At Chacruna: A Clinical Psychologist’s First Experience with Ayahuasca

Elizabeth Arnold, Ph.D.

A colleague and friend referred a shaman to my private practice. We did brief and very focused work in one area of distress. As our work together was ending, she told me about an upcoming retreat for mental health professionals focused on psychedelic medicine, bridging the gap between ceremony and therapy. I understood the potential for this experience to be about healing, at a limbic level, the traumas passed down generationally. I wanted to do this personally, but also wondered how it might change me as a therapist... continue reading.