August 16, 2025

46 - How Embodied Leadership and Coaching Intersects with Psychedelic Therapy with Joe Strummer

1 hour 8 minutes

Dr. T hosts this episode solo and welcomes, as his guest, Joe Strummer, partner of Truth Fairy. Joe Strummer was instrumental in helping set up Punk Therapy and had his own therapeutic psychedelic experience a decade ago alongside Truth Fairy and Dr. Gabor Maté. Joe shares how that experience has stayed with him, how he works with Truth in supporting her workshops, and how the psychedelic healing and therapy both factor into his own work in corporate leadership coaching. Joe’s background with the arts and team facilitation fuse into his embodied leadership approach, which he shares with Dr. T.

Many key themes weave through the conversation between Joe and Dr. T. as they discuss Joe’s own history and work. Leadership development is something Joe is very involved in. He stresses the importance of integrating left-brain strategic thinking with right-brain relational and somatic skills to assist leaders in self-awareness and being fully present. Joe also works in the overlap between leadership coaching and psychedelic therapy, drawing on his training in somatic relationship trauma-informed practices and personal experiences with ayahuasca, MDMA, and psilocybin, to help his clients.

Dr. T and Joe talk in detail about Joe’s personal journey with imposter syndrome and outsider syndrome. Joe was able to trace the roots of those struggles back to childhood experiences, and through psychedelic-assisted therapy, he was able to reframe old narratives. He and Dr. T explore how Joe is now able to pause, ground, and adapt in high-pressure facilitation moments. Joe advocates for leaders to recognize and integrate the parts of themselves they’ve felt pressured to cover or suppress to foster greater authenticity and inclusion, as well as human connection, in the workplace.

“... maybe another good metaphor is the work that the Truth Fairy leads through somatic relational informed practices for psychedelic medicine. And, you know, that somatic relational is really important. Somatic meaning of the body, being present in the body in that moment. So being aware physically of what's going on with your body and where you are and how you're sitting, but also just being in that moment rather than in your head.” - Joe Strummer

Resources discussed in this episode: