Psychedelic Therapy: More Than the Experience Itself
Updated: 4 hours ago
Psychedelic-assisted therapy refers here to psychological care around a substance-assisted treatment protocol: preparation, a supported medicine session where applicable, and integration afterward. Preparation and integration are distinct from administering a substance. Research protocols, personal experiences and the services a practice offers should be considered separately.
My Personal Path
About 12 years ago, I found myself at a point in my life where, from the outside, everything looked pretty successful. I was living overseas, doing well financially, had an established career in media, and was in a long-term relationship. I had been picked up for a television show when I was 18, and from there my career took off in a direction I never really planned for.
I’m incredibly grateful for those experiences because they shaped so much of who I am today. At the same time, I eventually realized that I had become very disconnected from myself.
I had spent so many years being told what I should say, what I should do, how I should present myself, and even how I should look. I became very accustomed to seeking validation outside of myself. By the time I started questioning my career and relationship, I honestly didn’t know what I wanted anymore.
I remember feeling like the life I was living wasn’t really mine.
That was scary because I had entered that world so young. I didn’t know what else I was good at or what another version of my life could even look like. I just knew I felt stuck, unhappy, and without much of a sense of purpose.
How I Became Interested in Psychedelic Therapy
Eventually, I left that life and moved back to the United States. At the time, I was questioning almost everything and became really interested in understanding people, consciousness, spirituality, and why we are the way we are.
I started reading about transpersonal psychology, Buddhism, yoga philosophy, and different approaches to healing. Somewhere in that exploration, I came across psychedelic therapy.
What interested me were the stories of people having experiences that helped them see themselves and their lives differently. People talked about connecting with parts of themselves they had lost, finding meaning again, and feeling more connected to other people and to life itself.
I had never really explored psychedelics before, so when I eventually chose to, I approached the process with a lot of intention. I read about preparation, mindset, set and setting, grounding, reflection, and especially the importance of integration afterward.
For me, that preparation mattered.
The experiences gave me a sense of connection that was very difficult to describe at the time. I felt more connected to nature, to other people, to myself, and to something greater than myself. I also began questioning an identity that I had carried for most of my adult life.
It wasn’t one experience that suddenly gave me all the answers. It was more that I started trusting myself again.
I became more compassionate toward myself and other people. I felt more comfortable being myself and began to recognize that I could actually have a say in the direction of my life. Instead of continuing to follow a path simply because I had been successful at it, I started paying attention to what genuinely interested me.
What Does the Research Say About Psychedelic Therapy?
My experience is personal; it is not evidence that another person will have the same response. Clinical studies ask different questions about particular treatments and groups of people.
For example, a randomized trial in 104 adults with moderate-to-severe PTSD compared MDMA with a specified therapy protocol against placebo with the same therapy. It reported greater reductions in PTSD symptoms and functional impairment in the MDMA group. Difficulty masking a substance's noticeable effects and the trial's selected setting limit interpretation; this is not proof of benefit from unsupervised use or other substances.
That research is separate from the personal story here. It does not establish that my experience followed a clinical protocol or that a substance is offered at Hur Psyche.
At the same time, psychedelic therapy isn't appropriate for everyone, and I think it's important not to portray it as a miracle treatment. Screening, preparation, support, mindset, and integration all matter, and the research is still developing.
What Happened Afterward Was Just as Important
The biggest changes in my life didn't happen overnight.
I did notice fairly quickly that I felt more hopeful and less stuck. I felt like there was something on the other side of the confusion I had been experiencing, even though I didn't necessarily know what that was yet.
What followed was a much longer process of figuring out what actually interested me and what kind of life felt authentic.
I kept studying psychology, yoga, breathwork, mind-body practices, spirituality, and human potential. Eventually I found myself working as a field researcher in the Bronx with teenagers who had a parent who had been incarcerated. Part of the research looked at factors related to substance use.
Through that job, I discovered something important about myself. I enjoyed the research, but what I was naturally drawn to was sitting with people, interviewing them, building rapport, hearing about their lives, and creating enough trust for someone to share what they were actually going through.
That experience helped me realize that working directly with people was something I was good at and genuinely cared about.
It eventually led me toward clinical psychology and my doctorate.
My formal education was much more traditional and didn't include much training in psychedelic therapy at the time. Through supervisors during my clinical training, I was encouraged to pursue additional education in psychedelic studies and psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy.
That felt like different parts of my life finally coming together.
I had spent years studying the mind, the body, spirituality, yoga, breathwork, consciousness, and psychology separately. Eventually I found a way to integrate those interests into the work I do today.
Preparation and Integration
Integration offers space to explore a previous experience without requiring a particular meaning or breakthrough.
Ketamine-assisted psychotherapy is a separate service: I provide psychological preparation, support and integration, while prescribing, administration and medical monitoring belong to appropriately licensed medical providers.
Those moments are incredibly humbling for me to witness.
I don't see myself as the person giving someone answers. I see myself much more as a guide who helps create the conditions for people to explore their own internal experience.
This is also why I place so much importance on preparation and psychedelic integration. A psychedelic experience can be meaningful, but the experience itself is only one part of the process. What happens afterward, how someone reflects on it, what they practice, what they change, and how they begin bringing those insights into their everyday life is often where much of the deeper work happens.
That was true for me too.
Psychedelics were not the only reason my life changed. They became one part of a much larger process that helped me reconnect with myself, trust my own direction, and have the courage to follow interests that eventually led me to become a psychologist.
Now I get to support other people as they explore their own process, and I'm genuinely grateful that this has become part of the work I do.
For me, the purpose of psychedelic therapy isn't simply to have a profound experience. It's about what that experience may help you see, feel, understand, and ultimately bring back into the way you live your life.
