Heart & Brain Healing Camp with Truffle Medicine – 4.5-Day Retreat
4.5-day retreat for the healing of trauma and emotional wounds
For those who feel that old wounds call for a careful, embodied approach, with attention to the body, the nervous system, and emotional integration.
A deepening and well-held path of healing
Not all wounds can be resolved through insight or talking alone. Trauma settles in the body, the nervous system, and in recurring patterns of thinking, feeling, and responding.
This 4.5-day Heart & Brain Healing Camp with Truffle Medicine is intended for those who feel it is time to meet their old wounds in a deeper, yet carefully paced way.
This retreat does not offer quick fixes or promises of transformation. What it does offer is a professionally held container in which healing can emerge through slowing down, safety, and attunement. Trauma is approached here as a wound, not as a disorder, and calls for attention, compassion, and integration.
One guided truffle ceremony
During this retreat, you will take part in one guided truffle ceremony, embedded within a trauma-sensitive and professional framework. The truffle medicine is used as a supportive instrument within the Heart & Brain healing process, not as a solution in itself.
The ceremony is carefully prepared and extensively integrated. It may help soften stuck emotional patterns, open access to deeper layers of experience, and support the restoration of connection — always in conjunction with guidance, regulation, and aftercare. Safety and integration are always prioritised over intensity.
An integrated approach to trauma recovery
The Heart & Brain Healing Camp is grounded in modern psychology and neuroscientific insights, and deepened through body-oriented work, meditation, energetic medicine, and shamanic wisdom. We work, among other things, with the medicine wheel and the four directions, which offer orientation for processes of letting go, reorientation, and reconnection.
During these days, we focus on regulating the nervous system, interrupting the loops of thinking and feeling that sustain trauma, safely meeting and integrating emotions, restoring self-regulation and inner coherence, and working with group processes as a supportive and healing field. Everything we do serves the restoration of the connection between heart and brain, body and consciousness.
Working with truffle medicine, carefully and legally
In this retreat, psilocybin-containing truffles are used, which are legal in the Netherlands. The use of truffle medicine takes place within clear ethical and therapeutic frameworks, with careful attention to safety, dosage, setting, and integration.
The guidance is provided in collaboration with psychiatrist Julia Javkin and an experienced multidisciplinary team. This collaboration ensures both psychological depth and medical responsibility. The work is informed by current scientific research and many years of clinical experience in trauma-related care.
What this retreat offers
The 4.5-day Heart & Brain Healing Camp is not an endpoint, nor a promise of cure. What these days do offer is a meaningful shift in how you experience yourself, your emotions, and your body.
Many participants experience a settling of the nervous system and a greater capacity to feel emotions without becoming overwhelmed. The loops of thinking and feeling that sustain trauma often lose intensity, creating more clarity and freedom of choice in daily life. Old patterns become recognisable, without immediately pulling you back in.
The truffle ceremony and the group process often bring experiences of perspective, softening, and connection — not as isolated peak experiences, but as part of an integrated whole. What is touched is held, given language, and given meaning, allowing it to continue unfolding after the retreat.
By the end of these days, participants often take with them greater inner calm, self-compassion, and a stronger sense of agency. Not because everything has been resolved, but because their relationship with themselves has fundamentally changed. For many, this retreat marks a turning point: a moment in which the wound no longer needs to be avoided, but can be approached in a safe and supported way.
Who is this Healing Camp intended for?
This Heart & Brain Healing Camp is intended for people living with the effects of trauma, loss, or prolonged stress, who notice that talking and understanding alone are no longer sufficient. It is for those who long for healing, relief, and greater inner calm, and who are willing to take responsibility for their own process within a carefully guided setting.
You do not need to achieve anything or force change. What is important is that you are open to self-inquiry and take your process seriously.
The setting: De Maanhoeve, Drenthe
The retreat takes place at De Maanhoeve, a small-scale and peaceful retreat centre surrounded by nature in Drenthe. The environment supports stillness, safety, and slowing down. Comfortable rooms, nourishing vegetarian meals, and the natural surroundings all contribute meaningfully to the healing process.
Professional guidance
The Heart & Brain Healing Camp is guided by Anouk Bindels, psychologist and systemic psychotherapist, developer of the Heart & Brain healing process and author of Wijsheid van Trauma, in collaboration with Julia Javkin, psychiatrist and trauma specialist. Together, they provide a professional, trauma-sensitive, and ethically grounded framework.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
The 4.5-day retreat typically starts in the afternoon and ends in the late afternoon on the final day.
The day begins with meditation and body-oriented practices and ends in the early evening. In the morning, there is space for explanation, reflection, and integration. In the afternoon, we work with emotional and body-based practices and, on one day, the truffle ceremony. Throughout the retreat, there is space for individual support.
An eye mask, a blanket or shawl, a cushion, warm socks or slippers, and comfortable clothing. After registration, you will receive a comprehensive and carefully prepared document to support you in preparing for the retreat.
All meals are vegetarian/vegan. If you have specific dietary requirements, you can contact us in advance.
Feel free to get in touch via info@anoukbindels.nl or +31 6 51811198.
Both Heart & Brain Healing Camps are rooted in the same foundation: the Heart & Brain healing process — a trauma-sensitive approach in which the restoration of self-regulation, emotional integration, and inner coherence is central. At the same time, the 4.5-day and 7-day retreats differ substantially in intensity, pace, and depth.
The 4.5-day Heart & Brain Healing Camp with Truffle Medicine offers a carefully paced introduction to this work. This retreat is suitable if you feel it is time to approach old wounds, while doing so within a shorter and more contained timeframe. With one guided truffle ceremony and a strong emphasis on preparation and integration, this option creates space for softening, insight, and an initial shift in how you experience yourself and your emotions.
Many participants experience greater calm in the nervous system, increased clarity, and renewed contact with their body and inner compass after the retreat. This option is particularly fitting if you have already engaged in therapy or guidance, or if you wish to take a first deeper step without overburdening yourself.
The 7-day Heart & Brain Healing Camp with Truffle Medicine is a more intensive and deepening trajectory. This week offers more time to carefully open, feel into, and integrate layers of trauma. With two guided truffle ceremonies and a longer group dynamic, there is greater space for depth, repetition, and anchoring. This option is suitable if you feel ready for a more intensive process, if themes have been repeating for a longer time, or if you notice that previous forms of guidance did not provide sufficient space to truly settle. The additional days make it possible not only to open, but also to stabilise and integrate within the same supportive container.
Both retreats are not quick fixes and do not promise healing. They are intended as a turning point: a moment in which the relationship with yourself begins to change, and in which the wound can be approached in a safe and supported way. The difference is not one of better or worse, but of timing, capacity, and the need for depth.
If you are unsure which option suits you best, it is always possible to discuss this in advance. Together, we will explore which setting is most supportive for your process at this moment.