Keegan - Psychedelics and the Bathtub Funeral

Keegan – Funeral in the Bathtub

Keegan 01:05 I don't pretend to know everything. Even about myself.

Brian 01:10 Well, you are the expert on here though.

Keegan 01:11 That I am. I'm still learning though.

Brian 01:15 We're just going to keep the recording going. So, if there's something later, you’re like, you know what? I don't know how my relative is going to like that. Can we take that part out? It's not a problem.

Keegan 01:28 No stress. 

Brian 01:29 So, we talked, you're feeling a little anxious? How are you feeling right now? What's going on in your life?

Keegan 01:36 Well, what's going on in my life? I guess there's probably some underlying emotions that feed into this. But I think that I understand you gave me a little bit of direction of where this could go, and what it says, represented for other people, and so I've given that thought, and a lot of those thoughts just generate emotion. I've gone through a bit over the past two years, or even a smaller amount of time, condense that in the last six months, I feel like I'm a completely different person. So, the anxiety that I'm feeling now is maybe just the vulnerable aspect of sharing this with somebody that, you know, I do trust you. That being said, it's only the third or fourth person that I've been open and honest with about all of the aspects that have come into a Keegan that sits here. Maybe that's probably.

Brian 02:31 Is this recording going to be too much?

Keegan 02:32 No.

Brian 02:33 Are you sure? 

Keegan 02:33 Yeah. 

Brian 02:34 Okay. Because you've been very honest with me, and I appreciate that. I just don't want to force that on you, for everyone else and now it's time to meet the world. It's like, yeah, Mike doesn't make four listeners.

Keegan 02:48 Well, and I understand that whether this is your four listeners, or if it ends up being the most listened to podcast, I know where I am today is I'm just going to be honest with where I stand. As long I can look back today and see that a Keegan on that specific day just spoke to what he was living in and the relative truth. I think that has been a big thing for me. It's like this is what's true today. This is what's Keegan today and that's going to be what comes out.

Brian 03:23 Yeah, and change is an important part of this podcast. So, hopefully, people will realize that the person that did this interview yesterday or a year ago, or what, however, it dates, it's not the same person. It wasn't the same person five minutes later.

Keegan 03:36 Yeah, I am a wholeheartedly ready to actively change and be a new person on a 24-hour cycle. There's no limit to the amount of changes that I can make.

Brian 03:49 Now, have you always been like that? That's a recent thing?

Keegan 03:52 That's a recent thing that has come by way of, jeez. I could put x innumerable number of factors into that equation. But it's something that I felt maybe two years ago, that change was possible, but it was slow. It was like erosion. People can change but it's like, rarely is it going to be instantaneous. So, I held myself to that standard.

Brian 04:25 So, you've brought up that timeline a couple of times two years ago. Do you want to jump into that? Is there something specific you want to start with that got this off or?

Keegan 04:33 Well, the conditions that needed to be set for me to be open to change. I can think back realistically to every big paradigm shift or every big jump leap in my progression, whatever that was, at the time, my perspective. Either the moments, the days, weeks leading up to those interactions, I have been probably at my most vulnerable, humble, meek understanding, just really like the lowest points. So, about, I was even shorter was fall of 2020, we were going through, online learning, I was at the University of Utah, and I had this facade of success. I was realistically impressing myself, and stroking that ego. Within two months or so, everything that gave me pride was gone. I'm not a very good online learner. So, there's this course required for the finance program at the U and if you don't get a B, it's non-negotiable, there is no advancement. Especially under the conditions of online learning and the competitiveness of the program. It's a one shot go. So, here, I am not learning well, and not learning actively, I had this girl that I was in love with, and very distracted. So, I get a C in the class. I appeal it, I use every avenue necessary. I even go to my former mission, president Clark Ivory of Ivory home, sits on the board of regents of the U, [INAUDIBLE] submitting a letter for my recommendation, and he did very kind letter, they still said no. I'm realizing that oh, you just didn't get the fucking work done. All of these things that were stroking your ego, and then the girl left, she was in. So, I had to tell my dad that I failed school and academic says is everything. I had already separated myself from religious values. But I had replaced those with values because you're forced to create your own values once those go away. There was another step in which I really crossed a personal boundary. So, all of this happened within the course of two or three months, and spiral. I was open about it, too. I actively was telling friends hey, you can't hurt me right now, this is ground zero. There's no more to be like, this is the shell of the man. I believe that in the psychedelic world, which I'm sure this is going to come up a million times. But there's this idea that you have your modus operandi, the way that you are your monkey mind for a meditation reference, but my monkey mind, my MO, the person who I am is an angry, irritable, sexually motivated, anxious individual with real life fears. In that low moment, I'm like, this is a lot to take on and to understand that. I knew it wasn't going to be permanent. But man was I stuck for probably three or four months after failing school, you know? These were the conditions.

Brian 08:45 Well, I don't think any of us go through change lightly. By that, I mean, something has to happen for us to change even the simple things. But for us to reach in and look at our core, and start to really question and make a huge change and make major changes. There has to be pain. There has to be discomfort, such that I don't know what this holds. But I'm going there because where I am right now does not work. This is not where I'm going to stay. So, something has to give.

Keegan 09:20 There was no means by which I had tried up into that point that were leading me to success. Anything. You name it, it wasn't working. I had leaned on friends, I had leaned on family, I had leaned on religion, I had leaned on academics. It just wasn't, nothing was going to fulfill that. So, here I am, three, four months later, and it wasn't till a close friend was like you desperately need to see someone. I had been told that before but hearing it from that perspective, herself being a mental health professional. It started the progress. So, here I am, four months after getting flunked out of school and I start this mental health thing and it's slow. It's exactly what I thought change would be, is just glacial at times. I started reading this book, probably at the same time that I flunked out of school. It was weird that it just kind of fell into my lap. Think Like a Monk, written by Jay Shetty. All of the tools were in my lap going through all of this difficult time. But I had no grasp. I had no tangible grasp of how to implement those tools. It's like books on a shelf. Awesome. They're there but it's almost intangible.

Brian 11:09 But if you look at our education system, we're not given those tools. We're not exposed to those tools. In a similar situation, I ran across a great book called Permission To Feel. It talks about emotions. It said, the average adult can identify in themselves or others for emotions.

Keegan 11:35 It's not very many.

Brian 11:36 We knew 64 colors before we went to kindergarten. 

Keegan 11:40 No kidding.

Brian 11:40 Right? 

Keegan 11:40 Yeah. 

Brian 11:42 Maybe not 64. Some of those we couldn't identify. But 60. But four emotions, happy, mad, angry, sad. So, it talks about it's okay to have these feelings, first of all, but identify what they really are. Mind blowing. This author, he works out at Yale. He is trying to get this education in elementary schools. Because if you get out of elementary school, and you can identify 4 emotions, you're not ready for junior high.

Keegan 12:20 Which you are subject to 64. 

Brian 12:23 Exactly. At least and we don't even really know the difference between anger and frustration. Seems like that should be by the time we're adults, we should know that. We just think we're angry all the time. No, you're not frustrated. You're not angry, you're frustrated. You're anxious. You're disappointed. What's the difference? We don't know. Anyway.

Keegan 12:50 No, it's a great point. It's a great perspective. Yesterday, I'm talking on the phone, I work with an insurance adjuster. These two heads, he and I literally all it was a matter of fact, is we were looking at two different documents thinking we were looking at the same one. He's like, well, I don't have time for this. This is BS and anything and I let my ego get in the way. I'm like, well, if it's bullshit for you, let's escalate it to somebody who has time for me, and I'm just like, he calls back and the two of us have to be like, "Yeah, dude, what the hell are we doing?" That's frustration. We were frustrated that we weren't coming to the same answer, but we just decided that it was going to be anger and just yell at each other over the simplest like, yes. I'm now learning that at 25. Two years ago, 25 I'm understanding oh, I'm anxious all the time. This isn't who I am. It's a state of being.

Brian 13:51 Yeah, it's become part of who I am. I haven't been able to separate that from a temporary. Well, don't be too hard on yourself. I'm in my 50s and just learning that it's okay to have feelings and to even talk about them. It's crazy. But you've always struck me as someone who's pretty introspective. That even in high school when we first met you were very much someone who thought things through, you were connected with other people. You could read emotions fairly well and had pretty deep emotions yourself. So, that part, I don't know where that came from. But it seemed to have served you well.

Keegan 14:39 Yeah. A lot of those things I feel does really kind words. However, I've heard them enough to believe them to be true. I am very introspective. Whether I was consciously aware of other people's feelings at that point that might have been more of a subconscious, realization that you saw on me. Being the youngest child of three, with six years separation from my next sibling, I was an observer. The world that I lived in, subjected me to. "Look, you have a voice, and it's there. But let's let the adults talk." You know what I mean? You're a child, and all of your opinions will be treated as such. So, sure, as a kid, that's just the way it is, so I'm thrusted into this situation where I observe and I've always been that way, because oftentimes, even in my adulthood, when I have acted impulsively, I'm often incorrect. In fact, I think most of us are, but this introspection throughout this changing aspect of my life, ended up being a huge asset. It was because as I'm going through this experience with my therapist, I'm realizing that the book that I'm reading, my therapist, they're asking, and they're giving me all the right things and it's just I'm not quite there yet. It's more like I'm observing what they're talking about from a distance and they're trying to describe it. I'm just not about to get there yet. Then I'm really, in this search for any aspect, any avenue out, and I come across as many of us do, I guess nowadays it is access to different forms of consciousness. Mainly through meditation through this think like a monk book. I'm like, Man, I would love to experience this serenity, this peace, this whatever the hell they're talking about. I have no idea what it is. But I can't get there. Maybe I'm not holding myself to that standard, but just mainly because I don't know how. I'm not ready for it yet. Change was happening so slow, this progression, this glacial change in me and I was so anxious and ready to just get this over with, let's stop with the anxiety and the depression. I was really impatient with my progress. So, here I am looking for any of these answers and I come across this article, or a handful of articles talking about how Johns Hopkins a few different universities, not only in the 60s in the 50s, but now. We're talking in the last three years are researching into how altered states of consciousness specifically through the use of psilocybin mushrooms, or ketamine, which is a sedative, are allowing individuals who have gone through PTSD, former veterans, addicts, and they're breaking free of some of these mines that they have. I'm like, Holy shit, I got to do it. Like, I got to but out of safety. I have no idea what this is. So, here I am, as an observer, that you're asking me about, I spend the next probably nine months still going to therapy, still trying to get into that mindset through meditation or other ways, but it's more like I'm just observing it. We can talk about how I got to this point, but I take there was this one session nine months later, once I get all of the groundwork done, where I feel safe, and I feel like I'm at a point where this isn't going to hurt me physiologically, psychologically, I can take this with no holds barred. Man. There was 20 minutes that I sat in a bathtub freezing, shivering so cold. However, I was enveloping and it's like, I'm going to say some really like ethereal weird, but just the emotion that I felt in that moment was key and doesn't exist in the grand scheme of things and that's okay. Not only does he not exist, but this idea that you have of him is so limiting on your growth, that the longer that you hold on to who he is, the longer you're going to be stuck at that level. So, in this bathtub, I'm weeping and I sit there freezing cold, but just so warm and enveloped for probably an hour until 3am, 4am and I wake up, give myself two hours of sleep. Wake up the next day and I go visit my mom, who is an incredibly emotional individual for really great reasons. But we're at this youth football game and she's so emotional and she's crying over, my brother's going to be moving away and she's just so attached to this idea of being a mother that, God, it's so hard for my kids to leave and weeping and crying. Here I am. Never in my life having patience for that kind of shit. Now, I'm on two hours of sleep. I just spent the entire night in a bathtub and for the first time in my life, I have the patience to look my mom in the eye. As if she's not even my mom, because Keegan doesn't exist. I had to be my mom's mom, and that was okay. I just reminded her that we all love her and that she was the best example of everything good. But these words were falling, and all it came down to was hugging her, reminding her that these fears that she had about being a mother were pretty much all on her psychological. I would never say this directly to her, if Keegan doesn't exist. Brian Acord doesn't exist. None of us exist. What is this? It became way more esoteric and so that kick started another paradigm shift. But this idea that change happened over two hours. Now, it's not a game of slow burn or glacial change. Now it's a game of instants and moments. That alone was enough, there's no quantitative measure for anxiety and depression and all of these things, but I'm going to try 80% of my anxieties and depressions and fears over in that bathtub.

Brian 23:14 That's amazing, because in similar instances, that I've experienced, and I've heard from others, you think that learning from personals experience that death is the end, or there is no god or I don't exist, would increase that anxiety and the depression. In almost every instance that I've run across, where someone has come to that realization, it was like 80% is gone. That's okay. From an outsider who hasn't had that perspective, it's impossible to understand that. But having had a similar experience, and talked to others, that it's amazing that like, almost immediately, it's like, no, it's completely different. You'd think that would raise more questions and more anxiety and everyone seems to be just okay with that. Just like that seems. I don't know how that's possible.

Keegan 24:31 I don't either and I'm still looking for that answer. Gosh, but there is a really a cool perspective, both scientifically, that the chemical makeup of your brain under those conditions. I'm only speaking to the experience of the psychedelics but I'm very confident that that's what you experienced during moments of meditation, self-reflection, grief, it's this under the conditions of psilocybin, your amygdala, your fight or flight response in your brain is literally I want to say turned off, but man is it minimalized. This aspect of your brain, which is built up in a way to protect you for good things, can also serve us wrong at times, it can fool us into thinking things are true when they're not. But if that can just go to sleep for a second, and allow the rest of the parts of the brain to work, the fear of dying. We all have to do it. It's like when you're looking at a nature movie, and one animal eats the next. There's an attachment, you might oh, it's not sad that Bambi is getting mauled by whatever. But 24 hours later, you can look with an attachment towards that interaction and be yeah, it was going to happen. Keegan is bound, this physical form is bound to not exist. What are we going to do about it? I don't know why the lack of an amygdala in that scenario allowed me to just shrug my shirt. Yeah, that's what's going to happen. He's going to cease to exist.

Brian 26:27 I was going to ask you what you think caused that. But that's a good explanation. Do you think people that are able to reach that through meditation, it's essentially the same thing? It's taking themselves in a place where they take that inner critic or whatever you want to call it, and they just ignore it, silence it and just look past it.

Keegan 26:49 Well, and here's something, I used a cheat code, Brian.

Brian 26:53 Great. We're all about life hacks. Right? 

Keegan 26:55 Exactly. So, I would love to get to the point where I can meditate and access the same, and I have maybe once or twice, but to actively be able to do it day in and day out. I think that's pretty advanced. Yes, it is the state that I believe that they are in, and the state that I'm under, and those experiences that allow. Some people talk about it as like a connectivity, they feel connected to everything in the world and that's more of like a Hindu perspective. It's more of like an all-encompassing, and then the Buddhist perspective, they feel like there is nothing and I think that's kind of how I accessed in the bathtub is there's nothing and it's going to be nothing. It's two ways to get to the same end. But there's this idea that meditation will get you there. Not only meditation, Brian, you've been in states of meditation, you've been in states where your amygdala has been silenced. While on the ice playing hockey, you've done it while coaching, or not coaching, but parenting your children. Times in which you are looking in people's eyes or performing a task and there is no more Brian. You ever feel, it's just action?

Brian 28:15 Yeah. But one of the words I love is flow. You're just not there, time ceases to exist. You're just in the moment and you're doing your thing and you feel one with the whole thing. It just works. Such a rare treat.

Keegan 28:30 Such a rare treat, and I get to cheat code that shit. It doesn't work every time either. But yes, that's the state.

Brian 28:39 Okay, so what percentage of time does it work?

Keegan 28:45 Jeez lately. So, let's say I probably had 25-30 sessions. Regardless of dosage, doesn't matter how much I take, there's probably a 10-25% chance I'll get there. Low, I'll get, let's say for lack of a better term, self-actualization state, the peak that I know I'll get halfway there every time. I'll get halfway up the mountain every time and have like a better perspective over whenever I am.

Brian 29:37 Not that enlightened view that-

Keegan 29:39 Not the flow state, not the idea where these thoughts aren't even my own at this point. This is like universal knowledge being channeled through me and that doesn't happen. That's rare.

Brian 29:52 So how do you explain that? Do you consider that to be a universal knowledge that's out there that you're connecting to something that's greater than you? Or is it another trick that your mind is playing on you? Or are you unlocking another awareness that's deep in the core of you that comes from within? 

Keegan 30:13 Yes. 

Brian 30:14 What? It's something along those lines.

Keegan 30:16 I'm to the point now where any answer could be feasible. I'm that open. Like I said, I've tried the academic route, I've tried the esoteric Hinduism, Eastern philosophy route and in all honesty, I believe they support each other in this specific instance. So, you're asking, is it an external factor that I'm internalizing. Parts of me believe that there is a neural network of understanding where you look at something, or you hear a certain phrase is a Martin Luther King's speech in which there's a civil rights phrase that comes out of somebody's mouth and you're just like, yeah, never heard it before. But yeah, that's true. Yeah. That's universal truth. That's something that's, I don't know, if it's external or internal. I don't know if that's embedded in our DNA code, to talk about mushrooms, it's a natural phenomenon on the earth that it has its own kingdom and it sits in between Animalia and in plant species, it's this middle ground. Under the earth, there's this neural pathway of mycelium, these things that look like neural pathways in our brain. Well, jeez, they use those neural pathways to pass information, trees use the pathways to pass nutrients. They're communicating underground under our feet. If the trees are talking to each other, without using words, we probably are too. You and I are having a conversation.

Brian 32:03 That's a fascinating point. I think by using words, we are severely restricting our ability to actually communicate.

Keegan 32:14 Absolutely. We have to be. I don't know, your experience with learning another language. But it wasn't until I learned a second language did, I understand my native. I could not possibly understand what an adjective was until I had to apply it elsewhere. Then, jeez, that perspective dawn on you. Are we limited? You try to explain something, your spiritual beliefs in a language that you've never expressed before? Is that frustrating.

Brian 32:55 Well, or even in a language you do know, I was reading in that book Maslow was talking about the spiritual language says these aren't the right words. They've been co-opted to mean a certain thing and I'm going to use them because it's the closest thing I have.

Keegan 33:13 That's Stanley Cup playoffs. They interviewed the guy after they win the cup. He's holding it up. He can speak French. He can speak English; he could probably speak some other European language. He's got all these languages, all these beautiful words to express what he's feeling in that moment and what do they all say? 

Brian 33:33 Awesome. 

Keegan 33:35 There's no word. They're holding a 35 pound whatever it is a cup in the air. What do you want me to say, and that proves to me that human emotion is more expansive than human language? 

Brian 33:49 For sure.

Keegan 33:50 There's way too much inside for us to be able to express through our mouth. 

Brian 33:59 Good point. 

Keegan 34:00 I love that, though. I haven't really considered it in the way that you'd brought it up, but-

Brian 34:08 But it's there.

Keegan 34:09 It's there. 

Brian 34:10 You've touched it?

Keegan 34:10 Well, as far as yeah. Not being able to describe something in words and these states of being, these states have altered consciousness there. There are explanations scientifically, and they're going to come up with those answers, but it's not going to be me.

Brian 34:28 No, but even the research they do has to be boiled down into words. The research itself isn't perfect and the word certainly aren't helping and the way we read it doesn't help. So, when we read the research that's been done, how close do we even get to understanding it? We were closer hopefully.

Keegan 34:48 You're coaching a sport and you're coaching it from the sidelines for somebody who's never played it before. You can only do so much. Yeah, it's about time you just jump in and play the game. If you want to learn more If you are ready to learn. But you know that this. Sorry, I don’t have questions.

Brian 35:07 You're good. No, I had a couple of questions you mentioned earlier, I was going to come back. 

Keegan 35:10 Let's do it. 

Brian 35:11 You mentioned that it unlocked another paradigm shift. We're going to talk about that?

Keegan 35:19 Yeah. So, I lived in the state of gradual change and that was my belief system. Then the state of daily change now exists. The paradigm shifts are that before I was still attached to this level one, Keegan. This angry, irritable individual who that's who I was still right over the small change when I was trying to like a snake shed a skin of that person. But the change that happened internally, it was that, why? Why are we waiting to take our sock off? Just like it doesn't need to be that you're only smoothing so slow, because you want to hang on to the bits and pieces you loved. That ego stroke of this kid was XY and Z and I loved it. But now that I understood that my attachment to that Keegan was limiting me moving forward and the daily changes were going to allow for a faster, or- you had mentioned one time we had a discussion about your life was like an arrow that was shot from a bow moving in a straight line. There were some redirections that happened, and those redirections anyway, coming back. The redirections can happen day in and day out. In fact, they can happen every moment. If I realized yesterday on the phone, that I was an asshole to this guy. I don't have to wait till tomorrow to realize that I was an asshole to this guy. That's meditation. It's sitting there in your chair and saying, oh, I'm distracted. Let's just get back into every 10 seconds, you're noticing you're distracted? Well, that's progress, actually. You're correcting your correction. That's where the progress happens. Better that it happened two minutes after the initial phone call than two days. Right?

Brian 37:40 Yeah. There are emails that I wanted to send two minutes after an interaction that I'm glad I didn't send till the next day.

Keegan 37:45 Absolutely. Well, and it's like, don't send it, don't send it until you're back into this elevated state of love and understanding. Just don't absolutely.

Brian 37:56 Well. Yeah, there's a difference between a knee jerk reaction and a thoughtful response. You're saying that thoughtful response can happen every 20 seconds.

Keegan 38:04 It could. If you've been practicing well enough to notice your triggers to anger. I know that man, my voice rarely raises any more out of anger, but I know if it does, that, a lot of triggers were missed up into that point, and that I'm out of tune. So, yesterday, I raised my voice. Wow. I missed all those triggers leading up to it.

Brian 38:34 Tell me what those triggers might have been?

Keegan 38:37 Well, it's a lot. That's where the therapy stuff comes in. So, your body when responding to anxiety might be different person to person, I have an increased heart rate. I have tightness in my chest. A shaky voice. I noticed that the irritability skyrockets. Lack of motivation. There’re so many little tiny ones that are super unique to me. I'm misophonic, I don't even know if I'm pronouncing that right. I don't like the sound of people chewing. I absolutely despise it. I've gotten to a point in my life where that doesn't bother me anymore. But if I noticed that it is God, your way off Keegan, you need to dial it back in if that's pissing you off again. Come on, dude. That's the meditation and it's not more I hate using that tone. Come on, dude. Because that's not the tone. If you're going to be real meditator. The tone is okay, no worries. Let's just come back to center, just come back. No worries. Yeah, you got distracted.

Brian 39:47 What else might be causing that? Why was that there? Why did that bother you?

Keegan 39:52 You're not mad because of the email. You're not sorry, anxious because of the email. If we're going to use the right emotional terms. I was anxious because I feel overworked. I'm anxious because I get poor sleep. I'm anxious because I'm dehydrated. I'm anxious because I need to have conversations with people that I've been procrastinating that are important to me. That's the growth. Piecing, man, what I just said in the last two minutes, would have been a foreign language to Keegan six months ago. I think it is to most people. I hope, the Keegan, six months from now can bring huge insight, but that would have never happened.

Brian 40:46 Let's hope that version of you is going through that, like they're on the ice chasing a loose puck. They're not thinking about skating or whatever. They're just doing it and they're in the moment and all of those things have now become automatic.

Keegan 40:57 It's flow state. It's Brian's flow state. When was last time you were in that flow state?

Brian 41:05 It's been a minute. Yeah, I'd say writing does it. Writing does it for me and these conversations actually do it for me too. So, I'm pretty lucky that way.

Keegan 41:14 Well, and man I don't care the means by which you get there. If it's not hurting you or others, do it. Because that's life. We are fueled by that. I can't explain. There's no term for it. But flow state. That's fuel. That's human fuel.

Brian 41:41 So, you've mentioned a couple of terms, I want you to go back and be more specific about because I've heard you mention them several times here. One is hydration, you say you're drinking more water now than you've ever thought? Wow, that was interesting that struck the other night. You've mentioned meditation in a bunch of different levels that I think you're referring to different types of meditation. In the past, you mentioned a specific form of meditation. 

Keegan 42:08 Probably bhakti. 

Brian 42:10 No, it was. 

Keegan 42:15 That's okay. 

Brian 42:17 I'll think about it. So, if you want to talk about hydration, or meditation or other things that you've learned, that have now become your tools and your allies that have helped you with some of this, what do you think those things would be and how does it affect you?

Keegan 42:34 So hydration, that is a realization straight from psychedelics I never prioritize that. I was a habitual soda drinker. , at one point, we're talking six cans a day kind of thing. So, were bags of water with a bunch of other chemicals floating around in there that keep us balanced and alive. electrolytes, all kinds of shit. I'm having this session where you realize that when you are under that state of consciousness, you act like a child. Meaning when you're thirsty, when you're hungry, you don't express those emotions, you express whatever. You're just throwing tantrums at times. It's fun to observe yourself later and laugh. It's like, bro, drink some fucking water. You're just thirsty. So, here I am, like, having these realizations and I decide, well if I'm just laughing at myself under those conditions. Imagine if in another elevated state looking down on like my sober Keegan, is not safe, dude just drink some fucking water. Just do it. So, I do this thought experiment where you're going to actually stop drinking soda. You're going to abandon caffeine, which is probably affecting your anxiety, and we're going to move to water. I have never felt happier in my life. It probably was conditional to a lot of other things. I was going through some positive changes that allowed me to drink more water. I just made space for it. But I found that correlation to be powerful enough that I'm not going to abandon it. Its water is part of the equation.

Brian 44:23 How did you come to that realization to even try that?

Keegan 44:27 Well, the health of loved ones, and watching their patterns, and that being a scary thing for me. Both my grandparents died of substance abuse, one was self-inflicted, and the other one was cancer, esophageal cancer. So, the substances, all be it not alcohol or tobacco for my parents or for other loved ones. The substances we're impacting health in ways that I can physically see. Then now I'm seeing that on my suit you're drinking. You're gaining weight, I topped out at 200 pounds for which for me on my frame was a lot of weight. It was so apparent to me that the lifestyle choices that I was making with specifically liquid consumption is going to kill me.

Brian 45:25 So, soda every once in a while, are you just like, no, sort of thing

Keegan 45:29 If I do soda, it's going to be un-caffeinated. Like a sprite. My alcohol intake is probable, I used to go from 10-20 drinks a week, mainly on the weekend, not every day. But now I'm one or two drinks a week if not one or two drinks a month. It's just understanding that this bag of water that is facilitating your flow state.  we're talking about Maslow, we've referenced a book that I've given to you, and for that hierarchy of needs to be met. For that self-actualization state, you can't. It's the foundation. Let's get the body in check. Go to the store, buy yourself some fruits and veggies, get yourself some water, then we can take the next step up. 

Brian 46:22 But it can't be that simple, right? 

Keegan 46:23 It's not that simple. It's just step one. It's y equals mx plus p. This is just the x.

Brian 46:30 Yeah, but I was joking because I think it is that simple in some cases, it's like just stop eating all the processed drinks and foods and just get back to foods and vegetables and water

Keegan 46:43 If you're mad at your spouse because they didn't do the dishes, but you're miserably hungry. In that moment. You haven't eaten all day. Before you go talk to him about the dishes. Just make a sandwich and see how angry you are. I don't know. Because most of my anger is that simple. Most of Keegan's anger is that simple.

Brian 47:05 To get a drink of water? 

Keegan 47:07 Just yeah. Hey, deal with it in two minutes. Take a walk. 

Brian 47:11 Wow. What a huge realization.

Keegan 47:14 Im still trapped. I'm still in those states. This method, man, you're distracted. Like just snap. Just the other day, maybe like a week ago, I'm trying to get ready to go on this date. lock my key in my car. I'm not even home. There's no spare available and I get short with my dad. Because he offers to help but he just calls triple A. Then he's watching me try to fish my hook through my door frame and rather than coming and helping me he just reminds me every two minutes that hey, they're 10 minutes out. Hey, they're eight minutes up. Hey, they're six minutes out. I snapped. Thank you for the updates, Dad. Get the hell out of here, please. Then jeez, okay, wow, Keegan. Just go and fucking walk dude. So, I took a walk on the block. Came back and the triple A guy was there. I had my keys and got to my date. It's embarrassing, right? I'm embarrassed about these experiences.

Brian 48:10 What's embarrassing is the number of times that we don't catch that and we live our whole lives like that and we destroy relationships with people that are trying to help us because we can't get a drink of water or take a walk around the block.

Keegan 48:22 Yeah, or if it is more, if it's not that simple. Like, Keegan, you're mad because there's a really serious conversation that you need to have with a loved one. It's been weighing on you for six months and that's what's in the way and no amount of water foods going to get that taken care of, like, I'm not ignorant to these, but Jesus, a lot of the time, is it that simple.

Brian 48:44 So that leads us into the next part of the meditation. What's your meditation like now? You've used that term and seems like a different way.

Keegan 48:55 No, I do use it with a lot of vagueness and not to be disingenuous to the people who actually meditate with real practice. But I think because I'm actively engaged in consuming a lot of Eastern philosophy from a lot of different sources. I get a lot of different answers and so a lot of different answers come out. But meditation for me is allowing time. If I don't allow myself an hour, or two at least minimum week, I will allow myself an hour or two minimum a week to sit, meditate and consider my anger. To meditate on why you're angry.  you go throughout the week, and you get these clues. I was mad with so and so here. Here's the checkpoint where I got pissed with that person. Road rage happened on Tuesday and here we are on Saturday. Now, I'm putting myself in timeout. That's more of a self-reflection. That's not meditation. But what allows the meditation state to come up is for me to work through all of the problems that could be holding me up and then meditation is finding the space between those thoughts. Because you're not going to stop thoughts, your brain is going to do its thing. But you can manipulate time with your perception in order to elongate the time within, in between your thoughts. That's the flow state. So, when you're skating, in a flow state, you're not considering lunch, you're not considering your hunger, you're in between thoughts. Man is hard to get there. I try it with sensory deprivation, I try it with-

Brian 50:54 That was what I was thinking of earlier. 

Keegan 50:55 So sensory deprivation, for me, if you think about meditation is, just using my own definition, trying to get to that space in between thoughts. What are the distractions that get in the way, the sound the bus driving down the streets, the light flickering next to you, or the smell of bacon that your mom has, or whatever, you're going to get distracted, by your senses? Now we're going to start to cheat code again, we're going to bypass the old Eastern philosophy and say, okay, if my eyes distract me, we're going to cover them up. If my ears distract me, we are going to put noise cancelling headphones on with some kind of audio that gets me there. We might have a sense, but really, that doesn't. So, here's a good question. In your opinion, what do you believe your strongest sense is out of the five? 

Brian 52:00 Oh, sight.

Keegan 52:01 Sight, and there's, you've probably lost acuity in some of your other senses and that's why you bring yourself there. But, if sight is the strongest sense that you have, or that you believe that you have, I would argue that under the course of a psychedelic or an altered state, your visual acuity would actually be your access point, into a meditative state. So, let me explain this with sensory deprivation, my access sense, I believe is my hearing. I've really good hearing, I love music, and under the influence of psychedelics, most of those more psychedelic experiences, it's an auditory experience. I'm hearing things that aren't actually real. So, put yourself into a state in which all of these stimuli that are gone, and there's nothing. You are left with your brain and your body and darkness I assume. People talk about bad trips. Well, who are you going to blame a bad trip on? If the only thing that you're tripping on is your own brain is what's already living in your head. I find that those forced states of reflection and effort to get into meditation will bring out it'll flush out so quickly all of the distractions in your life.  it is the purest mirror. If my ears aren't deceiving me, my eyes aren't deceiving me. My thoughts aren't really, what is getting in the way? Well, jeez, this is all, this is what it is. It's the conversation that you neglected to have with your dad about how you don't want to participate in the family religion anymore. Sorry, I'm not sure if that answered the question. 

Brian 54:06 Yeah. 

Keegan 54:07 The sensory deprivation is literally allowing that kind of making yourself the hamster in a thought experiment and saying, What will you do when there's nothing to do? Literally nothing to do? Your brain is more active than it's ever been in its life under the course of psychedelics, you're trying to slow it down. Let's observe. There's a key and observing again.

Brian 54:38 Okay. So, when you give me the details on you put on the headphones, you literally blindfold or just close your eyes. You go into a dark room, obviously your make sure you're home alone or you find a place where you can be alone.

Keegan 54:52 Yeah, you hope that you can be alone and not locked in on because that looks weird sometimes. So, I sit in a dark room usually sitting works best for me, rather than on the floor. But in a chair in a comfortable position, you want to feel safe, you want to feel that for one, you're doing a schedule one drug in my case. That's already going to give yourself some issues with trust. But I'm in a completely dark room, usually my garage, which sounds even worse, on unconscious, but I'm in a garage, the lights are completely dark, I'm sitting in a chair. Usually you want to be warm, like with a blanket, but your body's going to try everything it can to stop this. Everything it can. So, you just got to be prepared to fight off those urges. So, it's going to be like you're cold, you're hungry, you have to pee, you forgot to do this, is that candle going to start a fire. So, I sit down in the chair, everything's dark. I put on a headphone, and I use like an audit, I don't use any lyric based audio, it's all really like a white noise, but a little bit more palatable. It's like a flowy white noise thing. At that point, you can't see your hand more than two inches in front of your face. You can't hear anything. The only thing you can feel is this blanket, which feels pretty, there's nothing really tangible about that. Now you're going to try to dive,  I call it scuba diving, like, you're going to go down as deep as you can, in between this thought, or, try to detach yourself from those thoughts or whatever you want to call it. At any point, you get scared or spooked down there, come up for air, turn the light back on. Take your earbuds out.  it's the safest form of meditation for me, because it's hard to get stuck. I don't want to get in those states in a spiral down of depression of anxiety. So, if I start that way, the conditions are so immediately changeable, I can flip on a lie, I can take out the headphones, and I'm back to square one and I'm not freaking out anymore. So, it's a really safe way to get into those altered states, that flow state. Man, my brain does weird shit. Like weird stuff when you don't have anything to look at. So, let's assume that you have nothing to look at. But your eyes are open and your brain is trying to make sense of something. What is it? What would your brain think of? 

Brian 57:40 Your brain needs to fill in the gaps.

Keegan 57:42 It’s trying.

Brian 57:43 If all you have is a big gap?

Keegan 57:45 It's trying its hardest? Is it an Irish castle? What's your setting? Is it a hockey rink? Is it a golf course? What's your brain going to come up with? By the way, your brain is going to flip it every10 seconds. That's going to get you nauseous. You'll be like, well, wait, we were just here. Now we're here. But don't attach, just let it go. Follow it. That's the tough part. That's really tough. It's been exciting and I am not going to advise that the cheat code of psychedelic is the answer for everyone. It's not even answer for me in perpetuity. It's one of the few drugs that as they study it more, the individuals who take it don't express ill will towards it. They just don't really find a need to habitually use it. Does that make sense? It's like, oh, yeah, I might get back around to that. Six months, a year, six years. I'm not attached. It was great. I don't necessarily need it. That fascinates me. That's cool to me. The idea that everybody who tries it knows how good it can be, but yet they understand they don't need it. You don't need it.

Brian 59:08 Well, it seems like it's really good for breakthroughs. You mentioned the trauma, and everything else. If you can get past something. Well, now you're past it. You don't need to get past it again. You're already past it.

Keegan 59:22 To admire yourself for going through it. That's all it's for now as a reflection point.

Brian 59:33 Wow, that's fascinating. Other types of meditation. You mentioned, once a week you sit down for an hour or two and go through your anger. During the day. Do you find yourself just using any meditative type tricks or between conversations You're saying, okay, your voice just went up then what's going on?

Keegan 59:54 Yeah. The meditative tricks that I use are a little bit more hippie, gratitude. This gratitude meditation of I got angry yesterday and rose my voice and everybody in the office heard and I'm not an angry person. So, this gratitude of after that happened, I walked into offices and apologized that hey, sorry to hear that. I'm grateful that that hasn't happened a lot. I'm also grateful of your understanding of me, okay, so now you've apologized you've gone through and so there's your gratitude, sometimes I'm not on point well enough to do that. So, that's might be level five action, we're on level two. So, let's go take a walk at work, I would literally walk out of work, do the block, and I know that everybody has that luxury, but walk around the block, come back and sit down, start the task up again. You might still be angry, but it's this subject object observation now, where once you remove yourself from the physical environment and come back to it, you can observe it as a subjective observer, hopefully. That's I was sitting there in that chair and I was angry. I've now gone on a walk. Will I sit down angry? That's the subject object. I might do it. I still might be pissed. I might choose at that point. Yeah. Fuck that. I'm angry.

Brian 1:01:37 Yeah. I’m still angry. I need to go for another walk. There's no enough time in the day for this walk.

Keegan 1:01:42 You might need a three month walk, Brian. That's a big one. That's one that's rattled you, a loved one's passed or somebody's walked out of your life or you've trust issues. That could be a year Walk. That's fine. It really is.

Brian 1:02:04 I have so many different things I want to come back to and talk about this is awesome. Do you have like a daily routine? You said you get up really early now and you go to bed really early.

Keegan 1:02:16 So, my daily routine got me out of bed early, it got me to bed at a decent hour, every night, I lost 40 pounds. Now I'm at a point where I my body is now used to that. Because I understand that I don't need that, avenue all the time. It's just an avenue that I'm leaning on that I eventually have to get rid of. I get that. That space is still sacred to me. I spend that hour every day in that same chair that I would be smoking, but this time it's reading. Tomorrow, it might be just listening to music, I might wake up and have no energy to read about Eastern philosophy. I have all the energy in the world to listen to the new album that my favorite artists put out. If that's going to get me in between thoughts, or if it's going to get me out of my anger through the morning, I just have to postpone anger. That's my meditation. I'm postponing my anger through that. If I'm a natural state, angry person. I just have to; this is a game. How long can I make it without a trigger? That's the Kickstarter. It's the hour in the morning where let's go through it. You're an angry person. You're going to be aware of that today and we're going to test it we're going to see how far we can make it in the day. Yeah, that was it.

Brian 1:04:24 Exercise.

Keegan 1:04:26 That's a fail. I give myself a D. I love to be active. In fact, this is a separate conversation that you and I will have in the future but I believe the best avenue for exercise for me moving forward will have to come through service. It will have to be in the form of like coaching because I am not intrinsically motivated or interested in my own physical health enough, at least right now. Maybe it was too many times that I turned off my amygdala, but I don't have the ego that I need the body. Unfortunately, with a lot of my peers, that's the motivation and so I just have distaste with the gym. I prefer to in an act of service, as my football team that I helped coach two years ago is running their ladders because the head coach feels that they need to run ladders at the end of practice, I will then participate with them. That's an exercise man and I’m so bad at it. I'm so bad at it, the only time I've ever exercised was when I was forced to do it and when I forgot about myself while doing it. I would love to because that's a great tool. It'd be a great tool for me to get into a meditative state, for me to connect with other people potentially, but I can't bring myself to go into a gym.

Brian 1:06:03 I avoided it for the most part, too. Most of the exercise I got was in coaching and during practices and whatever. I love doing the drills and the games with the players, but didn't get a lot of exercise out of it and Ranger. But that's something that's changed for me a lot in the last couple of years is I started going to this gym and lost some weight and put on some muscle and started feel better about it. But I liked the particular gym that I'm at. I have tried and I've gone to other ones, and I'm like, I couldn't do this.

Keegan 1:06:36 Well, and I've met it's an individual that has gone to it sounds more like a community. 

Brian 1:06:41 Absolutely it is. 

Keegan 1:06:42 That's why you're there.

Brian 1:06:43 Yeah, so I'm wondering if I just got to the right gym, or I hit it at the right time, or Gabby got me up, Gabby and I started doing this nutrition thing at the same time and it was right after I got out of the bishopric. I was looking forward to and I did not feel healthy. I was definitely overweight. I lost about 35 pounds as well. I've gained a little bit of a back. 

Keegan 1:07:09 Maybe muscle.

Brian 1:07:10  Yeah, hopefully, most of it its muscle, but not all of it for sure. But yeah, that's become an important part for me.

Keegan 1:07:17 Well, and the value jeez, you walk out of there with an endorphin release that is unrivaled. Like just physically moving your body.

Brian 1:07:28 Yeah, for sure. I still like the coaching. I like the sunshine. Sunshine is a big win for me. Winters are hard.

Keegan 1:07:36 Me as well. I spent way too much inside in the dark. We know living in where we do geographically, we're not getting for six months out of the year. We are just upgraded. At least I am. I'm not taking my vitamin D or whatever it might be.

Brian 1:07:59 Okay, do you have anything at the top of your head, you want to say

Keegan 1:08:01 No.

Brian 1:08:02  So, looking back. How long ago did you graduate high school? Was it nine years, ten?

Keegan 1:08:09 13 to 22. We're on our ninth year almost. 

Brian 1:08:13 So you haven't gotten your 10 year reunion yet? 

Keegan 1:08:15 No. I'm the same age as your daughter. But we're going to have a 10-year coming up a year from I guess, this month. Looking back at that kid to today, he was exactly where he needed to be and he actually he was instrumental to who I am now.

Brian 1:08:41 Both of those are fantastic realizations. By the way. I think too often, we beat ourselves up. Because we weren't better. We weren't sooner, we didn't know. Now, I think those are great realizations.

Keegan 1:08:52 He is ignorant and naive, and hell of a time and perfect conditions for this. I'm not necessarily like, the happiest person in the world. But I'm cool with what with where he's been able to get me and he relatively looked the same for that slow burn, eight of those nine years, I was relatively the same person in relation to the last year and a half of change. It's been that drastic. So, I love that kid. I loved the missionary. Who is so as we are pivotal? So, different, two ends of the spectrum, right, and the spectrum is probably going to get larger. Wider I mean, and I'd love him.

Brian 1:09:58 Good for you. If you were to talk about the two or three biggest changes between then and now

Keegan 1:10:14 I'm going to give you two answers today. But that's one that will be two different answers. Probably a week from now, when you ask me again. The two biggest catalysts for change. I know the first one was I finished the New Testament on my mission. Whether or not that script is, whether or not those words are factual or not, they were so different than the other two books that I was given that it was enough of a concern for me to that sparked a lot of change. I didn't know that at the time, but man finishing the New Testament was huge, because it was so different than the Old Testament and the Book of Mormon, in my opinion, and then the second change, there's a lot of places that I could give a lot of credit to, I would have to say that that night in the bathtub, I no shit, like held a funeral for this idea of what was Keegan. So, I think it'd be disingenuous to not throw that in the list. But I came out of that bathtub and understood that you are so changed. So, changed, this will never escape you. I could be I'm confident that I could have dementia and remember, that change and so not that the moments were all that dramatic. Maybe the bathtub was dramatic, but they are reflection points that lack any memory loss?

Brian 1:12:16 Really, it's just clear.

Keegan 1:12:19 It’s me. That is those are moments when Keegan so I'm not even going to use that name, when the being that lives within this body overcame the body and understood that there's so much more. You're so much more than what this physical being can allow you to do you know. I've had more of those. But those were two really incredible. Just demolishing my limiting beliefs, bulldozing any idea that I had, that there wasn't going to be enough of anything, of love, of me, of you. The idea that you and I being physically in different locations was going to do anything to the amount of love that we could give each other. Now, there's this, like, the truth that came out of those two experiences there's so impactful that I want to access more of those truths. But I'm to the point where I'm realizing that maybe my glass is full for the time being and that's okay. Like I keep doing psychedelics, and I keep practicing meditation, but I haven't had like a big one in a minute and I think it's because that's my glass is full. I need to sip on this. Because it's good enough. That should be good enough.

Brian 1:14:20 Do you think because you made such a significant breakthrough that if we're being honest, we just don't have that many breakthroughs? We need to do that. That first one is going to obviously be huge and tear down the wall of one world and replace it with another and open up all new possibilities. Once you've done that, what would be the next big barrier that you would have to break down, that's a pretty significant breakthrough. It's not like you can go through and break through that same wall again, you already broke through that wall. It's not there anymore.

Keegan 1:14:59 You might run grasp past that point. The waterline but you don't need to bust through. I'm not going to pretend to know on that one. I think, for me what makes it, because I do analyze and I too observe so many answers. It's only the answers that I don't see coming that are going to slap me across the face that are going to catch my attention in that same way. So, I think to my advantage, I don't know what the next breakthrough I don't even know what the wall looks like. It probably will be, if I were to take a guess it's like, knowing the fact that the tools that I've used to get to this point aren't sustainable. I have responsibilities that will fall onto my shoulders in the future that will put too many things at risk. However, that might be a breakthrough. It'll just be the next thing that gets me there. I think you're right I don't know if there is like another wall other than trying to stay within the walls of understanding.

Brian 1:16:22 No, that's absolutely fair answer. You didn't know that wall was there till you broke through it.

Keegan 1:16:27 I thought I was in the walls of understanding then.

Brian 1:16:30 Yeah. So, how were you going to see the next one coming? You're not, you don't know what it is?

Keegan 1:16:34 I was pretty ignorant. Yeah. I hope if I do find out, if I do get a clearer vision, you're going to be the first person because you're the only one that's ever asked.

Brian 1:16:44 Yeah, I'd love to know what the next level is I've got plenty walls to break through myself. I'm sure. So, big picture what drives Keegan what motivates, what inspires, what guides, what are your overarching beliefs I guess at this point is it Kismet, is it?

Keegan 1:17:24 You caught me in like a low in motivation.

Brian 1:17:30 So yeah, I guess I should say what motivates, what drives, what frames Keegan today? That’s a better question

Keegan 1:17:54 Man, I've been really grateful the last week, even in my low of motivation. There have been two specific individuals who have just absolutely like, taken an interest in me, out of nowhere. Both are mentors and this gratitude for doing that is enough to get me out of bed like he needed me to revisit my resume and to interview with like a few different jobs and preparation for the interview that I'm going to do with his job this mentor of mine and I have no energy, but just the simple fact that somebody's taken interest in me and sees that value. That's what's carrying me today. The overarching belief around that motivation it's been the driving force for me and all things is that I do not deserve the amount of good that I have been privileged to. I deserve good. I do not deserve the amount. I have to give it back. So, the best way I know how to do that right now today is to reinvest as much as I can into myself now because the opportunity to help and be there is going to present itself. I just have to be ready. So, I'm going to, in the meantime, stop worrying about what it's going to look like, if I'm a coach and I get to give back in that way, that would be a great avenue. If I'm a teacher of some sort and I do it that way. It's going to be a great avenue, but it needs to, I am seeking, I'm not seeking I'm contradicting myself, I'm not seeking I'm waiting for that opportunity that I know, I will explode out of a cannon with so much fire, because what's going to motivate me is the help and the understanding and the experience to connect. It's selfish to learn as you teach, because you know, just as well as I do, that teaching aspects is arguably more of a learning experience. You might have a different opinion, but I find that selfishly, teaching is more advantageous for the teacher, more beneficial for the teacher.

Brian 1:21:17 You definitely get a lot out of it, for sure.

Keegan 1:21:21 So, in my giving back, it's going to feed, whatever desire that is selfishly, but I know, it's just too much I've been to beneficial parties have just surrounded me, and I found way too many gold nuggets in my life.

Brian 1:21:51 I think a lot of that is due to the fact that you're looking and you're appreciative of it. I think a lot of people, myself included, are not worthy of all of the good things in their life. But I commend you, because you're aware of it, you are taking more time and being considerate of those great things in your life where a lot of people would take it for granted or not notice them when they happen. So, I think that may be partially, the cause for why you feel a little overwhelmed by it, is because you're seeing it more often than most people because you're looking for it.

Keegan 1:22:35 I'm glad you use the word overwhelmed because I didn't even really realize it till today. But when you asked about this method of meditation, the gratitude, overwhelmed with gratitude that is, I find as painful or as inconvenient as it can be at times. Man, does it get me to an authentic state of being? It's like, ground stop, it just pulls you in magnetizes this gratitude has it. There's nowhere to go. Other than to the flow state and it's you're giving me credit for recognizing it in myself, but the selfish, Brian, I know how beneficial it is.

Brian 1:23:35 As humans I don't think we're very good at recognizing what we should be grateful for. We are surrounded by it and when you take the time to stop and look at it, it is overwhelming. We all struggle, and we all have bad days and we all have our anxiety and depression. If you can focus on even finding one thing to be grateful for, you're going to find 100. There's another aspect of Keegan that really interests me that I haven't seen very often. You brought it up a couple of times today and almost every conversation touches on it at some point. The fact that you have these life mentors, I don't know many people that have a life mentor. They have maybe someone who looks over him at work or a parent and that's about it. You talk about these life mentors quite a bit. How is it that that's become important to you and you have found these life mentors and created those opportunities and why do you think others don't?

Keegan 1:24:49 A lot of gratitude in this. That's news to me that it is a unique thing I didn't know I was unique in that way. However as long as I can remember I have seen the value in people taking time to invest in someone else. The truest form of service and these mentors’ half of them don't even know that there are instrumental in my life and that's my fault I need to reach out. However, there are people who may have been educators, babysitters, coaches, a lot of coaches or friends and it's these funny comments that, I don't know if I'm more in tuned, or if they are more in tuned, or if it's a star aligned kind of moment where we're really matching up but there have been comments said to me by these people or actions made, in which the floodgates of understanding were opened and I had the whole narrative. What the narrative allowed for me in each of these scenarios was just understand, rather unjust or just but understanding and for example, a teacher senior year holding me my yearbook or handing me my yearbook, I walk up to the table. This is a teacher who everybody considers to be a scrooge. You know, she's like, just not she was just angry and just really not connected and yet, I'm really intelligent. Anyway, she hands me my yearbook. As she reaches across the table to hand it to me, I grab it, but she doesn't let go. We have a tug of war. She pulls me back in closely and says, you do not understand your potential. You have no idea. So, a teacher who says nothing to me, for an entire year, decides that that's the moment. She has 700 kids a year. So, there's that one. Then Brian Acord has 1000 Hockey students, former hockey players or lacrosse players or people that he could reach out to I'm under the influence of psychedelics. You'd already been on my minds many, many times before this. I could talk about other instances in which your presence simply the presence was enough to bring me to this moment of gratitude, even the presence of your children was enough. But I was under the influence of psychedelics and you reached out and said, hey, we should grab lunch. There's a lot to be said for me about like, the timing of things and when they happen, but I was particularly in tuned. I think you may have been too, and that was that, I don't need to find the mentors and they seem to just fall in my lap.

Brian 1:29:52 I would disagree with that a little bit because I would argue you see them when they're already there and a lot of people do not. That many people would take lightly that comment from that teacher that maybe you didn't get along with or didn't think you knew and you dealt with them all year and then they said one comment. The next minute, that student would rush out in the hall and completely forget about it and said, Yeah, senior year, let's get yearbooks, let's go get something to eat and just forget that it even happened. I would say there's something very special about Keegan that is aware of those moments and holds them dear and puts them in your heart and allows them to ruminate and become part of you. I think that is very special. I've coached a lot of players and I've reached out to a lot of players, and there aren't many that I have as close of a relationship with or can have these kinds of conversations with, there are a couple. But it's pretty. I would say a lot of them never played the sport later, which is fine. That not part of it. But I don't think they thought back on it. Anyway, the fact that you have so many of these life mentors, even ones that maybe you didn't necessarily know, knew you were there, and only said one thing to you, and you consider them a life mentor and you recognize that and took that as important. I would agree with her by the way. I think when you figure out how you're going to reach out and touch the lives of individual and be mentor to someone else. You're going to affect millions. 

Keegan 1:31:52 I appreciate that. 

Brian 1:31:58 Trick is getting there, right? Where is there? What is it? How do I start?

Keegan 1:32:05 Yeah, it'll come.

Brian 1:32:06 Yeah, it will come because your entire being is directed that way and will find the opportunities that make sense. When you do, that's the spark meeting the powder keg. That's just you're going to be so prepared and ready to go and full of love and understanding and want to be there for people like people who've been there for you or you feel people have been there for you and you recognize that they've been there for you and it's going to be an amazing thing. They're going to be very lucky and you're going to be very lucky.

Keegan 1:32:41 Yeah, I will be. I am lucky, and it's crazy. You bring that up and mentor to other people. I don't see myself as prepared to mentor however, it's cool and I pass on messages to peers that aren't my own. Very rarely does my own opinion carry any weight for somebody, but it's funny, I share some of these insights. They're like, wow, where'd you get that? I liked that. They're like, where did you? It wasn't me. It never was. We're all standing on somebody else's shoulder.

Brian 1:33:20 For sure. We may not remember whose shoulders were on or who said it initially, but it affected us.

Keegan 1:33:26 It's those yearbooks, I'm just looking to hand out some yearbooks for some people, you know? If that's all it is, then that's all it is. But it's got to be that, it's got to be those moments. It's exactly what you're talking about with this podcast, creating avenues of connection and of understanding where we can talk about these universal truths, this universal like, Aha, like, Oh, yeah. I just heard that for the first time in a TED talk. But for some reason, it's embedded in my DNA code is something I've known forever. You are going to bring those out in me and hopefully, vice versus.

Brian 1:34:05 If we're not doing that what's the point of anything?

Keegan 1:34:08 Why are we talking about all these other superficial? I don't know if you share this belief anymore, but at one point, we shared this belief that a life on Earth was somewhat of a choice. Well, let's take a moment to live in that headspace. Why would we choose to come talk about these arbitrary bullshit brands on our shirts? You think we took an incarnation for that purpose? You know what I mean? Like it's just so asinine. It's laughable. That's why you're here. Okay, have fun. I'm busy talking to Brian a quote about universal truths and how to help people and myself. Like, cool and that the freedom of choice, that idea is actually really, really probably one of the coolest perspectives that I've pulled from the past. Let's choose, I'm ready to choose. These choices are either going to fail or they're going to succeed, but let's just go. Let's pursue. Man, that was a big realization. That might be one of the two for me as well. Just knowing that we had a choice. Possibly, maybe not even in the past, literally, we have choices today. If yesterday on this physical Earth was my premortal existence, and tomorrow is this then now we're talking reality, I can be different day in and day out. That's the 24-hour Choice.

Brian 1:36:02 You want to spend the rest of your days talking about brands on T shirt. 

Keegan 1:36:06 No.

Brian 1:36:06 No, not that?

Keegan 1:36:08 Well, it is an avenue for connection. Hockey is an avenue for connection. Brands could be that. Coffee, just beans. We don't really give a shit. Yeah, I hope over the conversation around beans that you can say, wow, this bean reminds me of this truth that I experienced doing this and man, was that incredible. Oh, no kidding. Brian, tell me about this bean. Now I care about a fucking bean.

Brian 1:36:52 This has been great.

Keegan 1:36:53 This has been great. I'm sure we could probably do a five hour long if you want.

Brian 1:36:56 I’m sure we could. Actually, if you like to come back and do it again at some other point if you'd be up for that. 

Keegan 1:37:01 Yeah, let's do it. 

Brian 1:37:03 Thank you so much for being here. 

Keegan 1:37:06 We'll do it again. 

Brian 1:37:07 Not only for the podcasts and being vulnerable and bold and brave, but for being here.

Keegan 1:37:13 No, I'm here talking to coach and that's selfish. 

Brian 1:37:18 On my part?

Keegan 1:37:18 Yeah.

Brian 1:37:20 I really appreciate it. 

Keegan 1:37:21 Of course. I appreciate you.

Brian 1:37:23 I know you got some things to do today. You move into Vegas. Your brother [INAUDIBLE]

Keegan 1:37:27 Brother will be fun. 

Brian 1:37:28 No, it won't be fun. 

Keegan 1:37:29 I'll be emotional, but we'll make the most out of it. Thanks, coach. 

Brian 1:37:33 Thanks.