Everyone knows that a bad trip can leave a mark. But what about a good one – especially when someone else is holding the map?
Decades of clinical research have established that psychedelics don’t just open the mind and also open it to whoever is in the room. LSD measurably increases suggestibility. Patients in early psychedelic therapy sessions regularly fell into intense, rapid emotional attachment to their guides – an effect so reliable it was built into the treatment model, and so dangerous it was regularly exploited. Timothy Leary knew this, writing explicitly about using the first psychedelic experience to “”imprint”” a desired worldview onto the person having it.
MDMA therapy trials have been rocked by allegations that therapists used their patients’ chemically – induced openness to implant narratives, reframe memories, and cross lines that the drugs made it nearly impossible to resist. So, when you come out of a ceremony or a session with a profound new story about who you are and why you suffered – how much of that was yours?
Dr. Tamošaitis has been involved in drug harm reduction activism for the past 10 years and he is the head of NVO Young Wave that is one of the main information hubs for harm reduction knowledge.
Young Wave often comments in media ant public space on drug related topics in addition to organizing lectures, workshops and discussions at both the regional and international level.
