In this episode, host April Pride unpacks the often-misunderstood process of psychedelic integration through a rich dialogue between music, mindset, and medicine. You’ll meet composer Andy Reichel and creative entrepreneur Colton Winger as they explore how soundscapes and intention-setting shape a psilocybin journey. With support from psychedelic facilitator Natasha Lannerd, Colton opens up about fear, control, and childhood trauma—and what it really means to surrender. This episode invites listeners to examine their own relationship to safety, transformation, and the rituals we create for healing. Expect immersive storytelling, sound psychology, and soulful honesty on what it means to trust yourself in altered states.
🔵 Key Takeaways
Psychedelic integration is the real work—blending altered insights into your everyday reality
Music, especially improvisational compositions, can act as a guide through internal terrain
Even seasoned psychonauts face fear and resistance—surrendering is a practiced skill
Facilitators help frame your experience with clarity, compassion, and continuity
Set and setting still reign supreme: your mindset, environment, and intention shape the trip
🔵 Timestamps
[00:01] What is psychedelic integration?
[02:06] Meet composer Andy Reichel: improvisation and trip-conscious sound
[02:57] Colton Winger preps for his psilocybin audio journey
[04:02] Why fear often shows up before the magic
[05:33] Authenticity in sonic design and spiritual support
[06:06] Meet Natasha Lannerd: facilitator and space holder
[06:44] Creating ceremonial space in a new home
[08:12] Dosing decisions: Colton’s 1g Golden Teacher trip
[09:22] Debunking expectations and embracing surrender
[10:09] The link between trauma, control, and identity
[14:28] Natasha on building safety to release control
[15:44] Russian dolls, Jungian symbols, and soul wholeness
[17:31] Gratitude, gentleness, and complexity in integration
🔵 Featured Guests
Colton Winger | @wearecuniform
Natasha Lannerd | @breathe_with_natasha
Andy Reichel
🔵 Additional Resources
SetSet Blog: “Psychedelic Integration for Women”
SetSet Blog: “Best Music for Tripping”
🎙️SetSet Podcast: Ep. 45 “Psychedelic Trip Setting Tips”
🎙️SetSet Podcast: Ep. 44 “Psychedelic Mindset Preparation Tips”
🎙️SetSet Podcast: Ep. 28 “Music for Tripping #3”
How do you build safety in your own psychedelic practices? Have you ever feared the very transformation you were seeking?👇 Let’s talk about it in the comments after the transcript below.
🔵 Transcript
[00:01] April Pride:
Hey, this is April, and this show, Set Set Show, discusses cannabis, psychedelics, 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 [psychedelic substances], please consult your physician before doing so. Welcome to [Psychedelic Integration] presented by The High Guide. I'm your host, April Pride, and today we are integrating, which according to California Center for [Psychedelic Therapy], [integration after psychedelics] is the synthesis of the mind and body following the experience of a [non-ordinary state of consciousness]. We'll be right back. [Trust the Trip], Trust Yourself. In this audio, we're checking in with both the audio composer, Andy Reichel, and a psychonaut who will share the intentions that drove his [set and setting] to take in the audio journey after consuming [psilocybin]. But before we meet today's guests, let's take a moment with the purpose of this audio journey, learning to trust yourself. So many of us make decisions to avoid the really big, really disruptive decisions, because why? We don't think we can navigate the consequences or we want to spare others from having to. Enough of those and life is just one big hedge. Interpsychedelics. What if we can use our time in [altered consciousness] to muster the courage to alter the course of our life? Spoiler alert. You won't be the first to try to find yourself by tripping. Let's start the conversation with the audio composer for last week's episode, Andy Reichel. Andy creates music under the name Gel Soul and with the Seattle-based collective Monster Planet.
[02:06] Andy Reichel:
I'm primarily an improvisational artist, so you have to have a certain level of trust in yourself because you're making everything up on the fly.
[02:16] April Pride:
That doesn't mean he doesn't revisit his creative choices, particularly when he's composing a soundtrack for someone's trip.
[02:24] Andy Reichel:
I wanted to have some serious material on there, but I didn't want it to be like, I didn't want to kill anyone's buzz. You know what I mean? I guess that was one of my main concerns when I started this thing. I'm like, am I going to freak someone out?
[02:36] April Pride:
Funnily enough, Andy did briefly concern our psychonaut, who was dutifully preparing for his time with Andy's audio while under the influence. Let's meet this week's psychonaut, Colton Winger, who, as the founder of Kuna Forum, is an asthete and creative entrepreneur. He is also an experienced consumer of [psychedelics].
[02:57] Colton Winger:
I've been practicing regularly with a shaman over probably the past four years. I totally played around and listened to the audio prior to the experience. And when I was listening to it, I was like, oh gosh, this seems kind of intense. I was hoping it was going to be more upbeat, uplifting. But what was very interesting is when I was...actually engaging in the audio in the ritual, it totally was not like heavy or scary or like as dense as I viewed it when I was engaging with it, not under the influence of the [medicine].
[03:42] April Pride:
Let's take a moment and consider this. Why do we choose to be fearful of what's to come when embarking upon a [psilocybin journey] rather than giddy with excitement as we consider the magic that is surely about to unfold? There's definitely a metaphor here. Andy Reichel describes how this anticipation plays out for him.
[04:02] Andy Reichel:
I always find when I take [psychedelics], that first 20 minutes to an hour is nerve-wracking. I don't enjoy it. I'm nervous. My hands get clammy. But the one thing that I always feel, and this is probably personal to me, but I always feel like things are vibrating around me, whether it be like a slow vibration or a shimmering vibration. So I was trying to convey this sort of...These waves of intensity throughout the piece, because the first 20 minutes gets a little stressful. And then it all sort of I write a lot of stuff that oscillates the sounds. It'll be a wave moving slower, you know, fast, shimmering ones. But I always, you know, when I'm tripping, I always feel that kind of vibrations around my head.
[04:53] April Pride:
Okay, let's revisit the name of the audio journey. [Trust the trip], trust yourself. Again, why do we call on our fears to mark an unknown experience before us? Why does Andy's body exhibit fear-based responses in anticipation of what's next when at the same time he's also vibrating? The fear of the unknown is so powerful that although we recognize that we're experiencing pleasure in the present, the what if this goes off the rails, scariness can preempt us from enjoying our high vibes.
[05:24] Andy Reichel:
I wanted to create like an authentic [psychedelic experience] where you don't really know what's going on, but you enjoy it.
[05:33] April Pride:
One surefire way to enjoy even the scary moment of a trip is to work with a [psychedelic facilitator], or as we like to call them, high guides. Sometimes a high guide is your sober friend who's high on life and tasked with talking you through moments when your mind is playing tricks on you. More and more trained professionals are being enlisted to make the most out of our [psychedelic experiences]. I know many who've benefited from working with a [guide or facilitator], and I respect the support and insight that they offer, so I've asked Natasha Lannerd, to integrate with Colton.
[06:06] Natasha Lannerd:
I've been in the [psychedelics community] for many years, both as a student and as a space holder. I've been studying with my mentor for over three years and have been very active holding space in [medicine ceremonies] as well as [psychedelic breath ceremonies] through the use of holotropy. I worked through and got through a lot of the trauma that I experienced in my life through the use of these methods. And because of that, I'm in service to this work.
[06:38] April Pride:
Colton shares with Natasha how he prepared for his time with Psyched Audio, journey number three.
[06:44] Colton Winger:
I haven't been able to do any [psychedelic work] in my new home. So that was kind of something that I was like really excited for. And because this work is so important to me and my new home is like a big, it's kind of a big deal for me. I put a lot of like love and energy into it. So it was like this awesome sort of like I've arrived, you know, moment, which was really fun. Knowing that I was going into this specific [ceremonial space], I made a decision on where I wanted to hold space for this. And that happened to be in my bedroom because I am a forever...quick moving, quick talking, always working individual. And so one big part of that is like slowing down, resting, sleeping.
[07:41] April Pride:
Where you choose to play out your journey deserves much consideration. The concept [set and setting] was first applied to [psychedelic experiences] in 1964 and remains relevant today. Set or mindset refers to your inner world, emotional health, current mood, belief systems, and any internal struggles one may be dealing with. Setting relates to external factors that may influence you, such as people in place. Also, the [medicine] you choose and dose certainly account for setting.
[08:12] Colton Winger:
I decided on like a social dose of about like a gram of Golden Teacher. So in all of my previous studies, [psilocybin experiences], it's either been like micro-dosing on the regular or it's been like a shamanic dose in ceremony, but I've never had anything in between. And so I had no idea what to expect.
[08:39] April Pride:
What should Colton expect? As he mentioned, his one gram dose is characterized as a social or low dose, which is half a gram, 500 milligrams to two grams. And with a [low dose psilocybin], you'll start to feel some [psychedelic effects], such as slight changes in visual perception, where colors appear enhanced, a slight body high, feeling giddy, a bit euphoric. The strain he chose Golden Teacher, also known as Golden Emperor, the potency of this is mild with expected effects such as visual distortions, enhanced colors, lightness, giddiness, euphoria, and finding yourself spiritually in tune. For more information on Golden Teacher and other [Cubensis strains], please drop a message to the email in the show notes for a menu.
[09:22] Colton Winger:
I was sort of expecting, like, I might not get what I normally get out of this [medicine] in this slightly different container that I've created. And I was totally wrong. It was, like, unbelievably perfect.
[09:40] April Pride:
Note, dear listeners, that for the second time, our psychonaut gravitated toward a less than satisfying prediction for his journey. And for a second time, he not only found his fear-based conclusions proved false, he also had a [psilocybin journey] that proved fruitful, even though key elements were unfamiliar. I'm going to beat the hell out of this metaphor. Maybe it'll get through to all of us. Ultimately, your selection of [medicine] and the dose should support the intention you set for yourself and your trip.
[10:09] Colton Winger:
Because I play a lot in the shamanic world with my healer and other healers, I'm very big on, like, my intention setting. From the very beginning of setting this intention for this ritual and sort of partaking in the [psilocybin journey] and lying down and just sort of surrendering to the experience was so perfect because...it very quickly allowed me to internally ask these questions that I had been grappling with for the larger part of a whole year. Maybe not an hour, probably like 30 minutes. I was like, okay, I'm ready to integrate the sound portion of this ritual. And the moment that I started that, it was like this perfect vehicle for surrendering. Like, I was able to just sort of, like, let go of the driver's wheel, the wheel, and just let the music sort of take me along. And I just sort of followed that through my thought pattern. In the beginning with the audio, it was a little more, like, low beat and sort of, like, grounding and space holding, which is really awesome and interesting. I felt so supported by the experience when I was moving through my internal dialogue and this dialogue with the [medicine] and following along, sort of like surrendering to the audio, being this vehicle of a guide. The very clear change from one grouping of instruments or grouping of sound to another was very, very, like, to the millisecond spot on, to the, like, exact...like internal change or conclusion or like answer that I was exploring in this like internal dialogue with the [medicine]. I sort of was having this internal dialogue of like, okay, what, like your, you have held so much space for yourself over the year through this lens of self-love that Like, what else do you need to see? You know, like, what are we missing here? And one of the biggest things that came up was, I'm scared to lose control. And so when I started asking the question of, why do I feel like I need control? And the answer that came up was like, because if I don't have control, I don't know who I am. And then I asked the question, like, why is that? And a lot of what was coming up was just childhood trauma experiences. So I grew up in a household with, as I mentioned, like a lot of like drug and alcohol addicts, a lot of death. My mom, my dad passed away when I was 10. My mom was a single mom of four that was narcoleptic. We lived on top of a mountain. She worked two hours away. We pretty much lived this Huckleberry Finn-like relationship living with wolves lifestyle and as fun as that was when I was a kid in my adulthood I really realized that like I really lacked like structure and checking in and um conversations about like how I'm feeling and that sort of thing. Me, in my adulthood, I'm like, okay, I have to control things. Otherwise, if I don't control all of the things that are sitting in front of me and all of the experiences that I'm engaging in, then I don't know who I am. I feel lost and scared because at that point. I'm surrendering to an experience that someone else might be holding space for.
[14:28] Natasha Lannerd:
I think one of the things that I work a lot with the different clients that I have, especially people that are heady humans, right, is around like the axis, right? So like the axis of control versus safety. How do you build more safety to stop clinging so tightly to that pull of control?
[14:48] Colton Winger:
It's very easy to compare ourselves to like one another in life. I feel like I just don't get life. I just don't understand life, you know? And a lot of that, it really truly comes down to, I am not checking in with myself on a regular basis of, what do I need? Like, what do I need to feel safe? And that could be something very simple as like, I need food to feel safe right now or I need financial security, or I need love security right now. So, okay, well, what version of love security is that? Is it friendship? Is it partnership? Is it family?
[15:25] Natasha Lannerd:
And the more you feel safe within yourself, the easier it's going to be to feel safe in the world, to feel safe with other people, to feel safe venturing out. And so when you think about what it means to come home, it's coming home to all those parts of yourself and feeling safe in doing that.
[15:44] Colton Winger:
And then the other thing that came up was I started having these visions of these Russian dolls. You know, I was like, oh, my God, I'm the one that's hiding in this Russian doll. And I then was asking, like, well, what does that like? Why is that? And I…The things that came up were like, I'm scared to show my true self. True self being like living in the moment from deep with deep internal compass.
[16:12] Natasha Lannerd:
So what I found really interesting, I'm a huge like Jungian, like subconscious symbols, all of that. And, you know, when you were describing the doll, have you ever kind of explored more the fact that those dolls, those dolls that you're seeing are versions of yourself? And we stack them together because the soul is yearning for wholeness. But in order to be whole, we have to acknowledge all of these different parts of ourselves. But it also could very well be that part of yourself that's witnessing the broader picture of who you are, realizing that there's all of these parts and they're all trying to come back home together.
[16:57] Colton Winger:
Thank you so much for offering a different perspective on that because I'm struggling with this sort of self-identity crisis. I feel so honored to be able to have this conversation with you because just by you saying that gives me so much peace in being compassionate with myself, knowing that we are multifaceted, complex humans. We don't need to figure out what our one version of ourself is.
[17:31] April Pride:
Let's follow Colton's example of gratitude for finding a simple answer to making sense of the complicated versions of ourselves and responding with compassion for what's arguably true rather than seeking to fix our inconvenient truths. And The High Guide aims to do the same with [psychedelics]. Put them together and what have you got? [Psychedelic Integration]. Tune in every Friday for a new episode alternating between a [guided psychedelic experience] and its follow-up [integration after psychedelics]. Subscribe and follow wherever you listen to podcasts. And we don't just give good ear here at The High Guide. Find us on Instagram at thehigh.guide. Find more advice from our [High Guides] online at our website, thehigh.guide. And make sure to sign up for our newsletter, to learn about our favorite products to guide your high. I'm April Pride. I'm your host here at The High Guide, and we'll see you next week.
