During psychedelic facilitation, participants often have deep emotional experiences beyond what they are able to access in their daily lives or in regular therapy. Many describe transcendent feelings of joy, bliss, and love, as well as moments of struggle with feelings of despair, fear, sadness, and grief, often as part of a healing catharsis. At other times, participants find themselves confronting challenging beliefs about themselves with a directness that they would normally avoid. With appropriate integration support, these openings can lead to lasting psychological change.

The EMBARK model supports participants with identifying, welcoming, and experiencing affective (emotional) states more fully. EMBARK training prepares facilitators to support participants during moments of extreme emotionality and facing core psychological wounds. EMBARK-trained facilitators employ interventions that help participants confront, accept, and shift seemingly intolerable thoughts and feelings, while helping them understand how their avoidance of these aversive feeling states often drives problematic behaviors in everyday life.