Our Processes
Intake/Screening Process
After our guests fill out a medical and health background application, they will participate in a zoom call with a member of our staff. This call entails specific questions about their intentions for the retreat, past experiences and important personal history evaluations. Once accepted, guests receive a 7-Day Online Preparation Course which focuses on the psyche, somatic body awareness, thought patterns and present state of each guests. It introduces some of the concepts we will cover at the retreat including: ceremony, introspection of the “shadow side” of our subconscious, holding space for healing, present moment awareness and more.
Preparation
Your experience begins before you even arrive. We work to prepare all of our guests for the work ahead, ensuring that both mind and body are ready to accept the insights derived. Some of the tools we advocate, and introduce early in your journey with us, are deep breathwork, movement, active listening, and focusing on emotional responses as opposed to rational. This broad-based study in mindfulness will help you connect with yourself as you move towards your experience with the medicine. Next, we ensure that our guests are equally prepared to experience the ceremony itself. We offer tools that you can use to maintain balance in what may otherwise be am intimidating experience.
Ceremony
The Buena Vida Mushroom Retreat medicine ceremony combines a rich blend of the ancient and the modern, infused with the particular traditions and beliefs of our very experienced staff. With specific study of the traditions of the Camino Rojo, and a blend of other indigenous and modern traditions from other parts of the world, ours is a ceremony experience that is truly unique. Because of this somewhat flexible approach, we believe our clients will feel free to create their own rituals that feel deeply personal. While your journey is yours alone and always distinctly personal, our ceremonies embrace community. The community aids in the integration and processing of your experience. It brings a sense of belonging and acceptance. All are together as one and supporting eachother on our respective journeys. Derived from the traditions we have been trained to respect, we will infuse sonic healing into the ceremony, with specific sounds and tones very much part of the traditional experience. But we infuse modern music with these classic sounds, helping our clients better integrate their experience long after they have left.
Integration
Our team makes sure that you absorb as much benefit from the medicine as possible, but we can not ‘figure it out for you’! Our singular hope is that the practices, tools and learnings that you absorbed in your time with us can be continued after you leave. It’s only through this incorporation that you will find the confidence to heal yourself and the foundational self-acceptance to believe you deserve it. Our integration model has been created iteratively and based on the feedback we get from observing, and talking to, our guests. Key to this approach is the documentation and absorption of everything you experienced with the medicine. Some tools to assist include journaling, dancing, and meditation. We do not believe that ‘talk therapy’ belongs in our program, as many of our clients have access to this back home. We may, at your option, continue to support your integration over an additional 8 week program. This program aims to establish Intuitive Integration, wherein you reinforce your newly-disciplined thinking so that it becomes part of your routine. There are individual and group aspects to the program, with the bonds established during your stay with us continuing to help you on your journey long after you have left.
