Entering the Psychedelic Field - Supporting Clients in a Shifting Psychedelic Landscape

As psychedelic use grows across clinical, underground, and personal contexts, mental health professionals are increasingly being called upon to support clients in ways that are safe, ethical, and transformative — even if they are not facilitating journeys themselves.

Entering the Psychedelic Field is an 8-week online course designed for therapists, guides, and curious professionals who would like to develop a practice in the emerging world of psychedelic therapy that is grounded in current research, clinical best-practices, and a supportive professional community.

Taught by practitioners with deep and varied real-world experience, this course equips participants to support psychedelic preparation and integration across clinical, ceremonial, supervised, and personal use settings, offering practical tools alongside theoretical frameworks, with plenty of contextual nuance.

Participants will explore their own role, scope of practice, and motivations in doing this complex work. Whether you’re curious or already engaged in psychedelic care, this course will help you move forward with clarity, humility, and skill.

What You'll Learn

• A working understanding of the current psychedelic therapy landscape—in Canada, the US, and beyond—including clinical models, legal access points (like SAP and ketamine clinics), and underground or informal use.
• How to support clients in psychedelic preparation and integration, even when you're not present during the experience.
• Key harm reduction principles, and how to apply them skillfully across diverse contexts.
• Practical tools and frameworks for assessing client readiness, identifying risks, ensuring safety, and recognizing when to involve or navigate medical and psychiatric systems.
• Greater clarity around your own ethical responsibilities, scope of practice, and boundaries—alongside strategies for self-reflection and sustainable engagement in this evolving field
  

Course Format & Details

• 8 live online sessions (90 minutes each)

• Fridays from 12:30–2:00 PM ET — April 10 to May 29

• Replays available for all sessions

• Includes guided practices, case reflections, and downloadable tools

Weekly Breakdown

Week 1 — The Psychedelic Landscape: Then, Now, & Next
Explore the cultural, clinical, and political currents shaping today’s psychedelic movement — from indigenous roots to clinical trials and contemporary access models.

Week 2 — Harm Reduction as a Healing Framework
Learn how harm reduction applies to psychedelic work and how to ethically support clients using substances outside of regulated systems.

Week 3 — Screening and Assessment
Client assessment and screening, including contraindications and risk mapping.

Week 4 — Preparation
Managing expectations, psychological/somatic prep, informed consent, and therapist role-setting.

Week 5 — A Framework for Psychedelic Healing
Explore experiential avoidance, the foundations of the trauma paradigm, and the practice of embodied inquiry for working with both.

Week 6 — Psychedelic Integration in Practice
Tools and approaches to support post-journey meaning-making and psychological integration.

Week 7 — Ethics, Scope, and Spiritual Integrity
Understand professional limitations, dual relationships, consent, and the ethical dimensions of spiritual emergence and power dynamics.

Week 8 — Entering the Field
Clarify the emerging frameworks for legal facilitation, explore professional pathways, and understand what’s needed to support this work long-term.

Who This Course Is For

• Therapists, coaches, and mental health professionals

• Psychedelic guides and facilitators

• Mindfulness and meditation teachers

• Peer support providers and integration specialists

• Anyone beginning to support psychedelic work in a professional or semi-professional context

Your Facilitators

Drawing on decades of combined experience in psychotherapy, mindfulness-based practices, integration work, and psychedelics, Dr. Joe Flanders and Andrew Rose will guide participants through a deep, practical, and ethically grounded exploration of this emerging field.

About Joe

Joe received his PhD in Clinical Psychology from McGill University in 2008 and went on to complete a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He founded Mindspace Wellbeing in 2011, a clinic chain in Montreal specializing in mindfulness-based psychotherapy and group programs. In 2021, Mindspace was acquired by Numinus and Joe took on the role of Vice-President of Practitioner Training. Since 2023, he has been focusing on his private practice as well as his role at Refuge. Joe specializes in Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy and occasionally (and legally) introduces psychedelic substances to catalyze on-going psychotherapy with clients who are eligible. He has been trained to deliver psychedelic-assisted therapy by Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) and contributed to their phase 3 clinical trial. He holds the Advanced Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) Facilitation Certificates from the Centre for Mindfulness Studies (CMS) in Toronto and has extensive training in Mindfulness-Based Psychotherapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT).

About Andrew

Andrew Rose is a psychedelic integration coach and educator, certified mindfulness teacher, and strategic consultant with over 20 years of experience working with psychedelics, meditation, and contemplative practices. Since 2017, he has educated clinicians, therapists and the public about psychedelics and their therapeutic applications. He maintains a private practice supporting clients around the world with issues related to non-ordinary states of consciousness, spirituality, and wellbeing. He is also the co-director of Plant Parenthood, a community organization supporting parents and families who are interested in the intersection of intentional psychedelic use, parenting, and family life. He previously played strategic leadership roles with a number of prominent organizations in the psychedelic sector including Mindspace, Numinus, Fluence and the Psychedelic Safety Institute. Learn more about Andrew here.