A six-week experience of preparation, discovery, connection, and integration
Medicine is one part of the journey. The relationships, preparation, and work that surround it are what help bring the experience into everyday life.
What if, before entering a deep psychedelic experience, you had time to get to know the medicine, your therapists - and the people who would be journeying alongside you? What if you could explore your intentions, become more familiar with your own emotional and physical responses, and learn practical ways to safely and productively meet whatever might arise? And what if, afterward, you had a group of people and experienced therapists to help you make sense of what you discovered? What if you could trust that with this kind of preparation, you could have a journey that will be meaningful and important to your life?
This is the experience we have thoughtfully curated at OUR HOUSE.
Our six-week, psilocybin-assisted group therapy program in Denver, Colorado, is designed as much more than a retreat or a day with medicine. It is a guided process that brings together psychotherapy, somatic practices, nervous system awareness, personal exploration, and the healing potential of community.
Co-founded and facilitated by licensed psychotherapists Nikki Fall, LCSW, and Camila Pastor, LCSW, OUR HOUSE offers a relational, trauma-informed approach that attends to the whole experience: before, during, and after the medicine.
We believe healing happens in relationships—with others, but also importantly with the parts of ourselves we may have learned to hide, avoid, or protect. In every psychedelic experience, whether journeying solo or in a group, we enter into deep relationships with our parts and ourselves. And sometimes it is much easier to meet ourselves with the support of others.
It All Begins Before the Medicine
Some of the most important parts of our program happen before participants ever arrive in Denver.
Over three weeks, our group meets online for three guided preparation workshops. These are not simply informational meetings or lectures about psychedelics. They are experiential sessions designed to help participants begin building trust, developing self-awareness, and preparing for the inner work ahead. During this time, Nikki and Camila help all group members connect with each other, in live workshop meetings and in the private WHATSAPP group, where insights, support and motivation are shared. The WHATSAPP group usually lives on, long after our program ends. What is met with hesitation at first, tends to become a source of shared support and understanding. Deep friendships often emerge from shared psychedelic experiences; participants from different backgrounds and in different life-stages find common ground and learn to care for each other deeply.
We all arrive to these journeys with different histories, hopes, fears, personalities, and expectations. Some may feel excited and curious; others may feel uncertain, nervous, or unsure of what to expect. All of that is welcome.
We begin by getting to know one another—not through pressure to disclose or perform vulnerability, but through thoughtful invitations to reflect and share. Sharing is encouraged and gently supported, but never expected or enforced. Participants use images, songs, personal reflections, and guided questions to explore how they see themselves going into the journey ahead - and what they hope to discover.
Group agreements help create a safe, respectful and supportive environment. Confidentiality, mindful listening, the freedom to pass, and speaking from one's own experience are all part of building a container where people can participate at their own pace.
The OUR HOUSE facilitation team does not rely on the group process alone to establish a participant’s readiness. 1:1 conversations with each client allow Nikki and Camila to get to know everyone’s goals, hopes and fears. Participants are always encouraged to seek out as much individual support as is needed to help them feel prepared.
There is something meaningful about being able to arrive at the in-person experience already recognizing familiar faces, remembering someone's story, or knowing that others are also navigating their own questions. A sense of support and community is felt before the journeys take place in Denver.
Building a Psychedelic Journey Tool Box
Staying Grounded
Our preparation process workshops practical tools to become more aware of what is happening internally.
Through guided somatic check-ins and simple exercises participants begin noticing important things: Where do I feel tension? What emotions are present? What happens in my body when I talk about something difficult? Can I pause for a breath and notice without immediately needing to explain, judge, or change what I feel?
We introduce practices that help participants orient themselves to their surroundings, settle into the present moment, and develop a more compassionate relationship with their internal experiences.
This is not about forcing yourself to become calm, meditate perfectly, or arrive at the journey without fear. It is about becoming a little more familiar with your own mind and body, and discovering that difficult feelings can be approached with curiosity rather than automatically pushed away. Knowing how to approach difficulties with curiosity is one of the most important psychedelic tools a journeyer can be equipped with, and at OUR HOUSE we make sure that journeyers travel with a backpack full of such tools.
As we often say in therapy, the goal is not simply to feel better, but to get better at feeling.
For some people, this may mean learning to recognize the early signs of anxiety or overwhelm. For others, it may mean becoming more comfortable with sadness, anger, uncertainty, or vulnerability. These are small but meaningful ways of preparing to meet an unfamiliar experience with greater awareness and self-compassion.
Exploring Trauma, Shadows, and the Parts of Ourselves We Protect
Another tool box participants work on at OUR HOUSE involves turning toward the emotional patterns and beliefs that may shape how we experience ourselves and the world. These emotional patterns and reactions are usually what brings clients to therapy and their journeys.
Together we explore the idea that many of our reactions have a history. Sometimes a present-day situation touches an older wound or a belief we developed long ago: that we are not enough, that we are unsafe, that we have to please everyone, or that our feelings are somehow too much.
Using guided reflections, OUR HOUSE guided IFS meditations, somatic awareness, and other elements of Internal Family Systems (IFS), participants are invited to become curious about the different parts of themselves.
Rather than trying to get rid of difficult feelings or judge the parts that carry them, we begin practicing a different kind of relationship: one rooted in curiosity, compassion, and understanding.
We may ask:
What part of me is showing up right now?
What might this part be trying to protect?
What does it need me to understand?
What did I come to believe about myself through earlier experiences?
Is there another way I might understand this story?
Participants are not expected to solve everything in a workshop. Rather, they begin to meet their fears and to turn them into intentions for their journeys. The therapeutic trauma beliefs and IFS work at OUR HOUSE can help people approach their journeys with greater self-understanding and a more compassionate relationship with the material that may arise.
This aspect of psychedelic preparation work tends to help journeyers in two important ways:
Defenses or protective parts become more open and receptive to the medicine work, which allows a person to drop into a journey more deeply or easily
Clear, on-point intentions may make for clearer, more productive journeys - and possibly more helpful journey outcomes.
Guiding Journeys with Intentions
The third preparation workshop brings the group's exploration together through intention setting. When you set out on a journey, do you ever travel without a destination in mind?
It is common for participants to arrive with the psychedelic adage “I will just be curious to what the medicine wants to show me”. At OUR HOUSE we know that this is a half-truth; it is missing an important aspect of this work: We are the medicine. We have agency, we are opening up to learning from deep within ourselves. The medicine only opens these doors, but we need to set the direction. So where do we want to go? What do we want to let go off? What do we want to learn and heal? An intention is not a demand that the journey produce a particular outcome. It is more like a compass: a question, feeling, or direction that can help orient the experience.
Sometimes an intention begins as a simple wish—to feel less afraid, to understand a recurring pattern, to reconnect with oneself, or to find a little more room for joy. As participants explore what lies beneath that wish, the intention may become more personal and specific.
And once we are clear on our intentions, and we have made sure we are not trying to by-pass any fears or discomfort, then we also remind ourselves to journey with curiosity and to allow the medicine to teach or show us what we need.
We give participants time to work with their intentions in pairs and small groups. They can speak them aloud, notice how the words feel in the body, and receive thoughtful reflection from others without being fixed, analyzed, or given advice. Participants are encouraged to have a journal for their process, capturing thoughts and intentions during their preparation process.
And intentions are allowed to change. In fact, they often do.
The purpose is not to arrive at a perfect sentence. It is to develop a sense of what feels meaningful to bring into the experience.
A Preparation Course You Can Return to Along the Way
Alongside the live group workshops, participants receive access to the OUR HOUSE online psilocybin preparation course.
The course offers a way to learn important concepts and practical tools at your own pace. It covers topics such as:
Understanding set and setting
Trauma and the psychedelic experience
The nervous system during a psilocybin journey
Parts, protectors, and difficult beliefs
Working with intentions
Navigating challenging moments
Psilocybin safety and harm reduction
Preparing for dosing day
Consent and touch
Understanding integration and how to carry insights into everyday life
The course is designed to support—not overwhelm—the process. It gives participants a foundation they can return to when questions arise, when they want to revisit a practice, or when they simply need a reminder of what they have been learning. The course is also our way to keep the live preparation process fun and engaging, full of conversations and connections, rather than lectures. Participants learn at their own pace with the course, and find support, deep insight and engaging community in our times together.
Explore the OUR HOUSE Psilocybin Preparation Course.
The Denver Experience: Two Journeys, One Shared Process
After preparing together online, participants meet in person at a licensed healing center in Downtown Denver.
The in-person portion unfolds over three days, with time for arrival, time in nature, two distinct psilocybin experiences, integration, and closing. The flow is intentional to create a psychedelic, (ceremonial) process that allows participants to connect with themselves and to settle into the significance of the moment.
Nikki and Camila do not simply add rituals to surround the medicine. Every aspect is an intentional part of the therapeutic process. The 3-day process creates a dedicated space in which participants can step away from everyday demands, become more present, clarify what they hope to explore, and approach their inner experience with greater awareness. The OUR HOUSE structure, environment, music, shared agreements, and intentional somatic practices all help establish a sense of safety, focus, and meaning. The elements and practices Nikki and Camila share are not intended to create a particular experience; they are a way of giving importance and attention to everyone’s internal process.
The first day begins with an opportunity to settle into the nervous system and into the healing center space together. Nikki and Camila are proud to be working out of their chosen healing space where participants will find art and creative elements; flowers, snacks, water and teas. Comfortable pillows, mats and blankets await each person. Everyone is welcomed with an OUR HOUSE gift bag with contents to support the journey process.
Participants take part in grounding practices before entering into a lower-dose journey, which offers an opportunity to become familiar with the experience and notice nervous system responses. The recommended dose on day 1 is ~1g of dried mushrooms, or 9mg of psilocin, the active ingredient in psilocybin mushrooms. This hand-shake with the medicine allows clients to have deep, valuable healing experiences while meeting the mushrooms safely. Nikki and Camila attribute this deep effect at a lower dose to the power of the group, as well as the preparation process. Community, safety and preparation enhance the effects of the medicine. Day 1 leaves every journeyer and the facilitation team with directions and personalized recommendations for day 2 dosing.
The following day is devoted to the higher-dose journey, which can be as high as 5g of dried mushrooms or 50mg of psilocin. After the previous hand-shake experience, participants are able to enter into dosing discussions with more clarity and less pressure for a “heroic dose”. Day 2 dosage and booster dose strategies are discussed with each person. Each person's experience is unique, and therefore each person’s dose is unique and right for them. At OUR HOUSE we help each client find their sweet spot with the medicine, and any pressures of comparison or overwhelm are lifted. Nikki and Camila are present to provide support, guidance, and attention throughout the process; and Christine Pateros, healing center owner and registered nurse is oftentimes present during high dose journeys, as a facilitator and clinical support partner.
The third day brings the group together for an in-person integration circle and closing. After the intensity of the journeys, this is an opportunity to begin reflecting, sharing what feels ready to be shared, and recognizing that the experience is not something we have to make sense of all at once. The integration ceremony process involves sharing fruits, snacks and chocolates, allowing nourishing foods to “integrate” into our bodies, to support the beginning of physical and mental integration.
The group has now moved through something together. That shared, ceremonial experience can become an important part of the work that follows.
Integration: Where the Experience Meets Everyday Life
A psychedelic experience can feel meaningful, moving, or full of insight. But what happens when you return home, go back to work, reconnect with family, or find yourself responding to an old situation in a familiar way?
This is where integration becomes so important.
At OUR HOUSE, we don't treat integration as a final conversation or a quick recap of what happened. Our two online integration sessions provide space to revisit intentions, reflect on what has stayed with participants, and explore the emotional, physical, and relational shifts that may be still unfolding. Participants practice how to remember journey insights and apply them when circumstances in everyday life trigger old feelings. In working with Nikki and Camila, participants learn that it is all a normal part of the process and that healing with psychedelics is a new skill we need to practice.
Nikki and Camila use guided reflections, somatic journaling, and elements of IFS again to help participants notice what is still alive from the journey. What feelings, images, memories, or questions keep returning? What has become clearer? What might need more attention?
We also explore how to cultivate the positive experiences participants may have accessed—such as connection, self-compassion, calm, courage, or a sense of possibility.
One important part of this work is learning not to dismiss those moments when everyday life becomes difficult again. Having a hard day or falling into an old pattern does not mean that a meaningful experience has been lost. Change takes practice. Integration helps us return to what we discovered and find ways to embody it over time.
We may use images, journaling, memories, and body-based practices to help make those experiences more accessible in daily life.
The goal is not to hold on to a particular feeling forever. It is to learn how to recognize what matters, nurture what we want to grow, and keep bringing our insights into the way we live.
A Team That Holds the Whole Process
OUR HOUSE was co-founded by Nikki Fall, LCSW, and Camila Pastor, LCSW, licensed psychotherapists and Colorado Natural Medicine Clinical Facilitators.
Their backgrounds include psychotherapy, trauma-informed care, EMDR, somatic approaches, ketamine-assisted therapy, and psychedelic facilitation. They have led more than 15 psychedelic group experiences with ketamine and psilocybin, completed 150-hour facilitator training and supervised practice with Fluence Training.
They are joined by Christine Pateros, MS, RN, a registered nurse and Licensed Natural Medicine Facilitator with decades of experience in healthcare and clinical research, and owner of Natural Medicine Home, the Downtown Denver healing center where the in-person program takes place.
The team brings together clinical experience, natural medicine facilitation, and a shared commitment to thoughtful, supported group experiences.
We believe that a meaningful therapeutic environment is created through many things: the preparation that happens before the journey, the care and attention participants receive, the quality of the relationships in the room, and the support that continues afterward.
The OUR HOUSE Program at a Glance
The six-week program includes:
Individual intake and screening: A one-to-one intake, behavioral health screening, and medical history review.
Three online preparation workshops: Mental and physical preparation, trauma and shadows, and intention setting.
Online preparation course: Self-paced learning and practical tools to support the process.
Two in-person psilocybin journeys: A lower-dose journey and a higher-dose journey at a licensed healing center in Downtown Denver.
Three integration sessions: One in-person integration and closing circle, followed by two online integration sessions.
Ongoing community: Optional monthly, donation-based virtual integration circles.
Learn More: Upcoming Denver Psilocybin Programs
The Medicine Can Open the Door. The Work Continues Together.
At OUR HOUSE, we don't believe the value of a psychedelic experience can be measured by the dosing day alone.
The real process begins when people start getting to know themselves and one another. It grows as they learn to listen to their bodies, approach difficult emotions with compassion, and discover new ways of relating to old stories. It deepens through the journeys themselves and continues as they bring what they have learned into their everyday lives.
Our intention is to create a space where people can feel informed, respected, supported, and connected—not only during a powerful experience, but throughout the process of making meaning from it. For as long as needed; that is why the process at OUR HOUSE doesn’t end with the program. Every participant is able to join our donation-based, virtual Community Integration Circles.
Explore our Integration Circles
Visit the OUR HOUSE Gallery for pictures of our Denver process
Healing happens in relationship.
If you are curious about joining us, we invite you to explore the OUR HOUSE Denver program or book a free 20-minute consultation.
