Inspired by his recent post about receiving religious freedom tax exempt status, I invited Ian Wallin of Ashland's Psilo Sangha for an interview to share his story of the process of setting up a religious ministry for psilocybin sacraments. We met at Ian's downtown Ashland office where he shared his emotionally raw and surprising story of attempting to work through two different psilocybin assisted services facilitator training programs for the state of Oregon, which did not go well, to put it bluntly. In this lengthy and very personal interview, Ian gives us an intimate inside look at some of the problems in the state-run program, and how it inspired him to take his mission into his own hands and make Psilo Sangha official.

And here's an additional statement from Ian: "I'd like to start by saying thanks again, Martin, for giving me the opportunity to share my experience in creating Psilo Sangha and giving me the opportunity to introduce our church to the community. I want to give a big shout out to our amazing team and board of directors, Jaron Riddle, Anna keppen, Dani Thomas, Urith Davis, and Caleb Upperton, along with all of our beautiful supporters. We're an eclectic group from different backgrounds, ethnicities, sexual orientations, and gender identities, and I'm just extremely thrilled we've found each other and united in support of this spiritual work and practice. I also want to bow and thank my mom, Jaymie Lujan, for being so supportive of me as I've tripped and stumbled and crawled and dusted myself off along this path. We've often had a difficult relationship but this medicine has been very healing for both of us. Our board is going to visit her where she lives in Oaxaca next year, and she's going to connect us with a traditional curandera, in support of our efforts to better honor and understand the indigenous roots of these practices. I know we're all really excited to deepen our relationship with this medicine and hopefully build a bridge with that community in Oaxaca."