Episode 28: “The Plant Poet” With Edgar Soto

Podcast

Apr 17

Living a limitless life means having no boundaries and being the best you that you can be. In this episode, Anand Sukhadia sits down to talk with “The Plant Poet” himself, vegan chef Edgar Soto. Edgar shares his experiences growing up with a single parent and getting steeped in the party scene. We learn about his spiritual awakening and how going through a psychedelic phase helped spark this awakening. Edgar also speaks about how becoming vegan has helped change his life. An inspirational story that will resonate with people in search of a change in their life.

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“The Plant Poet” With Edgar Soto

Do you want to know the secret to extracting joy and blessings in every single moment in this life? Our guest exemplifies a limitless expression of gratitude and health through every cell in his body and the way he conducts his life. We have a limitless member of our Jersey City tribe. Edgar Soto was born and raised in Jersey City, New Jersey, and loves his hometown. He is a master plant-based chef and poet who is all about promoting health, wellness, and peace, especially in his community. Edgar and I have been friends for years. Above anyone else I know, he's the most positive human being I've ever met. He's always got an enormous smile on his face, and he always engages in intentionally positive and empowering communication.

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Welcome to the show. How are you?

I appreciate you. I'm feeling on top of the world. I'm excited to be on this show. I'm grateful to have known you. In my eyes, you're a legend and a great example of wellness. I look up to you. I appreciate your kind words.

Thank you. I'm a mirror. You reflect the same that's why we attracted one another. The reason I asked you on the show is that you have such an amazing life story. At such a young age, you’re accomplished. I wanted us to share that story with the Limitless One tribe. Before we get into all that, I would love for us to peek into your soul and hear a little bit of a poem that you wrote.

I have a poem called Now and it goes like this, “Launching this from consciousness. If you don't want the war inside, don't resist. It's all a gift. I promise this. Breathe inside the core. Let what's the obvious lift. Open hand and open heart, remove violent fists. Ignore the trap when you take the trip and miss the people that tend to send a dish. All they ever do is bend their wrist to defend the ignorance they consider bliss. Rewrite the history. Getting better than the mirror me. Intertwined and mystery. Recognizing misery. Flipping all epiphany. Synchronizing symphonies. In degrees, 360, I'm changing. Constantly arriving at a different me. Cannot stay the same, got to look at life differently. Drinking herbal tea. Mother Nature is always blessing me and reminding me I'm the only one to blame if they're blinding me.”

“I cannot stay in the past. No rewind in me. I cannot play it too fast. Need time to breathe. It’s so cold in this realm, yet time doesn't freeze. Finding signs in the skies and the giant trees. Favorite molecules found in the sound of the silent breeze. When it's time for me to breathe, I purge then cry. I’m feeling like I'm riding seas. Nobody is higher than me. I have my soul. I have my show. Stop waiting for my own guests to start inviting me. I can’t crash. I'm the vehicle, the passenger, and the one who's driving me. Frequently, I see myself in different frequencies. I doubt the Devil, so I use my words magically. Replacing words like try would be. Tomorrow never comes because it’s always right now for me.”

I got chills hearing that.

The way I write it, it's a reminder to myself to bring me into that flow, that now moment, that ultimate zone that I prefer to be in, and that omnipotent state of mind that would inspire myself and others. At the end of the day, I'm reminding myself that I don't know anything. I'm learning at all times.

You have such a passionately curious personality. You're always learning. You're always getting involved and trying new things. You're into basketball, plant-based health, spirituality, meditation, reading, and jiu-jitsu, all of it. When we become diversified, we experience all these different things. In the poem you shared, every single line has a different meaning in your life. You’re drinking herbal teas, nature, and all of it. It's beautiful.

The Plant Poet: Living a limitless life means living full of excitement and joy. Everything that you do is to not only help yourself but also help others in a non-egotistical way.

I appreciate it. It’s a beautiful thing. The drinking herbal tea part also means taking ayahuasca or mushrooms. It's not just herbal tea as in green tea but at the same time, that's what it means too. To stay healthy, drink your tea and your herbs. It's a blessing that I can express myself in that way. A lot of people see what I say and that's a beautiful thing.

They get it in the heart. What does living a limitless life mean to you, Edgar?

I do love the concept of living a limitless life. To me, it means infinity and to be staying healthy. Also, everything that you do is to not only help yourself but also help others in a non-egotistical way. Limitless means infinite. As a momentum, you're picking up. There's no end but staying on that infinite momentum, that limitless momentum. You can't even stop yourself. You're flowing. To me, that's what it means. Living a life full of excitement, joy, and never stopping. Stay in the moment. Once you stay in the moment, there's no end or beginning. It’s that momentum. It’s surfing the wave. There's nothing that could stop you, not even other people. That’s what a limitless life means.

What I love so much about what you shared is that a lot of people, when they’re answering that question or they think about being limitless, it’s like, “How much can I do in this life?” You're bringing in that element of contributing to others and helping them become limitless as well. For me, that's what this life is all about if you don't have other people to share this knowledge and love to inspire others to become better versions of themselves. When we all have that same agenda to see everybody get lift up, then that's how we change the world. If one person becomes a billionaire and then keeps everybody else down, how is that helping the collective?

That separates the collective. That's the illusion of separation. We are all connected. I learned through taking psychedelics that your passion and your gift are not just for you. It's also to help others. At the same time, you don't want to say, “This is to help this person.” You want to do it knowing that it's going to help others and helping yourself. We're all connected. It's not like, “I'm doing this for this person.” At the end of the day, do it for yourself and that's when it will reflect on everybody else if you're doing what you love doing, for sure.

This is not about counting scores, like, “I did ten things for this person and only three things for this person. They didn’t give anything back to me.”

There’s no contract signed in this life.

That's a scarcity mentality versus abundance. I love listening to you. I love talking to you. I get a chance to talk to you every week and we have this deep conversation. Let's get into your story. Tell us about your upbringing, your mindset at the time, and then how it's evolved over to where you are now in life.

I grew up in a household with my mother and no father around. My mother worked hard all her life to put food on the table. Growing up and seeing that made me realize, “I have to become my own father.” There was no father figure. I had a stepfather from 9 to 13 years old. He taught me a lot. Before that, there was no father figure around. I was a rebellious kid growing up. I was bad because I had no father figure around until my mom met my stepfather. Through him, I learned a lot of manners, how to become a man, old-fashioned positivity where you don't want to hurt people, you don't want to hurt yourself, and you don't want to go down a bad route.

I'm thankful that, at that age, I ran into my stepfather because he taught me a lot. It was different growing up without my biological father. Eventually, I've met with him when I was eleven years old. Even at that time, I didn't feel a connection with him. Over time, when I started to forgive him and understand why he wasn't around, a lot of that stuff made me stronger. I'm the type of person that instead of being a victim, I like looking at it as like, “I'm glad this happened to me. Look at me now, I learned from it. It's a unique story for me.” Embracing that healing, growing, and becoming my better self will allow me to help others.

The Plant Poet: What is the point of eating healthy if you're doing all this stuff that is contradicting your longevity?

I'm grateful that my story from growing up with my mother made me realize how much I love my mother because she's the one that taught me everything. She would tell me, “I'm your father and mother.” I didn't understand the father part. I was like, “How can you be both? I have a father for a reason. I'm a man. I don't feel like you're my father.” I get it now. She was doing everything in her power to keep me healthy and growing. She had different beliefs, though. She wanted me to pursue a career where you go to school and be a doctor, technical, and support. Those are the careers I never resonated with. There was a little difference between my mom and me. Over time, I let her know that my passion and excitement are bigger than going to a system or school where they're going to brainwash you. I never resonated with the school system. I knew that experience, life, and love is the real teacher. I will always live by that, even though it may seem like I'm hard-headed or anything. We live in a weird time now and I'm grateful I chose to live like this.

When did you start understanding that whole part of you don't want to go down a certain systematic route? At a young age, I didn't know the difference. Where did you come to that realization? How old were you?

I want to say 17, 18. I was finishing high school. Throughout those four years, the teachers never felt like they were welcoming. They would throw these kids in the class. We have one curriculum. They don’t have to do. If they don't do it, they fail. I never liked that. We're all different. We all have unique abilities. They teach us the same thing. They try to keep us like robots. We're not robots. At that time, I was also doing hip-hop music. I would listen to conscious rappers that would express this. They would say, “School is a system that is going to brainwash you.” I will look into that and do my research.

Luckily, I grew up in the computer age. As a kid, I had a computer. I would navigate through the computer the social media and learn a lot and not get lost. That's a good thing about me. I would go deep but I'll never get lost. I will always come back and re-evaluate if it makes sense or not for me. Don't get me wrong. I do believe in learning from somebody but not necessarily in a school system where they collect money from you. You missed a whole life of experience because you were in a school system. I'm grateful that I chose the experience path rather than like, “I'm going to be in this school and learn how to do things.” That probably would have shifted me to a different maybe career in life or something that I would have never wanted to do.

There are so many things to dissect. The first thing is the diversity of this planet and the universe. It thrives off of abundance. If every one of us is the same and we go down the same path, how do we know what else is out there? We need people that would look up at me that go on a tangent and try new things. No one in my family or a few people have gone out and tried a wellness center the way I've done it. Going through your paths and becoming a vegan chef, a conscious rapper, a poet, and all this stuff, we need those outliers. Without that, we don't ever evolve as people. It's important to honor people like yourself that are choosing to go there.

What I love so much is that you have a strong North Star. You know like, “I'll take in all this information and then I'm going to filter it through my North Star, which is my consciousness.” For a lot of us, it takes a long time to get to that place where we know who we truly are and we're not influenced by outside forces. There are so many forces out there that want us to take in this cookie-cutter way of life. I love the fact that you developed this strong consciousness within yourself to know, “This is not for me. This is for me.” You're going through all this information. We're bombarded by all these different views, thoughts, politics, and all this stuff. One thing I know about you is you always remain humble, happy, and loving towards other people no matter what their views on things are.

We're all connected. If I judge someone, I feel like I'm judging myself. Everyone is different and has their way of doing things. At one point in my life, I was a different person. I'm not here judging that whole person. I'm embracing this person so he could be a better person. That's how I look at life. There’s a quote that I love. I forget who said it but it's like, “If there was one way of doing things, there will only be one person. If there’s one way of being, there will only be one person.” We’re different people, so there are different ways of living. I appreciate other people’s beliefs and creed. Even if I don't necessarily agree with it, I want to pose it. I'll stay humble and focus on myself. At the end of the day, I got to shine my light and that's what matters. I don't like getting into arguments with people about their lifestyles. That's not me. I'm not that type of person. I like shining my light and living by example, and energy, whether it's a hug or a smile. That's very powerful.

That’s impactful even if somebody is in a bad mood or they're like, “Everything you're saying is wrong.” If you give them a little bit of love, you can rewire their brain into thinking, “I'm being awful towards one person and yet this person is still giving me love.” Subconsciously, it sets the seed in there.

It breaks a pattern too. Maybe they're used to getting heated after somebody doesn't agree with them. You break the pattern. As you said, a seed is planted. Before you know it, this person looks differently or has attracted different people. That’s a beautiful and mystical thing that I love about life. When you vibe at a certain frequency and you attract certain things in your life, that idea is such a beautiful law. I love that.

It's taken me a long time to figure it out. You can't think about it mentally. You have to feel it on every ounce of your being and know that it's about to happen. Once you are fully committed to that spiritually, mentally, physically, and emotionally, those things are a natural attraction and magnet for the way that you want to live and it comes into your life. You were telling me about your former self. One of the stories you share with me is that when you were younger, you had different influences, and you spent a lot of time in the New York City party scene. Tell us a little bit about that.

When I turned eleven, that's when I met my father. The reason why I met my father is because I have a half-sister who's five years older than me. At that time, she was 16 and I was 11. She met me because she saw a picture. She found evidence that she has a little half-brother. She forced my father to look for me. I love my sister and I thank her so much. She would pick me up after the years passed. Before you know it, I was sixteen in the party scene. My sister knew a lot of people in the party scene. I would get into places without ID and stuff like that.

At that young age, I was experiencing what I thought life was about, having fun, music, smoking, hookah, drinking, alcohol, dancing. Over the years, I would be in the party scene. Eventually, I became a photographer in the party scene. I would’ve become a DJ too if I was more advanced. I do prefer photography and stuff like that. Even then, being a photographer in a party scene, I still involved myself in drinking, smoking, staying up late, stuff that cut time out of my life. It canceled the longevity. I knew my liver was bad because I would feel like shit after a while. I didn't feel like I had energy. I was young. That lifestyle, being in the party scene, even though it was fun at the time, made me realize that it wasn't for me.

The Plant Poet: If you let circumstances affect your state of being, then you're not in control, you're just reacting.

After a while, I started consuming pot and stuff like that. I'll tell you a story. I was at a club called 46 Lounge on Route 46. Sean Paul was performing. I was a photographer and I arrived early to see the spot and everything. I was vaping some pot. When I started vaping, I started realizing like, when you see things in a bigger picture. People are coming here. They're getting their drinks ready. They're ready to get drunk and this and that. That was the end of the beginning of the club scene where I was like, “I don't want to be a part of this.” I stood there for a while and then there was a fight at the end. There were two groups of people. One group was popping 60 bottles. The other group popped 70 bottles. They were in competition.

All that stuff was going through my mind. I'm like, “I don't want to be part of this stupidness.” I was like, “We're coming here to get drunk, fight, and ruin our lives.” That's when I realized I didn't want to be part of that scene anymore. It would happen all the time. Sometimes I would ignore it. That was the last draw. I was in those altered states seeing it. Ever since then, I have minimized the consumption of alcohol and going to nightclubs. Now I don’t partake in a lot of those. Especially these weird times that we live in, it’s not worth it. We want to breathe and not intoxicate ourselves.

I was guilty of that for a long time. I wasn't a huge partier. Throughout my twenties and going to study abroad in Australia, I was partying every night, drinking every night, and getting wasted. I felt that was happiness because I was trying to escape who I truly was. I wasn’t that person at the time. Even up until my 30s, there were some instances where I drank too much and I got into arguments with people or didn't have good experiences. If you think about it and you're honest with yourself, it's a superficial type of way of living. The example you gave is like, “We popped 60 balls. They popped 70 balls. Who could spend more money? Who’s flashier? Who could get the girls at the table?” At the end of the day, what does that do for your life other than making you feel superior to somebody or inferior?

It causes damage.

There's no empowering conversation. We don't get anywhere to evolve our state of being. I'm not trying to dug on people because there's a purpose for that. Everybody wants the club scene and enjoy themselves. For me, I realized it wasn't going to bring me anywhere closer to where I want it to get to in life.

It’s the same with me. From Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday going to nightclubs, taking pictures, getting drunk, coming home late, arriving to work the next day hungover and dehydrated. It wasn't making me better. It wasn’t empowering me. Luckily, my North Star told me, “You have to stop doing this.” I'm grateful I did. I've been vegan for many years. Drinking alcohol, getting wasted, and not worrying about my sleep patterns, what’s the point of eating healthy if I'm doing all this stuff that is contradicting my longevity?

I'm glad I went through all those stages because it allows me to gather information, re-evaluate myself, and realize, “What do I prefer?” Here I am. I prefer living a wealthy lifestyle, being well, being healthy, and being compassionate to others. That's what means a lot to me. As they say, “Tomorrow is not promised.” It’s good to be present in the now and shine your light. In the future, you'll regret it. You won't have the same health as you had when you were young. Why wait when you could do it now? It's important to me to promote wellness and health. It's not like I'm a health master. I'm learning, reminding myself, and reminding others that this is what I feel is important in life right now. It’s to uplift one another, stay healthy, and promote all the good stuff that I've learned through my life.

Thankfully, you had a strong North Star. You were able to pull yourself away from influences that weren’t the best for you. For people who are struggling with something like that, maybe all their friends are into the scene and they're not. I talked to so many people daily at Om.life when they come through and they say, “I'd like to give up this but all my friends want to do it.” It's important to find the right people to spend your time with. They say that you become the average of the five people you spend the most amount of time with.

The power of community is important. There are a lot of people that are like you and me that are looking to promote more health and stuff like that. Anyone who's looking for a tribe that vibes better with them, I encourage you to find those people because they're out there. They're looking for you as much as you're looking for them. One of my favorite quotes is by Tony Robbins, “Your net worth is equal to your network.” The people inside of your group will help you elevate you to where you want to go. Net worth could be anything, health, wellness, money, business success, or whatever it is. Spend the time with the people that are where you want to get to.

It's all about having awareness. If you're around a group of people and you're trying to have these uplifting conversations and they're shutting you down, then it's up to you to either stay there or go somewhere else. Find a different environment. It's all about the environment. Instead of going to a bar to talk to people, go to an art studio or a yoga studio where you'll find people that are most likely on the same wavelength as you. It's all about opening up, too. Some people are like, “I'm not worthy of speaking to this person here. I'm used to my sabotaging friends.” That’s not true. It's all about how you vibe. It's good to self-evaluate and step back.

I know that maybe, it can be selfish but those friends that you have, they’ll thank you if you shine your greatest light. They'll thank you in the future, trust me. Even if it's in a dream state, they’ll thank you. You're thanking them because they're allowing you to learn from them. That’s a beautiful thing. Instead of judging anybody, focus on yourself. If this person is like this or however they are, I can learn from that person. Instead of shooting this person down, learn from them because of the way they are. It's a beautiful thing. It's a nice hack when you look at people as lessons rather than trying to attack me or attacking them. It’s none of that. It’s all about learning from people. There's always a lesson in somebody.

I always try to look at people as mirrors. If somebody mirrors me or somebody upsets me, it’s like, “Where is that action within them reside within me?” I have to be able to forgive them because if I can't forgive them, I can't forgive myself. We grow as you said.

For example, I forgave my father. Even my mother, I forgive her for a lot of stuff. When she was young, she wasn't aware that she would project on me or promote on me. Let go of all that stuff because they're all small illusions that won't serve you in this now moment. I'm growing. I'm a better person now. People look up to me. Family members think I'm crazy. Now they're asking me and picking my brain for like, “What herbs are good for this? What food should I eat?” I love that. I could have been another person and be like, “You didn't listen back then.” There is no back then. I like looking at life as a now moment.

The Plant Poet: Psychedelics are an experience that is a little bit beyond this dimension. When you go through something like that, it just brings you more awareness.

Do you know how the timeline is horizontal from beginning to end? I like flipping that timeline and staying in that now moment. I’m not worrying about the past or the future. I’m staying excited at that moment. That helped me a lot to stay present. Staying present is one of the best things even when it comes to learning. If you're present and you're learning something, you'll never forget that because you were present. Being present is like using both your left and right brain, using association, feeling all of that. If you have that formula, you'll never forget anything. That's how I am sometimes. When I'm present, it's hard for me to forget a moment that inspired me or was insightful for me.

At the end of the day, being in the present moment and being happy in the present moment, that's the real juice in life. Everyone is like, “When I reach this destination, then I'll be happy.” In reality, that's one little point. The road that you're on, if you're happy, then you're maintaining that momentum. You're flowing throughout that. You have to be happy in the hard times as much as you are in the successful times. You're going to spend most of your time in that unhappy place if you're not getting the next carrot.

One of my favorite quotes is, “Circumstances don't matter. Only state of being matters.” I remind myself that all the time. That's what we're talking about. Your state of being, that’s found in the present moment. If you let circumstances affect your state of being, then you're not in control. You're reacting to all these circumstances. If you stay present and you stay calm in your state of being, nothing would affect you. You're now in control. It’s from backward thinking to functional thinking. Growing up, they never taught us how to have a good state of being. It’s all circumstances. React to all the circumstances in your life and all these commercials on the TV. All of those stimuli program a person to act like a robot, believe it or not. It’s crazy.

That picture behind you, I always felt like that. There's something there in the center of our brain that’s tapping into something. There’s a picture of Alex Grey that’s similar to that. He's reaching up to the cosmos, and there was this third eye. When I first saw that picture, it made me realize that my North Star is communicating with me. Even if it's through this picture, there's something greater than what I'm doing now. Following that allowed me to open up doors that I never thought were even there. It's a beautiful thing when you follow the excitement and be yourself. It's like a game. You already have the tools. Use them and engage in life and align. It’s beautiful.

We have this physical reality. At the same time, there's a flip mirror image on the spiritual realm where our higher self is able to send us little nuggets. They're limited to a certain amount. If we could pick up on that, then we could get the future gets. It's like a video game almost. If we're not listening, then we get stuck. We have to go back to the previous level or whatever it is. Anytime you learn a lesson, those things don't ever come back to us in life, especially in a relationship. I found that if I kept allowing the same things to happen in relationships or if I was treating somebody a certain way, why would I attract the same type of people?

I had to get through a lot of that stuff and learn the lesson for good. Once you think you learned the lesson, you'll be tested again. If you passed that final test, then you're good. Now you're on to the next evolution, the next level. We look at this life as a game, which it is. At the end of the day, for me, and I know you probably believe this too, we are eternal beings. We're here for a short amount of time, but we're eternal. This is a pitstop. We're here for a couple of moments. How can we influence our life? What do we want to play out? What do we want to experience? Let me ask you, Edgar. Why did you come here to planet Earth? As Edgar Soto, what did you want to experience?

I came to planet Earth to experience healing and how it feels to be humbled. We're born on this Earth and we have certain circumstances that affect us in a certain way. As you get older, you can't relate to a lot of people because people have different religions and belief systems. I came to this planet Earth to be understanding, compassionate for everyone and myself, too, promote health, heal, do the work not to be in Nirvana, not to drink all my life, or be at the party scene all my life. It was all for a reason. It was all to do the work and I'm still doing the work. Even when I did ayahuasca and mushrooms, it was all for work, healing, and to be your best self. It’s to promote love, wellness, and peace. That's what I feel I'm here on Earth for. It's embedded in me that I feel like nothing could shift me away. Even if it was me when I was in the club scene, even then, it didn't overpower me. It made me stronger. As they say, “What doesn't kill you makes you stronger.” I'm alive and I'm stronger. I came to this Earth to be a lightworker.

You certainly live in that. Speaking of compassion, you became plant-based years ago. You then decided to become a vegan chef. Take us through the journey of that. You grew up in a Dominican household. I'm sure meat is a big part of life. Tell us how that occurred.

My first job was at Macy's. I was selling women's shoes. I was eighteen years old. When it comes to food and as you go to the food court, most of them are not even healthy for you but they're fast and affordable. I would be eating that the whole time. I gained a lot of weight. There was something that happened to me that triggered me. I was like, “What the fuck?” I started becoming allergic to raw fruits like avocado. Anything raw like raw apple juice. It was the weirdest thing. That was the last straw. I was like, “Something is going up.”

I would talk to people and people would be like, “It's the body. It changes every seven years. That's fine.” They were saying, “Accept it. That’s what the body does.” I didn't want it to take that for an answer. I started doing my research. Long story short, it’s because my body was full of toxins and full of all these processed foods that it started neglecting the fruits. It was the craziest thing. I would eat avocado and my throat would get itchy. That would never happen to me. Growing up, avocado is my favorite fruit.

That's when I started doing my research. I started watching these documentaries about health. One of the first ones that came out in 2008 was called Food Matters. I'm not sure if you’ve ever heard of that one. David Wolfe is in it. A whole bunch of raw foodists and vegan. They were talking about all these herbs, these superfoods like spirulina, cacao, goji berries, mushrooms. I was intrigued and these people looked healthy, happy, and full of life. I was like, “I want to be like these people but in my way.” Subia’s was still open at the time and they were selling herbs. All these stuff that they mentioned in the documentary, they had it there. I would spend $300 on all these herbs and fruits, and I would consume them every day.

Before you know it, I lost 50 pounds in 2 or 3 months consuming herbs and running. I remember I would take my mom's car to go to Lincoln Park and run. In hindsight, I ran around the block. It was a radical change for me. A lot of people were telling me, “You're too radical.” I was not only being vegan but I was choosing organic. People were telling me, “You got to pick one. You can’t do both?” I would say, “I know what I'm doing.” I was at Macy's consuming goji berries and cacao nibs in a bag, and people were like, “What are you eating?” No one knew what the hell I was eating. It was a good seed that I was planting for other people to consume and to know about healthy food.

The Plant Poet: An hour of yoga is better than any psychedelic.

I kept doing my research. I was learning more about herbs. I do enjoy herbs. I love the idea of green tea healing your body or making you feel better when you drink it. I started doing research on herbs and consuming herbs. After that, I left Macy's. I didn't want to be a part of that materialistic lifestyle where they'll pay you but at the same time, they're encouraging you to spend that money back on other material that they sell. Eventually, you're in debt. You owe Macy's every month. I never liked that idea. I started to pursue my passion, which was food, a healthy lifestyle, and veganism. That's when I became a vegan chef. I was like, “This is what I love doing my whole life.”

I used to watch the Food Channel as a kid. I would make recipes on the spot because that's what I'm passionate about. Mixing that passion with the plant-based aspect created this formula that became part of my life. I'm this plant-based chef that’s inspiring people. I’m making delicious food that is plant-based now. It's a good feeling. I'm my biggest critic. Even if I make food, I'm always looking at how I can make it better. Even though people think it's delicious, I always think about how I can make it better and healthier. At Plant Base, we’re soy-free and gluten-free. My passion is to have an establishment or serve food and make food gluten-free, soy-free, healthy, light on the body, and delicious.

You're doing it. My girlfriend and I had some of your amazing food. There's a pizza that's named after you, the Buffalo Soto. If anyone is in New Jersey city, you got to go to Plant Base and get the Buffalo Soto. Make sure you get it when Edgar is there. It’s made with so much love. When food is made with love, you're absorbing all that energy into your body. If you ever go to a place where the shops are angry or upset, you're absorbing that too.

That's not good. I never liked that. I never enjoy that when chefs are angry and stuff like that. The food will make you feel bad when it’s like that. I'm not that typical chef either. I'm a spiritual warrior chef. My girlfriend, Rose, told me that the reason why I'm in the kitchen as a warrior is that there's a placement in one of the houses in astrology. People have warriors in different places that they like and mine is in the kitchen. In the kitchen, I'm a warrior. It's my place to express my creativity. It's not me cooking food but it’s me incorporating love and all my feelings into it. It's a beautiful way of expressing it. I'm grateful that food chose me. I love cooking with raw foods and preparing them at the perfect time. It's an art. It's like playing an instrument. I'm grateful that’s my passion, for sure.

You're blessed to be able to find that passion and what you were put here on Earth for. You’re a shaman when it comes to the kitchen. You’re a shaman warrior inside there.

I learned that through ayahuasca, to be honest. When I was taking ayahuasca and even DMT, it was showing me like, “This is who you are. Follow this path. Be this type of person.” There's no way of looking back when something and what you want to do is in front of you. Every decision I make, I know where it's going to get me. As Bob Marley said, “Take me to the higher place.” That's what I'm doing, going to that higher place. It feels good to be alive.

Let's rewind a little bit and tell us a little bit about your ayahuasca experiences. What started you on the psychedelic path? I know you've done multiple. Tell us a little bit about how you started venturing in psychedelics and why you dove in.

The chef that taught me everything, his name is Mark Rasmussen. He's a vegan pioneer. He's been vegan for many years. He used to work at Subia’s and I went under his wing. As he was teaching me stuff, he was also opening these doors of psychedelic because he will talk to me about his psychedelic experiences. At the time, I didn't find it weird at all. I didn't find it like this guy is crazy. I find it intriguing. That was a good sign. I was like, “There's something here for me and I'm going to pay attention.” He would talk to me about how mushrooms opened up his third eye, how it got him more connected to vegan food, and how he used to hunt.

He took mushrooms and he stopped hunting because he didn't want to kill any animals and stuff like that. I was like, “I believe that. That's how I feel.” I haven't taken mushrooms but I know that something in me is like, “I don't want to harm any animals. I don't need any animals to promote my health. Why would I need to harm them to eat?” Before you know, I met a friend named Raphael Zaki, who you know as well. A mutual friend of Tyler. He didn't take psychedelics at the time. He said he was doing his research about it. Raphael is the type of person that will break down every component of a psychedelic experience.

I was grateful. The first time I got to psychedelics was with him. We were together in his apartment. We were diving deep. He was telling me, “You're going to start to mucousing. Don't get scared. It's going to come in waves. You shouldn't go outside because of how the world will affect us and whatnot.” Being in the apartment and being in those states, I realized that I have a lot of things to learn in life. That was the first time and I was like, “I have a lot of things to learn that I never knew I needed to learn.” That was being my father in a way. That was one of my biggest things. I didn't have a man in my life to teach me anything. I had to become that man. I had to become my own father. That first psychedelic experience, that's when I became my own father, the man that I always wanted to be.

The psychedelics happened at the perfect time. It happened when I was still young. When I first took psychedelics, I was 23, 24 years old. I learned the lesson that I needed to learn and it was to become my own father and become the man that I always wanted to be. Throughout that experience, even with ayahuasca, it was teaching me the same thing, like, “Let go of any doubts that you had as a kid, any traumas. Heal now. Attract your tribe. Help you brothers and your sisters.” Those are lessons that I embedded in my soul. I'm grateful for ayahuasca and psychedelic mushrooms, even LSD and things like that too. They all helped me sharpen my mind and helped me stay grounded in my heart and align my chakras.

All these psychedelics helped me to become the better person I am. It was through the help of the friends I have now. They knew the right information. They knew the right people to get it from. Everything happens for a reason. I didn't judge myself at the moment. I wasn't scared. It was like going to school almost. When you're in school, you don't contemplate. When you're young, you go to school. That's how it felt like for me at that age when I was 23. Taking psychedelics was like going to school. I didn't think about it too much. I didn't feel like I was doing drugs.

I was certain that this was going to be life-changing for me. It allowed me to experience it without resisting or thinking about it too much. It was the help of chef Mark, who I think of a lot. He's one of the people I look up to. My friend Raphael, who I tripped on different occasions with him whether it was DMT or Ayahuasca. Tyler, too. All these friends I have that I've done the ceremonies with inspire me to become my best self because they're becoming their best self. It’s beautiful to attract your tribe, your warrior brothers, sisters, and your families.

We had Tyler James Burger on the show. I believe in synchronicity and psychedelic experiences. Whichever one that's destined for you to experience, it'll come to you at the right time. From what I see, all the people that I talked to, it comes in a time where they're seeking more out of life. Many of us are spiritual and we believe that there's something more to life than we're seeing in this physical reality. We have so many questions. We have beautiful things that happened to us but also some challenges that we need to go through.

Psychedelic is an experience that is a little bit beyond this dimension. When you go through something like that, it brings you more awareness. You have to go to this spiritual realm, whether it's the 4th dimension or 5th dimension. Whatever you want to call it, it's somewhere else and it allows you to see who you truly are. A lot of times, it'll tell you things that you might not want to face. It is the ultimate experience and self-awareness. If you listen to it, if you take the lessons with you that you learn there and bring them in back here, that's when your life starts to transform.

On the other side, there are people that do psychedelics like drugs. It's almost like a recreational thing for them and they don't bring it back into this reality to make the changes that they need to. When you go through these lessons in life, if you don't learn from them, you're going to be destined to repeat them. It’s the same thing with psychedelics. It's even more amplifying effect. We have to respect the medicines when we take them and treat them as a source of divinity that's coming through us. We have the privilege and the honor of being able to experience it. When we do these things, make sure that our bodies are clean, we're not drinking, or smoking pot the day that we're doing ayahuasca. Each medicine is powerful. We want to prep our bodies to honor that inside of us. If we're not, we're disrespecting the medicine.

*Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue, Book 1*

You don't want two teachers trying to teach you. You want to give time to each teacher. There are people that do it with three different teachers, if you will. It creates chaos. It's not respectful for the teacher. You want to give one teacher your undivided attention. When it comes to psychedelics, I never like mixing psychedelics. I always wait and come down to get grounded if you need a little pat or something. I’m not doing it for recreational reasons. People do it to trip balls and stuff like that. If you trip balls, you’re going to trip and that's not good. It's a beautiful thing for me.

When they planted the seed of psychedelics in my mind and the way I took it, in hindsight, it was a flow, I'm grateful. There are times with psychedelics where I felt like I was 60 years old or something like that. I felt that 60-year-old Edgar talking to the Edgar I am now. That was a little trippy. At the same time, it was beautiful. I’m integrating myself in the now moment. I don't have to wait for 20, 30 years to learn what I learned now. It's integration from now. Now that I have my North Star, it's all about integration and following the highest excitement, not looking back, and digressing or whatever. I'm happy that I took this psychedelic journey. I always try to promote it for people but not everyone is ready. That's something I understand. It's all about planting the seed. It's never good to force people like, “This changed my life. Try it.” It's all about sharing your experience. From there, they do what they want to do and you did what you had to do, which is to share your experience.

That’s my view on that is I share my experience with passion. I tell them about my experience and then let them go and find their experience if they want to. If they have any questions, they can ask me. I’ve made that mistake in the past, like, “You got to do it. You're coming with me to the ceremony.” You grab them by the neck. “Drink the ayahuasca.” You live and you learn. Other than psychedelics, what are some of your favorite spiritual practices to get you back into connection with your highest self?

I don't do psychedelics as much. It was a good phase. It's not good to do it all the time. I do microdose sometimes when I feel like it. I don't even know when it is. I don't have a schedule for it. I used to have a schedule. It was once a week but that only happened for a month or two. I benefited and integrated from there. Some people want to do it all the time, every day. My favorite is yoga, for sure. I love an hour of yoga. It's better than any psychedelic. Also, floating. Floating at Om.life is one of the best meditation hacks. The best psychedelics I ever had is floating. It keeps the mind relaxed. It allows you to reset your biological clock and conceive new ideas that you never thought were there. Now you have an idea that's there and it’s happening. It’s like that picture that you have. It’s is like tapping into that consciousness. It’s like dipping your paintbrush in these colors of consciousness, you’re bringing it back down, and painting a beautiful picture. Floating and yoga allow me to get into those states. It allows me to be creative in my food, my music, and my way of communicating.

I am a big fan of comedy. I do like the wittiness of comedians. I love laughing with people. Yoga and floating sharpen my cooking skills, poetry skills, and life skills. I enjoy floating and yoga and also playing basketball. I love basketball a lot. I never thought I was going to like it as a kid because my mom put me in baseball. When I discovered it, it was like, “Wow.” Throwing the ball into the hoop from far away is satisfying, it gets you active, and running. It also sharpens your mind. When you're shooting a ball, you're relaxed, and you're in a flow state, you would make that shot 80% of the time. I love those three activities. There's a lot, writing music and listening to music. The physical ones are floating, yoga, and playing basketball or any sport. I like to do it all. Those are my favorites.

We got to get the om crew together and get a basketball game going.

I'm playing with a few friends. Jewel might join from Plant Base. I have yoga and after that, I might play basketball at Hamilton Park. We should get a crew together because it's fun.

I’m wrapping it up. Let me ask you the most important question. What is God or spirituality mean to you? What role does it play in your life?

We're all made in the image of God. God is God. God will never not be God. I prefer to be the best I can ever be. God is in me, you, and everybody else. He doesn't judge. God prefers to grow and to integrate. God is 50/50. 50% negative and 50% positive like Yin Yang. Even though it's 50/50, I still feel like God prefers the light even if it's by a few percentages. That's how things grow. If not, things will not grow. I do look at nature as an example of God and how things grow and how things truly are, grow fruits, the rain, and all that stuff. God is that growth inside of us. We should always pay attention to growth, connection to one another rather than fighting each other and dividing each other. I don't think God prefers that.

At the same time, if we're all God and people are preferring to kill one another or whatever, God is probably going to be like, “That's what you want to do.” God wouldn't judge us. God doesn't judge, but I feel like God does prefer growth and not to kill one another. I'm saying that out of my consciousness. That's what I prefer. Everyone comes into this Earth with different intentions. I spoke to a friend, and he said that there are some people that come to Earth intending to disturb the peace. What can I say as a human person? I can say, “I don't think this person prefers that. Let me talk to this person. Shine light to this person.” That's what God wants to do. Otherwise, it’s like, “Let that person be.” My definition of God is becoming a being that you can help others uplift one another rather than to destroy them or kill them. Anand, can I ask you that? What's your definition of God and spirituality? I’m interested.

It's everything. It’s the whole spectrum. God-consciousness, negativity, evil, all of it is an expression of the infinite. God is infinite. I had this realization one time when I was in a temple in India. This ancient temple is 2,000 years old or whatever. There's this one deity, Lord Shiva. You go around three times and you do the mantras or whatever. As I was going through, I got zapped out into a wormhole, I went into this consciousness state, and understood that we start from God-consciousness, we break away, we go through the evolution of our soul. That could be multiple lifetimes, millions, billions, and different expressions. We're here right now in this one particular element of life and planet. I'm here as an Indian man living in America, having a wellness center, and having a show. That's one element of the expression that I wanted to have.

Once I complete that evolutionary journey and understand all the lessons that I need to for my soul to reach back to God-consciousness, it's a loop. As I was going around this deity, it showed me that when we pray to God, we're praying to the highest expression of ourselves. Once we're that and then we’re here now in wherever this timeline is, we will reach back to it at some point. It’s up to us, by our actions, by our deeds, by living in Dharma and honor. That's how we get back. You have to laugh about it and you have to be light about it because there's so much craziness that can happen that can take us off the path of our consciousness, of our journey. I try to make it an experience.

Thanks for sharing that because it makes me look at it differently. I grew up in a Catholic household. My family and my mom would worship a God that's out there. I try to tell them, “God is in you. You're made in the image of God.” They'll look at that as blasphemous. They’re like, “No. What are you talking about? No one is stronger than God Almighty. I'm weak compared to God.” That's backward thinking. You got to internalize God. You got to realize that God is in you. Why would God be out there trying to judge you? It never made sense to me growing up. I have this book, Conversations with God.

The Plant Poet: When food is made with love, you're absorbing all that energy into your body.

That’s such a beautiful book. It’s by Neale Donald Walsch.

When you read it, you realize, “We are God.” He's communicating with the higher consciousness, bringing it down into a book, expressing it, and recognizing the momentum of certain actions if it's good, bad, or disruptive like war, for example. Is it good? No. Are religions fighting against each other good? No, it's not. I don't feel like God wants that. I don't want to say it, but I feel like it's playing out for a reason. God knows best. God is inside of us. I will never worship somebody that's outside of me. It doesn't make sense to me. Jesus Christ, for example. People worship Him, like, “Jesus Christ is this. Jesus Christ is that.” He was saying things, like, “You are like me. Don't worship me. Worship the point of what I'm trying to tell you.”

Christ’s consciousness is what a lot of people don't understand. That's what he was embarking on us. He planted that seed in all of us. What I try to do when I listen to anyone talking about Jesus, I was like, “What did Jesus say?” It’s some of those things you’re saying, like, “Any miracles I can perform, you can perform too.”

We are the same. People worship him rather than worship the point. That never sat well with me. Over time, I realized, “We are made in the image of God. Once you know that, no force could disrupt you. You're always in control.”

There’s a difference between ego and thinking, “I’m great.” Sitting in the knowing, you are divinity and accepting that, there's a big difference between that. It's not about ego. It's about everybody having that ability. We're all cut from that same cloth.

Dwayne Dyer was like, “EGO means Edging God Out.” He also gave it a different connotation, EGO, Earth Guide Only. I love those two quotes. Your ego is here to prevent you from jumping off a window. It's not here to take over the job of your soul. When the ego takes over the job of your soul, it gets overworked. When it gets overworked, it’s not happy. You got to give the ego its job back. Physical awareness is not to take over the job of God.

How can we learn more about you?

I'm on Instagram. I'm going to start releasing a lot of my poetry and music videos. I'm also at Plant Base in Jersey City. I’m at Om.life a couple of days a week. I'm at a yoga studio called Powerflow a couple of days a week as well. I'm in Jersey City. A way to learn about me is by having a conversation with me, picking my brain and vice versa. That’s the way we learn from each other, spending time with each other and communicating about what matters in life. @ImEdgarSoto on Instagram.

To get us out of this show, do you want to share another one of your poems?

Yes. The first poem was called Now. This poem I’m going to perform is called Less. We were talking about the now moments and the lessons. Thank you, Anand. I appreciate you. “There's a lesson in this section. You know you're a blessing. Never stress it. The plan that God got you invested in, suggestion. Trust in the love, the good. Don’t harm others, your sisters and your brothers. Blood is thicker than the water. Assisting all the mothers. Work the consciousness. Thoughts, I'm announcing it from a pure place where my heart is pronouncing it. Living in a dream, bouncing in reality without gravity.”

“Obviously, I'm alive with this. The Earth is telling us we won't survive. How do we get to live? Poisoning the water supply, pesticides, and a lot of it. Is this how we are going to die? Is this how are we going to go? They’re trying to spy on your mind and soul, trying to get you out of control. Switch your mind back. Drop the control. You change what you want and need. You got to breathe. Free your soul. Let the demons flee. Grab a key. See disease as a business factory. They profit from keeping us sick, that's a fact to me. Please don't get mad at me for expressing what I see because it seems bad to me. Don’t fail inspection. They feed you food that makes you sick and tries to cure you with infection. That's the lesson in this section.”

I have a part two and it goes like this, “In a world full of people, tell me, are we all little equal? Wish you felt this way to see the things they say. In a world full of people, tell me, are we all little equal? Wish you felt this way to see the things they say. In this world, something is missing. Love and unity are lost in subtractions and divisions. It's like I got to snap so they could listen. I'm less about the segregation. I’m more about the mixing predictions. I see them clear. They make decisions more efficiently. To the ones I met growing up who I don't see frequently, I've always been here. I shifted to a different frequency.”

“Some feel me and see me when they tune in. Some so far away you'll think they see me if they zoom in. New lens on this camera. I’m equipped with decent megapixels. Shot after shot, I present to you a better picture. Be the best you moment after moment before time catch up and you’re hating every moment. Tell the sun you love me and tell the moon you wake up again. If the clouds send the rain to descend, say you accept the cleanse like the tears when your heart is dense. In a sense, it's all love. Mother Nature is so immense.” Thank you.

Thank you. Be the best you, moment after moments. It’s such a beautiful poem. Thank you so much.

I appreciate you. Anand, I love you, too.

We'll see you soon.

Live a limitless lifestyle. I appreciate you.

Take care.