Understanding the Long-term Impacts of Marijuana Use
The focal point of our discussion today centers on the profound insights regarding the detrimental effects of marijuana, as elucidated by Dr. Raymond Wiggins in his recently published work, "Weeding out the Myths about Marijuana." Dr. Wiggins, drawing from his extensive expertise as both a medical professional and a minister, provides a compelling analysis of marijuana's impact on mental and physical health, revealing alarming statistics regarding its correlation with increased risks of anxiety, psychosis, and heart issues. Through a personal narrative intertwined with professional observations, he underscores the critical need for a reevaluation of prevailing perceptions surrounding marijuana as a benign substance. Our conversation delves into the societal implications of marijuana legalization, as well as the spiritual dimensions that inform Dr. Wiggins' perspective on addiction and recovery. Ultimately, we aspire to illuminate the urgent necessity of addressing these misconceptions in our communities for the betterment of public health and well-being.
The discourse unfolds with a profound exploration of personal adversity articulated through a poignant anecdote from Dr. Raymond Wiggins' formative years. A significant piece of advice from a mentor, encapsulated in the phrase 'a calm sea never made a skillful sailor,' serves as a thematic cornerstone for the discussion. This metaphor underlines the essential role of challenges in personal development and resilience. Dr. Wiggins reflects on his own life, particularly the adversities faced by his family concerning substance abuse, and how these experiences have equipped him to minister to others in similar predicaments. The conversation deftly weaves between personal narrative and broader societal implications, emphasizing the importance of using one's trials as a foundation for helping others navigate their own challenges. As the dialogue progresses, Dr. Wiggins recounts his diverse academic and professional journey, transitioning from a business degree to a medical career in oral and maxillofacial surgery, ultimately embracing a calling towards ministry. His multifaceted background enriches the conversation, highlighting the intersection of medicine and spirituality in addressing contemporary issues surrounding substance use and addiction, particularly in relation to marijuana.
Takeaways:
- The best piece of advice received was that a calm sea never made a skillful sailor, highlighting the importance of adversity in personal growth.
- The speaker shared personal experiences with family adversity related to addiction, emphasizing that such experiences can prepare one to help others.
- The podcast discussed the significant changes in the medical field, specifically in anesthesia, over the past three decades, including advancements in medication and imaging technology.
- The speaker's new book addresses misconceptions about marijuana and discusses its negative impact on mental health, including increased anxiety and risk of psychosis.
- Legalization of marijuana is argued to lead to an increase in addiction, psychiatric issues, and other social problems, countering popular belief.
- The importance of incorporating biblical principles into discussions around marijuana use was emphasized, suggesting that spiritual guidance can aid in overcoming addiction.
Links referenced in this episode:
Transcript
Foreign.
Speaker B:Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker B:How you doing today, my friend?
Speaker A:I am great.
Speaker A:How are you, Keith?
Speaker B:I'm good.
Speaker B:It's good to have you on.
Speaker B:Looking forward to talking about this important topic today.
Speaker B:So we're going to jump right in with some great conversation.
Speaker A:Glad to do it.
Speaker A:Glad to be here and honored to be here.
Speaker B:So we're going to start with my favorite question first.
Speaker B:What's the best piece of advice you've ever received?
Speaker A:There was a gentleman in my church growing up.
Speaker A:He was our guitar player, a great man.
Speaker A:He was about 10 years older than me and kind of a mentor to me.
Speaker A:And he told me one time, and I don't remember the conversation other than what he told me is that a calm sea never made a skillful sailor.
Speaker A:And I've always remembered that.
Speaker A:And I found it to be so true.
Speaker A:You know, any adversity in life, you don't like it while you're going through it.
Speaker A:But man, you look back on it and you know that you've grown and wouldn't be the person that you are today without it.
Speaker A:And for instance, the adversity that I've seen in my family with drugs and marijuana, alcohol, etc, I wouldn't be able to minister to people today in those situations had that not happened to me and my family.
Speaker B:That is so true that those, those ways that God has used those things in our life to prepare us for what's next I think are just so critical.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker B:So, Dr.
Speaker B:Wayman Wiggins, tell us a little bit about your background.
Speaker B:Kind of walk us through how you, because you have a very diverse background, MDIV, MD.
Speaker B:So kind of walk us through your, your journey.
Speaker A:Well, my first degree was a business degree from smu.
Speaker A:And I thought I was going to go into business with my dad.
Speaker A:He had a construction company.
Speaker A:He was successful through the seventies and most of the eighties, but I was about to graduate in the late eighties from, from college.
Speaker A:And he came to me just literally a few months beforehand and he said, hey son, I am starving right now and if you come into business with me, you're going to starve as well.
Speaker A:And I don't want that for you.
Speaker A:And I recommend that you look for something else.
Speaker A:And I didn't want to hear that, but I knew that he loved me and I knew that he was telling me what was best for me.
Speaker A:So I started looking at other things and I saw that oral and maxillofacial surgeons got to fix cleft lip and palate and do other craniofacial stuff.
Speaker A:And I thought Hey, I thought that's what I would be doing if I did that.
Speaker A:And so I thought that's a way to help people and I just thought that would be amazing.
Speaker A:So I went into that field and most OMSs get both their dental degree and their medical degree because it's kind of the bridge between the two.
Speaker A:And so I got that.
Speaker A:And then later on, about 10 years ago I started really.
Speaker A:I've always felt a call to ministry but I just decided to at that point really yield to it more and you know, a deeper calling and, and decided to get my M.
Speaker A:Div And I went to Regent University and it was a great experience.
Speaker A:I learned a lot.
Speaker A:I feel much more comfortable ministering, writing, delivering sermons, lectures, writing books, et cetera.
Speaker A:It was great.
Speaker B:So how do you balance all those different interests with all the things you have going on in your life?
Speaker A:Well, if you ask my wife, she'll tell you it's probably not very balanced and she's probably right.
Speaker A:I burn the candle at both ends.
Speaker A:I have four children as well and a full time job in practice as well as a lot of ministry commitments, a whole lot more.
Speaker A:And I was just asked to take another role here just this past Friday, which I'm praying about it but I can't imagine that I wouldn't ex.
Speaker A:Wouldn't step into that new role as well.
Speaker A:So the good Lord's doing great things through, through my ministry and I'm so thankful, just odd at what he's doing in my life and thankful.
Speaker B:So it kind of reminds me of the, the Spider man phrase.
Speaker B:With great talent comes great responsibility.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:One of my mentors told me that, that you know, if you are, are blessed then you need to be blessing other people.
Speaker A:He was the leader of the residency program that I was in.
Speaker A:Mark Wong, great man.
Speaker A:And he told me that.
Speaker A:So it's kind of the, the same thing.
Speaker A:It just a little different wording.
Speaker B:Yeah, I kind of, I kind of fudged a little bit on the Spider man line, but it kind of applied to this, this situation.
Speaker A:Yep, absolutely.
Speaker B:So you've been on the front lines of patient care for nearly three decades.
Speaker B:Can you share some of the most significant changes you've seen in a medical field during that time?
Speaker A:Yeah, especially well in anesthesia, the anesthesia side of things.
Speaker A:Most oral and maxillofacial surgeons do.
Speaker A:The vast majority of our procedures are under general anesthetic and I've seen a big change in the meds that we've used.
Speaker A:The drugs, the anesthetic drugs, they're much cleaner, fewer side effects, they're shorter acting, they're a lot safer.
Speaker A:That's a big difference that I've seen.
Speaker A:And that all happened around 20, 25 years ago.
Speaker A:And then the imaging that we use is way different.
Speaker A:You know, when I started, we were using plain films for, for radiographs.
Speaker A:I would, you know, we had a dark room in our office and the staff would take the, the radiograph, they would take it to the dark room and develop it.
Speaker A:Well now, of course, everything's instant, it's all digital.
Speaker A:And I have a CT scanner in my office and you know, now I can go into surgery.
Speaker A:You, years ago, I would go in literally blind.
Speaker A:I, you know, it's, I don't even know how we did it back then, but, but we did.
Speaker A:You know, the first decade that I was doing this, I was blind.
Speaker A:But now I go in there and I know before I get in there the precise location of, you know, if there's a lesion, for instance, a cyst or a tumor or something like that in a jawbone or, you know, inside, in the face or whatever, I can know the precise location and, and the exact dimensions of it, you know, down to 100th of a millimeter, how, how big it is.
Speaker A:So that's a, that's a huge difference between now and 30 years ago.
Speaker B:So let's get into why I kind of had you come on and you have a new book out, Weeding out the Myths about Marijuana.
Speaker B:What motivated you to delve into that topic and write a book about it?
Speaker A:Well, there's a professional side, first of all.
Speaker A:About 10 years ago, I, along with many of my medical colleagues, began seeing that many people were becoming much more difficult to sedate.
Speaker A:We were using three to four times more propofol for these total IV anesthetics.
Speaker A:And people were often still awake and struggling and even fighting us.
Speaker A:And we didn't understand what was happening.
Speaker A:It was happening mostly in young people, but not exclusively.
Speaker A:And, and after several years of study, we determined that it was marijuana use that was causing that.
Speaker A:And then we saw that these patients were having much more anxiety.
Speaker A:They were taking 58% more post operative pain medication.
Speaker A:That's the professional side and then the personal side.
Speaker A:I come from a large family and there are just so many people that have been addicted to drugs, alcohol, et cetera.
Speaker A:And unfortunately, I've witnessed the devastating effects in my family leading to premature death in some of them.
Speaker A:Three of my cousins, I have no doubt would be here today if not for marijuana.
Speaker A:One died of a Sudden heart attack.
Speaker A:After smoking it Heavily for about 30 years, two others started with marijuana and moved on to other drugs.
Speaker A:But if not for marijuana, they wouldn't have died from those other drugs.
Speaker A:And then a few years ago, another close family member, a very close family member, was headed in the right direction.
Speaker A:He grew up going to church.
Speaker A:He went to a Christian school when he was young.
Speaker A:He graduated high school and went to college with a young man that he had grown up with.
Speaker A:They were in youth group together at church, but they got to school and got in with a group of guys who were smoking marijuana.
Speaker A:And they thought, hey, everybody is doing it.
Speaker A:Everybody seems to be okay, so why not?
Speaker A:And so they, they started smoking it as well.
Speaker A:And the second time they did this, this young man had a psychotic episode and he thought people were chasing him.
Speaker A:He was displaying very bizarre behavior.
Speaker A:He didn't know his own identity.
Speaker A:And he was taken to a psychiatric hospital and doctors told our family that he might never be the same.
Speaker A:He was released, but unfortunately he was never able to return to school.
Speaker A:So I, I began investigating the subject and what I found really shocked me.
Speaker A:What I found, you know, what I had heard from pop culture and most of marijuana being safe and benign just wasn't true.
Speaker A:And so I started speaking about what I was finding.
Speaker B:So you'd mentioned your research.
Speaker B:What are some of the most shocking things you found, your research on effects of marijuana?
Speaker A:There's, there's a lot of them.
Speaker A:The, probably the three most shocking are the greatly increased risk of a suicide attempt, especially in young people, somewhere between three to three and a half to nine times the risk of a suicide attempt.
Speaker A:The risk of psychosis is up to six times normal in marijuana users.
Speaker A:There's a huge study about that.
Speaker A:And then the risk of heart attack.
Speaker A:You know, until my cousin had that heart attack, I hadn't even really thought about that.
Speaker A:I looked into it a little bit because the other incident happened just several months before that.
Speaker A:And so I was already looking at marijuana.
Speaker A:But when I started looking into heart attack, there's a five times risk of a heart attack for an hour after smoking marijuana.
Speaker A:I had no idea, even as a doctor that that was the case.
Speaker B:So why is it that we're told all around that marijuana is a safe drug and it's not a gateway drug and it's okay, and let's legalize it because it really is harmless.
Speaker B:Why are people.
Speaker B:I shouldn't say, you can't tell if a.
Speaker B:Why is that narrative being pushed so much?
Speaker A:I think it's a profit Motive.
Speaker A:I just got back from a conference in D.C.
Speaker A:i was able to speak at that conference, the Good Drug policy conference in D.C.
Speaker A:and so many of the people there were telling us the profit motive behind this.
Speaker A:You know, if there wasn't a huge profit motive.
Speaker A:Think about it this way.
Speaker A:Florida Amendment 3 that they were trying to push to get it legalized in Florida, which thankfully failed.
Speaker A:One Canadian company, just one Canadian company, put $100 million, over $100 million into that referendum trying to get it legalized.
Speaker A:If there wasn't a huge profit motive there, they wouldn't have done that.
Speaker A:And I also heard at that conference that George Soros has put $70 million into it, into the cannabis industry.
Speaker A:So, you know, these billionaires that, that already have a lot of money but are wanting to make more money on the backs of our children, you know, they're, they're putting a lot of money into this.
Speaker B:That is, that is shocking.
Speaker B:So, so kind of give us an overview of your book.
Speaker B:What are the topics that you cover and how do you lay the book out for those who pick this up?
Speaker A:Well, I, I start out talking about the, the economic and societal impacts of it.
Speaker A:And then I, the, the medical impacts, both physical and mental health.
Speaker A:I talk about the problems with the, with the brain, with the heart, with the lungs, with the immune system.
Speaker A:And then I go into the, the mental health effects, the increased suicide, the increased schizophrenia and anxiety, et cetera, even personality disorders and substance use disorders, of course.
Speaker A:And then I, in the expanded edition, I go into the biblical side of things too, and I talk about what the Bible says about it.
Speaker A:And even though the Bible doesn't use the words cannabis or marijuana, it does have a lot to say about this subject.
Speaker B:Are you getting any pushback from your research, from the medical profession about this topic?
Speaker A:You know, I really haven't, not from the medical profession.
Speaker A:The pushback that I get is from a lot on social media.
Speaker A:There's just a lot of trolls out there and they're, they're not people that are, that have expertise in the area.
Speaker A:The, the medical community has been overwhelmingly supportive because we see it, no matter what specialty we're in, we're seeing the devastating effects.
Speaker A:Whether it's ER doctors, I'm getting a lot of feedback from them.
Speaker A:Great feedback.
Speaker A:Neurologists, people that, that are our therapist and psychologists, LPCs, they're all giving me great feedback.
Speaker A:And in fact, a very prominent neurologist wrote the forward for my book and she just raved about it.
Speaker A:Also recently, just a couple of weeks ago, A doctor told me that anytime someone asks her about marijuana or for medical marijuana, she just says, hey, this is the book you need.
Speaker A:And she gives them the link to the book and asks them to do that because she's not willing to give that.
Speaker B:I'm curious.
Speaker B:Before we ran across you in the summit, I really have not heard many doctors ringing the alarm bells about marijuana.
Speaker B:Why is that?
Speaker A:I think there's so much pushback.
Speaker A:And there's also, like I told you, even as a doctor, I didn't understand the effects.
Speaker A:I kind of believed what I heard from pop culture and the media before I really started digging into this.
Speaker A:And I, I don't think it's, it's.
Speaker A:People are.
Speaker A:I, I don't think it, that it's, that they don't care about it.
Speaker A:They just don't understand the risk.
Speaker A:And when they really start looking into it, they, they do understand the risk.
Speaker A:Now, like I said, ER doctors, there, there's, there's a lot of specialists, er doctors, neurologists, psychiatrists, they understand the effects for the most part, but a lot of other specialists, yeah, we see some of the effects, but then, you know, they just don't really understand and they don't want the pushback.
Speaker A:Honestly, some of them, they.
Speaker A:You get a lot of pushback when you start pushing in this direction.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker B:So do you have a specific case example from your practice that illustrates, kind of.
Speaker B:You talked about your, your relative.
Speaker B:But are there other case studies that you have that you've.
Speaker B:From your practice that talk about the adverse effects of marijuana?
Speaker A:Yeah, I, I see people with significant anxiety all the time.
Speaker A:And at this point, I know a lot of times that that that's due to marijuana.
Speaker A:These young people that, that have just an incredible amount of anxiety.
Speaker A:I pretty much know that they're using marijuana.
Speaker A:Not, not always.
Speaker A:They, they may have other psychiatric issues, but a lot of times that's, that's the case.
Speaker A:And one thing that I see, at least on a weekly basis and sometimes even a couple of weeks ago, I had two in one day.
Speaker A:But I see that it takes so much more propofol to keep patients sedated.
Speaker A:You know, the, I had a patient that, that told me, no, I don't use marijuana.
Speaker A:And I suspected that he did.
Speaker A:I suspected that he was not telling me the truth.
Speaker A:Really nice young man.
Speaker A:But, you know, he didn't want me to know that he was using.
Speaker A:Well, I gave him the normal amount of propofol.
Speaker A:He was still wide awake.
Speaker A:I gave him half again what I had given him before.
Speaker A:He was still completely awake, you know, just barely, barely relaxed.
Speaker A:I gave him some more, and I said, hey, do you use marijuana?
Speaker A:And I know I knew what the answer.
Speaker A:At least I knew the what the answer should be.
Speaker A:And he told me, oh, oh, yeah, all the time.
Speaker A:I use three or four times a day.
Speaker A:And then when he was fully awake again, he would only admit to rarely using.
Speaker A:He backed off on what he had told me.
Speaker A:But I know that when he told me that he uses three or four times a day, that's really the truth.
Speaker A:And it's funny that even my staff can tell now.
Speaker A:They know.
Speaker A:Users, you don't always know, but you have a really good feel for it, and we can tell.
Speaker A:Okay, we need extra help in the room.
Speaker A:We know that this patient's going to be a difficult sedation, because even though they're not telling us that they use, we know they do.
Speaker B:The myth is that marijuana, if you are anxious, marijuana will help to calm you down.
Speaker B:So people will say, I use marijuana because it keeps me calm.
Speaker B:And now you're telling us that it actually increases anxiety, so the more anxious you are, the more marijuana you probably need because you think it calms you down.
Speaker A:Exactly.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:There's so many things, so many directions I could go with with that statement and the question there.
Speaker A:But number one, marijuana causes.
Speaker A:It almost doubles your risk of general anxiety disorder.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker A:It's a 92% increase.
Speaker A:So, yes, when you're on it, you have that dopamine hit, you feel good, at least for most people.
Speaker A:But even some people when they're.
Speaker A:They have significant anxiety.
Speaker A:But definitely when you come down, then you have more anxiety than you would have had had you not used.
Speaker A:And it all has to do with dopamine?
Speaker A:Yes, the.
Speaker A:The marijuana works on the cannabinoid receptors, you know, in the brain and elsewhere in the body.
Speaker A:But ultimately it leads to a.
Speaker A:A boost in your dopamine, which is the pleasure chemical of the body.
Speaker A:Well, when you come down from that, your body now thinks, okay, I have to.
Speaker A:I have too much dopamine, so I need to produce less dopamine, and I need to have less sensitivity to dopamine as well.
Speaker A:So now without that extra hit of marijuana, now you're feeling like, you're feeling horrible, you're feeling more anxious, you have more depression.
Speaker A:And so you need that hit, you need that marijuana now just to feel normal.
Speaker A:And without it, all the psychiatric issues that.
Speaker A:That we see with it and the addiction occur.
Speaker B:So being also a minister, how do you incorporate biblical principles into your marrow, into a talk about marijuana use and to kind of help treat people who are dealing with marijuana.
Speaker A:Well, I, I have a, an expanded edition of my book, Weeding out the Myths About Marijuana.
Speaker A:There's, there's a, there's a standard edition which only has secular information.
Speaker A:You know, it's for, for public schools and law enforcement agencies and, and people that, that don't want to look at the spiritual side of things.
Speaker A:But the expanded edition has three extra chapters and woven throughout the whole book is a biblical and spiritual perspective because I know that when people ignore that side of their life, it often leads to failure when they attempt to overcome addiction.
Speaker A:And so I like to talk about that biblical and spiritual side of things.
Speaker A:I give six reasons, biblical reasons in the book that people shouldn't use marijuana, for instance, it makes you a slave to sin.
Speaker A:Addiction is slavery.
Speaker A:And I use Galatians 5, one which talks about it is for freedom that Christ has set us free.
Speaker A:Stand firm and don't let yourself be burdened again with the yoke of slavery.
Speaker A:And we know that 30 to 46%, 30% overall of all people who use marijuana are addicted and can't stop.
Speaker A:46% of young people are addicted and can't stop.
Speaker A:And those are CDC statistics.
Speaker A:So I use that in many more scriptures.
Speaker A:God wants that.
Speaker A:He wants to be our source of peace and our joy.
Speaker A:There's a lot of scriptures that talk about that.
Speaker A:And then I go into the, the fact that, you know, God calls us to be sober at all times.
Speaker A:And there's a, there's a lot of scriptures.
Speaker A:Paul wrote scriptures to, to Titus and, and to Timothy, to, to four of the churches, four of the epistles that he wrote.
Speaker A:He talked about sobriety, and Peter talks about it as well.
Speaker A:And God really commands us to be sober.
Speaker A:And I give nine reasons for that.
Speaker A:And it's not that God wants to take away our fun, it's that he loves us, he knows what's best for us.
Speaker A:And, and not being sober or drunkenness, if you want to say it that way, leads to poor judgment, it leads to indulgence in sin, it leads to poverty, it leads to loss of spiritual insight, it leads to attacks of the enemy.
Speaker A:And, and when you, you look at all those things, I just can't see a reason that someone would want to, to live a life where, where they are drunk.
Speaker B:How is that version of your edition of your book being received?
Speaker A:Very well.
Speaker A:There, you know, there are people, people that aren't Christians.
Speaker A:Sometimes, you know, they'll, they'll laugh at me and say, you know, the Bible shouldn't have anything to do with science and things like that.
Speaker A:You know, they should be completely separate.
Speaker A:And you know, all the, all the things that, that we hear from, from people who are not just not Christian, but, but anti Christian.
Speaker A:You know, I, you know, those people, they're going to be against whatever I say.
Speaker A:They're, they're against the fact that, that I'm against that I don't support marijuana, etc.
Speaker A:But for the most part, especially from the Christian community, I.
Speaker A:It's been received very well.
Speaker A:And even people that aren't Christian, the book, the expanded edition, has much more depth because of the spiritual side of it, and that has been received really.
Speaker A:Some of my friends who I know don't know the Lord, they have really enjoyed that expanded edition.
Speaker A:So I use it as a tool really for witnessing to a lot of people.
Speaker B:For those church leaders listening to our podcast going, this would be a really good workshop seminar in my congregation.
Speaker B:How would you recommend they take the book and the information and maybe turn that into kind of a support group for their community?
Speaker A:Well, one of the things that, that I wrote, I didn't just write the two books, but I wrote two study guides.
Speaker A:I have a study guide with each one of those.
Speaker A:And it's made for Bible studies for, or, or for, for the secular version, for, for just know, community groups, etc.
Speaker A:But each chapter has a study that goes along with it.
Speaker A:So it's already there for you.
Speaker A:You don't have to develop it.
Speaker A:It's already developed for you, and it's really great.
Speaker A:I've had great feedback on that as well.
Speaker B:Would you start with parents or would you start with young people who maybe not understand the importance of not getting hooked on marijuana?
Speaker A:Well, we definitely have to get parents on board.
Speaker A:There's absolutely no doubt about that.
Speaker A:And when we can get them on board, then they can teach their children.
Speaker A:But absolutely.
Speaker A:I mean, I think it's a multifaceted approach.
Speaker A:I don't think we can just key in on one or the other.
Speaker A:I think it's both and not either or.
Speaker B:That's great.
Speaker B:So I know we talked a little bit about the legal issues involving marijuana.
Speaker B:How do you address that in your book?
Speaker A:Well, I talk about what legalization does, and there are so many studies that show that legalization leads to more suicide, it leads to more use, it leads to more psychosis, it leads to more hospitalizations, it leads to more car accidents.
Speaker A:I mean, you can just go on and on all the problems that it causes.
Speaker A:It leads to more crime.
Speaker A:You know, you think it's going to lead to less crime.
Speaker A:It leads to more addiction.
Speaker A:People think that, oh, we legalize it and then people will use that instead of opioids.
Speaker A:Well, guess what happens when you legalize it?
Speaker A:They get addicted to marijuana and opioids.
Speaker A:So, you know, there's just so many things when we legalize it.
Speaker A:If you really look at the statistics, the statistics are staggering against it.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker B:So what you.
Speaker B:You've got this project.
Speaker B:Is there something else you're working on in the future?
Speaker A:Well, I, I do have a couple of books that, that I wrote during.
Speaker A:Actually during the M.
Speaker A:Div.
Speaker A:Process.
Speaker A:I, I have people that want me to write one about hallucinogens, because that's another issue that we're seeing.
Speaker A:That, that's a, you know, it's a, it's a hot topic right now.
Speaker A:Hallucinogens, hallucinogens are, are a very high hot topic.
Speaker A:And I've thought about doing that.
Speaker A:I haven't decided to do that yet, but I, I wrote a book about repentance and one about Gideon.
Speaker A:There's, there's a Bible study that I wrote.
Speaker A:I had had the opportunity to write a Bible study during my M.
Speaker A:Div.
Speaker A:Program, and I, I think that's probably where I'm.
Speaker A:Where I'm headed next is Gideon and then to a book about repentance.
Speaker A:We, we don't really understand repentance.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker A:It's much more than, than what we really understand.
Speaker B:It's very true.
Speaker B:I love to ask my guest this question.
Speaker B:What do you want your legacy to be?
Speaker A:I definitely want to be known as someone who loves God, loves people.
Speaker A:And Jesus said that's the most important thing.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And so I trust his judgment.
Speaker A:I want to be remembered as someone who loved people enough that I was willing to.
Speaker A:To tell them the truth.
Speaker A:I didn't let them languish, you know, and possibly not even be saved.
Speaker A:So I just want to love God and love people and lead as many people as I can to him.
Speaker B:As we wrap up our conversation, what key takeaways do you want to leave with the audience about our discussion today?
Speaker A:Well, marijuana is not a benign drug.
Speaker A:That, that's, that is woven throughout the whole book.
Speaker A:That, that's what the whole book is about.
Speaker A:It's about the dangers of marijuana.
Speaker A:And whether you're looking at it from a societal standpoint, an economic standpoint, a medical standpoint, a psychiatric standpoint, you know, it's, it's not a drug that is benign.
Speaker A:It's a drug that causes significant problems and can even lead to death.
Speaker A:And so I hope that, that people will, will understand that.
Speaker A:And again, my, my book talks about that throughout.
Speaker B:Well, I hope the listeners will take this podcast and share it widely across their sphere because I think this is a conversation we don't have much of or very often.
Speaker B:And I don't think people understand exactly how dangerous this drug is.
Speaker B:We've been told it's just a, it's a party drug and there's no consequences for getting involved and indulging in it.
Speaker B:So I'm glad you set some important light on the topic for us.
Speaker A:Well, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker A:And I hope your listeners will also go to drwiggins.coM-R-W-I-G-G-I-N-S.com and follow me on social media.
Speaker A:And there's a whole lot of resources there, especially if someone has an addiction issue.
Speaker A:There are a lot of resources there that can help you overcome that.
Speaker A:And don't try to do it alone.
Speaker A:That's, that's another thing I want to tell your listeners.
Speaker A:Please don't try to do this alone.
Speaker A:You know, allow your, your pastors, your, your teachers, your counselors, etc, to, to help you because people that try to do it alone usually fail.
Speaker B:And where can they find your book?
Speaker A:Anywhere books are sold.
Speaker A:But Amazon.com is, is a great place to find it.
Speaker A:But anywhere books are sold, you can find it.
Speaker B:Is there anything I haven't asked you that I should have asked you?
Speaker A:Well, you did a great job.
Speaker A:I will tell you one more thing, that my Audible book actually just came out.
Speaker A:I haven't announced it anywhere yet.
Speaker A:So this is an exclusive.
Speaker A:This is an exclusive breaking news.
Speaker A:The Audible book just came out, the expanded edition.
Speaker A:And it's, it's on Audible and you can find it on Amazon.
Speaker A:I hope you'll go get it.
Speaker B:And who was who?
Speaker B:Read if it was a James Earl Jones.
Speaker A:No, the gentleman that did it.
Speaker A:You, you asked me a question that I wasn't prepared for.
Speaker A:There.
Speaker A:I wish I could remember his name.
Speaker A:He.
Speaker A:Great guy, really great voice.
Speaker A:And he did, he did an incredible job.
Speaker A:But it's not James Earl Jones.
Speaker A:I love his voice as well.
Speaker A:Of course.
Speaker A:Who wouldn't like that voice?
Speaker B:Well, Dr.
Speaker B:Wiggins, thank you so much for what you do and thank you for talking about this topic.
Speaker B:Like I said, I just don't think enough of it's been told and we've been really given the impression that hey, this is not a big deal, and anyone can do it and have fun and just fala la, la, la, you know?
Speaker B:So I'm glad you kind of open our eyes that there's something deeper and.
Speaker B:And more sinister behind that than we been led to believe.
Speaker A:Well, thank you for allowing me to.
Speaker A:To talk to your audience about that, and I'm just honored to have been able to do it.
Speaker B:Well, thank you.
Speaker B:Blessings on the work you're doing, and.
Speaker A:Blessings to you as well.
Speaker A:Thank you.
