The Great Work of Growing Whole [Collage]
Doug Van Houten
I teach, facilitate, speak, and advise at the intersection of spirituality, human transformation, and psychedelics.
Psychedelics and plant medicines were held within religious and ceremonial traditions long before they were studied in clinics, yet the field still too often treats their spiritual dimensions as incidental, or as someone else’s department. Across twenty years as a scholar of religion, educator, and builder of programs, I have become a fluent translator between worlds that rarely speak to each other: the scholarly and the sacred, the visionary and the operational, the ancient and the modern.
Meet Frederica
Transformation has been the through-line of my professional life: not lifestyle adjustments or shifts in values, but the kind of change that reorganizes a person’s entire cosmology. My career has been spent building and tending the containers in which such change can unfold, and, increasingly, helping the psychedelic field hold it with the seriousness it deserves.
I grew up between worlds, Belgian by origin and American by upbringing, and trained as an eco-theologian and scholar of religion at Dartmouth and at Yale, where I earned dual master’s degrees from the Divinity School and the School of the Environment. Along the way came Peace Corps service in the Philippines, a season on a log cabin crew, five years teaching ethics, environmental justice, and world religions at the University of Washington and Seattle University, and roles at United Religions Initiative, Spiritual Directors International, Esalen Institute, and Synthesis Institute, where I directed the Psychedelic Practitioner Core Training.
Today, as a Field Scholar at Emory’s Center for Psychedelics and Spirituality and as a consultant, facilitator, and educator, I help practitioners and organizations build spiritual literacy: the capacity to meet the meaning-laden dimensions of psychedelic experience without pathologizing them, prescribing belief, or flattening the depth that makes this work matter.
Outside of work I am usually in the mountains, rowing, biking, open-water swimming, or pursuing Type 2 fun of some kind, and I live in Seattle with my partner, our two children, and an intentional tangle of chosen family and friends.
Where my work has lived:
Emory Center for Psychedelics and Spirituality · Sabba Collective · LightEn and the Council on Spiritual Practices · Gather Well Psychedelics · Ligare · Sacred Garden Community · Synthesis Institute · Esalen Institute · Spiritual Directors International · United Religions Initiative
Services
Program & Curriculum Architecture
Your program has heart but the design isn't holding it. I build the structure: sequence, pedagogy, ethical framework, and assessment, so the experience actually delivers what it promises. Certificate programs, practitioner training, and continuing education are a particular strength.
Speaking, Writing and Research
I speak and write on religion, spirituality, and psychedelics for conferences, podcasts, and commissioned projects, and contribute to research on how the field can meet the meaning-laden dimensions of these experiences.
Retreats, Gatherings, and Facilitation
Retreats, workshops, board retreats, leadership offsites, community reckonings. I design and hold the container so the conversation goes where it needs to go.
Learning Design for Training Technology
I help edtech and simulation teams build the learning beneath the platform: skills taxonomies, progressions, and readiness pathways, including the relational and spiritual capacities that are hardest to teach.
Spiritual Literacy & Psycho-Spiritual Work
When psychedelic experience exceeds clinical categories, practitioners need more than a protocol. I help you develop the frameworks to recognize, hold, and respond to spiritual dimensions of this work without pathologizing or over-spiritualizing them.
Organizational Assessment & Strategic Consulting
Something isn't working and you're not sure what. I come in, talk to your people, find the thread, and tell you honestly what you're looking at — then help you do something about it.
Media
Guest discussion on the architecture, ethics, and evolution of psychedelic practitioner training programs.
Conversation on working responsibly as healer and guide in the emerging psychedelic landscape.
ReMind Conference Panel Speaker
Panel speaker: “Psychedelic Retreats and Wellness Centers: Insider Strategies for Success” — exploring sustainable infrastructure and standards in psychedelic programming.
What Others Say