James Fadiman has been a pioneer  in psychedelic research beginning in the 1960s. He wrote the influential The Psychedelic Explorer’s Guide where he outlines best practices for safe, sacred entheogenic voyages. For over 50 years James can be found at the growth edge of inquiry into psychedelic explorations.

James speaks to the immediate and long-term effects of psychedelic use for healing (microdose), for  problem-solving (low dose), for therapeutic  engagements (moderate dose), and for spiritual explorations (high dose).

Fadiman is the individual most responsible for the wide spread phenomena known as “microdosing” psychedelics. He suggested a microdosing protocol which has been used by tens of thousands of citizen scientists. He has collected over 23,000 reports from individuals  who have followed his microdosing protocols.

Fadiman did his undergraduate work at Harvard and his graduate work at Stanford, doing research with the Harvard Group and the West Coast Research Group in Menlo Park, and with Ken Kesey. A former president of the Institute of Noetic Sciences and a professor of psychology, he teaches at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology, which he helped found in 1975.

More information about his work and interests can be found at https://www.jamesfadiman.com/

We've also included a pdf download of Fadiman's Meeting the Divine Within .

R. Coleman has quietly conducted over 3,000 psychedelic therapy sessions over the last 35 years. He is the author of the influential book, Psychedelic Psychotherapy, published by Transform Press.

One of the pioneers of underground  psychedelic psychotherapy, Coleman brings the unique experience and insight that comes from conducting thousands of  sessions. He is passionate to share what he has learned for the benefit of others who are seeking to do this work.

Topics covered in this segment include:

Psychedelic Psychotherapy: Working with childhood sexual abuse, Re-parenting, Working with Transference in sessions, the arc of my treatment program.

The MIthoefers describe the protocols which they developed for the MAPS MDMA trials. This methodology is presented in the MAPS MDMA trainings. Both were trained in the holotropic non-interventive model of holding space by Stan Grof. They model a client-centric approach that deeply honors the innate healing intelligence of their patients. They bring this sensitivity to their clinical work with MDMA.

The Mithoefers have been at the center of clinical efforts to demonstrate the efficacy of MDMA and the efforts to make this molecule available as a prescription drug. They have introduced an entire generation of practitioners to the protocols and nuances of MDMA assisted psychotherapy.

The way they hold space in sessions was strongly influenced by the Holotropic model of care which is explained by Diana Medina in a separate presentation. Based on their experience using MDMA in clinical trials they have continued to refine their understanding of best practices.

Learn more about Annie & Michael Mithoefer

Music is used in every kind of psychedelic session. From clinical therapy sessions to religious ceremonies, the psychedelic experience seems to be paired with a soundscape. Music can played live by musicians, or presented as a recorded playlist. Songs or prayers may be sung or chanted by the leader or by all the participants. Though musical expression is commonly found in psychedelic sessions, there has been little discussion about the skillful use of this powerful intervention. Byron Metcalf is uniquely qualified to speak to the skillful use of music in psychedelic journey space. 

Metcalf has been a professional drummer for 6 decades. He has played on many gold and platinum albums and has produced and performed on more than 20 albums of music for shamanic and psychedelic journeying.

Byron holds a Ph.D. in transpersonal psychology, and  a master’s degree in counseling. He has over 30 years experience as a holotropic guide.

Byron has trained, studied, and worked with shamans, healers, and psycho-spiritual teachers from many parts of the world. He has been intensely involved in consciousness research and spiritual development, specializing in the transformative potential of alternative states of consciousness.

As a drummer, percussionist and recording engineer, Byron produces music for deep inner exploration, breathwork, shamanic journeywork, body-oriented therapies, various meditation practices and the healing arts. 

You can learn more about Byron at https://byronmetcalf.com

Silvia Polivoy has been investigating expanded states of consciousness for 40 years. She has carried out field research in Mexico with Mazatec shamans and has worked extensively with Ayahuasca, San Pedro, and other sacred plants in their native habitats.

Since 1996, she has hosted  retreats for thousands of participants in both the Peruvian and the Brazilian Amazon. At these retreats she provides participants with the opportunity to “meet” the ancient plant teacher ayahuasca in it’s natural environment – the jungle.

Silvia is a trail breaking  pioneer  in South America who was one of the first to  provided safe access to non-indigenous people of visionary plants. She models ethical female leadership in a world inhabited by mostly male shamans.

In 2004, Silvia co-founded The Vine Spiritual Retreat Center on the Atlantic forest of Bahia, Brazil. This center was purposely created to hold ayahuasca retreats for those interested in spiritual pursuits and was one of the first retreat centers ever created for this purpose.

Her work is in the spiritual realm, integrating her expertise in psychology, expanded states of consciousness, shamanism, and other spiritual practices. Her current focus is modeling an effective method for spiritual development and integration using ayahuasca. 

She has a postgraduate degree in clinical psychology. For 20 years she had a private practice in Buenos Aires, starting with psychoanalysis, transactional analysis and transpersonal psychology, and  later neo-shamanism and spiritual practices.

Learn more at www.spiritvineretreats.com.

Ralph Metzner left his body in 2019 just prior to our recording a conversation with him to discuss 60 years of experience guiding psychedelic sessions. Ralph had been conducting psychedelic sessions since the 1960's at Harvard with TImothy Leary and Richard Alpert (Ram Das). During his life time  Ralph did not speak publicly about his ongoing underground session work using visionary plants and molecules. He published extensively on these topics, but never spoke publicly about his underground session work. After his death, we are able to reveal his important contributions.

Ralph has been hugely influential in the psychedelic community regarding the skillful use of psychoactives. He left a prodigious scholarly output in where he discussed the many aspects of the psychedelic experience. He wrote many books about specific psychoactives (MDMA, ayahuasca, mushrooms, 5-meo-DMT, San Pedro, LSD and more). He conducted a thriving underground practice for over 50 years where he did individual sessions. During that time he also lead  several annual week long study groups that  experimented with healing and visionary interventions paired with various combinations of psychedelics.

So that you might gain a deeper appreciation of Ralph's important contributions to holding space for a psychedelic session, we bring you recordings of Ralph explaining his neo-shamanic approach. He called his method Alchemical Divination.

Ralph understood psychoactive molecules as non-specific amplifiers of consciousness. Each plant, fungal or chemical molecule  occasions a particular type of expansion of awareness. In Ralph's experience, if the participant does not have a specific intention for their session or if  there are no purposeful interventions offered by a guide, then a session will simply amplify what is arising in the participant's mind stream at that moment. This is the basis of the "set and setting" hypothesis that Ralph helped formulate which suggests that an individual's subjective experience of a "psychedelic" will arise based on the mind set of the participant and the environment  in which the molecule is experienced.

After many years conducting psychedelic sessions, Ralph further expanded his practical  understanding of set and setting to emphasize that purposeful interventions used in a session (either through the focus of  intentions by the participant (part of set) or the externalities introduced and directed by a guide (part of setting)  would exert a strong influence the subjective experience of the participant. This understanding led Ralph to refine his skillful means of conducting sessions for the best outcome for participants.

Ralph suggested that the most important intervention in a session,  was for a psychedelic voyager to intentionally and continually maintain a sense of curiosity and ongoing inquiry while in an expanded state of consciousness. Directing awareness in this way gives the participant the ability to navigate in an expanded mindstate during a session and to pursue paths of insight that they find meaningful.

Ralph offers a methodological counterpoint to those who follow Stan Grof's orientation that emphasizes that one follow the lead of one's own healing intelligence which will take you where you need to go. Stan was emphatic that a sitter not offer any interventions in a session. He wanted to protect the integrity of the inner healing trajectory, lest the external influences of the sitter hijack the consciousness and direction of the participant's healing journey.

Ralph was very interested in how one could direct ones own healing journey. Rather than trusting that a journeyer's consciousness would offer the best content for exploration and healing, Ralph suggested that that one could purposefully set up the trajectory of a journey in a psychedelic experience. In this way one could expect to intentionally explore in a session: a past trauma, the family system, future visioning, problem solving, mythic archetypes, and much more.

Alchemical Divination suggests a practical methodology for conducting sessions using psychoactive molecules for purposeful inquiry.

By framing ones intentions before a session, a person can effectively "seed" the direction and the kinds of content that one's mindstream will reveal. The setting of intentions is best done during the preparation phase, prior to dosing. In this case, the participant can rehearse a "practice run" of their session, contemplating the questions they are bringing to the journey.  Any processes or interventions that  will be introduced by a guide during the session will also be introduced and rehearsed prior to the session.

Individuals are exceptionally suggestible under the influence of psychedelics, thus a pre-session rehearsal in an ordinary state of consciousness helps to focus intentions and color the coming sense of inquiry in expanded awareness.

Ralph  is the individual most responsible for the wide spread practice of bringing a clear intention to a  psychedelic session. Ralph shared that intentionaiity,  a sense of purposefulness, curiosity and inquiry, are the primary elements that contribute to an impactful and meaningful session.

Ralph  was a master alchemist, pairing the unique subjective effects of particular molecules with complimentary kinds  of inquiry in expanded awareness. For example, he might pair MDMA with a process from Hellinger family system work in order that the empathogenic qualities of the molecule might support the pursuit of family system healing or insight. He might use the visionary properties of  mushrooms and LSD to enhance the visceral felt experience of traveling on a guided journey through the Buddhist wheel of Samsara. He would use the somatic and visionary effects of mescaline to support a meditator's exploration of somatic practices and the human energy field.

He would also combine molecules for their synergistic impacts. For example, when using psilocybin mushrooms he typically added a low dose of San Pedro cactus powder  which he felt offered a grounding influence. He would offer Syrian rue if one wanted to intensify the mushroom effects or might offer the option of a low dose of LSD (60 micrograms) at an hour plus into the session to intensify, clarify and lengthen the journey. Ralph paid exquisite attention to the preparation of the intended trajectory of a session and the choice of the right molecule to pair with the particular inquiry or Alchemical Divination that he chose to introduce.

We bring you two  lectures in which Ralph describes his process of  Alchemical Divination and demonstrates its use. Ralph believed that "divinations" (which are inquiries) could be done both in normative consciousness and in enhanced states. In the following  2 lectures he offers divinations without the use of psychoactives. Due to the on going "war on drugs" Ralph never spoke publicly about using psychoactive molecules or that he used this process extensively with psychedelics. In both cases his audience understood that his lecture was coded.

Ralph felt that his psychedelic session work was an esoteric teaching (not for everyone and only with ample preparation). His public teaching was thus carefully coded to protect himself and those he worked with.  These 2 lectures speak directly  to expanded states of consciousness occasioned with psychedelics. He models the practice of guided meditations in these mindstates and offers tools for navigation. There is some overlap in the presentations, but they are worth listening to as they are the only two recorded presentations that exist of Ralph discussing his approach.

In addition to these lectures, we bring you a few audio recordings of Ralph conducting sessions and teaching  classes so that you can catch a direct experience of him. They are provided to give you a deeper sense of this wise and influential teacher.

Ralph was an active guide during a session- moving his clients rapidly through many types of inquiries, processes and somatic practices. Ralph's guiding style was extremely interventive, but he was very careful to support his client's cultivation of their own insight and meaning making and not to suggest or direct of their inquiry. His guiding was intended to offer and open for the individual using psychoactives the opportunity to choose different directions of possible exploration. He offered the participant full autonomy in the session, they could choose to follow his guidance if it was fruitful, or not.

In order that you might more fully understand Ralph's skillful approach to guiding psychedelic sessions, we bring you other presenters in The Guiding Presence who will share Ralph's methods.  A long time student of Ralph's, who is called "Anonymous" among the presenters,  will describe in detail the way Ralph guided psychedelic sessions. The Anonymous interview is presented after Ralph in the order of presenters. Jamy Faust describes how Ralph used the family constellation work, developed by Burt Hellinger,  in his psychedelic sessions, as a template for healing the family system. Both Anonymous and Jamy provide insight into how other practitioners have adopted Ralph's methodology and incorporated it into their practice.

We hope that these presentations will provide you with a deeper understanding of Ralph's unique  approach to guiding and introduce you to the important contributions that he made in this space.

Ralph Metzner  was a recognized pioneer in psychological, philosophical and cross-cultural studies of consciousness and its transformations. He attended The Queen’s College, Oxford, where he obtained a BA in philosophy and psychology. Subsequently, he obtained his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at Harvard University and held a post-doctoral NIMH fellowship in pharmacology at the Harvard Medical School. While at Harvard he collaborated with Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert in classic studies of psychedelics in the 1960s, co-authored The Psychedelic Experience and was editor of The Psychedelic Review. He was a psychotherapist in private practice and Professor Emeritus at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, where he taught for 30 years.  

Author of over 100 scientific papers and scholarly essays, he is the editor of and contributor to two collections of essays on the pharmacology, anthropology and phenomenology of ayahuasca (The Ayahuasca Experience, 2006)  and of psilocybe mushrooms (Sacred Mushroom of Visions, 2004). His conversational memoir of the Harvard projects in the early 1960s, Birth of a Psychedelic Culture with Ram Dass and Gary Bravo, was published in 2010. He compiled and edited a collection of essays and experiences with the empathogen MDMA, entitled Through the Gateway of the Heart (1985, 2012).

The Green Earth Foundation publishes his writings devoted to psychoactive/psychedelic drugs:  The Toad and the Jaguar – A Field Report of Underground Research on a Visionary Medicine (2013), and Allies for Awakening – Guidelines for productive and safe experiences with entheogens (2015). The Ecology of Consciousness – The Alchemy of Personal, Collective and Planetary Transformation was published in 2017.https://www.greenearthfound.org

Stanislav Grof is one of the founders of the field of transpersonal psychology. He has personally explored the use of non-ordinary states of consciousness for inner exploration, healing, recreation and  in search of deeper insight into the human psyche.

Stan is one of the most influential psychedelic practitioners and his work  and influence is legend. MAPS, USONA, Compass Pathways and most research studies all follow his non-interventive sitter protocol for holding space during a session. He was the first to articulate the concept of the "inner healer" that resides in each individual's consciousness and provides every person with the power and capacity to know for themselves what they need for their own healing.

We bring you Stan in candid conversations discussing his approach to conducting psychedelic sessions. Few people have heard Stan speak about the protocol he used to conduct more than 5,000 LSD sessions.  Most people assume that his LSD sessions were done in the same manner as his Holotropic Breathwork sessions (spoiler alert: this is NOT the case). He provides us with an essential download about his non-interventive approach to holding space for psychedelic sessions and provides us with some history of what he was doing in sessions in the 1960's before prohibition.

Grof is known for his early studies of LSD and is one of the founders of the field of psychedelic therapy. Grof has articulated a theoretical framework for prenatal and perinatal psychology and transpersonal psychology in which LSD trips and other powerfully emotional experiences are mapped onto a person's early fetal and neonatal experiences. Grof developed a practice through which many states of mind could be explored without drugs by using a breathing technique known as "Holotropic Breathwork".

Grof received his M.D. from Charles University in Prague in 1957 and then completed his Ph.D. in medicine at the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences in 1965, training as a Freudian psychoanalyst at this time. He was the Chief of Psychiatric Research for the Spring Grove Experiment at the Research Unit of Spring Grove State Hospital (later part of the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center. In 1973 he was invited to the Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California, and lived there until 1987 as a scholar-in-residence.

As founding president of the International Transpersonal Association (founded in 1977), he went on to become distinguished adjunct faculty member of the Department of Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness at the California Institute of Integral Studies. 

He is the author of over 150 articles and 20 books.

Dr. Eli Kolp is the trail breaking pioneer who first described the use of ketamine for therapeutic transpersonal applications. Ketamine is the only psychedelic that can be legally prescribed by physicians at this time. His clinical research opened the door to a new generation of ketamine practitioners.

He was born and educated in the former Soviet Union. His parents, both physicians, practiced medicine throughout Central Asia, and the family lived in several different republics before settling in Moscow in 1970. Dr. Kolp completed medical school in 1973, a surgical Internship in 1974 and residency training in psychiatry in 1978. He practiced psychiatry In Moscow until 1981, when he immigrated to the United States.

He completed a second residency In psychiatry in 1987 at the University of Texas Medical School in Houston. While there, he accepted the position of Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry.

In 1988, Dr. Kolp moved to Tampa to continue his education at the University of South Florida College of Medicine, where he completed a fellowship in Geriatric Psychiatry in 1989. During the same year, Dr. Kolp became a Diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. Since that time, Dr. Kolp has maintained his interests In both academic and clinical psychiatry. He joined the faculty of the Department of Psychiatry as Clinical Assistant Professor at the USF College of Medicine and has served in the position of medical director in several psychiatric hospitals in the Tampa Bay area, directing both residential and outpatient treatment programs.

In 1994, Dr. Kolp began researching ketamine psychedelic psychotherapy while on staff at the James A. Haley Veterans Hospital in Tampa. He continued his research until 1999, when he separated from the VA Hospital. Dr. Kolp has returned to private practice offering ketamine assisted psychedelic psychotherapy. Dr. Kolp has continued his scientific research with ketamine psychedelic psychotherapy and has published the following articles about the results of his studies. Most of these studies can be found on the web and are worthy of your attention.

• Krupltsky E. & Kolp E., 2007. Ketamlne psychedelic psychotherapy. In M. Winkelman & T. Roberts (Eds.), Psychedelic Medicine: Addictions Medicine and Transpersonal Healing, Volume 2, Chapter 5, pp. 67-85. Portsmouth, NH: Praeger.

• Kolp E, Young S, Friedman H, Krupitsky E, Jansen K, & O'Connor L, 2007. Ketamine Enhanced Psychotherapy: Preliminary clinical observations on its effectiveness in treating death anxiety. International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, 26, pp. 1 - 17.

• Kolp E, Krupitsky E, Friedman H, Young S, 2009. Entheogen-enhanced transpersonal psychotherapy of addictions: Focus on clinical applications of ketamine for treating alcoholism. In: A. Browne-MIiier [Ed.]. The Praeger Interhatlonal Collection on Addictions, Vol. 3, pp. 403-417. Westport, CT: Praeger.

• Kolp E, Friedman H, Krupitsky E, Jansen K, Sylvester M, Young S, Kolp A, 2014. Ketamine psychedelic psychotherapy: Focus on its pharmacology, phenomenology and clinical applications. International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, 3, pp. 112-168

For decades Kylea Taylor has been  directing people's attention to the ways in which holding space for a psychedelic session requires close attention to the ethics of caring. It is essential that anyone who works with clients using psychedelics understand the unique ethical concerns that arise in these sessions. Transference, counter-transference, inflation, power, sex, money and much more will arise with great intensity in a psychedelic session. 

Kylea and Selene Vega clearly articulate  the core ethical concerns when sitting for others in expanded states of consciousness.

Kylea is a California Marriage and Family Therapist. She has been a senior trainer at the Grof Transpersonal Training since the 1990s. She worked at a Santa Cruz residential substance abuse treatment center for 9 years.  In 2017 Kylea rewrote and republished her successful 1995 title The Ethics of Caring. The new book won the 2017 Nautilus Book Award in the category, “Relationships & Communication.” She also authored The Breathwork Experience, The Holotropic Breathwork® Facilitator’s Manual, and edited Exploring Holotropic Breathwork®. Kylea does consulting and teaching related to ethics.

Selene’s work with movement and other experiential modalities has evolved over many years of teaching and developing approaches to facilitating self-exploration, connection, and transformation in workshops and courses. She has taught at The Institute of Transpersonal Psychology (now Sofia University), Bastyr University, JFK University, Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health, SoulCollage® Institute, and Sacred Centers and has served as President of Santa Cruz CAMFT (California Association of Marriage & Family Therapists). She was editor of the Spiritual Emergence Network Newsletter, and co-authored The Sevenfold Journey: Reclaiming Mind, Body, and Spirit through the Chakras (Crossing Press, 1993), which has been translated into six languages.

Our guest, who will remain anonymous, is in his 80s and has advanced degrees in psychology and anthropology. He was re- introduced to psychedelic use in the 70's in a ritual and ceremonial way by Ralph Metzner who became his guide and mentor. Our conversation will seek to illuminate the practical side of Ralph’s methods.

Our guest has worked with a broad range of guides and began leading groups and individual sessions in 1980. In the 1960's, he became involved with a disciplined alchemical spiritual practice and has maintained a life long contemplative practice.

In order that we might have a candid and revealing conversation- our guest will remain anonymous. Our guest is a true psychonaut who has explored the landscape of mind expanding practices and substances. In keeping with Ralph Metzner’s legacy, he offers guided experiences enhanced by entheogens using a small number of psychedelic molecules: MDMA, 2CB, Ketamine, Mushrooms, LSD, San Pedro and 5meo-dmt.

In order to  preserve their anonymity of the following presenters (they are all current practitioners) their voices have been transcribed. We bring you candid conversations with senior practitioners who hold nothing back. Please don't miss these interviews. They take some additional effort as they are only available as text. You can read them here or download them as a pdf. You might use a web based program to read them to you.

One consequence of the War on Drugs, which began in the 1960's, was that  many practitioners who were working legally with psychedelics chose to move their sessions into the underground. Many others ceased their activities.  Some courageous individuals continued doing sessions. In this context, extreme confidentiality has been an essential element of maintaining  the integrity of these kinds of sessions. This  keeps both the practitioners and their clients safe. Both the practitioners and their clients have established complex networks of trust that allow these kinds of sessions to happen.

The Guild of Guides underground practitioners have  had a strong influence on psychedelic culture. Their methods  of practice and the kinds of interventions that they have developed in sessions have been widely adopted by a new generation of psychedelic guides who are beginning their careers.

Guild members are able to use psychoactive materials that are not legally available to the public. These include molecules like LSD, 2cb, 5meoDMT, MDA, and methylone which are unlikely ever to be rescheduled as legal pharmaceuticals.  Their underground sessions can  be conducted in ways that lie outside the standards of practice defined by the medical or psycho-therapeutic  professions (for example the use of healing touch). These Guides have formed networks to share information and practices and in some cases they have offered  trainings to teach their practices.

We think it is essential for people who are interested in a deep understanding of the methodologies of holding space in expanded states of awareness (for healing, personal exploration and for pleasure) hear the diverse voices  that make up the full range of expression in this space. 

It is  up to the individual  psychedelic guide practitioner to decide what kind of  guiding protocol suits them and  which interventions are appropriate based on their skill level.  

In all cases, it is incumbent on a practitioner to hold themselves to the highest ethical standards. Clear agreements and disclosures  between a guide and client are always a prerequisite for this kind of relationship. Both parties must be hyper conscious of transference and counter transference issues. There are multiple opportunities for a guide to abuse a client's trust and to violate their boundaries  in expanded states of consciousness.

Clients can  come to their sessions with unrealistic expectations regarding what they hope to experience and achieve. 

Both a client's and guide's relationship to sex, money, trust, and power will be put to the test in these high stakes relationships in expanded states of consciousness. 

We bring you some of the most experienced and influential underground guides in the space in the following interview transcripts.

Jamy Faust brings to us her deep experience healing the family system using expanded states of awareness.

Jamy holds a Master’s in Holistic Counseling and Spiritual Psychology. She co-founded The Constellation Approach™ programs including Faust Family Constellations and co-authored The Constellation Approach: Finding Peace through Your Family Lineage with her husband Peter. She is accomplished in Energy Medicine and is a graduate and former faculty member of the Barbara Brennan School of Healing. Jamy wrote “The Role of Energy and Intuition in Family Constellations” for the book Messengers of Healing: The Family Constellations of Bert Hellinger through the Eyes of a New Generation of Practitioners. She has crafted Amethyst Opening™ sessions offering the Alchemical Divination method created by her teacher Ralph Metzner. Jamy lives near Boston, MA and has been in private practice utilizing these modalities to assist others in their awakening process for over twenty-five years.

Sylvia is an editor, librarian and researcher specializing in the field of drug information. She is the Senior Editor with the Erowid Center where she has reviewed and published over 27,000 experience reports written about hundreds of different psychoactive plants, chemicals, and technologies, by people from all walks of life. These reports are published at erowid.org.

Her work has focused on raising awareness of how the language used to describe psychoactive drugs and experiences can deeply affect the thoughts and actions of others, with a significant impact on individual and societal understandings of drug use, misuse, and abuse.

Sylvia's past professional affiliations include leadership at the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies where she was one of its first staff members, the Center for Educational Research + Development, KPNW Hospice Care Volunteer Program, and DanceSafe.

Sean O'Sullivan and Donna Rosenthal were involved for many years in the efforts to legalize the Santo Daime religion in Canada. They bring us their extensive experience using "Daime" or ayahuasca in group ceremonies.

Donna graduated with a B.A. in Sociology from the University of Toronto in 1967 and completed 3 yrs. of graduate studies in Sociology and Religion at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. She worked for 15 yrs. at the Chedoke-McMaster Child & Family Centre with multi-generational, multi-problem families.

She was certified by Stan & Christina Grof in Holotropic Breathwork and has led Holotropic Breathwork Workshops for 15 yrs. She teaches courses in Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction.

Sean was born in Dublin, Ireland and graduated from medical school in 1968.  During medical school, he did a two year training with the Irish Psychoanalytic Society.  He began a family medicine practice with a strong focus on psychotherapy in 1970.

Sean was certified by Stan and Christina Grof in Holotropic Breathwork in 1987.  He has taught courses in Mindfulness Based Stress reduction.  He has worked with Dr. Bruce Tobin and his team to move Psilocybin towards legal status in Canada, focusing initially on patients in End Of Life Distress (EODS).  

Mark Seelig was born in West-Berlin, Germany, and has lived in the USA, India, and Germany. From an early age he has been fascinated with the spiritual quest of the human soul, which eventually led him to the study of indigenous traditions and native wisdom. Mark has a degree in Theology and a PhD in Clinical Psychology. He is a founding member of Ken Wilber’s Integral Institute, an Advisory board member of the Association Holotropic Breathwork International, and a  Founding member of the German College for Transpersonal Psychotherapy. He has studied indigenous ceremonial medicine traditions with Luis Eduardo Luna. 

He has written ‘Das Selbst als Ort der Gotteserfahrung’ (The Self as the Dimension of Spiritual Experience) and several articles about Kundalini, and Near-Death Experiences in the ‘Journal of Near-Death Studies’, the ‘Inner Door’, and ‘Religion Heute’ (Germany). 

Inspired by shamanic journeying he studied Asian Indian Classical Music on the Bansuri (bamboo flute) in India. He has released several award wining shamanic-ambient collaborations to induce and support shamanic states of consciousness with notable artists  in the space including Byron Metcalf and Steve Roach.  These cd’s include:  ‘Wachuma’s Wave’, ‘Mantram’, ‘Nada Terma’, and ‘Nightbloom’, ‘Intention’, ‘Tree of Life’  and ‘Disciple’ and  most recently 'Persistent Visions'.

Music is used universally in sessions. Mark brings us a refined understanding of the skillful use of music and silence in a session.

Mark has 20 years of experience as a clinical psychotherapist, working with groups, couples, and individuals. He also has extensive clinical  experience with the empathogen methylone . He brings us a paper he wrote about its use.

The conversation with Mark explores some of the more subtle sensibilities that arise holding space  using psychoactives that are worthy of consideration.

Kokyo Henkel has been practicing Zen since 1990: in residence at Tassajara Zen Mountain Center (most recently as Head of Practice), Green Gulch Farm Zen Center, No Abode Hermitage in Mill Valley, and Bukkokuji Monastery in Japan, and currently as a teacher at Santa Cruz Zen Center. He was ordained as a priest in 1994 by Tenshin Anderson Roshi and received Dharma Transmission from him in 2010. Kokyo is interested in exploring how the original teachings of Buddha-Dharma from ancient India, China, and Japan are still very much alive and useful in present-day America to bring peace and harmony to this troubled world. He is also interested in the interface of Buddhist practice and plant medicine work. Learn more at www.sczc.org

Once you mark as complete this section with Kokyo, you will receive an email with the article; Dissolving the Roots of Suffering: Zen meditation, Psychotherapy and Entheogens by Dokushô Villalba Sensei.  Villalba is a Soto Zen Master living  in Spain who provides us with a spiritual framework that values the powerful experiences occasioned by both meditation and entheogens. This article provides you with another thoughtful practitioner who has a life long contemplative practice that also values the psychedelic experience.  Please keep an eye on your email!

Michael W. Taft is a maverick meditation teacher, bestselling author, and podcaster.

As a mindfulness coach, he specializes in secular, science-based mindfulness training in retreats, groups, corporate settings, and one-on-one sessions. Michael is the author of several books, including the bestselling The Mindful Geek, Nondualism: A Brief History of a Timeless Concept, and Ego (which he co-authored), as well as the editor of such books as Hardwiring Happiness by Rick Hanson and The Science of Enlightenment by Shinzen Young.

He has often taught meditation at Google, worked on curriculum development for SIYLI, and is currently core faculty at Wisdom Labs, in San Francisco. Michael is also a featured teacher on the Simple Habit app, and an official advisor to the Therapeutic Neuroscience Lab. He was previously editor-in-chief of Being Human, and was the long-time editorial director of Sounds True.

From Zen temples in Japan to yogi caves in India, Michael has been meditating for over thirty five years and has extensive experience in both Buddhist Vipassana and Hindu Tantric practice. Michael is a senior facilitator in Shinzen Young’s Unified Mindfulness system, and is a teacher of meditation groups around the Bay Area. He currently lives in Oakland, California, and is founding editor of the iconoclastic mindfulness meditation blog and podcast Deconstructing Yourself.

Dr. Robert Weisz is a  clinical psychologist, consultant, educator, and trainer  in private practice in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  Dr. Weisz  is the developer of Mindfulness – Based Emotional Processing (MBEP),  a focused approach to support emotional processing in counseling and psychotherapy. He has had a life long engagement both with the practice of psychology and the healing use of psychedelics.

Dr. Robert Weisz was born in Lima, Peru, in 1944. His parents were German Jewish refugees from the Holocaust. He lived in Peru, Bolivia, and Chile before immigrating to the USA in 1957 at the age of thirteen. Dr. Weisz earned an MA in psychology and a Ph.D. in clinical/community psychology from the University of Wyoming. During graduate school years, he conducted research and authored a number of articles in scientific journals in the field of sleep and dreams. Dr. Weisz served as an officer with the US Army Medical Service Corps. In 1980, he cofounded the Milton Erickson Institute for Clinical Hypnosis and Behavioral Sciences of New Mexico.

His interest in the healing potential of altered states of consciousness brought him back to his native South America to study with shamans and healers in Peru, Ecuador, the USA, and Brazil and a 30-year study of the healing process with plant entheogens.

Dr. Weisz has served as an educator on the faculties of the University of Wyoming, Southwestern College, Webster University, and the Clinical Faculty at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine. He is the co-author, with Deuter (1991), of a series of eight hypnotherapeutic audio healing journeys published by Health Communications, Inc., and now available in CD format. Dr. Weisz is deeply interested in the spiritual/philosophical path of Nonduality. In private practice since 1980, Dr. Weisz lives and practices in Santa Fe, NM.

He has developed a Mindfulness-Based Emotional Processing (MBEP),  a new therapeutic modality that stimulates and supports deep, intrinsic emotional processing through mindful attention upon the body’s sensory experience of an emotional issue or memory.

Meredith Little and her husband Steven Foster co-founded Rites of Passage Inc. in 1976 and The School of Lost Borders in 1981, pioneering new methods and dynamics of modern pan-cultural passage rites in the wilderness, and creating innovative practices of  “field eco-therapy.”  The essence of their work is captured in articles, chapters, an award-winning documentary film, Lost Borders: Coming of Age in the Wilderness, and books that include: The Book of the Vision Quest, The Roaring of the Sacred River, The Four Shields: The Initiatory Seasons of Human Nature.  Since Steven’s death in 2003 Meredith continues both nationally and internationally to guide and train others, dedicating her life to returning meaningful and culturally appropriate rites of passage ceremonies to all people and lands. She has also co-founded along with Scott Eberle a new branch of Lost Borders entitled The Practice of Living and Dying, to help break the taboos and silence that pervade the subject of death and to help restore dying to its natural place in the cycles of life. 

Why are we including a conversation about vision fasting retreats in a program about holding space for psychedelic journeys?

Meredith is a true pioneer holding space for intense visionary expanded states of consciousnesses. A 3 day fasting vision quest will occasion extremely intense mind/body states- that are similar to and more emphatic than what can  arise using psychedelic molecules.  Meredith has guided thousands of people on these kinds of journeys. The fasting vision quest experience is one part of a comprehensive process that the School of Lost Borders has  developed for their participants. They demand of their participants that they dedicate the time needed to prepare for their experience,  to have the experience,  and then to return to base camp for an extensive and comprehensive integration download.

Psychedelic "sitters" are well advised to study what Meredith and the School of Lost Borders have learned about holding space for intense mindstates and visionary revelations. They model excellent preparation, holding space impeccably, a non-interventive approach, and the power that comes from devoting several days to an integration process  that is held respectfully and with reverence.

We are grateful to bring you the last public interview Tav Sparks gave before he left his body. This conversation was recorded  while Tav was wrestling at the end of his life with challenging cognitive and health issues.

Tav Sparks was director of Grof Transpersonal Training (GTT), the only training program that certifies people as practitioners of Holotropic Breathwork. Tav was a teacher, consultant, and writer with over 30 years of experience working therapeutically with people in non-ordinary states of consciousness.

Since 1986, Tav  conducted hundreds of trainings and workshops. He  may hold the record, having conducted breathwork sessions for over 10,000 individuals.

Tav is the author of four books, a training manual, and a CD series. In his latest book, The Power Within: Becoming, Being, and the Holotropic Paradigm. He shows how a holotropic paradigm can inform all sorts of settings, from the therapeutic to the personal and interpersonal, and more. Tav is the author of the training manual Doing Not Doing: A Facilitators Guide to Holotropic Breathwork.

Tav served on the International Transpersonal Association (ITA) Board of Directors.

Anna Greta Mazziotta is a senior faculty member for the Co-Active Training Institute (CTI), the largest coach training organization in the world.  Since 1999 she has trained and coached thousands of students in North America, Europe and Asia.  

Anna Greta was selected to be one of a small group of people who teach the Leadership program for CTI.  This program is a nine-month developmental program that involves 4 residential retreats. The leaders of this program must have a high degree of skill in coaching people for leadership positions, and the ability to identify and “call out” the qualities participants need to succeed.  Anna Greta led this program for ten years.

During the course of her career, Anna Greta has served organizations that include Microsoft, Mozilla, Google, CNN, Capgemini, IBM, Duke University, AT&T, Yale University and PASOC.

Anna Greta Mazziotta received her BA in Psychology from the State University of New York at Oneonta and her MA in Counseling Psychology from the State University of New York at New Paltz.  She is a Professional Certified Coach (PCC), and member of the International Coach Federation (ICF).   She is a graduate of the California Institute of Integral Studies certificate program in Psychedelic Assisted Therapy and Research and has also completed the Ketamine Training Center’s  program in Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy.