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How Psychedelics Can Help You Meditate, and Why Meditation Makes Your Psychedelic Experience Easier

Posted on March 14, 2016 by Roger R. 

 Meditation can benefit psychedelic therapy by building the skills to cope with negative situations, while psychedelics can open us up to the benefits a meditation practice can bring. 

Image Source: Flickr user lillie kate

 As 2 AM rolls around, I toss and turn in bed thinking, “Why can’t I fall asleep?” I have so much to do tomorrow, and while anxiety about that kept me up at first, as the hours pass, I worry more about this insomnia itself. It becomes a self-perpetuating cycle that leaves me unfocused and drained the next day, lucky to have caught four hours of fitful rest. That is, unless I remember my meditation practice and break the cycle.
Meditation has been shown to ease the minds of those suffering from a wide range of mental issues, including depression, anxiety, PTSD, and insomnia—the last of which I’ve struggled with for most of my life. I’ve found mindfulness meditation especially helpful, and the benefits spill over into other areas of my life, enhancing my creativity, focus, and calmness. In a nutshell, mindfulness meditation is performed by freely allowing thoughts and sensations to arise in your mind but letting them pass without ascribing any judgment.
But despite the clear benefits of meditation and the low cost (it’s free, after all — it needs no special equipment and can be done almost anywhere), few people regularly practice it in their daily lives. This might be because it’s difficult to be alone with your thoughts, many do not know where to start, or simply because adopting a new habit isn’t easy.
Luckily, organizations like Vajra Body Vajra Mind, a podcast and coaching community dedicated to spiritual practices, are working to bring practices like meditation to a wider audience. Vajra founders Damien Abel and Jed Ward offer personalized coaching to help you build and cultivate your spiritual practice, and on their podcast, they talk with key figures from the Buddhist, entheogenic, and somatic communities about spirituality and how we can better understand ourselves and our place in the world. Vajra Body Vajra Mind recently spoke with Psychedelic Times co-founder Joe Mattia about his meditative practice in conjunction with the use of marijuana, which got me thinking about my own understanding of psychedelics and meditation.

 As the number of distractions in everyday life only seem to increase, the benefits from a mindfulness practice are even more important.

Image Source: Flickr user Thomas8047

The Connection Between Meditation and Psychedelics

 

The role of marijuana — and more broadly, psychedelics — in a meditative practice is still an open question. Certainly, it appears that Western culture began embracing meditation and other spiritual practices as part and parcel of the psychedelic movement.
But more specifically, what can meditation and psychedelics offer each other? In a 2001 MAPS bulletin, Vanja Palmer, a 30-year Zen practitioner, noted that the skills trained in meditation—of remaining at peace in one’s own mind—are invaluable during a psychedelic experience. When feeling overwhelmed, the skill of grounding yourself through meditation may be enough to pull you back from the edge of a negative experience.
Likewise, the sensations and insights felt during a psychedelic experience — such as the sense of total understanding, the ability to face your inner turmoil, and ego dissolution — can give a meditator insight into the limitless mind-states their brain can evoke. Many cultures have practiced meditation as a way to get closer to the divine—psychedelics seem to offer another route to this.

 

Integrating Meditation and Psychedelics

For those interested in cultivating a regular meditation practice, psychedelics may help in another way. Ibogaine’s significant role as an addiction interrupter may be in part due to its ability to help us break out of old patterns of behavior and build new, healthier habits and outlooks. Because one of the most difficult parts of meditation is simply getting yourself to do it, a powerful psychedelic experience could function as a catalyst to really integrate meditation into your life. Approaching a psychedelic session with the intention of improving your life in this way —  by exploring meditation and deliberately integrating your experience afterward — has allowed many individuals to cultivate new habits and become the people they want to be.
Meditation is indisputably one of the most positive changes someone suffering from mental ailments like depression and insomnia can make in their life. Those who have tried but haven’t been able to integrate meditation into their routine, however, may benefit from a catalyzing psychedelic therapy session to open themselves up to this new, constructive practice.
On the other hand, those who are interested in psychedelic treatment for an issue like depression, but have no experience with psychedelics and are hesitant to take the plunge, could benefit tremendously from meditation, which can prepare the psyche for the insights and sensations they will encounter. Meditation and psychedelics have a deep synergy, and their combination can be truly life-changing.



Psychotherapists and other experts are harnessing the transcendent power of psychedelics to treat mood disorders, substance addiction, and much more. While psychedelic therapy is still largely unavailable in the United States, the staff at Psychedelic Times is here to answer all of your questions about psychedelic therapy and, if you choose to take the next step, connect you with one of the excellent clinics found around the world. Contact us today with your questions about ayahuasca, ibogaine, and other psychedelic therapies.

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 What’s the Right Psychedelic Mushrooms Dosage? Deciding the Best Dose for Psychedelic Treatment.

Posted on March 30, 2016 by Psychedelic Times Staff
 

 Psilocybe cubensis, a commonly-used psychedelic mushroom containing psilocybin, is the focus of a seminal new study on psychedelic dosage by Dr. Roland Griffiths. 

Image Source: Wikimedia Commons user Zergboy

As you lie back and feel your trip beginning, your excitement becomes colored by doubt. Did you take too much? How can you be sure it’s not more than you can handle? As you worry, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, and your anxiety takes over. You can tell the next few hours are going to be grueling.
If this sounds familiar to you, you’d probably agree that determining dosage can be one of the biggest challenges of a psychedelic experience. Yes, you want to get the most of the experience, but you don’t want to go too far.
Luckily, we are at a truly exciting point in the history of psychedelic science —  after decades of prohibition on all research, the last few years have seen an explosion of studies into the therapeutic benefits of psychedelics like ibogaine and psilocybin for addiction and PTSD. And thanks to one recent study from John Hopkins, it seems like an answer to the question, “What’s the ideal mushroom dosage?” may be just around the corner. 

The Research About Mushroom Dosage

 

Though the overall flurry of recent research is reaffirming to see, a true herald of a change in the way we see psychedelics comes from a very new study by Dr. Roland Griffiths (Dr. Griffiths is also responsible for a well-known study about the effects of psilocybin on patients diagnosed with terminal cancer, as well as several other seminal psychedelic and addiction studies). In this study, 18 healthy volunteers were given four tiers of psilocybin dose and encouraged to lie down in a comfortable environment with headphones. The study’s aim was to evaluate volunteers’ subjective experiences—positive and negative—at different doses.
The highest dose tested was 30 mg of psilocybin per 70 kg participant weight (mg per kg is a typical clinical measure of dose for drugs of all kinds). This is equivalent to a 155 lb individual taking slightly less than 5 g of psilocybe cubensis, a typical psychedelic mushroom—quite a strong dose. Four out of five volunteers receiving this dose reported the experience was one of the top five most spiritually significant events of their lives, but a third of participants also reported a significant psychological struggle. At this higher dose, experiencing fear, anxiety, and stress was more likely.
At the next highest dose of 20 mg per 70 kg (equivalent to roughly 3 g of psilocybe cubensis), all volunteers reported positive experiences, and only one experienced any negativity. This trend continued for lower doses, with slightly less profundity of experience but still significant, long-lasting effects. Over a year later, the researchers followed up with volunteers and found that the vast majority still thought that their experiences were in the top five most spiritually significant of their lives.

 

 The Big Three: Set, Setting, and Dose

 

Besides dosage, there are a couple other things to consider when undertaking a psychedelic experience. It’s widely agreed that the three factors that most influence a psychedelic experience are set, setting, and dose.
Set refers to an individual’s mindset: are you coming into the experience expecting something to go wrong, or do you have a constructive intention? Setting refers to the environment of the experience: do you have an experienced sitter, guide, or therapist who can help chaperone you through difficult stages? Are you in a comfortable, soothing room or the outdoors? Set and setting are well understood, and it is clear how they can push a psychedelic experience in a positive or negative direction. Dose, however, is less intuitively clear, and that is why this study is so important: it attempts to quantify the relative benefits of different doses of a psychedelic.
We know that psychedelics like psilocybin are capable of revealing deep personal insights, transcendent realizations, and ineffable connections to the universe that lead to long-lasting improvements in outlook, but also that in some circumstances, we can have difficult, troubling, and even frightening experiences. That’s why set, setting, and dose are so important. Though some may say that these negative experiences teach us something valuable in and of themselves, individuals who are apprehensive about psychedelic therapy would do well to have their fears soothed so that they can receive psychedelics’ full benefits without negative expectations.

 

What the Research Means for You

 

This research is so significant because it isn’t looking at psychedelics in a prescriptive manner—it can help any individual, whether they’re “sick” in a clinical sense or simply seeking to improve their own mental health. It benefits anyone seeking a psychedelic experience, especially those who are unsure where to start or apprehensive about what they have heard. Even very low doses of psychedelics still engender long-lasting positive changes, and the lower the dose, the less likely you are to have an anxious or stressful episode.
With attentive detail to set, setting, and dose, you can seek out the psychedelic experience most suited to you. If you are seeking a truly transformative experience — and are willing to face your fears and tackle deep-seated issues — a high dose may offer one of the most significant experiences you could encounter. If you’re apprehensive about psychedelics, or simply want to open yourself up and improve your outlook, a lower dose may be best for you. Remember also that dose is only one component of your experience—make sure your mindset is prepared and intentional, and your setting is supportive, therapeutic, and above all, safe.


Psychotherapists and other experts are harnessing the transcendent power of psychedelics to treat mood disorders, substance addiction, and much more. While psychedelic therapy is still largely unavailable in the United States, the staff at Psychedelic Times is here to answer all of your questions about psychedelic therapy and, if you choose to take the next step, connect you with one of the excellent clinics found around the world. Contact us today with your questions about ayahuasca, ibogaine, and other psychedelic therapies.

Contact Us 

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