I'm excited to announce my new role as a soon-to-be licensed psilocybin (magic mushroom) facilitator in Oregon. This will supplement my work as a relationship and self-development coach. If you're feeling stuck in your life, you might be particularly interested in this episode. Listen for more details!

Learn more about working with Karin:

Karin's website https://drcalde.com

Karin's Instagram https://www.instagram.com/theloveandconnectioncoach/

TRANSCRIPT

Intro:

Karin: This is Love Is Us, Exploring Relationships and How We Connect. I'm your host, Karin Calde. I'll talk with people about how we can strengthen our relationships, explore who we are in those relationships, and experience a greater sense of love and connection with those around us, including ourselves. I have a PhD in clinical Psychology, practiced as a psychologist resident, and after diving into my own healing work, I went back to school and became a coach, helping individuals and couples with their relationships and personal growth. If you want to experience more love in your life and contribute to healing the disconnect so prevalent in our world today, you're in the right place. Welcome to Love Is Us.

Episode:

[00:50 ] Karin: Hello everybody. I have been looking forward to this episode and making this announcement ever since I made the commitment to this new training program that I've been a part of recently. But I wanted to make sure that nothing got in the way of my completing it because as we all know, life happens. But if you are listening to this episode, that means I'll be less than a week away from completing the program. Earlier this year, I started an accelerated program to become a licensed psilocybin facilitator in the state of Oregon, and I will be done as of March 24, and hopefully I'll be licensed and ready to see clients sometime around the end of May or early June. Okay, so what does that mean? First of all, if you don't know, psilocybin is the psychoactive ingredient found in 200 different species of mushrooms growing around the world. So you might otherwise know them as magic mushrooms. And while there is an active underground psychedelic community in the state, it's now legal in Oregon if you use a licensed facilitator in a licensed service center. So it's open to anyone over the age of 21 who doesn't have significant risk factors. And this is not going to be replacing the work that I'm currently doing. It's going to supplement it. My practice is thriving. I love the work I do with my clients, helping them with their self development and their relationships. And I'm so excited to jump into this new way of helping people because it can be life changing. So why am I doing this? So I've got a few reasons, but I'm going to tell you two of the biggest ones. One, I love to help people become more compassionate, loving, connected, and satisfied with their lives. And yet there are those who get stuck. They might try all the things, coaching, therapy, breath work, meditation, somatic work, whatever it is, and they still feel like they can't move forward in the way they want to. Many people who do psychedelic work get unstuck and have profound experiences that change their lives for the better as long as they put in the work. So my work in the psilocybin space will largely be for people who feel stuck in their lives, whether it's feeling stuck in depression or anxiety or in their relationships. If they're stuck because they can't figure out why they get triggered so easily, or they don't feel like their life has meaning or purpose, or because they can't seem to habit like smoking or drinking or shopping or scrolling on their phones or stepping out in their marriage, or perhaps they feel disconnected, disconnected from themselves, their emotions, other people, the planet, or spiritually. So the second reason that I'm doing this is because psilocybin has changed my life. So just a little bit of my story is that when I was younger and up until only about ten years ago, I had no interest in psychedelics and really no clue about them. My brother had used them and really loved them, but I thought he was office rocker. I didn't know why anyone would want to do them. But then I started having conversations with my brother and I started getting curious, and I read Michael Pollan's book called how to change your mind. I then joined a local psychedelic group. Might have found them on meetup, I can't remember, but now I've had several experiences, a couple of them really challenging, and a few others that were profoundly beautiful and inspiring and all helpful. So those experiences, paired with follow up work changed my life. I have felt a stronger connection with myself and with everyone and everything. I have felt the bliss of self love and a deep connection and appreciation for my time on this earth. I got guidance around what was triggering me and holding me back. I saw my strength. And all of this has helped me to dive into my own work because I learned where to go and how to do it. That is how psychedelics at a high level has helped me. And I'll also say that the combination of psychedelics and ifs internal family systems has had a profound effect on my life. And I want to help others have their own experiences that might help them. I have training now in both psilocybin facilitation and ifs, and that's just like a dream come true for me. I want to take a moment, talk a little bit about the history of psychedelics, because I just feel compelled to honor this potent, naturally growing substance and the people who have shown the rest of the world what it can do. So psilocybin and other psychoactive substances have been used probably throughout time by humankind. Some groups of people we know have used them as important parts of their cultural traditions, including Aztecs, Zapotech, Mayans, the Masetech people, some of them for thousands of years. And cave paintings indicate that psilocybin has been used around the world for likely much longer. They grow prolifically on every continent except Antarctica, and there are even some interesting theories about how they might have helped us develop as a species. I'm not going to go into that, but if you want more information, I can point you to some resources. Now, here in the US and in Europe, we often ignore this history and what happened before. 1938 and 1938 was the year that Albert Hoffman, a swiss chemist, first synthesized LSD. And then in 1957, Gordon Wassen, who worked in the finance industry in New York at the time, and his wife Valentina, visited the now famous Maria Sabina in the mountains of Oaxaca, Mexico. Maria Sabina was a local healer and shaman and introduced the couple to the wonders of psilocybin. The couple then brought their stories back to the US, and Time magazine published their story, leading the way for many Americans to make their own trek to visit Sabina. But some did that without the reverence for her and the mushrooms and her town. So there were some serious consequences for Maria Sabina and her village. And that's the point that I want to make here, is that psilocybin mushrooms really are a sacred substance that has a rich history, especially with indigenous people who have treated them with a respect that they deserve. And the earth has gifted us with these substances that, again, these indigenous folk have long since recognized. They've been an important part of their cultural practices. So I want to honor those who have paved the way for us to enjoy the benefits of these mushrooms and the actions of many people from North Americans and Europe ignorant about their sacredness and what they can offer us have had some serious ramifications, especially for indigenous people. So there's a lot more to this story, but I'm going to leave it at that for now. Now, in modern times, since the mid 90s, when the research field was allowed to reopen, the research on psychedelics has ramped back up. Now, there were thousands of studies done on LSD and some on psilocybin as well, before they were classified as schedule one drugs, along with mescaline and DMT in, I think it was 1968, which was largely a political move and kicked off the disastrous war on drugs. And now there are research centers at NYU, Columbia, UC Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, the University of Texas at Austin, the Imperial College of London, UC San Francisco, and many, many more. And it's so exciting to see all the research that's being done on both psilocybin and MDMA specifically. So, MDMA assisted therapy has been given breakthrough status by the FDA because it's been shown to be more effective than any other treatment out there, specifically for PTSD. And this has the potential to benefit so many people who are suffering. And I'm specifically thinking of all the veterans, those who have survived sexual assault and so much more. And it's expected that the federal government will legalize MDMA assisted therapy sometime this calendar year. So what that would likely mean is that you could get a prescription for it so that you could use it in conjunction with therapy. But the details are unclear at this point, and whether or not I would be able to use it with clients is also unclear. I think it's maybe unlikely, but I'm not sure. It's also being studied in those on the autism spectrum to help them with social anxiety, and it's frequently used by couples to help them with relationship challenges and just to feel closer. It's also used by people who are just seeking self understanding. But again, it's not legal yet, so ple