hoffman process <3

reflections on the $6K healing retreat celebs swear by

enlightenment, or sth??

Last month I spent a week offline in the forests of Petaluma, screaming into a pillow about my ugliest mistakes, then dancing it off with strangers who became friends. Yes, I did the Hoffman process.

I had heard about Hoffman from people I admired; people whose stories made me go “woah, that’s epic,” like one girl who switched from a boring sales job to acting after she remembered, in her 30s, her childhood dream of acting. Now she’s an actress on HBO! After hearing stories like hers and celebrities who swear by Hoffman, I was quite inspired to learn about the process, but no one would tell me what goes on between the time they take your phone away for a week and the moment you come out a refreshed, changed person on the other side. So I decided to find out for myself.

In short it was epic, absolutely worth the $6K and trip to California. I don’t actively recommend it to anyone because the process can be extremely triggering and at times downright weird, so go at your own risk. But by the end of the week I felt very connected to everyone in my cohort as well as the world around me, and a month later I feel the effects deeply. I have reason to believe that my cohort-mates feel the same way :)

Hoffman was just one step of my broader Eat Pray Love journey which has spanned over a year in various locations like Bali, Japan, Barcelona, California, New York, Pakistan, and featured a number of coaches, therapists, reiki healers, etc. But Hoffman was a quite intense experience that I get asked about a lot, so it deserves a chapter of it’s own. Sharing my reflections below.

Everyone is dealing with shit

I had heard the proverb “be kind, for everyone is fighting a hard battle” before, but it hits deep after Hoffman. At the process we aren’t allowed to discuss anything about work, and most of us go by made up names so we don’t know much about each other’s real-life identities. As a result you learn more about someone’s relationship with her dad than her job title, which is quite a unique experience.

Of course, in the end my cohort was full of people with extremely impressive accomplishments. But it was a real reminder that no matter how beautiful, rich, or traditionally successful someone may be, we are all dealing with some real stuff. Envy and comparison should ideally have no place in the world.

Now I try to remember that everyone is living a life as complex as my own; no one is exempt from pain and doubt and insecurity. Models and hedge fund managers and happily married people; we all carry baggage. I hope and believe that I’m a much kinder person after Hoffman.

It’s really painful at times

Hoffman is not for the faint of heart. If you’re doing it right, there will be times you want to get the hell out of there! You won’t have anyone to call (phones are turned in at the start) or any vices to distract yourself with. Just you and your demons for a week.

But if you’re doing it right, you’ll look back and realize that the times you wanted to get out of there were actually the biggest catalysts for your personal growth, and at the end of the week you’ll be glad you stayed.

This is essentially a deep dive into your ugliest, most painful demons so that you can slay them. It’s supposed to trigger you and bring you face to face with the things that are excruciating to see and deal with, so you can then lay them to rest. Before I even arrived at the process, I had to fill out a 15-hour homework assignment, which itself was so painful that I had to fly myself to Thailand and check into a resort just to be able to do the damn homework. It’s hard.

Everything goes back to parents

I used to shrug at the “so, tell me about your relationship with your mom” therapy meme, but I have since come to see the truth in it. All roads really do lead to home, and specifically to our relationship with our biological parents.

This is not at all to blame our parents but rather to understand the ways they, their beliefs and patterns have influenced us so that we can keep the beneficial bits and drop the ones that hold us back.

I’ve also come to believe that even with the best of parents, the honest truth is that parenting is really hard and almost impossible to get perfect. I will do my absolute best with my kids, and still send them to Hoffman soon as they hit the age limit (21) to clear out any mistakes I will inevitably make.

In Hoffman we focus a lot on our parents, often in ways that feel absurd in the moment. But on the other side, I find myself pursuing long-forgotten childhood dreams and all but living with my parents because in all truth, I quite enjoy spending time with them. As I write this we are in Hunza celebrating their anniversary.

Shame

Apparently shame is an inherent human emotion we all carry and find ways to externalize. Someone might feel shame about their size, another their age, money, job, whatever, but shame as a wound actually goes back to being babies and has little to do with whatever externality we are currently pinning it on.

This is refreshing to know. Apparently you can disarm that shame by naming it (”oh, that’s just shame I’m feeling, I don’t have to make a whole story around it”) but I can’t say I’ve had the best luck with this method.

If you can’t tell, I am still working through this one.

Radical authenticity & nothing is personal

True openness and authenticity is the key to relationships; with that, strangers can become best friends in the course of a week.

Uncomfortable conversations, when done correctly (with ownership, not blame) can lead to very deep connection. At one point in the process I got extremely triggered by someone’s behavior (I later learned that this was by design, the process creates situations meant to trigger us!) and wanted to storm out of the process. But voila, the next exercise was to talk about those triggers out loud.

This made me want to vomit. But once I actually had the conversation I was so, so happy and felt really close to the girl who had triggered me. I realized that it was nothing personal, she was operating in her own world, she had no idea what her behavior had meant to me, and she was extremely kind and receptive when I told her about it.

On the other side of the uncomfortable conversation I felt completely at ease with her, more than I would if nothing had happened. I was also reminded that truly, nothing is personal.

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TL;DR Hoffman is a weird, wacky, cult-y phenomenon that I’m really glad I tried. It made me more self aware and I’ve been able to break patterns that previously seemed deeply ingrained in me no matter how much plant medicine or eft tapping or reiki I tried. I’m glad I did it, and if you’re considering, you probably will be too.