Translated from our German original by AI. The German text was researched, written, and edited by the Psychedelia Foundation team and remains the authoritative version.
Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapies (PAT) can trigger personally meaningful spiritual or existential experiences in patients, and in various treatment fields these are associated with improved outcomes. A paper now sets out how spiritual and religious themes can be systematically integrated into training for psychedelic psychotherapy.
The authors propose the Relational Spirituality Model (RSM) for this purpose, an empirically studied framework that serves as both theoretical and practical guidance. Its broad SERT approach (spiritual, existential, religious, theological) allows it to be applied openly to a wide range of traditions and forms of experience.
For practice, the study proposes concrete training components:
- Structured exercise formats (deliberate practice) and experiential learning
- Dedicated “SERT groups” for personal experience and reflection
- Teaching of clinical theory alongside training in assessment and case conceptualization
These components can be built into regular psychotherapy training as well as into specialized PAT programs. The model does not aim to demonstrate a therapeutic efficacy of its own; it offers a professional training framework for working with existential and spiritual phenomena across disciplines.
