Microdosing for Grief: Heal and Reconnect with Your Loved Ones | Kayse Gehret | EP 482

You know you need something, you're just not sure what. You've been listening, you're doing the work, but there's still this feeling that you're circling the same place, like you're waiting for the thing that finally moves you. Now maybe you've thought about working with me one-on-one. Maybe something's held you back, the timing, the money, or you're just not sure you're ready yet. I get that. And I want you to know there's still a place for you. I built a resource for exactly this moment, guided meditations for when the waves hit and you just need to breathe. Workbooks to help you get out of your head and onto the page, ebooks on what near-death experiences tell us about the people we've lost, and whether they're really gone, a full course for widows and widowers who are ready to find their way back to living, and a full course for the evidence of the afterlife. And all of it is available for pay what you want. Nobody gets turned away because of money. I think these resources are valuable, but I don't want to hold them back because you don't have the money to pay for them. You don't have to wait until you're ready for coaching. The next step might be a lot smaller than you think. To find out, go to grief2growth.com/store. That's grief, the numeral 2, growth.com/store. And check out the resources I've made for you. Close your eyes and imagine. What are the things in life that cause us the greatest pain? The things that bring us grief are challenges, challenges designed to help us grow, to ultimately become what we were always meant to be. We feel like we've been buried. But what if, like a seed, we've been planted? And having been planted, we grow to become a mighty tree. Now, open your eyes. Open your eyes to this way of viewing life. Come with me as we explore your true, infinite, eternal nature. This is Grief to Growth. And I am your host, Brian D Smith. Welcome to Grief to Growth. I'm your host, Brian D Smith. And whether this is your first time joining us, or you've been a part of this community for a while, I'm glad you're here. This show is all about helping you navigate life's most challenging moments, and understand the deeper questions, things like who we are, where we came from, why we're here and where we're going. Today I'm joined by Casey Garrett. Casey is a pioneer in the healing arts and the founder of Microdosing for Healing. A global community spanning more than 30 countries. With nearly 3 decades of experience in holistic wellness, Casey created the Professional Microdosing Facilitator Program, the first of its kind to train practitioners in safe and supportive, supportive microdosing practices. In this conversation, we'll explore how microdosing can support people navigating grief, loss, and difficult life transitions. Casey will share her own healing journey, including how she overcame a grand mal seizure through microdosing. We'll talk about building emotional resilience, addressing trauma, and finding spiritual connection during the times when we need it most. And we'll tackle some of the myths and misconceptions that surround this emerging practice, including the fears that keep many of us on the sidelines. So if you'd like to continue this conversation after the episode, head over to grieftogrowth.substack.com. You'll find a companion article there. You'll find the community of people discussing this. You can ask questions and get involved there. So with that, I'd like to welcome Casey Garrett.

Hi. Hi, Brian. Thanks for having me.

It's great to have you here, Casey. This is a subject I've been interested in for a while, so I'm really looking forward to having this conversation with you today. But tell me, how did you get started in microdosing?

Yeah, happy to. Unexpectedly, definitely. So I wanted to be a doctor. Growing up, my whole childhood, I've always been drawn to the health and wellness and healing of others, but I was on a very traditional path for many, many years. And then when I was 19 in college, I was called to move to California. I heard a very strong internal voice and followed that call. When I got there, I discovered quote unquote alternative healing. I studied Reiki, I studied bodywork, I went into hypnotherapy, and did a lot of things unconventional, particularly at that time. And I'm so grateful then because it was exactly the preparation for the work I do today. I just didn't know it. Simultaneous to this, I developed a grand mal seizure disorder in my teens. It was really intense in my early 20s, and I was largely medicated for it even though doctors couldn't find any biological cause for it. So I was always very reticent to, to do any drug, let alone a psychedelic drug of any kind, right? However, fast forward years, I was on a yoga retreat and I met someone who introduced me to the concept of microdosing, which was taking a small subthreshold dose of psilocybin mushrooms. I wouldn't go anywhere, nothing would happen, it was very gentle, and I didn't really know what to expect other than I thought it might be clarifying, I might have a deeper spiritual connection on the heels of many, many years of healing modalities and practice. And my seizure stopped. So I have not had a seizure since, and I immediately developed a lot of other gifts, heightened connection with nature, deepening spiritual development, metabolized a lot of latent grief, which I hear from a lot of people who work with psilocybin. I've done all the therapy, I didn't know there was more to do. And turns out there was much more to do than than I expected. So at the time, I had Healing Arts Studios in Northern California, and then the pandemic happened. And so during the pandemic, we were in California, we were shut down for a very, very long time. We specialized in touch therapy and group classes. So we were kind of the first to close, last to open. And so originally back in 2020, I just started, I put together some microdosing programs online to help our community stay together, connected, and bring something healing. And community-based to really tide us over until we could be together again, not knowing that we were not going to reopen. Um, I eventually ended up losing the studios, and— but this work carried on, and over the last 5 years— oh, now 6, going into our 6th year now— yeah, we've developed into global programs, a community, a podcast, and different educational and training programs today.

Oh wow, that's, that's quite a, quite a journey. Thanks for sharing that. Now, when it comes to microdosing, you kind of touched on it, but for people that don't know I'm not familiar with that term. What is microdosing?

Yes, if you're brand new to it, in, in my sphere, microdosing is taking a small sub-perceptual dose of usually a psychedelic medicine. Usually we're talking about psilocybin mushrooms, but we can also be talking about LSD, um, San Pedro cactus, traditionally known as wachuma. And we also work with Amanita muscaria, which is the red mushroom with the little white dots, the kind of Christmas, Christmas mushroom people know it as. Um, we work with all of those, um, medicines, but typically my frame, I'm talking about psilocybin, also known as magic mushrooms.

Okay, thank you for that. So for me, just a little personal story. I mean, many years ago, a guy sent me a book. I was, I was doing a lot of reviews on Amazon. He sent me this book out of the blue, wanted me to review. And he had gone to South America and done something called ayahuasca, which at that time I had never heard of. I don't know how many people had. Sounded really fantastic in terms of having spiritual experiences and stuff. But First of all, it sounded really scary to me. And the other thing is I had to travel to South America to do it. So how is this similar or different from something like that?

It is— I always describe the difference between microdosing psilocybin and ayahuasca is kind of like psilocybin mushrooms would be like learning your ABCs versus ayahuasca is like reading Ulysses. Yeah, yeah. It's like that's the mountaintop versus microdosing just kind of starting at the base So with microdosing, you're taking small subthreshold. It's really gentle. It's not destabilizing. You live your day-to-day life, so it's easier to kind of take it in bite-sized pieces. It's much more similar to developing like a daily meditation practice or daily spiritual practice, prayers, contemplative practice versus like a high-dose ceremonial experience of ayahuasca, psilocybin, magic mushroom journey, right? A high, a high-dose experience, a high-dose LSD journey. That's something that is absolutely not going to be subthreshold. That's going to take you out of your day-to-day reality, probably loosen your ego's grip on your identity altogether. You go into mystical realms and other liminal states. So it can be profoundly healing, but it's something that you definitely want to take your time and prepare for before doing it.

Yeah, well, it's one of those things that like I have a very kind of— I'm prone to panic attacks and stuff like that. So when people were talking about this, I'm like, I could just see getting on this thing and I would just freak out. And I had a friend that actually did an ayahuasca ceremony. She's similar personality. She goes, oh yeah, I did have a panic attack when I was doing it. I'm like, yeah, I don't want that. So that's, that's something that's very scary to me.

Stay with us. We'll be right back.

You know, one of the hardest things about grief, most of the people in your life just don't get it. They want you to be further along than you are. They get uncomfortable when you bring it up. So you stop bringing it up. And that's why I started writing. My Substack is where I go deeper. Thoughts I don't always get to on the podcast. Essays on consciousness, on continuing bonds, on what it actually means to carry a loss and still build a life. The stuff that used to keep me up at night, written out in a way that I hope meets you in the morning. But here's what I didn't expect when I started it. The community that showed up. People who are doing exactly what you're doing. Listening, learning, trying to find their footing. Readers who comment, who share their own stories, who remind each other that none of us are as alone in this as we feel. And that's what the Substack has become— a place to go deeper with me and to find your people. It's free to subscribe. Find me at grief2growth.com/substack. That's grief, the numeral 2, growth.com/substack. Or just go to Substack and search for Grief to Growth. I hope to see you there.

Yes. And I am wired that way too. So microdosing really suited me. I see now it's perfect for me and it's perfect for me to be sharing the practice because a lot of people who come to me do have a lot of fear. A lot of them are Gen X kids, baby boomer kids who kind of grew up with the stigma of I'll go crazy, I'll lose control, I'll lose my mind. But have a lot of stigma, have a lot of fear. And so microdosing I could really get behind because you're not losing control at all. It's a perceptual one. So a lot of the people I work with are beginners who they almost can't believe. They're like, I can't, I'm so not the person to be doing this. Yeah, but it is actually beneficial for such a wide variety of things— physical, emotional, mental, spiritual— that most people will benefit from this. And you, you don't have to deal with the fear factor that you deal with the high-dose experience. It's—

so what types of things is it beneficial for? Because I've heard of psilocybin and similar drugs being used for like for drug addiction and for PTSD and things like that. So what other things are those, and what other things is it good for?

Yeah, thank you for asking. It's so incredible. We focus primarily, you know, just because we live in a time where, you know, we're in a very pharmaceutical-oriented culture, and so we focus on the mental health aspects and, and physical condition aspects of mushroom practice, which are profound and, and wide. So the top ones I've seen are definitely nervous system related. Anything due to nervous system dysregulation, we see a strong cessation of whether it's headaches, migraines, TBI, concussions, stroke recovery, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's dementia, anything that is rooted um, in dysregulated brain function as well as underlying nervous system dysregulation. But other things too that we don't automatically, I think, are linked to our nervous system but actually are— so addictions, eating disorders, anything that is tied to a ruminative looping mind, a very rigid mental pattern, which is what leads us to anxiety and depression.

Yeah.

So the way we frame it is psilocybin's curative for anxiety and depression when really it's actually healing those things because it's bringing us into greater nervous system resilience and presence.

Yeah. And, and again, when it comes to like ayahuasca and also psilocybin, it's also been used for spiritual type of exploration. Does the microdosing help with that as well?

Yes, absolutely, absolutely. I, my entire life I have been very drawn to— I lost my father when I was 7, and so at a very young age I was very drawn to explore death and the afterlife and what happens and makes sense. And it wasn't until I started working with mushrooms and intuition and energetic medicine that I was really able to sink down into a felt understanding of these subjects. And so I have such a profound spiritual connection today that I don't think there was any other way possible of all the modalities I have worked with that would have led to where we are now without the assistance of psilocybin. Absolutely not.

Now, did you start with a, a macrodose, I guess I would call it, or did you start with microdosing?

I started with microdosing. Yeah, I was very nervous and fearful about destabilizing my mind too much with a high-dose experience, but this is true for a lot of people I work with. I came to microdosing because I had that fear, and I received such gifts and benefits just from microdosing, and I had established a really strong trust in the medicine that I was led to journey more deeply. So I microdosed for quite a long time, longer than most, um, before journeying. But it was really when I did journey with the medicine that my spiritual connection really, really blew open completely.

Okay, that's interesting. So, um, yeah, I, I said I've heard about this for, for various things, or actually the journeying aspect of it, but I've also heard some precautions about that. Some people that it's not really good for. And I forgot who I was listening to that said, for the people that it works for, it's, it's good, but for other people it could like blow you, blow you open. So it's not for everybody to do the macrodosing, I guess.

Yes, that's a really important point. I think two things to keep in mind that aren't really referenced too much with this work is one is psychedelics are nonspecific amplifiers. So they make you more of what you already are. And so that's why set and setting and having support and resourcing is really important, because if you're working from a place where you have a strong foundation, you're resourced, you have all the other lifestyle pieces in play, like, you're going to have a much more supported experience than if you just kind of amplify what's currently going on in your life. So rather than thinking this is going to be a fix-it, like a pharmaceutical-type fix-it, it's actually going to make things more apparent first as you're healing. And to your point, you just reflected on medicine, especially psilocybin and ayahuasca. They're going to show you the truth. My clients have said in some ways it's big honesty, it's big truth. And so if you're someone who's been really working with yourself and understanding yourself, knows yourself, you are ready for that and you're welcoming of that. But if, say, you, you haven't done any preparation, you haven't done that, you're not expecting that, and you step into a high-dose journey, it can be very, very destabilizing.

Yeah, I've heard that these plant medicines can be brutally honest. And, you know, sometimes people have what they call a good trip, which is pleasant, and sometimes it's less than pleasant.

Yes, yes. But it's usually truthful.

Yeah, yeah. So in terms of when, when people are considering doing this, do you do therapy along with it, or Is there a preparation? How does that— how does it work in terms of the protocol?

So what I do, and kind of my framing of it, is we use the term guides. And I love the word guides because it's kind of ancient. It's something I think that we— how we used to hold healing a little bit differently in, in the past, in different epochs. And it's also novel in this time, so it kind of goes with the novelty of this work of holding it a little bit differently than we have, and helping people orient that this is not going to be like a pharmaceutical experience. This probably going to be like something you've never experienced before. Yeah, so it's kind of a new term for a new time. Also coaching therapy. It's really— I've worked with so many thousands of people now, and yes, you can microdose on your own and you'll probably get great benefits. I did when I was starting out, but it's just, it's so supportive and it amplifies your practice if you have support in some capacity. And for some people, it might be doing it with yoga. Some people, it might be breathwork. Some people, it might be prayer. Some people, it might be helpful to have a community and a guide. Some people thrive with one-on-one support, and other people love being in a small intimate group or a large community. And so I think having some kind of support depending on what you're working on and what your intention is, like, for example, somebody who's working on PTSD, or childhood trauma and wants to work with psilocybin, they might be best served working with a therapist with that training. Somebody else who's looking more for athletic performance or work enhancement and career enhancements might be working with a coach in that context. So yeah, it's really diverse. And we've now trained 48 people through our guide— microdosing guideship program. And I've been stunned by how diverse it is.

Oh, really?

People from all backgrounds. We've had lots of clinicians and therapists and coaches and healers, but we've also had lots of corporate people, lots of HR directors, interestingly, who work with other people and people who just want to build this practice and be able to serve in this way to build community in all the different facets of life.

Wow. HR directors, that, that one really surprises me.

Yeah, we've had, we've had 4 now, 4 HR directors of sizable companies. Yeah.

It's pretty good. They're doing microdosing with their employees.

They're not doing microdosing with their employees, but that's it as a guide, you're kind of guiding in all you do. So it's very, very different. It's lots of the therapists I've worked with. It's interesting. After they begin their own microdosing practice, they're like, I am such a much better therapist. Than I was before because I am so much more dialed into my client. I have more empathy and connection for them, and I can serve my clients. And so it's not something that fits neatly into boxes. So a lot of people, I think, are just taking the training and having the experience to build their own capacity to serve in what they're doing versus becoming something other than what they already are.

Okay. So they're doing it more for their, their own use to make them a better HR person or therapist or whatever.

And then lots of times word gets out, which is probably the intention from nature's perspective. It's kind of like, what are the spores? When I look at it from nature's perspective, it was so interesting to see all these HR directors. And then I was like, oh, well, from nature's perspective, what better way to populate yourself than to direct into the people people?

Yeah, well, this is, this is where I find this to be kind of really fascinating talking with you about this particular subject, because You know, from the Western medicine point of view, we think of medicines as bio— having biological impact. It changes this receptor, it opens this up. What's your take on how do you think these plant medicines work? Is it mechanical or is it spiritual?

Both. Absolutely both. Yeah. I think from a scientific perspective, how our understanding of these natural medicines is like a fraction what we're going to discover. In the coming years. Like, we have studied them enough to— we know what parts of the brain they impact. They quiet our, like, thinking, very cognitive, cerebral, our zones of identity, our fixed ways of thinking, our patterns, and opens up new pathways. Um, it quiets part of the brain and it activates other parts of the brain. So we know some, but I think we only know a fraction of things we're going to come to understand. And also the way the medicine works, when you watch the way it works with people, it's so far beyond human intellect. I always remind people, like, mushrooms are coded with ancient, ancient wisdom. So, I mean, they've lived through 5 extinction events. They've been along— they've been around far longer than human beings have. They have a wisdom and intelligence within them that's beyond us. And so sometimes I watch the way they work with people and they heal people, and it's very counterintuitive or just kind of strange. Why— like, why would it be doing— why would it be having this impact with somebody? But then 6 months later, we can look back and go, ah, okay, that was the fastest way to get this person to where they needed to go. And in our human framing, we would have never predicted that.

Yeah, I, I really— I think this is, again, it's not only fascinating, but it's— I feel like we're, we're kind of going back to the future, I guess, is where I'm trying to think. It's like, because these, these medicines— I remember when I was hearing about ayahuasca and, and this, and this, uh, tribe in South America, they're like, well, they take this one plant, they mix it with another plant, they make this tea, and this, this releases DMT, and etc. And people are like, Well, how did they know that? And then when they asked the shamans, they say, the plant told us.

Yes.

Yeah. So I think it's— there is, to me, there's definitely something beyond just the mechanical. There is. There. And people— and I remember hearing somebody, I forgot who it was, which plant it was. This guy was taking people somewhere in South America, and they would, they would give them on the plant journey, and they would look up and they'd see these beings like walking up this mountain. And the thing was really interesting is everybody saw the same beings. So it wasn't like, you know, it was an individual hallucination. There's something where it's kind of opening the veil, I guess, is the way I would put it.

Yes. Yes. And I love your, your Back to the Future, because that's exactly what it is. A lot of it is us remembering. A lot of people I know who are new to microdosing, when they start doing it, they come in going, okay, I'm ready for this to experience and learn from the medicine. It's going to be different. But then once they start, they're like, It's new, but there's also something strangely familiar about this. Like, I feel like I've done this before. And a lot of people share that, and we have done it before. I mean, the current culture that we're in, like this epoch that we're in right now, is not us at our finest.

Yeah.

This is not our finest hour. We've done better in the past, and I think we're moving into a time that's really exciting where we're remembering kind of these codes within us are starting to awaken. And I think that part of the reason why nature is kind of coming forth in this way is it's a key to help us activate some of these codes and remembrances that we used to be able to do and create amazing things with our minds, things that we can't even quite comprehend yet.

Yeah, that's, that's something I say all the time. You know, I think the biggest problem in the world is we've forgotten who we are. We don't know who we are. We don't know where we came from. We don't know why we're here. All those things that are really important to, to living a fulfilled, fulfilling life. And I do again start seeing some of the stuff kind of break through as, as Western people kind of say, okay, well, maybe this does make some sense. It's not just all, you know, superstition.

Yes. Yes. I have a lot of people in the U.S. who come to practice because they read the research. You know, they read the book and they're like, my memory is going, and they're like, I'm not really into this woo-woo stuff. Yeah, I just want to remember my grandkids' names again. And it's so fun to watch them because no matter what people come from, ultimately they get all of the gifts in it. And so to watch them not only become, you know, more mentally aligned and more articulate, but also spiritually connected, more empathetic, more compassionate, better relationships, better outlook on life, and kind of more vitality to their being. Whatever you come for, you wind up getting more than you— more than you came for, typically.

So has, um, have there been studies on microdosing? Is there, is there any science, you know, scientific backing for it?

So with psilocybin high-dose experiences, yes, this— the research has been absolutely incredible. Microdosing Microdosing is a little tough to study in the traditional scientific studies, the double-blinded, because it's so subtle, it's subperceptual, and also you're going about your day-to-day life. So you can't— like in a high-dose psilocybin experience, you can isolate somebody in a lab for 8 hours, right, and study the results. If you're studying microdosing protocol, say over 6 weeks or a month, you can't isolate someone for 6 weeks and minimize the variables. And so it's really, really hard to blind for that and do a double-blind traditional scientific study. The studies that have been done, particularly around LSD, have been significant, but they quote unquote have not conclusively proven microdosing beyond placebo, which is true for a lot of the— it was a lot of the pharmaceutical drugs, by the way, too. However, I secretly— well, not so secretly, I'm sharing it with you— I secretly am not in a rush for science to prove that microdosing works because I feel like as soon as science inconclusively proves that microdosing works, that's when pharmaceutical companies are going to move in as quickly as possible, isolate the molecules, and patent this as a drug, right? Prescription. And they don't belong there. They don't. They're, they're so far beyond what a man-made synthetic pill can offer. And I feel like the, the systems that we hold healing in, in the West right now, which is very isolated, it's very individual, it's take this pill, go home, and there's no relational support, is proven itself not to work. And so same thing if you just take microdoses and you go off and you isolate and you don't do anything else along with it, it's likely to work either. It's really these other models and the framing that we're creating real time that are peer-to-peer, that are relational, that are small groups that you get to be together with other people in relationship, held in a container of support beyond just taking a substance. That's what's really most effective. And so I kind of hope it's, it's quite a while before science proves anything.

Yeah, I love that. That's a really interesting perspective. I, um, I read a book. I read it actually a couple of times. It's really fascinating. A book called Lost Connections by Johann Hari. I don't know if you're familiar with it, but he wrote this book about antidepressants, SSRIs specifically, and not to trash them all because it's like they're effective for some people for some amount of time, but they're not effective for everybody. And over time, they don't typically, you know, stay effective. And he's the— it's called Lost Connections because they found that, like, if people just start working together in groups and get out and do all the, the unisolating things that we do, that, that can help with a lot of these things. So I love your idea of, like, this— it's a— it's not either or. It's not the medicine or becoming unisolated, but it's actually doing both.

You're absolutely right. Yeah, they did a study a while back of what actually is the most effective thing for depression of all the things one can do, pharmaceutical interventions and lifestyle interventions. And you know what the number one thing was? Number one effective thing was dancing.

Dancing.

Wow.

Okay. Yeah, yeah. I, I wouldn't have guessed dancing, but I can't say that it really surprises me. Um, it was funny because in this book he tells a story about, uh, there these Western doctors go to somewhere in the East and they're like, we've got this thing called antidepressants. And they explain to the people what they are and they go, well, we have that too. And they said, what do you And they tell a story about a guy who had lost his foot and he was depressed and he was working a job where he couldn't really function that well. So they bought him a dairy cow and became a dairy farmer. And then the guy was like, he was happy. And they said, that's antidepressants. And we, we look so much sometimes for like a mechanical or chemical aspect to why we feel so anxious and depressed, where a lot of times it is, it is a lifestyle thing.

Yeah, especially now, especially right now in our kind of overculture and society, it's like there's no pill in the world that can solve for our environment. Yeah, you know, and our overculture. And so I think that's what one of the things— it's what I'm training new guides, it's, it's harnessing the novelty of these medicines to open our minds and to take into account what are all of these, um, ecological factors going on, environmental factors going on in a person's life. Because until we start to take that into account, you know, we have been just treating people kind of like a brain and putting all of the responsibility for someone's inability to cope with life on the individual, right? When there's so many other systemic things that are not taken into account that I believe we are going to be taking into account here forward.

So we've been talking about a lot of different things that, that this could help with, and most of the people listening to my program are either in grief or have been in grief, and we talk about grief. And you mentioned the grief of your passing of your father. So first of all, I say I'm sorry that, you know, that was your experience. So how would this help with someone in grief?

Thank you. Um, I— this, this particular topic is very, very close to my heart. Of all— I work with lots of people for lots of diverse reasons, but this is among my favorite people to work with and support and serve, because grief especially— I've worked with a lot of people who've lost a loved one. I've worked with a lot of people who've lost children. Which is one of the most challenging experiences, I think, for any human being to go through, is the loss of a child. And so many people do all the things, they do all the programs, they do all the, the modalities, and they do lots of talk therapy, but they're like, I can only get to a certain point. And that was my experience too, is like, I intellectually understood the loss of my father and the impact it held, but I, I felt like I got to a certain point that I could get beyond. When you work with psilocybin, what psilocybin of all the medicines is really incredibly masterful at is metabolizing grief in the body. And so a lot of people weep and cry, and the, the function of tears and, and crying and its role in shedding grief is tremendously important to our metabolizing of grief And also lots of us, lots of people who work with psilocybin have had a lot of talk therapy and shed a lot of tears already. And they're like, I had no idea I had so much more. I had so much more. And so people will do a journey sometimes and just weep, weep for hours upon hours. And while it's not the most comfortable sensation, when you come through it on the other side, it's almost like you feel like that catharsis where you're like wrung out. Out of so much heaviness and you just feel lighter. And with that lightness, I have come to understand, like, our spiritual connection is always there for us. Our lost loved ones, our angels, our guides, our connection to the Divine are always there. But oftentimes it's our grief and our pain body, our density in our human form, that prevents us from really having and experiencing that connection to the full capacity that we can. So as people— I witness people move through grief and shed layers of density have these cathartic releases, energetic releases, they develop a heightened spiritual connection to source, and that's what shifts everything. It's like having that embodied felt sense that goes beyond the intellectual mind. So you're not— instead of like thinking our way to healing, we're actually experiencing a felt sense of healing and connection. That's so peaceful. A lot of people come to a place of peace with their loss and their grief that they didn't have and probably could not have access through any other way.

Wow. I— wow.

I—

what you just said just really blew me away. I love— I love that. I love what you— like, you— the phrase you used, metabolizing grief, because that is something a lot of us, we fight the grief. We want to get rid of the grief. We want to stuff the grief. And I always say to people, we have to let this move through us, and the tears are cathartic. You know, crying is not a bad thing. You want to let that, that move through you. So I, I love the way that you put that. And the other thing I think is really important is for us to really work with our grief, we have to have that spiritual connection to, to our higher self, to our source, to, to our loved one who's still with us. And when you said that, that heaviness, that denseness— because people will say, well, why can't I get that connection? Why can't I make that connection? And a lot of times it's because there's so much density and so much pain that we're holding on to that it's there, it's always there, but you just can't feel it.

Yes. Yeah, I think that the two things that block people the most are fear— are grief and fear. Yeah, is the other one. The more fear we hold in our bodies, the more we block the natural connection to Source that we have.

Yeah. So this is a way, I guess, we could think of it for us woo-woo people, which I don't, I don't mind being. I am a chemical engineer. I'm a scientific person. The, the word woo-woo, um, it only bothers me a little bit because I think of what we call supernatural is just what we can't explain yet. And so this, this stuff isn't woo-woo. It's not magic. It's, it's real. But it's just beyond what we've accepted at this point. But, you know, from, from one woo-woo person to another, I think this allows people to make that connection, which is what— if that's the key to everything, is, is remembering who we are and making our connection back and understanding the bigger picture, which we're really blocked by with this little brain that filters everything out.

Absolutely true. And once you— whether it's in psychadelic journey, or it's in a dream sometimes for people, or people have a near-death experience too. Once you tap into a, a felt sense that there's something else, you can't unsee that.

Yeah.

After that. And so once you really know in your bones that our soul is everlasting and we go on, and you really can see in these experiences that this is just my soul having this experience in this lifetime for these lessons that I came here, this path that I am here to do. And you forever shift your sense of time and realize, you know, I think— not that I— I would love to have my father here with me in this lifetime. I would absolutely love that and still miss him. But I feel just as close to him now as a spirit than I do if he was here in human form. Because I've developed that capacity and released a lot to enable that connection to be there. And so I think it changes your perspective fundamentally on loss and grief because you realize it— nothing ever really ends. It just changes.

Yeah. Well, you know, it's interesting because I've interviewed probably a couple hundred people who've had near-death experiences, and I'll sometimes I'll be talking to someone, they'll say, well, well, I wish I could have an NDE, then I would know everything I need to know. I'm like, well, don't ever wish you could have an NDE, because I've talked to a lot of people, they're like, I do not recommend it, it's traumatic. And again, going back to even the macrodosing of some of these plant medicines, for some people it can really mess you up. It could, it could, you know, you might not ever be the same again, you know. So I love the idea of a maybe a little, like a little window, you know, a little peek that we could do with the microdosing.

Yes, yes. And all, I think, things done— when we do things slowly and intentionally and thoughtfully, they also, they can sink in and they last longer and they're easier to integrate. I mean, one of the challenges with psychedelic work in high doses is sometimes people have these big truths and epiphanies. And they're like, I have been living so far off my blueprint. I need to change everything all at once.

Yes.

And then part of the guidance becomes, yes, you are there, but all the people in the rest of your life and all the scaffolding and architecture that you have created up until now aren't quite there yet. And so that's why I love to have people come to these awarenesses and epiphanies gradually over time so that you can kind of build and rebuild and reorient your life in a thoughtful way, not just for yourself, but all the other people who are presently in your reality.

Exactly. Because people that have NDEs, for example, near-death experiences, they have a high divorce rate. Sometimes they have a high rate of depression. They— it takes 7 to 14 years to integrate that experience. And I've talked to people who have— or I've read about and talked to people who have done, um, again, some of these plant medicines, and they might have some big experience, and then they come back questioning like everything, uh, which is not really a great way to integrate these things. It. Uh, so I like— again, the idea of taking small steps and, and allowing ourselves to absorb this slowly seems like a wise approach to me.

Thank you. Yeah, I think the vast majority of people benefit by this preparation time. And I've studied a lot of ancient cultures and the way they have held medicine practice in different epochs and civilizations I'm Greek, so I got really— went down the rabbit hole of Eleusis. In Eleusis, over 2,000 years, they had a psychedelic sacrament once a year. And everyone knows about the Eleusinian Mysteries and has heard of them in the field, but a lot of people don't know that they actually began earlier in the year, and there was something called the Lesser Mysteries. And so the Lesser Mysteries began in February each year, and they began the cycle of purification and preparation preparation, kind of getting the mind, body, spirit ready for this larger experience. And then in September is when the great mysteries were held. And that makes a lot of sense to me. You know, Westerners are very impatient.

Yeah, yeah.

We want everything done in 30 days or less. Um, and I think we have such much more of a profound experience, a more easily integrated experience if we take the time to set ourselves up with a special period of time where we're kind of cleansing our body and spirit and getting ready.

Yeah, I, I, again, I think that's, that seems like a wise approach to me. I'm also now thinking, because I know I've heard some therapists and doctors are working with people, uh, with psilocybin and some other, uh, plant medicines, but what in terms of legality of people like getting a hold of microdoses, is That— how does that work?

It's still a thing. It's still a thing. And so it's technically still illegal in most of the United States and much of the world, unfortunately. And it's, it's deeply unfortunate because the healing potential is unbelievable. When people step into the work, it becomes so absurd, like, how in the world did this ever become illegal? Because it's not only so healing, it's so safe. And it makes— it tends to make people more compassionate, more peaceful, more other-oriented. Like, all the things that we need in our society the most right now, right? Um, it blesses us with. So it's really unfortunate and hopefully very people-powered and changing. And so going back in the '50s and '60s, there was a lot of psychedelic research being done in academia China. But unfortunately, simultaneous to that, there was a lot of political upheaval. It was very similar to what we are going through right now, right? And the Nixon administration strategized that by making these substances illegal and criminalizing them, they could drive a wedge into the population. And so it was all political machinations is why these substances were made illegal in the first place, even though they do not qualify for any of the regulations that a Schedule 1 substance would qualify for. And unfortunately, our laws take longer to undo than they do to do. And so this movement has been so people-powered and people-led, and it's just enough collective people going, I'm not waiting for the government to give me permission to heal. I can't imagine my life today and my phys— on every level of my health if I was told I couldn't do this practice. And so To some extent, people have to be willing to have the courage to go, I'm going to do this regardless of what my local law says. That said, it's wise to be careful and responsible and safe. Microdosing for personal use is a lot different than kind of distributing, you know, having distribution and things going. Thankfully, there's more and more organizations have religious protection. And sacramental use protections. And so when we first started back in 2020, we, um, I had a partner who made cultivation kits that made kits for everybody so you could learn how to grow your own medicine at home.

Okay.

It's actually really easy and cost-effective to, to grow your own medicines, kind of like growing your own herb garden. Mm-hmm. In your own home. And so you can grow your own medicines is one way to do it and stay relatively private. Today though, there are thankfully enough of organizations who are making high quality, high integrity medicine licensed and able to distribute nationwide through religious protections.

Okay.

So thankfully, people— I mean, you still are taking on some degree of risk depending on where you live, but thankfully finding sources is much easier today than it was even 5 years ago.

Okay, that's interesting. I— because I, I mentioned mushrooms one time on Facebook a couple years ago. A couple of my friends like, oh yeah, you should do it, and there's places you can go. I guess you could— the spores are not illegal, I Yes. So you could get the spores and grow your own. Is that correct?

Strangely enough, yes. And now I think all but 3 states you can legally purchase spores. Yes. So the mushrooms are illegal, but the spores are legal.

Yeah. It's, you know, the whole drug thing is really interesting to me for, you know, alcohol's legal. Marijuana for so many years was not legal. You know, and then marijuana, now that the government feels like they make money off of it. It is, you know, illegal in a lot of places. And in terms of— I heard LSD, the Army or the military looked at it a lot, and they don't like the fact that it may— everybody connected. It's like, it's kind of hard to get people to go out and shoot each other when they realize we're all one.

You nailed it. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it makes you question the status quo. You're more likely to think for yourself. You're more likely to trust yourself and come to your own inner knowing versus the top-down fear-based narrative that the current structure is reliant upon keeping for us to stay in line. So it kind of turns everything on its head.

Yeah. So we have to ask ourselves when something is legal or illegal, you know, what are the reasons behind that? You know, and does this make sense. Um, again, I think there's been a very materialistic— now I think there's been a very materialistic drive in our, in our society and everything. And this is kind of like, again, like you just said, allowing, allowing people to think for themselves and think outside the box and not maybe stay on the hamster wheel and all the, all the things that, you know, that the forces in power want to keep us doing.

It's very disruptive in the most beautiful way, and that's why I I believe that's why it's still illegal in most of the world.

Yeah. So Casey, what is your organization? I know you trained people to, to practice, I guess, plant medicine. So tell me exactly kind of what you guys do.

Yeah. So we kind of evolved based on what people needed and were asking for. So when we first started, we did group programs, which are still— I've had— I've tested lots of different ways to experience microdosing, and my favorite by far is small, intimate group work. So we would have 8 to 12 people in a group. Our process was 6 weeks long. Some people choose to do 8 weeks or 3 months, but it's powerful. Small group work is so powerful. And I witnessed, you know, what would take somebody one-to-one 6 months to experience, people were moving through their process in 6 weeks when you have an intentional group focus and you have each other to reflect and share together. Lots of them wanted to stick together after the 6 weeks, so we created a community which is now a global community. As Sourcing expanded, so could we expand, and so we welcome people from all over the world into kind of a lighter touch community so that people always have a touchpoint. We gather 2 to 3 times every month where people can come and meet the guides and ask real-world questions from experienced people. Then we created a podcast in 2023 so that That was when the field really opened up and psychedelic science got very popular. There were more research and academic studies, but the narrative got very focused on the clinical side of things and the very pharmaceutical mental health side of things. And so I started the podcast to feature lots and lots of guides that have been doing this work underground for many, many years for a wide variety of things. So I just gave people a voice to speak to the different areas of practice than the mainstream narrative might be sharing. And then we, we're going into our third cohort now of our training program, which is to teach people who've had a really personal, personally powerful experience with medicine who want to serve other people and become a guide, a coach, a therapist who has this modality as a skill.

Okay. Yeah, that's, that's great. So, um, when you say groups, are these virtual groups or these in-person groups?

Our groups are all virtual, but a lot of the guides I have worked with in my, in my training program are creating lots different frameworks. Some of them are creating hiking groups that go hiking together and have their integration calls on the hiking trail. Other people are doing it more of a retreat format in person, doing men's circles, women's circles, veterans group circles. So it's really beautiful to watch all the innovation of the way that the groups can come together and form. But really the relational aspect of healing is one of the most powerful things that I think the medicine is just facilitating. It's kind of what brings people together, but it's the togetherness is actually the stronger of the healing component sometimes.

Wow. So you, you mentioned earlier that some of the benefits that you've seen from the plant medicine— what would you, if someone said, because you said it sounds like it's kind of all-encompassing, but how would you describe the benefits gotten?

I shared some of the physical condition, uh, things. I also think people would— lots of times people are called to medicine practice or discover it some, it seems accidentally or serendipitously. But looking back, lots of them can see that the medicine found them right before they were about to go through a huge change in transition. In life. Like, they didn't know it's 3 months later they were going to be losing their job, or getting— or leaving a relationship, or letting go of something that they knew wasn't aligned, but they were having trouble. And it's really interesting how often that has happened. And so I really think at this pivot point that we're all in collectively, when all of the old is revealing it to be so toxic or dysfunctional at best, and we're having to create all new systems and framework and really reorienting to an entirely new way of life, I think it provides people with this inner sense of connection and self-trust to help carry us through change and transition. The next few years are gonna be so volatile, and it requires so much of letting go of everything we have known own so that we may bring our creativity to the future and start to build new systems and frameworks. And so I think in people's individual lives too, that's another thing medicine is profoundly good for, is like helping us build and develop the resiliency and the emotional capacity to create change in our lives.

Yeah, and as you said, that's, that's going to be— or that is so needed right now. So for someone, someone listening and thinking this might be something that I would think about or might be good for me. What types of questions should they ask themselves or what types of questions would you ask someone if they said, I'm interested in this?

Great question. So lots of our offerings were created to speak to this person. So I think educating yourself and empowering yourself with education and confidence building is the number one thing you can do at the outset is sometimes people go down the rabbit holes on the internet and get really overwhelmed because there's so much information and misinformation out there. So we put together just— you can go binge watch the podcast and learn a lot from that. People have been doing this work for a while. You can step into our community and learn. But in terms of your readiness for practice, if you've already done a lot of other healing work, group work, therapy, contemplative practice, yoga, um, most people have laid a foundation to do this work. If you have not done any work, um, that's not to say you, you can't do it, but I encourage people to take the time to understand what the work is. It's not like another pill. If you think it's going to be like Prozac or Lexapro, it's absolutely not going to be that way. So to start to orient yourself around, um, what healing actually looks like versus what we've been conditioned to believe.

Yeah.

And I also invite people lastly to check in with, like, your level of capacity in your life. Are you wanting to escape your life, right? Is life so uncomfortable right now that you're looking for something to save you or to take you away from your life? Hmm. That's not a good reason to practice with earth medicines because even though we've been trained to think that's what a drug experience is, that's where psilocybin is so different. Like, psilocybin, more than anything, brings you home to yourself.

Yeah.

And so if your circumstances are really, really, really tough— so for example, one that I see sometimes is people will come to me and they've just lost their cherished beloved pet, or they've just lost a spouse, and they're kind of really raw with grief in this moment. And sometimes they're like, will mushrooms help me move through this. And for some people are able to hold the capacity and resourcing to move through that, but some are so raw emotionally that you need to get to a different set point, right, before you can work with your grief. I mean, many of your listeners who have moved through it or moving through big portals of grief right now know exactly what I'm talking about.

Yeah.

And so a good question to ask yourself is like, in my current present-day life, could I tolerate feeling more and more emotional than I already am? And if the answer is yes, that's great, then you're probably fine. But if you're like, no, not right now, not quite yet, yeah, it's, it's probably better to start with some lifestyle modalities first and then layer in the medicine when you're at a different set point.

Yeah, thank you, that's, that's a great answer. So, um, I was going to ask you the experience. I mean, we can— I don't know, but I can imagine what the experience of like an ayahuasca trip is or an LSD trip or something like that. What's the experience like of microdosing? What am I going to notice? Is it something— yeah, what's it going to feel like?

Yes, I love this question. So it's, it's— and one hand, it's hard to describe because it's so subtle and it's so gentle, and people are like, well, does that mean I'm not going to feel anything? Well, no, it doesn't mean that. So typically I've seen people in the first week. The most common experience is people within the first day or two notice kind of an uplift and just life seems a little brighter. It's almost like if you turn the dial of your life up and your life vibrancy, just your senses come back online, like your sense of taste and your sense of touch and the way the light catches your eye. Nature kind of pops. I remember my experience my first day, I was inside 'cause I had no idea what I was doing or what to expect. I didn't know who to talk to about it. And so I just was inside and I was like, oh, okay, I don't, you know, I feel good. I feel a little uplifted, but I don't really notice it that much. And I was living in Sausalito, California at the time. And I remember opening my front door to go walk my dog and foom, as soon as I opened my door, I could smell and taste the salt from the bay. In the air. I could smell my neighbor's jasmine from like 4 blocks away, wafting through the air. It was real. I was like, okay, something's happening. And so your senses come back online, you kind of— your instincts, your intuition, your creativity. Lots of people— this is an interesting one too— in the first week, lots and lots of people report they lose procrastination.

Hmm.

They just start doing the things. Like, they'll come in and go, gosh, I've been meaning to like organize my desk. Desk forever. And I just did it. I was just called to do it, and I did it. And so life takes on a different flow, and you move from a place where you're thinking your way through the day versus feeling and flowing your way through the day. So that's— those are the things that I hear most commonly in the first week.

Okay. And so with, um, something like grief, and like assuming someone's done the work and they're in the place— I mean, we, we talked about this is not an instant thing. You're going to take, you're going to take a hit and you're going to be fixed. But is it, is it typically weeks, months where people start to notice that their grief's lifting, or how long does that— and I know there's no typical answer, I can't believe I'm asking this question, but people are going to want to know, like, do I take this for a week and I'm over it, or how does this work?

Totally, totally. No, it's a great question. I've witnessed enough people now working with grief is typically it comes with a lot of tears at the front end.

Yeah.

Um, which lots of your listeners, I'm sure, I'm like, of course it does, of course it does. But lots of times I've worked with people and they're like, they've already done a lot of work and a lot of therapy and a lot of crying, but they're like, they get down to these deeper layers and dreams. And so we start to metabolize things in our sleep, in our dream life, and just tears, like shedding tears during the day where you're not upset about anything present day, but you can just feel these are old. These are old tears falling. And then people notice the shift in new awarenesses. I would say that the most common things I've seen with people who have lost a loved one, particularly people who've lost children, is as you lose density, the density and heaviness of grief, their spiritual connection lights up, their connection to animals and the natural world. And oftentimes people notice like nature and spirit uses the natural world to bring messages of connection. So almost always the people I've worked with, they have in, in the first few weeks of microdosing, they're crying and they're releasing a lot, but they also have— it was so strange. I was outside having my breakfast tea, and this hawk came and just sat on the chair like right next to me, and it just didn't have any fear of me at all. So lots of birds often, because birds are the spirit messengers between— they go be between the worlds. And so they start to have this, and then a lot of them have more direct signs of their loss one that they can finally hear. It's not that they haven't been around us, but they're like, gosh, I, I all of a sudden, like, I could smell, I could smell my son's presence and his, like, the way his hoodie always smelled. And I could feel him in the car and just, it was, his message came through in a felt presence. And that's what enables them to come to a different sense of peace. And completion isn't the right word because we're never complete. We— there's always more. But a, a new sense of completion in the cycle of grief that they have been experiencing.

Yeah, the way that you phrased that is so, so profound, so great. Because, you know, I, I work with people and we're, we're really, really working hard on this intellectual understanding and, you know, and studying and reading books and, you know know, listening to podcasts and all that stuff, but it's getting that felt connection that, that, that, that could be a difficult thing to overcome. And I love, you know, as you said, that the spirit connection— spirits are always out there, but sometimes we're kind of, we're too dense. Um, I had someone, she had a near-death experience, and I love the way she described it. She said, imagine your loved ones trying to get back to you, and you're like underwater, undersea, under the the ocean. And the deeper you go, the higher the pressure is. So your loved one might be very skilled, but they just can't quite get down to where you are. And that's what I hear when I hear you give— I feel like it's like lifting us up so we're closer to being able to make that connection.

Absolutely, absolutely. And they'll continue to— they try in different ways.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. Um, yeah, one, one— I have so, so many amazing stories of, of experiences like this where spirit is talking to people and And sometimes we just don't. That's why the group can be really powerful too, because it can be obvious to really other people.

Yes.

Sometimes they're not to us. But we had a woman who was in our 6-week microdosing experience, and right from the start, right from the start, spirit was talking to her and things were happening immediately. And a couple weeks into her microdosing experience, her community had this freak storm. It was like one of those tornadoes that doesn't touch all the way down. Down to the ground, but it just comes down. And she, she came to the call one day and she was really, really upset and sad that week. And she said, I'm so bummed. We had this freak weather event and the rest of the house and the neighborhood was untouched, but it came into my yard and it clipped one tree. It took the top half of one tree off. And I'm so sad because that was the tree my father had planted for me. When it was— when I bought this first home, it was my first home, and this many years ago, my father planted this tree with me. And she was really upset about this when what was happening was her father was trying to speak to her.

Yeah, exactly.

And he was choosing— he was choosing the one thing in her life that she would absolutely, without a doubt, know it was him communicating with her. And after that, she shifted things and he was much more able to communicate with her and show her things. And her intention for practice, her particular intention she had shared, was she was really stepping into the second chapter of this lifetime and was feeling fearful and was looking for spiritual support to, to get it. And it— what she received was a whole lot more. Yeah, from her ancestors as well.

That, that is a great story because it illustrates not only the, the fact that, you know, she was— her father was able to reach her in that sense, but the the sometimes spiritual blindness that we have. I'll be working with clients and they'll say, I don't get any signs, I don't get any whatever, and then they'll immediately start telling me about a sign that they got. And I'm like, well, you just said, you know, you don't get signs, or other than this crazy dream where, you know, and it's like, you know, so this, this allows us to— and then the group thing actually helps to validate those things because people can say, oh yeah, I didn't see that.

100%. 100%. Yeah, almost every call— we always laugh in our group experiences because every single call we do, there's always one person in the group that starts off the call with like, nothing really happened this week. And then other, other people share and they're like, actually, can I go again?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's— well, again, that's one of the reasons why community is really important, because I know for, for me, again, I'm being a— I'm an engineer and a skeptic, skeptical kind of person stuff, and I didn't believe in synchronicities or or any of that stuff. And, um, I realized how many of them we discount, you know, if we're not in the community that will validate those things for us. And some of them are pretty miraculous. And so it's opening up to that possibility. And again, I think this, you know, the microdosing and the plant medicine can help kind of help us lift to that level where we can, you know, really start to, to ground that in.

Absolutely, absolutely. Other people— I'll share this too because I imagine a lot of people listening are moving through grief experiences. Another thing that happens is lots of times people start microdosing, they have big powerful dreams. So they'll have ancestors and loved ones come, right, speak to them in their dreams. But also there's this beautiful window of time when the veil is quite thin between like 3 AM and 5 AM. So lots of times people will start waking up at this time and they're like, it's really annoying, I'm waking up every night at 3:30. And if we don't know this, that this is actually a special time that spirit is really available to us to move through us during those hours. It's actually a sacred time. It's why monks and nuns would often wake up that early and start morning prayers at that time. So lots of time, if your intention is to connect with your angels and your guides and your ancestors, um, that's when you wake up, and that's a time to really be present and pray, and it'll come to you.

I was going to ask you about dreams, and, and you answered that. And I also noticed that, yeah, waking up between 3 and 5 in the morning, as you start to seek spiritual stuff, it'll happen more and more often. And that's when you get your best inspiration. That's when you get your ideas. That's it. I don't know why it is, but that, that's definitely been my experience too.

Yes, yes. Yeah.

So Casey, uh, remind people of how they can reach out to you and— we talked about what you provide, but how can people reach you?

Yes, easy. It's all at microdosingforhealing.com. We have everything in one place so you can kind of cruise around and find your point of access that suits you. Lots and lots of podcasts to listen to if you're a podcast person. Lots there for you. And then our community too is a great place to pop in if you want real connection with real humans to learn about the experience. There's a lot of people who've been in there for 5 years now, and there's always new people that are just starting in practice. So it's very warm and embracing. So everyone is welcome.

Yeah, I actually— I love the work that you're doing. So thanks for doing that. Thanks for sharing it with me today. Anything that I didn't ask you that you would like to get across?

No, just gratitude. Gratitude for the opportunity. You know, so many people coming to Practice Share that they heard about it on a podcast.

Yeah.

So really, I think where we're at right now, especially here in the US, is all of our news, quote unquote news, is so filtered and censored and kind of created by an algorithm.

Yeah.

And so I just appreciate you and your community and having this forum to talk because it really is the best, clearest way for us to communicate and share at this point. So thank you.

Great. Thanks for being here today. Have a great afternoon. Hi there, I'm really excited to tell you about my latest ebook. It's 4 Lessons That You Can Learn From the Near-Death Experience Without Going Through All the Trouble of Dying to Learn Them. I've been studying NDEs for several years now. I am completely convinced that not only are they 100% real, but that there's some very universal wisdom that we can get from the near-death experience. And I've distilled that down in this book into 4 short lessons. And I've also given you all the reasons why I believe that NDEs are absolutely real. So go to www.grieftogrowth.com/NDElessons to pick it up for free. www.grief-the-number-2-growth.com/NDElessons. I hope you enjoy it.