physis integration

WELCOME TO PHYSIS

Physis offers Psychedelic-Informed Relational Psychotherapy as well as harm reduction and integration for those who have experienced or will be experiencing the transformational processes of psychedelic-assisted therapies, plant medicine ceremonies, or any other experiences and practices that expand and deepen individual consciousness.

Entheogens and techniques such as Holotropic Breathwork and various forms of Kriyā have the capacity to reveal the depths of our psyche. While these plants, molecules, and practices can serve as powerful catalysts in the therapeutic process—often by bringing unconscious material into awareness—they are not the therapeutic process itself.

Amid the hype of the so-called 'Psychedelic Renaissance' in the Global North, we believe it is important to remember that these substances are neither shortcuts nor magic bullets capable of simply erasing existential struggles or deeply rooted issues. Moreover, experiences in expanded states can sometimes leave us feeling disoriented or overwhelmed—highlighting the importance of grounding, integration, and containment as essential parts of the healing journey.

Psychotherapy—along with meaningful changes in lifestyle and habits—is a key component in making the most of what has emerged, or may emerge, from experiences in expanded states. Our work is deeply relational: it begins with building a solid therapeutic alliance, includes harm reduction—as well as managing expectations—and continues with integration after those experiences, creating lasting change by tending to and honouring what has been revealed.

“Until you make the unconscious conscious,
it will direct your life and you will call it fate”

— C.G. Jung

PSYCHEDELIC-INFORMED
Relational PSYCHOTHERAPY

PHYSIS RECIPROCITY wheel

“The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way. Some see nature all ridicule and deformity... and some scarce see nature at all. But to the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself.”

―William Blake

ALESSIA Chiappino

I am a London-based Italian-British relational psychotherapist (MBACP), visual artist (MA) and group facilitator. I am currently undergoing advanced clinical training for the Postgraduate Diploma in Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy at the Institute of Psychedelic Therapy (UK), as well as a Certificate in Indigenous Studies from the University of Alberta (Canada).

I have a strong interest in Amerindian Cosmologies—the ancestral lineages of healing through Plant Teachers of the Native peoples of the Americas. I learn directly and experientially from Indigenous groups, specifically the Navajo-Diné in North America and the Shipibo-Conibo of the Upper Peruvian Amazon, with whom I have participated in Master Plant Dietas and ceremonial uses of Plant Teachers in traditional settings.

These experiences have deepened my commitment to social justice and biocultural conservation, prompting me to support several NGOs and charities dedicated to protecting threatened habitats in the Amazon Basin and parts of Africa. Through reciprocity-based projects, these organisations work to address biodiversity loss, habitat loss, deforestation, the ongoing impacts of post-colonial extractivism, spiritual appropriation, and the effects of forest and desert Medicine tourism on Native communities.

Philanthropic Support for Biocultural Conservation & Research
View fullsize Psychotria Viridis • • Chacruna, Chacrona, or Chaqruy in the Quechua languages. “We are being trained by the plants, the fungi and some other marvellous molecules to see what truly is.” — Kathleen Harrison 📸 by @ales
View fullsize A Very Swollen Salt River • • “The Navajo have that wonderful image of what they call the Pollen Path. The Navajo say, ‘Oh, beauty before me, beauty behind me, beauty to the right of me, beauty to the left of me, beauty above
View fullsize Hope • • Baby Hope, our four years old African Desert Elephant, browsing the Huab River area together with her mum. Thoughts on Reciprocity —- There is a term in the Quechua language “Ayni” - it reflects a world in perpe
View fullsize Saguaro National Park • “The Holy Land is everywhere” ― Heȟáka Sápa [ Black Elk ] 📸 by @alessia.chiappino Saguaro National Park #BlackElk #NativeAmerican #medicineman #lakota #oglala #ecology #spirituality #sacredp
View fullsize The Ayahusca vine - cleaned and smashed before being boiled. • On becoming the plant. Thoughts on the Dieta Vegetalista. SG: “That’s an important way that shamans gain knowledge of the objects of studies is rather than being detache
View fullsize Ceiba Lupuna [continued] • “Make yourself useful to many, and there will be many hoping for you to succeed.” – — Robin Van Loon “When we talk about the ecology of a forest, and the ecology for example of a tree sp
View fullsize The Italian Alps • “A human being, is a part of the whole, called by us “Universe”, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest — a kind of op
View fullsize Rescued Tamarin a La Isla de Los Monos • “Any little thing that brings us back into communion with the natural world and the spiritual power that permeates all life will help us to move a little further along the path of human moral and sp
View fullsize West and East Mitten Buttes • “The land is the real teacher. All we need as students is mindfulness.” ― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants 📸 by @alessia.chi
View fullsize Victoria Amazonica • “If diversity is a source of wonder, its opposite - the ubiquitous condensation to some blandly amorphous and singularly generic modern culture that takes for granted an impoverished environment - is a source of dism
View fullsize Tsé Biiʼ Ndzisgaii • • “Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.” — Chief Seattle&
View fullsize La Maloca at Nihue Rao • • Ayahuasca ceremonies are held in a large circular hut called the maloca, which is the traditional ceremonial space used by the Shipibo people for ceremonies. “These structures represent the largest works of
View fullsize The Red Rock Formations of The Colorado Plateau ‘All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. ... Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn’t, it is of no use. Both paths lead nowhere; but one has a heart, the
View fullsize