• Shawn Ryan was a Navy SEAL for nearly six years, then joined the CIA.
• During these high-stress jobs, he was in a nearly constant fight-or-flight mode.
• After he left, he struggled to adapt to a normal life. He says a psychedelic experience helped.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Shawn Ryan, a former Navy SEAL and CIA contractor, and host of the "Shawn Ryan Show." It's been edited for length and clarity. Ryan is not a medical professional. Psilocybin is illegal in the US federally and in most states. There is no medical consensus about whether it has benefits, including those described below, and the drug comes with risks.

When I left the Navy, I wasn't ready for what came next.

I had been a SEAL for five and a half years. After that, I worked as a contractor with the CIA. The tempo stayed high. I did 60 days on, 60 days off, sometimes 45 and 45. I was still running hard, living in fight-or-flight mode. When that ended, I crashed—hard.

I didn't know how to slow down. I wasn't used to dealing with normal life. All I knew was intensity. I needed that adrenaline hit every day — and when I couldn't get it from missions anymore, I found other ways.

I got into sleeping pills. Ambien, Valium, Xanax, Lorazepam — you name it, I was taking it. On top of that, I was using opiates like hydrocodone and tramadol. Eventually, I moved out of the country and started living in Medellín, Colombia. That's where I got really into cocaine.

I would go into the worst neighborhoods I could find to score. I didn't want it easy, I wanted the risk, to feel something. When that got boring, I'd go to another country and do it again.

At my lowest point, I was drinking two fifths of vodka a day. I'd wake up with mini bottles stashed all around the house — under pillows, in drawers, in the car, in my coat pockets. After dinner, I'd go to the freezer, pull out a bottle, and that's how I'd wash down my sleep meds. Except by the end, they didn't even put me to sleep anymore.

In the morning, I'd take a stimulant — Adderall or something else — to start the cycle again. That was my life. It went on for years.

The 'death experience' that changed my life

Eventually, I hit a point where I knew I couldn't keep going. A friend told me about psychedelic therapy, and I decided to try it.

The first was Ibogaine. It's a 12-hour experience. I basically watched my entire life play out from a different perspective. Every memory, every trauma — it's all there.

After the Ibogaine effects wore off, I did another psychedelic called 5-MeO-DMT, sometimes called the "God molecule." The trip is described as an ego death, or death experience.

It was the most intense, intuitive thing I've ever felt. I came out of it seeing the world differently.

I could feel energy flowing from the ocean, onto the shore, through the trees. For the first time in my life, I realized everything is connected. Everything is one. That hit me in a way nothing else ever had.

When I came back from that psychedelic experience, I didn't need the pills anymore. I didn't need the vodka. I quit everything.

I've been sober for two and a half years. I quit smoking cannabis. I stopped using stimulants. And for the first time in a long time, I was fully present with my family.

That experience changed everything. It gave me a second chance.

That's why I started talking about this publicly on my podcast, the "Shawn Ryan Show." I wanted other veterans — other guys like me — to know there's a way out.

A lot of them have been through the same thing — addiction, trauma, broken families, suicidal thoughts. When they hear that someone else made it through, they start to believe that maybe they can too.

So many of us come back broken. We lose ourselves. We spiral. But healing is possible. Recovery is possible.

If you have a unique military story that you would like to share, please email the editor, Jessica Orwig, at [email protected].

This story was adapted from Ryan's interview for Business Insider's series, "Authorized Account." Learn more about his life before and after the Navy SEALs in the video below:

• Shawn Ryan didn't leave the Navy SEALs because he was done with combat. He still enjoyed the rush.
• He left because he saw what being a SEAL for 20-plus years did to his teammates.
• Now, he uses his experience to help other veterans and active-duty members.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Shawn Ryan, a former Navy SEAL and CIA contractor, and host of the "Shawn Ryan Show," a podcast sharing uncensored, first-person stories from military veterans, law enforcement officers, and other high-stakes careers. It has been edited for length and clarity.

One of the reasons I left the Navy SEALs after nearly six years was that I didn't get enough action.

I was very gung-ho about going to war.

I'd seen combat in Haiti, Afghanistan, and Iraq, but the reality is, you might re-up for another six years and only spend a small part of that actually in combat. The rest is training and waiting.

I also saw what 20-plus years as a SEAL will do to somebody — to their body and to their home life.

A lot of us have the same injuries and the same symptoms, like back and knee issues, PTSD, and traumatic brain injury. Plus, pretty much everybody I knew was divorced, had been divorced, or was getting a divorce. A lot of them didn't know their kids very well.

Your platoon, your teammates, are your primary family. The families are secondary. I knew that if I stayed at the rate I was going, I would be a very lonely person come retirement.

How I became a Navy SEAL

I didn't even know what a Navy SEAL was when I decided to join the US military.

I tried the Marine Corps first. They told me I had to go infantry. Then I went to the Army, told them I wanted to be a Green Beret. They kind of laughed me out of the office.

A Navy recruiter saw me and said, "Hey, have you ever thought about the SEAL teams?" He gave me a pamphlet. That's how it started.

I went to the library and checked out every book I could possibly find on special operations and Navy SEALs; watched all the documentaries on National Geographic and Discovery; and decided that's what I'm going to do.

I didn't leave the SEALs because I was done with combat

I made it through BUD/S (Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL) and deployed to Haiti in 2004. It was civil unrest everywhere, but our duties were reconnaissance missions that involved basically flying on a helicopter every morning over various towns to report back about the civil unrest.

It wasn't enough action for me, and made me really hungry for more. I wanted to go to the Middle East.

In Iraq, we got sent out with conventional units that were getting hit with IEDs and ambushes. We'd go in, train them up, then take them out on real missions and kill the guys that were killing them.

My transition to normal life was difficult

After leaving the Navy, I worked for the CIA for a while, which was similar in intensity but paid four to five times more than what I made as a SEAL.

After leaving the CIA, I moved out of the country to Colombia and got really into cocaine and alcohol. It became a vicious cycle, but eventually I climbed out of it and moved back to the US and launched my podcast the "Shawn Ryan Show."

I wanted to document history from veterans' perspectives. I was tired of the mainstream media telling military stories wrong.

Everybody that I brought on the podcast at the beginning had been through the low points, the addictions to adrenaline, to substance abuse, to broken families, to suicide attempts. Many have also found some form of success through entrepreneurship.

We've been running the show since 2019 and are approaching our 200th episode now. I've interviewed many active military members and veterans, and one thing I've learned is that people benefit from hearing their stories.

If I hadn't left the SEALs and had all the experiences I've had, I wouldn't have met my wife, created this podcast, and met the people who have become my extended family.

When people hear that someone else made it through, they start to believe that maybe they can too.

If you have a unique military story that you would like to share, please email the editor, Jessica Orwig, at [email protected].

This story was adapted from Ryan's interview for Business Insider's series, "Authorized Account." Learn more about his life before and after the Navy SEALs in the video below:

• NASA astronaut Jonny Kim can add going to space to his incomparable résumé.
• Kim launched on an expedition to the ISS earlier this week to serve as a flight engineer.
• Before NASA, he was an emergency medicine resident at Harvard and served as a Navy SEAL.

Jonny Kim served as a Navy SEAL on over 100 combat missions. He earned a medical degree at Harvard. And earlier this week, Kim went on his first spaceflight to the ISS, floating 250 miles above Earth.

The 41-year-old made the 262-mile journey to space Tuesday to serve as a flight engineer on an eight-month expedition aboard the International Space Station.

Before working at NASA, Kim's one-of-a-kind career journey includes receiving a Bronze and Silver Star while in the Navy and training as an emergency medicine physician at one of the top medical schools in the US.

First spaceflight

Shortly after midnight on April 8, Kim launched aboard a Soyuz MS-27 spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan with Russian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Alexey Zubritsky.

A little over three hours later, the trio docked at the orbital laboratory around 5 a.m. the same day, boarding the ISS two hours later to join the Expedition 72/73 crew.

A video taken aboard the ISS captured the moment Kim was welcomed aboard the space station.

Welcome to the station, @JonnyKimUSA!

Kim will now begin an eight-month @ISS_Research mission aboard the @Space_Station. Follow our station blog for daily mission updates: https://t.co/FRrjhINIvY pic.twitter.com/objZw5pQAX

— NASA (@NASA) April 8, 2025

Joining the ISS expedition

For the next eight months, the NASA flight engineer will assist in scientific research intended to benefit future space missions and people on Earth.

Kim's research includes observing the flammability of certain materials in microgravity and testing new space-related technologies.

Enlisting in the Navy

Becoming an astronaut is a popular career aspiration for children, but Kim said he didn't have a dream job until he turned 16 and was drawn to serving in the Navy.

"As a kid, I did not have really any dreams until I was 16 years old, and I heard about Naval Special Warfare and the kinds of things that Naval Special Warfare operators do," Kim said in an interview with the peer-reviewed journal Annals of Emergency Medicine.

"That was really the first time, when I was 16, that I actually had a vision and a dream and felt that I was called to do something," he continued. "I never once thought I could be a physician, or an astronaut, or anything else."

When Kim, a Korean-American born to immigrant parents, told his mother about his decision to enlist, he said she tearfully urged him to reconsider.

"My mother, with tears in her eyes, [said], 'It's not too late; you can come home, and we'll do this family business,'" Kim told Business Insider in 2020. "And for a fleeting moment, I considered it."

But Kim said, "There wasn't anyone or anything to talk me out of it. It was the first time I set my sights on a dream."

Finding identity in Naval Special Warfare

After graduating from high school in 2002, Kim enlisted as a seaman recruit in the Navy, later completed Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training, and was assigned to SEAL Team 3.

As a Special Warfare Operator, Kim participated in more than 100 combat missions as a combat medic, navigator, sniper, and point man, receiving the Bronze Star, Silver Star, and other service awards.

The decorated Navy SEAL said serving in the military was "a very growing experience" that helped him find his identity, build confidence, and "see challenges for what they are and be able to draw off the strength to overcome."

"Going into the Navy was the best decision I ever made in my life because it completely transformed that scared boy who didn't have any dreams to someone who started to believe in himself," Kim said in a Q&A published by the Annals of Emergency Medicine.

Harvard physician

Kim's combat experiences — particularly when he provided medical aid to his injured teammates and observed other medical doctors saving "lives and limbs" — are what led him to become an emergency medicine physician after serving in the Iraq War.

In his mid- to late 20s, Kim earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics from the University of San Diego and a medical degree from Harvard Medical School. He then completed a Harvard-affiliated internship in emergency medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's Hospital.

From the Navy to NASA

While in medical school, Kim said physician-astronaut Scott Parazynski "opened up my eyes to NASA and its mission," which resonated with him much like Naval Special Warfare did a decade earlier.

"It really struck a chord with me, of going to the unknown of space and overcoming these impossible challenges, with technology we had not yet developed," Kim said in the medical journal interview.

Kim added that he was especially drawn to the idea that he "would have a chance to inspire young children who may be in tough situations as kids."

Kim was among a record number of people who applied to become astronauts in 2016. The rigorous application process included a range of mental and medical tests, including ECGs, blood draws, a chest radiograph, and a multiple-choice personality and behavioral test.

While Kim said he couldn't go into the specifics of the interview process, he said one of the rounds of interviews included team-oriented games and evaluations with behavioral specialists to see "how you react to stress and interactions with your team members, all of whom I had never met before."

Selected by NASA out of 18,300 applicants

While he was shopping at the grocery store the following year, Kim said he got a call from NASA that he would be one of 12 new astronaut candidates selected from a pool of over 18,300 applicants.

Kim said he "just couldn't foresee" getting selected among "so many amazing people who apply for this job." Most applicants don't get in on their first application, which he said initially made him feel "survivorship guilt" upon hearing the decision until he thought back to his time in the Navy.

"We have a saying in the [SEAL] teams — it's 'earn your Trident every day,'" Kim told Business Insider in 2020, referring to the insignia that Navy SEALs wear after earning their special warfare certification. "What that means is that you have to earn your right to be where you are every single day."

"I take that to heart when I think of this job," he said.

Space boot camp

After joining the new class of astronaut candidates in 2017, Kim embarked on a two-year-long training program, in which he learned how to operate on-board systems and robotics on ISS simulators, received physiological and expeditionary training, and practiced space walk procedures in NASA's Neutral Buoyancy Lab in Johnson Space Center in Houston.

He also trained in field geology and water and wilderness survival, became proficient in Russian, and even completed a solo flight as a pilot on a Navy T-6 trainer aircraft.

In 2020, Kim graduated from astronaut boot camp and supported ISS expeditions before serving on his first space mission aboard the space station this year. But it likely won't be Kim's last time in space — he was also selected as an astronaut on NASA's Artemis moon-landing missions.

He said he credits his success as a NASA astronaut to "an extraordinary team of dedicated individuals who truly care."

"It's not the rockets, planes, satellites, or science that define this agency," Kim wrote in a post on X a day before launching to the ISS, "it's the remarkable individuals who bring it all to life — always has been, and always will be."

Meta is open sourcing a method to watermark AI-generated videos. Called Meta Video Seal, the company says it's robust against compression and edits.

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