In June 2024 I came out of ten intense days at New Eden, our retreat centre in the Netherlands, having facilitated three events back to back. The first was a four-day Heart iQ Circle Work Facilitator Training for people new to the modality, laying down the basics of trauma-informed, nervous-system-aware circle leading. Within a day of finishing that, I moved into a five-day Group Leadership Experience, where more advanced facilitators took turns leading large group circles from what we call the hot seat, supervised and co-facilitated by me. Two hours after that ended, I began a Thriving in Tribe weekend, this time facilitating the circle myself.
I want to share a few honest reflections from that stretch, both for people who were there and for anyone curious about what facilitation actually involves.
Preparing to hold a group
In the recording, I speak about a personal ayahuasca experience before this period and the sense of openness I felt afterwards. That is part of my own account of the time. Years of experience working with groups were also central to how I approached those ten days.
Expanding the capacity to receive
One thing that became clearer to me through these ten days is what Heart iQ actually is at its core. For years, when people asked me to define it, I would struggle, because it touches so many things at once: trauma processing, emotional range, community, something like church. What I landed on more firmly this time is that Heart iQ is not primarily a processing modality where we go looking for our blockages and work on ourselves. I have found that approach draining and not very sustainable. Instead, the essence of the work is training people to receive and channel love. I often describe it using rain and a thimble: if love and abundance are pouring down like rain, and we are only holding up a thimble, that is all we will experience, no matter how much is available. The work is about expanding from a thimble to a bucket, not by searching for pain, but by opening more.
I often notice that difficult feelings arise as people become more open. I don’t need to go looking for pain in every interaction. I want to pay attention to the whole group, the quality of contact, and what each person is ready to meet.
What the hot seat reveals
The Group Leadership Experience made this vivid. Watching facilitators take the hot seat, I saw how quickly their own patterns appeared: becoming overly authoritative, trying to please everyone, or withdrawing when contact became difficult. Tools alone do not resolve those patterns.
Some moments required us to address boundaries and repair a loss of trust. That gave me serious questions about readiness for this form of training. In the recording, I reflect on the need for preparation, time in circle and continued supervision before taking on greater responsibility. Those lessons stayed with me beyond the event.
Making room for rest
The back-to-back nature of these events also taught me something about transitions. People who did all three events, moving from one group into another within hours, found it genuinely hard, and by the third weekend many were simply exhausted. We ended up opening that final retreat with a group nap, which is not how I would normally start a session, but it met what was actually present in the room.
The last day, held in the new dome space we had just built at New Eden with all forty of us in one circle, felt like a fitting close to the ten days, and a reminder of why I keep returning to this work.
What these ten days brought into focus
- Prepare for the responsibility of holding a group.
- Notice personal patterns when they enter the facilitation.
- Respond to boundaries and repair loss of trust.
- Leave room for rest and transitions.
