Intention isn’t about what you want to happen. It’s about how you choose to face what arises.
In the world of psychedelic therapy, intention is often talked about, but rarely understood.
People show up with the best of motives: I want healing. I want clarity. I want to feel love again.
But what many don’t realise is that intention isn’t a goal. It’s not a wishlist or an agenda. It’s a direction.
A commitment to meet whatever the medicine reveals with honesty, humility, and care.
In my work with clients, especially those preparing for psilocybin sessions, I’ve found that the right intention doesn’t control the journey. It frames it.
It creates a field of meaning. A kind of inner compass you can return to when things get intense, confusing, or unexpectedly beautiful.
In this post, we’ll explore:
Because when your intention is authentic, the medicine responds.
Psychedelic experiences are not random. They are relational.
What you bring, your internal state, emotional readiness, and energetic openness, interacts with the medicine to shape what unfolds.
That’s where intention comes in.
Your intention is like a tuning fork. It sets the vibration of your experience, long before you take the medicine. It doesn’t dictate what will happen, but it frames how you relate to what does.
In moments of bliss, it can help you anchor and receive. In moments of intensity, it can help you stay open rather than resist. In moments of confusion, it can help you trust that even this is part of your journey.
I often tell clients that their intention is a way of entering into dialogue with the medicine.
You’re not demanding answers. You’re making an offering:
“Here I am. Here’s what I’m bringing. Show me what I need.”
When the journey begins, things may look or feel very different than you imagined. That’s okay. In fact, it’s expected.
The role of your intention is not to ensure comfort, it’s to keep you connected to meaning.
Especially in preparation for psilocybin, this becomes vital. Psilocybin often surfaces layers of the unconscious, including grief, longing, exiled parts, and soul memories. Your intention becomes a kind of inner orientation point. Not to cling to, but to lean toward.
Because when everything else feels unfamiliar, it helps to have something clear to return to.
It’s completely natural to feel unsure when setting your intention, especially if you’ve never done it before. However, over the years, I’ve observed a few common patterns that often lead people astray.
Here are some of the most frequent mistakes I see when it comes to psychedelic intention setting:
“I want healing.”
“I want to feel better.”
“I want clarity.”
These are understandable desires, but they’re too broad. The medicine doesn’t need a full life plan, but it helps when your intention has depth and specificity. Ask: What kind of healing? From what? Get more honest and more human.
Sometimes people come in with tightly controlled goals:
“I want to meet my spirit guide.”
“I want to unlock a specific memory.”
“I want to experience bliss.”
This can block the deeper intelligence of the process. If your grip on the outcome is too tight, you might miss what’s actually trying to emerge.
“I want to explore the intersection of trauma, epigenetics, and self-worth through a Jungian lens.”
If you’re thinking like a therapist or coach rather than showing up as a human being, you’re probably in your head. Good intentions come from the body, the heart, and the gut. They’re simple, honest, and alive.
Some people think they have to be in a high vibration to “attract” a good journey. So they suppress fear, sadness, or anger and set intentions like:
“I want to feel love.”
“I just want a beautiful, peaceful experience.”
There’s nothing wrong with wanting that. But if it’s covering up deeper emotions, the medicine may take you straight into the places you’re trying to avoid.
Sometimes, it doesn’t take you anywhere at all. I’ve seen this often: when someone tries to control the outcome, staying positive, spiritual, or ‘in control’, they may end up having no real experience.
It’s not until they surrender to the intelligence of the medicine that the journey begins and they receive what they need.
The antidote to all of these? Honesty. Simplicity. Humility. You don’t need to get it perfect. You just need to be real.
A good intention doesn’t sound impressive. It sounds true.
It’s not a place to reach. It’s a doorway into a deeper relationship with yourself.
One that invites vulnerability, openness, and surrender.
✅ Emotionally honest – rooted in what’s authentic to you now
✅ Open-ended – leaves room for the unknown
✅ Simple and clear – not poetic or intellectual, but felt and embodied
✅ Curious – more of a question than a demand
These aren’t affirmations. They’re invitations.
They invite the medicine in. Not to fix you, but to reveal what’s ready to be seen.
When preparing for psilocybin specifically, intentions that touch the emotional body tend to go deeper. The mushrooms speak primarily in feelings. And if your intention is rooted in feeling, you can have a meaningful conversation with truth.
The most powerful intentions are rarely the first ones that come to mind. They live just beneath the surface—quiet, persistent, often uncomfortable. You not inventing them. You uncover them.
Here are a few ways to gently peel back the layers and let your true intention rise:
Give yourself 10–15 minutes, free from distractions, and write without editing or censoring. Let it be raw.
The goal here isn’t to solve anything. It’s to listen. To allow what’s been buried to come closer to the surface, gently and without judgement.
Often, the place you don’t want to go is exactly where your soul is pointing. If the idea of grieving scares you… If meeting your anger feels unsafe… If letting go of control brings panic… That may be your doorway.
A good intention challenges you. Not to the point of overwhelm, but just enough to stretch you beyond what you currently know. To the edge where something real can move.
Because let’s be honest: You’re here because your life has become too small. And the only way forward is to expand. To stretch beyond old patterns, old identities, old stories. To meet the version of you that’s been waiting just on the other side.
There is no perfect intention. So much of this work is about letting go of control, of needing to get it right, of forcing clarity before it’s ready.
Your intention doesn’t need to sound profound. It just needs to be honest. The point isn’t to find the perfect phrase. It’s to trust what comes through and let that be enough.
When you write it down, speak it out loud, and feel it in your body… that’s when it begins to take root. And in the journey, when things get uncomfortable or unfamiliar, it’s your intention that will support you. Not as an outcome. But as a compass.
Once your intention becomes clear, the work has already begun. The point isn’t to “hold onto” the intention like a mantra you mustn’t forget. It’s to live with it. To let it inform how you move, breathe, speak, and prepare in the days leading up to your session.
This is how intention becomes more than a thought. It becomes a reminder of what you really want.
🌀 Repeat it like a prayer
Each morning, sit quietly. Speak your intention aloud or in your heart with gratitude.
🌀 Move with it
Walk with it. Stretch with it. Dance with it. Let your body show you how it responds.
🌀 Create a small ritual
Light a candle. Write your intention on a piece of paper. Place an object next to it like a stone, flower, or something personal. Let it anchor your commitment.
🌀 Breathe into it
Take a few minutes each day to breathe deeply and allow the words to settle in your body. Where does it live? What sensations arise?
🌀 Notice how life responds
When you carry a clear intention, the world begins to reflect it. You might find signs, dreams, or unexpected encounters that reflects what you’re working with.
Preparation for psilocybin (and other medicines like MDMA) is about creating a relationship with feeling and intuition.
When you tend to your intention like a seed, the journey doesn’t come as a surprise, but as a continuation of something already unfolding.
This might be the most important part of intention setting: You don’t get to control how it shows up.
You may ask to reconnect with joy, and instead, find yourself deep in grief. You may want to feel peace, and end up meeting your rage. You may long for clarity, and be asked to sit in the void.
This doesn’t mean your intention failed. It means it was heard and responded to in the most honest, soul-aligned way.
Psychedelics, especially psilocybin, have a way of going straight to the root. Not the symptom. Not the idea. The truth beneath the words.
Sometimes you’ll receive exactly what you asked for. But more often, you’ll receive what you didn’t know you needed.
Letting go doesn’t mean abandoning your intention, it means releasing the grip of expectation.
It means staying curious. Present. Willing to trust the deeper intelligence at play.
This is where the real work is. Because when you can meet even the unexpected with openness… You are surrendering to the greater intelligence of life and humbly allowing your highest most soul-aligned path to appear.
At its core, setting an intention is being clear about what you want and need. It’s about showing up with the courage to listen. Even if what you hear isn’t what you expected.
Because this work isn’t about controlling your journey. It’s about surrendering to it. And surrender doesn’t begin on the medicine. It begins now.
When you craft an honest, grounded, and emotionally resonant intention… When you carry it with you like a prayer… When you let it shape how you show up before the journey even begins…
Something opens. You step into a partnership with the medicine. You step into alignment with your soul. You step into a deeper way of relating. Not just to the psychedelic experience, but to life itself.
So, before you focus on what you hope to get from the journey, ask yourself this:
Am I willing to listen?
Not just to the insight… But to the grief, the fear, the joy, the mystery?
Because that’s where the real journey begins.
→ [Still preparing? Read: How to Prepare for a Psychedelic Journey]
→ [New to this work? Read: Is Psychedelic Therapy Right for Me?]
→ [Feeling the call? Explore 1:1 Psychedelic Therapy & Integration]
Read the latest insights and stories on the power of psychedelic-assisted therapy and holistic personal development for leaders and entrepreneurs.
