Women in Psychedelics: Learning from Success

10:00 AM – 11:00 AM
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10 am Deanne Adamson: What Is Organic Integration?

When and how do the lasting benefits of psychedelic therapies show up in a person’s life? What is that process that makes it so? How does one ensure their time, energy, and efforts count? What is organic integration and why is this essential to getting good, pure, and lasting results? What do facilitators, sitters, coaches, and supporters need to know about integration that is not being spoken about?

11:00 AM – 12:00 PM
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11 am Livi Joy: First Goose! Embodying (Feminine) Leadership When There Is No Road Map

Over the years my bios have often included words like “exploring,” “pioneering” and when in a more creative mood – “bushwacking”. These are helpful qualities for anyone wanting to do deep transformational work, but especially for those drawn to psychedelics and even more especially for those drawn to leadership in this field. There I said it. Leadership. These days it can feel like leadership is a dirty word conflated with dominance, manipulation, and exploitation. It’s up to us to bring forth something different into the world. Psychedelics and non-ordinary states are neither good nor bad in and of themselves – they are powerful and full of potential. Are you here to help bring forth something more beautiful, more joyful, more ‘successful” for you and all your relations? I am, and I would like your help please 🙂 The alternate byline I came up with (that was decidedly too long) read: “How curiosity, compassion and not being afraid to make it up as I go along are responsible for most of the things in my life I consider to be successes.” So I’m going to tell you about some of my favorite things that I’m doing these days that fall into this category, maybe answer some of your questions about what it’s really like to have entheogenic work be your day job, and hopefully inspire you to find the places in your life and your community where you are ready to joyfully take on the role of first goose.

12:00 PM – 1:00 PM
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12 pm Tricia Eastman: Nurturing the Seeds: Embracing Nature’s Womb for Resilience, Connection, and Empowerment

Embark on a journey into the heart of feminine wisdom and natural healing as a descendant of a matriarchal lineage of mestiza curanderisma, and a Bwiti initiated medicine woman shares about psychedelic initiation. This is an invocation to the deeper currents of nature’s wisdom, illustrating how we can rise from adversity through the transformative power of ancient practices and the numinous experiences they offer. The rich, interconnected web of life “the universal womb” offers us a balanced, feminine, nurturing pathway to become better stewards of nature and the psychedelic movement.

1:00 PM – 2:00 PM
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1 pm Annie Oak: Harm Reduction for Psychedelic Communities

Annie Oak has created harm reduction strategies for psychedelic events and communities since 2007. She will talk about how to develop safety systems for gatherings where people may be exploring psychedelics. These strategies include structures for mental health support and medical care, insurance considerations, conflict deescalation, drug checking, and mediation of boundary violations. She will also touch on safety considerations for evaluating facilitators and retreat centers that use psychedelic medicines. Annie will acknowledge the contributions made by many historical psychedelic communities that have for 50 years developed culturally appropriate ways to care for their members.

2:00 PM – 3:00 PM

2 pm Ginevra Naidoo: Ontocratic Awakening: Understanding Consciousness and the Power of Being

This talk presents a simple and practical guide to consciousness, its different levels, and Dr David Hawkins’ map of consciousness. The map is an essential part Ginevra’s work with clients in which she uses a wide variety of entheogens. She has extensive experience with psilocybin, MDMA, and 5 MeO-DMT, having facilitated many hundreds of transformative healing sessions using micro, macro, and mega doses and the map of consciousness. Ginevra will consider recent relevant research together with ancient teachings and approaches and tools and techniques from medicine, science, health, healing, and spirituality. You will learn about biohacking, controlling your own biology to enhance your physical and mental performance and accessing your innate capacity to heal, manifest, and master the self.

3:00 PM – 4:00 PM

3 pm Mia Bronner: Soul Surfing: How I Reunited with my Soul

This reunion is something I promise to do continuously. In the process I am repairing the damage of a lifetime of cultural shame and of an abusive relationship, learning to identify and trust my intuition, allowing the sacred serpent goddess to use my body and mind to express and actualize, finding my true twin flame, freeing myself from fear, forgiving my parents for neglect and abuse, supporting them in their own healing journeys, and looking ahead to a future after healing/communing. When a strong and stable connection has been made between mind, body, and soul, I will commit to a regular practice of circulating energy through that trifecta to flow and nurture, enter into trance and allow the divine to act through me, to talk with spirits and offer them prayers, to ask for their support and protection, and to open portals for others to enter altered states and explore their inner and outer worlds and ask their questions. I’ll touch on creating psychedelic spaces for all female- representing beings, heroic doses, and tools for pushing through physical and psychic edges, breaking through to further realms of spiritual experience. I will discuss protecting your sacred journeyer self from transference, keeping visions inside and alive, and working visionary muscles.

4:00 PM – 5:00 PM

4 pm Jessica Barrileaux: Don’t Sleep with the Shaman

We are at our own most vulnerable when we are working in other realms with medicine and sacred entheogens. We allow the shamans and teachers we have chosen to work with to enter our sacred places, trusting that they will honor us, hold us, and help us heal. When that boundary is crossed it is confusing and shocking and only adds new levels of shame and self-doubt to what we are already working on to heal. We can even entertain our own egoic thinking around being & chosen and yet most of the time we have not been chosen at all, but instead used. Jessica will share her own story of mistakenly crossing this boundary. Her story took her on a journey of learning about dark magick being used by the ayahuasquero and then learning to pull herself up and out of that story and into a new story of the deepest healing, returning to self-trust and self-respect. This is not a story that is unique. It happens more often than most of us realize and too often the stories are held deep inside wrapped in shame, doubt, and fear. Jessica will create a safe place for others to share their stories or ask questions.

5:00 PM – 6:00 PM

5 pm Leanna Standish: Bringing Ayahuasca to North America

I will talk about ayahuasca, its beauty, and potential. I will cover how to proceed ethically to study it in the laboratory and the clinic. I am founder and CEO of Sacred Medicines PBC, whose mission is to safely and ethically conduct well-designed clinical trials of a standardized ayahuasca analog using National Institute of Health research funding. I will discuss the technical, regulatory, cultural , and philosophical issues surrounding bringing ayahuasca to North America.

6:00 PM – 7:00 PM

6 pm Deborah Parrish Snyder: The Hidden History of Women

Since the inception of Synergetic Press in 1984, our journey has been one of deliberate exploration and advocacy for often sidelined subjects, such as ethnobotany, biospherics, and by the 2000s, psychedelics. However, our path was not without its challenges, particularly in sourcing and amplifying the voices of women and other marginalized communities, whose perspectives were frequently overlooked in the broader discourse. Recognizing the importance of representation, we made it our mission to actively seek out and publish works by and about women, alongside other marginalized voices. Through strategic collaborations with organizations like the Chacruna Institute for Psychedelic Plant Medicines, we were able to unearth a wealth of hidden histories, showcasing the diverse experiences of Indigenous communities, LGBTQIA+ individuals, and women within the psychedelic landscape. Our latest publication, the anthology “Women and Psychedelics: Uncovering Invisible Voices,” stands as a testament to our commitment to shining a light on these overlooked narratives. In my talk at this conference dedicated to women and psychedelics, I am eager to delve into the untold stories and profound insights that this anthology brings to the forefront, highlighting the vital role that women have played, and continue to play, in shaping the psychedelic experience.

7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
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7 pm Kerry Moran: The Goddess and the Plants: Psychedelic Mysteries and Feminine Wisdom

Working as an ayahuasca integration therapist, I see firsthand how entheogenic plants can heal the pervasive symptoms of disconnection—from the body, from emotions, from self, from nature, from the divine—haunting so many in the modern world. I believe that many of our modern culture’s wounds stem from the millennia-old systematic destruction of feminine ways of knowing. In this sweeping look at feminine wisdom, Western history, collective trauma, and the psychedelic renaissance, we’ll explore how psychedelics inspire alternate states of consciousness bearing all the hallmarks of feminine wisdom. I’ll look at how psychedelics, as “medicine for these times,” can rekindle these ways of knowing, in the process reconnecting us to our archetypal heritage. The Divine Feminine is alive and well despite millennia of neglect and persecution. This archetype is embedded within each one of us, and is deeply encoded within the reawakening power of psychedelics.

8:00 PM – 9:00 PM

8 pm Mareesa Stertz: The Incredible Utility of Story Frameworks to Map the Psychedelic Journey, Life, and Beyond

When it comes to shifting the dominant narratives around mental health, well being, and wholeness, it’s not only what we say, but how we say it. Recent studies are showing new and impressive ways Joseph Campbell’s “Hero’s Journey” is proving useful when it comes to finding meaning within life, as well as mirroring the transformative arc of a mushroom journey. In this talk, we will explore how to us this as well as Carl Jung’s individuation frameworks to tell better stories and become more powerful agents of change.

9:00 PM – 10:00 PM

9 pm Lakshmi Narayan: What Does It Mean To Be Awake?

I want to talk about the two types of Awakening — an absolute awakening vs a cyclical awakening, which together create a certain creative tension and paradox. Embracing paradox is one of the milestones of being awake, and in this talk I’m going to share my understanding of this phenomenon, some key features and processes that I have experienced over the years, and delve into the metaphysical markers along this path that can appear for anyone and everyone, no matter what stage or age or level of awakening they might be at in their life.

10:00 PM – 11:00 PM
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10 pm Martie Underwood: Ethics in Psychedelics

As the use of psychedelics in the therapeutic context is becoming more mainstream, important issues are surfacing that require practitioners and participants to be cognisant of the spaces they occupy. Considering aspects such as informed consent, suggestibility, power dynamics, transference and conflicts of interest are crucial to ensure the safety of all. 

11:00 PM – 12:00 AM
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Sonatta Camara: Embracing Inner Alchemy: A Journey of Healing and Sovereignty

Dr. Sonatta Camara, PhD, will provide an inspiring exploration into the realms of self-discovery, healing, and empowerment. Her talk unveils the transformative journey of turning trauma into sovereignty through the wisdom of nature and ancient practices. With her rich background, she shares enlightening insights on using entheogens, community, and daily rituals to navigate life’s complexities. She advocates for every day as a ceremony, a sacred opportunity to live sovereignly and in control of our healing journeys. This presentation is more than a talk; it’s a transformative experience, guiding participants to convert pain into power and embark on a path of personal, generational, and communal healing towards a legacy of wellness and empowerment.

12:00 AM – 1:00 AM
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12 am Amelia Travis: Rhizomatic Rematriation

Psychedelic ‘awakening’ is a common occurrence, but can mushroom medicine take us beyond transcendental experiences and into a transformed relationship with the immanence, body, and Earth? Can mycelial medicine help us both wake up and grow up? Psilocybin-supported rites of passage may serve as an initiatory path into relationship with the ecological self. Journey work can help us compost old values, move from self-centeredness to other-centeredness, foster a greater sense of self trust and maturity, and increase our creativity and capacity to navigate increasing polarities and tensions of the modern world.

1:00 AM – 2:00 AM

1 am Solana Booth: Remembering Mother’s Breath

I will invite attendees to accept that we as a human family are in an unhealthy relationship to ourselves and one another and most importantly to Mother Earth. Regardless of which happened first, we are all in tough times; we are in “the thick of it”, a term used when we are having a tough time during a plant ceremony. This sharing will be my testament to humanity and Mother Earth and healing, to having the entheogenic, spiritual experience, to remembering Mother’s Breath. Humans must heal. This is what Mother Earth is asking. Indigenous people are the original sentinels of Mother Earth. We have an intimate, informed, and evidence-based connection to her. It’s knowing that we are both made of the same elements, that we are both mostly water to start. This will be a moment of my matrilineal matriarchal lineage to express the story of remembering Mother’s Breath, a story of how deeply connected we are to Mother Earth as a human family and how we can reframe the dysfunction happening among all of us right now and restore the spiritual connection that binds us to each other, to essence, and to Mother Earth.

2:00 AM – 3:00 AM

2 AM Cathy Coyle: Wisdom from the Ancient Mushroom Cults of Thessaly and the Prophetic Poets of Ireland

Cathy will delve into the enigmatic world of ancient mushroom shamanism, uncovering its profound relevance for women today. She will explore the rich tapestry of Europe’s spiritual landscape, beginning with the ancient women’s mysteries of the Thessaly mushroom cults. These cults not only highlight the shamanistic origins of entheogenic mushroom use in Europe but also underscore the spiritual dimension of mushroom work—a path increasingly embraced by women today for its deep healing and service potential. We will also traverse the mystical realms of ancient Ireland’s Soma cults and the Irish strand of a vast Indo-European tradition of psychedelic shamanism. We will focus on the secret rituals of this tradition and on the entheogenic roots of “poetic frenzy”—the intrinsic link between spiritual intoxication and divine inspiration. This talk invites you to rediscover and reclaim the legacy of these powerful, ancient practices, demonstrating their timeless significance for women’s empowerment, healing, and spiritual fulfillment in today’s world.

3:00 AM – 4:00 AM

3 AM Julia Javkin MD: Exploring the Intersection of Somatics and Psychedelics: Navigating Body Signals

I will explore the synergistic potential of psychedelics as catalysts for understanding and addressing our body language. Drawing upon both anecdotal evidence and research, I will delve into the therapeutic possibilities of combining somatic approaches for the preparation and integration of psychedelic experiences. Through our discussion, we aim to shed light on the potential applications and implications for personal growth and healing and teach the transformative power of psychedelics in unlocking the language of the body.

4:00 AM – 5:00 AM

4 AM Kate Kifa I Women and Psychedelics on Wikipedia

The talk will delve into the representation and depiction of women in the psychedelic field as presented on Wikipedia. It will shine a light on the gender gap present in the platform’s content, particularly within the psychedelic field. The talk will also provide an overview of projects and initiatives that attendees can get involved with to help improve the representation of women in this area.

5:00 AM – 6:00 AM

5 AM Sarah Sun: Pygmy Testimony: Iboga In My Blood

Sarah will be sharing key points in her life story to bring listeners closer to the innerstanding that there is help beyond what the system has to offer. By no means are we lost when we brave the unseen and unknown to find the answers within. I will be open to questions and willing to answer from experience to share the gifts that iboga holds for humanity. The story is told that the Pygmies of my clan took this medicine deep into the forests when our land was colonialized. The Bwiti were said to be the only tribe willing to keep their spirit clean, so the medicine and seeds were shared with them. In my heart, I feel this is true. Elders have similar stories and have the feeling of truth. So my truth is that I am present to bring the medicine back to my tribe WOMEN first. As we rise so will the rest. I know nothing more beyond this, just that the journey is becoming more synchronistic and colorful, and there is flow. I even get glimpses of bliss. Our future feels golden.

6:00 AM – 7:00 AM

6 AM Sara Ucendo I Resetting and Rebirthing with Amphibian Medicines

I will talk about how focusing on purging mental, physical, and emotional toxins with kambô combined with Bufo Alvarius (5-MeO-DMT) results in a profound reset at the mind-body-spirit level. This rebirth gives people a second chance at living their lives with more presence, acceptance, and self awareness. This entheogenic experience allows you to remember your true essence.

7:00 AM – 8:00 AM

7 AM Mehrav Artzi: Telling Grandfather Tobacco’s Story

In the Amazon, Tobacco is considered a universal medicine and is widely used by shamans and other traditional healers. A teacher and a guide to cosmic knowledge and the spirit world, Tobacco is called with affection “The grandfather of all plants”, one that brings blessings and protection. I will provide a short introduction to Nicotiana rustica, commonly called Aztec, Brazilian, or strong tobacco. Let me acquaint you with its ecology, history, related creation myths, and how it is used by the many different indigenous groups I have come to know during my 15 years in Amazonia, often in support of other psychedelic preparations and integration. I will also speak to the success stories I have witnessed due to its healing benefits, starting with my own—where I started and where I am now—and include the stories of those I have treated.

8:00 AM – 9:00 AM

8 AM Erin Atkinson, LCSW-C, CCTP I Microdosing for Women’s Sovereignty

Women are often labeled, diagnosed, and pathologized for having authentic and adaptive emotional responses. We are taught to be nice, to stay in line, to ignore our body’s protective responses in order to be accepted. Could the labels of chronic depression or anxiety actually be the manifestation of societally sanctioned disconnection from our bodies and the Earth? Finding one’s authentic voice among a lifetime of such programming requires working through many layers. Microdosing with mushrooms can help women to connect to their bodies and recognize the deep wisdom in everyone.

9:00 AM – 10:00 AM

9 am Shonagh Home: Mushrooms, the Sidhe and the Otherworld

For countless initiates through time, the ritual ingestion of mind-altering substances ferried them beyond the earthly world into vastly different realms where connection to the gods, ancestors and spirits of the land was made possible. Celtic mythology and lore hold numerous stories of magical potions, berries, nuts and salmon that when ingested in the proper dose, transformed one into a sage and poet with the knowledge of the ages. The storytellers of the old Celtic world spoke in metaphor and riddle, very likely veiling the ritual use of amanita and possibly psilocybin in the training of initiates. The inhabitants of the Otherworld were known as the Sidhe (shee), which is the Irish word for Faerie. These spirits are not the sprites of Victorian fancy but rather a race of tall, wise and noble people with the power to impart certain gifts, not the least of which are poetry and music. In our modern, commercial secular world this is regarded as simply superstition and myth, yet among intrepid visionary mushroom seekers there are some who have encountered what they would describe as the Faerie, and their experiences with them are indelible. In a world seduced by technology and materialism, what is the point of trying to connect with these intelligences? Is it even possible? How can we benefit from making such a connection? And what might these Otherworld inhabitants have to teach us? I will endeavor to answer these questions and share my personal insights.

10:00 AM – 11:00 AM

Summary Sesssion