Welcome back to the Soul Care for Therapist podcast. In this episode, host Dawn Gabriel invites special guest Alexis Ward, LMFT, to talk about sacred plant medicine and its integration with therapy. Alexis Ward shares her background as a transpersonal psychotherapist and her journey into specializing in working with men's issues and sacred plant medicine integration. About Alexis Ward, LMFT Alexis received her master's degree in counseling psychology from Sophia University in Palo Alto. After receiving her license in Marriage and Family Therapy, she opened a private practice in Los Gatos, CA. Alexis moved to Colorado in early 2014 and eventually opened a practice in the DTC area. She specializes in working with spiritual emergence/emergency, plant medicine integration, men's therapy, EMDR, individuals, and couples. Introduction and Background Dawn introduces Alexis Ward, a therapist specializing in sacred plant medicine integration. Alexis talks about her practice and her background as a transpersonal psychotherapist, explaining how she integrates existential concepts, spirituality, and religion into her work with clients. "I recently relocated down to Castle Rock, as you said. Um, but I've been in practice for a little over 15 years now, and, um, more recently have come to specialize in working with men's issues, um, and then also with sacred plant medicine integration." Exploring Spiritual Emergence and Plant Medicine Dawn and Alexis discuss spiritual emergence and its connection to sacred plant medicine. Alexis defines spiritual emergence as a point in someone's life where they are exploring the deeper meaning of their own existence. They also touch on the potential challenges and overwhelming experiences that can arise during spiritual emergence, especially when working with plant medicines. "Spiritual emergence really just being, you know, a point in somebody's life where they are looking at the deeper meaning of their own existence. Um, so that can be after a, like a near-death experience. That could be through a plant medicine experience, that could be through getting divorced, um, or just kind of reaching a point in life where they're questioning more of those things for themselves." "Sometimes even a more difficult outcome is the sort of disappointing experience. Cuz sometimes nothing happens, or from the life perspective, nothing happens. Or sometimes it's just kind of minimal and it's not the life-changing event that they were hoping that it would be." Types of Sacred Plant Medicines The conversation shifts to discussing different types of sacred plant medicines and their psychoactive properties. Alexis mentions some commonly known psychoactive substances such as psilocybin mushrooms, cannabis, and ayahuasca. She also explains the distinction between natural derivatives and chemically altered versions used in clinical settings. "The more commonplace ones that are psychoactive are psilocybin mushrooms, um, cannabis, we all know that one. Um, there is iboga or Ibogaine. So iboga is, um, it comes from a shrub that grows in Africa, and the natural bark of that is something that you can ingest and have the psychoactive experiences from." "For a lot of these substances, there's a natural derivative and then there's like a more, um, chemically altered type version of it. And often it's that second group that's used in the, um, like the clinical trial settings or in ibogaine clinics, in ketamine clinics and things like that." Therapeutic Applications and Integration Dawn and Alexis explore the therapeutic applications of sacred plant medicines. They discuss how different substances can be beneficial for various conditions, including trauma, depression, PTSD, and addiction. Alexis emphasizes the importance of psychedelic integration work and the role of therapists in helping clients process their experiences. "A lot of times, people are very excited about going into the experience, but they don't necessarily th