Psychedelic Plants Saved My Relationship (And Made Me a Better Person)

Today I am the happiest I have ever been in my life. I love waking up in the morning and I'm grateful when I go to sleep every night. I don’t say this to brag, at all. This wasn’t always so. The last 15 years have been some of the darkest, most difficult years of my life, and I want to share how I turned it around. My hope is that if you are in a dark place my story can inspire you to keep going or if you are also living your best life you will share in my joy and gratitude over my success.

Let me first say that I am not wealthy, this isn’t about financial success. My story is about achieving an abundance of love, first and foremost learning to love myself, and learning how to let that love overflow into all of my relationships making my life feel complete.

For those who I haven’t spoken to in a while who may not know the story of the last decade of my life let me give you a brief recap: 

14 years ago I was a top Real Estate Broker selling on average 25 homes a year. I had a successful house flipping business and was making 6 figures. I owned several properties and was financially secure, but I was a desperate emotional mess. Some of you may remember I was partying constantly, drinking heavily and imagined myself to be the “life of the party.” I realize now that some of my behavior was at the least obnoxious and at worst abusive. All of it was to distract myself from the emptiness I felt inside. I would be mortified at the embarrassment of some of my behavior that you may have witnessed except that I now understand that period was part of my journey and was necessary for the lessons I needed to learn.

During the 2008 financial crisis I suffered huge losses and at the same time my mother died from breast cancer. This was too much for me to handle and I had an emotional breakdown. I was put on anti-depressants but quickly stopped taking them because they made me feel emotionless like Dr. Spock. I preferred to struggle with the pain than to feel nothing at all. I threw myself into political activism as a new distraction, I thought I would be happier if I could "change the world" by fighting the system. It would be years later that I finally learned that the best way to change the world is to heal myself.

My marriage was a formality. I felt alone. Ultimately I ended up divorced. I was a functional alcoholic but my real addiction was sex. I wanted and needed connection badly but physical connection alone couldn't satisfy me; as soon as the orgasm subsided I was in need of my next fix.

A few years later I met my now wife Vanessa, I fell deeply in love with her but I carried all of my toxic addictions and behaviors into our relationship. The "honeymoon phase" ended quickly and we realized our relationship was extremely unhealthy. We were constantly drinking, fighting then making up. Repeating that cycle for years until we hit rock bottom. After one drunken fight I ended up spending a night in jail. It was at that time we realized we either needed to heal, or go our separate ways.

Around that time we ran into a friend. An old drinking buddy of mine who had changed so much that I didn't even recognize her. (She literally had to re-introduce herself to me on an elevator) This dear friend who would become a mentor suggested we try plant medicine. Psychedelic plant medicine. It changed our lives completely.

Psychedelics showed me that the only connection I really needed was to my soul. Self love was what I was searching for in parties, alcohol and women.

After taking these plant medicines the change was so dramatic we were featured on NBC's Today Show talking about how plant medicines changed our lives. You can watch that story below.

Now don't get the wrong impression. We didn't take a bunch of drugs and all of a sudden we were magically happy. It has been a long road of healing. It took lots of hard work to begin to love ourselves, then rebuild our relationship piece by piece starting with trust. So many people found our story inspiring and wanted to hear more so we started a podcast called Sovereign Lovestream.

On the Sovereign Lovestream podcast we don't just talk about the psychedelic medicines we use but all of the healing techniques: mindfulness, meditation, empathy, shadow work and so much more.

If any of this resonates with you and you want to learn more about plant medicine healing, shadow work or are just curious about our journey I invite you to check out SovereignLovestream.com where you can watch all of our past episodes. You can also listen on Spotify if you prefer, click here.

Thank you for taking the time to read my story, I hope you have a beautiful 2022.