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How Cannabis Works

A Guide

At Physis + Agency we are building towards a world where everyone is equipped to make intentional and informed decisions about cannabis and its uses. This book, How Cannabis Works: A Guide, is the most comprehensive guide to date.


In the process of making this book, we had thousands of conversations across the cannabis spectrum with consumers of all kinds, producers, retailers, doctors, therapists, social workers, parents, researchers, and public health advocates.

We distilled those, plus hundreds of research papers, our decade plus of experience with the industry in Washington State, and our own original research, into an accessible and comprehensive overview of how cannabis works, the most comprehensive guide to date. The culminating chapter, The Mindful Cannabis Session: Putting it All to Work for You, is a great place to start and then return to again after reading the rest of the book. 

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Meet the Authors

Aric Mayer, MBA, MFA

Aric has experience across the business spectrum, from billion-dollar legacy enterprises to scrappy startups that are trying to change the world, and has led projects for clients ranging in scale from Amazon to small boutique product companies. With both an MFA and an MBA, Aric brings creative energy and hard business skills to everything he does. He created and co-teaches the MBA Consulting Capstone in all three tracks of the MBA program at Western Washington University.

Graham Halwas, MBA

Graham's interest in cannabis took root in 2017 as the supply chain analyst for a boutique producer in Seattle, where he gained hands-on experience in craft cultivation. After earning his MBA, he managed a high-volume cannabis retailer, improving performance by focusing on customer and employee experience—rare in a cost-driven industry. As a certified medical cannabis consultant, he spent three years engaging with thousands of consumers, deepening his understanding of their needs. Today, Graham works in finance for the Department of Neurological Surgery and the Department of Neurology at Washington’s top-ranked hospital. Outside work, he enjoys game nights, baking, painting, reading, and training with his rescue Rottweiler.

What’s inside

  • The Experience of Getting High

    It starts with three basic categories for experiencing the THC high: mind, mood, and body. From there we add 10 subcategories to dig into the specifics of how cannabis is affecting you.

  • Methods of Getting High

    It’s not actually all that complicated. THC products break down into three basic categories for getting high: inhaled, ingested and sublingual.

  • Stages of the Cannabis High

    This guide outlines the five stages of a cannabis high—preparation, onset, peak, denouement, and afterglow/comedown—helping you navigate and enjoy the experience with more confidence and control. 

  • The Levels of Being High

    There are five primary levels to being high. These are dose dependent, with more bioavailable or lung available THC leading to increased levels of intoxication. We will explore this in two distinct ways, low to no tolerance and high tolerance/high frequency.

  • THC: The Journey from Plant to Brain

    It all starts with THCA, an unstable and non-psychoactive compound that the cannabis plant produces as a natural defense against insects, animals, mold, fungus, and bacteria. What happens next is where things get interesting for humans.

  • Bioavailability, Recovery Rates, and Dosing THC

    We created a standard dosing model that standardizes intoxication across the methods of getting high. This enables precise calibration for you to get as high as you want to and more predictably repeat your desired experience.

  • THC Tolerance, Dependence and Disordered Use

    Explore the mechanisms of THC tolerance and how to recognize emerging issues around dependence and disordered use before they are major problems.

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