🫠 This Week in Psychedelics

Welcome to Tricycle Day. Did you miss us on Sunday? We had some censorship drama to handle, but it’s water under the bridge now. We’re so back. 💪

Here’s what we got this week.

• A new precedent for entheogenic churches 💒

• Tripping with eyes open vs closed 👁️

• Numinus is shedding its Canadian clinics 🥲

• We tried the legal hippie flip 🍫

FROM OUR SPONSORS

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Psycon Las Vegas is 2 weeks away. Don’t miss it.

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MICRODOSES

🔬 Research

Get a stretch in: Psilocybin works on depression by inducing psychological flexibility.
Every second counts: People who microdose LSD sleep 24.3 mins longer per night.
Mama knows: Fluence and Reunion Neuroscience are teaming up to test a novel psilocybin analog for postpartum depression.
Fetch or forage: Here’s what the science says about giving psychedelics to dogs.
Uh, subscribe to Tricycle Day? Most medical trainees still know next to nothing about psychedelics.

🏛️ Policy

You down with DOC? Researchers are suing the DEA (again) for trying to ban two obscure psychedelics.
The Show Me (the secrets of the universe) State: Missouri’s bill to legalize psilocybin therapy for veterans has passed a second House committee.
Y tho: Colorado Senate has passed a bill that would force social media platforms to ban users who post about psychedelics.
Could be faster innit: The UK Parliament has published “rapid responses” on psychedelic treatments for eating disorders and PTSD.

📈 Business

Mystical tourism: Traveling for psychedelic experiences is more popular than ever.
These Guyz don’t give up: An Ontario location of FunGuyz, the psychedelics dispensary chain, was raided for the fourth time.
Where the magic happened: Sasha and Ann Shulgin’s family have launched a crowdfunding campaign to restore their legendary farm and laboratory.
Insurance coverage: As part of a six-part essay series, a UPenn professor laid out the roadmap to reimbursement for psychedelics.

🫠 Just for fun

DJ Shroom: The MAPS-approved guide to creating a psilocybin playlist.
Alcohol is canceled: Kava, kratom, cannabis, and adaptogenic tonics are replacing booze.
We have cluster flies, alas: Phish has taken over the Las Vegas Sphere, and the visuals did not disappoint.
Sharing is caring: Tricycle Day’s founder opened up about his ayahuasca experience.
Meme of the week: When you want to celebrate Bicycle Day but harm reduction comes first…

THE PEAK EXPERIENCE

The separation of church and state

The sun is shining and the birds are chirping, Cyclists.

Earth Day just passed, we got our newsletter back, and what’s this? Yup, another win for the good guys.

This one might even go down in the psychedelic history books.

After a long legal battle with the US government, this week the Church of the Eagle and the Condor (CEC) clinched a massive W. They settled their lawsuit with a whole gang of three-letter gov’t agencies—the DOJ, DHS, CBP, and DEA—and secured their religious right to use ayahuasca as a sacrament.

Big deal? We’d say so. That makes the CEC the first non-Christian church to receive such protections. (UDV and Sainto Daime got their passes first.) It’s also the first time in history that a church affirmed its right to import and serve ayahuasca without going to trial.

Keep in mind, this isn’t a free for all. The church and state were able to reach their agreement, in part thanks to the CEC’s public safety practices.

• 🩺 Health screening and intake procedures

• 🏺 Secure storage of the brew

• 📝 Careful record-keeping around importation and distribution

No doubt, the hundreds of psychedelic churches around the country are taking note. Because operating in a gray area is fun, until it’s not.

Fun fact: the CEC takes its name from a Peruvian prophecy about the eventual unification of North and South American cultures.

Reconciling a mystical healing tradition within a draconian legal system may not have been exactly what the original truth seers had in mind. But hey. Progress is progress, right? 🫠

AFTERGLOW

A real eye-opener

To gaze outward or inward while tripping—that is the question. Any normal person would just call it a matter of preference, but scientists are gonna science. So, in a recent study, Robin Carhart-Harris and others compared the effects of LSD on the brain when participants either opened or shut their eyes.

Spoiler alert: they found that keeping your eyes closed enhances the psychedelic effects of LSD. Shocker. But the interesting part is why. The researchers measured participants' “brain entropy”—or the complexity of their brain activity—after exposing them to all sorts of audio-visual stimuli, alongside the LSD. And nothing produced as big a jump in brain entropy as simply going deep on LSD in blackout silence.

Brain entropy is linked to expanded states of consciousness. That much we know. Now these findings suggest any kind of external stimulation (including music) will “compete” with the drug, making the internal experience less profound. Guess that’s why Terence McKenna always preached 5g alone in the dark, not 5g alone with Netflix.

All American psychedelic-assisted therapy

Ever been dumped via text? Ouchies. But if you thought that was cold, get this. Numinus just announced it’s dropping its Canadian clinics through a press release. Instead, they’ll focus on growth in the US, where they already generate nearly 90% of their revenue.

Tough break for Numinus’s Canadian clients. But they likely won’t be left completely high and dry. Numinus is exploring all the options for its “Canadian Reorganization,” including selling off several locations to the Canadian Centre for Psychedelic Healing, who’ve signed a letter of intent. For those keeping track at home, that’s the same CCPH that took over seven Field Trip clinics after its collapse.

So why double down on the US? Well, apart from following the money, all signs point to the FDA approving MDMA before Health Canada does. In other words, the near-term future of psychedelic-assisted therapy looks much brighter south of the border. So, Canada, it may not be too late to salvage this relationship. Just approve a heart-opener, and maybe Numinus will take you back.

CYCLISTS’ PICKS

UNTIL NEXT TIME

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DISCLAIMER: This newsletter is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice. The use, possession, and distribution of psychedelic drugs are illegal in most countries and may result in criminal prosecution.