Isabel santis, Phd, MA

Hi, I am Isabel, and I help people transform their lives through intentional work with psychedelics. My work focuses on three primary areas:

I help psychedelic explorers have safe, profound, and meaningful journeys and make sustainable changes in their lives based on those experiences.
I partner with values-aligned organizations seeking to develop a psychedelic area of practice.
I support climate activists and organizations to help them reconnect with their calling, reduce burnout, and increase personal and organizational resilience.

I bring 20 years of experience in psychedelic harm reduction, preparation, and integration, 6+ years facilitating expanded states, and 30+ years of personal experience and training in navigating transpersonal experiences, and the personal and collective unconscious.

My Story

My journey along the path of expanded states started in 1995 when I had a dream that changed my life. When I woke up, covered in sweat and shaking, I knew this was no ordinary dream. It was an invitation to a journey of self-discovery. This experience catalyzed a process of self-exploration and learning. I began studying shamanism, dreamwork, somatic embodiment, expressive arts therapy, and other subjects that helped me gain skills to navigate expanded states of awareness. I also became a certified coach and completed an MA in Transformative Leadership. All this time I was working on my "real job" as a program manager for corporations and non-profits.

During this period, I was attending a lot of transformational festivals, and I kept on finding myself in situations where people who had taken psychedelics needed support. It happened so many times, actually, that in 2012 I took the MAPS training on psychedelic harm reduction so I knew what to do in case of an emergency. In 2014 I had an powerful experience at Burning Man, supporting a young woman who needed help. I spent 8 hours with her, and by the end, I knew that I had found my calling. But at that time, there were not many above-ground opportunities to pursue training, so I didn't know how to move forward. The following year, the psychedelic rennaissance began gaining momentum, and more opportunities for learning and training opened up. I began attending conferences and workshops to deepen my understanding on how to safely support folks working with psychedelic substances.

In 2018, after a particularly powerful journey and a string of amazing synchronicities, I decided to leave the corporate world and commit myself to the Medicine Path. I enrolled in the East-West Psychology Ph.D. program at CIIS, where I could pursue my passion. Being a full-time student allowed me the opportunity to take graduate-level courses on shamanic practices, psychedelics, indigenous traditions, rites of passage, spiritual counseling, art therapy integration, and eco-psychology. For my dissertation, I studied the effects of psychedelics on people's experience of eco-anxiety. In 2019, I launched Spiral Journey, where I help my clients become skilled at safely navigating profound and transformative psychedelic experiences. From 2023-2024, I was a psychedelic Retreat Facilitator and the Director of Integration for Beckley Retreats, where I led the preparation and integration process for over 350 guests and facilitated retreats in Jamaica. Currently, I am part of the facilitator mentorship faculty at Nectara, a psychedelic integration resource.

My training

I have been deeply honored to learn from many distinguished and generous teachers. Everything I know I owe to them, and to my ancestors who have passed their knowledge down to me. My formal education credentials include:

A PhD in East-West Psychology from CIIS, with a concentration in eco-psychology, shamanic practices, and expanded states of consciousness. My dissertation research focused on the effects of intentional work with psychedelics on people's experience of eco-anxiety.
A Masters degree in Transformative Leadership, also from CIIS. My practicum project focused on embodied learning and different ways of knowing.
Various coaching certifications and continuing education, including Trauma-Informed Coaching, Positive Psychology, and Integral Coaching.
Training in Eco-Psychology, Somatic Psychology and Internal Family Systems (IFS).
Facilitation training in "The Work that Reconnects", Harambee Art Therapy, and psycho-spiritual group work.
Extensive training in psychedelic facilitation and best practices.
And much more! To find out details about my training and certifications, click here.