What does it mean to truly heal in a psychedelic space? In this episode, host April Pride is joined by Satya—a seasoned facilitator whose work bridges psychotherapy, meditation, and natural psychedelic therapy. Together, they unpack how conscious language, sacred space, and personalized protocols shape transformative outcomes. From working with trauma survivors and cancer patients to designing women-only retreats for deep healing, Satya reveals how integrating science and spirituality can unlock layers of self that pharmaceuticals and talk therapy alone cannot reach. If you’re questioning whether psychedelics are for you—or how to choose between a retreat with or without medicine—this episode helps you explore those decisions through the lens of compassion, integrity, and feminine wisdom.
🔵 Key Takeaways
Psychedelic healing is not one-size-fits-all—the path begins with your needs, history, and readiness.
Language shapes experience. Conscious facilitation means guiding, not imposing, especially during altered states.
Cancer patients, trauma survivors, and military veterans have unique responses and needs in integration work.
Women’s-only spaces allow for safer, deeper healing, especially for survivors of sexual trauma or body image issues.
Science and spirituality aren’t opposites—they’re complementary tools for individual and collective healing.
🔵 Timestamps
[02:52] Satya shares her early influences: meditation, surfing, and emotional healing
[04:24] How Satya’s family shaped her perspective on evidence and structure
[05:17] The role of language and energy in psychedelic facilitation
[09:41] When and why to introduce psychedelics in retreat settings
[13:00] Real talk: psychedelics are not safe for everyone
[13:45] Cancer, end-of-life care, and the honesty that emerges in late-stage healing
[18:44] Psychedelic healing as a collective responsibility, not just a personal journey
[21:00] Why faith and science must meet in this new paradigm of care
[23:58] Patriarchy, power, and the illusion of superiority
[25:35] Healing men vs. healing women: different pain, different pathways
[29:21] Women’s liberation is about reclaiming dignity—not battling men
[34:55] Creating safe space for women to confront trauma and rebuild boundaries
[35:57] Body image, eating disorders, and reclaiming the body as sacred
🔵 Featured Guest
Satya
🔵 Additional Resources
SetSet Blog: “Psychedelic Integration for Women”
🎙️SetSet Podcast: Ep. 71 “Psychedelic Therapy for Trauma”
🎙️SetSet Podcast: Ep. 47 “Psychedelic Integration Therapy for Women’s Healing”
🎙️SetSet Podcast: Ep. 44 “Psychedelic Mindset Preparation Tips”
🎙️SetSet Podcast: Ep. 21 “Cannabis for Cancer Patients”
Substack: “How to Choose a Psychedelic for Therapy”
Substack: “Why Disordered Eating Needs Psychedelic Treatment”
How do you decide whether psychedelics are part of your healing? What’s shaped your choices—curiosity, fear, science, or something else? 👇 Let’s talk about it in the comments after the transcript below.
🔵 Transcript
[00:03] April Pride:
Hey, this is April, and this show, Set Set Show, discusses cannabis, [natural psychedelic therapy], and altered states of consciousness generally. It's intended for audiences 21 and over. Also, I am not a medical expert. If you are looking to engage with [natural psychedelic therapy], please consult your physician before doing so. I'm April Pride, your host for Set Set Show, a resource for everyone curious to safely explore the use of cannabis and [natural psychedelic therapy] for their clinically proven therapeutic potential and beyond. If you like what we share on the show, please rate and review us wherever you listen to podcasts. Today, I'm joined by Satya, a visionary and integrating science and spirituality to support healing through consciousness and [plant medicine]. Satya's journey began with meditation and surfing, laying the foundation for a lifetime of exploring how holistic methods can transform lives. In this episode, we dive into the mindful use of [natural psychedelics], the creation of sacred spaces for healing, and the powerful role of conscious language as facilitator. Satya shares her work with diverse communities, including cancer patients, trauma survivors, and military personnel, while highlighting the unique needs of women in the healing process. Whether you're curious about blending psychotherapy, psychology and spirituality, or seeking inspiration for your own healing journey, this conversation offers profound insights into the transformative power of integrating science and spirituality. And for our Seattle listeners, join me live for our next Psychedelic Salon on Monday, April 7th, 2025 at 7.30pm at Town Hall Seattle where we explore [psychedelics and women’s health], understanding the relationship between [natural psychedelic therapy] and female hormones. During this 75-minute salon, we'll dive into how [natural psychedelics] might address health challenges unique to women like menopause, autoimmune disorders, will also unpack the latest research on how hormonal cycles can influence [psychedelic experiences] and treatment outcomes. Whether you're curious about using [plant medicine] to support your well-being or want to better understand their potential in [psychedelics and women’s health], this conversation will offer science-backed insights and compassionate perspectives. Seats are limited, so grab yours now at townhallseattle.org. Monday, April 7th at Town Hall Seattle at 7:30 p.m. Let's reimagine [women’s health and psychedelics] together. Continue listening as we explore the tools and wisdom that make deeper healing and connection possible.
[02:52] Satya:
I'm very happy to be here with you. I started by a personal journey a long time ago when I was really young, when I was 11 years old and I met meditation and surf. I decided that I would love to combine science and spirituality because I saw for myself that only psychotherapy and psychology was not enough to heal many dimensions of my being that was in need. And I saw too that only spirituality would not be enough to have a life that could be integrated in our society. So I turned my mission, this path of bringing science and spirituality together so we can create a method or a sacred space, a safe space for people to have the possibility to work on themselves in different levels and dimensions of their own being. And perception of their reality or what they call reality. That includes family, work, their own wealth and health. And at the end, recognizing the relation that they might have with the mystery of life itself.
[04:11] April Pride:
So where did the science come from? I can understand being connected to spirit perhaps through your moments of silence with meditation, but... Were you on a path to pursue a career in science?
[04:24] Satya:
I come from a family that is... high culture and all these university doctors, engineers, scientists, academics, exactly. All my life I was surrounded by this and I can see how important it is so we can have a life that is truly grounded and how important it is in our evolution species. Without medicine, it would not be possible to be where we are now and saving so many other lives. Of course, a misuse of medicine can be a problem, like antidepressives, chemio, in a way that is sometimes used. Other [natural psychedelics] are misused. It can be a problem. So everything that is used with consciousness, I believe can be a great resource.
[05:17] April Pride:
I think that your language, like [natural psychedelics], right? You would think that seems pretty obvious, I guess, a way to describe medicine or fungi medicine, but I actually don't see [natural psychedelics] very often as a phrase. And like I mentioned earlier, awareness facilitator school, your language is so deliberate. It's so good. And just the way that you are. So I started working in [natural psychedelic therapy] a couple of years ago and started talking to facilitators a lot. And I'm not careful with my language. And when I think I'm being fair and coming cautiously into, it's most likely during [psychedelic integration] when people are trying to tell me their experience or how they felt. And I have been correct to say that is in the carefulness with language so as to not invoke a certain way of thinking and that could be additive to what someone is thinking. It's just, it's so critical to everything that you do as a facilitator when someone is in a vulnerable state and you can influence them through your language, right? And to see that carry over on your website in such a deliberate way, it's like... It really blew me away.
[06:38] Satya:
We really need to take care in the way we speak or present certain ideas, not as truth, but as possibilities or as inquiry so we can support the person to find their own perspective, their own truth. That will change along their line on the path of consciousness. I believe that consciousness will help us to become aware of our traumas and belief systems and what we sometimes take as truth because it was imposed by social condition, family condition. To find it and we can present opportunities for them to inquire or to see where they are conditioned at the end by the experience or by the social or environment or family environment. So we need to be at least aware how we use our frequency of energy where we vibrate as a person in front of them online or in a live. It's the same thing. And the language. So we don't say, I want you to do this. I want to invite you to experience or to quest. Otherwise, we are taking them out of their potential to discover themselves and to own their own life. I believe that's why I say that spirituality and science needs to be together because through science, we can work on the personality level, the persona that was created since a child. And on the spiritual level, we can work on the soul level and that exists even if socially we are speaking in a light way, like a metaphor, not really acknowledging that we can be much more than our persona. And that we belong to maybe a super consciousness and we are just experiencing ourselves individually. And for example, the pain of separation is not only a pain of separation of me and you as a partner or me and you from the belly of our mother, but maybe it's a separation from the oneness without the name into individualization. All this talk, sometimes through psychology or persona, when we are interconnecting through the personality, doesn't make any sense rationally. But if we go to deep states of feelings and experience what is there, maybe on those places of expressing ourselves and experiencing. We go beyond personality and we find this that never dies. Who is there observing? Who is there experiencing? I believe that together we have a richer opportunity to explore life itself.
[09:41] April Pride:
So you have modalities that include [natural psychedelics] and retreats that are [natural psychedelic] free. True. When do you introduce [natural psychedelics]? And I know it's probably individual, but there are people that haven't even gone to a retreat before. Maybe they haven't gone to a retreat other than perhaps a yoga retreat, like something focused on physical activity. How do you choose a retreat with both intended to help you connect with your soul, but one has [natural psychedelics] and one does not? How do you choose?
[10:16] Satya:
Has [natural psychedelic therapy] or any psychedelics, not for everyone. I believe that if you are a person that you never did anything, you need to pay attention to what are your true needs? What are you really looking for? Then you need to take in consideration the information that you can have to see if that information can fulfill at least your expectations. And to ask how it would be for you to be there and who is the person leading any kind of retreats. Because in a good way, I believe that retreats and so many modalities of therapy, meditation, [psychedelic retreats] are popping up because it's a true need on the level of unconscious collective for us to expand and to heal so many trauma that we carry for generations and generations. So it's not something that I want from my personality. It's like a need of our unconscious collective. That's why it's blossoming everywhere. At the same time, there are so many people that they just do it because they think they are ready or because they want from their personality structure to become any kind of facilitators. So in my case, when people arrive to me, we always look to the person's history, medical history and personal history. And then we show the possibilities for [natural psychedelic therapy], of course.
[11:51] April Pride:
So people come to you and then you help them choose. You come to me and then I will help you find your course within my ecosystem that we feel really will be best for you.
[12:03] Satya:
And if we feel, for example, that we don't have a tool that can help the person, we send them to other places. We will work psychiatrists too.
[12:14] April Pride:
What about, I do agree with you that [natural psychedelic therapy] is not for everybody. Cannabis is for everybody. Alcohol is not for everybody, right? We can go down the list. And so it's important for people to feel like they have agency over what they feel something that is. Additive to their life, whatever that might be. But there are people who may not have participated in [natural psychedelic therapy] that could really benefit and are not necessarily open to it. Do you have any examples without talking about the people who attend your retreats of a person who maybe had never attended? Participated in [natural psychedelic therapy] that you thought could really benefit, like what perhaps their life experience had been and why you thought that this was a next step for them.
[13:00] Satya:
I just want to alert that people with heart problems, diabetes, mental health problems, and they are taking antidepressives, humor stabilizers, sleeping pills, other kinds of drugs, for example. It's really dangerous and risky to start using [natural psychedelic therapy] without any guidelines. So who can benefit? I work, the last 15 years, I worked with more 15,000 people. 15 years, more than 60,000 people. It's like loves. My true love is people that they are with cancer. So I work with [natural psychedelic therapy] a lot with people with cancer. And we work with the doctors with exams before and exams after the work that we do. So what we see is most people, their body is still ready to heal the cancer. And we see a big reduction of the cancerous cells level to almost zero. And of course, there's a small percentage when they arise already in a state that the body can't recover, we work on how to prepare them to die, how to help them to make peace with themselves, with life, with their family members and other situations. That is something that I really, it's where I spend a lot of time. One. The thing that I really appreciate in these people is there's no time for more games or more excuses. So they are really there with everything that they have. The deck that opens, that's an honesty, an authenticity in that moment where we are sharing that space or sharing their experience. It's something that I really value a lot. And honestly, all the other work that we do without [natural psychedelic therapy] is for that, is for people to find that depth and to find that honesty in themselves so they can really see where they are and they can rise from that. They can forgive themselves. They can rewrite their story so they can own the story, not the opposite. And to go to a place of intimacy with themselves and to understand what is important and what they need to transform. So other people that I work a lot is militaries that carry a lot of trauma. I work a lot with people with any kind of trauma. And of course, this work with cancer, with trauma, or people that they are just curious and they want to grow their creativity is possible too. For example, when you have a person that is level four cancer, they don't have much time. So ceremonies or the sessions are taken to a different level and intensity of work because we need to put the body in a state of frequency that the body can follow the emotional and other dimensions. In my perspective, I know that scientifically is not proven yet, but it's something that I really want, that I'm studying and I'm watching for the last 15 years as a facilitator, is the body always follow the transformation on the emotional and mind level. In a deep space, the body goes to a frequency of vibration where the cancer cells are liberated and then purge or integrate another. I know scientifically I will repeat is not proven, but I believe that one day we will reach that. Understanding of the frequency of the cell that is responding to everything that we are feeling, perceiving, or experiencing. And that's why the results of the work are so fast. It's not everyone that can do it, but it's a big percentage of the population that I work with, the clients that I work. And so. Level four, for me, they have a great possibility to diminish their cancer. And we see this every day that we work. The body sometimes is not ready or to recover. With trauma, we work in a total different way because there's a lot of fear. So we can’t push through the fear. So we even create more trauma. So there's different ways of working, even in a big circle of people that I really believe that the collective work can have a lot of benefits. For the individual work. And I come from the shamanic part. 15 years ago, there was no [natural psychedelic therapy]. So the way we could really reach the [natural psychedelic] work mainly was with ancient traditions. And we were always in the [collective healing] and how the individual is a part of the collective and how the collective really merge with the individual and take us to all the healings about family, ancestors, partnership, how we perceive ourselves in the whole, what is our contribution? What is the responsibility that we have by being alive in our small society?
[18:44] April Pride:
Yeah, your work is very much if we heal the individual, then we will start to move toward a new world unity. There's a woman in Seattle who's a [microdosing coach], and she always asks her clients, the people that she works with, what are you doing with the growth and the healing and the insight that you've gained to further society, to help society, to help heal society? Like you also have, as you heal yourself, you have to remember that there's a greater purpose here, which I really appreciate. And [palliative care], [end-of-life care] is what leads federal legalization of [psilocybin therapy] here in the U.S. is what's believed. I understand, right? And to go back to the fact that you've worked with your path, you come from a [shamanic path]. I've been recently introduced to this term [two-eyed seeing], right? Which is we may not have scientific data to show you for what's been done over the centuries. Millenniums. But thank you. We've seen it. We can share it with you. And so there is this, in an age where faith is not even something that people discuss as being necessary to move through life and not feel like it's all on you. It's really necessary for us as a quote in this rapidly emerging [commercialized psychedelic space] to recognize that we have to have faith in so much that came before us that we don't have data points for. I just, our system just isn't set up for that, right? Which is why we have to go through academic institutions and show results. I actually, I can appreciate that, right? It does make everyone feel better that we're not just supplements, right? Oh, this vitamin D is going to save your life and you don't have to have any proof of that, right? But no one's resolving the fact that there isn't a trusted source for the [medicine] still right and we're also quick to show the evidence but it's oh and then where do you go and do that?
[21:00] Satya:
So yeah April I think you're normal if we look to human history we started to disconnect from nature and even the relation with God or existence became a channel only for some, that was church, any kind of church, all of them, religions. And the other, the population would be the followers. We are recovering our own direct channel with the mystery of life, with wisdom, with cautiousness that some people call God, and I can call God too, but... It's not the word in the religious terms. So when religion took over their relation with God and the others need to obey, I believe science came in after centuries of repression. If we remember so many scientists, they were killed because they were against what church was saying. So science became our religion. because it was making the separation of the three powers that were mainly in the hands of some. And science was the coming back to everyone's possibility to heal themselves and not asking for permission to higher power. But then, as humans, our need for power, need for recognition, need for acceptance, because all these millenniums of history that only a few had the power in their hands, science became the same exactly thing somehow. like the church. And now I believe that we are in the time of humanity that we will recover the balance between science has their place. It's highly important. And the connection with the depth of our own existence, not only has humans, but has beings that they are in the ecosystem, in this planet and in the planet that is in the ecosystem of the universe that we can't reach. And so [spirituality and science], they work on the same field. That is the mystery of life. And if we, going back to this, the way we perceive life is consuming. I want more. I want to know more. I want to control more. And this is a time with COVID, with all these wars coming up, with all manifestations that we are watching, what I see behind all that is the need for us to come back to a space of true connection again. It's like people are depressed. We have the higher rates of depression ever. I live in the US. Yes. And anxiety and kids are suiciding themselves. Our teenagers.
[23:58] April Pride:
I think what you're saying about taking... power from what's been set up as the church and now science. It goes, I was watching a video with you that talked about the paradigm of people thinking they're more special than others. And that I really do think is the source of so much evil. It's not that I hadn't heard it put that way, but I hadn't thought of it as this overarching way of people talk about the patriarchy and the system and all that. It's a caste system, right? People do think others, whether it's because they have more money or they look a different way or whatever the case may be, but we can't get around that because it's the way that some people. find power themselves and who knows what's happening to the individual level why they feel like they need to acquire power we don't know what type of childhood they had it's interesting to watch people use their power for not even believe it in so many ways i do want to talk about your your work with [women and psychedelics] specifically because i am curious you offer retreats. And men and women are invited. And in the same video that I just mentioned, you talk about the need to be able to heal together as not necessarily non-sexual human beings, but in a non-sexual way to connect on a soul level, knowing that we all walk through the world together and we have to be able to see one another as human beings. So at what point did you look at the women at these [psychedelic retreats] and say, huh? We have special work to do with you.
[25:35] Satya:
Being a child of... Sorry for interrupting, but why are they more special than the men? I don't believe in that. I will start by the men and then we go to the women if it's okay, please. Sure. Honestly, I believe that men are much more innocent than us. When they come. I'm raising two sons. About love. Everything about love. We women, we born with the possibility to generate a life inside. We have a menstruation every month. The cells dying, the body reproducing itself. It's a very... deep process that we are not aware on the rational parts of our lives, but we have a maturity constantly in movement. We need to die so we can regenerate, so we can give birth again, even if they are not used. And the cycle goes on. And man, they have this cycle in a different way. So we as beings that we generate life through millenniums, and to give birth to a person, to generate a life inside. We give everything that we have. Even if we don't want, we give it. So it's in us to give. And men, they come out of the belly. And mother for them is the first love. For all of us, men and women, we are inside of that space. vessel of life their hearts beating us the connection everything physically emotionally energetically spiritual so when we say that man patriarchic system i believe for them was even harder because the small boy watching the mother being raped or humiliated. Or, you know, you don't matter, you are just a mother. Imagine for the little boy, observing from their perspective, like, how do you treat my mother, the one that I love, that gives me milk and life and love and food this way? So to be a man or to be a society means that I mistreat the person that I most love. And we, as women, it's like we are treated like this. It's a totally different pain. For them, it's more distorted. So to be man means this. Of course, we are changing already for a long time, and I'm very pleased that we live in this century now. But still, there's a lot of work to do. So I have a lot of love for man and a lot of compassion in the sense that we had to became the manipulative beings to survive and to make our kids to survive. Because if we would lose that marriage, We would lose everything. We couldn't work. Our kids would lose the family, house, all these.
[28:44] April Pride:
Totally. We were really abused. I think it's important to emphasize that. In this day where I grew up with a single mom, had a grandma who worked until she was 84 and earned her own money. She grew up in the Depression and she made sure of that. I think that we forget how even today women are dependent on men for... either a life of things that they want or survival. There's a big range there, but still exists and men take advantage of that power that in even an individual relationships.
[29:21] Satya:
I believe the bigger number is what you're speaking because women are still struggling to have the same salary, to the same rights, to the same respect, not being just a sexual object or the mother. It's still a lot. Look at what just happened in Afghanistan. Yeah. And you go to America Latina and you go to Indonesia and you go almost everywhere. Honestly, even in Europe, I believe to prove women as to prove that we are. the same level of wisdom or knowledge. We need to work much more and to go through things about sexuality that if you are beautiful, it's because you are beautiful. You can be so intelligent because if you are fat or all. So there's a lot of stigma, a lot still in our days. So I believe, and because we have the memory of this, the [liberation of women], that is not against men. It's just our place, our right of birth to be respected and nurtured, to be together.
[30:27] April Pride:
I think that we instinctually know that we have so much that we can offer society and to our planet. And there, this collective frustration of just not being able to do that fully and to live up to our potential as this type of species and to just see that there's so much harm being done.
[30:47] Satya:
But I believe that we are doing it. So I will sing in terms like this, who am I? If I could look myself from the outside who I want to be, and that is the price that I'm ready to pay. I will not do less, even if my freedom is in stake, even if I can be judged or criticized, because we are not only doing for ourselves, we are doing for the ones that they were fighting for us. The ones that they will come. I don't want any women, kids, any child, my nephew, my niece to feel this. I don't want my friends to feel this, that they are afraid to speak up. But in Europe, we are, honestly, I believe that we are one of the best cases. Still, it's very curious because it was in the Catholic Church that women went faster on their rights and acceptance because we have so many other religions. So not everything is so black or white. We are giving a lot of steps. But we still need to do much more, not in terms of action, but in terms of how to live together, how to respect each other as human beings. And coming back to [women's healing] with all these memories for centuries and centuries, the healing of our body, acceptance of our body, of our sexuality, to feel safe that You will not be attacked because you are just a woman or just because you are beautiful and you can be attacked because of that, or just because you are a black woman, for example, even worse, or because you are ugly. It's about everything. So I started many years ago because I was a child of sexual abuse and I saw how much I took to really go into the depths of my being and to recover my strength, to recover my integrity, my self-esteem, my value, my sexuality, my dignity, not being afraid that could happen again, but to be responsible with myself about my boundaries and what are my limits. All this deep understanding and transformation. Honestly, with men around, We can do it, but there will be a moment of mistrusting and it's very deep because we connect for centuries that they were the ones. So when I created the [women’s retreat] for us, that I'm included, to feel safe in a very deep way because we have that space. We can dive deeply in so many themes. We can meet them from a space that we can trust them. We will not project mistrust and maybe they will attack it. Because we were the mothers educating our kids, men, to be like that because we knew that they couldn't survive if they would not be like that. And that is the change in us. We need to have this dignity and integrity and courage and that no matter what happens, I will stand for what I believe, including losing my freedom or my life. Honestly, this is not for everyone. Because we are in survival mode. Yes. Yes. So when we say I'm brave enough, we are not accepting that maybe we are not. And maybe that's clear. And we need to have a safe space to grow that [consciousness], to grow that trust. Only if you, we burn with these tools inside already that I will do anything because I need it. It's a calling that you feel. And we need to take that in consideration and to create safe spaces so they can grow into that.
[34:55] April Pride:
And that. What I read on your website, I think that's where I saw this, is that you had this moment of knowing that this was a message that you wanted to share with others, that you felt that you had a very specific point of view and that you could communicate in a way that would connect this many people as possible, right? Like we talked about setting up the show. Yeah. And I think that your personal experience working as a woman who is an abuse survivor allows other women's experiences, and we know that the numbers are quite high, to immediately trust that you are looking to only put them in a safer place and hit space. So we know that surviving [sexual trauma] would be a reason that women might choose to attend one of your [psychedelic retreats]. What are some other life experiences that you find that women really appreciate being able to be among women only in that very focused space?
[35:57] Satya:
Space I believe that the healing of their relation with their body it's you all the [eating disorders] are growing more than we can imagine than ever I didn't know that the numbers for [eating disorders] is the [mental health] disease that takes people more to suicide than any other yes the relation with their body has a secret temple for them to be alive.
[36:27] April Pride:
And if you're ready to dive deeper into [psychedelic integration], be sure to check out the show notes to link to SETSET's [Universal Integration DIY Program], a clinician-backed resource available on PDF and with an audio companion that covers [candidate criteria], [dosing], [methods of administration], [contraindications], [science], [history], and more. The Set Set website has this resource available for purchase and download, as well as DIY guides for [psilocybin], [ketamine], and [microdosing]. Thank you for joining me for today's episode. I'm your host, April Pride. If you liked what you heard, please rate and review Set Set wherever you listen. It really does help more people find our show.
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