A conversational YouTube interview between host Josh Trent and guest Steven exploring the idea that consciousness can "collapse reality into the version we want." Steven opens with an anecdote about intentionally changing the behavior of an allegedly aggressive dog to demonstrate this premise. The discussion moves into how the intellect and ego can block simple shifts, cultural programming that equates value with struggle, and the practice of embracing "being nothing" to allow ease. Steven contrasts his 30s (operating from judgment and ego) with later maturity, and recounts a multi-day plant-based cleansing retreat in Ecuador involving chili oil (applied to eyes, perineum/genitals), ginger baths, tobacco cleansing, three days of preparatory rituals, and a seven-hour, eyes-open, silent ceremony where shamans enforce humility.
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That our consciousness is collapsing reality into the version that we're choosing. That sounds strange.
We'll just let that land for a moment.
Yeah, I'll give a fun story. Two months ago, I went to a friend's friend's house. When we arrived, we stopped, parked a car. My friend was like, look, they have a dog. This dog bites everyone. They're going to lock it up in a room, but at some point, the dog's got to pee. When they let the dog out, do not make eye contact with the dog because it will bite you. And I'm being told this, right? And I'm like, okay, so I'm just going to alter reality. So about an hour and a half in, you know, I'm conversing with the owners of this dog and house. They're like, all right, we got to let the dog out. Be still. Don't look at it. They let the dog out. Five minutes later, the dog is in front of me. I'm petting its belly. It's kind of like in a fully submissive position. And the owners are looking at the dog, looking at me like, we've never seen this before. And I go, yeah, we can. We can collapse reality into any version that we want.
So you reorganized the threat that there was no problem to solve, that the dog wasn't.
It's the most. I'm going to go with the. It's the most loving dog. And literally showed up as the most loving dog. This is what we're capable of.
This is so powerful. So I've heard of this concept, and I've. I've shared the concept with you about my father, and you've shared so many ways about this. I think what gets in the way is the mind. The intellect comes in and says, well, it can't be that easy. Yeah, it can't be that easy. Air quotes. The mind is also powerful. So there's this. There's this harmony. You know, we have a mind. We're in a body. We are a spirit connected to that which created us. I get all these things, yet I fumble. I still get attached to the mind. And I. I still say, that can't be that easy.
Yeah. What.
What is that all about? In. In me and in all of us. It's a very human thing.
It is. I mean, just imagine when we were young, our parents didn't come over and say, you know what? Make sure you don't work too hard when you grow up.
Especially not a tiger mom.
Right?
Yeah.
We got the opposite message.
Yeah.
All programming Says, you got to work hard.
Yes.
Nothing comes easy. And then for us to feel enough, it would almost feel. Feel like we didn't accomplish things if it wasn't difficult. And so we just get to laugh at that game in that programming and just recognize that that's a programming, like things can be absolutely instant if we just let go of the need to be important. Yeah. I find that if we just dissolve the need to be important and significant and we just embrace like, you know, when I was still in operation at Immortal, we would talk to companies that want to partner with us. We. My question to the founders would always be, how comfortable are you with being. Being completely insignificant? It's just a great question to kind of see where are they at in their own game of embracing their divine selves, the coder, the player, the ego, all that stuff, as their reaction and response tells me a lot. And so I think the more that we embrace being nothing, the more easy life becomes. It's fascinating, right? And then if we just apply the law of polarity, the opposite of nothing is everything. And so by loving nothing, we're also loving that we are everything, which is God in.
You talked about mass media a lot and the words that they use and how they keep us in the zoo. And you're like, well, there's no zoo. Let's just, there's nothing to fix here. Go back to when you were at 32 and you know, with compassion, with curiosity, with understanding. For that version of Steven.
Yeah.
What did he not know then that the current version of you knows now?
Oh, that's such a good question.
I'm sure you can just hop a timeline and go to him. I've met with my 11 year old. I'm like, hey, you don't understand. Here's something easy, right? What was that?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, in my 30s, I was for sure still operating from a problem solution perspective, first and foremost. Yeah, I was definitely still judging because I remember so nine years ago was when I committed to. So I was early 40s, I just committed to not using good, bad, right, wrong, positive and negative. So my 30s, I was definitely still judging. In my 30s, I definitely was healing and treating and helping people as a oblique way for me to feel better than others. It was for my own ego for sure. I was still operating from that perspective. It was very shadowy. That didn't come up until like early 40s. Like, oh, right back then I was still seeing people in terms of hierarchy. Wow, there's so much ahead. Right? There's like so Advanced in their spiritual practices or in their healing practices or whatever. So I still saw some kind of hierarchy. Yeah, I think those would be the main ones that I've continuously worked on dissolving.
And even recently you shared with me, you went, I believe it was Peru or somewhere in a cave, and they were using like hot chili pepper. And in your different gates, can you tell us about that? There was still. What I'm saying is I respect your viewpoint of there's nothing to fix. We've already won, you know, we're already here. There is no zoo. I intellectually understand that and a part of me understands it as well. That's not just my mind. So I just want to preface that and respect that.
Yeah.
Yet we still have at times residue of stuff that we thought we've healed. I mean, that's happened for me for sure.
Sure, sure.
Can you. Can you walk us through that? Because it seemed to me like when you had shared with me earlier that there was still some resid from even potentially connected to 32 and onward.
I don't want to suggest that you get to a point where you're just not doing anything. We will always spiritually, emotionally, mentally evolve forward. We just evolve forward from what I call the current version of divine perfection to the next version of divine perfection.
I like that.
Which is different than, I'm not there yet. I need to get there. Yeah, right. And so when I went to Ecuador, when that opportunity was offered, it didn't come from a, this will be a great mechanism to heal me, to uplevel me, to improve me, to awaken me. When that offer was presented, my entire knowing, without knowing what the program actually was, was a yes. Right. So there was no intellect. There was no, like, oh, got it. This is what we're going to do. This is what we're going to learn. And yes, that's exactly what I need because I'm trying to do this. None of that happened.
It was just curiosity for your own evolution, not your own fixing and healing. Because there was. There was no problem. Sure.
Curiosity. And then without thinking, my body was like, yes, I just said yes. In fact, I didn't know what we were doing until we got there. Right. And so. And you know, I signed up three months. For three months, I had no idea what we're doing. Just like I knew it's a yes. And so I'm going, of course, when we got there, then we did, you know, the chili, you know, in our eyes and upper butts and our penises.
Wait, you got to Please share that.
This is so.
This is such a cool story.
Okay, so first, I'll preface it with. At the end of the experience, the. The student of the shaman that was there. Right. Was like, you know, this isn't like, spiritual entertainment. Meaning he was hinting at that. I. What I'm about to share. I don't want to come across, like, in any way that this is, like, bragging in terms of what's happened. I'm just kind of sharing what. What happened. Yeah, it's very important to kind of keep that energy clean. So. Yeah, so I didn't know what I was getting into. But when we arrived, then we found out we're going through this deep spiritual cleansing process. Right. And so. And part of that cleansing process involved using all kinds of different plants. Right? Chili. Right. The chili oil was put in our eyes to clarify our thoughts because it was so painful, you. You literally couldn't think for 15 minutes. All I could experience was pain and centeredness in my mind. There was no thoughts just because of the intensity of the pain. And then they put the chili oil, you know, on Q tips, upper butts. That was designed to clean our root chakra. They rub the chili oil. Rub the chili oil on our genitals. And that was designed to clean our. Our sexual or, you know, second chakra, basically. And then we. We bathe in ginger. We smoked and swallowed a lot of tobacco smoke, using tobacco to clean. And we did about three days of these cleaning rituals before we jumped into the actual ceremony, right. Where we sat with, you know, some of our plant elders. And unlike any other ceremony where you ingest these plants and you have your vision and you integrate, this was you ingest the plants, you keep your eye open, you sit in circle, complete silence, and you basically just maintain complete humility, humbleness, and focus without talking for seven hours straight. And anytime that you deviate, the shamans can notice this, and they will basically scream at you and say, you need to come back to centerness. You need to let go of your ego. And so when I went through it the first hour, I was basically being scolded for being arrogant and egotistical. Yeah. Wow. Yeah.
And what did you learn from that?
That I was arrogant and egotistical.
Whoa.
Whoa.
So you love that episode. You'll love the one on the screen. Click it and enj.
