My Psychedelic Roots

Raymond Feng is a breakdancer, writer, appreciator of life, and a self-described life-long learner. He discovered his passion for psychonautics through psychedelic medicine and spirituality, and has brought that passion into his life in a variety of ways. Academically, he has finished two Bachelor degrees at University of Ottawa, one in Biomedical Sciences and the other in Psychology, and recently completed a Master’s in Mental Health Counselling & Behavioral Medicine at Boston University School of Medicine. Raymond ‘s balanced nature is on full display as he shares about his first psychedelic experience, which challenged him to trust his connection to self and others in some life-changing ways.

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Manzar Zare is a Muslim woman, mother, legal professional and PhD student who is conducting research on psychedelics and the mental health of people of color, with a particular focus on support to Muslim women. This research naturally played a big role in her decision to have her own experience with psychedelics, which she recently undertook in a well supported psychedelic retreat centre in Jamaica. This decision to have her own healing experience with psychedelics also came out of becoming a mother and navigating her own mental health struggles with postpartum depression. Manzar embodies thoughtfulness in all senses of the word: both in her caring for the lived experience of others, and in her long-standing desire to explore and understand the human experience with her whole mind, body and spirit-- all of which is on full display in this episode.

Shownotes

Manzar's most recent publication:

• Zare, M., & Williams, M. T. (2024). Muslim Women and Psychedelics: a Look at the Past, Present, and Future. International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction, 22(2), 897–912. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11469-023-01108-9

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Joe La Torre is a psychedelic enthusiast and researcher, currently serving as Lead Research Psychologist at the Center for Novel Therapeutics in Addiction Psychiatry (NTAP) at the University of Washington, where he co-leads a variety of research including a three-year Phase 2 psilocybin safety clinical trial funded by the state of Washington. In our conversation together in this episode, Joe shares his path towards psychedelics which includes being confronted with his academic pursuits in Buddhist studies, learning what it takes to navigate the shifting of his friendships and relationships, and ultimately being encouraged to reimagine what he thought his life’s path might look like.

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Laura Ritzie is a counsellor with over 20 years of experience supporting clients in both the public and private sectors. She is also a PhD student with a passion for researching psilocybin in ceremony and contributing to conversations about loss, grief and our relationship with death. She is curious about people's experiences of connection in relation to resilience, meaning making and flourishing.    

In our chat together, Laura shares about her own brushes with serious illness and her own mortality, her discovery of cannabis to help heal, and how this curiosity about alternate healing modalities led to her first psychedelic experience in her 40s.

Music credit: Music by Mass X Audio from Pixabay

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Trigger Warning: discussions of suicide and suicidality

Kellen Saxberg is a self-proclaimed queer history nerd, psychedelic enthusiast, and student researcher on the intersection of queerness, psychedelics and healing. In our conversation together, Kellen and I talk about navigating conservativism and queerness in their youth, their experiences of losing a sense of self, experiencing awe and cultivating trust, and eventually moving towards finding their way back home, both literally and figuratively, in their first psychedelic experience.

A reminder that this episode contains explicit discussion of suicide. This warning is meant to empower you with the knowledge you need to make healthy decisions about how and if you should consume this podcast content. We invite you to practice self-care and do what feels right for you. And if you need support, please connect with someone who can help: family and friends, professionals, or a crisis line. There are both Canadian and international recommendations in the show notes below. You are not alone-- not in your pain, nor in your healing.

Shownotes

Links to

• Kellen’s grandfather, Donald Ross, served as one of Canada’s first openly gay ordained ministers: https://passages.winnipegfreepress.com/article/id-323/Minister,_advocate,_dad,_hero
• The quote “A book is a suicide postponed” is from Emil M. Cioran’s The Trouble With Being Born (1973)  https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/117564.The_Trouble_With_Being_Born

Below are some Canadian and international mental health resources to access if you are in distress or need support:

• Crisis Services Canada: https://988.ca/
• Befrienders Worldwide (crisis lines serving 32 countries): https://befrienders.org/ 
• International Directory of Mental Health Helplines: https://www.helpguide.org/find-help.htm
• The Fireside Project (US-only psychedelic-specific support): https://firesideproject.org/ 
• Psychology Today (to find a therapist in North America): https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/therapists

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Tahlia Harrison is a therapist, researcher and bioethicist who comes from an ethnically, culturally, spiritually, and racially mixed background. Not surprisingly, she is someone who embraces complexity, and as our conversation reveals, much of her career and research interests in psychology and ethics stem from her own personal experiences navigating complex relationships and traumatic experiences. In our chat, we also get to know her as someone full of joy, self-awareness, humour and gratitude.  

Our talk together touches on the complexity of being exposed to parental substance use in childhood, slowly learning to trust and receive care, and eventually opening up to the healing potential of a well-supported and loving psychedelic experience.

Music credit: Music by Mass X Audio from Pixabay

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Sheldomar Elliot has years of experience in food justice, community support and research roles, and is deeply committed to addressing food insecurity and advancing Black food sovereignty across the City of Toronto. As you will hear in this episode, Sheldomar is also passionate about exploring the intersections of psychedelics with access, community, and healing.

Our wide-reaching conversation touches on his experiences of magic and curiosity in childhood, the complexity of navigating identity in both childhood and adulthood, and finding his way to his authentic Self.

Shownotes

• Sheldomar's food justice organization Foodshare 
• And the podcast he hosts there!
• His community work in Black food sovereignty
• The psychedelic healing and justice coalition he works with
• And a guide for anyone who wants to get into the best trading card game ever!

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Katherine Kimbell, (RN, BA) was introduced to the concept of psychedelics by the CBC Radio program "Ideas" in November 2015 at age 78. This was a profoundly life-changing experience that led to her eventual first psychedelic experience a few months later. Her story is wonderfully unique, while also echoing the pains that many people navigate in life—grappling with the loss of faith, confronting shame, and cultivating acceptance and forgiveness for others and for oneself.

Shownotes

McLean's magazine psychedelic issue "My 12 Hours as a Madman" from October 1, 1953 (Trippingly): https://www.trippingly.net/lsd/2018/5/17/my-12-hours-as-a-madman

CBC Ideas 'High Culture' 3-part series, aired October and November 2015: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/ideas-for-october-2015-1.3247404

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In this inaugural episode of the podcast, we sit down with Victor Distefano Wiltenburg, a Brazilian PhD student studying in the Department of Biology at the University of Ottawa. He currently works with medicinal plants and entheogens, studying the ayahuasca neo-shamanic movement in Brazil and Canada. Victor has a unique story of his psychedelic roots, and his path has woven together science and spirituality in some surprising ways, both within and outside of the psychedelic realm.

Music credit: Music by Mass X Audio from Pixabay