In today’s Solidarity Friday’s Episode, Kyle and Joe sit down to talk about Grof Legacy Training, Peyote scarcity, a DMT survey on entities, and more.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
Grof Legacy Training
- Its based on Stanislav Grof’s research into psychedelic therapy, holotropic breathwork, transpersonal psychology, and spiritual emergencies
- Dr. Stanislov Grof and his wife just launched this program
- It’s not just about breathwork
- His involvement in the Grof transpersonal training program dropped off in the last few years
- He wasn't allowed to teach breathwork in the GTT model, there wasn't any growth in the company, so a lot of people like Grof left and started their own thing
- Kyle says this is pretty common with trademarks and protocols
- Joe says he's very excited about it
- Kyle says Stan’s work is very important and a lot of the reason Psychedelics Today came to be
Peyote
- Native American Churches don't have as much access as they need to properly grow Peyote
- Perhaps, in countries where Peyote isn't illegal, there should be growing of Peyote
- Native American’s are in a bad spot due to colonialism
- As insiders, we need to talk about how to use less Peyote
- “Pick one, plant two” should be the mindset
- Kyle says, “how do we just respect these sacred medicines?”
DMT Survey
- Survey of entity encounter experiences occasioned by inhaled N,N-dimethyltryptamine: Phenomenology, interpretation, and enduring effects
- 2,561 individuals (mean age 32 years; 77% male) completed an online survey about their single most memorable entity encounter after taking N,N-dimethyltryptamine
- Senses involved were visual and extra-sensory
- The most common descriptive labels for the entity were being, guide, spirit, alien and helper
- 41% of respondents reported fear
- More than half of those who identify as Atheist before, no longer identified with Atheism after the experience
- Out of any other method, DMT seems to occasion the most entities
In this episode, Joe and Kyle interview Erik Davis, Author of High Weirdness: Drugs, Esoterica, and Visionary Experience in the Seventies. In the show they cover topics on La Chorrera, uncertainty, synchronicities and more.
In today’s Solidarity Friday’s Episode, Kyle and Joe interview Dave McGaughey, Founding Partner of NorthStar. In the show, they talk about NorthStar, Ethics, and the story, “We Will Call It Pala”.
In today’s episode, Joe and Kyle sit down with Dr. Mike Hart. In the show they talk about Cannabis and Ketamine used as medicine.
3 Key Points:
- The main uses for Cannabis are for chronic pain and mental health. CBD is really good for people with inflammation.
- When it comes to any psychedelic/plant medicine therapy, it's all about agency. The power lies within the individual, the therapy and the drug are just tools to help the person obtain the power to heal themselves.
-
Ketamine is a useful treatment for depression. It's instant, a patient can take it and it's effective right away, where typical antidepressants may take 4-6 weeks to kick in.
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Show Notes
About Dr. Mike Hart
- He attended Med school on Saba Island
- Then he came to Ontario where he did his residency
- 8 months after practicing he started prescribing cannabis
- He got into cannabis because it's a great alternative to opioids and pain pills, etc.
Cannabis
- The main uses for Cannabis are for chronic pain and mental health
- CBD is really good for people with inflammation
- CBD is good for anything with -itis like arthritis, etc
- THC is found to be much better than CBD for things like sciatica and nerve pain
- Kyle mentions that when he takes CBD he has flashbacks of ayahuasca dreams/experiences
- CBD is not psychoactive in that it doesn't get you high
- Kyle says that people can have spiritual experiences just by breathing, so the
- CBD is just another vehicle that helps
- Adding a small amount of THC to CBD isn't going to potentiate it, but there may be an entourage effect that can be a further benefit to a patient
- Don't use more than 2.5mg of THC with CBD if you don't want psychoactive effects
- Mike says that some people use CBD isolate, and that's great, but like an egg, it's best not to eat just the egg whites, it's best to eat the whole egg to get all of the benefits
- So just like eating the whole egg, the best way to get all the benefits of cannabis is to use/consume the whole plant
- There are definitely situations where using the whole plant is best, and other situations where isolation is best
Cannabis and Therapy
- Anxiety can be treated very well with exposure therapy
- Exposure therapy is exposing something you're afraid of, and exposing it over and over until its not an anxiety anymore
- CBD can decrease learned fear
- PTSD is a learned fear
- “The people who end up doing the most in life, are the people who have had the most trauma. We need to tell people that their trauma does not define them.” - Mike
- It's all about personal agency
- It's not about the drug, its you
- It's not about therapy, its you
- The power is in you, its just learning how to harness and use that power
- Mike says your relationships, your job, and your health are the three most important things to master
- Going without something makes you more grateful for that thing
Ketamine
- Mike has been prescribing Ketamine for just over a year now
- It is helpful for mental health and chronic pain
- Ketamine is really useful for treatment resistant depression
- He prescribes Ketamine orally
- He advises his patients to take it in the morning as soon as they wake up on an empty stomach
- If it is taken that way, they get a psychoactive effect, and he thinks that it is the most effective way
- Its instant, a patient can take it, and its effective right away, where typical antidepressants may take 4-6 weeks to kick in
Links
About Dr. Mike Hart
Michael Hart, MD is the medical director and founder at Readytogo Clinic in London, Ontario. Readytogo Clinic focuses on cannabinoid medicine, but also offers family medicine services, IV vitamin therapy and specialized hormone testing. Dr. Hart is a recognized speaker on the topic of cannabis. He has spoken at CME events throughout Ontario, multiple cannabis conferences and has been featured on a variety of cannabis websites. In March of 2017, Dr. Hart released a free Ebook with his co-author Jeremy Kossen. Dr. Hart has seen first hand how the opioid epidemic is affecting our population and wanted to take action by finding a solution. Dr. Hart believes that cannabis is an excellent alternative to opioids and has seen excellent results in his practice. Dr. Hart emphasizes lifestyle changes in his medical practice and follows a low carb diet himself. Dr. Hart actively trains MMA at Adrenaline Training center and follows a comprehensive strength and conditioning program.
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In today’s Solidarity Friday’s Episode, Kyle and Joe sit down to talk about therapists being unprepared to talk to people taking psychedelics, the drug war and more.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
MAPS Press Release
- PRESS RELEASE: Interim Analysis Shows At Least 90% Chance of Statistically Significant Difference in PTSD Symptoms after MDMA-assisted Psychotherapy
- MAPS hired a third party to work through their data set and they may be getting FDA approval
Therapists Are Unprepared to Talk to People About Taking Psychedelics
- Should there be some sort of body regulating therapist training in integration?
- Should there be a standardized training?
- There are going to be good therapists that care, and go out of their way and get the training, and there will be bad therapists, that do harm
- It's a long and difficult topic
- Should people be going to jail for being bad therapists?
- Looking at breathwork, there are training groups, but there isn't one large, overarching group that governs all trainings
- “Are we acting with integrity if we aren't bringing the utmost safety to the table?” - Joe
Group Setting Impact
- How is COVID going to impact psychedelic tourism?
- In breathwork, people are potentially coughing, crying, and in general just doing heavy breathing, COVID is super contagious
About Kyle
Kyle’s interest in exploring non-ordinary states of consciousness began when he was 16-years-old when he suffered a traumatic snowboarding accident. Waking up after having a near-death experience changed Kyle’s life. Since then, Kyle has earned his B.A. in Transpersonal Psychology, where he studied the healing potential of non-ordinary states of consciousness by exploring shamanism, plant medicine, Holotropic Breathwork, and the roots/benefits of psychedelic psychotherapy. Kyle has co-taught two college-level courses. One of the courses Kyle created as a capstone project, “Stanislav Grof’s Psychology of Extraordinary Experiences,” and the other one which he co-created, “The History of Psychedelics.”
Kyle completed his M.S. in clinical mental health counseling with an emphasis in somatic psychology. Kyle’s clinical background in mental health consists of working with at-risk teenagers in crisis and with individuals experiencing an early-episode of psychosis. Kyle also facilitates Transpersonal Breathwork workshops.
About Joe
Joe studied philosophy in New Hampshire, where he earned his B.A.. After stumbling upon the work of Stanislav Grof during his undergraduate years, Joe began participating in Holotropic Breathwork workshops in Vermont in 2003. Joe helped facilitate Holotropic and Transpersonal Breathwork workshops while he spent his time in New England. He is now working in the software industry as well as hosting a few podcasts. Joe now coordinates Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork workshops, in Breckenridge, Colorado.
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In this episode, Kyle and Joe interview Eamon Armstrong, host of the Podcast, Life is a Festival. In the show, they talk about Eamon’s Iboga experience, the festival culture, rites of passage, ethics and more.
3 Key Points:
- Eamon Armstrong is the host of Life is a Festival, a podcast promoting a lifestyle of adventure and personal development through the lens of festival culture.
- Maya is an intelligence platform for psychedelic therapists to manage their clients and their protocols.
-
Rites of Passage can look different for everybody, they can look like going to Africa to be initiated in an Ibogaine ceremony, to attending Burning Man.
Show Notes
About Eamon
- Eamon is the host of the Podcast, Life is a Festival
- It's not about festivals, it's about how to make life like a festival
- Eamon is very passionate about mental wellness
- After graduating college, he felt very lost
- He was throwing mushroom tea parties, making electronic music with his friends
- The key to throwing a mushroom tea party is to have people drink less mushrooms than they think that they're drinking, everyone just thinks they are tripping harder than they were
- He went to Burning Man in 2010
- He started working in social media for Burning Man’s off playa events
- Psychedelics and harm reduction became core to their editorial voice
- He worked closely with Psychedelic Peer Support, Zendo, Kosmicare, etc
Ibogaine Experience
- Eamon attended an Iboga retreat in Gabon, Africa, and he says it was more about the retreat than the Iboga
- He was in the chamber for 5 days, and he was alone in it
- This retreat was in the Bwiti religion
- He really went there for a full sledgehammer experience
- He felt he had some addicted aspects that were hindering his sexual experiences
- Iboga goes to the root of the trauma and shows you where the addictive pattern of behavior is
- Iboga has a long integration period
- Iboga is a root, and he consumed it in a form of a tangled nest
- He felt very blasted open from the experience
- Iboga took him directly to his anger
- “We have in our modern Western Culture, a lot of lost, young people” - Eamon
- “The value of a rite of passage, is that you are confronted with certain things that you can't get to on your own” - Eamon
- The fact that you can die in an Iboga experience, is part of the initiation
Rites of Passage
- Burning Man isn't a rite of passage, but it can be used as a rite of passage
- Burning Man is a temporary experience in civic living, it is not orchestrated by elders
- There is a growing topic on psychedelic parenting, and taking psychedelics with children
Maya
- Maya is designed in partnership with psychedelic practitioners & ceremony leaders
- Maya is an intelligence platform for psychedelic therapists to manage their clients and their protocols
- Ethics in psychedelics are so important right now
- This does not replace the therapist, it's everything the therapist needs to support their clients in healing
- “The ecosystem itself will thrive when we are all working in service to each other” - Eamon
- “If you want to be a part of the cool kids, and the cool kids are doing it ethically, then you have to do it ethically” - Eamon
Final Thoughts
- The soul is the most beautiful thing
- “Psychedelics as medicine, treat society, beyond individuals” - Eamon
Links
Life is a Festival Facebook Group
Psychedelic Therapy Podcast by Maya Facebook Group
About Eamon Armstrong
Eamon Armstrong is the creator and host of Life is a Festival, promoting a lifestyle of adventure and personal development through the lens of festival culture. He is the former Creative Director and public face of Chip Conley’s industry-leading online festival guide and community Fest300, where he was a global community builder. Eamon’s belief in the transformational power of psychedelics led him to take part in a traditional Bwiti initiation in Gabon, and to become a trained Sitter with MAP’s Zendo Project. Eamon is a passionate advocate for mature masculinity and offers public talks and workshops from mythopoetic men's work to stand-up comedy on integrating masculinity.
Headshot Photo Credit: GBK Photos
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Navigating Psychedelics
In today’s Solidarity Friday’s Episode, Kyle and Joe sit down with Brett Greene, who was the very first guest on Psychedelics Today four years ago. In response to last week’s episode on the Corporadelic topic, Brett comes on the show to talk about companies and drug discovery.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
Brett Greene
- Brett Greene was the very first guest on Psychedelics Today four years ago
- Brett and Kyle originally met at the Horizons: Perspectives on Psychedelics conference in New York City in 2013.
- He works at The Center for Drug Discovery
Drug Development
- At his new company, they are making drugs from tryptamines that are more predictable
- His team has not only done this countless of times with the FDA, they have also done it with psychedelics
Ethics
- The psychedelic movement doesn't own psychedelics, they don't own molecules, but they do own their history
- “We should get away from the right and wrongness of the mechanics, and get into the right and wrongness of the ethics” - Brett
- “Patents are the language of invention” - Brett
- “An ethical charter is one that covers cognitive liberty, business ethics, and responsibility and accountability for patient safety” - Brett
- What are the minimal acceptable requirements when doing this work?
Final Thoughts
- We need to be kind with each other
- We need to balance truth with kindness and compassion
- For those interested in a work postiton email Brett@adeliatx.com
About Brett Greene
Brett works in research administration under Alexandros Makriyannis, one of the world's top cannabinoid researchers. His job consists of a multitude of functions, ranging from administrative support for a team of 15+ grant submitting scientists to lab equipment and lab management, and diverse recruitment for NIH grants.
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In this episode, Joe interviews Tom and Sheri Eckert, organizers of the Oregon Psilocybin Therapy Initiative. The IP 34 is the bill that would legalize psilocybin therapy.
3 Key Points:
- IP 34 asks the Oregon Health Authority to create a licensing system that will create a regulated program where Oregonians suffering from depression, anxiety, trauma and other challenges can see a licensed and trained facilitator to receive supervised psilocybin therapy.
- IP 34 was written by licensed therapists in Oregon along with the country’s leading advocates in the field. It is supported by healthcare professionals, treatment providers, veterans’ groups and community leaders across the state.
- There has been a multitude of studies from leading medical research institutions such as Johns Hopkins, UCLA, and NYU showing that psilocybin therapy works.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About
- Tom and Sheri began their interest in psilocybin research about 5 years ago when they read an article in The New Yorker by Michal Pollan
- They realized how powerful psilocybin was for clinical work
- They are both therapists, and were inspired to find out if there was a way to create a modality that allowed them to provide psilocybin therapy to help their clients
Psilocybin Assisted Psychotherapy
- Psychotherapy is supposed to be experiential, the breakthrough is where the change happens
- Sheri says that psilocybin therapy gets all parts of the brain in communication together
- “The more intense the mystical experience the more clinical outcomes that are achieved” - Tom
Ballot Initiative
- They started in 2015
- They wanted the breakthrough studies and the research proving low risks to work for them
- The psychedelic community was very helpful
- They went through rotations with the way the initiative was written
- They like the therapy model, its safe, careful and mindful
Clause
- Joe asks about a Supremacy Clause, where the state supersedes local districts
- This initiative does not get in the way of any other initiative
- There are angles on all different types of drug policy reform
- There is nothing in the IP34 that blocks any other initiative like decriminalization
- We are all a part of the big picture, we all need to work together
GMP Psilocybin
- They wanted to keep this in the frame of non-commercialization
- Their goal with this is not about money, it’s really about the healing
- “We are trying to move forward a healing modality to help people, we are trying to legalize psilocybin assisted psychotherapy” - Tom
- There is a part in the initiative that says measures will have to be taken to make sure the psilocybin is ‘food grade’ standard or in general just clean and safe
Oregonians to Sign the Petition
- Download the petition, sign it, and mail it in
Final Thoughts
- Sheri says that the team behind the initiative is inspired by what is happening globally around psilocybin and research
- They are right at the end of their signatures, but they need help to reach the goal
- “We've got to see the bigger picture here, and get behind it.” - Tom
Links
About Tom and Sheri Eckert
As husband-and-wife founders of the Oregon Psilocybin Society (OPS) and authors of the Psilocybin Service Initiative (PSI), Tom and Sheri Eckert have set in motion a historic campaign to legalize Psilocybin Services, also known as Psilocybin Assisted Therapy, in their home state of Oregon. A growing number of Oregonians are getting behind the idea, largely in response to the latest science. The Eckerts, with a growing army of volunteers, are spreading a truth held increasingly self-evident: that the psilocybin experience, when facilitated under safe and supportive conditions, can be a life-changing gift.In addition to their activism, the Eckert’s own and operate “Innerwork” – a private psychotherapy practice serving the Portland metro area. Included in their catalog of services is their groundbreaking “Better Man” program, which is shown to neutralize intimate partner and family violence. Sheri has been awarded a Cosmic Sister Women of the Psychedelic Renaissance in support of her presentation at the Spirit Plant Medicine conference.
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In today’s Solidarity Friday’s Episode with Kyle and Joe, they talk mostly about Corpora-delic, companies and wealthy individuals investing in the psychedelic industry.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
Psychedelics Company Orthogonal Thinker Closes $6M Seed Round
- The company is valued at 111 million
- The CEO, Jason Hobson says, “The current health pandemic has resulted in a societal shift in the way we think about our health and the importance of access to treatment, both physical health and mental health. Ei.Ventures believes this is the right time to lean into mental health issues such as mood disorders and addiction, and eventual access to therapeutic treatments from innovations in botanical compounds that have been around for thousands of years.”
- Joe and Kyle say that there is so much money coming in, and it worries the psychedelic community because they aren't used to seeing capitalism
- Joe says that he hopes that some patents don't equate to ruining access
Thiel Backs Psychedelic-Drug Startup in Latest Funding Round
- “Are these companies going to bully the smaller organizations out of existence so that diversity doesn't really exist in the way we think it should?” - Joe
- Medical is a great model, but it should be reduced to that only
- Kyle says the sacred-ness feels like it may be taken away, and big companies just look at it as a commodity
Medical Researchers Worry Silicon Valley Could Screw Up Psychedelics
- "Not everyone sees this opportunity for entrepreneurship as a good thing. For researchers looking into the efficacy of psychedelics for therapeutic purposes, these substances are far more than a market opportunity—they’re potentially life-saving medications. And after decades of prohibition, psychedelics are just barely gaining mainstream acceptance.’ - from the article
- People are bold enough to stand up to companies they don't agree with
It's no joke how much money was spent on making Tim Leary look bad
DARPA Wants Benefits of Psychedelics but Without Hallucinations
- The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is launching a new drug program for treating soldiers with PTSD, depression, anxiety, and drug addiction, and it is drawing inspiration from psychedelic research.
- Kyle mentions that this is tricky, its both a biochemical and experiential thing
- Will eliminating the hallucinations ruin the experience?
- Joe says that there are some people that are so unstable that a psychedelic experience can be really a lot
- Joe also says that there arent alot of drugs that their use needs to be supervised (medically) and psychedelics are some of them
How Climate Justice Could End the Drug War
- Joe recorded with Erica Darragh from Sunrise Movement
- Their talk was about how climate justice could end the drug war
- They talked about more equitable ways of including people of less power, influence or privilege into the world of psychedelics
- The more ahead we are of the government, the more likely we are to influence policy, Joe says it's best to just stay informed
A North Star for the Emerging Psychedelics Industry
- If we aren't coming from psychedelic values when bringing these substances into the mainstream, then what are we doing?
- What are psychedelic values?
- Valuing the planet, valuing your place in the planet, a sense of connection, cooperation vs. competition, how do we honor a lineage or where these medicines come from? these could be some psychedelic values
- Following the permaculture principles and applying them to life is a great tool for systems thinking
About Kyle
Kyle’s interest in exploring non-ordinary states of consciousness began when he was 16-years-old when he suffered a traumatic snowboarding accident. Waking up after having a near-death experience changed Kyle’s life. Since then, Kyle has earned his B.A. in Transpersonal Psychology, where he studied the healing potential of non-ordinary states of consciousness by exploring shamanism, plant medicine, Holotropic Breathwork, and the roots/benefits of psychedelic psychotherapy. Kyle has co-taught two college-level courses. One of the courses Kyle created as a capstone project, “Stanislav Grof’s Psychology of Extraordinary Experiences,” and the other one which he co-created, “The History of Psychedelics.”
Kyle completed his M.S. in clinical mental health counseling with an emphasis in somatic psychology. Kyle’s clinical background in mental health consists of working with at-risk teenagers in crisis and with individuals experiencing an early-episode of psychosis. Kyle also facilitates Transpersonal Breathwork workshops.
About Joe
Joe studied philosophy in New Hampshire, where he earned his B.A.. After stumbling upon the work of Stanislav Grof during his undergraduate years, Joe began participating in Holotropic Breathwork workshops in Vermont in 2003. Joe helped facilitate Holotropic and Transpersonal Breathwork workshops while he spent his time in New England. He is now working in the software industry as well as hosting a few podcasts. Joe now coordinates Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork workshops, in Breckenridge, Colorado.
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In this episode, Joe interviews Amanda Feilding, Founder and Director of The Beckley Foundation. In the show, they cover topics on psychedelic research, policy work, regulation, and the benefits of psychedelics in a time of crisis.
3 Key Points:
- The Beckley Foundation pioneers psychedelic research to drive evidence-based drug policy reform, founded and directed by Amanda Feilding as a UK-based think-tank and NGO.
- There is some interesting research happening around LSD expanding the neuroplasticity of the mind and increasing neurogenesis.
- We are in the midst of a mental health crisis, especially in the West, and psychedelics may be helpful in improving mental health.
Show Notes
The Beckley Foundation
- Amanda says she felt alone for a long time, they were taking a scientific approach, and it was much too serious for the underground
- The Beckley Foundation is doing policy work, medical work, scientific work, etc
- Amanda has a passion for science, but felt a social responsibility to do the policy work
- It's a very destructive work with ‘drugs’, because they are all under the same umbrella, but we psychedelic enthusiasts know, that psychedelics are beneficial and different than other drugs
- Joe mentions he always thought how crazy LSD sentencing is, in some places it is longer than murder charges
- “The ego is really a mirror of the government, and it can be much too restrictive and damaging” - Amanda
LSD
- LSD increases cognitive function by expanding the networks of integrative centers in the brain
- Amanda thinks that LSD is better at increasing cognition than mushrooms
- She says they are doing exciting work with LSD and how it expands neuroplasticity of the mind, and how it increases neurogenesis
- She thinks we haven't really even scratched the surface of exploring the benefits of these compounds
- Joe says he is hearing about a lot of athletes using LSD as a performance enhancing drug
- Neuroplasticity is like when the brain becomes hot metal and it can adapt and change
Crisis
- We have a horrible mental health crisis in the west, 1 in 3 teenage girls are depressed
- Out of all death causes in the US, air pollution is one of the largest
- “Our society needs a paradigm shift” - Amanda
- Amanda says that she doesn't believe that all people need to take psychedelics, but that they can be very beneficial
Regulation
- Joe says he would love to see regulation everywhere
- The cause of most drug harms are prohibition
- Portugal and Switzerland are great models for boosting public service
- Recognizing the potential benefits helps (starting with medical but not stopping there)
Final Thoughts
- We are all moving in the right direction
- The spreading of knowledge and education is the right path
- The intuitive gains are the main benefits of these altered states of consciousness
Links
About Amanda Fielding
Amanda Feilding has been called the ‘hidden hand’ behind the renaissance of psychedelic science, and her contribution to global drug policy reform has also been pivotal and widely acknowledged. Amanda was first introduced to LSD in the mid-1960s, at the height of the first wave of scientific research into psychedelics. Impressed by its capacity to initiate mystical states of consciousness and heighten creativity, she quickly recognised its transformative and therapeutic power. Inspired by her experiences, she began studying the mechanisms underlying the effects of psychedelic substances and dedicated herself to exploring ways of harnessing their potential to cure sickness and enhance wellbeing. In 1996, Amanda set up The Foundation to Further Consciousness, changing its name to the Beckley Foundation in 1998.
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Navigating Psychedelics
In today’s Solidarity Fridays Episode with Kyle and Joe, they talk about current topics in the news including MindMed, psilocybin synthesis, treating climate grief with psychedelics, psychedelic decriminalization and more.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
MindMed
- Psychedelic Pharmaceutical Company MindMed Develops LSD Neutralizer Technology To Shorten and Stop LSD Trips
- MindMed is a psychedelic Pharmaceutical company that is exploring LSD and patenting anything they find during the research
- Joe comments and says that organizations like Zendo are able to do optimal work and we don't necessarily need a Pharma company to help in recreational/festival settings
- But in a clinical setting, this is more necessary
- “Are these big companies coming into the space as allies are not?” - Joe
- Joe says he thinks they are part of the ecosystem, for better or worse
- Joe says, imagine if drugs were legal, they would be so much safer
- Kyle questions what legalization would look like not in a capitalistic market
Scientists Turn Yeast into Psychedelic Psilocybin Factories
- There is a lot of reason why people choose not to play in commodified markets
- “How do we know what is true? How do we know what is helpful for us?” - Joe
- Joe says lets not have a quick easy answer
- "It's infeasible and way too expensive to extract psilocybin from magic mushrooms and the best chemical synthesis methods require expensive and difficult-to-source starting substrates” - a quote from the article
Can Psychedelics Treat Climate Grief?
- 20 years is when it's going to be really bad for climate change
- It's been more prominent, people getting therapy for trauma of what's happening in nature
- The question of a conference that Joe and Kyle attended was, “Can extraordinary experiences help save us from planetary, ecological collapse?”
- We are able to make people feel more connected to ecological systems with psychedelics
- We have to be able to feel the grief, but we have to be able to act
- Are we stewards of the earth, or do we want to work pointless jobs and be a part of consumerism?
D.C. Would Vote To Decriminalize Psychedelics, Poll Shows
- If COVID wasn't a thing currently, it looks like decrim would happen in the belly of the beast, in D.C.
- Despite the public health crisis, its looks like citizens want to reassess entheogenic use
- “When there is hardship, creativity seems to spike” - Joe
- Joe says to check out the microdose VR by Android Jones
About Kyle
Kyle’s interest in exploring non-ordinary states of consciousness began when he was 16-years-old when he suffered a traumatic snowboarding accident. Waking up after having a near-death experience changed Kyle’s life. Since then, Kyle has earned his B.A. in Transpersonal Psychology, where he studied the healing potential of non-ordinary states of consciousness by exploring shamanism, plant medicine, Holotropic Breathwork, and the roots/benefits of psychedelic psychotherapy. Kyle has co-taught two college-level courses. One of the courses Kyle created as a capstone project, “Stanislav Grof’s Psychology of Extraordinary Experiences,” and the other one which he co-created, “The History of Psychedelics.”
Kyle completed his M.S. in clinical mental health counseling with an emphasis in somatic psychology. Kyle’s clinical background in mental health consists of working with at-risk teenagers in crisis and with individuals experiencing an early-episode of psychosis. Kyle also facilitates Transpersonal Breathwork workshops.
About Joe
Joe studied philosophy in New Hampshire, where he earned his B.A.. After stumbling upon the work of Stanislav Grof during his undergraduate years, Joe began participating in Holotropic Breathwork workshops in Vermont in 2003. Joe helped facilitate Holotropic and Transpersonal Breathwork workshops while he spent his time in New England. He is now working in the software industry as well as hosting a few podcasts. Joe now coordinates Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork workshops, in Breckenridge, Colorado.
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In this episode, Kyle interviews Melissa Stangl and Daniel Cleland, Co-founders of Soltara Healing Center. They talk about integration, Shipibo healing lineage, accessibility of psychedelics, and psychedelic tourism.
3 Key Points:
- Soltara is a Healing Center dedicated toward integration as well as practicing and preserving the Shipibo tradition of Ayahusca healing.
- It doesn't make sense to take nature based traditions and turn it into instant gratification and business. The further you get from tradition, the less beneficial it may be.
- Tourism for Ayahuasca can bring both harm and benefits to the local community. Reinforcing the heritage, paying the healers very well and giving back to the forests in terms of sustainability are all ways that Soltara is using Ayahuasca tourism to help the local communities.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Melissa
- Melissa originally comes from the STEM field
- She was working in corporate America and was in search for a deeper meaning
- She met Dan and after joining one of his initial ayahuasca journeys into Peru, it changed her mindset about healing
- Dan looked for someone to help him after starting up his first ayahuasca center in Peru, and so she dropped everything and moved to the jungle to make it happen
- After witnessing the healing potential working within the Shipibo tradition, and the need for integration within the community, she later founded Soltara with Dan in Costa Rica
About Daniel
- Daniel grew up in a small town in Canada
- He followed the typical life trajectory, go to school, go to college, get a job, etc
- He didn't have big ambitions at the time, very in line with the middle class area that he grew up in
- After entering the work-force, he was in un-ambitious jobs
- He thought “are there just 30 years of doing this until this is over?”
- He felt a strong pull towards South America
- He was very close to nature in his upbringing
- He got a job leading tours
- He had a personal crisis that led him to do some soul searching
- Within the span of a few years, the trajectory pushed him to build his own healing center in Peru
Pillars of Soltara
- They feel very strongly about having the Shipibo healers lead the ceremony, and everything that they (Mel, Dan and the team) do is to help honor the tradition
- They focus a lot on integration
- For the Shipibo culture, their life is integraton, but for a lot of people that are coming from the Western world and other places, that is not the case
- They started collaborating with clinical psychologists to help create a program that puts the retreat at the start of the program, the work comes after
- Soltara includes a workbook for integration afterward
- Our transition times in modern life are shamed, getting your period, having a mid life crisis, having a psychedelic experience, but these experiences can be very sacred
- “Connecting to the sacredness of life is so healing and so needed for modern-day society” - Melissa
Container for Safety and Integration
- The sensationalism is more around the experience itself
- People think that you just go in and have the experience and then your life is changed forever and that is not the case
- A place where people not only can find who they are, but then be who they are in that container, and meet people and create community, is so powerful
- Kyle said when he attended his retreat there, he can't shake how safe he felt
He said it really stood out to him, for someone who is looking at integration and so involved in this field
- Kyle said when he attended his retreat there, he can't shake how safe he felt
- “I would like to bring people to this tradition in a way that is accessible, and I think that starts with safety” - Melissa
Corporadelic
- There are new products, treatment centers, etc
- The further away you get from tradition, the less beneficial it may be
- Dan says it doesn't make sense to take nature based traditions for instant gratification, monopoly, and business
- The ceremony is the healing part, the ayahuasca allows one to connect with the plants, and that it is just the songs in ceremony that really create the healing
- Melissa says she understands that the science is helping the movement, but she is so afraid that big corporations will just run with this and ruin tradition around it
- Kyle says during his experience at Soltara, he just felt flooded with gratitude to experience the medicine healing in nature and in the Shipibo culture, where it is natural
Ayahuasca Tourism
- Tourism for Ayahuasca causes harm but also brings benefits to the community too
- Dan says they are expanding the work, they are not taking away from the traditions
- It takes a certain capacity to travel to the jungle, speak the language, figure out where to go, how to get there, and how to receive healing is not typically possible for the vast majority of people
- The Shipibo is receiving really good pay doing this work, which isn't typically possible for the indigenous people
- This is also reinforcing the heritage, encouraging the children to continue the traditional path
- Now it’s not only a cultural heritage, it's also a way to make a living for the community members
- You don't cut down trees to grow ayahuasca, you grow ayahuasca among the trees, so it's protecting the jungle
- In recent years there has been more information and collective awareness to ask the hard questions, Bia Labate has been on the forefront of this, asking the indigenous leaders the important questions of how to keep Ayahuasca tourism sustainable, beneficial and protected
Sustainability
- They just completed a fundraiser for the Amazon
- They have been collaborating with Amazon Watch, and they raised over $10,000
- They are working to plant new Ayahuasca, not to harvest but just to put back into the jungle
Final Thoughts
- Melissa suggest listeners to watch Reconnect, a movie about a man’s journey to Soltara
Links
About Melissa Stangl
After taking a leap of faith in September 2015 to step out of Corporate America and into the Amazon jungle, Melissa has since used her background in engineering, science, and management to help advance the plant medicine and psychedelic movements – first by helping run a top-rated ayahuasca center in Peru as Operations Manager, and then as Director of Business Development – and now as Founding Partner and COO for Soltara. She is passionate about using her technical, managerial, and problem-solving skills to help bridge the gap between the Western world and the incredible healing potential of plant medicines and holistic health. Melissa is honored to be a part of this project and working with such a high-quality team that understands the importance and sacredness of this work. Her ethos is one of authenticity, professionalism, respect for tradition, transparency, and high-quality service. These mutual tenets are the team’s vision for Soltara as a whole, and she is grateful to take part in creating a space that is a strong conduit for healing, sustainability, and knowledge, empowering each guest to become global beacons for positive change.
About Daniel Cleland
Daniel Cleland is the Founding Partner/Chairman and CEO of Soltara Healing Center. He is an international entrepreneur, traveller, and author of the book, Pulse of the Jungle: Ayahuasca, Adventures and Social Enterprise in the Amazon. Originating in Walkerton, Ontario, he has spent over a decade globe-trotting and hosting group tours all over Latin America and in the deepest parts of the Amazon to work with traditional indigenous medicine practices. After completing his Master’s of Intercultural and International Communication, Daniel founded the company Pulse Tours, a company operating in Peru which became one of the highest rated shamanic retreat centers in the world before he sold it completely in 2017. He believes in supporting sustainability initiatives around the world, such as a free solar power installation that he spearheaded for an entire village in the Amazon in 2017, and the work being done by Amazon Rainforest Conservancy, a Canadian NGO wherein Daniel sits as a member of the advisory board.
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In today’s Solidarity Fridays Episode with Kyle and Joe, they talk about the Shadow Panel, embracing the weird in psychedelia, what is real, re-examining ‘normal’, and more.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
Shadow Panel
- Topics in the Panel include
- Ayahuasca retreat centers
- Maximization culture to use psychedelics for optimization
- Ketamine therapy and shadow as aspects of character
- The collective shadow and astrology
- and much more!
Erik Davis
- Joe and Erik just had a call and they talked about his book High Weirdness: Drugs, Esoterica, and Visionary Experience in the Seventies (The MIT Press)
- It is a study of the spiritual provocations to be found in the work of Philip K. Dick, Terence McKenna, and Robert Anton Wilson
- It's a really nice survey of the weird
- “Are you acknowledging what you're getting by believing something is true? It's a part of your analysis”
- Joe says if you're into the weird stuff in psychedelics, this book is for you. If you are only into the clinical stuff, then this is good for you.
- Kyle says sometimes we don't give enough credit to the weirdness in the psychedelic space
- Corporadelic is a means of spiritual bypassing
- The weirdness is core to what the psychedelic experience is
What is Real?
- Psyche means more than just mind
- When its mind, body, spirit, breath, it seems more accurate
- It is worth reading Alfred Whitehead and James Fadiman, Philosophy is important
- We are trying to understand and have helpful language around the psychedelic experience
- “There are no whole truths, there are only half truths”
- Kyle said that at the core of our being, how do we know what is true and real?
- At the fundamental truth of what real is, Kyle says that sitting in the CAT scan machine and being on the brink of death, that's the only place where truth sits for him
Psychedelic Liberty Summit
- Saturday and Sunday April 25th and 26th
- Receive a discount here
- This is a psychedelic conference that turned virtual due to COVID-19
Group Work
- Breathwork, retreat centers, etc are at an undetermined standstill because we don't know how this is going to plan out
- The Navigating Psychedelics Today Online class has students learn the information first and then come together to talk about it
- There are so many means of transmission
- Kyle mentions he read something about COVID being transmitted on the soles of shoes
- We will probably need additional shelter in place measures all the way until 2022
- We are almost hitting 9/11 death toll numbers on a daily basis
Re-examining Normal
- Do we want to go back to the way things were? Or do we want to take this weird/uncertain time and do something with it?
- The worst of climate change is only a mere 20 years out
- It's easy to have emotional heartbreak when ecological destruction happens
- Eco-psychology is a huge field
Mind Medicine Australia
Final Thoughts
- Navigating Psychedelics for Clinicians and Therapists, May co-hort is SOLD OUT
The wait list for the next co-hort can be found here
Psychedelics and the Shadow: A Series Exploring the Shadow Side of Psychedelia
Enroll Today!
About Kyle
Kyle’s interest in exploring non-ordinary states of consciousness began when he was 16-years-old when he suffered a traumatic snowboarding accident. Waking up after having a near-death experience changed Kyle’s life. Since then, Kyle has earned his B.A. in Transpersonal Psychology, where he studied the healing potential of non-ordinary states of consciousness by exploring shamanism, plant medicine, Holotropic Breathwork, and the roots/benefits of psychedelic psychotherapy. Kyle has co-taught two college-level courses. One of the courses Kyle created as a capstone project, “Stanislav Grof’s Psychology of Extraordinary Experiences,” and the other one which he co-created, “The History of Psychedelics.”
Kyle completed his M.S. in clinical mental health counseling with an emphasis in somatic psychology. Kyle’s clinical background in mental health consists of working with at-risk teenagers in crisis and with individuals experiencing an early-episode of psychosis. Kyle also facilitates Transpersonal Breathwork workshops.
About Joe
Joe studied philosophy in New Hampshire, where he earned his B.A.. After stumbling upon the work of Stanislav Grof during his undergraduate years, Joe began participating in Holotropic Breathwork workshops in Vermont in 2003. Joe helped facilitate Holotropic and Transpersonal Breathwork workshops while he spent his time in New England. He is now working in the software industry as well as hosting a few podcasts. Joe now coordinates Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork workshops, in Breckenridge, Colorado.
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In this episode, Joe interviews Michelle Janikian, Author of Your Psilocybin Mushroom Companion. In the show, they talk about Michelle’s book, the need to speak about the unspoken, and how psychedelic experiences differ for everyone.
3 Key Points:
- Michelle Janikian is Author of the book, Your Psilocybin Mushroom Companion, an easy-to-use guide to understanding magic mushrooms, from tips and trips to microdosing and psychedelic therapy.
- Psychedelics can help people, but they don't solve all problems. Doing the homework after an experience is so important.
-
The psychedelic subculture has a lot of repressed stuff going on like sexual abuse. We need to speak about the things that aren't necessarily good for the movement, we need to talk about all of it.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Michelle
- Michelle was originally a cannabis journalist
- Then she was a staff writer for Herb
- She then started writing her own book, Your Psilocybin Mushroom Companion
- So much has been happening with mushrooms lately, and Michelle thought we really needed a resource on how to use mushrooms safely
- Ulysses Press did a few Cannabis books
- Michelle was approached by them, they wanted to do a mushroom guide
- She first took mushrooms when she was 17
- She took them for fun, but had so many deep and meaningful experiences too
- Michelle believes there are multiple right ways to use psilocybin, either therapeutically, ceremonially, recreationally, etc.
- "As long as you're being safe with your surroundings, and with yourself, anyway is the right way (except for the fact that they are still illegal)" - Michelle
- In places where mushrooms are decriminalized, she mentions it totally changes your comfort level and experience when you're not so afraid to have them on you
Retreat
- Michelle just volunteered as a trip sitter at a week long women's retreat in Mexico at Luz Eterna Retreats
- She says she doesn't have all the answers, but the group environment can be really great for some, and not good at all for others
- She suggests, “do what feels right for you”
Routes of Administration
- There isn't one ideal form of administration across all drugs
- Joe says one route of administration may be good for one person, and not for another
- You can powder the mushrooms and put them into capsules, put them on food, eat them plain, make a tea out of them, etc
- Michelle says she has a great recipe in her book for mushroom tea to prevent nausea
Different for Everyone
- Michelle felt a calling to write the book because she says many other books and publications were coming out, and she didn't want some people to feel upset when psychedelics didn't just ‘heal them’
- She says psychedelics help her, but they don't solve all of her problems
- Doing the homework after an experience is so important
The Unspoken
- She says she feels uninspired to write about the ‘black and white’, the same old, stereotypical narrative
- She wants to write about the grey, the unexpected, the in-between
- Michelle asks how do we talk about the things that aren't right for the movement? Like the sexual abuse that happens in this space
- This psychedelic subculture has a lot of repressed stuff going on, and how do we talk about it?
- We need to keep learning in this field to keep improving, it is dense and detailed
- Michelle leaves us with a final thought, “read more books written by women!”
Links
About Michelle Janikian
Michelle Janikian is the author of Your Psilocybin Mushroom Companion, the down-to-earth guide that details how to use magic mushrooms “like an adult.” As a journalist, she got her start writing about cannabis for publications like High Times, Rolling Stone and Herb. Now, she writes a column for Playboy on all things drug related and also contributes regularly to DoubleBlind Mag, MERRY JANE, Psychedelic’s Today and others. She’s passionate about the healing potential of psychedelic plants and substances, especially psilocybin and cannabis, and the legalization and de- stigmatization of all drugs. Michelle studied writing and psychology at Sarah Lawrence College before traveling extensively in Latin America and eventually settling down in southern Mexico. Born in New York City and raised in New Jersey, Michelle ventures back to the States a few times a year to give talks and workshops on safe mushroom use and other cannabis and psychedelic related topics.
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In today’s Solidarity Friday’s episode with Kyle and Joe, they cover current events on psychedelics for treatment of COVID-19 trauma, an article on single dose psilocybin effects, psychedelic investments, self care and more.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
A Single High Dose of Psilocybin Alters Brain Function Up to One Month Later
- It was a small study of only 12 people
- The article states, the researchers found that self-reported emotional distress was reduced one week after psilocybin administration, but returned to baseline levels at one month after psilocybin administration
Doctor Calls for "Temporary Approval" of Psychedelics to Treat COVID-19 Trauma
- There were a few doctors and people that didn't understand the value of psychedelics being used as psychiatric tools
- Kyle thinks especially of all of the first-responders that are working non stop, without a break, for weeks on end, witnessing tons of people dying daily, and then trying to come back and process this
- The mental health, long term of these people is going to be so impacted
- Then we have to think about the people that can't come together for a funeral after they lose someone
- This pandemic is going to be traumatizing for people
- Joe says this looks like a global ego death, all of the systems that we have had before are not adequate
- The Spanish flu of 1918 was only a few years away from the Great Depression
- We know that traumas influence health and behaviors, but we have tools and technologies to get ahead of this, from an epigenetic standpoint
Psychedelic Investments
- Kyle and Joe talk for a while about psychedelics and money and research and funding
- It's a tricky thing, because we want there to be funding to make this accessible, but we want people to invest with integrity and to not start a monopoly on the funding
- Joe says we (as a company) have been approached by investors, but we have been hesitant to stay with our vision, keep our integrity and stay on track with our mission
Self Care
- Kyle says stay in the present moment, limit news consumption (watch it maybe once a day to know what's going on, but then put the phone down and not drown in it)
- It's helpful to develop more of a spiritual practice in this time (yoga, meditation)
- Self care is going to look different for everybody
- Joe says ‘Maslow it’, get good sleep, drink good water, satisfy basic needs, those are first step during this time
- Kyle says that he uses movement, somatic work, breathing into places in the body that are tense, etc
- Kyle says that those who are doing a lot of online work, take time to move and stretch
- This is a time to do a lot of work we have put off, but at the same time, its okay to give our bodies a break, take time to rest, get outside, find movement, etc
- It's important not to take on too much or do too many things
Psychedelics and the Shadow: A Series Exploring the Shadow Side of Psychedelia
Enroll Today!
About Kyle
Kyle’s interest in exploring non-ordinary states of consciousness began when he was 16-years-old when he suffered a traumatic snowboarding accident. Waking up after having a near-death experience changed Kyle’s life. Since then, Kyle has earned his B.A. in Transpersonal Psychology, where he studied the healing potential of non-ordinary states of consciousness by exploring shamanism, plant medicine, Holotropic Breathwork, and the roots/benefits of psychedelic psychotherapy. Kyle has co-taught two college-level courses. One of the courses Kyle created as a capstone project, “Stanislav Grof’s Psychology of Extraordinary Experiences,” and the other one which he co-created, “The History of Psychedelics.”
Kyle completed his M.S. in clinical mental health counseling with an emphasis in somatic psychology. Kyle’s clinical background in mental health consists of working with at-risk teenagers in crisis and with individuals experiencing an early-episode of psychosis. Kyle also facilitates Transpersonal Breathwork workshops.
About Joe
Joe studied philosophy in New Hampshire, where he earned his B.A.. After stumbling upon the work of Stanislav Grof during his undergraduate years, Joe began participating in Holotropic Breathwork workshops in Vermont in 2003. Joe helped facilitate Holotropic and Transpersonal Breathwork workshops while he spent his time in New England. He is now working in the software industry as well as hosting a few podcasts. Joe now coordinates Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork workshops, in Breckenridge, Colorado.
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In this episode, Joe invites previous guest, Dena Justice back on the show to continue the conversation on Neuro Linguistic Programming and non-ordinary states of consciousness.
3 Key Points:
- 93% of what we do on a day to day basis, is unconscious. If we can figure out how to work with that 93%, then we can really do some important things.
- A lot of times we aren't happy with our behavior, first we have to distinguish between cause and effect. With effect, you blame other people, but when you're a cause in your life, you're taking responsibility for what's happening.
- Creating new habits is hard at the conscious level, because it requires conscious thought. NLP focuses on the unconscious.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
Last Episode
- 93% of what we do on a day to day basis, is unconscious
- If we can figure out how to work with that 93%, then we can really do some important things
- Communicating with the unconscious mind is kind of how we communicate with ourselves
- The previous episode was called Neuro Linguistic Programming and Non-ordinary states of consciousness
- NLP is all about our nervous system and what is coming in with our 5 senses, then the linguistic part is all about how we communicate what is happening in the body
- NLP basically creates all of our behavior
- The more we are able to understand how our unconscious mind works, the better we are able to get the outcomes we actually want
Outcomes
- A lot of times we aren't happy with our behavior
- First we have to distinguish between cause and effect
- When you're at effect, you blame other people, but when you're a cause in your life, you're taking responsibility for what's happening
- “When we can help people be more at cause, they get those desired outcomes, and people start to get to where they want to go in life” - Dena
Perception is Projection
- Whatever you're believing that which is outside of yourself, it's actually a reflection of you
- Dena said that she won't go to fitness classes simply because of the language they use
- Altering your state through movement makes a person very vulnerable and the language can be very suggestive
- What are we subjecting ourselves to everyday? When we sit down to watch TV or movies, we are in a trance-like state
- Dena suggests being very careful to be aware of what we let in
- Getting rid of barriers and obstacles to get where you want in life is the goal for NLP
Prepping the Unconscious Mind
- Going to the gym is a habit so many people want to have and don't
- Creating new habits is hard at the conscious level, because it requires conscious thought
- When we try to make decisions at the conscious level, it gets really difficult
- “All learnings and behaviors, happen at the unconscious level” - Dena
- “How many times did you have to tie your shoes consciously, before you tied your shoes, unconsciously?” - Dena
- Most people don't have good language running in the background, and that is a big reason why people are stuck in poor behaviors
Prime Directives of the Unconscious Mind
- We create gestalts of emotions and experiences
- A gestalt looks like a pearl necklace, and they are all related to each other
- All of our experiences of our emotions (ex. anger) all get hooked together like a necklace
- It's a way that our mind organizes the information
- When we learn to re-frame intentionally, we can take it as a tool into non-ordinary states of consciousness
Re-framing
- In psychedelic experiences, we are re-framing the conscious mind, we shake loose of our gestalts
- “We need to learn new tools in order to directly communicate with the unconscious mind” - Dena
- When we can get to the ‘aha’ moment, we can create change more quickly
- Limiting beliefs and negative emotions get in the way
- Getting rid of limiting beliefs causes massive aligned action which leads to massive life change
Tools
- Our unconscious mind loves following instructions
- We tell the mind so many don'ts, ‘don't cross the street, don't walk on the grass, etc
- We need to tell the mind exactly what to do
- People are really clear about what they don't want, but they aren't always clear on what they do want
- 7% of what we are saying are just words, the other 93% is is how we say it, our emotions, our infections, are body positions, etc
- Joe mentions somatic techniques, but that only goes so far, NLP takes it home
- We learn language, but we don't learn to be effective communicators
Workshop
- Joe, Kyle and Dena are talking about doing a 5-day breathwork and NLP workshop in Sonoma, CA
- Breathwork is such an amazing tool for non-ordinary state of consciousness
- Until more news is released about the retreat/workshop, Dena invites listeners to take her course over at her website, Ecstatic Collective
- Sign up at psychedelicstoday.com/NLP to be notified of the future workshop
Links
About Dena Justice
As a master manifester, Dena has created a beautiful life for herself. She been financially responsible since age 15 including putting herself through college, two masters degrees and purchasing her own home in the San Francisco Bay Area. She has made over $1M in her life through a fulfilling career as a facilitator, educator, trainer, mentor and coach working with thousands of people across the country. She loved her career, yet hit a point where she felt empty. Near the top of her career ladder, she was a classic case of a high performer and leader hitting burnout. She chose a powerful pivot out of her J-O-B and into her own business. Now, she helps other high performers who have hit burnout and are scared to admit they’ve hit a plateau or a wall. She helps them get the eff out of their own way and move to the next level to increase their impact so they feel fulfilled and inspired again, as well as helping them create more wealth and the relationships they want in their lives. She helps people experience new levels of success, increase/improve focus and performance, abolish FOMO, evolve communication skills, develop transformational leadership skills, create amazing relationships, increase financial abundance and live life on their own terms.
Get a 30 day free audible trial at audibletrial.com/psychedelicstoday In today’s Solidarity Friday’s episode with Kyle and Joe, they cover current events on COVID-19, social media narratives, a new world, psycho-pharma, psychedelic VICE articles, movies about acid and more.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
Coronavirus
- Joe and his girlfriend are recovering from being sick, potentially coronavirus (they weren't allowed to be tested without being hospitalized)
- Joe said he was really sick in a new and novel way
- Kyle is located in New Jersey (currently around 19,000 cases, close to 250 deaths)
- He has a weak immune system, so he is trying to be super careful by staying isolated (he hasn't left the house in weeks besides to go on a walk outside)
- Joe says this whole thing is really going to impact humanity and life on earth
- The ecosystem of commerce is fragile and this is a strong way of showing it
- Kyle says that Drumpf estimated 250,000 deaths in the US
- Joe says we are going to get through this, and life will go on, but what will that look like?
- How can the conscious show up as leaders?
- When we are in a fear state, we don't make rational decisions
Narratives
- Kyle says all of the psychedelic people that he is connected to on social media are posting so much on 5G right now
- There are dual narratives, like people dying, but also a lot of info on conspiracies
- What do we pay attention to, and what is really happening?
- Joe said that he played in the conspiracy, occult area for a while, and he couldn't find any solid ground
- In times like this, the conspiracy media ramps up, because people are afraid, and that impairs cognition
- There is a lot of media saying that COVID-19 is a biological weapon
- There is a lot of unknowns, and how do we not panic?
Processing All of This
- We were not evolved for this moment
- Now, how do we evolve to handle this stuff?
- How do we build resilience?
- As ecosystems collapse, some organisms start to mingle with other organisms and then viruses like this can come up, and will pop up more in the future
- We are in a spiritual emergence-y right now, we need to bring up our shadow and do the work
- What can I actually do in my life right now? Instead of worrying about everything
A New World
- 90% of products in the consumer economy right now are completely non-essential
- We are on a finite planet with finite resources don't mesh with infinite growth
- Hopefully this is the emergency that we need to re-imagine the future
- There is a role that the psychedelic community plays in this
- The psychedelic culture is familiar with sitting with shadow, doing the inner work, and taking a creative approach at alternative systems and reimagining the future
- Kyle says this feels psychedelic, having new ideas about what the future could look like, what we can offer the future
- A lot of the things that we wish for are starting to unfold, in some sense, the collective has been wishing for the things that are happening
- When we take substances, we are upgrading our operating system
Psycho-Pharma
- MindMed (Mind Medicine) call themselves a leading neuro-pharma company for psychedelic inspired medicines
- Right now they are working on a compound, essentially an iboga-like drug
- There is a lot of suffering happening in the world, and whatever tools that can help with the suffering will do
- There is a roller coaster of the psychedelic experience
- If every experience was just rainbows and happiness, it would just devalue the human experience
Vice
- Researchers got people to hallucinate from fake psychedelics
- Kyle says think about it, that sitting in a chair for a few hours with music can easily induce a psychedelic experience
- Joe says “the experience is within you, the drug is a key to help unlock that”
Shadow Panel
- Kyle is co-hosting a Shadow Panel with Ido Cohen and takes on a Jung approach to process the shadow
- They host interviews with doctors and other speakers on the topic
- They explore a lot of somatics in the shadow
- It is a donation based course right now, potentially paid in the future
Final Thoughts
- Joe says we are heavily impacted by COVID-19, a ton of breathwork events all had to be cancelled
- But we have a ton of online courses and resources available, from integration books, to online guided therapist and clinician courses, to psychedelic online courses, coaching, and more
- Joe said he had a fun conversation with a film producer (Malibu Road) on the acid scene in the 70’s
- The film cant be streamed yet, but the trailer is out
-
About Kyle
Kyle’s interest in exploring non-ordinary states of consciousness began when he was 16-years-old when he suffered a traumatic snowboarding accident. Waking up after having a near-death experience changed Kyle’s life. Since then, Kyle has earned his B.A. in Transpersonal Psychology, where he studied the healing potential of non-ordinary states of consciousness by exploring shamanism, plant medicine, Holotropic Breathwork, and the roots/benefits of psychedelic psychotherapy. Kyle has co-taught two college-level courses. One of the courses Kyle created as a capstone project, “Stanislav Grof’s Psychology of Extraordinary Experiences,” and the other one which he co-created, “The History of Psychedelics.”
Kyle completed his M.S. in clinical mental health counseling with an emphasis in somatic psychology. Kyle’s clinical background in mental health consists of working with at-risk teenagers in crisis and with individuals experiencing an early-episode of psychosis. Kyle also facilitates Transpersonal Breathwork workshops.
About Joe
Joe studied philosophy in New Hampshire, where he earned his B.A.. After stumbling upon the work of Stanislav Grof during his undergraduate years, Joe began participating in Holotropic Breathwork workshops in Vermont in 2003. Joe helped facilitate Holotropic and Transpersonal Breathwork workshops while he spent his time in New England. He is now working in the software industry as well as hosting a few podcasts. Joe now coordinates Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork workshops, in Breckenridge, Colorado.
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In this episode, Kyle sits down with Dylan Beynon, founder of Mindbloom, NYC based mental health and wellbeing platform. In the show they talk about how Mindbloom differs from other centers, paving the way for accessibility and affordability.
3 Key Points:
- Mindbloom is a next-generation mental health platform, catered to accessibility and affordability.
- They use ketamine tablets, different from lozenges and any other method. The tablets are held in the mouth and then spit out to avoid entering the liver, causing a sedation-like experience.
- Mindbloom differentiates themselves from other psychedelic therapy options by using a patient-choice model, to keep it affordable for those who need it. They offer the 4-week therapy model and give patients the option to choose ‘add-ons’ like extra integration.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Dylan
- Dylan is not a clinician or a doctor, he is an entrepreneur and a psychedelic medicine and therapeutic ketamine patient
- These medicines have been transformative in his life and he wants to bring their benefits to the public
- He grew up in a family that suffered greatly from mental illness
- He lost his mother to addiction
- He discovered positive psychology
- When learning about the science of happiness, he realized that he wasn't happy
- He was in business school and wanted to be a banker and make a ton of money
- He soon realized that money doesn't buy happiness, and he thought maybe everything he was doing was a lie
- He was self medicating with psychedelics
- About 5 years ago he heard about psychedelic therapy
- About 18 months ago he started working with a clinician doing ketamine therapy
- He saw that when it's done in a therapeutic context, it can have a profound effect for people to get the most out of it
- “Recreational vs therapeutic use is a false dichotomy” - Dylan
Mindbloom
- The goal is to build the next-generation mental health platform
- Right now they are doing Ketamine therapy
- They are trying to make it accessible by making it affordable
- They are trying to bring an elevated client experience, which they do with the space and software
Software Background
- Voters Friend - a platform to help inform voters on the candidates, to increase access to democracy
- Mighty - increasing access to social justice
- Mindbloom - increase access to psychedelic medicines
Differentiation
- The protocols that Mindbloom are using are capped
- They are increasing access to the medicines, making it affordable
- They keep it at $150-$250 a session, where at most Ketamine Therapy centers, it can range from $1000-$2000 a session
- Dylan says he makes this possible by bringing in technology and software tools to make the sessions for efficient and effective
- They use patient choice care, where the patient can use their best judgement on how in depth they want their treatment
- They can ‘add on’ extra integration time onto the therapy session, or choose not to
- This keeps the price down and accessible for each individual patient if need be
- Mindbloom is a 4 session program, usually 1-2 months
- They use the platform to have the client practice using the information in the weeks between each session, so they can practice integration even when not with a therapist or in session
The Program
- The clinician prescribes a 4 week Ketamine Therapy session for anxiety and depression
- The clinician will schedule a video interview to learn their symptoms
- Then they will meet in person and build an integration program if needed
- Its $1000 for the 4 session program and $600 for the renewal program
- They use Ketamine tablets (similar to lozenges but faster acting)
- They're not swallowing it, they spit it out after
- If they swallow it, it breaks down in the liver into nor-ketaine, and that produces a sedative effect
- After they spit it out, there is about an hour of music with no vocals
- After the session, they move to an integration room where they are journaling
- The protocols at Mindbloom were based on the MAPS protocol
- They don't have a clinician in the room during the experience, only for after the experience
- Dylan is looking to expand to other locations
- A lot of people request couples or group therapies, so they will be taking that into consideration when building new locations
Final Thoughts
- The more people who are thinking critically about this and putting their intentions into making this more accessible the better
- There needs to be more gentle conversation around psychedelics and therapy, especially around the people that are still so unaware about this field
- We should bring sacredness, specialness, and care to the conversation with those who might still be afraid about it
Links
About Dylan Beynon
Dylan is the Founder & CEO of Mindbloom, an NYC-based mental health and wellbeing startup helping people expand their human potential with clinician-prescribed, guided psychedelic medicine experiences. There, he is partnering with clinicians, technologists, researchers, and patients to increase access to science-backed treatments, starting by reducing the cost of ketamine therapy for depression and anxiety by over 65%. Dylan is a 10-year psychedelic medicine patient and 3-time tech entrepreneur with both $100M+ in funding and an exit in his prior startups, which were focused on increasing access to justice and democracy. Dylan graduated from The Wharton School at The University of Pennsylvania.
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In this episode, Kyle sits down with Dr. Ryan Westrum, Psychedelic Integration Therapist. In the show, they talk about topics and teachings from Ryan’s book, The Psychedelic Integration Handbook.
3 Key Points:
- The Psychedelics Integration Handbook is designed to bring psychedelic experiences into the flow of your life and maximize their potential for helping you create the life you want to live.
- There is an important part in distinguishing integration from aftercare. Aftercare can look as simple as taking care of your body, getting good rest, eating well. You can't integrate without taking care of yourself first.
-
One of the pillars of integration is PREP (purpose, reflecting on experiences, expectations, potential).
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Ryan
- Ryan is a Clinical Psychologist in the Minneapolis area
- He has been a licensed Marriage Therapist for 15 years
- He works in the realms of psychedelics and sexuality
- He has a 14 year old daughter, and likes to take a psychedelic approach to parenting
- He holds healing circles with mothers and fathers and their child(ren)
- Psycho-ed and harm reduction are his focus with families
- This is a group of people that need an honest conversation
- At a young age he was into Stan Grof and Jungian literature and psychedelic experiences
- His graduate program was focused on non-ordinary states of consciousness
- Kyle mentions a good book, The Smell of Rain on Dust: Grief and Praise
- “As a western civilization, we have really minimized the opportunity for growth, the expansion of consciousness, and to be ourselves.” - Ryan
- These experiences are powerful, and to come back to a culture that does not support it, is hard
- The goal is being conscious with your confidence of why you're doing this work
About the Book
- The Psychedelics Integration Handbook
is designed to bring psychedelic experiences into the flow of your life and maximize their potential for helping you create the life you want to live
- This is not a book with black and white answers but an offering to individual people who want to explore all the possibilities for being alive and seeking wholeness.
- The Psychedelics Integration Handbook contains historical perspective, maps of consciousness, approaches for integrating body-mind-spirit, and practical suggestions for all stages of psychedelic exploration.
is designed to bring psychedelic experiences into the flow of your life and maximize their potential for helping you create the life you want to liveThe Psychedelics Integration Handbook
- The book was written for people to make it their own
- Its broken into 3 parts, educational, a ‘your turn’ section, and then integration
- Its about having a compartment, and then playing within the compartment
- Everyone has unique nuances, integration looks different to everyone
- Integration practices don't matter if they don't personally mean something to you
Integration
- The question to help determine the integration needs is, "What does the individual lead with?"
- It's the mind, body, emotion in the spirit altogether
- Immediately after a psychedelic experience, some want to talk about it, others embody it
- Do they lead with thoughts or emotions?
- There is a part in the book: The difference between integration and aftercare
- How do we distinguish between self care and integration?
- Is my body rested? Am I comfortable? Are my needs taken care of?
- Aftercare is grounding
- “If you're not taking care of your body, you won't be able to integrate” - Ryan
- It might not be as complex as it needs to be, its as simple as taking care of yourself
- An important part of aftercare, is asking yourself when it is okay to practice again
- Ryan was mentored by James Fadiman, and he believed in taking big doses every 6 months
- One of the pillars is PREP (purpose, reflecting on experiences, expectations, potential)
- Ryan says he is not the gatekeeper
- Controlling willpower is a huge step in integration
- Some people want to just take psychedelics, but not write, or do yoga, or do any other mindful activity
Safety
- Dose, set and setting are the obvious
- It's like a goldrush, some just want to jump in blindly
- You have to understand what safety means to you
- Ryan thinks we aren't talking enough about the recreational use
- He is excited about all of the conversation on therapeutic use, but he thinks we are ignoring recreational use
- He wants to see ritual and reverence in the recreational community
- Preparation is so important
- Kyle says that a lot of times after an experience he has all of these ideas for how to live his life, and he tries to practice them, but sometimes he finds himself slipping into old patterns of behavior
- Ryan says he believes there is still movement and progress, be gentle with yourself
Links
About Ryan
Dr. Ryan Westrum, PhD, LMFT, is an internationally recognized psychedelic integration expert. For more than 15 years, his primary focus has been working with individuals and groups facilitating experiential therapy and integrating psychedelic journeys into healing and personal transformation. Ryan speaks on a myriad of topics and leads experiential groups, like dreamwork integration therapy and psychedelic integration groups.
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In this episode, Kyle interviews Jessica DiRuzza, Psychotherapist, Astrologer and Teacher. In the show they talk about how astrology can be used as a tool and framework for navigating and understanding psychedelic experiences.
3 Key Points:
- Astrology can be used as an integrative tool for psychedelic and other exceptional experiences.
- The planets are emitting some type of force that are letting us behave a certain way. Astrology is the one thing we have agreed upon across millennia and era.
-
A Saturn Return transit can be a difficult but transformative time in one's life. This transit happens around age 28-31. During this time, we face crises in our life as we take on greater responsibility. It can feel like death and a rebirth. It can correlate to Grof's Perinatal Birth Matrix II (“No Exit” and "Cosmic Engulfment").
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Jessica
- She is a Psychotherapist
- She teaches and practices Astrology
- She uses Astrology to help put meaning and understanding to what happens in visionary states
- She received her bachelors at CIIS and studied and taught with Stan Grof and Richard Tarnes in the Philosophy, Cosmology and Consciousness Program
- Since the 70’s, Stan Grof was following his transits and all the transits of his clients
- Richard Tarnas and Stan Grof studied astrology as a diagnostic tool for those who would do psychedelics
- They studied transit astrology
- By looking at these transits, what they found were archetypal similarities
- “Our solar system is an extension of our ecosystem here on earth.” - Jessica\
- “For millennia, the one thing that human beings have agreed upon across cultures and eras, are the meaning of the planets” - Jessica
- Astrology is the original science
Free Will vs. Determinism
- The planets are emitting some type of force that are letting us behave a certain way
- They are reflective, what is happening in the sky is indicative of what's happening here
- Astrology is like a clock, a clock does not make it be a certain time, it just helps us tell the time
Interest in Astrology
- Psychedelics brought Jessica to Astrology
- Jessica went to her first Burning Man at 20 years old
- She received an astrology reading there and said it broke her open
- She went to CA to see the reader that gave her the initial reading
- She did a high dose LSD session
- She re-lived her birth experience, and gave birth to her new self
- The person who gave her the reading was teaching with Stan Grof and Richard Tarnas at CIIS
- She dropped out of college and moved to attend CIIS
- She was in a Uranus conjunct Ascendant transit
- Through these experiences she uprooted her entire life
Astrology Lingo
- Sun represents our sense of self, our identity in the world, egoic consciousness
- Moon represents our relational matrix, our early childhood experiences, our emotions and experiences, and a deep sense of belonging
- Rising represents who we are from moment to moment, how we initially meet existence
- Zodiac means belt of life
- Each aspect carries a different quality
- Conjunct means new moon, representing a new beginning
- A full moon represents when the sun is opposite than the moon, a blossoming or fruition.
- Astrology is a language, the language of the stars
- There are so many ways to speak this language, and so many schools of thought
- What really matters is the cosmology that goes behind the description
- “Both astrology and psychedelics are a tools for self reflection, that hopefully we are using to become more kind and more caring” - Jessica
- “Astrology provides a world view or a cosmology to hold what happens in those visionary states, it's a grounding place to integrate and make meaning of what's happening” - Jessica
Saturn Return
- Saturn return happens from age 28-31
- During our Saturn Return, we face crises in our life and take on greater responsibility
- It can feel like a death, but also like a birth
- “The greater the death, the greater the rebirth” - Jessica
- The 4 bpms correspond to the four outer planets
- It's not just in entheogenic spaces that this is applicable
- “Working with the resistance consciously, actually helps us move into what the divine or the universe wants us to step into our life, karmically, what we are here to do” - Jessica
Astrology and Psychedelics
- Kyle asks about using astrology to pick a time of when to do psychedelics
- Jessica responds saying that if you have a strong calling to do so for healing and balance, and you have all the components for proper integration, then it's a good time
- Then, astrology can be used to help find themes and help dissect the experience
- Your Saturn transits contain a difference component in each person
- The sense of responsibility grows in you
- “My deepest calling in this life is to bring Astrology and Psychology together in one unified field” - Jessica
Final Thoughts
- Jessica is so proud of the honest integrity that people are bringing to this work
- She send best wishes in the great reckoning, and the great becoming
Links
About Jessica
Jessica is a licensed psychotherapist, astrologer, and teacher. Her life is guided by a passion for engaging with people, understanding relationships, and staying connected to the larger world around us. This passion and curiosity led her into the healing profession as a counselor in 2007. For over a decade she has worked collaboratively with individuals, couples, and groups on their transformative journeys. Helping people on their path of exploration and healing is the privilege of a lifetime. Jessica received her Master’s in Counseling Psychology with an emphasis in Depth Psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute. She completed her undergraduate degree at California Institute of Integral Studies, where she studied and taught archetypal astrology and transpersonal psychology. Her greatest joy is working in sacred and revolutionary ways with people in psychotherapy, teaching, and astrological consultations. She also shares her work through podcasts and writing on her site.
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In this episode, Kyle sits down with Rob Heffernan, an independent researcher and activist. In the show, they talk about churches, Ayahuasca, accessibility and the Psychedelic Liberty Summit by the Chacruna Institute for Psychedelic Plant Medicines. Rob is also part of Chacruna’s Council for the Protection of Sacred Plants.
The Council for the Protection of Sacred plants is "an initiative of the Chacruna Institute for Psychedelic Plant Medicines that endeavors to advocate for the legality of sacred plant medicines among indigenous peoples and non-indigenous communities, encourage legal harm reduction practices that protect those who use them, educate about conservation of plant species, document relevant legal and social issues, and consult on legal cases including possible litigation. "
3 Key Points:
- The Psychedelic Liberty Summit is a gathering on legal, cultural, and political issues around the emerging psychedelic renaissance.
- Accessibility is not just about whether or not people can afford psychedelic therapy, people cant even afford regular therapy, the whole healthcare model is an issue.
- A lot of churches get a bad name, but really most churches are built around community. Psychedelics can help revitalize churches.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Rob
- Rob is a member of the Chacruna Council for protection of sacred plants
- He is an integrative sound and music practitioner
- He is involved in the Santo Daime
- He has been drinking Ayahuasca for over 20 years
- He began to ponder and ask a lot of questions about involvement with medicine communities
Psychedelic Liberty Summit
- Rob will be hosting a talk on religious exemptions and more
- There will be speakers of all different initiatives, from decriminalization to indigenous relations
- There are a lot of investors interested in the psilocybin market
- The issue is complex because there is this ongoing cultural history of the US and other countries exploiting those cultures and removing resources (oil, medicines, etc)
Ayahuasca
- The first time Rob drank Ayahuasca was back in 2000, where there weren't Ayahuasca retreats going on then
- People who lived in the area were not familiar with Ayahuasca use
- People started coming from around the world to use Ayahuasca
- There are feedback loops between the cities and the forests
- People typically think integration is what happens afterwards, but really it is also the sacrifice from the start, the preparation, such as a dieta
- We need to honor what we have learned from the indigenous, and give back
- Traditional dietas don't involve actually drinking the Ayahuasca, the culture has come a long way
Accessibility
- While these medicines are relatively safe, you can get in trouble using these substances recreationally, there is a role for the therapeutic support
- It's not just about whether or not people can afford psychedelic therapy, people cant even afford regular therapy, the whole healthcare model is an issue
Santo Daime
- It was founded in the 1930’s in Brazil
- The reason that the Santo Daime looks more white in the USA is due to the segregation
- There are all sorts of ways that the Santo Daime may look
- When Rob first got involved in drinking Ayahuasca, he wasn't sure that he wanted to get involved in the Santo Daime, but he said the container was so strong
- There are hymns sung, and it's very structured
- It allows you to really go deep
- Sometimes it can look like drumming, dancing, and fire, but there is also a style of sitting in silence
- There is a profound ethical foundation which is really important
- All of the elements make for a really important container
- In the traditional form, you do not touch anyone, unless there is a certain circumstance, and a prior consensual agreement, and waivers signed, etc
- There have been issues of sexual abuse in the psychedelic realm, the Santo Daime takes many precautions against this
Churches
- There are legal churches in the US through the Daime and the UDV (União do Vegetal)
- The Daime has 5 churches that are explicitly legal
- The government has decided not to pursue or prosecute Ayahuasca for those other churches
- From Shock to Awe
- Someone tragically died at the Soul Quest Church, but it wasn't related to ayahuasca
- There are a lot of people that claim to be a part of a Native American church that are not
- A lot of people reach out to Chacruna on how to become a part of the Native American Church to hold ceremonies, and it's not easy, you almost have to already be a part of it, instead of just joining
- Some people don't like the word church, but it originates from the words ‘congregation’ and ‘assembly’
- “The problem is the controlled substances act, that these things are illegal in the first place” - Rob
- "The experience in all those settings is about community. The goal isn't to have spiritual experiences, its to have a spiritual life” - Rob
- Psychedelics and entheogens could be central to creating a new hub
- It is possible to create psychedelic churches outside of the Santo Daime
- The Ayahuasca tradition really uses the potential of group process
- “How individual is the psychedelic experience, where you need some one-on-one work?” - Kyle
Psychedelic Liberty Summit
- April 25-26 in San Francisco
- Discount Code: PsychedelicsToday for 10% off at checkout
Links
Chacruna Institute for Psychedelic Plant Medicine
About Rob Heffernan
Rob Heffernan has been involved in the Peruvian curandero tradition and the Santo Daime for the last 16 years. He was a member and chairman of the North American Santo Daime Legal Committee for a number of years. He has been engaged in independent research and active in ad hoc groups promoting legal clarity and ethical integrity in the Ayahuasca Community. He is also a certified Integrative Sound and Music Practitioner; Shamanic Breath Work Facilitator; and a long time student and practitioner of Buddhist Dhamma. He has a BA in Communications and Social Studies from Fordham University, and works in the AV/IT communication industry.
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In this episode, Joe interviews Clinical Psychologist, Alicia Danforth. In the show, they cover topics including how to get involved in the space, consent, research, MDMA, Autism and more.
3 Key Points:
- Alicia Danforth is a Clinical Psychologist who will be having a talk on Ethical Challenges in Psychedelic Medicine at the ICPR Conference in the Netherlands, April 2020.
- There is a possibility for MDMA to have a non-responder effect. No one has done research dedicated to why some people don't react at all to MDMA.
- Psychedelic science is very hard to talk about. We have the language of science that studies the psychopharmacological effects of drugs but no language that holds the effects of an altered state of consciousness yet.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Alicia
- Her path to her current place is such a random road that led her to where she is
- She was going to burning man and getting into harm reduction when she realized the untapped value of psychedelics, its where her interest began
- She began volunteering, doing administrative work for a doctor
- She was offered to be a study coordinator
- She got introduced to the power of psilocybin as a medicine, for dying cancer patients
- The patients had a prognosis from 6 months to a year
- To see how this state of consciousness helped people transition to the end of life so smoothly, that is what inspired her
- 5 months after she started working on the study, she got a cancer diagnosis
Getting Involved in the Space
- Alicia would always get people approaching her about how to get in the field and she tells them “what field?”
- Her Power Point making skills, are what technically got her involved in this field
- “You never know what skill may be needed in this field” - Alicia
- Alicia encourages people to look into their own collection of skills, and dig deep into that, find your niche, and then use that to contribute to the movement
- Clinical therapists and psychologists are not the only people in this field
We need accountants, marketers, etc
- Clinical therapists and psychologists are not the only people in this field
Consent
- People start to get really religious around this field
- Joe mentions a story where someone performed non-consensual reiki
Current Research
- She is currently looking at why psychedelics appeal to people who typically like to abuse power
- She did a talk at burning man about ‘coming down from the psychedelic power trip’
- She tries to cite as many references and research as possible
- Her talk at ICPR is going to be the very professional, version of that talk
- Why are individuals who seek to abuse these tools so irresistibly drawn to psychedelics?
- “If someone gets abused, and people say don't come out about it because it's not good for the movement, then what kind of movement is that?” - Joe
Empathogens
- MDMA is known as an Empathogen
- Can empathogens help people who are not empathetic, become empathetic?
- Cohen’s D is the measure of effect size
- Big pharma uses this all the time, to determine the effects of one drug compared to another
- The Cohen’s D is how large that difference is
Non-response MDMA
- There is a known, non-responder effect with MDMA
- There was a few double-blind sessions, where the patient received MDMA, and they didn't react, their vitals didn't change
- At the end, it was revealed that they truly received MDMA, and then even to be sure, they would do a blood test, and it showed up in the blood
- No one has done research dedicated to why some people don't react at all to MDMA
- It's probably common, that for people who are relying on MDMA to work as their last resort option and try it and not feel anything at all, to end their life afterward
Media and Support
- It's the most difficult thing in dealing with the media
- When you are entirely dependent on funding, if you don't talk about what you're doing, then you can't get funding at all
- There is a crisis in science on the replicability on these studies
- Joe says its cool to have these studies replicated outside of the US
- “Psychedelic science is very hard to talk about due to the subjective nature of the psychedelic experience. We have the language of science that studies the psychopharmacological effects of drugs. There is no language that holds the effects of an altered state of consciousness yet.” - Alicia
- The rapport that the patient and facilitator have, and the effect of that relationship, is a variable
Links
About Alicia Danforth
Alicia received her doctorate in clinical psychology from the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology in Palo Alto in 2013. Since 2006, she has worked in clinical research at the Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute at the Harbor-UCLA Medical Center on clinical studies for adults with anxiety related to advanced-stage cancer and with autistic adults who experience social anxiety. She is currently a lead clinician and supervisor for a clinical trial at UCSF for psychological distress in long-term survivors of HIV/AIDS. She is also certified in Trauma-Focused CBT and Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy.
Get a 30 day free audible trial at audibletrial.com/psychedelicstoday In this episode, Kyle and Joe interview Mike Margolies of Psychedelic Seminars. In the show, they cover topics including guests and conversations from the Psychedelic Seminars, the decriminalization of all drugs, and the importance of allowing psychedelic use to be a part of training therapists for psychedelic therapy.
3 Key Points:
- Psychedelic Seminars is an educational conversation series deepening awareness of the benefits, risks, and complexities of psychedelics.
- There are large topics of decriminalizing psilocybin or the movements for ‘decriminalize nature’, but the conversation on decriminalization of all drugs is rare, which is what's really important.
- Some companies (MAPS for example) allow the option to use MDMA as a part of their therapist training program while other companies who are training therapists for psilocybin therapy, don't have the option to use it. This leaves the question, "Should the psychedelic experience be part of the psychedelic therapy training?"
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Mike
- Mike used to work as a chemical engineer in corporate America, and then he did Ayahuasca
- When he returned, he thought to himself about what he wanted to do with the rest of his life
- He took a look at the pulse of the country and looked at what it needed
- There wasn't anyone organized locally in Baltimore, so he started Psychedelic Seminars
- Now he is living in the Bay Area, doing events locally
- He has been interviewing people and putting the videos out globally
Psychedelic Seminars
- They will be having some Indigenous people at the seminar
- It's hard to get Indigenous people to seminars and conferences, because, what's in it for them?
- The goal is to ramp up the project and do a seminar every month, where it usually takes place every few months
- They are doing it all in a home, privately
- The whole project is donation dependent, they are doing it all for free
- You can support the mission here
- After Michael Pollan, they did one with Jim Fadiman
- He did another with Ayelet Waldman
- The talks were on microdosing and the unknowns of microdosing
- Just because there is no real harms taking a large dose of LSD, doesn't mean there aren't any harms taking a low (micro) dose of LSD frequently
- Mike thinks that the term Jim Fadiman uses is its ‘sub-perceptual’, in that you have a noticeable effect on the mood, but no other way of noticing it
Decriminalization
- Drug Policy tends to stay in the realm of psychedelics only
- There are large topics of decriminalizing psilocybin or the movements for ‘decriminalize nature’, but no one likes to talk about the decriminalization of all drugs, which is what's really important
- Poppy is not considered in decriminalize nature, which is selective nature decriminalization
- It's not a real decriminalization, it's just a low priority for law enforcement
- He’s been asking in his conversations, opinions on decriminalizing all drugs
- Different drugs have different risk profiles
- “Just because you're not using criminal justice as your mechanism for reducing risks of drugs, doesn't mean you do nothing. The last thing we want to do is add criminalization to those who are already suffering, this is why we should decriminalize all drugs” - Mike
- Laws should be written in terms of what are you not allowed to do, not what you're allowed to do
- He is allowed to walk down the sidewalk, but not punch someone he walks past, but the law shouldn't be to get a license for walking down the street so long as you don't punch someone
- The communities that are marginalized continue to be marginalized by the drug war
Psychedelic Therapy and Experience with Use
- With MAPS, there is an option to do MDMA as a part of the training
- With psilocybin, at least with Compass Pathways, there is not an option to use psilocybin. Mike says that's a huge issue
- When you scale treatment, there is the risk of losing the quality of care
- “We aren't going to solve the problems of our future by mass distributing psychedelics” - Mike
- The fact that we have such mass amounts of widespread depression, means that we have a deeply ingrained systemic issue at hand
- Psychedelics treat the symptoms, but we still need to fix the underlying cause
- “If you are distributing psychedelics, but still exacerbating the same underlying issues, you now have the problem and solution in the same hefty package” - Mike
- “Psychedelic experience is intrinsically something spiritual. How can you guide someone in spiritual practice if you haven't experienced it yourself?” - Mike
- “Inducing a state intentionally, and guiding someone through a process, its completely unethical to guide someone through a spiritual process that you haven't been through yourself.” - Mike
New Economy
- Burning man is not a barter economy, it's a gift economy, where things are given without an expectation of receiving something in return
- We are far from that economy
- What if we had a world where instead of trying to extract value, we were trying to create value?
Links
About Mike Margolies
Since 2015, Mark has worked full-time in the psychedelic community, starting and contributing to a number of projects as an event and media producer, connector, and advisor. He is the Founder of Psychedelic Seminars, an educational conversation series deepening awareness of the benefits, risks, and complexities of psychedelics. On the PsychSems stage, he has interviewed a range of leaders including bestselling author Michael Pollan, Dr. James Fadiman and Ayelet Waldman on microdosing, and therapeutic ketamine expert Dr. Raquel Bennett. He started the project in 2015 after returning to his home city of Baltimore to build community for open and honest conversations about psychedelics. The project now operates primarily out of the San Francisco Bay Area and livestreams globally. Through his psychedelic community work in Baltimore, he seeded the Baltimore Psychedelic Society. He has sparked and mentored similar Psychedelic Societies around the world from Washington DC to San Francisco to Portugal. He helped start the Global Psychedelic Network to connect them.
Get a 30 day free audible trial at audibletrial.com/psychedelicstoday In this Episode, Kyle sits down with Elizabeth Nielson and Ingmar Gorman, Co-founders of Fluence, Training in Psychedelic Integration. They are both therapists on the MAPS clinical trial for MDMA Assisted Psychotherapy for PTSD.
3 Key Points:
- Elizabeth and Ingmar are co-founders of Fluence, an online Psychedelic Integration Training program.
- If psychedelic treatments become available more widely, the fear is that therapists won't be as educated on how to handle their patient interactions based on the behavior of each psychedelic. Psychedelic Integration Therapy Training is so important.
- There are 3 phases to the MDMA for PTSD clinical trial. Phase 1 would be pre-clinical data about the chemistry of a drug, Phase 2 is where you begin to test your treatment in a patient population, and Phase 3 is where you get the data to demonstrate that the treatment is superior to a placebo and other treatments in general.
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Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Ingmar
- Ingmar is a previous guest of the show
- He is a private Investigator for the MAPS MDMA trial
- He is a therapist and the Co-founder of Fluence
About Elizabeth
- Elizabeth is a Clinical Psychologist
- She has a long history in working with clinical trials as a therapist
- She is part of the psychedelic education and continuing care program
- She does a lot of supervision and training for therapists
The Trial
- The approval of expanded access by the FDA includes 50 people in total
- They are near the end of MAP 1 (out of MAP 1 and MAP 2)
- When they transition into MAP 2, it will be a little more refined
- MAP 2 is different participants than MAP 1
- There are 3 phases
- Phase 1 would be pre-clinical data about chemistry of a drug and how it metabolises, if its poisonous, etc
- Phase 2 is where you begin to test your treatment in a patient population
- Phase 3 is where you get the data to demonstrate that the treatment is superior to a placebo and other treatments in general
- They are done as a double-blind trial, both the therapist and patient don't know if the patient is receiving the treatment or now
Take-aways
- There is a lot of information that has to be shared effectively
- The therapists are very much in the lives of the participants on top of just the MDMA
- Instead of learning from the trials of what to do on a practical level, its about inspiring them to bring this as an actual treatment for people
- The multiple ways that PTSD can manifest and look like, and the may ways that MDMA can look like when administered, have some commonalities
- The deepening, the broadening, the way they communicate, can all be the same
- Ingmar holds the belief in the inner healing intelligence of all people
- One of the first things he does when he begins with a new patient, he says that this is something he really believes in, and his role as a therapist to help them in their own healing process and mechanism
- What Elizabeth wanted to learn, know and practice while she was going through school, isn't what she she thought it was until she found it
- She says this work really requires them to trust people's minds and experiences
- There is something that they tell their patients, “Don't get ahead of the medicine” - Elizabeth
- There is an interesting paradox between not knowing and following intuition, to having an actual method and following that
- There is a sweet spot between following a script to following your intuition as a therapist
- You want to trust that inner healer process of the patient, but also need to know when to intervene (usually from a safety standpoint)
Fluence
- 3 days after Horizons, Elizabeth was at home with a cold, and talked to Ingmar that morning curious for a name for the project
- Fluence means, magical or mystical power or source of power
- It can also refer to the density of particles of energy
- They teach about harm reduction and integration with their patients in their practice
- They aren't teaching protocols in the workshops, they just think the harm reduction is important
- The last part of integration is mindfulness
- Ingmar’s biggest influence are his clients and patients, he is so inspired by them
- A large piece of the motivation for creating Fluence is from patients just looking for someone to talk about their experience with
The Why
- A mother whose teenage daughter with depression, reached out to Ingmar with trouble trying to treat her depression
- The family decided it would be a good idea to use Ketamine therapy, which was successful
- She was doing so well, so well that she then went to a therapist to integrate it
- The therapist that she went to then instead of responding positively, decided to fire the teen for further therapy, and report the parents to child care services for providing ketamine therapy
- Ingmar says their position is not that everyone needs psychedelic integration therapy, its specifically for those that don't feel supported by family or community, and it gives them a professional service as an option
- "Psychedelics are not 10 years of change in one night, they are 10 years of insight in one night. integration is so important." - Elizabeth
- The goal is to support people in making a change that feels safe and right for them
- If the treatments become available more widely, the fear is that therapists won't be as educated on how to handle their patient interactions based on the behavior of each psychedelic
- Mental health practitioners can be a great source for working through those experiences
Menla Training
- Menla Training
- They could really take their time with the process and training
- The trainings that they had gone to has made their own Fluence courses better
- In 2019 they had 5 of the trainings for clinicians, and the trainings will be better and better as they go
Ketamine Infusion Therapy
- The experience is not dose dependent
- The purpose of the workshop is to educate both therapists and doctors about what can happen in psychotherapy
Links
Psychedelics 101 and 102 Workshop at ICPR 2020
About Elizabeth
Dr. Elizabeth Nielson is a co-founder of Fluence and a psychologist with a focus on developing psychedelic medicines as empirically supported treatments for PTSD, substance use problems, and mood disorders. Dr. Nielson is a therapist on FDA approved clinical trials of psilocybin-assisted treatment of alcohol use disorder, MDMA-assisted treatment PTSD, and psilocybin-assisted treatment of treatment resistant depression. Through Fluence, she provides continuing education and training programs for therapists who wish to engage in integration of psychedelic experiences in clinical settings. Her program of research includes qualitative and mixed-methods projects designed to further understand the phenomenology and mechanisms of change in psychedelic-assisted therapy, including the experiences of trial participants and of the therapists themselves. Having completed an NIH postdoctoral fellowship at NYU, she has published and presented on topics of psychedelic therapist training, therapists’ personal experience with psychedelics, and including psychedelic integration in group and individual psychotherapy.
About Ingmar
Dr. Ingmar Gorman is a co-founder of Fluence and a psychologist who specializes in assisting populations who have a relationship with psychedelics. He is the site co-principal investigator and therapist on a Phase 3 clinical trial studying MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for post-traumatic stress disorder. Dr. Gorman is a board member of Horizons Media, Inc., a not for-profit educational charity and organizer of the Horizons Conference: Perspectives on Psychedelics. After completing his NIH postdoctoral fellowship at New York University, Dr. Gorman stepped down as director of the Psychedelic Education and Continuing Care Program to focus his efforts on Fluence and the training of future therapists.
Get a 30 day free audible trial at audibletrial.com/psychedelicstodayIn this episode, Joe interviews Jon S. on his experience in the psilocybin-assisted trials for alcohol dependency at NYU. In the show, they dive into Jon’s background and how psilocybin assisted therapy helped him out of his alcohol dependence and into a new life.
3 Key Points:
- Jon participated in the NYU Double-Blind Trial of Psilocybin-Assisted Treatment of Alcohol Dependence.
- The study was double-blind. In each session, he didn't know if he was going to receive psilocybin or Benadryl.
-
The sessions helped him so much with this dependence on alcohol, he believes he is a better father, husband, and human overall. He hasn't had a drink in 5 months (or a desire to).
Support the show
- Patreon
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- Share us with your friends – favorite podcast, etc
- Join our Facebook group - Psychedelics Today group – Find the others and create community.
Navigating Psychedelics
Show Notes
About Jon
- He is based in New York
- Jon is the father of 2 kids
- He spent a lot of his life DJing, so he has spent a lot of time around alcohol
- He found out about a psychedelic therapy study at NYU from someone at a Holotropic Breathwork Retreat
- The study took place in New York City
- He had always wanted to explore the psychedelic side of things
- He read Michael Pollan’s book and it said in the book that the Holotropic Breathwork community would be a great group to help find a guide
The Trial
- In his assessment, he found out truly how much he was drinking
- He would crack a beer before even playing with his kids
- He was into craft beer and at 8% a beer, his 3 beers were more like 5
- He was asked to not have his sessions recorded so he could be as open as he could be
- The session was very focused on curbing drinking
- His wife knew he was going down the path of psychedelic healing
- “I'm not doing this to have a good time, I'm doing this to be a better person” - Jon
- His trial was double-blind
- He was never told when he was receiving the psilocybin at each session
- He was told that he was either going to get 1 or 3 doses in the trial
The First Session
- The first session with the eye shades on (on psilocybin), was very visual
- In that first session he kept seeing this pirate ship underwater
- His sons would say “come on daddy, lets play on the pirate ship”
- He would go to the pirate ship with his sons and then say “I need to go back down and do some work”, and he would swim back into the depths
- He came home that day, and his youngest son greeted him at the door, and said let's play power rangers, I'll be the red power ranger and you be the pirate
- It hit him in a float tank session, the message of that session was to play with his sons more
- He had a moment in his first session of rebirth
Integration
- There is a 2 hour integration session the very next day
- He didn't think it was going to be as important as it turned out to be
- He had the choice to keep it at the same dose or up it
- He upped the dose to 40mg instead of 25mg
- He was told his second session wouldn't be anything like his first
- The medicine was so intense the second time, he couldn't even remember the music
- In his second session, he saw a body being chopped up (realizing it was his body)
- He realized that he was one with the universe, love is the only thing that matters
- He wanted to be a part of everything
- He was compensated about $100 per session
- "When the university gives you financial compensation, you buy everyone in the ice cream shop ice cream" - Jon
- Jon says he has a new baseline for anxiety
- He never thought he had anxiety, but after his sessions, he found that he is way less anxious than he was, even though he really wasn't
- He didn't have a desire to drink, he hasn't had a drink in 5 months
- He has never felt better or happier
- He's a much better dad, and husband
Life After the Experience
- He is re-reading Aldous Huxley and is finding a whole new meaning to it all
- He is spending more time with his family and being present with the
- He spends a ton of time with his kids now
- Stuff that used to worry him, doesn't worry him anymore
- His experience was everything he hoped for and more
- He genuinely believes, that whatever he got out of a session, is what he needed
Final Thoughts
- He is talking to the Decrim Nature in NY
- He appreciates the platform (Psychedelics Today) for the space to talk about his experience
- He appreciates everyone at NYU for the work they are doing
Use code PSYTODAY at Onnit for a discount on all products except fitness equipmentGet a 30 day free audible trial at audibletrial.com/psychedelicstoday