A Holotropic Breathwork™ session combines the use of accelerated breathing, music, and body work with an intention to heal. The process involves working in pairs where one person is in the role of “breather” and the other takes the role of "sitter" for each session. Each person will experience either the role of the “breather” or “sitter” in the first session and then switch roles for the second session, if multiple breathwork sessions are necessary.  The sitter's role is simply to be available to assist the breather, not to interfere or interrupt the process. Each breathwork session lasts from two to three hours.

Breathers lie on mats on the floor while the sitter sits nearby. Participants are advised not to have a goal or specific agenda when beginning breathwork, but rather to trust that whatever happens is the best outcome for healing. The facilitators lead a guided relaxation to help the breather relax the body in preparation for the breathing. The Holotropic Breathwork™ experience is, for the most part, internal and largely nonverbal, without interventions. Although facilitators suggest to breathers, at the beginning of the session, that they increase the pace and depth of their breath, breathers are encouraged to find their own pace and rhythm. Thus, after the breathwork session begins, breathers are not "coached" in any particular way. The facilitator plays evocative music as the breathing deepens to encourage a healing experience.

With the help of the breath, evocative music, a safe atmosphere, relaxation and a willingness to embrace the experience, breathers are guided by their own inner healing function to whatever experience will bring them healing and transformation.  The music continues for two to three hours while sitters watch over them, providing a sense of shelter and support.

During the breathwork process, the breather can have a wide range of experiences. What is visible from the outside varies. Some people are very still while others rock, cry out, or move rhythmically to the music. Experiences can include a variety of physical sensations including feelings of joy or serenity, meditative states, or re-experiencing and releasing trauma or traumas from their birth process. Some people report encounters with mythic or archetypal story lines, past-life experiences, and spiritual or religious awakenings. Some may see emotionally charged visual images, feel energy moving through their bodies, receive intuitive insights or clarity in troublesome issues in their lives.

Often participants report that they release built up stress, release emotions from previous traumas, gain an increased awareness and trust in themselves and their bodies, and recognize and can now transcend old patterns of behavior that have brought unwanted results. The experiences vary from individual to individual and from session to session. The same individual will often have different experiences each time he or she does breathwork.  Breakthroughs may be minimal, or could be dramatic and significant.

At the end of each session, the facilitator checks in with the breather. If the breathwork has not resolved all of the emotional and physical tensions activated during the session, the facilitator may offer focused energy-release body work to help release blocked energy.  When the breathwork session is complete, the breather will create a Mandala drawing to represent their experience.  The word Mandala is Sanskrit for “circle.”  Mandala drawing is an opportunity to express the breathwork experience in a non-verbal way and to begin the integration process.  Carl Jung called the Mandala, “a representation of the unconscious self."  The Mandala drawing could be anything from the simplest arrangement of colors to something quite more elaborate.  Each individual Mandala is unique to the individual breather, much like the breathwork session itself.

There is an opportunity to talk about the breathwork experience during the group sharing process and there are also suggestions for supporting the Integration process after the workshop.

BENEFITS OF HOLOTROPIC BREATHWORK™ 
Holotropic Breathwork™ is of value to anyone interested in developing more fully as a person, self-exploration, inner transformation, healing and spiritual awareness.  It is a wonderful adjunct to psychotherapy and other forms of holistic therapies and somatic practices.  Workshops heal birth traumas in adults which helps to avoid birth trauma during the limbic imprinting process and help mothers with Distinguishing Postpartum Disorders ("baby blues" or Postpartum Depression) and helps prevent burnout for Doulas and Midwifes.

ADDITIONAL BENEFITS:

Helping with creative or writers block;
Seeking inner guidance, vision and clarity;
Working with family of origin issues;
Supporting recovery from addiction;
Support during a time of grieving;
Support during a time of transition;
Working with trauma and abuse issues;
Release of stress, anxiety and depression;
Explore the emotional connection to physical ailments;
Explore spiritual connection and insights; and
Explore mystical or transpersonal experiences

CONTRADICTIONS:
Holotropic Breathwork™ is intended as a personal growth

experience and while it can be deeply therapeutic, it should

not be looked upon as a substitute for psychotherapy.

Holotropic Breathwork™ can promote experiences

accompanied by strong physical and emotional release.

It is therefore not advised for persons with a history of cardiovascular disease, including angina or heart attack, high blood pressure, glaucoma, retinal detachment, osteoporosis, severe hypertension, significant recent physical injuries or recent surgery.  It is also not recommended for persons with mental illness, epilepsy, a history of seizures or for persons currently using major medications.  Pregnant women are advised against taking this workshop. Persons with asthma should bring their inhaler and consult with the facilitators.  Persons with infectious or communicable diseases are asked to avoid this workshop.  

If you have any questions about whether you should participate, consult your physician or therapist as well as our team before registering for any of our workshops so that we can address your concerns. 

The primary source of our psychological and physical problems, as well as the ability to access ecstatic states, lies in one's own birth.

Healing the deep subconscious traumas encountered at our birth gives us a new blueprint for a re-birth while still living. When we stop living from our distorted birth imprints and start living from our new blueprint, our life changes.

The workshop draws upon the ancient principles of healing and modern psychotherapy to help you reclaim your health and inner vibrance.

Through thoughtfully accelerated breathing, evocative music, focused energy-release bodywork, Mandala drawing and group sharing, the participant enters into a non-ordinary state of consciousness which activates a natural healing process within their psyche.  Each session can have from a relatively small affect to a  significant affect or release, like peeling off a layer of an onion.  Whatever layer from your subconscious that most needs to come up, will in fact come up.  It is a natural, subconscious cleansing process.

This will be a day of deep exploration of one’s psyche within a container of fellow like-minded breathers and travelers into non-ordinary states.

Our one day workshops are a wonderful way to be introduced to this work as well as deepen your own ongoing practice.

BY Appointment Only

10:00 am to 6:00 PM

BOULDER CREEK, ca

- Introduction and Program Overview

- Holotropic Breathwork™ Session

PRICE per group of three or more: 
$500 personal one on one session

UPCOMING EVENTS and workshops

Integral Sveta

holistic HEALTH & wellness