The Messy Work of Integrating a Psychedelic Experience

No one really prepares you for integrating a psilocybin journey. Integration is discussed, but there isn’t a lot of fine print to mill over. Going into the experience, I assumed integration work would hinge on my experience while on the journey. I imagined it would be something between dream analysis and traditional talk therapy. Integration, it turns out, has more to do with the concrete and profound shifts that arise in your life after the journey.

Welcome back to my series on psilocybin therapy. In the first two pieces, I wrote about finding a psilocybin guide and what I experienced on my journey. Now I am picking up the thread with an exploration of the post-journey integration phase. Along the way, I will sprinkle in some insights from my first foray into microdosing.

It’s common for guides to offer a three-step approach to psilocybin journeys. You start with one or two preparation sessions, followed by the trip itself, and then a couple of follow-up integration sessions. When I broached the subject of integration with my guide, she wasn’t particularly enthusiastic. The sheer amount of information you take in during the journey, she said, can take weeks or even months to process.

Given the raw nature of the experience, an outside perspective too soon after the journey could easily sway someone…