The Microdosing Conversation Nobody Is Having For Trauma, Stress and Real Relief

When nothing else has worked, therapy or medication, some people are finding calm, focus, and emotional healing through microdosing. Today I'm speaking with Casey Garrett about a small mindful dose of psilocybin mushrooms that they may help regulate the nervous system, heal trauma, and rebuild resilience. I actually asked ChatGPT about this. And they said that around the world, this was one of the trending areas for discovery and work into it as an alternative to what people are taking now for, you know, pain and, and also for mental health, that it's really something that is starting to explode a little. What is microdosing with mushrooms?

Beautiful. Yes, the cat's definitely out of the bag at this point, which we love.

We love.

I've been doing this work publicly professionally since 2020, and it's been astounding to watch it grow mycelially and organically around the world. Microdosing is taking small sub-perceptual amounts of typically a psychedelic, Plant medicine, earth medicine, sometimes LSD. I specifically work with and adore psilocybin mushrooms, and so work with them primarily. But they're quite different than people's perception and conception of this work because it's, it's sub-perceptual, it's sub-threshold. You're not trippy, you're not altered in any way. Yes, you're feeling gifts and benefits and healing come through, but you're not feeling outside of yourself in any way. So it's something that you take the small doses on a protocol. So it's not something you're doing every day. You're typically doing it 2, 3, 4, 5 days a week, depending on what you have going on. And then you might do a cycle for about 6 weeks to 3 months is what we see on average. And then we take a break, integrate, and assess how you're doing. So it's not something you'll do long-term, which also sets it quite apart from our conditioning of pharmaceuticals.

Is it through like drops? Is it through eating them? How, how, how do they actually ingest this?

Great question. So you can just take the mushrooms themselves. So some people work with raw mushrooms, you can work with dehydrated mushrooms. But today, as the field develops, there's lots of different mediums. There's tinctures, there's chocolates, there's edibles and gummies. There's capsules and tablets. I would say probably the most common are capsules. Overall, but yeah, thankfully today there's lots more options.

So we're talking it is different to a psychedelic, or is it a psychedelic but just tiny dose?

It is a psychedelic but tiny dose, and that's what appealed to me. So to give a little bit about my history, what brought me to it, I was always a seeker. I've studied lots of different healing modalities. I've been in the healing arts and wellness for 30 years. But I had a grand mal seizure disorder. I was always really cautious. I never did any drugs, let alone a psychedelic. Kind of terrified me to destabilize my already destabilized mind. But when I came across the idea, I met someone who introduced me to the idea of microdosing, which was, I'm not going to leave the earth realm. I'm not going to destabilize my mind. This is something I can do and stay completely in control. I was like, huh, okay, that sounds interesting to me. And I thought, maybe I just have dreams, you know, my dreams would improve. And I didn't really know what to expect. But my seizures healed immediately after I began working with mushrooms. And I had a whole host of other gifts come in, mental, spiritual, emotional, physical. What is happening is it allows us to gain the effects and benefits that a high-dose ceremony would give us, but it kind of drips it out to us in a way that makes it much more manageable, easier to integrate. We can do it as part of our day-to-day life. You don't have to go anywhere outside of yourself to do it. And I think for people who are very hesitant to do a high-dose journey, microdosing is an ideal way to start.

Do you then increase, increase, or does this microdose, Is that efficient?

It is efficient. And what I have seen is most people, after they practice and get really connected to the medicine, the practice, over time you actually need less, not more, to get the same effects.

So it's not like your body gets used to it and then you have to keep adding and increasing the amount to feel the effects. Like sometimes, you know, I mean, I've never been on antidepressants, but I feel like Sometimes you're always adjusting to get it right because it's not quite enough, or your body's got used to it and you have to change. So it's not like that at all.

It's not like that at all. And that's still a really common misconception that's floating around in the ether and on the interwebs, is that part of the reason why people say don't do it consistently over time or do a protocol so that you don't build up a tolerance— from what I've seen in practice with people, it's rarely that happens. It's usually you develop healing Innately, and then you don't need to keep microdosing to keep that healing. That kind of the point of microdosing is to not to need to microdose anymore.

That's what most people want. They want to have some form of resolution to their, whatever they're dealing with, and not to have to have ongoing supplementation or medication, regardless whether it's natural or not, is a life being free of that. Traditional medical system is still trying to help people with seizures. To say that you've had this and now that you don't have seizures anymore is really a phenomenal thing. It's kind of mind-blowing, really, that now you've never had one again.

No. And also very few headaches. I used to get headaches very, very frequently, and I've probably had 1 or 2 headaches ever. Since I began.

How does microdosing— how does it support people with like chronic illness? But especially what we're talking about today is, you know, like the stress, anxiety, and especially feelings of, you know, trauma. Because trauma, once it gets into the mind, the body, you know, it just governs a lot of people's lives. How does it— how effective and how does it help?

It's remarkably effective. And I work with a lot of people with tougher health conditions, chronic health conditions, because this is a practice, one, it's hard to find, you know, you have to hear about it through someone.

Yeah.

And also for a lot of people I work with, like, they're not psychedelic people. Like, they're never, if you ask them a few years ago, like, would they be working with magic mushrooms? They would've been like, me? No, no, not me. And so it's oftentimes it's the last thing they've come to. And they've taken every medication, they've taken every program, every talk therapy, they've done all the things that they can do. Sometimes within 6 weeks, they can clear pretty substantial health conditions or mental health conditions. Understandably, people are— can have 2 reactions. One is a justifiable kind of righteous anger or annoyance that this has been available. And 2, for so many people, so many people have suffered for so long with their condition, it becomes their identity. And then the practice becomes, who am I now that I am not this person who's kind of limited anymore by this condition? And that becomes a whole nother practice and step in the process. So yes, yes to all of the above.

That— I love that point. I've brought that point up several times in different episodes. about having a condition and then owning it as part of your identity instead of maybe saying, I'm experiencing this. So there's some separation between who you are as a person and the condition. Whereas when you take it on like, this is who I am, do you find that that's so much harder to shift even with a psychedelic like this?

It is just because our conditioning is so strong, right?

Mm-hmm.

It's so strong. And so our whole— a lot of us, our entire world is built around our identity of ourself. And so sometimes it's— we can grow a lot, but then we have to change the whole architecture of our life. All the people who know us, especially our closest relationships, are used to us being the sick person or the limited person. And so everything is kind of up for A reset. In addition to our mind, we're kind of resetting our whole life ever after.

Absolutely. So if we're talking about it helping with negative thoughts, you know, I assume we're talking depression, anxiety, all of the mental health issues. It comes to mind, so are we looking at microdosing in combination with therapy, or do you find that it works just as effective In isolation, like itself? And then how does it do that?

Yes and yeah. So you can just microdose on your own. That's what I did because I didn't have anybody else to do it with. And I kind of created my original program so that people could move through the process together. So back in 2020, I brought a pilot group together so we could all microdose. This was during the pandemic. We were all locked down. And so we would just come together on Zoom and talk about our experience from the week before. And what I found is you can microdose on your own, but the practice in the healing is so subtle, but so profound that it really is supported by sharing. Psilocybin is a very relational medicine. So oftentimes we only see our healing in connection to relationship. So speaking it out loud, expressing it, having others to reflect our experience, whether it's a guide or a coach or a therapist or a community or a group. It's really helpful 'cause people will go, oh, come to think of it, yeah, I had this thing happen and I reacted completely different than I normally would've. That's the medicine. That's gotta be the medicine because I don't typically recover from things that quickly, or I keep my cool, or I just felt more patient in that situation. I had more compassion in the situation than I might have. So to your point of like, what are people coming for? It's so beautifully broad at this point. I would say physical health things, anything to do with nervous system dysregulation at the root, it is— psilocybin is magic for. So that can be everything from headaches, migraines, cluster headaches, to TBI, concussions, car accidents, any kind of head trauma, spinal trauma, Parkinson's disease.

Mm-hmm.

Seizure disorder. I've had now about a dozen other clients in addition to myself have amazing healing for grand mal seizures with psilocybin. In the mental health arena, addictions, OCD, anything that the root is kind of that ruminating fixed mind, the rigidity of a depressed mind, An anxious mind, addictions, and that ranges from anything from eating disorders to repetitive behavior type conditions. Also, we have a lot of people coming for spiritual connection, which is so beautiful. It's a lot of people say now, like, I've spent most of my life managing symptoms and getting myself to okay. And okay is no longer good enough. They like want something more, and they're willing to try something kind of out of the box and different that they've never been open to before, because they're just— they want to feel a life where they're more vital and thriving, not just surviving.

So when it comes to, say, mental health, is it actually changing the neurotransmitters in our brain? Maybe it's because we're not in reality when you're taking it, you know, it's like you're, you're sort of A little bit off with the fairies, and that's why you're feeling calmer and you've, you know, your responses are different because maybe you're not grounded anymore. Just imagine all the skeptics around this, you know, being within the psychedelic basket, you know, thinking, yeah, but that's only because you're, you know, a little bit off with the fairies.

So I work, I work with a lot of very public people, performers, um, people who have a lot of responsibility. And they'll say, I've read about it, I'm following the research, and I really want to do this. But Kasey, I cannot be weird. I can't be weird even for a minute. And I can't lose my game. Like, they're very ambitious, engaged, active people. And they're like, I don't want to be away with the fairies, like not caring anymore. And yeah, I don't want to be calm to the point where I'm oblivious.

Yes.

And quickly they realize Mushrooms especially are the opposite of like an alcohol experience, the polar opposite. Whereas kind of other drugs might take you away from yourself, mushrooms bring you back into yourself with a clarity that people have never experienced before. So it's funny, like my biggest skeptics when they came in, or the people that were most tentative and cautious, often within days they're like, I'm like better at everything. I'm better in every way. Like, not only am I not out of it, I'm kind of more on than ever. I'm more articulate, I'm more focused, I'm more clear, I'm really productive, I'm not procrastinating. Yeah. And so as soon as people kind of connect with the medicine and feel the experience, it's so different than the stigma of a drug experience.

As you were talking, I was thinking this would be absolutely incredible for people who have ADHD and are students, or even if you've had ADHD or ADD your whole life and now you're an adult and you realize as we age we may not be able to be masking or covering up those symptoms or managing those symptoms as well as we did. And sometimes we're diagnosed really late because You're so good at masking. So I can imagine the impact that this would have, especially if you're either studying or you're an executive. You know, this is going beyond just the chronic conditions. Like, ADHD can have such a significant impact on our ability to get work done and focus and be on, on the, on game.

Yes.

Have you ever had anyone with ADHD?

Oh, yes. Many, many, many. Yes. And I actually, I just recorded one and have an upcoming recording to focus on microdosing for ADHD and also microdosing for autism spectrum. Because my belief from witnessing people with both of these conditions, I think in many ways, the people who have those minds are Gifted. I don't view them as a condition. I think it's more a giftedness. And once you tap into that and build and design your life, rather than trying to fit yourself into the box, it allows you to come into a greater coherence and clarity so that you can communicate and express how you shift your life to be, which I think is what we're moving into as a human. species. The kind of dispersive mind of the ADD mind is actually far more sensitive and far more conscious and aware than a quote-unquote normal.

Yeah.

So when people work with ADD and microdosing, typically what happens is they just kind of forget to take their ADHD medications. It's really interesting. A lot of people find them just Effortlessly, they're like, oh, I haven't taken my— I haven't needed my medication in the last 3 weeks. One of the gifts of psilocybin, it really brings us into energetic and mental coherence. And so a lot of people who have that normally like scattered mind sensation, as your energy becomes more coherent and clear, they just find it's— they almost forget about it. Because it's less of an issue in their day-to-day life.

I can see broad spectrum benefits, you know, like the concentration, the procrastination, you know, the— like you're saying, the scattered thoughts. But also, you know, um, with ADHD, sometimes you have those big anger outbursts as well. So what I'm understanding is that it would be due to the nervous system, I guess, also. Calming, very calming. And what have you found around autism? Do you find that they— have you heard of people becoming with more eye contact, or maybe if they're non-verbal, a little bit more verbal? What are some of the benefits, uh, well, benefits that you've heard of around autism?

Yeah, I love this topic. This was one of the gifts of when I first started medicine practice. If I may share a quick story.

Yes.

That introduced me to how different this is. So I had been practicing for a few months and I knew things were happening. I had experienced things, my seizures had stopped. And I was hiking one day and I saw coming in toward me was a father hiking with his son. And as they got closer, I could see the son was on the spectrum. And the father was walking ahead briskly, somewhat impatiently ahead of his son. And we were crossing This little footbridge where we had to get pretty close together to cross paths. And I passed the father, and when I passed the son, he stopped and he just wrapped me in his arms. He was probably 9 or 10 years old, just grasped me. And I was taken aback, but I quickly hugged him back. And we just stood there for a while holding each other. And his father finally realized his son wasn't coming. And when he turned back around, he walked back and his eyes were just— He just looked at me with surprise. And I said, is this okay? He said, you don't understand. He doesn't touch people and he doesn't allow anyone to touch him. And I was like, well, I just, once we separated, I just remember bursting into tears. And I was like, this is the medicine. It was people on the spectrum, I think, have such an incredible sensitivity. that we don't fully comprehend yet. They have incredible powers of awareness and perception and communication. Um, some of your listeners may have listened to the Telepathy Tapes. If you haven't, check them out. They're fascinating about nonverbal autism. Autistics can communicate telepathically with their caregivers. It's fascinating. And so I think what happens when we work with mushrooms is We change and shift ourselves on an energetic level. And the first people to notice around us are the most sensitive beings. So babies notice, little kids notice, people on the spectrum notice, animals, our pets, all change their behavior once we shift our own resonance. We have hundreds of crazy animal stories and pet stories. People start microdosing and they have these incredible connections with animals and their pets sometimes. It's, it's really remarkable. But for autism, I share this story because this was early on, I think it was spirit going, hey, check this out. Check this out, follow this thread. And so I, I've really come to view neurodivergence very differently than something to medicate and something to solve for. And how do we— bring a greater sense of balance and a greater expression. So to touch back to your, to your original question, what I have seen happen with people on the spectrum with microdosing is lots of times they have trouble expressing emotion. They can feel emotion, but it's often really frustrating because, and overwhelming because it's so much feeling, but it doesn't come through.

Mm-hmm.

And they have a hard time connecting the dots to what they're feeling with moving it through the mind and then expressing it out. And I've really, really seen a greater capacity to connect all those dots and to speak, to feel and be more in touch with emotion. And that brings a greater balance to the whole being. When that can happen.

Being able to express your emotions is something they struggle with, but I find even non-neurodivergent people struggle to express and put words to what— how they're feeling. To be able to get the word from the brain, you know, into the body, or from the body into the brain and out, is challenging.

Mm-hmm.

Because we're just not in touch half the time with our, with our emotions. So to have something like this, you know, I, I can tell for someone who's like even socially shy, how it would work so well. You know, like those panic attacks when you're walking into a crowded room or you have to give that speech. You know, panic attacks are so— I know a friend who was just on a, on a European trip and she had to be hospitalized with a panic attack. It just all of a sudden came over her. You know, they are really debilitating. So do these panic attacks and anxiety and everything— do you believe it comes from an unregulated nervous system?

I do. Yes, I've seen it. Yeah, I work with a lot of speakers and people who have to give speeches on stages and talk in front of big groups in high-pressure situations and came to microdosing for this. They wanted to, they were like, this is what I do for my profession. I still get anxious. I still have a lot of anxiety around it and/or social anxiety to support. Like, they were fine most of their time when they were alone, but when they had to interact with other people, they would have a low-level anxiety all the time. And it's beautiful for that. There's a famous mycologist in the States named Paul Stamets, and he's been kind of ringing this bell for many decades. Right? He's a genius now, but he was like the weird mushroom guy back in the '70s. And he tells this incredible story that when he was a young boy, he had a really pronounced stutter. And he had a high-dose psilocybin experience when he was a teenager. And for many years, he said, psilocybin cured my stutter. I had a stutter, and then I didn't have a stutter after this this experience. And since that time, he realized it didn't cure his stutter. It cured his social anxiety, because he would only have the stutter when he talked to a pretty girl. And so it's, yeah, it's, that's the reframe is sometimes people come to microdosing for XYZ symptoms or XYZ conditions. But really, at the heart of it, we're stabilizing and resetting our nervous system.

As we're progressing as a, you know, as a human race and we're going into all the technology and everything's just moving so fast, I don't know if we're actually designed to be moving that fast. And I think it's just really affecting so many people's nervous system. I see it. Australia on the roads used to be just so, you know, Calm and yeah, you know, a couple of people. Road rage is increasing. Like, I just find people getting angrier. They're angrier now. Moving through time and space at lightning speed. And I just don't think we're, we're catching up as a human. So when you're microdosing, what role does intention and ritual play within the process?

One of the things we as microdosing guides do is to work with people and really assess like them as a soul and as an energetic blueprint, because everybody's process is going to be different. Like the things that you love to do as a ritual, some people love to journal, some people love to meditate, some people like to dance, some people like to drum. And so it really, it opens you up to moving in a way. that your body is most aligned with. So that's kind of the beauty and artistry of, of guideship and having support in the process. But I've seen a huge range of very creative ritual. And actually, when people stop, you know, people will microdose 6 weeks or 3 months, and they'll feel much better, and they'll pause microdosing. That's often they say they miss the person they were when they were microdosing because they titled— they were just living more intentionally. They were more thoughtful about how they were going about their day, and they missed the ritual that they had created around that, which is very telling how important that is to us.

It's kind of like a dual thing— microdose, and if you need therapy or whatever, you do that, or microdose and be very intentional about what you're doing. So if you stop microdosing Does that kind of, like you said, does that fall away or does the microdosing has still affected your nervous system? So you still calm, but you are sort of missing what you were doing whilst you were microdosing.

Exactly. It's the lifestyle choices. Yeah.

It's the app.

Microdosing, the mushrooms kind of give you that beautiful window of neuroplasticity where your mind is open, you're forming new connections, you're feeling better, and people often have this beautiful cascade. So They're feeling better. And so they sleep better. And when they sleep better, they eat better. When they eat better, they move more. And so it's this beautiful cycle that happens just very naturally. And when people stop microdosing, sometimes they stop doing the other good stuff too. And so that becomes the practices to keep this going because mushrooms can give you this opening, but it's really up to us to partner with the medicine and do the practices, whether it's the therapy or the coaching or the guideship or the movement, um, to pair with the practice that really takes that opening and kind of converts it into lasting results.

It's still around responsibility. We still have to be responsible for the result that we want. It's sometimes, I think, when we take supplements or even the mushrooms, the microdosing of the mushrooms or the pharmaceuticals, we put all the responsibility on that. Instead of, this is assisting me in the responsibility I need to take for my health. Is there anybody who shouldn't use it?

Great question. It's a very— psilocybin is exceptionally safe, so there's surprisingly few contraindications. Um, one is in the pharmaceutical world, lithium is one of the primary ones that is a contraindication. But other than that, most pharmaceuticals we can work with. However, many of the antidepressant family class of drugs blunt the effect of psilocybin. So it's a little bit of a dance to get the dose right so that people can kind of overcome the blunting of the antidepressant to be able to feel the benefits and effects of psilocybin. Other than that, though, it's interesting when I'm assessing someone the first time I meet them on an introductory call. I've learned kind of, and this is going to sound odd, the biggest contraindication to me is if someone is not yet ready to feel life.

Mm-hmm.

And by that, like, sometimes we are so, we run away from our feelings, we run away from Any emotion. And where people who are highly, highly uncomfortable with emotion, mushroom is big feeling, big truth, big honesty. So if somebody is really ready for that, which is the vast majority of my clients, that's why they're coming. They're like, game on, my soul's ready. I don't know what I'm doing, but I'm here and I'm ready. Right? I can sense that in a person, but if someone is not either ready, willing, or in a place where they're resourced enough in their life to feel more emotion. I found interestingly, like, that's the biggest contraindication to working specifically with psilocybin. Typically, we'll work with another medicine, or we might start with practice and just work with other aspects of self and kind of work up to the point where they're ready to work with psilocybin. But interestingly, that's the biggest thing I've seen.

If someone is so fearful of feeling their emotions and they've kind of like, you know, the old saying, they've put their head in the sand every time they need to talk about something, microdosing, maybe in my— what I'm hearing is it's most probably not that, um, maybe safe to start it by yourself.

It's not that any— it's not unsafe It's just, let me get— let me give an example when this, when this can go well. So for example, I have a lot of, I have a lot of male clients that are 75 and older. And they'll come to me and they're like, hey, I'm not interested in any of the spirituality woo-woo stuff. Like, I'm just forgetting everything. And I forget my grandchildren's names. And that's why I'm here. I read the research, and I heard it can help with my cognitive decline. Which it can, and so they'll start practice. But they'll tell me, "Yeah, it's working great. My memory is much better. I'm sharper. I'm clearer. I could do all these things again." But when I talk to their wife and I talk to their grown adult children, they're like, "He is a different person. He is more tender. He's more kind. He says, 'I love you,' to us more often. He." Can apologize when he's done something wrong. And so that's what I mean, like, people— sometimes if people allow for that emotion to come out through into action, that's how it works. But if someone is so stubborn and resistant to allowing that into their life, that's when it doesn't work.

When someone's so stubborn that doesn't allow anything into their life, nothing works.

Yes, true, true.

You know, this won't work, pharmaceuticals won't work, relationships won't work. You know, it's— nothing works. But yeah, I was, I was thinking maybe if someone was taking this and they have been so closed to their emotions, then they start feeling— will they have like a bit of a trauma response? Will they kind of, you know, basically freak out a bit? And if they're doing it by themselves maybe they won't manage it well, you know, their, their own feelings, their own feelings. Yeah.

Great question. This is exactly why I think far and away most people are best served starting with microdosing, because a lot of people who jump straight to the high-dose experience, which we tend to do as humans, right, tend to focus on the big sparkly experience. And so sometimes when people are— have no preparation and no context for the medicine work, and they've done very little self-reflection therapy, contemplative practice, sometimes going straight to a hiatus experience can be like Pandora's box, like way too much content and emotion all at once to be held by your current capacity. And so that's why I love microdosing. Microdosing is never going to overwhelm you. It's just bit by bit by bit.

Mm-hmm.

You can integrate it more easily. And if you carry on, you kind of build a relationship of trust, knowing yourself, knowing the medicine, and then you build a capacity that I've seen many, many people who start with microdosing go on to journey and have a really beautiful experience because they're so much better equipped to hold it when they've prepared for it.

It sounds like it's just such a spiritual experience as well. Like it goes way beyond just the physical, the emotion that you're tapping into something so much, uh, bigger and higher that you didn't think you even were capable of.

Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, we know a little bit, like we know at this point that psilocybin, how it plays with the body and the brain, it works on the serotonin system. So we know that, we know it increases neuroplasticity and the window creates new neural connections. They just recently showed, and research showed, that it actually decreases aging and enhances longevity. We actually grow new dendrites and telomeres. So we know a lot, but I think we still are just scratching the surface as to the totality, like you said, of the, the spiritual benefits and just the Divine intelligence coded into these organisms. I mean, they've lived through 5 extinction events. They've been on the planet for way longer than us, and we actually come from them. We, we are part of them. And so I am always reminded when I see the remarkable results people have, and it's almost— it's like, really? Like, this is too good to be true. They contain the codes and intelligence that our human minds can't begin to wrap around.

I know everyone is individual and everyone has an individual experience, but overall, is there a, like, uh, how long before someone starts noticing some change when they start taking it?

It varies, but many people notice from the first day. Um, it's, it can work very, very quickly. It can be very subtle. But it can also be very noticeable. So like my experience, I, I had a very— one of my first day dosing, I was at home and just inside and I was like, okay, I feel a little calm. I feel a little uplifted, but nothing major. And I went outside to walk my dog. And as soon as I opened the front door, it was just like nature just popped. And it was almost like there was a little turn dial. Where I wasn't altered at all. It was just life took on a brightness and hue. And I remember the light just caught my eye in a new way. And I could smell the jasmine like 4 blocks away in my neighborhood. I could smell the sea air, the salt from the bay in the air. So these were all things that were in my existence every day, but I just never noticed them before. So it's very— it's typically like that where it's very subtle. But unmistakable. So nature kind of catches you differently. Nature responds to you differently. Animals respond to you differently. The number one thing people notice usually in the first 2 days is the cognitive benefits. They're like, I'm just so sharp. I'm clear. I'm energized but uplifted. And I think that's why people get so much done. It's really interesting how the procrastination factor, like how often people go, It's crazy. I like cleaned out my garage that I've been not doing for 7 years. My wife was like, hallelujah, like whatever you're doing, great. So it could really be like in the first few days and weeks. Other people, it can take a few weeks, particularly if you're on a few pharmaceutical medications. And in that case, until it could just take you a little longer to connect and feel the benefits. But I always encourage people in that situation, things are always working, even if we can't quite perceive them, because our emotions have been blunted sometimes for many years by antidepressants, a lot of sleeping medications, just to keep trusting that things are still happening, even if you don't have the sensitivity yet to discern them.

I think it's really good if, if we stop thinking everything has to be instantaneous. Like, as soon as I take something, it should work. I mean, it took me 30 years to get there, but I want it to be fixed in 1 week. And I assume when you say about, oh, all of a sudden someone's clearing out their garage and they've got all this motivation, especially for someone with, say, arthritis or chronic pain, well, are they able to do that because it doesn't take away the arthritis, but it takes away the pain of the arthritis? And the chronic pain, but do, if they stop taking it, do they feel that again or does it resolve it like it helped your seizures and now you never have them again?

2 things I've seen happen. In some cases, it really can clear the condition. I've seen that happen with a lot of nervous system conditions. I've seen that with women with PMDD and really extreme PMS, like within one cycle of microdosing, they have their first normal cycle in decades sometimes. Other people, it's not so much like you don't have pain anymore. And I say it works with trauma similarly, where it doesn't take away the experience, but what it does, does it stretches you. It stretches your capacity and it stretches your perception so that you are expanded. And this thing holds a different relativity in your awareness than it did before, which is really incredible. And so like converse than a lot of our Western medical system, which is focus on the thing, focus on the thing, talk about the thing over and over and over again, right? This is the opposite effect where we're kind of stretching ourselves more broadly so that the thing might still be there. It's just smaller relative to our new perception of ourself.

Do you have a particular protocol?

Lots of them, actually. So there's a few we tend to work with, but it's really, we base them part on listening to the person's spirit, listening to their hopes and intentions, what they're working on. Um, also their level of sensitivity will determine, help us determine their dose. Um, so it's different for each person, but I would say Most people begin either on an every other day format for, say, 6 weeks. Other people might do consecutive day dosing, like 4 days on, 3 days off, or 5 days on, 2 days off. That was my personal protocol. And when I work with new medicines now, it's almost always 5:2.

For someone who's so excited about all this information and is going, this is for me, what about The legal side of it.

I knew you were gonna ask that.

The legal side.

Yeah, it's the big shoe that drops. It's like, why? Okay, these things are—

Let's address the elephant in the room.

Right. And it's like, oh yes, it's deeply frustrating to people, especially when they're new to practice. Like when people are new to practice and they experience what it really is versus what the perception of it is and the stigma of it is, and knowing that people can receive the benefits it is, it's understandably frustrating to people. So essentially, back in the '50s and '60s, lots of research was underway. However, it was political. It was politically driven, and psilocybin was made a Schedule I drug.

Wow.

On, in most of, in, in the UK and some of Europe, in the United States and Australia. So unfortunately, there it lies, even though it doesn't qualify for any of the qualifications for a Schedule 1 drug. It's not addictive, it's safe, it's non-habit-forming, but it's harder to undo laws than it is to, right? So, and again, the decriminalization process is also very political. So, and we also have a very, very well-funded, powerful pharmaceutical industry.

Yes.

That is highly invested on people not healing things permanently, right?

Absolutely.

So there's lots of forces aligned against this work to promote fear, suppress this work, repress this work. A lot of us in this field, Are banned, our accounts are shut down, or we're shadow banned. It's a constant battle to share with people because there are yeah, there's very powerful forces aligned to to keep to keep these medicines illegal.

So when someone wants to take this and isn't in America, for example, what can they do? Like here in Australia. Is someone able to order from you? Is it legal to take it here? Like, do you know that? So, so, you know, someone say here with me in Sydney is gone, oh my goodness, I want this, where can I get it, and is it legal for me, can I bring it in?

Yes, happy to provide some advice and guidance. So part of the reason why I created my platform so publicly is I can do that because I am not a medicine maker. I don't supply the medicine, I don't source the medicine. So I'm just educating and sharing information and guidance. And so that's how I and a lot of the guides internationally can do this work so publicly. That said, there are dedicated, devoted people out there providing and making medicines. To different parts of the world, different countries. Some are above ground, some are underground, and they operate in different levels. Thankfully, here in the US, we have a wonderful medicine maker partner that sources nationwide. And so people can step into our community and programs and get the support, the coaching, the guidance, the camaraderie with the community, but they, they take care of the sourcing. Most other countries that we work with, sometimes they're public, sometimes they're underground sources. And the beauty of mushrooms is you can grow your own. So they're very easy to grow. They grow in nature. And so when you kind of step into this world and start to meet people in the field, it's very easy to, in most of the world, to find psilocybin mushrooms growing in the wild.

When we were talking beforehand, you said Australia was a bit of a trailblazer in this area. Can you expand on that? I feel very proud about being Australian.

Yeah, you should. You should. Yeah, I love it. So yeah, there's a few countries and Canada has been really, really trailblazing as well. There's 2 states inside the United States, Oregon and Colorado, who have been trailblazers and kind of first to go. So they're the first legal and Canada and Australia are both have passed legislation that it's legal by prescription. So right now, access is limited in Australia to the traditional, you know, doctors writing a prescription for it. But that's big progress.

Yes.

That's a good starting point. And so as we determine how these medicines are held, my hope is that we'll kind of embrace a big tent philosophy where some people will want to go to a clinic and a doctor in a clinical setting. to work with the medicines. Other people would much prefer a naturalistic setting to be able to work with medicines on their own time, in their own home, out in nature. So hopefully, ideally, I would love to see decriminalization kind of lead and then legalization follow, if that makes sense.

Absolutely. You know, we need more. We really do. We need other solutions. You know, People are desperate for help. Um, you did— I just want to touch on very quickly before we finish. You mentioned, oh, you can grow them, they're out in nature, all that. But how do you know how much of the fresh mushroom to have compared to if you were to have, like you're saying, the capsules? I mean, it would— is it different? Like, how would— would someone just need to experiment?

Mm-hmm. So the first couple of years we started in the US, we were all cultivating because we were on lockdown and this is— there weren't a lot of options. And so we were all growing at home. And typically it takes people about 3 to 4 months to get the hang of it. Just like any new hobby, they usually mess up the first round, right? Things go wrong or you mess with them too much. And so just when people ask me like, well, how long is it going to really take me to get the hang of things? I'd say budget about 3 to 4 months. So once you have the mushrooms, you can, most people tend to dehydrate them and dry them. And then most people microdosing range from, I'd say the average kind of mainstream is 100 milligrams to 150 milligrams of fruiting bodies of the mushroom itself. So once you get the hang of it, You have like, you have a lot of mushrooms. So you don't have to worry about sourcing. And then most people take those mushrooms and turn them into capsules just to have some consistency in their dosing by weight. So I'd say most microdosing is 100, 150. Our particular community has a lot of very sensitive people, just very open. They're very creative, lots of creatives, lots of healers. People that are just open, pretty bendy people, neuroplastic people to begin with.

I love that.

So a lot of them dose at just 50 milligrams too. So lots of people, you can always start low and go slow. And then if you kind of want to feel a little bit more or feel like you could take a little more, you can just work your way up over time.

Great. So to finish off, for someone listening who's lost hope with their condition, what would you say to them?

Um, have faith. Have faith. I've seen the most remarkable things from physical health conditions that we're told, um, you can manage them, but you can't make them any better. From dementia, Alzheimer's, stroke, Parkinson's, nervous system conduction, like the things that we were kind of told is a death, a life sentence, and you just have to manage this until the end. I've seen remarkable things. I've also seen people work through and heal and metabolize deep, deep trauma. That they could never quite get to.

Mm-hmm.

They're like, I've done all the things, I've done therapy for so many years, but I can't quite get it. I can't quite get, get to it. And that's where mushrooms are, can do things that nothing else we can do because they access us on truly a soul level, on a somatic level and a soul level where so much of our trauma is stored. So have faith, step in, be curious. Part of our community design is that it's really, really accessible. It's just a monthly, month-to-month thing where people around the world can just step in. And you don't have to be microdosing yet. You could just step in and meet people and listen to people's real-world stories, what they're working on, where they're at. And so that's really a beautiful way to build confidence And also to restore hope and faith that you can heal.

I love that, Casey. And that's the whole thing, isn't it? Faith. Having the faith that you can heal and not feel that, you know, whatever you're dealing with is kind of like a life sentence and that's it because you haven't been able to be helped before. And that's what I love about people like you coming onto the show. It's like, what is beyond my diagnosis? And it's all about exposing what people haven't heard of and, you know, what else is available. This has been fantastic. Thank you so much for coming on the show. I loved hearing all about this, and I'm sure so many have. So please go to the show notes. All of Casey's details will be there. And do click on her website, join the community, and listen and hear more about it. And then maybe even speak to you, book in with you. And then find out how you can access these, uh, wonderful mushrooms.