A Community of Practice for Those who Hold Space for Others
Join us to ‘do the work’ in a community of like-minded professionals
The Heart of Holding is a community of space holders of all kinds - whether in clinical or community settings, modern or traditional medicine, practitioners with decades of experience or those beginning their journeys.
We believe that in order to help others, we must come into deep relationship with ourselves, our communities and the world we live in. Without it, we risk burn out and compassion fatigue, vicarious trauma and unintentional harm to those we work with and ourselves.
We come together to ‘do the work’ that supports this deepening into relationship. We support each other in a community of practice as we each look deeply within and integrate the wisdom we find, taking accountability and responsibility for our journeys and our work.
We understand that there are many ways to do this work. We work regularly with the breath as medicine, and support it with movement, nature, vocalisation, community and other somatic and relational techniques. The community also provides a place to connect, whether that’s for discussion of cases and other professional challenges, or personal connection with those who understand your world and are committed to deepening their work.
If this appeals to you, come join us. We meet online at least twice a month, and we have our inaugural retreat coming up from the 25th-29th of November 2025, in Northern NSW.
If you’re interested in joining us in this space, please fill out the form below and we’ll be in touch.
About Us
The Heart of Holding community is led by a group of facilitators who connected and work together in Australia’s emerging psychedelic sector.
We created the Heart of Holding to satisfy a desire we feel in ourselves and see in others, for a container that holds the holders, and supports us to do deep work in community.
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Trudi lives on a Bee Sanctuary nestled in Gumbaynggirr Country on the Mid-North Coast of NSW. Here she has a private practice as a Mental Health Social Worker working somatically, with nature, in trauma-focused care and the integration of experiences.
Trudi has worked for over 25 years with expanded states of consciousness through birthwork, earth connection and breathwork practices.
Trudi is active in the Deep Ecology and Wayapa Wuurrk networks as a practitioner, facilitator and trainer and runs 1:1 sessions, group work, workshops and retreats. Her work is anchored in experiencing pieces that remind us of how we need to nurture ourselves, each other and Country, which has the potential to ignite deep earth, mind, body and spirit connections to what is missing.She is called to this position within her work to support others to discover and rediscover this connection in times that are changing – and that there are many ways we can work with and hold space for expanded states of consciousness to find meaning.
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After 27 years of day-dreaming and naval gazing, Scott discovered serious, formal introspective practice when he sat his first Vipassana retreat in 2015.
This was the beginning of a journey into deep practice, and an exploration of what it takes to create safe, powerful containers for healing and transformation.
He has training and extensive experience in the worlds of meditation, somatics, psychedelic therapy and breathwork. He runs Australia’s largest training program for psychedelic-assisted therapy (Mind Medicine Australia’s Certificate in Psychedelic-Assisted Therapies).
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Lauren is a psychiatry doctor, psychedelic therapy guide and group facilitator. For the last few years she has been a clinical trial doctor at The Centre for Psychedelic Research (Imperial College London) investigating psilocybin-assisted therapy for anorexia-nervosa, chronic pain, and treatment-resistant depression.
Alongside her clinical roles Lauren regularly facilitates psilocybin retreats in The Netherlands, and is co-founder of Essence Medicine, an organisation providing psycho-spiritual group support to people facing life threatening illness. Lauren is also passionate about educating future psychedelic facilitators and delivers integrative, experiential and heart-centred training for Mind Medicine (Australia) and PsyEdu (UK).
Lauren has trained in medicine, psychology, MDMA-assisted therapy, and yoga, and continues to be a student of earth-based, indigenous wisdom traditions. She is driven to help people come home to themselves, unfold more of who they truly are, and deepen into the beauty and mystery of life.