Psychedelics Today

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:

1. 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.
2. 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.

3. 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.

The 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

Healing Souls LLC

Psychedelic Integration

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:

1. Astrology can be used as an integrative tool for psychedelic and other exceptional experiences.
2. 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.

3. 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

Website

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:

1. The Psychedelic Liberty Summit is a gathering on legal, cultural, and political issues around the emerging psychedelic renaissance.
2. 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.
3. 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

Psychedelic Liberty Summit

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:

1. 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.
2. 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.
3. 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

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

Website

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.

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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:

1. Psychedelic Seminars is an educational conversation series deepening awareness of the benefits, risks, and complexities of psychedelics.
2. 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.
3. 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

Psychedelic Seminars Website

Psychedelic Seminars Patreon

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.

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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:

1. Elizabeth and Ingmar are co-founders of Fluence, an online Psychedelic Integration Training program.
2. 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.
3. 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

Fluence

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.

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In 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:

1. Jon participated in the NYU Double-Blind Trial of Psilocybin-Assisted Treatment of Alcohol Dependence.
2. The study was double-blind. In each session, he didn't know if he was going to receive psilocybin or Benadryl.

3. 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).

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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

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In this episode, Joe interviews Joost Breeksema from the Netherlands to talk about the Interdisciplinary Conference on Psychedelic Research. In the show they cover topics on ICPR 2020, and the importance of accessibility.

3 Key Points:

1. The Interdisciplinary Conference on Psychedelic Research takes place April 24-26, 2020 in the Netherlands.
2. It's important to acknowledge the indigenous, ethical, and political dimensions to psychedelic use at conferences.
3. Although this conference will be catered toward mainstream science and research, personal experiences and stories are important too.

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Show Notes About Joost

• Joost is a part of the OPEN Foundation
• ICPR is a huge conference
  • Nobody before was doing research on psychedelics in the Netherlands
• William James work sparked Joost's interest in psychedelics

ICPR

• Starting with the OPEN Foundation, the conference has been very scientific
  • It is interdisciplinary, but also taken very seriously
  • This field is so broad, you could really never get bored
• Wade Davis, Alicia Danforth, Matt Johnson and more will be speaking at the conference
• There will be over 80 speakers
• Joost expects it to be a pretty international conference, half local, and half from abroad
• Psychiatrists are usually short on time, and they like things compressed more
• It's really easy and cheap to grow psilocybin as mushrooms or truffles
  • Even in Mexico, they need to use GMP Psilocybin

Accessibility

• "If this is going to be the treatment, how are we going to help people afford it?" - Joe
• There is some tricky stuff happening, companies trying to patent different parts of psilocybin to use it for therapeutic use
• Ketamine has been off patent for years, but you can develop a new route of administration, patent that, and make a ton of money
• Spravato is making it to the UK

Conference Themes

• Joost is both excited and scared that they are bringing indigenous practitioners to the conference
  • It's important to acknowledge the indigenous, ethical, and political dimensions to psychedelic use
  • Talking about concepts and approaches to healing is going to be an important aspect
  • The goal would be to do research with the indigenous communities to be able to address the needs of psychedelic use
• There are also a few neuroimaging people coming
• For mainstream scientists, the conference has to be as close to a scientific conference as possible, they may be turned off to the cultural aspects of psychedelics
  • It's the conservative nature of psychedelia
• Joost also says that although the scientific research is important, it is really cool to hear the personal experiences
  • Joe brings up a previous episode of a therapist and patient from the MDMA trials
  • Stories are much more convincing than just data
• People's experience with psychedelics may be completely different from each other
  • It's important to share the bad stories with the good stories
  • If we don't share the stories and data and research, then we can never learn
• Joe hopes that there will be a growth of citizen science in the near future

Links

ICPR

About Joost

Joost Breeksema is a part of the OPEN Foundation, which from it came the Interdisciplinary Conference on Psychedelic Research. His current research focuses on the experiences of patients that are undergoing therapy assisted by psychedelic substances. His aim is to better understand psychological mechanisms of action/change, to tease out salient themes, and finally to learn about what works and what does not work in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy.

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In this episode, Kyle invites a guest interviewer, Hallie Rose of the Thought Room Podcast, to interview him on his recent experience at Soltara. In the show, they talk about Soltara, Kyle's experience with the plant medicine, and important topics like privilege.

3 Key Points:

1. Eastern attendees have a different integration need than Western attendees. In the West, attendees come back to more hustle and bustle, more time is needed for integration. Soltara does a really good job at providing that time for integration.
2. With Psilocybin and other psychedelics, there is this one big door, you eat the mushrooms and open the door and get to experience it heavily. With Ayahuasca, there is a smaller doorway to penetrate through, you have to create a relationship with the medicine first.

3. If the people that really need the help can't even afford it, then how do we have mass healing? Peer support movements are a way forward in this issue.

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Navigating Psychedelics

Show Notes About Hallie

• Hallie interviewed Kyle after his first 4 experiences with Ayahuasca
• Kyle's episode on The Thought Room Podcast about his Near Death Experience
• The Thought Room Podcast was inspired by Hallie's first Ayahuasca experience
• She had typically pushed away anything psychedelic in nature, even alcohol before coming to Soltara as a guest
  • "A lot of the paradigms I had been working with were flipped upside down on their head" - Hallie
• The message that really spoke to her was to create a podcast
  • 2 ceremonies later she had some things come up about family and career, and again, the message 'podcast' came up again
  • When she went over her integration notes from her experience at Soltara, she kept coming back to the podcast thing
  • She describes her journal entry message as a black hole, a void
  • She felt like she was in rooms, some were bright and rainbow-y, and others were dark and lonely
  • The rooms were rooms for thoughts, thought rooms
• She owns the start up company Lunar Wild

Soltara

• Hallie mentions that she was blown away by the amount of effort that it takes to uphold a medicine center like Soltara
• Kyle says right from the start from arrival to the location, he was greeted with such warmth and it reminded him of his breathwork background
  • The ground rules that they laid down right at the start made him feel so safe
  • She said it's amazing to see the amount of healing that happens in that space
  • "When it comes to your own medicine work, your own journey work, only you know what's right for you" - Hallie
• Hallie is part of a mastermind group through Aubrey Marcus, the CEO of Onnit
  • She is connected to a bunch of people as a part of this group
  • She was introduced to Dan Cleland, a co-founder of Soltara, who invited her to come down
• Yes they had the traditional Shipibo aspects, but they also did a fantastic job of adding in the Western concepts to cater to the western needs
  • Hallie mentions that coming from the West, we have the need to integrate the experience in a different way than those coming from the East, and Soltara does a really good job with that kind of integration

The First Session

• Kyle said the tea was actually tasty
  • You drink a lot of it where you override the system to where the body wants to purge
• Kyle drank 5 cups of the tea over all the nights
• The purging is to clear the system out of toxins and clean it out energetically
• Soltara built in pre-ceremony sessions like yoga or meditation to help ease into the actual sessions
• Kyle said that the Ayahuasca experience was familiar
  • Everything felt very green behind his eyes
  • There was a serpent weaving in and out of his DNA
  • The experience felt so healing
  • Kyle didn't purge (vomit) but did do a little crying
  • He said he did not experience much anxiety
  • The serpent was healing him and stitching parts of himself back together
  • "There is something intelligent here working on very subtle levels" - Kyle
• The next two ceremonies were very gentle, some crying, going through family dynamics, but always in the background, there was that same serpent
• Kyle said the first 3 sessions felt really easy, compared to previous experiences with psychedelics
  • The spirit said to him "oh you think this was going to be easy, that you would just drink this and that I would show you all this stuff. Well we have to get to know each other first"
  • With Psilocybin, there is this one big door, you eat the mushrooms and open the door and get to experience it heavily, with Ayahuasca, there is a smaller doorway to penetrate through, you have to create a relationship with the medicine first

Final Ceremony

• It was during the full moon in Cancer and lunar eclipse, the energy was already intense
• For the 4th ceremony, Kyle was already feeling high energy, and did not want to go too strong, so he started with ¾ of a cup
  • Kyle felt like he was sober, the medicine told him to ask for a second dose
  • The facilitator gave Kyle ¼ of a cup more
  • That ¼ of a cup really blasted him off
• After the singing, he laid down and that's when things took off
  • All of a sudden, he saw himself back in the CAT scan machine (referring back to his NDE as a teen)
  • He always tells the story as blissful and beautiful, but this time was so different
  • He saw himself back in the CAT scan machine as a child, and was terrified, and he began shaking
  • He felt this pain in his pelvic area as he felt during his NDE
  • He was shivering and so cold, it brought him right back into that state
  • He was re-experiencing the fear in a new way during the ceremony
  • He went into his body and felt the scar tissue and felt that shake and stretch and kind of brought in some healing there
  • After his actual surgery/NDE, as he was healing he was always really afraid to move in certain ways in the fear that movement would re-open some of the healing wounds
• He got a clear way of looking at how the body holds trauma, especially after surgery
  • That trauma is tied to the way we hold ourselves, the way we walk and talk and in so many ways
  • This ceremony helped Kyle view somatic body work in such a new light
• The ceremony was not scary, he allowed his body to process the fear, but not attach to the fear and become fearful
• Yoga can also bring that out, stillness and vulnerability can bring up some body trauma and put you into that fight or flight response
• Even when you think you're done processing something, there are always more layers to dig into and see something differently to bring more clarity

Preparation

• Hallie said what she is learning with this medicine, is that she doesn't need to make anything happen, she needs to just let it happen
  • That feeling of relaxing things is scary because it means giving up control
  • It's a practice and its a lot easier said than done
• The most important part is the set (mindset), because the set is you
  • "Having your set figured out, when the going gets tough, you're safe still" - Hallie
• Kyle said that Aya always told him to wait, he didn't need to jump into trying it right away, he waited over 10 years to process his NDE trauma
  • Hallie says it's just like marriage, you can get married easily, but it's not always going to work out if you don't have the tools and the skill sets to maintain it
  • Ayahuasca is similar in needing the right tools and time to do it right
• The dieta and the prep itself is so hard
• People are turned off by the idea of doing something disciplined
  • These experiences can be so much different when we go through the process of giving something up
  • It's not to punish ourselves, it's to heal ourselves
  • "There is a whole other side of us, that opens up when we cut out some of the things that numb us" - Hallie
  • The dieta strips away the illusions, the plant medicines help us remember who we are

Hopi Creation Story

• The great creator said "I have a gift for the human beings, but I need to hide it somewhere until they are ready to find it"
  • It is "the gift of the knowing that they can create anything, they can create their own reality"
• The creator asked the earth where he should hide it
  • The eagle said he will bring it to the moon
  • The fish said he will bring it to the bottom of the sea
  • The buffalo said he will bring it to the edge of the plains
  • The creator said no to all of them, they will find it there
• So the great grandmother who lives in the breast of the earth said, put it inside of them
  • And the creator said "it is done"
• It brought Kyle back to his fourth ceremony, the Ayahuasca was a reminder that everything he needed was already inside of him

Privilege

• It's hard to tell people of their only legal options for healing, which most of them are leaving the country, which is not an option for some people
  • We are all worthy of finding relief of our suffering through psychedelics
• Is therapy only going to be for the rich and elite? There are so many people who really need it
• Yes, you can grow mushrooms, but then you're at risk of the law
• The system is so complex and we need a more humane way of moving forward in this field and offer experiences like this to the people that need it
• Therapy is a privilege
  • Most people that need therapy are in survival mode that don't have the privilege of access to therapy
• Peer support movements are a way forward in this issue
  • If the people that really need the help can't even afford it, then how do we have mass healing?
  • There are great healers out there that never became healers because they didn't have the privilege to
• Kyle says he escaped a lot of suicidal ideation after his near death experience, it took a lot of time to call earth his home
• "Just to wake up and be a part of this, even that is magical in itself" - Kyle
• "The stars come out every night, and we watch television" - Hallie

Authentic Self

• Hallie has recently had her 12th Ayahuasca experience
  • "I am no longer breathing, I am being breathed" - Hallie
• "Hatred does not exist, it is only a resistance to love" - Hallie
• Even being hard on ourselves is only a resistance to loving ourselves
  • Its love with nowhere to go
• People that have a lot of self hatred toward their bodies or themselves, the medicine always comes back to the self, it teaches people to love and take care of themselves
  • "You really can't love anything outside of yourself until you love yourself" - Hallie
  • Kyle says that the people who he looks up to (ex, Stan Grof), what if they never showed up for themselfves? What if they never stood up for what they believe in?

Links

$200 off coupon code for Soltara: THOUGHTROOM

Soltara Healing Center

Hallie's Instagram

Thought Room Podcast

About Hallie

Hallie Rose is an author, speaker, educator, and relationship coach from New York City. She is the host of The Thought Room Podcast and also the founder & CEO of the company Lunar Wild which aims to reclaim the sacred feminine and address a modern need for a Rite of Passage into womanhood. The Thought Room is a combination of edge-of-your-seat storytelling and groundbreaking interviews with celebrated thought-leaders from around the world. The show covers a breadth of topics including psychology, spirituality, sex & relationships, psychedelic science & plant medicine, bio-hacking, fitness, nutrition, alternative health, business & entrepreneurship, mindfulness, yoga, and meditation.

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This disclaimer was originally posted in our episode, Treating Social Anxiety in Adults with Autism with MDMA and LSD – Voices in the Dark, and it feels important to post it on this episode as well. 

Caution/Disclaimer

A few important notes. This is an episode of an individual experimenting with powerful drugs to see if he can get any sort of relief from autism. In this case, it appears to have been successful. That said, this came with a substantial amount of risks, and people need to be aware. Please read the below bullets so you understand. 

• Autism is not what is treated. The thing being treated would be a symptom like social anxiety.
• "The field of autism science includes a long and shameful history of quack treatments and parents taking desperate and harmful measures to “fix” their children. Autism is a spectrum of congenital and neurocognitive variants, and there are no published research data in support of any compound that can influence its course." Alicia Danforth, PhD
• Please do not administer these drugs to children with autism. It would be highly unethical to do so. 
• There are only two researchers investigating where MDMA and autism meet - Alicia Danforth PhD and Dr. Charlie Grob. A scientific paper will likely be available on this in the next few months. Expect to see more here. 
• These drugs have not been shown to cure or treat autism, but in some cases, just like with neuro-typical individuals, some have seen meaningful changes. 
• Even if changes are noticed the person is still autistic no matter how many high doses of psychedelics they take.
• Obtaining pure drugs is very difficult if not impossible in black markets.
  • Verifying purity will require the resources of mass spectrometry from organizations offering these services like Energy Control or Ecstasy Data
  • Providing unsafe, dirty or compromised drugs to people can cause serious harm or death.
• If you are planning to use MDMA to alleviate some suffering on your own, please wait or don't.
• Do substantial research and have skilled people available to help. 

Thanks to Alicia Danforth for helping us understand the nuance's in this area.

..autism is a genetically determined cognitive variant. It's pervasive, and it affects the whole person, not just the brain. No chemical compound has been shown to treat, cure, or alter the course of autism. However, for some people, substances like MDMA can help them manage symptoms such as anxiety, social anxiety, and trauma effects. - Alicia Danforth, Ph.D

In this episode, Joe sits down with Aaron Orsini, Author of Autism on Acid. In this powerful episode, Aaron shares his moving story on how LSD gave him life-saving relief from his struggles with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

3 Key Points:

1. Aaron spent the first 20+ years of his life suffering from the struggles of Autism Spectrum Disorder. He changed his life in an unexpected way through the use of LSD.
2. LSD gave Aaron the emotional installation of perception to see the stimuli in life that he had been blind from because of his disorder.
3. Aaron is the author of the book, Autism on Acid, a self told story on his autistic perceptions before, during and after his LSD experience. He goes into great depth on his experience in the show.

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Show Notes About Aaron

• A large part of his psychedelic journey stems from his Autism
• His diagnosis didn't affect him in school so much as it affected him in his adult years with socialization
• His childhood friends were more based on similar shared activities
• When he was thrusted into more social situations, he had more issues with non-repetitive and non-scheduled socialization
  • He was anxious in the idea that he would go into avoidance, he wasn't very afraid, just more confused
  • Most of his knowledge was based on repetition and memorization, it was harder to navigate new or unique social scenarios
  • Social vertigo is how he described his experience
• His doctor told him to read some books, and he felt like he was reading a journal on his own life
  • Daniel Tammet - Born on a Blue Day Born On A Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant

A Transition Point

• Aaron left his job
  • A relationship he was in ended
  • A friend of his was killed by a drunk driver
• He was in a dark place, and he wanted to retreat
  • He didn't know what he needed, he just wanted to leave
• He got a backpack and a bike and headed west toward California
• He had an opportunity to try LSD
  • He thought it was going to be an escape, and it ended up being the most involved experience of his life
  • He sat on a tree stump in a wooded area, finally noticing everything that had been there his whole life that he hadn't seen before
  • He saw the beauty in literally being alive
  • He sat there and cried for an hour or two, it was a lot
• Aaron eventually got up, and started walking and saw some people walking and he had an urge to say hello, so he did, and they said “hello, how are you” back
  • He describes it as a sensation of a child riding a bike for the first time
  • Them saying “hello, how are you” to him, was the first time he experienced someone saying hello to him and him feeling it
  • It was like a def person getting a cochlear implant and hearing for the first time
  • It kick started his exploration of the world around him

Integration

• His LSD experience was about 6 years ago, and he didn't know much about LSD at the time
  • He didn't know what to do with his experience
• In the beginning, he felt as if he would go into it, see everything very clearly, and then back out of it again, and things felt more muted and ‘blurry’
  • “I was utilizing LSD, not for a sub-perceptive, metabolic effect, I was going for a supra-perceptive effect” - Aaron
• Aaron was taking at or slightly above the threshold dose amount (20-50micrograms)
  • For someone who already had sensitivity issues, it was very apparent when he would take ‘too much’
• In no way is he advocating someone to repeat what he has done, he wants it more to spark interest in researchers to find more data on this in the hopes to find relief for others

Emotional Installation

• “LSD has helped me understand myself and embrace that” - Aaron
• Aaron said he's willing to take a risk to not be anonymous, because it's not some simple thing, it's so important, it's the most important thing to him
• He gets emails all the time saying the same thing has happened to them, but they want to stay anonymous
• Aaron says it has changed his relationships with his loved ones, the fact that he has this new depth of feeling has changed his relationships dramatically
• The main treatments for kids with autism was to help the caretaker, to help the child not fidget when they sleep
  • Aaron says he needed to fidget, he needed to squirm around
  • “If you can't hear, and someone is telling you over and over again ‘listen, listen, listen’, how are you going to begin to listen? That’s the void that LSD filled.” - Aaron
• He fell in love with parts of himself that he didn't get a chance to before
• Every other form of therapy was coming from the outside and telling him what to feel, LSD was the only therapy that came from the inside
• He mentions a quote from a documentary on someone who used truffles to help them, “Truffles installed emotionality in me”

Hope for Research

• There were studies done with LSD on autistic children in hospital settings before the drug prohibition
  • The results showed the kids changing so fast and so effectively
• It's a difficult topic, ASD research in general is heavily funded by the government
• Autism aside, the older you are in life, the more surprised you are when that veil is lifted for a moment
• The risk that he is taking is nothing compared to the significance of what good this has a chance of bringing
• It's not a desired risk to come out as an Autistic person, and especially as one who has taken controlled substances to heal from it

Links

Autism on Acid: How LSD Helped Me Bridge The ASD-Neurotypical Divide  

Website 

Email: [email protected]

About Aaron Orsini

Aaron Paul Orsini is a writer, public speaker, and survivor of a decades-long battle with clinical depression resulting from social isolation, mental rumination, and hypo-sensitivity issues common in autistic individuals. When Aaron was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder at the age of 23, he took comfort in receiving a diagnosis but remained deeply depressed as a result of seeing himself as broken and blind; someone who just couldn’t and wouldn’t “get it”. But then came his first experience with LSD, during which he became intuitively aware of the very stimuli he’d been incapable of perceiving throughout his life. Thanks to LSD---and a yet-to-be-fully-understood combination of chemically-induced synesthesia and associated fluctuations in intrinsic functional connectivity within the salience and default mode networks, Aaron can now perceive critical social cues embedded in facial expressions, speaking tones, and body language, which in turn means he feels fully connected to the human experience, and fully capable of navigating the social and emotional landscapes of life.

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