Psychedelic Integration
in Arcadia and Irvine, CA
What Is Psychedelic Integration?
After a psychedelic experience, many struggle with applying insights, reconciling unresolved emotions, or coping with the residue of "bad trips" that bring up trauma, fear, or grief. Whether the journey was recreational or ceremonial, we might feel confused or disoriented afterward, finding it difficult to reconcile what we experienced with day-to-day life. If we’re left with existential questions about our life purpose, we want to ensure we have a safe space to process what we learned and make meaning of our journey.
Psychedelic Integration Therapy (PIT) helps you process and gain clarity about experiences you’ve had with psychedelics, MDMA, or psilocybin. After using these substances, you may have had powerful insights, emotional shifts, or even difficult moments, such as fear or confusion. Integration therapy helps you understand and find meaning in these experiences in a more grounded way, making them useful learning tools for healing and personal growth.
How Does Psychedelic Integration Therapy (PIT) Work?
In integration sessions, we’ll discuss your journey, examining any consciousness-expanding or challenging emotions you might have experienced. Whether you’ve had profound realizations or faced emotional material during your journey, we’ll work together to help you process it safely and meaningfully.
Psychedelic integration will be a collaborative exploration into your psyche with an emphasis on building resilience and applying breakthroughs to your life. In addition to traditional talk therapy, we may also incorporate creative art, journaling, and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) if you need support in neutralizing the intensity of distressing memories.
In particular, Internal Family Systems (IFS) can be a helpful modality for integration that explores how a psychedelic journey reveals the different aspects of self to you. Accepting and loving every part of self, even the shadow self, has a calming effect that can normalize and destigmatize a “bad trip” experience. The shadow self has much to teach us—once you understand it’s a part of you and nothing to be afraid of, you’ll expand self-awareness and self-compassion.
The goal of PIT is to help you feel more connected to your sense of self, find clarity, and navigate any confusion or existential questions that may have come up. Through thoughtful and deliberate integration work, you can create lasting change and align your life with the lessons learned from your psychedelic journey.
What’s The Difference Between Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy And Psychedelic Integration?
Psychedelic-assisted therapy with me involves ingesting ketamine with intention and purpose while I support you throughout the experience in real time. After your journey, we always schedule an integration session to ensure you gain insight and meaning from your experience.
Psychedelic integration focuses on helping you find meaning post-journey, whether that experience took place a couple of days beforehand or decades earlier. Perhaps a journey long ago brought up shadow self-material, which has haunted you ever since, and you seek clarity and deeper insight.
Or maybe you are planning a psychedelic experience on your own and would like to schedule an integration session soon afterward. As a psychedelic therapist, I am open to supporting you however I can.
Who Can Benefit From Psychedelic Integration?
Psychedelic Integration Therapy (PIT) is a highly effective treatment for anyone seeking support dealing with the after-effects of a profound or challenging psychedelic experience, such as trauma, emotional shifts, or spiritual insights. Compared to traditional therapies, PIT offers faster healing by helping you process deep emotional material and insights more quickly. People with terminal illnesses have utilized psychedelic integration counseling to ensure they feel connected at the end of life and shed any fear they may be contending with.
If you have struggled to find relief, healing, or growth through other methods, psychedelic counseling offers a powerful alternative. After a profound psychedelic journey, you may feel confused, overwhelmed, or uncertain about how to apply your insights. Psychedelic integration provides a safe, supportive space to process and integrate these experiences, especially any that may have been difficult or considered a “bad trip.”
With psychedelic integration therapy, you can make sense of emotional shifts, transform challenging moments into sources of growth, and apply newfound clarity to everyday life. PIT can help you go deeper, breaking through emotional blocks, reframing past trauma, and fostering lasting deep healing, even when other therapies have not been effective.
Working with a therapist familiar with psychedelic experiences enhances healing, especially in processing “bad trips” and integrating insights. Research conducted in 2022 underscores the importance of integration in maximizing the therapeutic benefits of psychedelic experiences. [1]
I was inspired to offer psychedelic integration therapy after an experience with a client who had struggled with deep trauma from childhood abandonment, leading to feelings of unworthiness and isolation. After a challenging psychedelic experience, they confronted these painful emotions. Through PIT, we processed and reframed the trauma, leading to emotional relief and healing. Witnessing their transformation showed me the power of psychedelic integration to heal deep wounds and inspired me to integrate it into my practice.
Why I Utilize Psychedelic Psychotherapy
I have now been practicing Psychedelic Integration Therapy (PIT) for several years, helping clients process profound or challenging journeys. My approach is informed by both personal experience and professional training in Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy.
I've guided many individuals in integrating powerful insights, processing difficult experiences, and achieving lasting healing, even when other therapies haven't offered relief. In both the short and long term, psychedelic integration therapy provides a pathway to healing, growth, and clarity.
In the short term, PIT helps process and integrate difficult or overwhelming psychedelic experiences, turning confusion into insight and providing immediate relief. Over time, you can expect lasting transformation as you break through emotional barriers, heal past wounds, and apply newfound clarity to your life.
Find Out How Psychedelic Integration Can Help You
Psychedelic integration therapy can help you apply new insights into your daily life. To schedule a free consultation and learn more about psychedelic integration, either in-person or online, please contact me to schedule a free 20-minute consultation.
[1] https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.824077/full
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