The Student Handbook &
Initial Training Agreement
New students are required to complete several event participation agreements and waivers to participate in our training program. All event participation agreements are located in the Student Handbook. Prospective students of PSS1-2 and Electives will be given a packet that contains requirements specific to their class, in addition to and the PSS1-2 & Electives Training Agreement linked below. These agreements and the Student Handbook are provided for informed consent purposes for those applying to the training program.
Ketamine Facilitation Training additionally requires this agreement to participate:
Students who complete PSS1 & PSS2 can register for professional credentialing and full membership in the MM Foundation non-profit and the Healer-Explorers Guild. Signing the full Student Handbook is required at that time to join the credentialing program, and attend any advanced training programs (PSS3, PSS4, and other medicine specific practicums).
The Healer-Explorers Guild
Psychedelic Sitters School Student Handbook &
Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation Membership
v1 2022-2023
A note about this document: The MM Student Handbook is a technical legal resource similar to any student handbook you would receive from a college, university, or established professional training program. It has been published on the PSS website as a PDF so all potential students and current students have access to the informed consent agreements as a reference prior to joining our program.
Due to difficulties commonly experienced by psychedelic medicine users, and other general traumas experienced by the psychedelic community (often associated with unjust laws and inappropriate societal rules that have caused many of us real harm), reading technical legal language and ethical guidelines such as the Student Handbook can be a significant process for many of our prospective students and members.
Please take your time with it and stay connected. We are here to help guide you through the application process. If you find yourself feeling overwhelmed reading it, use this as an opportunity to explore a difficult process that is not unlike psychedelic guiding. Take a break. Skim areas you want to review later.
The most relevant section for new students is our Community Guidelines and Code of Ethics in Part 4.
My biggest concern in sharing this is turning off prospective students who might truly align with our community values. Please know that this is provided to honor one of our core commitments to informed consent and full disclosure.
Before publishing, this document was studied and discussed by our core team and it went through a review and editing process to address any initial questions or concerns that real psychedelic practitioners might have. I am sure there are areas that will improve over time. It’s an evolving document and will be reviewed annually based on feedback from our community through a representative process.
Contact us if you have any questions or don’t understand something. It looks complicated because being a psychedelic guide in a legal setting in the 2020s is also complicated. We did most of the work required for you to safely and legally practice so you can focus on developing the skillsets of becoming a successful, professionally practicing psychedelic guide. That is the sole purpose of the handbook.
Some sections are published as subpages on our website. The contents of this document are copyrighted and cannot be used without the expressed written permission of the Center for Medicinal Mindfulness. Many trade names listed are already registered, but all are protected by first commercial use principles.
The PSS Student Handbook is a complimentary document to the Training Descriptions and Program Guide located at: www.psychedelicsittersschool.org
Medicinal Mindfulness Safe Community Policy (SCP) – v6 – This document is available on the PSS website here. It is currently being updated to v7 2023-2024. While recommended, this document is not required to read because much of the content has been simplified and included in the documents provided in the Student Handbook. It remains a foundational guidelines document to support community decision making and accountability. Links to other ethical guidelines are included in the Guild Agreement. Some information in SCP v6 is outdated, so the Student Handbook supersedes v6 until a new version is published.
Table of Contents
Because this document is a combination of several PDF source documents, the middle page number is the specific document’s page number. The page numbers listed here are located on the bottom right corner of each page.
Pt 1. – Introduction and Foundational Information
Pg. 05 – Introducing the Healer-Explorers GuildTM
Pg. 08 – Introducing the Student Handbook
Pg. 10 – Introducing Gateway PsychonauticsTM
Pg. 13 – MM Foundation Community, Student & Professional Membership Information
Pg. 15 – Introducing Dragon Training
Pg. 19 – Psychedelic Sitters School Training & Professional Progression Overview v2
Pg. 21 – Checklist for Completing Psychedelic Sitters School with Credentialing v2
Pt 2. – Application Information
Pg. 23 – General Application – v11
Pg. 31 – CMM Scholarship Application – v5
Pg. 33 – Psychedelic Safety Questionnaire – v16.2
Pt 3. – Event Participation Agreements
Pg. 47 – Psychedelic Cannabis Event Participation Agreement – v11
Pg. 56 – Community Breathwork Agreement v7
Pg. 59 – Yoga Participation Agreement – v4
Pg. 60 – Covid-19 Risk Informed Consent – v4
Pt. 4 – Community Agreements (Training, Credentialing & Membership)
Pg. 62 – Community Guidelines for Online & In-Person Training Intensives & Practicums – v2
Pg. 65 – Medicinal Mindfulness Community Code of Ethics – v5
Pg. 67 – The Psychedelic Guild Agreement of the Center for Medicinal Mindfulness: Psychedelic Training, Credentialing & Membership Requirements – v5.5
Pg. 88 – Appendix 1 of the Guild Agreement – Additional Information on Credentialing, IP and
Citations
Pg. 91 – Appendix 2 of the Guild Agreement – PSS Training Progression & Minimum
Requirements for PSS-Related Professional Services v3
Signature Page
Pg. 99 – Signature Page for Agreements in Student Handbook – Pt 2. – Pt 4.
Introducing the Student Handbook
Just as a university or college has a Student Handbook outlining their curriculum and code of conduct requirements, we do too. A few years ago I started a credentialing track to provide additional support for my students stepping into professional practice. That required me to seek legal advice on how to provide these services in a way that had real value for my students. This led to the development of a professional facilitators protocol that allowed our center to be the first psychedelic therapy center in the United States to get full professional liability coverage for both licensed mental health professionals and non-licensed spiritual practitioners who work with cannabis as a psychedelic therapy ( a plant medicine), as well as ketamine (a prescription medicine). This handbook is a consolidation of the rights and responsibilities of our students so they can successfully replicate these services in a professional practice, either through our professional services program, or as independent practitioners.
To apply to our program, students will be provided a registration platform and DocuSign agreement to collect signatures in the documents listed here. This is to establish a professional relationship between our program and you; it outlines what we are providing to you, at each level of practice, and the commitments you make to us so we can safely and effectively train you and recommend you.
For those of you who are turned off by rules and paperwork, I want you to know I get it. The psychedelic community is full of fiercely independent and very empowered individuals, myself included. Many of us have had to chart our own course in life as a response to the oppression and harassment of people in positions of power and the institutions that enforce compliance. We generally don’t like rules. In a lot of ways, this handbook is a response to my own path as a psychedelic guide and the struggles that myself, my friends, and my teachers had to endure.
Please know that it is important to distinguish the source of a guideline, and to not disregard all guidelines equally, especially if these guidelines, even if imperfect, are in alignment with psychedelic community values. We take the professional stance that accountability is extremely important, and the old paradigm of “underground” practice with no accountability is quickly becoming a thing of the past. Ethical underground practitioners that I know already consent to some form of community accountability and professional oversight.
Fundamentally these guidelines were written by psychedelic medicine people for psychedelic medicine people so we can create a container of mutual support within the safest and highest ethical practices. The documents in this handbook were created so we can be an effective counterforce to the systems and institutions that continually seek to co-opt or control our movement, and to create a collective voice to more effectively express our personal empowerment.
This is an evolving document, and is designed to compliment the Program Guide, which is on our website: www.psychedelicsittersschool.org. The following are brief descriptions of the documents contained here and the purpose of each. Because informed consent is a core value of our practice, we have consolidated it all here in the form of the Student Handbook so we can publish it on our website in an easily accessible package.
If these guidelines are still too much for you, no problem, there are plenty of other psychedelic organizations and training programs that may be a better fit. Again, this information is provided at the very beginning of your journey with us so you can make an informed decision about your path into the field of professional psychedelic facilitation. The following is a very brief introduction to the content of this handbook:
Pt 1. – Introduction and Foundational Information
The next section introduces three new important concepts to our community and the world, and are specific, legally protected “brands” to differentiate our work from other organizations. These terms included the name of the organizing philosophy and theoretical orientation of the Center for Medicinal Mindfulness, known as “Gateway PsychonauticsTM,” the term used to describe our journey members, “Gateway PsychonautsTM,” and our professional, credentialed psychedelic practitioners, “Gateway GuidesTM.” By the time this handbook is published, an application will be submitted to register all three terms with the United States Trademark and Patent Office. Additional trademarks are listed in the Psychedelic Guild Agreement in Pt 4.
The MM Foundation Community, Student & Professional Membership Information is self explanatory and describes the three levels of memberships in our non-profit community program and professional association. Introducing Dragon Training describes the professional trainers program for our PSS trainers, and is also designed to support the independent professional practices of our students in new geographical locations. Psychedelic Sitters School Training & Professional Progression Overview is an easy to understand chart that fully outlines the training progression through our core classes, advanced practices with other psychedelic medicines, and credentialing requirements for professional practice.
Pt 2. – Application Information
This section discloses the General Application and CMM Scholarship Application. The scholarship application is a need-based diversity and inclusion program. The Psychedelic Safety Questionnaire is required due to the experiential medicine-based nature of our program. We believe to be a guide, you have to know the territory, and the questionnaire helps us determine your readiness to participate in a program such as this. The Checklist for Completing Psychedelic Sitters School with Credentialing is a simple to use form to track your progress in your training.
Pt 3. – Event Participation Agreements
These are our informed consent agreements to participate in the psychedelic cannabis experientials, breathwork, cannabis-assisted breathwork, and yoga classes, which are all core aspects of our training intensives and practicums. The Covid-19 Risk Informed Consent document outlines requirements for in-person trainings and events at the Center for Medicinal Mindfulness.
Pt. 4 – Community Agreements (Training, Credentialing & Membership)
Consenting to these agreements are required to participate in our training program and Healer-Explorers Guild. The Community Guidelines for Online & In-Person Training Intensives & Practicums is self explanatory and represents the safety and community consent agreements to participate in the training classes. The Medicinal Mindfulness Community Code of Ethics is our core code of conduct and ethical practices guidelines for both personal and professional use of psychedelics.
The Psychedelic Guild Agreement of the Center for Medicinal Mindfulness: Psychedelic Training, Credentialing & Membership Requirements outlines the full membership agreements and legally binding commitment to ethical conduct and professional accountability to practice as a legal, ethical, and skillful psychedelic guide. It is a legally binding agreement between you and the Medicinal Mindfulness Foundation to protect you, your clients, our community, and the integrity of the program. Appendix 1 of the Guild Agreement provides Additional Information on Credentialing, IP and Citations, and Appendix 2 of the Guild Agreement provides a full chart of PSS Training Progression & Minimum Requirements for PSS-Related Professional Services.