How to Prepare for a Psychedelic Journey
Simply put, adequate and proper preparation is key for a rewarding psychedelic journey. We’ve broken down the important aspects into a step-by-step guide so that you can start preparing for the experience now.
Why are you using psychedelics?
This is the most important question you can ask yourself as you start preparing for your psychedelic journey. We all have different reasons for choosing to have a psychedelic experience, but it’s important that you get to the bottom of yours.
First, ask yourself if you’re doing psychedelics responsibly. Is your reason driven by a desire to learn, grow, or heal? Or is your choice based on a desire to escape? If it’s the latter, re-evaluate your interest in psychedelics to determine if it’s a healthy behavior. Seek help to get to the root cause of that desire before considering psychedelics.
The reason behind your psychedelic journey could be to simply have an enjoyable experience and connect with this planet and the people on it, and that’s okay. Recreational psychedelic use can certainly produce a profound and beautiful experience, but it can also end up being a distraction. Understanding your true intentions and needs will help determine the difference.
We often find that someone may start dabbling in the psychedelic world for fun, but the power of these substances ends up causing a shift in the individual. This may encourage them to explore psychedelic substances for all of their healing and transformative power—not just for a fun weekend activity.
You should never feel forced or pressured into doing psychedelics. It’s important to understand that it could (and probably will) end up being one of the most profound and impactful experiences of your life—and your motivation and full participation is crucial in getting there.
You’ll know that you’re using psychedelics for the right reasons if you feel called to participate in the experience despite the potential for discomfort, the surfacing of repressed thoughts or emotions, or the notorious “bad trip”.
Some nerves and uneasiness are normal, this is your ego starting to tremble at the fact that its seemingly secure position in your reality is going to get a shakeup. This could be the habits that you’ve said you’ll give up for years, that old relationship that’s no longer serving you, or that traumatic experience that you’re ready to process. Any signs of discomfort could indicate that change is coming, and it’s generally for the better.
At this stage, it’s likely that you’ve tried other alternatives to achieve your desired goals. It’s also likely that they haven’t gotten where you want to be. If you’re nodding your head or starting to feel more comfortable about the possibility of psychedelic-induced discomfort, you have officially started the psychedelic healing process.
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What do you hope to get out of the experience?
Once you have an idea of why you’re embarking on a psychedelic journey, you can start to pinpoint the specific things you want to get out of the experience. This will be related to your reasons for choosing a psychedelic experience but will require you to dig even deeper.
This will be your intention, which will serve as the backbone or anchor in not only the rest of your preparation but also during the experience itself. If/when times get tough, your intention will help you endure any discomfort.
You’ll want to be crystal clear on your intention, and the more specific, the better. This may be anything from seeking relief from a certain mental blocks, to wanting to get to know your emotions better, and even working through past trauma.
Take some time to write your intention(s) down. Yes, get them down physically so that they live somewhere other than in your head. It is important to write your intentions, journal your thoughts and experiences, and to be able to reflect and process at a later date when you are ready to revisit.
It’s alright to have more than one intention, but we’d recommend keeping it between one and three. You don’t want to end up feeling like you need to resolve all of your life problems in one session. This is also not realistic, as the medicine will determine what to prioritize. The psychedelic healing process is a long one.
Investing time and effort in this stage always pays off—the more you prepare, the more impactful your psychedelic experience will be. Once you are clear here, you’ll have a better idea of what the rest of your preparations will look like.
We always recommend that all journeys and consumption be done with either a trained guide, or a trusted someone that can help if things become uncomfortable.
Committing to a healthy lifestyle
In the run-up to a psychedelic journey, it can be beneficial to prepare not only mentally, but also physically. By taking steps to feel fit and healthy, it can put you in the best possible frame of mind for a positive experience. You don’t need to go on an extreme detox, or sweat it out at boot camp – it’s all about making positive, healthy choices as part of your normal routine.
It can be helpful to avoid alcohol for a while, to eat more vegetables and less processed food, and try to be more physically active. Studies show that healthy lifestyle choices, such as cutting out alcohol, sugars and smoking, as well as increasing physical activity, leads to improved mental wellbeing – and, a better frame of mind contributes to a more positive psychedelic experience.
Considering a
Guided
Psilocybin Journey?
A Guide’s Experience is Paramount
Set and setting —your mind-frame, and held space or location— are important factors to consider when engaging with psychedelic therapy, and in all cases, guidance is equally paramount. Journeying into this type of therapy requires the direction of someone with experience, otherwise there’s high potential for things to go sideways, fast.
An experienced guide can help determine the direction in which the medication is going to evolve and unfold within the patient.
When a person with experience in this area has more tools, they'll help you develop your intentions, which is super useful because like everything else, where the intention is and how you come into this experience will make all the difference in what you get out of it.
Experienced guides are able to give a client the support and direction needed throughout their psilocybin therapy experience, should challenging emotions or insights come out of their sessions, which sometimes happens.
If you run into some emotional difficulty, an experienced guide who has helped people in a situation like this before will make a difference between a healing session and a terrible session.
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We recommend the good people at The Elevated Wellness Co for their experience and tools in this field.