For much of Cory Firth’s life, achievement was closely tied to pressure. Competitive sports taught him to perform and prove himself, and that pattern later followed him into business. From the outside, his career looked successful. Internally, however, he had struggled with depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts since childhood.

In a conversation on the Ayahuasca Podcast, Firth described how ayahuasca helped him recognize the patterns behind that struggle and rethink his relationship with work, success, fatherhood, and personal growth. Today, much of his work focuses on flow states and what it means to build a life around awareness rather than constant performance.

A Life Built Around Proving Himself

Firth traces part of his performance-driven mindset back to childhood sports. Hockey began as something playful, but as competition increased, so did the pressure to make teams, impress coaches, and succeed.

Years later, the same pattern appeared in his professional life. He built a successful marketing agency and worked with major clients, yet he felt increasingly disconnected from what he was doing. Even the agency’s name, Proof of Performance, eventually seemed to reflect the deeper issue: he was spending his days trying to prove his value.

At the same time, Firth was dealing with serious physical and mental health challenges and unhealthy habits. After trying numerous therapeutic approaches, he eventually became curious about ayahuasca.

The Ayahuasca Experience That Shook the Snow Globe

Firth initially backed out of his first planned retreat because he was afraid. After a friend went instead and returned describing a major breakthrough, Firth booked his own experience.

He compares what followed to shaking a snow globe. His assumptions about identity, work, purpose, health, and the direction of his life were suddenly unsettled.

The changes were not instantaneous. Firth emphasizes that integration took time, especially because there was far less psychedelic education and community support available when he first began. But the experience helped him recognize that his relentless drive to perform was contributing to his suffering.

He eventually left his agency and moved into psychedelic advocacy, policy reform, coaching, and consulting.

Replacing Force With Flow

One lesson was that ambition did not need to disappear. What needed to change was the source of that ambition.

Instead of creating from pressure, fear, or the need to prove himself, he began exploring how the same energy could come from clarity and calm. This led him deeper into the study of flow states.

Firth describes flow simply as “effortless action”: a state in which self-consciousness fades, the sense of time changes, and attention becomes deeply immersed in the present activity. Rather than forcing a particular outcome, a person becomes absorbed in what they are doing.

For Firth, psychedelics and flow share an important quality: both can interrupt the constant mental storytelling that pulls attention into the past and future.

What Flow Looks Like in Everyday Life

The conversation also explores how these ideas survive contact with ordinary responsibilities, especially parenthood.

Before becoming a father, Firth maintained a three-hour morning routine. Missing part of it could leave him anxious for the rest of the day. Fatherhood made that level of rigidity unrealistic.

Now, instead of demanding perfection, he adapts. If his daughter needs more attention, he can shorten his personal routine to five or ten minutes. Play becomes part of the practice.

The larger lesson is that wellbeing should not become another performance test. A routine designed to reduce stress can become a source of stress when someone becomes overly attached to completing it perfectly.

Ayahuasca, Fatherhood, and Letting Go

Firth also connects his psychedelic experiences with fatherhood. He had always wanted children, but says ayahuasca helped him reconsider a relationship he had been trying to force and make space for something new.

He later met his current partner, became a father, and faced another major challenge when his partner experienced a serious postpartum medical emergency shortly after their daughter was born.

That period reinforced the importance of adaptability and self-trust. Firth says psychedelics became one of several tools he used while navigating fatherhood and supporting his family.

Beyond Healing Toward Integrated Living

Firth does not see psychedelics as something people should depend on indefinitely. He is more interested in how insights from these experiences can be incorporated into daily life.

Health, in this view, is not only about diet and exercise. Work, relationships, schedules, stress, attention, purpose, and the way people organize their lives all influence wellbeing.

This is where the conversation moves from healing toward growth. Psychedelics may shake the snow globe, but eventually the pieces have to settle into ordinary life. For Firth, the goal is not constant optimization or endless self-improvement. It is learning to create, work, parent, and live with less force—and more flow.

Listen to the whole podcast episode here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6GLtIlpioTrOCKLCp32YLw?si=95bee3543c2346fc