798 Kayse Gehret: Founder of Microdosing for Healing

0:00Kara Goldin:I am unwilling to give up, but I will start over from scratch as many times as it takes to get where I want to be. You just want to make sure you will get knocked down, but just make sure you don't get knocked out. So your only choice should be, go focus on what you can control. Hi everyone and welcome to the Kara Goldin Show. Join me each week for inspiring conversations with some of the world's greatest leaders. We'll talk with founders, entrepreneurs, CEOs, and really some of the most interesting people of our time. Can't wait to get started. Let's go. Hi, everyone, and welcome back to the Kara Golden Show.

0:45Kara Goldin:Maybe you've heard the term microdosing tossed around in conversations about creativity, healing, or nervous system regulation, but you're not quite sure what it actually means, how it works, or whether it's even relevant for you. And honestly, that confusion is one that I think many people feel. So I'm excited to have our next guest here with us today to talk a little bit about what microdosing is and answer many, many questions. So Casey Garrett is the founder of Microdosing for Healing, a global education and training platform that has supported more than 1 ,400 people across 30-plus countries.

1:31Kara Goldin:What makes Casey's work different is that it's rooted in nearly three decades of hands-on healing practice, nervous system regulation, and a lived experience, not trends or theory. And I cannot wait to get into this conversation for anyone seeking to really understand clarity, context, and better information about this whole topic. So Casey, welcome to the show. We're also friends. So I'm very excited to have Casey here to and be able to see her. So very, very excited. Hi, Kara. Great to be here. Very, very excited. So, okay. So let's start with, for all of our listeners who may have heard the term microdosing, but don't fully understand it.

2:23Kara Goldin:How do you define microdosing? What is it and what is it not? Great question. When I started our platform five years ago, the problem was there was no information. So no one had heard of microdosing. Fast forward five years later, it's almost too much information out there. And so people are like, is this hormones? Is this, is that, what are we talking about here? So microdosing in my world is taking a small subthreshold dose of psychedelic earth medicines, typically in my case, psilocybin mushrooms that I work with most often. And it's taking a dose that you're feeling gifts and benefits from the medicine, but you're not feeling altered in any way.

3:08So it's a way to incorporate psychedelic medicines into your life in a way that's really practical. It's easier to integrate and you don't have to leave your day-to-day life to experience it.

3:20Kara Goldin:So interesting. And is it something that you can buy over the counter, buy online, that you need to go to a center to go to? I mean, what is the outlet, I guess, that people go to get microdosed? Great question. And it's a movie target all the time. So right now, psilocybin mushrooms and most psychedelic medicines are illegal still in most of the world. However, it's growing organically. There's a decriminalization movement going. Oakland was one of the first places in the country to decriminalize. So there's pockets all over the country that are decriming. There are two states so far, soon to be three, we hope, states in the country that have a legalization model.

4:13But also a lot of people are using and practicing with medicines under religious protection laws. So it's far easier to access safe sourcing now. We have access all over the world thanks to religious protection laws.

4:29Kara Goldin:And so the three states is, so it's more than three states, but are there three states that are kind of the most common that people are going to when they want to experience this? Yes, microdosing people are doing all over the country, but when people want to go experience a high dose work in a legalized setting, it's Oregon and Colorado right now. Oregon, Colorado, you said three states or is it? Yes, New Mexico is also close. Alaska is getting close. And New Jersey, of all places, is also getting closer too. So, so interesting. So you guide people through this safely and intentionally, the trainers.

5:13Kara Goldin:So how did you begin? How did this all become something that you were so interested in being involved in and teaching others? A little bit serendipitous, a little bit destiny, and a little bit just inevitable, I think. I've been in healing arts for very, very many years, 31 right now. And I came across microdosing. I was on a yoga retreat. And I met someone who introduced me to the idea and concept of microdosing. And given I had a grand mal seizure disorder, I had never experimented with drugs, let alone psychedelic drugs. The thought of destabilizing my brain when it was already quite unstable on its own wasn't a draw.

5:58But I could kind of get behind the idea of microdosing. I wasn't going to trip or be altered in any way. And I had such a long background in the healing arts. I thought at best, I'd experience something similar to a meditation effect. However, I started microdosing. My seizures stopped. They healed as soon as I started practicing. I've not had one since. I had great gifts of creativity, intuition, focus, nature connection within the first few months of practicing. So when my studios closed, my healing art studios closed during the pandemic, I thought at the time to tide us over and support our community while we were closed.

6:38I just put a couple of microdosing groups together online. And one group became two, became six, became 12. And then five years later, we've supported, yeah, thousands of people now in microdosing practice.

6:51Kara Goldin:What do you think is the consumer misconception, I guess, about microdosing that you want to straighten out, I guess, for people. Debunk. Debunk it. Exactly. Yes. Exactly. There are a few, but the biggest one I hear, especially from us Gen Xers, is that we grew up with the Just Say No culture and categorized these medicines as drugs. But when you actually work with them, they are the opposite of drugs. I think people think they're going to have similar to an alcohol experience. They're going to escape. They're going to be outside of themselves. But actually, mushrooms in particular really bring you home to yourself.

7:35You're better in all ways. That's what my clients tell me that all the time. I work with a lot of high performing people and people who hold a lot of responsibility. And they're like, Case, I can't be weird. I can't be off my game. I can't like start suddenly being different. And after they begin, they're like, wow, I'm not only not off my game, I'm actually far better at almost everything.

7:59Kara Goldin:That's so, so interesting. So the hype around microdosing as a quick fix, I've heard you talk about this, but can you talk a little bit more about that? Sure. I think we're so steeped in the pharmaceutical narrative and we have such high expectations of ourselves and our modern Western society. Like we want everything fixed and solved yesterday. And so I think we're used to pharmaceutical mechanism where it's a substance doing something to us. Whereas when you're working with mushrooms, you're really working with that mushroom. So each person's system interacts differently with the medicine. It's a different process.

8:44Sometimes it's a very physical experience. Sometimes it's very mental. Sometimes it's very spiritual. It's quite different for each person. And so we really take the time to develop a protocol and the right medicine for each person, depending on where they're at.

8:59Kara Goldin:So who is microdosing not for? And why is that an important part of this conversation? I love this question. And it's not what you expect. The times that I have said, let's hold off and let's wait, it's typically when someone is going through something, but they're in such a peak raw state of emotionality. Like I'll ask them, can you imagine what you're currently feeling now? Can you imagine that being amplified at all? And if they're like, hell no, absolutely not, that's not necessarily the right time to start working with psychedelics. Psychedelics are mind expanders. They're amplifiers. They are going to open you up further.

9:45And so if you're already kind of in a raw peak state, we'll typically start with other practices first. The biggest one I've seen, I work with people who have experienced great grief. Lots of time, people have lost a loved one close to them. I've worked with a lot of people who've lost children. So it's important to start once people are at a point where you're resourced enough to really get underneath some of the symptoms that you're having.

10:11Kara Goldin:So what should someone look for when trying to find a qualified guide or program in this space? And I guess what are the red flags as well? Yeah, one of the exciting things is we're actually creating this field as we go. And so I love this because it's an opportunity to really approach healing quite different. And lots of times people are coming to microdosing. I work with a lot of people who never in a million years, if you told them a year ago, they would be working with magic mushrooms, they'd be like, me? Me? And so it's a great opportunity if you're doing something new for the first time.

10:50It's a great opportunity to harness that novelty and change up how you're approaching healing from a very passive taking a pill experience to a more participatory relational experience is a big part of the process. So if you're looking for someone now, in part, we started our training program and certification in this work for the first time. I've now had 48 people through that program so that you've gone through a training program. You've worked with guides. My teaching team is among the most experienced that we have in modern times doing this work. And so you want to check out how long they've been doing the work.

11:34And I think having a really rich personal experience and embodied experience is really key in this work as well.

11:42Kara Goldin:And do people typically go to someplace in order to try this experience? Or what is kind of the first step? Microdosing is so gentle and subtle. It's just something you do in your day-to-day life. So typically, you'll have a coach, a facilitator, a guide who you're working with, but they're not with you when you're taking it because you're not really feeling altered. I remember my first time I took a microdose, I didn't know what to expect. And at the time, I was living in Sausalito. And I was like, I'm not really feeling much of anything. And I stepped outside to walk my dog. And I was like, I immediately could smell the salt in the air from the bay.

12:26I could immediately smell the jasmine from three blocks away in my neighbor's yard. And I was like, wow, okay, it's doing something. It's doing something. So it just kind of brings you back to life. Your senses come back online. Most people notice a cognitive uplift within the first few days. People also, really interesting, people often notice a release of procrastination, which is so fun. So fun. And like so many people are like, God, I finally dug into that project that I've been putting off. I'm actually doing what's most important in my day first, very effortlessly. I cleaned out my garage for the first time in seven years, those kind of things.

13:04So those are the kind of things you see versus feeling necessarily like a physical sensation in any way.

13:12Kara Goldin:And are people experiencing this from like one trial or are they having to take it every single day in order to get those effects? Great question. So we typically start with a protocol. So I love to work with people for six weeks at a time. Typically, people in my world will practice for about three months. That's their first cycle of microdosing. And so sometimes people feel immediate effects, like within the first day or two, they notice subtle changes, but it will build and grow over time. And one of the fun parts of this practice, it evolves over time. So you might practice for six weeks or three months and say you came for migraines or to release alcohol or to lower your social anxiety.

14:01and so you work for six weeks or three months and then you'll solve for that intention. You'll stop for a while and then when you come back to practice, you get to work with something else. I think that's another big misconception people have about practice is to think that you need to keep microdosing to keep the benefits that you gain. So for example, when I stopped, I was super curious. I was like, wow, I haven't had a seizure. I haven't had an aura. I wonder when I stop microdosing, if they're gonna come back. They never came back. And so it's really so different than pharmaceuticals in that it ignites your own healing potential.

14:39And once you get it, you keep it.

14:42Kara Goldin:So, so, so interesting. I've heard people going on retreats or going to a center. Is that for a sort of higher levels of microdosing? And do you suggest that or do you suggest actually doing a lower level version first before going into the higher level? There's micro and there's macro. Yep. There's both. There's both. So I work with a lot of people, it's fun, who aren't interested in doing a high dose journey. They're kind of freaked out. They're a little bit fearful of the experience, but they're okay with microdosing. That was totally be. And once you realize so many benefits from microdosing and you come into a greater trust with the medicine, a lot of those same people, myself included, get drawn to work with the medicine at deeper levels.

15:32So they're similar but different in that when you're working at a higher dose, you can access mystical states, other levels of consciousness. Lots of times people visit with lost loved ones, have conversation, connect with their guides and their angels. So most people don't access those levels in a microdosing experience. Microdosing is about one-tenth of what your dose would be in a ceremonial journey. And when you're new to practice, I think you definitely want to have a guide if you're going to do a macro dose journey. And most people also benefit by starting with microdosing and kind of working your way up to there.

16:12So it's not such an extreme experience the first time you're doing it. But I love and advocate for both and think most people ultimately benefit by doing both. But I think probably 90 % of people are best served by starting out with microdosing first.

16:30Kara Goldin:So interesting. So microdosing, I've heard you talk about how it's supporting nervous system regulation rather than over stimulation. So how have you seen that work for, you talked about your own health and the scares that you had that have stopped, but how else have you seen, can you name other examples of that? Many, many, many. And that's the thing I think of all of the physical conditions that I've seen, that's been the most remarkable healing. So many of our conditions are due to underlying nervous system dysregulation that we don't lump together because we don't really realize that's what the root of them is.

17:22So everything from addictions to depression to anxiety to headaches, clusters, There's TBI, concussions, stroke recovery, Alzheimer's, dementia. I've seen great, great benefits with microdosing for all of these conditions because they're all rooted in treating that underlying nervous system dysregulation.

17:46Kara Goldin:It's so interesting. We've, especially in Silicon Valley, we've, I feel like microdosing has had a focus in particular. And I think it's, it seems like there's a lot of men that are talking about it. But I think the whole world of Silicon Valley ends up being a lot of men as well. There are women that are involved in it. But what's going on in that whole culture inside of Silicon Valley that you think is maybe interesting, but also maybe it's not really giving microdosing the best name, I think, in some ways. I feel like microdosing, too, while it has a lot of people talk about it with creativity, but then when it's talked about by certain people in Silicon Valley who maybe you don't really want to be like those people, I guess, is, is, um, or you're not an entrepreneur or maybe, um, maybe you're an entrepreneur, but you're like, I don't know what they're doing, but I guess what, what is sort of going on there?

19:06Kara Goldin:Is that more macro, um, than micro or I don't know. I love your diplomacy, Kara. I know. Yes. Yes. Well, well said. Yeah. I mean, the beauty of microdosing to me is that it really meets you where you are. So I always embrace people if you're coming for longevity or you're coming for professional enhancement or you want to work, be more productive, that's great because you're also going to get all of these other benefits too as an entourage effect, right? But the other thing to keep in mind too with psychedelics is they're non-specific amplifiers. So they're going to make you more of what you already are.

19:48And so we see many examples of this on the world stage right now of some individuals who have used a lot of psychedelic and become more of some of the qualities that they already came in with, sometimes for better and sometimes for our detriment. right? So I do think it's really, really important to, when you're holding these medicines, to be in a container, ideally, of positive growth and collective good, because there's so, so much potential for these medicines that if we orient ourselves outward versus inward, they're limitless in their potential to heal us, both as an individual and as a society, but they also make us more of what we already are to begin with.

20:39Kara Goldin:And when people are looking for, are there brand names out there that people should look for? Or you need to experience the microdosing through an established individual, as you talked about. I mean, is there any way to try it without having an individual who's working with you on it? Thank you for asking this question. Yeah, the sourcing is so important. So I always encourage people, like, imagine the strawberries that you get at the farmer's market. They're beautiful and they're bright and they're vibrant and they're vital. and they have so much life and nutrition in them versus the strawberries you get at the big box chain store, right?

21:31It's night and day. That's exactly what you want from your mushrooms too. So ideally you'll know your cultivator, know your farmer. If you step into a microdosing or a psychedelic community, you'll meet people quickly who know people who know people. It's a very mycelial community. So that's the dream is if you can kind of know or know a guide who knows their source and makers. We have a lot more options now, especially in the U.S. and Canada, for those people who are vetted and high integrity and are also under religious protection so they can have websites and so forth to make access easier.

22:09So interesting.

22:11Kara Goldin:How do you respond to skepticism around the microdosing as well, given what you've seen and how it's actually helped heal so many people? Thank you. You know, I've worked my entire life in the quote unquote alternative healing art. So I've kind of wrestled with and contended with this most of my life. And what I always come back to is to always focus on the work. Like come back to the work, come back to the work. Because when you're in the work, you see on a daily basis. miracles. You know, people healing from things that they thought they were going to, conditions they were going to have the rest of their life.

22:54And Western medicine just told them, you can manage this, but you can't really overcome it to any extent. We see that every week happening. And so just seeing the work, I've really come to trust this particular practice is serves people best when people are called to it. So it's not something you want to be sold to or pitched to or convinced to do it. So I honestly don't have a lot of people who don't come unless they're called to it. And so they tend to come with an open mind, a curiosity, a humility. And that is the best way because nature actually knows far more than we do. And also too, I think I've actually given your book to quite a number of new guides, because particularly those who haven't been in the healing arts for very long, it's new to them.

23:47And what I always remind them too is you have to be a little bit courageous and undaunted when you're doing this work because you're first. Like, I think this practice is going to be as normal as yoga and meditation studios 10 years from now. Like, we're going to look back and go, how crazy was that that this was illegal at one point? Because it's absurd once you step into the work. So I always remind them that they're first. You know, when you're the first to do anything, you're going to have a lot of people telling you it's not going to work. It's crazy. You're right. As you know, as you know.