Holotropic Breathwork®

One-day workshop in Portland, OR USA

Heart of the Rose, 4314 N. Mississippi Ave. Portland, OR 98217

*this work is useful for refining skills and expanding framework relevant to those working with individuals in therapeutic or psychedelic settings.

Holotropic Breathwork® is a powerful approach to self-exploration and personal empowerment that relies on our innate inner wisdom and its capacity to move us toward positive transformation and wholeness. Acknowledging, accessing and supporting the inner healing intelligence and impulse in each individual is the essential cornerstone of this approach. The theoretical framework integrates insights from modern consciousness research, anthropology, various depth psychologies, transpersonal psychology, Eastern spiritual practices, and mystical traditions of the world.

THE PROCESS: The process itself uses very simple means: it combines accelerated breathing with evocative music in a special set and setting. With the eyes closed and lying on a mat, each person uses their own breath and the music in the room to enter a non-ordinary state of consciousness. This state activates the natural inner healing process of the individual’s psyche which can mediate access to all levels of human experience including unfinished issues from our post-natal biography, traumatic physical or emotional events, perinatal memories, death and rebirth sequences, and a variety of transpersonal experiences that can reach mythological, archetypal, and universal realms. With the inner healing intelligence guiding the process, the quality and content brought forth is unique to each person and for that particular time and place.

“SITTERS” AND “BREATHERS”: Additional elements of the process include focused energy release work and integration practices such as mandala drawing. Within a group workshop, people work in pairs and alternate in the roles of “breather” and “sitter.” The sitter’s role is simply to be present and available to the breather—not to interfere, interrupt, or try to guide the process. The same is true for trained facilitators, who are available as helpers if necessary.

*Contraindications: Holotropic Breathwork opens the door to a wide range of physical, emotional, and spiritual experiences, which cannot be predicted in advance. The process can evoke strong emotional and physical stress and can put people with the following conditions at risk. These conditions include pregnancy, serious heart conditions, epilepsy, glaucoma, retinal detachment, history of severe mental or emotional disorders, acute infectious disease and recent injury or surgery. Please contact consciousaustin@gmail.com for more info on contraindications.