Some say people can’t change, but they do; it happens all the time. It may be the result of a major upheaval that causes permanent course-correction. But more often, change happens little by little, so slowly as to be almost imperceptible.
Whether you’re healing from physical, emotional, or spiritual wounds, that pace can feel frustrating. You can’t walk as far as you wanted; long-standing patterns get triggered; you reach for the same old crutch. Often you wonder if you’re even progressing at all. But if you do the work, one day you realize you can put a little more pressure on that spot than before, or you react differently to a challenging situation. Suddenly, you see that things have been subtly shifting all along.
Microdosing is an approach of increments: taking tiny doses of a substance to build benefits over time. You can do it with anything, really, but a growing number of people are microdosing psychedelics and empathogens—sub-intoxicating amounts of substances like psilocybin, LSD, MDMA, and even ayahuasca and DMT. Users say the practice can help with everything from anxiety, depression, and addiction to healing from trauma, connecting with emotions, and being present with their kids. I’ve experienced many of these benefits myself.
Unlike pharmaceuticals, microdosing cannot be standardized—apart from their murky legal status, there is no one-size-fits-all approach. Dosages, experiences, frequencies, and intentions vary by individual, while potencies differ across medicines and even between psilocybin strains. Generally, people take about 1/10th the amount as for a full-blown trip, with new users advised to “start low and go slow.” For mushrooms, that range is usually <0.1-0.5g; for LSD, 6-20 micrograms. Researcher James Fadiman and mycologist Paul Stamets have developed recommended protocols of two to four dose days per week, but even this is simply a suggestion.
Some recommend stacking these substances with other supplements and herbs, such as cacao, non-psychedelic mushrooms, or adaptogens like ashwagandha. The “Stamets stack” mixes psilocybin with lion’s mane mushrooms and niacin, a nootropic said to boost cognition and memory (though some report unpleasant physical side effects). In the end, many people land where I did: dosing intuitively, whenever, to whatever degree, and with whichever supplements they feel called to. The point is finding what works for you, and incorporating periods of rest for your nervous system and psyche to process and recover.
After all, psychedelics are relationship-based medicines. While they have neurological benefits, these molecules really work as “non-specific amplifiers,” allowing information to flow more easily; opening people to new possibilities, substances, and choices. Sometimes that means challenging feelings and memories rise to your awareness; others, it can enhance positive aspects. Fadiman says microdosing improves the relationship between people and their bodies, helping them attune to their needs. He popularized the practice in 2011, touting benefits based on anecdotal reports that included improving cognitive function and physical and mental performance; this caught on with Silicon Valley executives and the human-optimization crowd.
But psychedelics aren’t a cup of coffee, says Mikaela de la Myco, an educator, entheogenic facilitator, and community care provider. Microdosing requires building relationships with the medicines themselves: learning their histories, rhythms, affinities, and ancestral uses. For example, she says, the Aztec and Mazatec peoples—the Indigenous Mexican group from whom the Global North first learned of psilocybin—take cacao before mushrooms to ground and deepen the effects. And these traditions state that there are different medicines for different times. She says mushrooms, with their introspective, reflective energy, are often best for the late afternoon or evening, while LSD, with its cerebral, bouncy vibe, may land better in the day.
Everyone responds differently, and microdosing takes trial and error, time, and trust: in the plants, yourself, and forces greater than but made of all those things. Just like any psychedelic experience, things can seem to get worse before they get better as the sources of wounds come to the surface and the system rushes to respond. Like a bruise spreads blue and purple and yellow and green before it fades, like a scab gathers on the surface of a cut, your pain becomes visible so it can be healed—with proper care.
As always, guidance and support are essential when working with any psychedelic medicine, and caution must be taken, as this approach is not for everyone. Far from a magic bullet, some say it’s closer to snake oil; when it comes to modern science, the jury is still out on the chemical efficacy of microdosing. Yet Indigenous people from Amazonia to Australian Aboriginal cultures have been doing it for millennia to improve perception, stamina, and alertness. Others say clinical studies are inherently limited, since microdosing is designed to be incorporated into everyday life; new research is aiming to utilize citizen science to better capture the real-world experience.
Stories of psychedelic therapy often involve immersive visions and encounters with the divine; I’ve certainly experienced such transformations. But some of my most profound realizations have come in a much subtler way: by creating the conditions that allow insights to come easier; subconscious patterns to be surfaced, named, and noticed so that you catch yourself earlier, without having to go all the way in.
Little by little, you see bigger glimpses of the truth. The world starts to look a little shinier; colors seem brighter, details more dazzling. The beauty of a slowly spreading sunrise drives you out of your desk chair and into the quiet dawn. You find yourself staring rapturously at the plush pink folds of a cherry blossom, wondering if they’ve always been this beautiful.
And maybe you start looking at yourself a little differently, too, with more of this wondrous perspective. You see yourself as just a creature like any other, doing what an animal does; you glimpse who you really are, with all that cultural conditioning stripped away. The volume gets turned down on the story while the curiosity is cranked up, allowing you to question the assumptions you’ve always made.
Sometimes it all builds to one big moment of awakening. During the COVID-19 lockdown, for example, microdosing along with therapeutic support helped me realize I was nonbinary. But mostly, it’s just making you more present to what was always there. So you keep going, doing the work little by little, and eventually, it can add to a lot.
