Sep 17, 2026 · 8 min · 7 segments
Dr. Sandra (Sandy) Newes, PhD, is a licensed psychiatrist and the Co-founder and Programming Director of Living Medicine Institute, which offers psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy training programs…
Sandra NewesHostAlthough it hasn't happened nearly as much as I expected, there is what we call protector backlash.
So what we learned the hard way without psychedelics is the importance of working with protectors to get permission to go to these vulnerable exile places that they've been trying to keep you away from for decades.
So we learned all the protector fears and we learned how to address those fears and how to get permission.
And psychedelics can very spontaneously take people to those places
because
it does put the protectors to sleep.
Now, I expected a lot more backlash from that.
My thinking about why sometimes people don't have that experience is because when you access that much self, as I said earlier, parts just get calmer about, okay, there is this big, strong person in us.
who can handle all this stuff.
We don't have to punish them for going to these vulnerable places because they can handle it.
And some people still do.
But we've learned before the medicine is injected to work with any protectors and all their fears about what might happen during the journey or about going on the journey at all and address those fears.
And so our subjects don't go without permission from their protectors.
And that seems to make for a calmer and deeper
journey.
Although it hasn't happened nearly as much as I expected, there is what we call protector backlash.
So what we learned the hard way without psychedelics is the importance of working with protectors to get permission to go to these vulnerable exile places that they've been trying to keep you away from for decades.
So we learned all the protector fears and we learned how to address those fears and how to get permission.
And psychedelics can very spontaneously take people to those places
because
it does put the protectors to sleep.
Now, I expected a lot more backlash from that.
My thinking about why sometimes people don't have that experience is because when you access that much self, as I said earlier, parts just get calmer about, okay, there is this big, strong person in us.
who can handle all this stuff.
We don't have to punish them for going to these vulnerable places because they can handle it.
And some people still do.
But we've learned before the medicine is injected to work with any protectors and all their fears about what might happen during the journey or about going on the journey at all and address those fears.
And so our subjects don't go without permission from their protectors.
And that seems to make for a calmer and deeper
journey.
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