The Team

Jean Paul Dufour is a psychologist and transpersonal therapist, as well as a certified Grof Breathwork facilitator trained by Stanislav Grof, Javier Charme and Viktoria Luchetti. His formation includes Gestalt therapy, the SAT program developed by Claudio Naranjo, mindfulness and meditation in therapeutic contexts. He has also undertaken long-term experiential study of ancestral practices and Amazonian traditions. Jean Paul integrates psychology, transpersonal psychotherapy, embodied practice and ancestral knowledge in his clinical and educational work. A trained musician and composer, he has researched the therapeutic function of music and contributes to the selection and review of music sets used in Grof® Breathwork. He is active in the development of Transpersonal Psychology and Psychotherapy in Peru.

Paul Grof is an internationally recognized psychiatrist, researcher and Director of the Ottawa Centre for Mood Disorders. His career has focused on affective disorders, psychopharmacology and the long-term treatment of bipolar illness. He has held research and teaching roles at McMaster University, the University of Toronto and the National Institute of Mental Health in Washington, D.C. He also served for many years as an expert for the World Health Organization’s Mental Health Section, contributing to international work on psychotropic medications. Within the training faculty, Paul brings a rigorous psychiatric and scientific perspective, helping students situate experiential and transpersonal approaches within broader clinical knowledge, diagnostic responsibility and evidence-informed mental health care.

Emma Bragdon has been a pioneer in mind–spirit wellness, spiritual development and spiritual emergency for more than five decades. She is the author of several books and co-producer of documentary films on healing and transformation. Her early training included bioenergetic, neo-Reichian, breathwork, bodywork and energy-oriented approaches, which shaped her understanding of embodied personal growth. Emma worked closely with the Spiritual Emergency Network and dedicated her doctoral research to understanding how to support people undergoing intense psychospiritual transformation. She has taught experiential adult learning since the 1980s and has developed professional education for clinicians, caregivers and communities. Her contribution helps distinguish spiritual emergence from pathology and identify practical, compassionate forms of support.

David Lukoff is a licensed psychologist and retired professor whose work has transformed the way mental health professionals understand religious and spiritual experiences. His research on spiritual crisis helped establish the diagnostic category Religious or Spiritual Problem in the DSM-IV and DSM-5, increasing recognition of spiritual concerns in clinical practice. Over four decades, he has focused on spiritual competence: the ability to assess spiritual resources and difficulties, respond appropriately to spiritual emergencies and incorporate practices such as mindfulness, forgiveness and self-compassion when clinically relevant. He has published extensively, participated in professional working groups and founded the Spiritual Competency Academy. His teaching offers clinicians a practical framework for integrating spirituality without pathologizing meaningful transformative experiences.

Ted Esser has directed the Spiritual Emergence Network, founded by Stanislav and Christina Grof, for more than fifteen years. He has training and experience across several contemplative and spiritual traditions, with particular expertise in lucid dreaming, kundalini, nonduality, altered states and transpersonal development. Ted has served in core and adjunct faculty positions, teaching graduate courses in Consciousness Studies, Transpersonal Philosophy, theory and research methods. His doctoral work explored lucid dreaming, kundalini, the divine and nonduality through a transdisciplinary framework joining psychology, religious studies, dream studies and consciousness research. Within the faculty, he helps students understand the varieties of spiritual emergence and develop nuanced ways of recognizing, contextualizing and supporting transformative experiences.

Amy Burrell is a bilingual therapist and educator whose life between Brazil and the United States shaped a deeply intercultural approach to healing. Her professional beginnings in dance, movement and costume design continue to inform her understanding of the body, creativity and non-verbal experience. She holds graduate training in fine arts and dance/psychology and is a licensed massage therapist with extensive preparation in trauma-informed and holistic modalities. Her certifications include Grof® Breathwork, Reiki, relationship coaching and Structural Energetic Therapy. Amy has taught movement and dance in Brazil and the United States and has participated in international ceremonial traditions and mentorship. Her work supports preparation, embodied process, ethical facilitation and the integration of psychedelic and holotropic experiences.

Edward Sellman is a mentor and tutor in Grofian psychedelic psychotherapy training with extensive experiential preparation in Holotropic and Grof® Breathwork. He is a trained mindfulness teacher and has volunteered as an integrative transpersonal counselor in hospice, supporting people experiencing bereavement or life-limiting illness. His therapeutic approach is informed by Grof’s expanded map of the psyche and emphasizes presence, preparation, integration and respect for the inner healing process. Edward is also trained in TRE® and SoulCollage®, which he uses alongside meditation as integration practices. In parallel, he is an academic and prize-winning artist whose research and creative work explore mental wellbeing, inner development, human flourishing and the ways holotropic states can inform artistic expression.

Neil Hanon is a psychiatrist in British Columbia and a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of British Columbia. He has taught medical students, psychiatry residents and family medicine residents since the 1990s and has worked across inpatient, outpatient and community settings, including services for people affected by homelessness, addiction and complex mental health challenges. He has received recognition for excellence in clinical teaching. His research interests include legally sanctioned studies of ketamine, MDMA and psilocybin for complicated grief, treatment-resistant depression and severe addiction. Neil is also a certified Grof Breathwork facilitator, bringing together clinical psychiatry, personal experience of grief, experiential practice and careful attention to safety.

Luis Eduardo Luna is a Colombian anthropologist and scholar of comparative religion whose work has made a major contribution to the study of Amazonian shamanism, ethnobotany and visionary art. He completed graduate studies at the universities of Oslo and Stockholm and has held academic and research positions in Europe, Brazil and the United States. His fieldwork has focused especially on the Colombian and Peruvian Amazon. He is the author of Vegetalismo and co-author, with Pablo Amaringo, of Ayahuasca Visions, as well as other publications on altered states, indigenous knowledge and the religious imagination. Within the faculty, Luis provides historical, cultural and anthropological context for understanding plant traditions and visionary experience without reducing them to purely clinical categories.

Renn Butler studied with Stanislav Grof and Richard Tarnas at the Esalen Institute beginning in 1980 and became a certified Grof Breathwork facilitator in 1989. He facilitates workshops internationally and offers archetypal astrology consultations to clients around the world. His writing explores the relationship between planetary archetypes, dreams, psychedelic experiences, relationships and the unfolding of holotropic processes. His books include Pathways to Wholeness, The Archetypal Universe and Oh, Goddess. Renn’s work helps students examine meaningful patterns in experience while maintaining attention to psychological process and personal responsibility. He brings more than four decades of engagement with Grofian psychology, archetypal studies and direct experiential practice to the training.

Paulina Ulloa is a clinical psychologist trained in Santiago, Chile, and works as a transpersonal psychotherapist with adults in the United Kingdom. She is a certified Grof® Breathwork facilitator and has undertaken advanced training in Grofian psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy, the Polyvagal Model and Integrative Focusing Therapy for trauma and addiction. Her longstanding interests include the therapeutic and developmental use of psychedelics, spiritual emergency and the integration of challenging or transformative experiences. Paulina has spent extended periods in Peru learning in indigenous and clinical contexts, including work supporting participants at a retreat center. Within the program, she combines student coordination, facilitation and therapeutic support, helping participants prepare for experiential work and translate insights into sustainable change.