#303 Introduction to Microdosing and Psychedelics - Djai Baaten

Djai Baaten (0:00)

It seems to be really promising. Studies being done in psychedelics now show very big effect sizes. The results that they get from using psychedelics together with therapy, they are very big compared to other means of giving therapy.

SPEAKER_2 (0:15)

Welcome to the Siim Land Podcast. I'm your host, Siim Land, and today our guest is Djai Baaten. Djai is a neuropsychologist and clinical psychologist from the Netherlands. Djai is involved with the academic community of psychedelics and co-organized the Interdisciplinary Conference on Psychedelic Research 2020 He's also a consultant at microdosepro.com. This episode is brought to you by Optimal Carnivore organ meat supplements.

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Siim Land (1:24)

Djai, welcome to the podcast.

Djai Baaten (1:27)

Thank you very much.

Siim Land (1:29)

I'm excited to talk with you because we're going to cover a topic that hasn't been on my podcast previously yet that much, which is psychedelics and microdosing. So it's going to be really interesting. It's very kind of new, let's say, or a lot of more scientific attention has been going to this field.

But first, let's talk about your background. How did you become a neuropsychologist and what made you delve into the world of psychedelics?

Djai Baaten (1:58)

Yeah. Well, first of all, thanks for having me here. It's a pleasure.

Siim Land (2:04)

Yeah.

Djai Baaten (2:04)

So I work as a psychologist now. I have degrees in neuropsychology and clinical psychology, for which I studied at university, of course.

And yeah, I think I've always been fascinated by how the brain works and the interactions between things that happen in the brain and how that affects behavior, thoughts, feelings, you name it, which is why I went to study neuropsychology. In the end, I found that my specific master's degree mostly led me to work in hospital with people who have brain damage, whereas I would be more interested in working with people who had other kinds of problems, like depression, addiction, anxiety, which is the work that I'm doing right now.

But in between all of that, I discovered psychedelics first through reading, found out that in 2007, 2011, there was some research being done into psychedelics, what they do, how they work, and whether they could be used as tools to help people heal from trauma, help them deal with addiction, help them deal with depression.

So that got me really enthusiastic about the subjects. And that's when I started reading into it more and more. And I think one of the things that most got me the most was that while I was studying, I always had the idea that everything important there was to know about psychology had already been discovered. And all the important things, you know, all the treatments, they'd already been invented. So there wasn't much to do anymore. I got a bit sad by that. It seemed a bit boring. But then I found psychedelics and that seemed to be like, we had a lot of research going on in the 60s. That was a lot of attention for it. And then due to social political reasons, outside of the scope of this conversation, most of that got banned. So actually, right now, there still is a lot to figure out about psychedelics, how they work, how to use them best. That makes me very enthusiastic.

Siim Land (4:40)

Yeah, absolutely. Over the past few years, there has been, I think, more like academic and clinical adoption of psychedelics as treatment options for different psychological conditions. And yeah, apparently, at least like the biggest effects come from this addiction related issues and trauma related issues, et cetera.

But what is, let's say, can you give like an overview as well about what is the clinical evidence of psychedelics and what does the science say about the benefits of them?

Djai Baaten (5:17)

Well, it seems to be really promising. Studies being done in psychedelics now show very big effect sizes, which means that the results that they get from using psychedelics together with therapy, they are very big compared to other means of giving therapy. So, for example, if you would compare psychedelics for depression to antidepressants for depression, you see in the latest research being done that they actually seem to be very much online. And maybe there are some signs that psychedelics might be more effective. So this is for depression. We have a lot of evidence, a lot of research happening and being done in the past with MDMA, which is also being put in the same category as a psychedelic. So MDMA for post-traumatic stress. And beware, all of this is together with therapy. So it's not just the substance itself, it's the effects of the substance together with giving therapy that makes the treatment whole. And that makes it effective.