Before my journey
For most of my adult life, I have been a builder, entrepreneur, husband, father, and provider.
I was always moving. Building businesses. Solving problems. Taking care of people. Thinking about work. Thinking about tomorrow. Thinking about what needed to happen next.
I thought I knew myself pretty damn well. I thought I had dealt with most of my shit. I hadn’t.
There were things I had carried for years without fully understanding how much they were affecting me—my past, relationships, anxiety, hurt, people I had not completely forgiven, and things I had not forgiven myself for.
Eventually, my journey led me to ibogaine in Mexico. I did not know exactly what I was going to find. I certainly did not expect it to change the direction of my life.
Looking at what I was carrying
What I experienced with ibogaine forced me to look at myself differently. I looked at my past. My relationships. The things I was carrying. The people I needed to forgive. And the things I needed to forgive myself for.
Something changed. In the days immediately afterward, one of the things that struck me most was how quiet my mind became.
Work was still there. My responsibilities had not disappeared. My family still needed me. My businesses still existed. The outside world had not magically changed. But something inside me had.
For the first time in a very long time, I was not consumed by what I had to do next. I was not constantly worrying about work. I was not carrying the same noise.
Pure love. Pure peace. Pure joy.
I remember simply being outside, feeling the cool air, and experiencing something completely ordinary in a completely different way. I felt present.
And almost immediately, another thought started coming to me: How do I help other people?
The other side
I started thinking about how many people I knew who had been saying for years: I need to change something. I need to let something go. I know there’s shit I need to deal with.
I had been one of those people. Now I had experienced something I could not simply forget about and go back to life as if nothing had happened. I wanted people to know there might be another side to what they were carrying.
The experience itself is not the entire journey.
Coming home
Eventually, normal life comes back. Stress comes back. Work comes back. Your triggers come back. Your relationships are still there. Your responsibilities are still there.
I started becoming afraid of losing what I had learned and becoming the same person I had been before the journey. That forced me to start asking different questions.
What still triggers me? What have I not dealt with? What am I still carrying? Why do I react the way I do? How do I become more patient with my children? How do I become more present with my family? Where did the walls in my relationships come from? Are they protecting me from old hurt—or preventing me from experiencing something better?
How do I actually bring what I learned into everyday life?
That is when I began understanding the importance of integration. The medicine may show you something. Then you have to bring it home.
Into your marriage. Into the way you parent. Into the way you react when you are angry. Into your relationships. Into your work. Into the decisions you make. Into ordinary Tuesday mornings when there is no retreat, no ceremony, and no medicine.
That is where the real work begins. I am still doing that work.
My experience was profound. It did not permanently fix me, and it does not prove that another person will have the same experience. Transformation requires continued personal work, honest reflection, support, and integration.
Why I created Pō a Ao
After my experience, I started researching. Ibogaine led me to questions about psilocybin, ayahuasca, ketamine, MDMA-assisted therapy, DMT, 5-MeO-DMT, and other approaches.
I discovered an enormous problem. The information is everywhere. Research is in one place. Retreats are somewhere else. Clinics make their own claims. People tell incredible personal stories. Social media says one thing. Medical professionals sometimes say another. Indigenous and traditional practices have histories that deserve to be understood and respected.
Someone who is simply looking for help has to determine: What is real? What is hype? What is supported by research? What are the risks? What medications can interact? Who can I trust? Where is this legal? How do I know whether a clinic or retreat is legitimate? How do I prepare? What happens afterward?
I realized that the resource I wanted did not exist in the way I wanted it to exist. So I decided to build it.
From darkness into light
Pō a Ao represents the transition from darkness into light. For me, darkness does not mean that someone is broken. Darkness can be the things we have not seen yet. The things we avoid. The things we have buried. The things we have carried for so long that we no longer realize we are carrying them.
Moving toward the light means becoming willing to look. To understand. To forgive. To change. To become more conscious of how we live and how we treat the people around us.
Pō a Ao is deeply personal to me because Hawaiʻi is where I was born and raised. The name connects where I come from with what this journey came to represent in my life.
Ibogaine, iboga, ayahuasca, psilocybin, peyote, San Pedro, and other plant or psychedelic traditions are not Hawaiian practices merely because this platform has a Hawaiian name. Each medicine and tradition deserves to be described in its own correct historical and cultural context.
What I want this to become
I want Pō a Ao to become the resource I wish I had when I started searching. One trusted place where someone can learn before deciding, understand the medicines and research, recognize risk and red flags, find qualified professionals, and make a more informed decision about their own path.
Pō a Ao should never tell everyone that psychedelics are the answer. They are not.
My journey started with ibogaine. Pō a Ao is what came home with me.