Episode 70

Written By Michaela Carlin
 
 
 
 

In this conversation, friends and colleagues Michaela Carlin and Stefanie Cohen pull back the curtain on their long, strange trips of psychedelic transformation. Michaela and Stefanie open up about their personal journeys, sharing about the profound shifts in identity they’ve both experienced on the medicine path, the intensity and importance of their shadow work, and the concept of spiritual healing. 

Stefanie describes her past struggles with depression and SSRIs, culminating in her first experience with Ayahuasca in 2015, which set her on a path of self-discovery and healing. Michaela did not begin her psychedelic explorations from a place of suffering, but rather was led onto the path by a lifelong curiosity about consciousness. She shares about encounters with shadow selves, generational trauma and deep self-love in her very first psychedelic journey and how they changed her life forever. 

The conversation further explores reasons why certain people are drawn to the path of psychedelics, pondering how past lives, embedded traumas, or profound questions about the nature of existence may factor in.

Stefanie Cohen’s healing path began in an effort to heal herself from a decades-long struggle with anxiety and depression. After years of being on and off various psychotropic medications, she finally gave up and began seeking help from the natural world. She started working with herbal allies in a ceremonial context and experienced the deep healing and vast intelligence the natural world offers. Eventually, Stefanie returned to a state of peace and began a deep exploration into her own psyche and the true nature of consciousness.  

Stefanie holds a Level 1 certification on various therapeutic modalities such as Hakomi and Internal Family Systems. She also looked to indigenous teachings: apprenticing to soul work through Vision Quests and land-based practices, learning shamanism with Rose Khalsa and sitting in deep meditation with the moon and the mountain. She has a certificate from the Synthesis Institute’s Psychedelic Practitioner Training, which offers a new paradigm for mental health care, and has completed the Rainbow Bridges School for Evolutionary Guides. Stefanie brings humility and humor, honesty and compassion, skill and curiosity to her work with clients as she considers it a great honor to be able to work with them in that way.

Episode Highlights

  • Opening up about personal experiences with psychedelics

  • Stefanie’s struggle with depression and SSRIs

  • Her first encounter with ayahuasca

  • The deep healing she received through her first ayahuasca experience 

  • Exploring consciousness with psychedelics

  • Michaela’s first psychedelic journey

  • Reflections on the profundity of her insights and experience of self-love

  • Challenges with the Western medical model

  • The mystery of intuitive healing

  • The transformational power of psychedelics

  • The intensity of the psychedelic path … who should be on it?

  • Stefanie’s journey to an Ibogaine clinic in Tijuana 

  • The cliffhanger: to be continued

Stefanie Cohen

Resources Mentioned in This Episode

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Special thanks to Jeremy Colbert (Taragápe) for the original podcast theme music.

You can find out more about Jeremey’s work here:
taragape.com and @taragape

Michaela Carlin
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