Psychedelics Today

Fireside Project is a nonprofit that helps reduce the risks of psychedelic experiences through a free support line, coaching, education, and research. In this episode, Joshua White speaks with Psychedelics Today about why real-time support matters, what it takes to run a national hotline, and what Fireside learned after more than 30,000 conversations since launch. White shares how his background as a lawyer and his early hotline volunteering shaped Fireside's model. He also describes how festival harm reduction work, including lessons from Zendo-style support spaces, revealed a major gap: people often need help during an experience and after it ends. A major focus of the conversation is Lucy, Fireside's new voice-to-voice role-play simulator designed to improve psychedelic support skills through low-stakes practice. Early Themes With Fireside Project Joshua White introduces Fireside Project as an accessible safety net for people who are actively having psychedelic experiences or processing past ones. Th