Holos Retreat Center, San José Province, Pérez Zeledón, Costa Rica
Up to 15 in group
February 23 - 27, 2025
About this Retreat
Role: Lead Facilitator.
Costanza began working with psychedelics in 2012, initially as a participant, later as an assistant, then began training with shamans and healers, and eventually studied to become a Psychedelic Practitioner. Her last few years have been devoted to psilocybin, though she has worked with a variety of plant medicines. She is also a breathwork coach, working with the body's knowledge to achieve understanding and promote healing. She has trained in Bioneuroemotion, a field that blends biology, neuroscience, epigenetics, NLP, and psychology. She received training in India to be able to instruct in meditation, yoga, and pranayama. She has finished a master plant dieta with Noya Rao and follows the tradition of the Shipibo from Peru in terms of shamanic techniques.
Her facilitation style combines ancient wisdom methods with cognitive therapeutic techniques from the West to produce powerful transformational experiences. When singing in ceremony, Costanza places emphasis on the healing potential of music. Her goal is to serve as a bridge for people seeking to start or continue their own journeys of self-discovery; creating safe spaces so others can engage in their psychedelic healing experiences feeling supported and empowered so their own inner wisdom can emerge.
Role: Retreat Facilitator.
Juan has studied music since childhood and music production at University. He became interested in psychedelics and their strong influence on music and consciousness from an early age. He has spent years in India practicing meditation and yoga in various ashrams. He studied the Bansuri flute with the legendary Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia, and now teaches and makes Bansuri himself.
He has been dedicated to facilitating live music for meditation, healing, and psychedelic ceremonies for many years, for the Ayahuasca tradition of Colombian Shamans and increasingly for psilocybin journeys. Juan is passionate about the transformative power of psychedelics, what they can bring to humanity, and how they can help us heal our connection to nature and spiritual growth.
Bernardino is a Religion Sociologist and Physiotherapist (specialised in manual therapy and myofascial disorders), born in Venezuela but currently living in Madrid, Spain. He has been studying yoga, meditation and ancient traditions for more than 20 years.
In the last ten years he has worked as a yoga Alliance certifier delivering 200-TTC and workshops all around the world. Having a passionate interest for the use of psychedelics in ancient cultures and religion practices, he is very interested in exploring the effects of psychedelics combined with ancient eastern practices as yoga and Qigong as a way of expanding human consciousness and finding inner balance . Having music background as guitarist and flute player, he enjoys playing music from different traditions in the context psychedelic ceremonies.
Mary is a psychotherapist with over 30 years experience of working in a variety of UK healthcare settings as a clinical supervisor, group facilitator, researcher, and educator. She specializes in helping people face loss and change, illness, and death, and is particularly interested in how nature connection, mindfulness, self-compassion, and vision quest rites of passage can support journeys of personal growth, transformation, and healing. In her spare time, she tends an old Cornish garden, which has lots of flowers and brambles. She swims in the sea all year round and loves to walk in wild places.
Details of this retreat
A Comprehensive Program Including
Preparation, a 5-Day Psychedelic Supported Retreat and Integration
Are You Curious About How Psychedelics Might Support You in Connecting to Your Authentic Self?
Join Us for this Cornerstone Experiential Program Designed to Reveal Your Potential for Personal Growth and Expansion.
Interest in psychedelics and the potential they hold to unlock latent parts of ourselves, kick-start behavioural changes, and address emotional, spiritual, and physical challenges has created an increasing demand for access.
With a proven track record for leading safe and legal psychedelic retreats for more than 2000 individuals, Synthesis has collected years of data, experience, and anecdotal success stories that make us uniquely qualified to offer you the opportunity to experience the potentially life-enhancing benefits of a psychedelic retreat experience.
The Immersion Retreat is a comprehensive experience that includes pre-retreat preparation, a 5-day psychedelic-supported retreat, and post-retreat integration—is our cornerstone program designed for those who are eager to gain a deeper understanding of their true nature, tune in to their deepest wisdom and truth, and unlock their unique gifts and talents.
This is a legal opportunity to take moderate to high doses of psilocybin that carefully creates a safe, intentional, and transformative container consisting of preparation and integration components essential to activating the full potential for personal breakthroughs.
Past Immersion Retreat participants have reported their experience provided:
The ability to access deeper levels of consciousness promoted new insights and sparked creativity.
A deeper connection to others and the larger world encouraged the development of stronger personal relationships.
Increased resilience and a feeling of more balance and peace as they navigate life.
A greater sense of purpose and meaning in their life, resulting in a renewed sense of focus and direction.
Synthesis is committed to safely, legally, and effectively stewarding psychedelics into modern culture through our use of psilocybin mushrooms (or truffles containing psilocybin in the Netherlands). In our professionally curated settings, this remarkable organism can be an agent of life-enhancing experiences.
Using our integrative approach to transformative wellness, we combine leading-edge research with ancient wisdom traditions, rituals, and spiritual practices to curate a potent container that has the potential to catalyze change.
Led by professional facilitators, Immersion Retreat integrates psychedelic education, workshops, open-dialogue, breathwork meditation, sound, psychedelic ceremonies, and integration with the aim of restructuring disempowering thoughts, sharpening perceptual lenses, and awakening expanded forms of consciousness.
The Retreat Team will support you by creating a safe container conducive to deep exploration. They have worked with Synthesis for years, leading ceremonies at the facilities in Costa Rica and The Netherlands. This diverse team possesses a range of holistic, therapeutic, and shamanic qualities. In addition, students from the Synthesis Institute Practitioner Training will join as assistants to provide support. They will aid with operational aspects of the retreat as well as serving as helpful allies on your journey.
Our Approach
At Synthesis, we focus attention on the following six (6) conditions, each of which plays an essential role in every psychedelic journey:
Set: The mental attitude of a would-be psychedelic voyager.
Setting: The surroundings in which a psychedelic substance is ingested.
Guide: The program team who are all experienced with non-ordinary states of consciousness and equipped to mitigate challenges and channel insights.
Substance: The type and quantity of psychedelic agent; in this program, psilocybin.
Session: The entirety of a psychedelic trip, including all ancillary activities and rituals.
Situation: The environment, people, and culture a person comes to a retreat experience from and returns to afterwards.
When these elements are not carefully considered, and psychedelics are not used in a safe, supported, and structured setting, many of their potential benefits may not be experienced.
That’s why Immersion Retreat includes the critical preparation and integration elements that anchor the psychedelic ceremony experiences.
Because of the potentially powerful nature of psychedelic experiences, and the impact that sharing this experience with others can have on your psychedelic journey, we keep each Immersion Retreat program to between 15 to 20 carefully screened participants.
Program Overview
Immersion Retreat is a Three-Part Comprehensive Experience:
Online Pre-Retreat Preparation Sessions:
Inclusive of three (3) 75-minute sessions in the weeks immediately prior to the retreat
A 5-Day Experiential Retreat:
Inclusive of two (2) psychedelic ceremonies and three (3) 1:1 preparation and integration support sessions with your assigned facilitator.
Online Post-Retreat Integration Sessions:
Inclusive of three (3) 75-minutes sessions in the weeks immediately following the retreat
All participants will receive an Immersion Retreat Program Manual that contains important details, as well as a list of recommended resources.
Part One: Pre-Retreat Preparation Sessions
Setting the container for your experiential retreat begins weeks in advance. Our preparation process draws upon scientific research, as well as wisdom traditions, to get you ready for your experience.
Ahead of the first preparation session, we ask that you begin to work with the intention setting process outlined in your Immersion Retreat Program Manual. The sessions are hosted by our professional facilitators and will include all the other participants in your program.
There are three (3) 75-minute Preparation Sessions:
Preparation Through Practice: Whether expert or novice, we come together with a beginners mind. In the first session, we begin by getting to know one another and focus on simple practices that help you connect to your deepest intentions for the journey ahead.
Awareness Through Active Listening & Noticing: Being the listener is one of the most simple, yet advanced practices on the path. Active listening is an art all unto itself; more than a skill, active listening is a way of being. In this session we focus on developing our listening into an integrated practice of deep-rooted listening to ourselves, others, and life.
Opening Up Around Resistance: Resistance is a powerful force for transformation. During this session, we will explore what resistance is, how it may be showing up in your life, and how resistance can show up during a psychedelic journey. Together we will walk through acceptance practices that support us to remain present and grounded.
You will emerge from the preparation phase with a unique intention to inform the experiential phase of your journey.
Part Two: A 5-Day, Experiential Retreat
Day 1: Your retreat begins the day you arrive at the venue. We will start with a welcome circle, followed by one-on-one facilitation meetings where you will clarify your intentions and confirm the dose for your first psilocybin mushrooms (or truffles) experience. The evening culminates in a group sound meditation experience.
Day 2: After morning practice and detailed instructions, you will participate in your first psychedelic ceremony using psilocybin mushrooms (or truffles). You will be fully prepared and made comfortable in a setting optimized for your needs, allowing you to make the most of your psychedelic experience.
Day 3: You will spend time integrating your first psychedelic experience while simultaneously preparing for your next one. The schedule includes group practices, integration workshops, and one-on-one meetings with an experienced facilitator.
Day 4: After morning practice and a guided workshop, you will experience your second psychedelic ceremony.
Day 5: The retreat’s final day centers on integration. You will participate in one-on-one and group integration sessions to begin processing your experience which will help support and enable you to integrate it more fully into your life.
You will emerge from the 5-day experiential retreat with a deeper understanding of the intentions that are guiding you and clarity around what you need to continue cultivating in your life as you prepare to return home.
Part Three: Post-Retreat Integration Sessions
While preparation is essential for maximizing the potential of a psychedelic retreat, integration is critical for unpacking and understanding your experience and transforming it into your desired outcomes. During our three (3) virtual group Integration Sessions, you will explore how to move from the retreat experience back into your day-to-day life.
There are three (3) 75-minute Integration Sessions:
Somatic Integration: Coming home with a renewed sense of possibility and vision is both an exhilarating experience as well as a potentially difficult one. Using a variety of integration tools, we will provide support in accepting the challenges, however they may arise. We encourage you to connect to what is empowering and nourishing, and to remain feeling everything as deeply as possible by attending to your body.
Social Integration: In a world where language around expanded states of consciousness is rare, and the experiences themselves are frequently and easily misunderstood, you may face challenges in speaking your new, authentic truth. You may encounter disagreement, judgment, and unfavorable responses from people in your life. In this session, we will address how to remain integrated in the social sphere and how to discern when and how much to share with others.
Synthesis - The Culmination of Elements: This will mark the last week of your Immersion Retreat, and in this session, we will bring the program together by reflecting and making an inventory of what has changed and setting intentions to remain connected moving forward.
You will emerge from the Integration Sessions with a renewed sense of how to apply and embody the insights and learnings gained from this growth-enhancing experience to your everyday life, and equipped with the tools and practices to continue to evolve on your personal journey.
Verified
