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By Peter Ajemian   February 2024

For the past twenty years, I have found psychedelic medicine to be a powerful tool for my own personal growth and for that of my clients. Recently, friends and family have asked me how to go about choosing a psychedelic guide that is both safe and responsible. While competence and qualifications are important, finding the right fit is deeply personal. The following article is meant to be a starting point in finding the right one for you.

Getting to know a guide is important. You will entrust them with navigating your inner landscape, so a sense of rapport and mutual respect is crucial.  I invite you to explore your potential guides’ own experiences with psychedelics, their approach to supporting others, and how their values align with your own. This process may take time and involve meeting with a few potential guides before finding the right match. Trust your intuition and seek a connection that feels safe, supportive, and empowering.

Below are some basic questions to ask your guide weeks or even months before you decide to do a journey with them:

Basics:

• Conduct phone consultations with a few different guides before committing to a particular one.
• Ask yourself: after speaking with a potential guide, do you feel comfortable and heard
• Ask for a list of references of people with whom they have worked recently (in the past year) to give you up-to-date testimonials about working with them.
• Please note that if your guide comes from a non-Western-educated culture, they may not be used to answering any of the types of questions listed below. If that’s the case, you may still be in great hands.

Professional and Personal Questions for an Individual Guide

• What led you to become a psychedelic guide?
• How do your professional certifications and expertise match my specific needs?

• Please share some of your personal history with psychedelics.

• What therapeutic traditions or lineages do you follow?
• Beyond psychedelics, what other healing techniques might you integrate into my session?

• What are your strengths and limitations as a guide?
• Are you licensed to practice in my state? As of February 2024, only Oregon and Colorado allow licensed psychedelic therapy.

• What are your payment and cancellation policies?
• Package details: number and duration of sessions, and their costs. What is your availability for initial and follow up sessions, including frequency and duration?

Pre-Journey Evaluation:

• How do you assess my mental and physical well-being before the journey?
• What steps do you take if you identify potential risks during assessment?
• What access to supervision do you have for complex client conditions?

• Describe your process for checking for potential contraindications with my current medications.

• How do you ensure the confidentiality of my information?

Details of the In-Person Session:

• If a group session, approximately how many other participants will be present during my individual or group journey, and what are their experience levels?
• Describe the journey location: room layout, (if a group experience) space between participants, access to outdoors.
• Describe how you integrate music (if at all) during journeys: is it live or programmed?
• Describe the sequence of events, food, comfort and whether this is a sleepover situation.

Consent Protocols:

• How do you ensure physical and emotional boundaries, respecting client space, and avoiding any non-consensual touch?
• Please explain your approach to touch, if any, during sessions.
• How can I communicate a boundary violation if needed?

Further resources:

• 2023 article from the New York Times discussing some of the risks of using psychedelics for deep personal transformation: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/10/well/mind/psychedelics-therapy-ketamine-mushrooms-risks.html
• Book: https://www.swimminginthesacred.com/

Peter Ajemian is available for further advice on this topic, as well as Internal Family Systems therapy and Embodied Movement Sessions. You can contact him by visiting one of his two websites: PeterAjemian.com MoveWithPeter.com peter@movewithpeter.com

#wellness #psychedelics