The focus will be on your experience teaching you how you create and destroy, how you expand and contract – the two fundamental forces of the world we live in. By learning how to express fully, you will come home to yourself. Profound healing happens when you let go into the endless quiet of the trance state towards the end of the session. The meditations in presence  you practice as you ‘sit’ for someone, teach you how to remain in an informed relaxed state as you move through life. Shamanic breathwork allows you to travel through your personal story to merge with the collective consciousness of humanity, into Nature, the spiritual and way beyond. The maps we will be using will give you a deep understanding of your experience and whatever ails you and calls you.

You can examine limiting beliefs and emotional addictions, source new ideas, technologies and healing modalities, understand maps of the way you create and destroy your life, resolve life long relationship patterns, relieve the fear of death, illness, old age or future events, release trauma, open to orgasmic bliss,  and experience states of pure unconditional love and acceptance.

Breathwork sessions are usually about 3 hours long and follow a shamanic model of a journey. There is an initial individual sharing and intention setting, followed by about 2 hours of powerful breathing and then quieter spaces. The session concludes with mandala drawing, a light snack/lunch and extensive integration processes. In group settings, each breather is held in presence by a sitter and you swap roles in the afternoon session. In private sessions, you are held by Namae, with plenty of time to share and integrate.

Whilst there may be recurring themes, no two breathwork sessions are ever the same. The process activates intense altered states of consciousness that mirror the progression of psychoactive journeys with substances. See Breathwork retreats for the next gathering.

This workshop is deeply experiential and may involve intense feelings and energetic releases. If a person relives a traumatic event, they experience physical and emotional reactions very similar to what they had when the event was actually taking place – old injuries may be re-experienced, extreme heat or cold, strong physical and energetic movements. It is important to share all your relevant medical history before beginning, both with me and to a lesser extent with the person sitting for you at each session.

These sessions are not advised for persons with a history of cardiovascular disease, including angina, hypertension or heart attack, high blood pressure, glaucoma, retinal detachment, osteoporosis, significant recent physical injuries or recent surgery. Careful consideration must be made for people who have strong emotional disturbances or mental health issues.

This workshop is also not advised for women who are pregnant or for persons using certain medications. Folks with asthma or a history of childhood asthma should bring their inhaler to every session and consult with me. Anyone with a history of seizure disorders, psychiatric hospitalization or mental illness needs to discuss this with me prior to registering. The sessions may be disturbing for people who are very psychically sensitive or who suffer from paranoia.

Persons with infectious or communicable diseases are asked to avoid this retreat, as we are in a closed room for the duration of the sessions. Given the depth of expression and sensitivity of breathwork experiences, it is also suggested there be no smoking, drinking alcohol or use of any other mind or emotionally altering substances immediately before or during sessions, or until after integration each day.

While not all of the above conditions necessarily disqualify anyone from participating, you may require special attention and community support. Each participant will be sent a medical history form and a “I take full responsibility for myself and others” form. For the safety of every participant, please be honest and, if you have any questions, contact me.

For those who are breathing, it is suggested you eat very lightly for a few hours before starting a session to ease the physical discomfort of strong energy movement. It is not necessary to be sure of your intention before you arrive for the session; often, it becomes clear as you experience our initial discussion and explore whatever comes up for you.

Sessions are normally in a darkened room where you lie on a mat with a sheet and blanket and either close your eyes or wear an eye mask. There is usually a relaxation meditation and a blessing, anointing or spiritual invocation before you begin to breathe.

There is a diverse range of evocative music used throughout the session. Initially, it is very loud, with strong rhythms to engage you fully in the inner experience, to energize you, help you breathe, express and open you to non-ordinary states of consciousness. This loud music is to help dearer the brain and shift to the inner landscapes of the unconscious. After an hour, the mood shifts to deeply feeling music, the epic landscapes of the soul, designed to facilitate deeper emotional release. The third phase of music is quietly trance inducing and spacious music consistent with profound introspection and transpersonal travel. The last phase of the music support the breathers to come out, using natural sounds of this beautiful Earth, a welcome back to the beauty of this reality.

The process opens you to whatever set of experiences in specific times and places are currently relevant for you and will activate the healing intelligence of the body and soul. It is important to be able to surrender to the visions, sensations, feelings and energies that arise and move you during a session. There may be times when you feel very deeply when you need to express whatever it is that has been stuck, be it pleasure and/or pain. I’ve listed some things below that one might experience in breathwork.

• Often old emotional distress is first felt as a physical sensation, so the body may feel things before you can emotionally express them. There could be experiences of tightness, tingling in the extremities and contraction of the body, vibrations or muscle tremors, the need to shake the limbs and move.
• Some people feel cold, frozen or excessively hot, an indication of energy moving through the feminine or masculine channels of contraction and expansion.
• There can be sensitivity to lights, smells, touch and other sounds.
• There may be ecstatic feelings of energy coursing through the body or orgasmic releases.
• Some people may at times feel a little nauseous when there is fear present or they are really sick of something in their lives, or if they have eaten too much before a session.
• New feelings about past experiences in relation to current circumstances often arise revealing your deepest truths, bringing a sense of relief, insight, surprise and freedom of choice.
• Time may seem to flow more quickly or hours can seem like a moment. The past may seem to be more real than the present or you may be in possible futures.
• You may feel as if you are back in the birth canal or are being reborn or even feel like you are dying.
• You may experience just feelings or energy in the body without any story.
• You can reclaim lost parts of yourself through conversations with people, present or past, pets, animals, places and objects, using them as symbols or as aspects of yourself.
• You may go beyond the personal realm, open to the numinous by embodying gods or goddesses, spirits or ancestors, archetypes or animal beings, creatures from other worlds or angels or demons, in fact any creature that may or may not exist in anyone’s reality.
• You may be immersed in mythic realities or surrender to the Void, visit Armageddon or the creation of the Earth, or travel to the stars.
• You may access memories of virtually any experience any human ever has had or could have in the future.

However spectacular, non-event or challenging the experience, this is your psyche’s way of guiding you toward wholeness. The key is your willingness to surrender to it.

When you feel finished breathing, you will be invited to draw a mandala to express the energies you have awoken. This symbolic expression may be very primitive, free-flowing or as detailed as you wish. You can bring your own art materials with paper to suit your preferences. It is not about whether you can draw or not. It is to assist you in integrating the experience and keeping the symbolic language alive. Mandalas become a wonderful history of your explorations. Being in a totally private, peaceful and beautiful location allows you to be reborn into a world of welcoming love and beauty, kinda like the way we were all meant to be born.

Usually, I will discuss the maps for breathwork sessions before we start so you develop the tools to navigate the internal experiences and understand the transpersonal realms of consciousness. I mindfully observe and feel each person’s experience and create as safe, and loving container as I can for everyone. I only intervene in someone’s experience if they get very disruptive, endangering other people, if someone gets very stuck or if specific bodywork is required to help move the energy.

We begin a retreat with a dinner the night before. This gives you a chance to get orientated and to meet other participants and the trainees who will have had a training session that afternoon.

When we begin each day, there will be an introductory talk to frame the experience and discuss the process. Each person will lie on their own mat with a sitter whose role is to be present and protect and care for the breather. The sitter does not facilitate the process but holds deep presence and awareness for the breather. I will be walking around guiding the meditation to begin with, orchestrating the music and assisting anyone who needs anything.

When the session is finished, the sitter takes care of the breather in whatever way they need and helps them get settled to draw their mandala. Some people prefer to be out in nature during this time or simply remain quiet afterward because they are so sensitized and very open. Everyone is encouraged to keep a quiet, mindful awareness between sessions as the space is switched around.

At the end of the day, we come back together to either share mandalas or do nurturing integration processes, and to check in with everyone to see if they need anything. We finish each day with a nourishing meal and tend to our own self-care.

During integration, we may share the mandalas or we might share each person’s experience. Depending on what happens in the group, we may forgo this sharing to do active meditations or pair group processes to learn the ways of dealing with past traumas. We may just experience being held, with no expectations or chatter. There may be active processes to untangle early childhood aspects that support the maturation processes; developing awareness of the relationships between the transpersonal aspects and current daily life, and with the immature, hurt places we carry and our creation of an adequate inner parent. We might dance or do yoga or tell stories or walk in the forest. The integration processes recognize the transpersonal, mythic and symbolic meaning of experiences, as well as the personal healing that happens. We encourage the sharing of wisdom and insights each person gains, in multiple ways.

Many of the colors, patterns, images and symbols which emerge during sessions or in mandalas have deep meaning and will continue to evolve through dreams, meditations and in ordinary life. They greatly enhance our experiences if we continue to pay attention to these symbols.

After breathwork, it is often helpful to continue the work with other practitioners on an ongoing basis for emotional development, dietary, medical and physical concerns. Breathwork sessions can be hard on the body so massage, acupuncture, cranial sacral, chiropractic and tender care are always recommended afterward. Somatic experiencing work is invaluable.

It is really important to give yourself enough time to integrate the retreat. Create an easy transition where you can have restful, quiet time and space to get bodywork should you need it. Take an extra day off work if you are flying home.

I suggest as a matter of confidentiality that the names of those attending groups and retreats are not discussed with folks outside the group. People may be very vulnerable afterward and it is an act of care to respect their boundaries. I ask participants to refrain from sharing about other’s experiences, even to those in the work, unless they have specific permission to do so. You can share as much as or as little as you like about your own sessions but be mindful to whom you are speaking and their ability to hold your experience and the work in a way that can appreciate the depth of the process.

As an added layer of safety, if you meet people later, check in with them and ask if they are in a place to talk with you about the group, as there may be reasons why they cannot do so at that very moment.

As part of breathwork, people open up to their energy and often experience sexual feelings. It is a natural part of the awakening process and a fundamental experience of birth. If this happens in a group or retreat, people are encouraged to own their experience internally, to enjoy it by dancing and feeling it but not through acting it out with others. There is to be no sexual contact, explicit language or sexual acting out in group sessions. You are encouraged to open to the life force and experience the energy as an internal guide and teacher.

This limitation encourages you to create a container for yourself by reclaiming your energy within healthy boundaries, to be sensitive to the needs of others in the group and to awaken to the power of learning to channel your energy in different ways. 

Sexual behavior in group sessions does affect everyone, whether you are aware of it or not and in sessions you are very unlikely to notice your effect on others who have suffered abuse, incest or lack of respect in their tender formative years. We are exploring new learning environments, not trying to recreate and re-enact the wounds of the past. Learning to master the natural flow of your sexual energy opens up a freedom of choice to own your own energy and not act it out, a skill that is essential for any fulfilling sexual relationship.

It is strongly recommended you turn your phone and computers off for the duration of the breathwork sessions, and for the whole weekend when doing a retreat. The spaces that people experience in breathwork are usually very tender. Paying close attention to those present right in front of you during and after a session helps us all give and receive the kind of care and protection we all need.