy last year, believe it or not. And part of the concoction they give you is like ketamine, fentanyl verse said. so it's originally used as an anesthetic, but when you take it at lower doses than anesthesia, it's pretty trippy. It's a trippy experience. I've had a couple of ketamine experiences in the last four years. Last time was three years ago, before, that was four years ago. Pretty curious experience, definitely psychedelic, and I could see the potential for healing or helping people with depression or anxiety, which is why I decided to get training in it and, be able to offer that in my office as one of many tools. it's not for everybody. It's not a cure all. It's just a tool. And, Yeah, so that's the only sort of legal form of psychedelic therapy. So I do that in my office. But I formed the Psychedelic Society in Vermont a few years ago because, there's a community of healthcare providers that we need to be up to speed on the research and talk to each other. what are people up to? what are their thoughts about advocacy around decriminalization or getting, approval or, what if patients or clients are coming in Hey, man, I want to try microdosing. What should I do, what do you know about microdosing? And if you're not informed, you could be like microdosing, that's a bunch of blah, blah, blah. Or you could have some stigma, socio psychedelics, whatever. But the fact is A lot of people we know here in Stowe and beyond, people are microdosing, people are using psychedelics more and more. So it's really helpful to communicate with other healthcare professionals about what they're up, what they're seeing in their practices, whether it's the emergency department or in their practice. So that's why we formed the Psychedelic Society of Vermont. You can call me a pioneer. It's really just a selfish need to want to talk to other people who are interested in this field. And there's about 200 of us that are on this, Google group listserv. We actually have a meeting tonight after this and, we put on conferences and we bring big researchers into Stowe and to, share their research with us. So we're waiting for, a time when there are more psychedelic medicines available. legally approved in some form or another to, so that people can have access to these, but it's not for everybody. it's just a, it's a new paradigm for a mental health treatment. Really. I'm just curious, what's the science behind it? Is it that you're expanding your mind and look, seeing things in a new way that you didn't see before? Yeah, there's a lot of theories about how it might work. I don't think anybody's, everybody totally agrees on that, but, you guys might've had psychedelic experiences in your past. Oh, we're gonna, we're gonna get to that. Mike has what he wants to share. Yeah, it's very different. the theory behind it is very different than we've all used, I used a shit ton of psychedelics when I was a kid, like way too much, misused them. it was not good. It was not healthy. But, Yeah. having those experience recreationally, like at a concert or with your friends, like that's one thing. And some of that can be really, fun and, you could have real insights from that, or it can be upsetting and challenging depending on, what goes down. And that's very different than the therapeutic model where you're not. Your eyes are not open. You're not engaged with the world. You take the medicine, you have eye shades on, you have headphones like we have on now, and there's a curated playlist, and you're just supposed to be internal. So whatever is coming up from your thoughts, your emotions, it's coming from within. There's no distraction outside, and that's a very different kind of experience. So you're not thinking like you would normally think, like we're having a conversation now. There's an alternate reality that you're exposed to, and within that process there can be lots of insights and lots of emotions, and that can be. That can produce really transformative change. Yeah. Yeah. I know in Massachusetts Mushrooms was just on the ballot. I don't know. It failed. It failed. And it was to grow it and do personal use. Yeah, personal use. Personal use and a regulated, facilitated model. So it was both and it's, is it legal anywhere? Like mushrooms. So ketamine, I understand that's chemical is mushrooms legal, right? Anywhere? psy or decriminalized Yeah, psilocybin mushrooms or psychedelic mushrooms containing psilocybin, is not. Medically approved anywhere. Okay, it's approved in oregon under a licensed facilitator or facility model so you can Go to a designated regulated facility that's licensed to offer Psilocybin to people you pay out of pocket. You can't use your insurance And you can have an experience in the facility with air with yeah there in oregon So people are traveling to oregon to have these experiences. Apparently that program is falling a little bit flat You It's really expensive to have these experiences. it's really expensive to set up the regulated facility model because they have to license the practitioners. They have to license the facility. You have to have a pure source of psilocybin and if you regulate who's growing it and is it pure, is it well done? that kind of thing. So there's a lot of. So they end up passing that cost on to people. It costs you like 3, 000 to go into an office and have a suicide experience. Whereas, they also decriminalized it in Colorado. So if you, if there are locations in parts of Massachusetts and Michigan and California, Colorado that they've decriminalized psilocybin so that people basically that just makes it the lowest law enforcement priority So people can grow their own they can use it And if you get caught with a bag of mushrooms you get a slap on the wrist maybe a fine But you're not going to get a federally charged with a yeah That kind of thing. yeah, Massachusetts failed, but people in Colorado are having these experiences. People in Oregon are having these experiences. Places where it's decriminalized, there are these experiences are happening. And even here in Vermont, there are practitioners that are doing this work underground that I won't speak about here, but it's happening. Like people we know are growing their own mushrooms and making their own micro doses. And they're having these experiences. As long as people are accessing the research online. Looking up the data, trying to figure out how can I do this safely, informing themselves about, the ways to do it that aren't causing more harm than good, then, then I think it's safe. Yeah, no, I, I have actually done a couple of ketamine treatments to, to treat my, some depression that I've dealt with over the years. And I was running into roadblocks with the current model, just using antidepressants. And, I'm not gonna sit here and say it was, Oh, this life changing thing and I'm fixed, but it certainly was helpful and how I explain it is it does shift a little bit. I think how I was able to view myself and the world around me and as someone who did abuse drugs and alcohol when I was younger, I've been sober about 10 years now, thanks to your help over the years, I might add. But, doing that ketamine treatment, you're in a safe space, you're with a licensed professional. Was really powerful and initially I was nervous and then I'm just like no this is a safe place. It's You know with a professional in a safe setting So I think at least my experience for that was very positive. Everybody has different experiences, but I know for me Looking at other options for mental health treatment Was a good one. And I don't know what your take is. Do you feel in the United States we are, hitting a wall in treatment? It doesn't seem like there has been many developments in mental health treatment. Seems like psychedelics could be a good option. Yeah, I think it, I'm obviously a believer, someone else we know calls me a psychedelic enthusiast. I know it's not a fantasy, I know it's not a game changer, and the issue is it still has stigma associated with it, so it's really, it's slow going, there's a lot of research, but still there's so much stigma out there. You were going to talk about the experience you had with me. I can tell you my story. This is, let's get into that. Yeah, I did, so in, I went to UMass Amherst, which was, Zoom Mass when I went there, and, We did recreational drugs for sure and we would take mushrooms and we would go camping at a place called Mount Wateta. So we'd take mushrooms, we'd go to the top of the mountain, there's an old ski lift, we'd play on the ski lift. We'd hike all around the mountain. We had great times. We'd go in the winter with snow on us. Always would have super fun, great experiences. college ended. I graduated before my friends. Cause again, it's UMass. I graduated in four and a half years. A lot of my friends were on the five, six. seven, eight year plan. So I started working and we went back and did the same exact trip that we had always done. Hiked up to the top, we had our psychedelic mushrooms and we're sitting around the campfire and every ten minutes, I think I've shit my pants. I'm literally sitting just like we're sitting around talking and all of a sudden I'd be like, I gotta go check my pants and I'd scurry off into the woods. I'd pull my pants down and check it and there was nothing there. And I'd come back and be like, oh that was weird. 10, 15 minutes more, we'd go by, I think I just shit my pants again. And I'd leave and I'd come back and that went on for three hours like that. And the next morning I woke up and I go, that's it for me. I don't know if it was the burden of the world. I didn't have the same freedoms I had in college and I was working. I was trying to figure that out and just had that impact on me. That was the last time I've done it. So you'll be microdosing this weekend? That's what you're saying? I would do that in a guided way with Rick only. that's, as far as bad trips go, that's not terrible. that's, that does, at the time, and under the influence of that substance, when you actually think you're shitting your pants, like you actually believe you're shitting your pants constantly. And that can be very worrisome. Your body feels it. just imagine sober right now being like, Holy wait, am I shitting my, and doing that for three hours, you'd be really upset. Yeah. And then you're under the influence of this drug that really makes you feel like that's real. Yeah. that can be upsetting. So I'm not trying to dismiss it. Yeah, no. That's upsetting. But there are people that actually do have traumatic experiences, like they relive a trauma or they're just in a panic state. that's why there is stigma associated back in the sixties and seventies when they became illegal, it's because there were horror stories about people like freaking out and jumping off roofs and because they thought someone was chasing them or whatever. And I think most of those stories were just propaganda for the drug war to make it illegal. But in some instances, people do have really upsetting, challenging experiences. And I think that's why there's, I think that's why in Massachusetts, this measure failed because they're, unfortunately they were. people who are opposed to allowing people to have legal access to this substance because the fears around You know, maybe feeling like you're going to shit your pants for three hours Or kids getting access to it. Kids getting access and stuff like that. And it's that is so overblown. These are incredible. Mushrooms in particular are incredibly safe. Physiologically safe. And what makes them psychologically safe is that we have the research now. The point of decriminalizing it isn't to just have a free for all so people can just eat mushrooms whenever they want. at random times, drive their car into a tree or whatever. It's really There's so much research out there and we have the internet and people know look, if you get a bag of mushrooms, do your research, find out how to do it in a safe way. And that could be with friends that could be in your home. As long as you have a nice, comfortable place where you could do it with a trained guide and you could have a positive experience. There's enough information out there now for people to use their heads and their hearts and have experiences safely. And I think. I think that's the argument, in my opinion, for decriminalization. it's worse to have a war on drugs and people are getting, are taking these mushrooms and they're afraid they're going to get arrested. Yeah. So if you got a bag of mushrooms and you were like, I want to try this again. I don't want to, I hope I don't shit my pants. But you're also going to be like, wait a minute, this is illegal. I don't know if I really want to cause anxiety, exactly. Maybe have a bad trip. Yeah, exactly. So what about ayahuasca? So I, I don't know if you're familiar with that, but I have friends that have done that is, is that sort of that guided experience? I know that's an intense kind of thing. It's a different drug, than psilocybin, although psilocybin does get converted into dimethyltryptamine. DMT is the active ingredient in ayahuasca. So ayahuasca is a combination of dimethyltryptamine that comes from a plant, and that's a classic psychedelic. It's very short acting. If you just get straight NN DMT, and you ingest it, it will last three minutes or five minutes. But ayahuasca has this other compound in there, a harmaline, which is a monoamine oxidase inhibitor. This is my geeking out on my psychopharmacology thing, but basically when you combine NN DMT with this MAOI, this, I don't know. This substance that it inhibits the breakdown of DMT. So DMT stays in your system a lot longer because you have this other compound that's no, we're going to keep it in here. We're not going to let you break it down. So you can have a three, four or five hour journey on DMT, which is called the brew is called an ayahuasca brew and, people can do it four nights in a row, go down to Peru or go down to Brazil or Mexico or Costa Rica. And. They have ceremonies, they have shamans, they have guides, facilitators, whatever, and you can have a well run experience. You can also have some poorly run experiences if you don't have a very good facilitator or if you don't feel safe. You could do it in a group, and there could be other people in the group you don't feel safe with. yeah. It's a very powerful experience. And feeling like you're shitting your pants for three hours is very, like with ayahuasca, you could be literally seeing, entities, you could be, having snakes feeling like they're snakes all around you, geometric patterns that you've just entered a new dimensional reality that feels very real, but not just hallucinating, Like seeing the walls move and seeing people's faces change, but literally being transported into a completely different world for three hours. It's a very intense experience. It's not for people who aren't well prepared for it. There's a whole dieta that goes into it. So you have to eat certain foods for leading up to it for two, three, Two to four weeks, no sex, like all these things that you have to do to prepare for. And that's a, yeah. So that's a very unique kind of psychedelic experience. Is it there because people have been doing it there for hundreds of thousands of years? Yeah. Somehow indigenous peoples in that region figured out if you put this substance with this substance, it lasts longer and you can have these visionary. And actually back in the day, it wasn't even that it was given to people. It was just the witch doctor, the shaman who would ingest it and would perform a ceremony. on the ayahuasca and that ceremony would, entrance other people who weren't using ayahuasca and it would be healing in that way. And then over the years it changed that, people would engage with it. and now there's ayahuasca tourism, people are going down to these areas to have these experiences. You can have them, in the United States underground as well. So they're available everywhere. Again, psychedelics are getting more and more popular. I think the more we can learn about it in a healthy way, not all the hype, like it's going to. cure everybody. It's going to change the world and not all the fear mongering that we're used to, just having some nuance, look, there are some benefits here and there are some potential harms, but we can bring this to people safely. It's just, it's, I don't know if the world is quite right. Apparently Massachusetts isn't ready yet. And neither is Vermont. I like, I was on this legislative, committee to Look at psychedelic therapy in Vermont and, it was with the commissioner of health. It was with the director of, the Vermont Department of Mental Health with, The chair of the Department of Psychiatry at UVM, all the Vermont Medical Society, all these leaders in the mental health field were on this committee. We met four times this summer and we just wrote a report that's coming out in a couple of weeks that basically our recommendations were, let's keep looking at the research. Let's see what's happening in Oregon and Colorado. And also let's see if we can offer education and training for people. For harm reduction purposes. That was the two recommendations. We did not recommend that we should decriminalize it here in Vermont, even though I would have liked to have seen that in the recommendations, the feeling among the group was not ready. We're not ready, but I think we're ready, but we'll have to see next, next legislative session. Yeah. Great. Yeah, no. And with my experience, I think a lot goes into the prep work that you talked about, and that can really, optimize. The experience you can have and the results you can have from those experiences, having that initial meeting with the therapist doing your own research. And I think that is maybe lost sometimes in the fear that people have about the psychedelic therapy, that if you really take it seriously and take responsibility for it, you can definitely get the most out of it. What do you think are the key reasons or conditions that Psychedelic therapy you can treat, whether it's PTSD, anxiety, depression, what do you find most people are coming at you with? Yeah, and just to follow up with the preparation part, also integration. You can have good preparation, you can have a good or challenging psychedelic experience, but if you don't have follow up, That was some of the arguments against the research, like you go into a research trial for psychedelic medicine, you get prepared, you have one, two, or three dosing sessions, you have an integration session, and then the research trial is over, see you later. Meanwhile, you just blasted off to outer space and you're still processing what the hell just happened. Or experiences you had when you were five years old. exactly. Talk about. Awaken some psychedelics. But the research trial is over, so people need to go find some help. So I think having follow up care is also very important. I think it's really transdiagnostic, going back to your, the term is transdiagnostic, meaning that the way psychedelics work, the theory is that they can help anything. They can treat addiction, they can treat depression, anxiety. They can treat grief, loss, all kinds of different conditions. They're looking at psychedelics for eating disorders. They're looking at for cognitive impairment, for IBS, irritable bowel syndrome. so many different conditions, and that's partly because, to go back to your question before, it's like, how do they work? anything that so massively disrupts your regular thought patterns, your emotional thought patterns, your behavioral emotional thought patterns, any one of those three areas that are disruptive. Massively disrupted where you get a new insight or you realize something you never realized before you come out of it You could be like, okay, I don't need to stress about that anymore. I get it, right? I get more so than like regular therapy, like I really get it now Yeah, because it's like in your nervous system whether that's you know MDMA or psilocybin any one of these tools can really help any number of conditions, but they're still looking at All kinds of different things. Nothing's definitive yet. Can, can psychedelics make me and Ted better tennis players and tennis partners with each other? Is there any sports? I wonder if there is a sports angle, you would think. This could be a breakthrough. Aaron Rodgers and other people are always touting the benefits of ayahuasca in particular. He's been very open about his ayahuasca use and Won't talk about the Jets and how he's doing on the Jets. It's terrible. Obviously it has not helped him at all. There's a linebacker too for the Buffalo Bills. I don't know his name, but he talked about the benefits of ayahuasca and he had some addiction challenges that really helped him. Yeah. Become sober. Yeah. And also hockey players like Danny Carcillo. Danny Carcillo, yeah. He's a big proponent of psychedelics for head injuries, for CTE, for concussions, for depression, all that kind of stuff. So whether you're an active, you're active and you're looking to improve, I, there's a lot of people who go to the gym who swear that microdosing when they go to the gym really helps with the mind muscle connection because you're really focused on what you're doing. Yeah. Absolutely. So I don't know about the research particularly in that area, but I'm sure it's being looked at for sure. So here's my, I had heard the same thing with marijuana and I can't imagine that marijuana helps that feel like eating. So if we do psychedelic therapy, we will win the club championships. Yeah, there you go. That's a clinical trial right there. let's pivot a little bit. So let's take us back. you're living in New York. What? made you decide I want to move back to Stowe? Yeah, I grew up here and You can take the kid out of Vermont, but you can't take Vermont out of the kid, really. It was just, it's just in me, And my wife at the time and I had our first kid in New York City, and we were looking at having a second kid, and we were do we want to raise kids here in the city? Or do you want to go back to where she's from? She's from, she was from Connecticut and, or do you want to go back to Stowe, and Stowe is a fricking bubble, to, I, I had a great childhood growing up here and we can talk about that, but I love Stowe and my parents are still here and, I wanted my kids to have a connection to my parents. and my wife at the time, she was like, fine, let's move to Stowe. let's move back to Vermont. We didn't, we moved to Morrisville, but, yeah, we, were happy to move back here and raise our kids here. It was perfect. Again, fond memories of growing up here myself. And so I was not living here for 13 years. I was in Manhattan for 13 years and, and came back in 2005. Yeah. Good taste of the real world. And then get back to the bubble. Yeah. The bubble, love the bubble. what was it like? Yeah. Grown up in Stowe. Yeah. You said you had fond childhood memories. what was it like back in the day? Yeah. It's quite different. Quite different. I still feel incredibly safe here. I still, feel in terms of crime and all kinds of crazy stuff that happens in other places. we don't really have those issues here. So I do feel safe. And I felt that way as a kid, but it was also just such small town. I remember just riding my bike around my BMX bike around town by the union bank and before they had all the condos behind the green mountain in, there was just a trail that went. Back to, Industrial Park Road, which is now Thomas Lane and, around the elementary school and Marshall Hill sledding and all that kind of stuff. there's still some things that people still do now that we did when we were kids. this is going back 50 years. So I'm 52 now. this is like the late seventies, early eighties. It was just a different time. It was very small town. It wasn't quite as, pretend, not pretentious, but, showy, ostentatious. It wasn't quite as, built up in terms of wealth, but it was still a wealthy town. there's still, it's always been known as a trust fund town. That was even the case back then. that's what this thing is. This town grew up on is people come into here in the 30s and 40s who had a shit ton of money and That's what built stow. So that tradition has not really changed It's just been magnified massively and I don't think it's bad I know there's a lot of people who grew up here and just dismayed at how Everything's changed so much and all the wealth and I'm like, it's fine. I think it's still a bubble It's still a safe place. It's still got all the recreational and even more recreational activities So it's really just feel so grateful to be able to raise kids here and live here with all the other chaos That's going on the world to be able to make a living and live here That's a lot of people would love to move here, but they can't figure out a way to make a living here Yeah, that's gotten easier since you did it. You, so you moved back to what year? 2005. 2005. it was a more challenging time to be a remote worker. Yeah. So kudos to you. What, I know you're an avid skier, backcountry skier. What's your favorite backcountry trail? I think you had a secret trail near Elmore Mountain that I had heard about. That's right. I had a big chunk of land in Elmore. Good times. Yeah. and I spent the better part of a decade going up there with a chainsaw every fall with the orange thing on so I didn't get shot by any hunters and I'd just rev my chainsaw so I wouldn't, scare off any hunters. But That was fun. Yeah. Yeah, it was good to go up there and cut trail. And there I cut trail, I had trail signs up there. I had Ricky's run up there. There was actually an old trail up at Stowe. There was Henry's run and there was Ricky's run at Spruce back in the day. I don't know if you remember that before they created the meadows, the meadow chairlift. Yeah. There was woods on the right side there. And there was Ricky's run and Henry's run. So I made Ricky's run up on Elmore up on the Worcester range there. That was a favorite spot. I haven't been up there in a couple of years since I sold it, but it's still, it's got some sick mountain bike trails up there now. Maybe this winter, we'll head back up there. Actually, I was walking around there a couple of weeks ago. Oh, nice. Yeah, it was cool. I thought you still had access. I still have access. Oh, sweet. yeah. Trail signs still up in the woods? They might be, I don't know. I have to go look. Yeah, I know. There's one trail we cut called Medallion. Medallion. Remember that? Yeah. That was good. Yeah. You helped me with that. Yeah. That was a good one. Yeah. when I think of Oldstow, I think of the Mountain Road Market. Tell us one good story about the Mountain Road Market. Do you remember the Mountain Road Market? Where was it? Where AJ's is. And, where is it? In company? Before my time. Yeah. Legendary. AJ's. Yeah. Yeah. Current AJ's. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Before my time, it was the mountain road market. Oh, classic. So classic. it's actually funny now that I think of it, this just popped into my head. I know commodities is moving up the mountain road, but for the last few years, there's been a really nice health food store called commodities, literally just right up the road from AJ's. But back in the day, Malboro Market was this total hangout spot. There was three video games. They had just people went there to get beer and cigarettes and there was Pop Tarts and all. It was a convenience store, but a really run down one, but it's classic stuff. You just sit on the steps outside. People would pull in and out buying beers, buying cigarettes. And we'd just be, we'd have a pocket full of quarters before I was of age to drink. I just have a pocket full of quarters and I'd be sitting there for hours, after school or on the weekends, just playing video game after video game was so much fun. Yeah, I know that was a good spot for sure. But back to the skiing, if It's a powder day at Stowe, not in your stash. what is your run? What's your favorite run? I think I know what it is, but I'm going to let you. Yeah. I don't, when you say run, I was thinking about this. I, there was a time when we actually got a lot of snow, a couple of seasons in a row when I moved back here, we got a lot of snow. And there were times where I swear, like the entire season. I maybe skied on a trail, an actual trail, a handful of times. I was always in the woods. Yeah. This can mean woods sections. Okay. Like this. Yes. Anything goes here. There's very few woods. just the way people have cut What made the woods wide open from when, when we were kids, when I was a kid, there was a few woods trails like Mac and cheese over by the gondola was like, there's little trails in there and, and spruce, there were some little trails there, but, in terms of trace amigos and, partridge and, lookout was, Hey, Angel food. That wasn't, that really wasn't there. what I love to do and people don't really, poach it or, don't hit it very often when people go out to the bench, you pull off of a chin clip and you go out and then you get to that one spot where everybody stops and then they're okay, let's keep going. They go out to angel food. if you just go down just a little bit and then head a hard right, you cut into those woods or you can access it lower down on chin clip. I don't know what they're called. Bob's rash. They're Bob's rash. Yeah, we put a sign up in the woods. Bob's rash. A friend of ours, passed away. He favorite trail was chin clip. Yeah, and When we used to ski here, we were just learning how to ski and chin clips a long trail and He got to a spot and we're looking up and i'm like, what's he doing? Come on down and he was yelling down to us and we thought he was saying I have a rash I have a rash. He was really saying I have to rest. So from that point on that trail became known as Bob's rash. So often the woods is a little pink sign that says Bob's rash, exactly where you drop in off of Chincliffe. Yeah. Yeah. I love that. So you can get access to two ways off of Chincliffe. Cause nobody goes in there. You can get 20 or 30 turns easily untouched because everybody either, either they get to that spot before heading out to angel food and they just go straight down and then maybe carve right a little bit or they just got to angel. But if you go hard, there's a little drop that you have to do there first and then you get into the Big open spot and it's all untouched powder and that can not a secret anymore. Not as now it's not really a secret, but people like to go out. Like I understand like going out to angel food. There's really nothing. it's so fun to go out there. Outer planets. Yeah. it's magical. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. What about in the summer? We've seen videos of you doing some crazy, jumps, backflips into, quarries. What's, what's up with that? Yeah, I grew up with the trampoline. So I learned how to do flips from a young age. And, it's funny cause an old buddy of mine, Jim Moran, who was actually an Olympics mogul skier until he had an accident. he and I, we used to jump off cliffs all the time and jump off, what's called the, Crow's Nest, at Bigham Falls. If you look at Bigham Falls, you look up to the right, not where the falls are, but if you look up to the right, there's actually a place you can jump. It's 65 feet. Did that once drunk when I was 18 years old and also Red Rocks in Burlington. there's a 72 footer there. I did that. Again, drunk. I don't think I had the courage, to do it. Otherwise, that can help. But I also wasn't doing back when I was younger. I wasn't doing backflips off high areas. That was something that came just in the last 10 years or so. I was like, Oh, I could do this. And so I've been pushing the limits a little bit more, even off of big, falls doing backflips off, big, and over at the reservoir and stuff. So I just love, yeah. To be, 52 years old, still sending backflips off a 40 foot cliff. It's so fun. I love it. I know something else that you're into. I'll see videos of you jumping in fosters in January. So are you doing the whole Wim Hof cold water immersion? Therapy situation, I believe in cold water therapy I don't I don't know if the science is controversial on or not, and I don't follow any particular method Yeah, but I have been in Foster's at least once every single month of the year Been in there in January February March and it is fantastic Fucking cold. It is really cold. It's cold in August. Yeah, it's cold in August. Yeah. I was actually in my cold plunge at my office Last night, it was 45 degrees and it was cold, even though it's been warm out recently It is for some reason it was still 46 45 degrees. Yeah. No, I love it I feel like it's a challenge mentally to be able to control your body not freak out when I first started doing it in 2017 just I did cold showers every day for a year You And, that, that primed me to be able to do it now. It's just a, it's a mental test to just drop into that space and be able to breathe through the, your body telling you what the hell you doing, breathe through it. And it's invigorating. I think it's good for the muscles. I think it's good for the mind. It's good. It's awesome. And I've done a little bit of that at your office. We'll do the sauna, then the cold plunge back and forth. if you think about it, you see all the footage of those NFL football players, jumping in the cold tub, it's no different. Cleanses your mind. I don't know. Every in the summer when it's super hot, go play tennis or go do a mountain bike and you jump in Foster's. You come out of there. Your mind is so refreshed and clear. Something magical about it. I love Foster's is like the fountain of youth. I love that water is magical. And I love that spot. It's my favorite spot. It's so easy to just park, jump in, And how many times I've actually just driven up the mountain road, parked my car, jumped in, hung out for three minutes and then it's perfect. It's so good. So refreshing. Yeah. So you grew up here. You lived in New York. You came back here. You're here now. What's your hope for Stowe for the next 10, 20 years? what do you hope to maintain? What would you like to see? I don't know. I trust the process. I know that there's a lot of development going on. There's a lot of proposals, 71 units over by the golf course. And then, where commodities is going in right now, Kenny Biedermann is going to be putting something in there and, I'm all for it. Frankly, I'm maybe, maybe that's, It flies in the face of what other people want to see in terms of preservation and stuff like that, but I'm all for development. I think the regulations that we have in place, as long as people follow the proper procedures, I will, I just want to put my trust in the DRB, the Developmental Review Board, to say, Look, we have these policies in place for a reason. Come to us with your plans. We'll work with you to figure out how to do this tastefully to keep the growth at a pace that feels right. Reasonable and make sure we have the infrastructure like the water and the sewer to be able to handle it all. It's a lot Stowe's gonna keep growing and there's really there's no point in trying to resist change there's a point in trying to do it tastefully And pace ourselves But to try to you know Get in the way of change like even the the starbucks going in like some people hate that we can debate that kind of thing but There's just so what there's a Starbucks in town. There's been a Dunkin Donuts up the street forever There was a mcdonald's here when I was a kid so great. So what I mean vales here That's a chain right there. So it's all right as long as it's done tastefully It isn't isn't turned into your average strip mall town or whatever Which it will never do right stowe is always going to have that iconic main street I mean I hung out on that main street when I was a kid hacky sacking, just hanging out there like a year Day after day, all summer long. And that street, no matter what they do to it, they can't really change the character of it all run out of space. Eventually. Yeah. they're going to conserve lands. They're going to be putting that whole new thing down by the union bank there. and that's good. I think they're going to do that tastefully. It's going to be fun. Keeps it vibrant. Yeah. there's definitely that aspect keeps it vibrant. Yeah. Yep. So we're just about ready to wrap up, but we do ask all of our guests, this one question, if Stowe did not exist, where would you live? That's a great question. I don't, I honestly don't know. I love the mountains, so I'm more of a mountain guy. I'd love to live in a mountain town. I also love seasons. I would find it hard to live somewhere where there's no, no real demarcation of the seasons, I like warm weather. I like the ocean. I like, tropical stuff. I don't think I could live in a tropical place, but. I think ideally I would want to have both a mountain home and a home only one place. Yeah, my friend. I always want to bend the rules here. I'm well aware I'm a bit of a rule bender breaker outlaw, so I would say probably a mountain another mountain town, right? I don't know which one but yeah, cool. Just so our listeners can find a way to You're doing a lot of cool stuff with psychedelic therapy among many other things Cliff jumping, where can our listeners find you on social media? Yeah, mostly on social media, on Twitter in particular. I know some people hate that now even more so now ex Twitter, but I'm very active on there and LinkedIn, very active on LinkedIn and people reach out to me all the time and actually meet people in person from social media contacts. So you can get into these Twitter battles with people or whatever, and they turn into real contacts and real people. Real good connections to have with people. So I'm very active on social media. So look up Dr. Rick Barnett. Yeah. We'll put the link in. Yeah. On Instagram. Yeah. He's doing a lot of cool stuff. So thank you so much, Rick. Yeah. Awesome to be here with you guys. Thanks for joining us. Good discussion. Hope you all enjoyed that episode with Rick Barnett. Remember to follow us on Instagram at theoctagonpodcasto and subscribe on both Apple and Spotify. We'll see you next time.