Naming Needs As Nervous System Repair

Liz Zhou 0:00

It could be really reparative on a nervous system and attachment level to be able to say, actually, I need this, right? Because I think a lot of HSPs can self-abandon our own needs or feel like we're not allowed to ask for that because that's too sensitive. But to really own that, I need that. And the medicine can make it more impossible than usual to ignore that we have needs.

HSP Discovery And Early Psychedelic Experiences

April Snow 0:26

Welcome to Sensitive Stories, the podcast for the people who live with hearts and eyes wide open. I'm your host, psychotherapist and author April Snow. I invite you to join me as I deep dive into rich conversations with fellow highly sensitive people that will inspire you to live a more fulfilling life as an HSP without all the overwhelm. In this episode, I talk with Liz Zhou about how HSPs can be supported by psychedelic or plant medicine and how to navigate through the experience meaningfully and safely. Liz is a highly sensitive and neurodivergent therapist. She specializes in helping HSPs, neurodivergent adults and couples heal their nervous systems and connect with their authentic selves using EMDR, brain spotting, IFS, and psychedelic integration. Prior to becoming a therapist, Liz worked as a shaman's translator and ceremony facilitator at plant medicine centers in both Peru and Ecuador. Currently, Liz provides therapy services in Colorado and coaching services worldwide. For more HSP resources and to see behind-the-scenes video from the podcast, join me on Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube at Sensitive Strengths, or sign up for my email list. Links are in the show notes and at sensitivestories.com. And just a reminder that this episode is for educational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for treatment with a mental health or medical professional. Let's dive in the Welcome, Liz, to the podcast. Thank you so much, April. I'm so happy to have you here today. I'm wondering if you could start off by sharing your HSP discovery story, how or when you realize that you're highly sensitive.

Liz Zhou 2:31

Yeah, absolutely. So I would say I realized it at least several years ago. I don't know that there's like an exact moment or period of my life. And I was one of the people who grew up just being told I'm very sensitive or why are you right? Like, why is this affecting you in this way? So it was the word sensitive was always in my orbit. And then sometimes several years ago, I realized there was an actual HSP library and a term and that just an entire community of people who also experienced this. So that was part of the discovery.

April Snow 3:07

Yeah, I love that it was always in your orbit. That is so true that it's always around. We kind of have a sense that something might be a little bit different about me, but we don't always have the language or realize that it's this framework, this trait. So yeah, it makes sense that it was just always there in the background. And I know that a big support for you has been psychedelic work, and that's been part of your HSP unfolding. So I'm wondering if you could share a little bit more about that.

Liz Zhou 3:39

Yeah, I'd say that I started to kind of encounter psychedelic medicines maybe in undergrad of my college years and in recreational context mostly, psychedelic assisted therapy wasn't really a thing yet at that time. But as I was exploring my own personal relationship with psychedelic medicines, and though it was recreational, it was also very healing and therapeutic for me. I also was realizing how sensitive I was to the medicines, that I would be having experiences that seemed more intense than people around me. And not that it needs to be a competition of who's having the most intense experience, but that also clued me in that something in my wiring was just extra sensitive to things.

What Psychedelics Are And Why

April Snow 4:27

Yeah, that resonates a lot for me because having also experimented with psychedelics in college, as you do. Yeah, right. Yeah, looking back, there was times where I was having a very different experience than friends. And sometimes it was profound and it was spiritual and it was very nourishing, and other times it was really intense and a little bit scary just because I was maybe dosing compared to what others were doing, having a more sensitive nervous system, being more attuned to the effects of it. So I can really relate to that. And I'm glad that we're talking about this through an HSP lens, because as with anything, any treatment resource, we usually need a different approach. So I think this is going to be a really important conversation. And so when we're talking about psychedelics, can you tell us what you mean by that? Definitely.

Liz Zhou 5:22

It's such a broad term, right? And it can come with this mystery or even stigma or taboo. So when I say psychedelics, I'm referring to psychoactive substances. And sometimes they are derived from natural plants or fungi in the earth. Sometimes they are synthetically derived in a lab that induce an altered state of consciousness for a period of time. And by altered state, I mean your emotions might feel more vivid or intense, or you're just feeling more than you usually do. Maybe your thought patterns are different. You start having new insights, or dots are connecting in a new way in your brain. Also, physical sensations in the body can feel different under the effects of a psychedelic medicine, sense of time and space and sense of self, right? All of it can change. It's sort of like a dreaming state while you're waking. So, yeah, psychedelics could be any substance that induces that. And in the context of this conversation of like therapeutic psychedelic experiences, we might be thinking about cannabis. We might talk about ketamine. There's also psilocybin, also referred to as magic mushrooms. Those are some examples. But outside of a psychotherapy context, there's also this whole history of plant medicines across indigenous cultures like ayahuasca, San Pedro, Peyote, Eboga. Those are also psychedelic medicines.

Recreational Versus Therapeutic Use

April Snow 6:49

Yeah. So there's a wide menu of choices. Exactly. Yes. And I'm curious. So you mentioned recreational. So of course, people are using all these substances recreationally without the support of a therapist, maybe just for fun or for personal exploration or for spiritual practices. What's the difference between recreational use and therapeutic use? What's different there if you could shed some light on that experience? Yeah.

Liz Zhou 7:16

So with therapeutic use, we're we're looking at like using the psychedelic medicine within a structured psychotherapy context. And the medicine is really assisting the healing process that is happening between the therapist and the client, or maybe it's a therapist, facilitator, or healer and a group of people. And so that would happen under whatever legal regulations, whatever mental health regulations of that particular area. And in the states, we know that like each state can look really different, whether you're in Colorado or Oregon or Oakland, California, or like a, you know, Florida, New York, right? The laws vary, the regulations vary. So that's therapeutic use. And then recreational use is we're doing outside of the context of the therapy field. In therapeutic context, there is a medical provider. There's like a medical component as well. So you're getting like medically screened for the treatment. Whereas with recreational, it could look like you're at a festival. It could look like you're with friends and in that safe friend environment, but it's not being facilitated in a structured way by like a therapist. Yeah.

April Snow 8:28

Yeah. It's like when you're doing this alongside a practitioner, for me, there's a safety there because there's a guide. Because having experimented recreationally, there were some scary moments where I realized I needed a support person and there wasn't someone available. And that tipped it over for me from maybe an intense enjoyable experience to intense threatening experience. Threatening might be a strong word, but it was a very different moment, not having kind of this safety in place. And I know that's not true for everyone, but that was my personal experience. So that is soothing to me to think of someone is there with me to not only look out for me, but help me understand what's happening in the unfolding. Yes.

Liz Zhou 9:12

Yeah, it can feel so different. And to your point, recreational use can feel less contained because sometimes we just have to figure it out ourselves or scrap together information we're finding from the internet because the information isn't always easily available. And I will name for listeners that yeah, sometimes recreational news is kind of the entry point or window into discovering that therapeutic use exists. I have no judgment toward anyone who engages in recreational, right? It's whatever is accessible. And for some people, recreational feels safer if they can control some of the components and right, just the set and setting around it. Some people, therapeutic is safer. For some people, therapeutic use is not accessible financially or logistically. So, right, there's so many factors. And I just think it's important for us to just get good accurate information and safety information about whatever option we're considering.

Laws Shift By Place And Time

April Snow 10:03

Absolutely. And there's a few things that you mentioned there. One, you mentioned the legal differences from state to state, maybe even country to country. So I wonder if we could just name that. That's ever changing.

Liz Zhou 10:16

Yes. Yes, thank you. Because I know we're recording this in, you know, early 2026. Right. And since I'm based in Colorado, I've really seen and followed a bit how the legislation around natural medicine facilitation for psilocybin mushrooms, that's been a work in progress. There are programs rolling out, regulations rolling out. And a year from now, that'll look different or be more fleshed out. A year from now, another state might start something else, right? Also, rights can be taken away, right? It really depends. Yeah. So the US is its own situation. And then if we even look outside the US at ceremonial use of some plant medicines, like ayahuasca centers in Peru, right? San Pedro ceremonies in Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, that's operating under a whole other different system.

Set And Setting For HSPs

April Snow 11:05

Yeah, it's gonna depend on where you are and what time you're in. Exactly. Depending on what's available and how it's available. And you mentioned also set and setting. So for folks who aren't familiar with that, and because I think that's really an important component of this, could you define what those are?

Liz Zhou 11:21

Yeah. It's one of the kind of common vocabulary terms in the psychedelic therapy field, as we're all just getting acquainted with the field in its current form. So set and setting are the two things I really focus on when I'm preparing for a psychedelic experience or helping someone prepare. So set refers to like your internal state of mind. It's kind of short for mindset. And setting refers to the environment, what everything that's happening around you, the external surroundings. So with set, we want to think about am I like emotionally available for this experience? Am I able to be present? If I'm in a really busy period of my life or going through maybe just a really acute, right, like mental health experience, maybe that's not the best time for me to be then engaging in psychedelics because my set just isn't quite quite there. Right. For example, I also think of set in terms of what intentions we're bringing into the experience. So I want to be mindful that I'm not using psychedelics just to escape my life or to numb out or dissociate from everything. I'm wanting to use it intentionally to connect with a part of myself, connect with right community or, you know, connect with a sense of purpose or heart. So that's set. And then setting might involve like who is gonna be there in my experience? Who is facilitating this if I'm going that route? Where will it be? When will it be? Also, like the five senses, like what are the sights, sounds, smells, taste, touch of this experience, and especially for HSP, making sure that that's actually gonna accommodate your sensory needs in your nervous system. So all of that. And of course, like what medicine you're using, right? How you're consuming it, that is part of the setting as well.

April Snow 13:13

Absolutely. Yeah, there's all these factors that you can really be intentional about. And I hadn't heard that set is mindset, and I'm like, oh yeah, that makes so much sense. That's such an easy way to remember it. Yeah. So yeah, how are you entering into the experience? That's really, really important. I've definitely seen that for myself. And so thank you for that, just to bring in that consideration. So, as we're thinking about setting up the experience, how can we make sure that we're having a safe, meaningful process?

Liz Zhou 13:44

Yeah, yeah, that's such a big one. So, how can we have a safe and meaningful experience? I think of the whole experience in three phases. One is the preparation phase, one is the actual journey, like the time that you spend in that altered state of consciousness. And then there's the integration, everything that happens afterward. So safety and like meaning and like what you want to get out of this, it starts from really the moment you decide you're gonna do it. So if I decide today, yeah, a few months from now, I'm gonna really attend this retreat or like you know, sign up for this journey, like my journey starting now, the moment I decide that. And with prep work, if we're thinking about it in the therapeutic context, it could look like meeting for preparation sessions with a therapist or practitioner who is psychedelic informed. I would really be, yeah, I'd really want to work with someone who has a sense of like what this world is like, who can understand some of the vocabulary. It's not a total disqualifier. If, you know, you're working with a therapist and you have a really great connection. Maybe they're not totally informed on this. Like that, I wouldn't want you to not see the person you feel safe with, but just like that support happens in a context. And so that's the prep work. It really varies. Sometimes prep work can last for a few weeks and then you dive into the journey. Sometimes you're preparing for a whole year. There's really no set timeline. Yeah. Right. It it depends on what you need to feel safe and ready, and also what you might want to work through or kind of shake out in your own nervous system in terms of your processing before you then open up your psyche to like another, like to the medicine itself. So, as an example, in the psychedelic prep work I do with clients, sometimes we'll use modalities like IFS, internal family systems, brain spotting, EMDR to help kind of map out what are the themes coming up in your life right now. What do we maybe want to start working through? Start peeking through doors, just see what's there. And then when you get into the medicine journey, it's like your system has been prepped. Some neural pathways have been warmed up.

April Snow 15:52

That makes sense. Yeah. It's like the you're getting your system ready to receive.

Liz Zhou 15:57

Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. I will name too that prep work also involves just getting cleared medically for the treatment. So whether you're doing ketamine-assisted therapy, psilocybin assisted therapy, cannabis assisted, making sure that you are meeting with a medical provider or whatever the setup is of like the team or the context you're working in to just confirm there are no contraindications and that your body is right now a physical fit to consume the medicines.

April Snow 16:25

That makes sense. So it's you're looking at it from a few different layers: emotional, physical, mental.

Liz Zhou 16:31

Exactly.

April Snow 16:32

Exactly.

Liz Zhou 16:33

Yeah. Yeah. And psychologically, I would, you know, make sure, again, that I'm not going through an acute mental health crisis at the moment. Sometimes folks who have a history of psychosis or schizophrenia or like significant, yeah, or like just are going through a significant mental health period. Again, that might be a contraindication. So that's all the prep, right? There's so much that happens there. Yeah. Yeah. And then the journey itself. So, you know, by now we're assuming that, you know, you've connected with a facilitator, a therapist who you feel really safe and trusting with. I would think about the sensory components of the experience for yourself as an HSP, because some things that might not bother a non-HSP person might make a huge impact on your journey, like the lighting or smells in the space. Or yeah, those are two big ones. Or the sound, like the music in a psychedelic experience can really shape where you go in your psyche. So that's something, you know, worth having a conversation about with your facilitator if they're choosing the music for you. If you're bringing your own music to the session, to the psychedelic session, then right, like just be mindful about what you're putting into your system in that heightened state of sensitivity.

April Snow 17:43

Yeah, that piece really can influence the experience.

Liz Zhou 17:47

Yeah.

April Snow 17:47

Yeah.

Liz Zhou 17:49

And then I'll add there's kind of a way of being in the journey that can really aid in like a meaningful experience. So, first of all, like whatever happens is whatever happens. Like the whole point of the journey is like we are here to learn about ourselves. We are not here to control. Like it's really hard to control where a psychedelic journey goes unless you're like gripping really tight. And but then we learn something from that. Like, why are we gripping? You know? Right. And so kind of like the intentionality of like being present with whatever happens, just receiving whatever information comes through, being open and curious, just following where your brain takes you, where your body kind of what your body's feeling in the moment. And so the journey itself might be anywhere between a couple hours if you're doing ketamine work to like a whole day or half a day if you're doing psilocybin work. It might look like a series of sessions or a series of treatments. Sometimes people will do like two to three CAP sessions in a week at a certain cadence, just to keep like compounding the benefits and the neuroplastic effects in the brain. Sometimes you do one journey and it's really powerful and profound, and that's enough. So again, depending on what medicine you work with, how that plays out will look different. And then finally, the integration piece, right? How do we bring safety and meaning into that? I would say make sure you're doing integration work in some way, whether it's meeting for sessions with your therapist or practitioner, whether it's joining integration circles, like groups that meet to debrief the experience, whether it's just journaling, making art about it, journaling about it, just making space in your life so that the journey you just had isn't just something that fades in the distance. It's like, oh, that was cool or like something happened, but it's like disjointed from the rest of your life. How do we bridge that into how you want to live?

April Snow 19:35

How you want to live? Yeah, that's a great question. Yeah. So this process of the preparation, the journey, the integration, it really aligns with an HSV experience because we like to process before, we like to take our time and soak it up. And then we like to reflect after. So I really appreciate that that is part of the experience. Even though the journey can be unknown, we at least know the structure. That feels really supportive. Yeah.

Liz Zhou 20:06

Yeah. I love that reflection of yeah, we have like in kind of boarding the plane and then get flying and then debarking. Yeah.

Finding A Provider And Choosing A Medicine

April Snow 20:14

Exactly. That's a great metaphor. That's exactly it. So it sounds like you know, obviously, the setting is really important, the person that you're working with. So I have a couple of questions there. How do I find a provider? If I'm if I'm listening to the sound, like this might be something that I'm really interested. Obviously, if you have a therapist, you could ask them about it or ask for a referral. But if I'm starting from scratch, are there places I can go to find a provider? Or do I just Google?

Liz Zhou 20:41

That's a great question. Google is certainly a place you could go. There are directories off the top of my head. I know that there's like the third wave directory, and they'll include people who do prep work, integration work, and then journey work. And some people do some, some people do all. Currently, I only do prep and integration, and I'll refer someone to someone else for the journey. There's also a directory on elemental psychedelics, their website. There's, yeah, and lots of other like Polaris Institute. So yeah, I'd say if you have a therapist, ask them for a referral because they know you best and they're kind of tapped into that clinical world. But if you are just starting from scratch, yeah, Google or look up some of the sites I named.

April Snow 21:21

Yeah, thank you. And I'll put those in the show notes for folks. And also, because there's quite a few options now. We've talked about CAP, which is ketamine-assisted psychotherapy, psilocybin, mushrooms. What else am I missing? Cannabis. But how do I how do I know which is the right one to choose? You know, may and maybe there's some personal exploration. So you know that okay, this works for my system. But I'm wondering as you're talking with clients, is that a part of the conversation about this the medicine to work with?

Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy Explained

Liz Zhou 21:53

Yeah, absolutely. I'd say that sometimes the decision gets made for us if For example, they're in an area where the psilocybin isn't legally available yet, whereas ketamine is more available across the US. So sometimes CAP, ketamine-assisted psychotherapy is the only option. Within that, there are actually layers of options of whether you're gonna work with the ketamine sublingually, like it's a lozenge that you take in your mouth, whether it's intramuscular and it's like injected, whether it's IV or right. So there are variations of that, usually for CAP therapeutic where people are using the lozenge of the sublingual, rapidly dissolving tablet under the tongue. But to answer the larger question, if we're like just imagine that we do have a few different options, cannabis, psilocybin, and ketamine, I do like to provide the psychoeducation on what are some of the different effects? Because each medicine has their own personality. They're not just like box A, box B, box C, right? So ketamine in its sublingual form, it's you would put it under your tongue, dissolve it for several minutes, spit it out, and then the effects of the medicine in that form might last, you know, and like an hour, maybe a bit more. So then a CAP session is between one to three hours, if we want time to right again, do the board the plane, be in the effects, and then debark. So I know a lot of really amazing therapists who do three-hour intensives for CAP or even longer. And the effects of that is it's really calming and relaxing for the nervous system. Ketamine is officially referred to by the FDA as like a dissociative anesthetic. And what that means, I know even that term can sound scary, but like dissociative, is that it kind of helps people become the observer of their experience. That's the dissociative part. I know when we hear disassociation, we might assume that's bad. Like we don't want to dissociate, but kind of the way we talk about in the psychedelic field is that it's almost like the ketamine will dissociate for you. And then you can actually be present with yourself in a totally different way. And then, so if people, if their body is holding like memories or you know, traumatic wounds that are really painful to look at or go toward, you know, when they're just in their normal state of consciousness, what the ketamine does is it can sort of soften things, it can make scary things easier to look at. And then it can also help soften some of like our protector parts or the guardedness that we may live in in our nervous systems. And just for that hour, like the guardrails come down and we can really experience ourselves in a different way. And then layer that on top of like therapeutic work while you're under the effects academy, right? Like if you're also doing some parts work as you're coming out at the main effects of the medicine, or if you're doing brain spotting or like some EMDR bilateral stimulation, right? That dual dual effect of the therapy and the medicine, like that's where the healing just can be so powerful.

April Snow 24:50

Incredibly powerful. You actually get the space to do the healing work. There's yeah, for in the space, at least for me, there's safety. So it's like, okay, I can actually make some different choices and disconnect from the anxiety or the trauma. And then okay, can kind of touch back into some true self-experiences. It's it's pretty powerful. Yeah. So yeah, we don't have to be scared of that dissociative effect.

Liz Zhou 25:18

Yeah, yeah. And I'd say when I've seen people become scared or have concerns about that, right? There's something about the sentence setting that may be off, right? It's yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

April Snow 25:29

Always go back to the foundation.

Psilocybin Effects And Cultural Roots

Liz Zhou 25:30

Yeah, yeah. I can share a little bit about psilocybin, like the psychoeducation around that if that's helpful.

April Snow 25:36

Yeah, I think that would be great for folks who maybe aren't familiar with that, especially through a therapeutic context.

Liz Zhou 25:42

Right, right. Yeah, because so many of us have heard it as like, yeah, just tripping on shrooms, like in a recreational and like that that can be so deep as well. Like I know people had life-changing experiences with that. But in the psilocybin-assisted therapy world, I'd say that psilocybin is a natural medicine. It is a fungus that grows from the earth. It's been used just for thousands of years, actually, outside the US in these indigenous ceremonial contexts and shamanic contexts. But one of the most notable is the like Mazatec culture, Mazatec Huranderas in Mexico and Watla de Jimenez. That's actually how the West was introduced to mushrooms, magic mushrooms. So I just want to name that that this is like so much older and bigger than just like what we're doing here in the States and like kind of getting caught up to what communities have been kind of telling us for ages. But psilocybin is its effects that lasts longer than ketamine. So it can be up to six hours, sometimes longer, sometimes shorter. And some people say they can really feel like if you ascribe to these systems of beliefs, right? Kind of the spirit of the medicine that it's very, it's alive, it's a being, it's an entity, it's in the earth. And just because it doesn't communicate in our human language way, it can still communicate in like the way we feel when the mushroom is like in our bodies, when we're chewing it, right? So some people have spiritual experiences with psilocybin, some people have spiritual experiences with ketamine. It also depends on who you are as a person. Nothing's gonna make you spiritual if you're not all right, right? Like it's not gonna make anything, you're not gonna come out of it a different person. It's actually just gonna amplify or make you more aware of what's already there inside you. But yeah, so with psilocybin, it can, you know, sometimes people can really access their joy more easily. It's a sense of playfulness. It's like their brains kind of turn into or reconnect with their inner child self. So sometimes we're like you'll laugh a lot. Sometimes you'll cry just deeply, right? That whole spectrum of grief, it can really allow you to feel your anger or like feel your power too. So I think of it as it just kind of makes your inner world more colorful and vivid. Sometimes you might have visions, like you might see things with your eyes closed or open, colors might look different, smells might smell different. So that's that's a bit about psilocybin.

April Snow 28:01

So quite a different experience than ketamine. It can be, yeah, it can be, yeah, depending on the person and the experience. Yeah.

Liz Zhou 28:09

Yeah.

HSP Sensory Overwhelm And Self Advocacy

April Snow 28:09

Yeah. I love that that there's different, well, of course, depending on where you are, but there's different options depending on what you're looking for, what feels right for your nervous system. I'm curious with psilocybin. Obviously, there's a lot of sensory changes potentially. Could that be overwhelming for an HSP, do you think?

Liz Zhou 28:32

I think so. I think that, yeah, you're definitely onto something. And even as I recall my like personal experiences with ketamine and psilocybin, there was definitely a sensitivity that came with both, but it did feel different. And so I guess what I'd say for any HSPs is that like if you already have a strong reaction to a certain smell, like peppermint, like you're you're gonna have an even stronger reaction on psilocybin to the peppermint, to give a really basic example. Yeah. And then like also with sounds, if there's a song you listen to just in your everyday life that just makes you tear up a little bit, you might be bawling if you hear it on a psychedelic medicine, or it might just hit you totally differently. Yeah. And so we can see how that might tip toward like, oh, that can make the experience more powerful and healing, or it can make it overwhelming. And so that's where, yeah, I just think it's so important for us to know what our body means or just be curious about it and also just not be afraid to advocate and ask, hey, like I'd actually prefer to sit in a softer seat, or like I'd rather that light be off and this light be on, right? Like ways we can micro-attune to make our environment more safe.

April Snow 29:43

Well, and it goes back to what you're saying around it's you just enhanced or having a more heightened experience. So yeah, if you know that certain sensory experiences will be uncomfortable or be overstimulating, you can ask to tone those down in your preparation, it sounds like. And which I imagine the preparation part is, as with everything, even more important for HSPs to really look at those little details.

Liz Zhou 30:10

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And I'm actually thinking that it could be really reparative on a nervous system and like attachment level to be able to say, like, actually, I need this, right? Because I think a lot of HSPs kind of we can self-abandon our own needs or feel like we're not allowed to ask for that because, like, oh, that's crazy, like that's too sensitive. But to really own that, it's like, I need that. And the medicine can make it more impossible than usual to ignore that we have needs. So then, like that, that reparative experience. And then I'm also just wanting to know in the integration, right? As we're debarking the plane, that's where the heightened sensitivity might just be like extra hitting you. Because even if the effects of the medicine have left your system, like you're no longer seeing things differently with your eyes, you're no longer hearing things enhanced or having altered thought patterns, but your nervous system is still in the hours or days after the psychedelic different. Something has moved through your system. So yeah, that's where, you know, when people re-enter the world, especially if they're coming out of a retreat or just a really contained experience, it can feel a little bit rough to like land back into reality of like, oh my God, the cars are honking and the laptop screen is so bright. So, or the coffee, like the caffeine is extra caffeinated. So then I want to just give people a heads up, like be really gentle with yourself also in the days after.

Is It Right For You And Your Why

April Snow 31:30

Definitely like give yourself as much of a soft landing as you can. Yeah. Because everything will probably be a little bit more or a lot more heightened. Yeah, exactly. Makes sense because especially for HSPs, we need more time for transition and we're gonna notice the subtleties of those changes. So just yeah, having more space to integrate into land after makes sense. Yeah. So I appreciate you laying out what this looks like because even for me, it's like, oh, this is it feels a lot more clearer having someone who is so knowledgeable about this process, lay it out, and just to think about it through an HSP lens, because there have been things I've needed to advocate for myself for around dose or setting or the process that's really important. So if someone is thinking, well, I might want to try this. This sounds like it could be a great resource for me. How do we know if it's right? You know, and we talked a bit about when it's not right, like if you're maybe dealing with psychosis or a more heightened mental health issue, but how do I know if it's right for me?

Liz Zhou 32:33

Yeah, yeah. And I appreciate that, just that thoughtfulness of that question. Because I think something I've noticed in the way psychedelics are talked about is, and you know, like just like the capitalism of our society of like, yeah, like my friend sent me a photo of an ad on the New York Subway the other week saying it was an ad for ketamine treatment, and it was just like spritz your depression away. And at that point, it just spritz it away. And I'm not one to say like nothing can't right. I'm like, if that helps someone, yeah, I want them to see that like, but it's like that messaging of says something can just be like, oh, just pop that away, right? But exactly, yeah. So I that but to your question, how do we know if it's right? I would really want to know like what is my why? Is my why that I just want to again escape, dissociate, not feel anything, just go off into like la la land and never come back. And like also no, no judgment if there are parts of us that want to do that. Like, I get that too. But that I wouldn't, yeah, that doesn't to me feel like like right relationship with whatever medicine we're working with or right relationship with yourself. I think we also like owe it to ourselves to be here for us and like be active participants in our lives, even though it can be really hard sometimes. So just having a sense of an intention. And I'm not saying we have to know exactly like what we're here to work on. Sometimes people just know like they've felt stuck forever and nothing else has really worked, and they're like, I just I need to work through this. And like the first step is to figure out what I need to work through. Like that's okay too. That can be an entry point. But it's really this energy of I'm going into this open to see what might happen and not because I'm grasping on a certain outcome, like this will fix me or this will heal me or make me not broken. Because we're like no no one is broken anyway, but just so that we're not using this modality to reinforce narratives that like that narrative is harming us.

April Snow 34:25

It is, isn't it? That we think like, oh, this is the thing that will make me good enough or okay or unbroken. It's like, no, yeah, you're not broken. It's more of let's explore, let's see what's there. What do you need? What could be supportive? What could shift? Yes. Is there a little bit more room for your true self-experience to come through and to get back into maybe who you were or have always been, I should say.

Liz Zhou 34:51

Exactly.

April Snow 34:51

Yeah, it seems like more of a journey than a destination, if that makes sense.

Liz Zhou 34:56

Yes, exactly. Exactly. Yeah, yeah. And I'm also thinking about like when we choose to work with psychedelic medicines, we're introducing another relationship into our lives, the relationship with the medicine. And though we may think of it as like this is an inanimate, like, how do we have a relationship with like this lozenge, right? Or this mushroom, but it's like, let's let's be open to that. Um yeah, relationship with cannabis, with the plants, with earth. And so, you know, if you're just starting your first psychedelic therapy session, think of it as your first date with that medicine. Like, and then the next time, if there is an example, that's the second date. And after, and then that's the relationship building, or it's like a handshake at first. And actually, some models of care will have this titrating approach where like the first session with the medicine is a lower dose. That's really common for ketamine work, for psilocybin work, right? Dip your toes in the water. And then if that feels good and it's like everyone consents to moving forward, all parts of you, then you go on a second date. Um so yeah, and I know that, you know, in some of my personal experiences and work with different medicines, plant medicines, it's really been like the relationship with the spirit of that medicine and also the community surrounding it that really steward its right, right usage. Yeah. And I think we can really have a version of that here in our Western culture too. If we if we bring attention.

April Snow 36:20

I really appreciate that. That you can take it slow, but you can try it on basically, like that first date. Like, yeah, we're gonna start with a handshake before we move to the next stage. And so you could try it and realize this isn't quite the right medicine for me or the right experience for me. And that's okay. Yeah, yeah, you can change your mind.

Liz Zhou 36:42

Yes, yes, and how like freeing that is, yeah, to change our minds.

April Snow 36:47

Oh, so free. That's how this whole process feels, whether it's going in or deciding to move away. Like, yeah, there's a lot of choice along the way. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's beautiful.

Liz Zhou 37:00

Yeah.

Harm History Accountability And Less Is More

April Snow 37:00

Well, Liz, I'm wondering, is there anything that we didn't touch on that feels important to know about the psychedelic therapeutic process? I know we've talked about the different stages and when it's right and when it might not be right. Yeah, is there anything that you think we missed?

Liz Zhou 37:16

I feel like it could be like five different conversations, each breaking down every micro topic. I think if I were to kind of end with something, especially in that HSP lens of like we can take it slow, we have choice, and also recognizing that the psychedelic field has had a history of harm. Like, I really want to name that and like that, yeah, we don't owe the field our trust. I think it needs to be earned. And I think that's why, like, if we choose to embark on this, like, yeah, just making sure we are connecting with the practitioners, the therapists, the guides that really feels safe for us. And to know that, like, especially for me as a practitioner in the field, I'm really wanting to hold the field to a very high standard and keep us all accountable to like just the harms that have happened. We also need to recognize the context of like the war on drugs and what that has done to marginalized communities and that those are wrongs that must be right, like repaired as well. Like this is all actually, it's like everything is connected. So I want to name that piece as well. And for the HSP, that like less can be more, right? Like we feel the subtleties, we feel the nuances. I don't, I never want anyone to feel like they have to chase the highest dose or the most intense high because sometimes less is more.

April Snow 38:36

Yeah, less is more. And I appreciate that bigger context of you know, like you said, this medicine has been passed down from different cultures through generations. We're still learning about it in this modern context when it's being regulated, and it is really important to find a provider that you feel safe with, that you feel like you can trust, especially as it is new in the US through the therapy lens. So just taking a moment to check in with who you're working with and see if this is the right setting for me. Again, and advocating, you know, for me, I started with half of the lowest dose.

Liz Zhou 39:12

Nice.

April Snow 39:13

And that was right for me. Yes. Um, so just to know, like you might have a different need, and that's okay. And there's now research that HSPs are more not reactive, but responsive to medication. So we're starting to see actual research about that now, which is exciting. Yeah, so you can trust that if your body is saying, I need something less, it's okay. Yeah, yes, lots of room.

Liz Zhou 39:37

Yeah, yeah.

April Snow 39:38

Well Liz, thank you so much. I'm really excited for this conversation. As I said, I think it's a really important one because HSPs, we are more attuned to these subtler natural medicines. I think it's really important to be able to think about this through that lens and consider it as a resource.

Liz Zhou 39:56

Yes.

April Snow 39:56

In a safe way. So yeah, I'm I'm wondering if you'd like to share a little bit more about if folks want to work with you. Obviously, I'll share all the resources in the show notes along with your website, your Instagram. And I know you have a free prep and integration guide. We'll make sure to include that as well. But if anyone wants to l work with you, could you tell them a little bit more about that?

Liz Zhou 40:14

Yeah, for sure. So I offer psychedelic prep and integration sessions for folks. And then I can always connect you with a practitioner, therapist, or guide whom I really trust if you're looking for someone to do the journey with. And so my services are available in Colorado as therapy services. And then I also provide psychedelic integration coaching for folks outside of Colorado worldwide. So different options to work with me. And it can look short-term, like a series of psychoeducation prep sessions if you're just kind of figuring things out, um, or it can look longer term if you're wanting someone to kind of hold you through all the different phases. Yeah. And that free guide for anyone who wants it.

April Snow 40:54

Yeah, that's a great place to start, just to start the very early stages of that prep process, that explore exploration. Yeah. Beautiful. Thank you so much, Liz.

Liz Zhou 41:05

Welcome.

April Snow 41:11

Thanks so much for joining me and Liz for today's conversation. What I hope you're walking away with from this episode is a reminder that your HSP tendency to take your time, to set intentions, to prepare is very valuable, and that it's important to advocate for yourself on any healing journey. Only you know what's best for you, and it's okay to ask for adjustments. If you're interested in exploring psychedelic therapy, you can start by downloading Liz's free prep and integration guide or scheduling a coaching session with her. Go to seasonsofgrowthcounseling.com or find links in the show notes. If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to the Sensitive Stories podcast so you don't miss our upcoming conversations. Reviews and ratings are also helpful and appreciated. For behind the scenes content and more HSP resources, you can sign up for my email list or follow Sensitive Strengths on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. Check out the show notes or sensitivestories.com for all the resources from today's episode. Thanks for listening.