The Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation Non-Profit
In the spring of 2019, Daniel McQueen attended a Psychedelics and Spirituality Conference and were confronted through their participation by the stark reality of Climate Change. Dealing with the sense of hopelessness, yet grasping to the power of collective action nonetheless, Daniel, Carla Clements, and other allies initiated the development of a new non-profit that became, the Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation.
The primary purpose of our non-profit is to support the convergence of individuals, communities and organizations so we can organize an effective and skilled response to global crises by researching effective psychedelic journeywork practices in conjunction with mindfulness, psychotherapy, spirituality, ecological theory and advanced creative problem solving.
Vision Statement – The Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation envisions a world where society uses psychedelics in a sanctified manner for the benefit of humanity and our shared ecology.
Mission Statement – As a charitable institution established to support religious and healing practices associated with psychedelics, the Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation supports our members and our communities in the safe, legal, effective and ethical use of psychedelics through spiritual guidance, counseling and harm reduction programs, beneficial community-based use and healing services, and other support services.
Purpose – The Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation supports our members and communities in safely navigating the ecologic and existential crises we face today as a global society, and to develop an effective and skillful response to transform these crises into profound opportunities for global healing and collective self-actualization.
Read more about our programs below.
The Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation is a multi-faith, multi-religious, spiritually diverse, inclusive community that gathers to explore and share best practices with psychedelic medicines in healing, therapeutics, religious, and scientific areas of inquiry. The Foundation is non-denominational and non-dogmatic and operates from a shared belief that reality is greater than we can imagine and allows for a plurality of perspectives in its interpretation to hold personal and collective meaning.
The Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation identifies as a religious institution in that its members hold a shared belief in the sanctity and healing power of psychedelics when they are used skillfully with careful preparation, intention setting, integration, and in the right setting.
The Foundation is organized through shared membership, and we work within a moral code of ethics and conduct. We vocationally practice a healing and transformational modality called Psychedelic Guiding, (including practices that invite spiritual and religious growth and a world view that includes psychedelic medicines as sacred sacraments).
The Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation provides oversight and accountability for its spiritual and religious practitioners in accordance with Religious Ministry Exemptions DORA Code (C.R.S. § 12-245-217(1)).
In that regard, we:
- Advance, develop and define shared values, codes of ethics and moral conduct for modem psychedelic communities and practitioners based on western religious/spiritual traditions such as Transformational Alchemy, meditation and mindfulness, and religious traditions found globally that use psychedelics as sacred sacraments. These values equally hold spiritual & religious concepts with best practices of modern psychotherapy, aesthetics, research and scientific inquiry.
- Advance mutual learning and dialogue with traditional, ancient and indigenous communities engaged in cultural, spiritual and religious psychedelic practices.
- Offer our support to the Native American Church and its members in the sustainable harvesting, cultivation and ethical use of Peyote for their community.
- Advance a core religious value of informed consent of our members, our communities and our clients, and the ability to collectively adjust values and agreements for the benefit of the individual and community as we learn and grow.
- Develop and promote ethical guidelines for taking payments and donations for services that support sustainability and self care of practitioners.
- Provide ethical oversight through the Medicinal Mindfulness Safe Community Council to professional practitioner members who identify as religious or spiritual vocational practitioners (Ministers, Rabbis, Medicine Practitioners, etc.), and who practice as psychedelic guides, pursuant to Colorado Department of Regulatory Agency (DORA) Religious Ministry Exemption (C.R.S. § 12-245-217(1)). As members, practitioners are required to abide by the MM Community Code of Ethics, which includes the primary codes currently established in the field of psychedelic facilitation. Complying with these guidelines is legally enforceable through a membership and credentialing contract.
The Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation works to provide accountability, oversight, advocacy and other professional services to our members.
Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation shall establish a psychedelic practitioners Professional Association to:
- Provide public advocacy and education for the safe use of psychedelic medicines and the successful implementation of the Colorado Natural Medicine Health Act (NMHA).
- Advance and develop professional credentialing, codes of ethics and conduct, and support future licensing requirements for the use of psychedelics as medicines in professional, clinical, and community based settings of personal use. These standards may overlap the field of psychotherapy and medicine, but we recognize that psychedelic guiding is a unique field that in the state of Colorado adheres to the standards set forth by the NMHA and other ethical oversight organizations for regulated and personal use.
- To have a collective voice when engaging the Board of Advisors created by the NHMA and DORA.
- To support the organization of shared community resources for the purpose of purchasing or leasing property designed to house individual, group, and community spiritual and religious practices associated with psychedelic medicines and guiding, congruent with personal use practices and/or regulations associated with the Natural Medicine Health Act
- Support underground and legacy psychedelic medicinal practitioners’ transition to aboveboard practices congruent with new regulations.
The Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation explores the intersection of mindfulness, spirituality, religion, ethics, science and psychedelics through rigorous inquiry and the sharing of knowledge.
In that regard, we:
- Provide scholarships to underserved populations for psychedelic therapy, research and community grants for innovators in the field, and psychedelic education opportunities for the general population.
- Continue outreach campaign to educate communities on the value of cannabis as a psychedelic medicine.
- Fund and support psychedelic research and expeditions in consciousness for the benefit of society and our ecology.
- Support psychedelic curious individuals in safe and legal psychedelic practices now available under the Colorado Natural Medicine Health Act, and share guidelines for safe and ethical conduct with the larger community for harm reduction purposes.
- Organize researchers, scientists, academics, and other allies to conduct research on cannabis, psychedelic cannabis, and the Medicinal Mindfulness modalities of Cannabis-Assisted Psychedelic Therapy and Mindfulness-Based Psychedelic Therapy.
- Advance and develop meaningful therapeutic models for use of psychedelics as medicine.
To support the safe navigation of the ecological and existential crises we face as a global society, the Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation articulates the connections between psychedelics and sustainability and works to develop psychedelic protocols that support ecological problem solving.
- Articulate the connections between psychedelics and sustainability.
- Develop psychedelic protocols that support ecological problem solving.
- Continue to advance and support local, regional, state and national initiatives for the legalization of psychedelic substances and support the successful implementation of the Colorado Natural Medicine Health Act
- Advocate for the safe, sacred, accessible, and culturally conscious use of psychedelics to assist in environmental sustainability, particularly as it pertains to existential distress, addiction to consumerism, and the depression and apathy that result when an individual confronts the ecological issues of our time.
Grounding Values
Accessibility: Through need-based and identity-based scholarships, we are committed to making our training programs and resources accessible to those central to but on the edges of the psychedelic renaissance including: Black, Indigenous, and People of Color, LGBTQ+ folks, women and low-income people.
Sustainability: Our perceived separation from the more-than-human world is a function of our unsustainable worldview and culture. As we strive to embody the truth of our interconnectedness, we commit to taking action to disrupt current modes of destruction to both people and planet and to actively build the new world we want to inhabit.
Harm Prevention: We strive to prevent, not just reduce any harm associated with psychedelic medicines so that they can be used to their fullest potential and for the greatest good.
Community: Transitioning from “I” to “We,” we recognize that healing and change take place in the context of interdependence and not individualism.
Sacredness: We commit to building our culture and programs in a way that centers the sacredness of all life and the sacredness of the psychedelic medicine path.
The Center for Medicinal Mindfulness Psychedelic Sitters School Psychedelic Therapy Training Program has provided over $250,000 need-based diversity scholarships since we restarted the online training program through the Covid-19 Pandemic. Each of our programs involves research & education and holds a commitment to collective action.