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Tania De Jong AM from Mind Medicine Australia joins Mason for another inspiring and informative conversation on the topic of psychedelic assisted therapies.

In the time since Tania was last on the show, the TGA, Australia's Therapeutic Goods Administration, made the monumental decision to reduce the scheduling of MDMA and psilocybin, two key allies in the successful treatment of drug resistant mental health conditions.

The ruling to reschedule these compounds from Schedule 9 Prohibited Substances to Schedule 8 Controlled Drugs is incredibly important for the future of psychedelic assisted therapies, and although their immediate legal application is only indicated for a narrow index of specialised cases; MDMA for drug resistant PTSD and psilocybin for drug resistant depression, it's a huge win for Australia as the front runners in the legalisation of this movement. 

Tania relays what these scheduling changes mean for the future of psychedelic assisted therapies, and introduces us to The Healthy Person’s Trial, an exciting new research experiment for therapists operating out of The Australian National University in Canberra.

Tania shares her personal story with psychedelic assisted therapies, and the experiential journey that lead to the creation of Mind Medicine, the not for profit company she founded with her husband and business partner Peter.

Tania speaks with grace and humility, eloquently educating on what's happening on the ground with this movement. A penetrating and illuminating listen for all. 

"At the heart of any kind of disadvantage, whether it's homelessness, a disability, whatever it happens to be, usually at the base of that disadvantage lies some kind of mental illness, some kind of anxiety or depression or addiction or some kind of trauma that is underpinning that person's disadvantage.

So we can provide housing, we can provide programmes and activities and food to people who are disadvantaged, but at the end of the day, if they can't get over their trauma and get to the root cause of their trauma, they're still going to remain stuck. And they're never going to be able to fish for themselves and lead meaningful contributing lives."

- Tania De Jong

Tania & Mason Discuss:

• Why the TGA's decision to schedule the therapeutic application of Psilocybin and MDMA is a big deal.
• The future of psychedelic assisted therapy in Australia.
• CPAT, Mind Medicine's Certificate in Psychedelic Assisted Therapies course.
• The Australian National University's Healthy Person's Trial.
• Connection as a key factor in healing from mental health conditions.
• Tania's personal experience with psychedelic assisted therapies.
• The Mind Medicine Australia origin story.

Who is Tania De Jong ?

Tania de Jong AM is one of Australia’s most successful female entrepreneurs, performers, and innovators, having developed 6 businesses and 3 charities over 3 decades. Tania works across the public, private, creative, and social sectors. She founded Creativity Australia, Creative Universe, MTA Entertainment & Events, The Song Room, and works with disadvantaged communities nationally through Creativity Australia’s ‘With One Voice’ choir social inclusion programs. She has recently co-founded Mind Medicine Australia with her husband Peter Hunt AM. Mind Medicine Australia exists to help alleviate the suffering caused by mental illness in Australia through expanding the treatment options available to medical practitioners and their patients. MMA is establishing safe and effective psychedelic-assisted treatments to treat a range of mental illnesses. Tania presents keynote speeches and leadership programs and performs internationally as a soloist and with her group Pot-Pourri. She has released twelve albums, including new solo releases The Breezes at Dawn Have Secrets to Tell and Solitary Harmony. Tania’s TED Talk How Singing Together Changes The Brain has been viewed over 110,000 times and sparked international interest. She is the Founder and Executive Producer of Creative Innovation Global, winning national and international awards. Creative Universe and Creative Innovation Global were ranked among the top 20 event organizers and agencies globally as part of the newly released Eventex All-Stars Index. Tania has founded a co-working space called Dimension5 in Melbourne to drive social innovation and collaboration. Tania’s awards include Ernst and Young Australian Social Entrepreneur of the Year. She was inducted into the AGSE Entrepreneurs Hall of Fame at Swinburne University and named Brainlink Woman of Achievement. Tania was recently named in the 100 Women of Influence, and the 100 Australian Most Influential Entrepreneurs in Australia and recently was honoured with the Award for Meritorious Service to the Community in the Victorian Multicultural Awards for Excellence. She was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia in June 2008 for service to the Arts as a performer and entrepreneur, and for the establishment and development of music and arts enrichment programmes for schools and communities. Tania has a Bachelor of Law (Honours) from the University of Melbourne and is a graduate of Victorian College Of The Arts, in opera, music theatre, and voice. Tania’s grandmother invented the foldable umbrella in Vienna in 1929, so it’s not surprising innovation is in her blood. Her mission is to change the world, one voice at a time! 

Resource guide

Tania's Website
Tania's TED Talk
Tania's Music
Mind Medicine Website
Mind Medicine Instagram
Mind Medicine Facebook
Mind Medicine Youtube
Creativity Australia

Mentioned in this episode 

Driftwood The Musical
Mind Medicine CPAT Course
Tania's Heaven On Earth Album

Relevant Podcasts:

Psychedelic Assisted Therapies & Mental Health with Tania de Jong (EP#124)

 

Check Out The Transcript Below:

 

Mason:

Tania, welcome back to the podcast.

Tania De Jong:

Thanks so much, Mason.

Mason:

Fun. I was just saying, I mean we've had a little bit of a preamble chat. It's a fun friendship and co-destiny that we're on SuperFeast and Mind Medicine around an alignment in different areas of everything that we're doing. And I was saying how Peter Pan and it is such looking for where the adventure is, it's just such an adventure and it's just been along for that. Just joining our adventures is so much fun.

Tania De Jong:

No, thank you. I love being part of your adventures.

Mason:

Well, speaking of your adventures, I think we all got surprised when the TGA did something that was the first in the world.

Tania De Jong:

Yeah, that was true leadership from Therapeutic Goods Administration and it really is inspirational for Australians to be at the forefront of something for a change. We tend to follow a lot and it's very important that we actually motivate people to be pioneers and to create systemic change and to actually support change makers because we really need change. There's many systems that are not working very well, that need to be innovated upon and improved. And certainly one of those in Australia is mental health treatment system. And as you well know, Mason, the majority of patients have not been getting well from the current existing treatments for the best part of 50 years. And sadly, we are seeing very few people going into remission from existing treatments for depression and trauma. So to have the opportunity to reschedule psilocybin and MDMA from Schedule Nine to Schedule Eight, yes, the circumstances in which they can be used are pretty limited through this recent decision.

 

So for those that don't know how that works, basically psychiatrists are the ones who will be screening and be able to prescribe to treatment resistant patients with treatment resistant depression or treatment resistant post-traumatic stress disorder if they get authorised prescriber status. And that is granted through special ethics committee approval. So there's a few hoops for people to go through, but that's a way to start having some clinical treatments taking place in Australia, collecting some real world evidence and data which the TGA has requested, which is also very important so that people can start to see the outcomes of these treatments.

 

And of course we know from over 300 trials that have been taking place around the world with these medicines over the past 15 years that the remission rates are significantly higher than what they are for existing treatments for these conditions. So it is so important to give people who've got no other hope of getting better, the chance to have access to these treatments if they are suitable patients for these treatments. Obviously, we don't suggest that these treatments could work for every single patient and indeed some patients won't be suitable patients for these treatments.

Mason:

Let's bring some broad context because we've got many different cultures and many different approaches to medicine all over the world. And so you can see there's some pretty extreme decentralisation in Europe and in the Netherlands where people can go on these retreats, but they are limited. They are not under a particular category, and that's amazing that they have that America is just legalising, being able to sell it and sell psilocybin, psychedelic mushrooms in places. And then people might look at what's going on in Australia and the TGA and be like, it's so chemically synthesised. It's in a category of drugs and medicine. There is no decentralisation going on. But as we know, we're in a global community pushing towards something at the moment. There's specialisation going on, people hear that it's 15,000, 20,000 to go through this process. And it might seem shocking at first, especially when you go into comparisons. But just like being around Mind Medicine, I can feel the significance of how different this is and know where it's going in the future. Can you just bring some broad context to just how amazing this is?

Tania De Jong:

Yeah, I mean, so the important thing to say about this is that we fully acknowledge the indigenous use of these medicines and the incredible work that you do with Mason's Feast, for example, using a whole range of medicinal mushrooms, which are legal, but there's a lot of people in Australia who don't want to necessarily do illegal things, so they don't want to go underground or they don't want to go into a field and risk picking the wrong psilocybin. And we strongly recommend that people don't take those risks unless they've really done their due diligence and they know who's giving them the medicine, the purity of the medicine, the dose of the medicine, the practitioner's credentials and experience in sitting with patients with the medicine and so on.

 

So really the only option for Australians up till now has been that they either go underground and of course the people we are talking about, these sorts of specific treatment resistant individuals are often very, very sick. And for them to go underground, it could be extremely risky. And then of course many of them are too sick or they certainly couldn't afford to go to the Netherlands or to South America or to Peru or somewhere like that where you can get these treatments legally.

 

So the other thing I guess I just want to clarify is just the question of price. So there's lots of people banding around price of these treatments, but in actual fact the price has not been finalised. What I can tell you that is very exciting is that Peter, my husband, Peter Hunt, who's the chair of Mind Medicine Australia, has done a historic supply arrangement with a Canadian company called Optime. And that is for GMP grade psilocybin and MDMA so that these medicines can be used in their purest form in treatments in Australia.

 

But not only has he done that deal, that deal is for those medicines to be provided at the lowest possible cost.

 

And the cost that he's done this at is extremely reasonable. So the cost of these treatments will not relate to the medicine costs. The cost really is the cost of the therapies, the therapy that assists. So this is called psychedelic assisted therapy because it's the combination of the psychedelic medicine with psychotherapy and the psychotherapeutic support that goes with these treatments can be expensive, especially for example, if psychiatrists were going to be sitting for with patients for hours and so on. As it is of course in trials around the world and in treatments around the world, the types of therapists who are mainly sitting with the patients normally speaking are psychologists and psychotherapists and counsellors and others, all of whom we are training with our certificate in psychedelic assisted therapies.

 

So at the end of the day, I think the model that we'll see more and more is psychiatrists who will be screening the patients for suitability, making sure that they don't have a history of psychosis and other things, and they will be the prescribers and then the other clinicians will be sitting with the patients. And the cost really, as I say, hasn't been established yet, but there's also a world in which it'll be possible for some patients potentially to be given group therapy as well. And MAPS at the moment are looking at that in the US as well. And we've just announced that we are supporting a healthy person's trial, which is being run through ANU in Canberra. And that's going to be for therapists who've done training, either our CPAT course or some other clinical CPAT certificate in psychedelic assisted therapies training. They may have done MAPS training or other training. And so people who've done that training will then be eligible to do what's called a healthy person's trial.

 

And in that healthy person's trial, there's going to be groups of up to six therapists who are all taking the medicine together and then going through that experience together. They'll also have some devices measuring their brain waves during these treatments. And I think it would be just fascinating actually to sit in a room with these healthy therapists undertaking these medicines and treatments for the very first time for many of them and seeing what they learn about themselves.

 

And the reason why this trial is really important is because there are many therapists who actually, because the medicines have been illegal, have not actually taken these treatments and haven't gone through these treatments themselves. And as you would understand, Mason, if you haven't tried the medicine and the therapy yourself, it's harder to sit with a patient if you haven't done the medicine yourself and haven't done the therapy. So we feel it's very important for clinicians and therapists who are going to be psychedelic assisted therapists to have experiences themselves.

Mason:

Yeah, because I have a history of leaning towards, say, the conspiratorial and the cynical, and it's been one of my medicines to go, yes, I can have that part of me, which lives in reality and looking for evidence and acknowledging it, but then stepping back and going into a harmonising big vision for the planet. We need multiple places, multiple people, multiple organisations digging into the same source idea, which is people being well and having the right to get access. And just the consideration, people might go, why don't we just do what happens in the Netherlands? It's like, well, that's because when you start going into extremely rigid and for the masses medicine and being able to get a tidal wave of acknowledgement that this treatment for practitioners, this treatment cures this done this way, it has this success rate. That's what they don't have because it is underground or decentralised.

 

What's happening here is so dramatically different. And it was just when I kind of sank into it, I was like, wow, we're in the belly of the beast. And as you said, there are many people who too unwell, maybe just they're a part of the bell curve in this instance, that they're not able or willing to go and explore all these fringes and take those risks. There might be so much trauma.

Tania De Jong:

Yeah, exactly. And that's fair enough. And I think the Netherlands obviously has this very progressive stance on drugs and psilocybin truffles are completely legal there. But of course, the really important thing about what we are doing in Australia is we are having the ability to collect data so that we can see what a patient is like to begin with. They go through this standard operating protocols that are going to be set up for them, data is then collected about how they're going and how they're progressing. And then that data goes back into the system and it starts to really support potentially other conditions being treated by these medicines. It might mean that there's more confidence about other practitioners being part of these processes, and eventually, who knows, hopefully GPS can work with psychiatrists and prescribers.

Mason:

Integration.

Tania De Jong:

Exactly. So it's all about that multidisciplinary approach that we are trying to foster here where, and that's always been the case with our CPAT course where we've had multiple different disciplines from psychiatrists to GPs, physicians, addiction specialists, counsellors, social workers, occupational therapists, nurses, psychotherapists, and psychologists of course. And all of them are doing this training. And the idea is that the patient is at the centre.

 

Now, the government always talks about the patient being at the centre, but the patient's not often at the centre. They're usually treated by one particular discipline, then another discipline. And none of them are really working together in a team to get the patient well. And that's what we are trying to, it's a whole different approach as to treating illness and it's a whole different approach to healing.

Mason:

And well, it's also your willingness and skillset to go in to the place, what we're talking about, we've been able to study it and then put that evidence out there. Although it might be not how I personally practise healing, I know that to go excessive in the way that I practise healing is completely unreasonable and excessive in its own way. As a globe, what we're talking about here is something that will get such scale and such rollout. And this is, I want to lead to the next part of the chat because I think we've just covered that so beautifully. What you have and what I see is especially that mushroom consciousness of unity and connection that doesn't just fall into obsession over the single and going, we're just here. But the invisible connection is what the mushrooms do. They bring unification. And that's the only reason I know, that I continue to align with you guys is because I can always sense when someone's connected to a why. And when someone's connected to a why, they're adaptive. And I know that the source idea in essence is connected to what we've always been connected to Will that's integrate. So humans everywhere can be well.

Tania De Jong:

That's exactly right. I mean that's really what's been driving us the whole time. I mean, since Peter and I first had these medicines, treatments in the Netherlands, it became so clear to us that this was a complete paradigm shift in the way that we treat people with mental illness. It's really about reminding people that they are part of something, that they belong, that they are actually connected not only to themselves, which they often lose connection with, but that they're connected to everyone else and everything else.

 

And unfortunately what happens is we, as we know, is that when someone has a mental illness, it's generally characterised by a sense of disconnection and isolation. So to give people that gift of connection, which of course the mycelial world does so incredibly well, that's the greatest gift you can give to someone because then they can feel part of something.

 

And it's a circle of reciprocity, I think that happens. If we can get people well and out of the system, then they will start giving back and contributing to society and helping solve the many wicked problems that we're challenged by at the moment. And they start to pull others out of their disadvantage and their suffering as well. And I've seen that throughout my life, and Peter and I have founded six charities now. And we see it constantly that when you help people and they can get out of their disadvantaged box or suffering box, they then start to help others. And it's just beautiful to see that happen. So that's really what's driving me here. Yeah.

Mason:

Do you mind taking me, just to finish this up to, just to take me back? I mean, you mentioned it when we were talking earlier. I think when I had Leo my little baby in, we were rescheduling a little bit. Just talk me. And I've been practising this a lot, at SuperFeast, maybe you guys have better habits of doing it more often, is connecting to that, the initial idea and the initial feeling that really spurred it and the history behind it.

Tania De Jong:

Yeah. So really, I mean, would've never even thought of having any drugs in my whole life until like 2016. So what happened was I was one of these people that had never got drunk. I never have had any drugs in my life at all. I don't even drink coffee. And my husband, Peter, had also never done any drugs at all in his whole life. And so then I came across this article by Michael Poland, which had been sent through one of Tim Ferris's blogs, which was called The Trip Treatment in the New Yorker Magazine. And it was this incredible article well before Michael Roddy's book, and it was profiling participants in a trial for end of life stress and anxiety that was going on with patients at New York University. And they had an 80% remission rate after just two treatments of psilocybin with a short course of psychotherapy. And they went back to those patients actually after four and a half years. And they found that not only were the majority of them still alive, which is interesting in itself, but they were all still in remission as well from their depression and anxiety associated with a terminal diagnosis, which of course would be challenging for any of us human beings.

 

So one of the people profiled in that article was a Jewish man who had experienced some intergenerational trauma and through the Holocaust, and I'm the daughter and granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, and the majority of my relatives were killed in the Holocaust. So though I've not directly experienced trauma, I would say that my parents, both of whom were very lucky to survive, in their early childhoods experienced significant trauma and fear and worry from being in positions of enormous danger, often separated from their parents at times. And they went through this in their first few years.

 

And I believe that probably all Jewish people carry some of this. And collectively all human beings carry the trauma of great atrocities that have been committed to human beings since the beginning of time. So when I have worked with these medicines, I will often have, I see a whole lot of collective suffering through, a lot of transpersonal stuff comes up in a lot of my medicine experiences, and I see collective suffering that we're all going through, that we're all carrying with us. But certainly that was something that I thought, well, I had tried everything in my life. I've done psychotherapy, myotherapy, cryotherapy, mantra, tantra, hyperbaric oxygen. I've tried lots of different things because I'm a performer and for me to be at my peak best, I always want my mind and body to be in the best possible form.

 

And I'm just getting ready now to play the role of my grandmother who invented the foldable umbrella again in Driftwood the Musical. And she was the one who miraculously escaped Nazi Austria and saved my mother's life, which is obviously why I'm here. And she was a pioneer herself, and I'm channelling her in this Driftwood the musical that we're about to present. But I sort of knew, I knew my family's background and I just thought, what could I do that would be something different and could I learn more? Could I expand more? Could I evolve further? And I've always been a bit of a curious seeker.

 

And so I said to Peter, look, I think we should go to the Netherlands and I think we should try this treatment. So well actually, no, actually, initially we reached out to Robin Carhart-Harris because he was mentioned in this article. And so I reached out to Robin really early on and he said, look, there was no trials for healthy persons and because we didn't have a diagnosable mental illness. And so we eventually were referred to a Dutch guide and we flew over to the Netherlands and we had this extraordinary experience where we ingested some Syrian rue. And then about an hour later we had a large dose of psilocybin. And I've got to say I was petrified. I mean, I'm a bit of a control freak and to lose control, that's probably why I hadn't got drunk and hadn't done all these things in my life, was very frightening to me. And I thought, I'm going to have a heart attack. Am I going to lose my mind? All the things that all of this sort of stigma that's associated with these medicines sort of was flying around my head.

 

But anyway, I did do it. And of course it was the most life changing experience I could have imagined. And the same for Peter. And yeah, we had that incredible unity consciousness, that experience of oneness, the profound connection with self, with others, with nature. I've never seen a seashell, a tree, a cloud in the sky, raindrop, anything the same way, ever since that day. And we came out of that experience, and at that time, I think we had four charities between us and we just said, wow, imagine if we could give the gift of this healing experience to people who are disadvantaged because mostly at the heart of any kind of disadvantage, whether it's homelessness, a disability, whatever it happens to be, usually at the base of that disadvantage lies some kind of mental illness, some kind of anxiety or depression or addiction or some kind of trauma that is underpinning that person's disadvantage.

 

So we can provide housing, we can provide programmes and activities and food to people who are disadvantaged, but at the end of the day, if they can't get over their trauma and get to the root cause of their trauma, they're still going to remain stuck. And they're never going to be able to fish for themselves and lead meaningful contributing lives. They're just going to stay stuck and always have to be provided with services and funds and activities.

 

So we thought, well, imagine if we could create an ecosystem in Australia where these treatments could become available and accessible and affordable to people who really need them. And so that's what we set about doing, we set about setting up the ecosystem. We created enormous awareness. We've run and we still run incredible educational events and a global webinar series. We ran a Global Summit, which you spoke at of course. And we have chapters all over Australia. And we started the first certificate in psychedelic assisted therapies in the Asia-Pacific region, which David Nutt and I recently said was the leading training of its kind in the world. And we have a global.

Mason:

He is amazing.

Tania De Jong:

He is. He is amazing. And as you know, we brought him to Australia and he spoke in Byron, where we, of course, you were part of those events. And then we started working with universities. We started funding trials, we looked at medicine supplies, and that's what led to that recent historic supply announcement. We looked at partnering with, supporting with a lot of clinicians and clinic clinics who are trying to roll out these treatments and help them.

 

And of course, the major piece of work that we had to do was the rescheduling, because without the rescheduling taking place, there was so many and there still are, of course, so many treatment resistant individuals in Australia who are suffering immensely and no amount of existing treatments are getting them well and out of the system, and many are taking their own lives.

 

And we shared a video of a man named Franco whose wife had written a letter to the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese. She lives in his seat, about his experience. So he woke up in 2018 with depression, just all of a sudden, no real reason for it that they could ever find. And he was immediately with a psychiatrist, a psychologist. He was given 96 shock treatments, 24 TMS treatments, 19 different antidepressants and antipsychotics. He saw all the experts that they could possibly see. He was institutionalised for 19 months of the last three years of his life. And he begged his wife, who he loved very much to let him go every day. They'd been married for 30 years, had a young daughter. And she reached out to me a couple of years ago and I tried everything that I could to help them to access these treatments clinically because they didn't want to break the law and he was too sick for them to take overseas. And she was too worried that he'd take his own life.

 

And anyway, because there was this, so the TGA had been prescribing special access scheme approvals, but the states were blocking treatments so that if a psychiatrist had used the treatment in New South Wales where he was from, for example, they would've been criminally liable for using the medicines. So we knew that the only way to get patients well in Australia was if the medicines were rescheduled to Schedule 8 so that the states could then set up a permit system. And so that these treatments could be given to people like Franco. But sadly, he took his life last year before he could experience this treatment, which is really tragic.

 

Anyway, and there's so many people like that. I mean, we have so many videos on our YouTube channel of people, of people's loved ones, talking about people who've taken their own lives because they couldn't access treatments in this country. And we need to be better at making sure that people who are suffering get access to treatments before it's too late.

Mason:

Thank you for that. Going to, yeah, it's a chokes you up kind of thing. So I'm going to try and maintain composure.

 

Mason:

I'll laugh uncomfortably to get through that. But yeah, I think that's why I really enjoy being around Mind Medicine, because I think there's significant amount of people, but it's still rare to just get onto the inside and hear, because you guys, when the vision is so clear, and I think that's rare, but what's even rarer is not falling into the idealistic victim complainings about why that vision isn't able to come to life. You're willing to get your hands dirty, and that's where the special source is. So I really appreciate you sharing that and really grateful that everyone here gets to hear from you again.

(28:57)

And I know we were going to talk about this off air, but let me know if the download isn't coming. But there were two songs, and I think maybe from Driftwood, is that the new album? Is that?

Tania De Jong:

Which one? Sorry.

Mason:

Does Driftwood have a new album?

Tania De Jong:

Oh no, Driftwood's a musical.

Mason:

Doesn't have an album yet?

Tania De Jong:

No, no. I'd love you to mention it though, in your, I mean, put a link to it, but driftwoodthemusical.com.au is produced by Peter and I. Sorry, I've got the hiccups.

Mason:

That's okay.

Tania De Jong:

And our charity, the Umbrella Foundation, which is about telling stories that matter, and it tells the incredible story of my grandmother's invention of the foldable umbrella and the escape from the Nazis and a lot of...

Mason:

What a combination.

Tania De Jong:

Yeah. It's incredible.

Mason:

Umbrellas and Nazis, what a wild combination. Anyway.

Tania De Jong:

And so we're doing that in seasons in Melbourne and Sydney and May and June. We really encourage people to come.

Mason:

I'd love to come.

Tania De Jong:

I'd love you to come, Mason. If you want to come, just let me know.

Mason:

Yeah, I will. Yeah, with bells on.

Tania De Jong:

And then we have interest in New York and the show later this year as well. So that's really exciting.

Mason:

Really?

Tania De Jong:

Yeah. Yeah. It's exciting. Yeah. So in terms of, yeah, I know I'm going to suggest a couple of songs that I think tie nicely with what we've just been talking about. One of them I think is a song called Soul Journey, which is on my album called Heaven on Earth. And I think the other piece that will do that I might suggest you play is my song Somewhere There's A Place For Us, which I think you've heard me sing before.

Mason:

I was just going to say, I think that's one that you brought the house down with.

Tania De Jong:

Thank you. And that's on my, I think, Flying Free album, which I've sent you as well. Yeah, I mean really and that's about finding that place within, and we all have that place. When we stop all the external chatter and we stop worrying about what everyone thinks about us and all of that, it's about going inside. And that's what the medicines really teach us to do, to travel inwards and to find that place of love and peace and possibility. Yeah.

Mason:

Right. Thank you. Yeah, that saves me trying to do, not do the songs justice in introducing them. So I'm really glad that it was able to come.

Tania De Jong:

It's Soul Journey. Actually, I'll tell you about Soul Journey, the other piece. So actually Peter and I wrote the lyrics for that one, and it's the most beautiful tune. It's just like the most heart-centred piece. And that piece is really about the fact that we're all souls and we are living this material life in this current carnation that we're in. But our journey goes on and on as our journey as spirits and souls continues way beyond this life. And so I feel it's really important to create good things and be kind and decent in this life. And hopefully that energy goes and travels much further than this material plane into many different dimensions.

Mason:

You're speaking my language. I love it. Everyone listening, very easily you can go find Mind Medicine. Look up Mind Medicine. You can look up locally.

Tania De Jong: (32:35):

Oh yes. mindmedicineaustralia.org. And just a reminder that we're a registered charity, and though we're philanthropists, we can't do this alone. And we rely on wonderful partners like you, and we're so grateful to you, Mason. But to all of you out there, whether small or big donations, we really welcome your support and we can guarantee you that your donations will be used wisely. Peter and I donate all of our time and as much money as we can to this mission.

Mason:

Well, and on that, maybe some of you listening are like, great, that's what I do have. I do have cash to donate. And so that's perfect. And those of you, maybe you have time. So see maybe local chapter has will receive time. Maybe you have neither, but a small amount of cash going along and buying a ticket to a local event. There's many ways just to something like this, because I know a lot of people will feel like, oh my gosh, I want to contribute. And there'll be something that you have to contribute. So yeah, be open to that.

Tania De Jong:

Yeah, exactly.

Mason:

Thank you so much.

Tania De Jong:

Thank you for all you're doing in the world, Mason. It's really beautiful and you're doing great work, so thank you.

Mason:

I appreciate it. Coming from you, it's just adventure. It's adventure for me. Anything that's a nice gritty adventure is where I'm going. And this one's juicy. This one's fun. Thank you.

Tania De Jong:

Thanks so much, Mason.