“After the Ecstasy, the Laundry” – Shayla Love’s take on psychedelics in 2022 – Psychedelic Alpha

This review article is one of Psychedelic Alpha's excellent annual year retrospectives. It reads: "In the opinion of the Psychedelic Alpha team, journalist Shayla Love is one of the most astute observers of the nascent psychedelics industry. As such, we are thrilled to open our Year in Review series with Love’s account of the themes that shaped the psychedelics space in 2022, plus her hopes and predictions for the coming year… At a psychedelics conference last year, I got a pin that says, “Ask me about psychedelics,” in bubbly rainbow text.  I showed it to friends, who laughed because people do come to me with their psychedelic questions. They ask about the latest news article on mushrooms and depression, if they should go to an expensive retreat, and what I think about Oregon.  Yet, after last year, I have much less certainty when answering such queries. The industry and community are grappling with what it means to give birth to a new mental health treatment, and define its relationship to culture and the existing systems in our society. I have felt a bit like a character in Waiting for Godot, standing around and anticipating the arrival of a titular character, who may or may not arrive.  What am I waiting for? For Oregon to begin its psilocybin services, for FDA approval on psilocybin or MDMA, for more states to pass decriminalization or legalization bills, to see if patents get enforced, to know the actual cost of these therapies, if health insurance will cover them, and if we’ll decide on an integration protocol that we know works better than others. These aspects (and many more) are, in my opinion, all unresolved.  But all this uncertainty indicates growth. … Psychedelics are not contained within an insular bubble anymore. If you have a vested interest in psychedelics improving the world, I call on you to look at the larger systems that psychedelics are going to be operating within and tackle those systems rather than just expect psychedelics to do all the work. If you’re worried about psychedelic therapy being inaccessible, look at how psychotherapy is inaccessible because of the flaws in healthcare. If you care about decriminalization of psilocybin, look to the struggles of legalization and harm reduction of other drugs. Those are the kinds of things we could be advocating for: patent reform, universal healthcare, increased social services, decrim, and cultivating lives that provide emotional and spiritual support. These are all external changes that benefit psychedelics, but make the world a better place outside of psychedelics alone."

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