People at GTT

There are many great people at Grof Transpersonal Training. Some of the current senior staff members were able to join Stan and Christina while they still have been working at the Esalen Institute, where Holotropic Breathwork originally emerged. Here are some of our dearest teachers, who have been directly helping to shape our practice here at Holotropic Bohemia.

Tav Sparks was the director of Grof Transpersonal Training for 23 years. Tav was a teacher, consultant and writer with over 30 years of experience working with people in non-ordinary states of consciousness. Since 1986, Tav has conducted hundreds of trainings and workshops and supported thousands of individuals in their deep inner work. In 1990, he became the primary faculty member of GTT, working alongside Stanislav Grof. In 1998, Tav, along with his wife Cary, took over GTT from the Grofs. Among Tav’s books are The Power Within: Becoming, Being, and the Holotropic Paradigm; and Movie Yoga: How Every Film Can Change Your Life. He is also author of the training manual Doing Not Doing: A Facilitator’s Guide to Holotropic Breathwork. Tav lived in Northern California and was the father of two sons, Ason and Bryn, and the grandfather of four boys.

Tav Sparks was the director of Grof Transpersonal Training for 23 years. Tav was a teacher, consultant and writer with over 30 years of experience working with people in non-ordinary states of consciousness. Since 1986, Tav has conducted hundreds of trainings and workshops and supported thousands of individuals in their deep inner work. In 1990, he became the primary faculty member of GTT, working alongside Stanislav Grof. In 1998, Tav, along with his wife Cary, took over GTT from the Grofs. Among Tav’s books are The Power Within: Becoming, Being, and the Holotropic Paradigm; and Movie Yoga: How Every Film Can Change Your Life. He is also author of the training manual Doing Not Doing: A Facilitator’s Guide to Holotropic Breathwork. Tav lived in Northern California and was the father of two sons, Ason and Bryn, and the grandfather of four boys.

Sitara Blasco is a psychologist from Valencia University with master studies in Gestalt psychotherapy and Integrative Psychology. She was born and raised in Caracas, Venezuela and has lived in the United States before moving to Spain in 1990. Sitara lives in Alicante, where she has a private psychotherapeutic practice. Her background includes training in body-oriented techniques, theatre acting, therapeutic clown, dancing, shamanism and meditation. In recent years, Sitara’s interest in the Enneagram moved her to take Claudio Naranjo’s SAT program. She is a Holotropic Breathwork facilitator, leading numerous workshops every year in Spain and Europe since 2002. Sitara has also worked as staff member at international GTT training modules in Mexico, Spain, Ireland and Austria. Since 2003, she is co-organizing the Spanish GTT program, together with Juanjo Segura.

Sitara Blasco is a psychologist from Valencia University with master studies in Gestalt psychotherapy and Integrative Psychology. She was born and raised in Caracas, Venezuela and has lived in the United States before moving to Spain in 1990. Sitara lives in Alicante, where she has a private psychotherapeutic practice. Her background includes training in body-oriented techniques, theatre acting, therapeutic clown, dancing, shamanism and meditation. In recent years, Sitara’s interest in the Enneagram moved her to take Claudio Naranjo’s SAT program. She is a Holotropic Breathwork facilitator, leading numerous workshops every year in Spain and Europe since 2002. Sitara has also worked as staff member at international GTT training modules in Mexico, Spain, Ireland and Austria. Since 2003, she is co-organizing the Spanish GTT program, together with Juanjo Segura.

Juanjo Segura is the director of GTT Spain. He lives in Alicante, where he has a private psychotherapeutic practice. Originally, Juanjo was involved in the field of telecommunications, where he was trained in business management. Later he fulfilled his wish to become a therapist, taking training in Integrative Psychotherapy and Claudio Naranjo’s SAT program with the Enneagram. Juanjo has also been working for several years with people in substance addiction rehabilitation programs. He had traveled to the Peruvian forest for retreats with healing master plants. Seriously involved in Zen meditation, he has taken the breathwork also to meditation groups. His background includes training in body-oriented techniques, martial arts and shamanism. Juanjo has worked on staff at international GTT training modules in Mexico, Spain, Ireland and Austria. Since 2003, he is organizing the Spanish GTT program, together with Sitara. 

Juanjo Segura is the director of GTT Spain. He lives in Alicante, where he has a private psychotherapeutic practice. Originally, Juanjo was involved in the field of telecommunications, where he was trained in business management. Later he fulfilled his wish to become a therapist, taking training in Integrative Psychotherapy and Claudio Naranjo’s SAT program with the Enneagram. Juanjo has also been working for several years with people in substance addiction rehabilitation programs. He had traveled to the Peruvian forest for retreats with healing master plants. Seriously involved in Zen meditation, he has taken the breathwork also to meditation groups. His background includes training in body-oriented techniques, martial arts and shamanism. Juanjo has worked on staff at international GTT training modules in Mexico, Spain, Ireland and Austria. Since 2003, he is organizing the Spanish GTT program, together with Sitara. 

Jean Farrell, born in England, has lived in Ireland for 40 years with her husband and the children they have fostered, before recently moving to Scotland. In England she worked as a senior lecturer in Youth and Community Work, teaching Counseling Skills and Group Work at Manchester Metropolitan University. In Ireland she works as a psychotherapist and offers supervision to therapists working with trauma. Jean also teaches Counseling and Therapeutic Skills for the National University of Ireland. Since 1996, she offers residential Holotropic Breathwork workshops every month in a small centre at her home. Jean has worked on staff with GTT in Italy, Spain, Ireland, England, Austria, Slovenia and the Czech Republic. Her other main interest, when she has time, is her garden, which she and her husband attempt to create in the West of Ireland. Jean has a small playful dog called Maya who reminds her that everything is an illusion.

Jean Farrell, born in England, has lived in Ireland for 40 years with her husband and the children they have fostered, before recently moving to Scotland. In England she worked as a senior lecturer in Youth and Community Work, teaching Counseling Skills and Group Work at Manchester Metropolitan University. In Ireland she works as a psychotherapist and offers supervision to therapists working with trauma. Jean also teaches Counseling and Therapeutic Skills for the National University of Ireland. Since 1996, she offers residential Holotropic Breathwork workshops every month in a small centre at her home. Jean has worked on staff with GTT in Italy, Spain, Ireland, England, Austria, Slovenia and the Czech Republic. Her other main interest, when she has time, is her garden, which she and her husband attempt to create in the West of Ireland. Jean has a small playful dog called Maya who reminds her that everything is an illusion.

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Full list of Grof Transpersonal Training teachers, staff and coordinators

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The popular term “set & setting” which is now widely used in Depth Psychology and psychedelic circles, was originally coined by Timothy Leary in the early 1960s.

This is to say that, during the transpersonal experience, we may, for instance, experientially identify with some other being, e.g. an animal or a person, in contrast to our usual identification with our regular self. During this experience, we will be fully and intimately aware of that being’s mental and physical constituents and characteristics, as it experiences them in and of itself. However, we may also experientially transcend the associated sense of “I-ness” itself. This is the “self-reflecting” aspect that remains constant across both the examples considered — experiencing yourself as the ordinary “you”, as well as the “you” being the animal or other person. The psychedelic or holotropic experience may, on occasion, move beyond this sense of “I-ness” altogether. At that point, there is no “you”.

In the theory of Psychoanalysis, we have the classic categories of id, ego and superego. Roughly speaking, the id represents unconscious biological drives, the superego internalized rules of conduct from childhood (personal hygiene training, boundary enforcement, etc.), and the ego a self-aware “I”, functioning as a balancing mediator between the other two. In the expanded, holotropic state of consciousness, we may, for instance, have a vivid experience of identifying simultaneously with our regular self and the self of our father, resulting in a new perspective on our relationship with our actual father, as well as the relationship of the respective internal sub-personalities (ego and superego). At other times, our experience may exceed the boundaries of the psychoanalytic model (if, for instance, we happened to be previously familiar with it, and tended to view the internal workings of our mind through its optics) so dramatically and to such a degree, that it would render the entire Freudian conceptual construction completely irrelevant. Consequently, it would be necessary for us to adopt a broader, more comprehensive image of our self.

“While the traditional model of Psychiatry and Psychoanalysis is strictly personalistic and biographical, modern consciousness research has added new levels, realms, and dimensions and shows the human psyche as being essentially commensurate with the whole universe and all of existence.” Grof, 1985, Beyond the Brain

Some indigenous peoples have been using psychoactive plants (and sometimes animal products) for healing and spiritual purposes for thousands of years. Many of them developed original, elaborate contexts for this, both theoretical and practical. These so-called shamanic traditions can be found within tribal communities all over the world, with the Amazonian region being the richest, both in quantity and variety.

Citation from Wikipedia – Human Potential Movement

Abraham Maslow’s book “Religions, Values and Peak-Experiences” is widely recognized as the initiatory paper of Humanistic Psychology.

You can find a list of Stanislav Grof’s books in the Study section of this website. There is also a list with additional recommended reading, links and further information sources in the Integration section.

Since bodywork obviously involves some degree of physical contact, it is important to say that, in Holotropic Breathwork, bodywork is always initiated by the breather, and never takes place without the breather’s consent. GTT certified facilitators are carefully trained in Focused Energy Release Work and are required to follow high ethical standards in their practice.

An exception here may be a single-participant session, with only the breather and a qualified facilitator present. Even single-participant sessions, however, can be conducted with a sitter present, in addition to the facilitator.

Holotropic Breathwork® is an internationally registered trademark, and only holders of a GTT certificate have the right to use it for their public practice.

The promise that is the basis of the term “Promised Land” is contained in several verses of Genesis in the Torah. In Genesis 12:1 it is said:

The LORD had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.”

In other words: “Go and have an adventure!”

Grof elaborated on the concepts of both COEX Systems and Basic Perinatal Matrices already in his first book Realms of the Human Unconscious, originally published in 1975, which was shortly after he was forced by the new legislation to abandon his psychedelic research.

In the ancient Chinese Taoist tradition, the term Wu-Wei is to be found. Among its English translations we find the likes of “non-doing”, or “effortless action”.

The cited verses appear in the seminal, most ancient Taoist text Neiye (內業) or Inward Training. The text describes breath meditation techniques and qi (氣) circulation.

Excerpt taken from Harold D. Roth’s book Original Tao.
(credits: Wikipedia)

Tav Sparks deceased on August 9th, 2020.
Rest in Peace, Tav.

Fun Fact

According to Wikipedia “The last country to produce LSD legally (until 1975) was Czechoslovakia”.

LSD-25 model

Skeletal formula and ball-and-stick and space-filling models of the lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) molecule.
(credits: Wikipedia)

The word “psychedelic” consists of two Greek words: “ψυχή” [psukhḗ] meaning “mind, soul”, and “δῆλος” [dêlos] meaning “manifest, visible”. Thus the word “psychedelic” means “mind-manifesting”.

The famous Flammarion Engraving depicts a man, clothed in a long robe and carrying a staff, who is at the edge of the Earth, where it meets the sky. He kneels down and passes his head, shoulders, and right arm through the star-studded sky, discovering a marvellous realm of circling clouds, fires and suns beyond the heavens. It has been used as a metaphorical illustration of either the scientific or the mystical quests for knowledge.

That is to say, insight into the nature of the actual “substance” of the mind, as opposed to merely the internal dynamics of it.

This same principle can be found in other words too, like the word “heliotropic” meaning “moving toward the sun” (used with reference to plants that tend to follow the movement of the sun).

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Quantum mechanics is a difficult subject, and few, if any, people really understand it in its entirety. Fortunately, a number of authors have done a fantastic job in popularizing the basic ideas involved, e.g. Amit Goswami, Fred Alan Wolf, Michio Kaku and Fritjof Capra (The Tao of Physics, 1975), among others. As to general systems theory, Fritjof Capra delivered a good and accessible introduction in his books The Turning Point (1982) and The Web of Life (1996).