Policy Push for Psychedelics: Hope, Hype, and the Need for Wisdom
The burgeoning field of psychedelic care (O’Brien, 2023c; O’Brien, 2024a; O’Brien, 2025), once confined to the fringes, has been stepping into the national spotlight recently, garnering attention from the highest levels of government. This growing momentum offers significant hope for millions suffering from depression and trauma, but it also raises critical questions about the systems integrity and the need for wisdom in implementation.
Recently, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has emerged as a vocal proponent, stating that psychedelic therapy for depression and trauma has “tremendous advantage if given in a clinical setting”. His desire to see this happen within 12 months has apparently surprised even strong proponents of these drugs, signaling a rapid acceleration of the conversation. But this is long overdue. This political push aligns with the FDA’s new “top priority” status for evaluating MDMA and other psychedelics, with initiatives aimed at accelerating approval, potentially reducing review time from six months or more to as little as one month for drugs serving “the health interests of Americans”. The hiring of new staff with connections to the psychedelic movement is seen by some as “very promising signs that the administration is aware of the potential of psychedelics and is trying to make overtures that they’re ready to approve them”. However, since the medical model is inherently biased (O’Brien, 2025), motivated by profit, and the field of healthcare does not have pathology or addiction accurately captured (e.g., terms like addiction and unconsciously legally defined) (O’Brien, 2023a), should modern medicine and those professions who enabled and supported a war on these healing natural plants (e.g., not “drugs”), said that they have “no medical value”, and made them illegal with no science be the ones in charge of them? How should recovery community feel about this on the heels of knowing that bureaucratic incompetence and questionable or immature science sent people to prision for what they defined as a disease, allowed the opiates to be sold as non-addictive, and created COVID?
This high-level political support, while exciting, brings us to a crucial intersection with the scientific understanding championed by the Wounded Healers Institute (WHI). The WHI emphasizes that Psychedelic Therapy (PT) is already an evidence-based practice because meditation is; and because it directly accesses Memory Reconsolidation (MR), a key indicator for effective trauma resolution (O’Brien, 2023a; O’Brien, 2023b). With this implicit stamp of approval, the recovery movement should be awake enough to recognize the opportunity here to say hello to its own history with psychedelics. If RFK wanted to do anything for the people, he would legalize all classical psychedelics (all cannabis, mushrooms, LSD, ayahuasca, and DMT) and let them be used in the tradition of self-help, let concerts happen as they have been, and let people heal from bureaucratic rule.
WHI’s advocacy is for proper screening and assessment because psychology and the medical model has yet to produce an operational definition of addiction. Until now (O’Brien, 2023a). While we can appreciate the scientific community and all their efforts, this has been a war on “drugs” that science is actually showing us heals. Which science of theirs should we follow now or can we follow our own? Recovery was made by us because they could not then and will still not know show up in a way that will give the people what they need. But that seems to be turning. Our work highlights the dangers of all drug use and memory systems and invasive medical interventions without a clearer understanding of dissociation and the worlds that psychedelics provoke (O’Brien, 2023a) by those who clearly don’t know. Our recovery experience is invaluable to those who are ready to believe in those who have gone there and come back. Going into the unknown has risks and WHI’s clinical observation is that without Unconscious Informed Consent, no one should be giving any drugs to anyone (prescribed or not).
Both the political push and WHI’s work recognize the profound therapeutic potential of psychedelics to offer a viable and reliable path to healing for both physical and psychological trauma, but we should all be skeptical of a healthcare system that supports a war on drugs through bureaucratic compliance and submission (fawning due to dependence), implicitly denying the truth that science has revealed? Does psychology and society believe that drug and gambling are the only addictions causing harm to others?
Addiction as Dissociation Model proposes that perfectionism, altruism, and ambition addictions be considered as a way of promoting equality amongst civilians, profesions, and generations. However, the pace of proposed approval also sparks significant concern to those who forget that science already found that they have medical value in 1994 by an FDA approved study. There’s a palpable fear that “hype around psychedelics might be outpacing the science” and that “bypassing rigorous clinical trials could harm the field and endanger patients”. This does not directly contrasts with the meticulous research and deep understanding of complex neurobiological processes that the WHI advocates for because it has already been done. WHI also advocates for qualitative reasoning instead of more quantitative analysis because in psychedelic lands, 1 + 1 = 3. More than anyone else, as a person in long-term recovery, RFK should consider giving psychedelics to the people and allowing recovery community educate others and use them like Bill W. had requested and supported after doing LSD for the first time. From our recovery, clinical, and researched point of view, the people are more ready then the system to handle psychedelics. Dr. O’Brien takes it further to say that those who do not, would not, or have not done mind altering activities (with psychedelics or not) should consider doing it sooner than later because it is a wonderful way to prepare for life and death. This is why he sees the professional Healer as different, then those who namely conveniently cite psychology rather than live it.
Dr. Adam argues that the need for empirical evidence to please legal and bureaucratic rhetoric is the addiction we need to be talking about because what psychedelic means is mind manifesting. If the physical body is the psychological unconscious, then what mind is manifesting in which and how to assess becomes the question that psychology needs to legally answer because the legal and political professions are and have been behaving addictively. Should these “drugs” that are really plants that they have made into “drugs” have been made illegal by other professions besides psychology who do not understand the science? We offer our Meeting Area Screening and Assessment for all. Our purpose is to address how recovery can be helpful is addressing the same ignorance that imprisoned their own citizens based on no science, made “drugs” illegal, and stressed civilians out needlessly with a war against healing. Common herbs, plants, and mushrooms that science is now showing heal are what it was all about now that the dust is clearing. Those who already knew this should be able to inform those that said that they had “no medical value” until they found it. Such a implicit legal incompetent position directly challenges the scientific and evidence-based approach that the Wounded Healers Institute champions and expects from society. WHI supports how memory reconsolidation has become foundational to trauma therapies where directly reprocessing overwhelming memories are made possible with the aid of a Mechanism of Action. If psychology, the body, and the qualitative feminine wisdom has any rights at all with the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment.
The Wounded Healers Institute’s stance prioritizes trauma care in psychedelics because “set, setting, and skill with recovery lived experience” for positive outcomes in psychedelic therapy or psychedelic care are not happening, as the roll out of ketamine from 2012 demonstrates. Rapid results without sufficient orientation and attention to thorough preparation, post-session integration, and the training of trauma-competent therapists proficient in dissociation, literature, and MR principles could undermine safety and efficacy. As someone who has been performing memory reconsolidation on traumatic drug use memories and dissociative memories for 15 years, Dr. Adam defers to how ketamine is still being used without guides or complete orientation as a indicator of the level of awareness of the systems supported approach without recovery or Healers. As the WHI highlights the systems lack of understanding in addiction because for many clients, the “medicine is much more reliable and trustworthy than people/clinicians or the therapeutic process” so the type of profession needed to do this work properly are those who have been there and come back (e.g., those in recovery). Due to past relational traumas, underscoring the critical need for highly moral human guidance within a healing container, the field of psychology being governed by the law is suspect, due to the professions level of moral development, spiritual growth, degree of recovery, and cognitive abilities (HERE). Psychedelic healing need safeguarding from the professions because what is considered psychological is spiritual, intergenerational, mystic, ancestral, and moral territory.
While political support for psychedelic therapy is a promising development, true progress requires a balanced approach that prioritizes scientific freedom, ethical implementation, moral honesty, transparency in professional dynamics, separate and equal status for professions, and comprehensive clinician education and training over legal opinions on matters of psychological science. The goal should be profound, lasting healing, not more systems involvement, thus we present our solution of the new profession of Healer. The Wounded Healers Institute’s work serves as a vital reminder that while the promise is immense, the path forward must be paved with wisdom and a deep commitment to citizen well-being over corporate compliance.
In our last blog post in this series, we’ll delve deeper into the specific safeguards and training essential to ensure psychedelic therapy lives up to its potential without compromising client safety or scientific integrity, aligning with the comprehensive healing principles championed by the Wounded Healers Institute.
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References
O’Brien, A. (2023a). Addiction as Trauma-Related Dissociation: A Phenomenological Investigation of the Addictive State. International University of Graduate Studies. (Dissertation). Retrieved at woundedhealersinstitute.org/courses/addiction-as-dissociation-model-course/
O’Brien, A. (2023b). Memory Reconsolidation in Psychedelics Therapy. In Path of the Wounded Healer: A Dissociative-Focused Phase Model for Normative and Pathological States of Consciousness: Training Manual and Guide. Albany, NY: Wounded Healers Institute. Retrieved at woundedhealersinstitute.org/courses/addiction-as-dissociation-model-course/
O’Brien, A. (2023c). Path of the Wounded Healer: A Dissociative-Focused Phase Model for Normative and Pathological States of Consciousness: Training Manual and Guide. Albany, NY: Wounded Healers Institute. Retrieved at woundedhealersinstitute.org/
O’Brien, A. (2024a). Healer and Healing: The re-education of the healer and healing professions as an advocation. Re-educational and Training Manual and Guide. Albany, NY: Wounded Healers Institute. Retrieved at woundedhealersinstitute.org/
O’Brien, A. (2024e). Path of the Wounded Healers for Thrivers: Perfectionism, Altruism, and Ambition Addictions; Re-education and training manual for Abusers, Activists, Batterers, Bullies, Enablers, Killers, Narcissists, Offenders, Parents, Perpetrators, and Warriors. Re-Education and Training Manual and Guide. Albany, NY: Wounded Healers Institute. Retrieved at woundedhealersinstitute.org/
O’Brien, A. (2025). American Made Addiction Recovery: a healer’s journey through professional recovery. Albany, NY: Wounded Healers Institute. Retrieved at woundedhealersinstitute.org/
