Interest in psychedelic healing on the whole shot up in the last few decades, but a combined cultural stigma and extreme classification by the federal government halts psychedelics from making any real medicinal headway in the U.S.
But it’s not stopping psychedelic proponents from trying.
[Michael] Winkelman edited multiple studies showing how psychedelics produced therapeutic effects instrumental in treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder, addiction and depression.“There’s reason to believe that psychedelics have a very powerful effect in changing your settings, changing your cognitive emotional orientation, even changing your worldview,” Winkelman said.
Dr. Joe Tafur, an integrative medicine activist and medical doctor, echoes this sentiment. Through his practice, he’s working to bring a medical perspective to spiritual healing practices.
Tafur worked in the Peruvian Amazon studying Amazonian plant medicine. There, he underwent a traditional ayahuasca apprenticeship, learning under Shipibo curanderos, Indigenous shamans.
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Now he works at the Ocotillo Center for Integrative Medicine in downtown Phoenix where he incorporates what he learned to treat those struggling with mental illnesses. He’s seen people experience complete, or near-complete healing from their respective diagnoses.
He believes psychedelic healing might be the answer.
“Society is at epidemic levels of anxiety, depression and untreated trauma,” Tafur said. “[Psychedelics] are really about trying to find some effective way to move forward.”
