Meet Our Team

A group of experienced facilitators and professionals, dedicated to guiding you with care, expertise, and authenticity.

Meet The Team

Our program was created by a diverse team of seasoned facilitators with expertise in neuroscience, coaching, and psychotherapy. By combining scientific insights, proven methods, and real-world experience, we ensure that you enter the process feeling confident, supported, and empowered.

Maria

Experienced Facilitator | Neuroscientist | Integration Coach | Yoga & Meditation Teacher

With a background in neuroscience, yoga, and transpersonal psychology, Maria supports participants in making sense of their psychedelic journeys—blending scientific insight with deep presence. Her approach bridges Western and Eastern wisdom to offer integration that’s both grounded and expansive.

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Her academic background in neuroscience, Eastern spiritual traditions, and American shamanism informs her holistic approach. She studied yoga in India, focusing on Hridaya Yoga—the yoga of the spiritual heart—and integrates meditation and self-inquiry into her work.

As a transpersonal coach, Maria harmonizes Western psychology with Eastern practices, supporting personal and spiritual development. She specializes in preparing individuals for psychedelic journeys and post-journey integration, ensuring meaningful, lasting change. Her deep experience with plant medicines and scientific knowledge provides well-rounded support.

Anastasiya facilitator

Anastasiya

Experienced Facilitator | Psychologist | Dedicated Yoga Teacher

With roots in somatic and Jungian psychology, Anastasiya supports participants in reconnecting with their inner intelligence. Trained in psychedelic facilitation and contemplative practice, she creates spaces that feel emotionally spacious and attuned—where insight unfolds at its own pace.

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Anastasiya holds a Master’s degree in Psychology and brings a deeply integrative approach to healing and transformation

As a holistic psychologist and integration coach, she blends modern psychological science with altered states of consciousness and holistic practices rooted in both Eastern and Western traditions.

Her therapeutic approach draws from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), somatic and humanistic modalities, mindfulness-based interventions, and is strongly informed by Jungian, transpersonal, and existential psychology. Anastasiya also incorporates yoga, breathwork, and meditation into her work—bridging science and spirituality to support healing on emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual levels.

Her personal path, including time spent in India, silent Vipassana retreats, and study with Thai monks, has deepened her embodied understanding of presence, awareness, and the mind-body connection.

Anastasiya believes that true healing unfolds in spaces of unconditional acceptance and loving presence. At the retreat, she offers both preparation and integration sessions that combine emotional processing, scientific insight, and practical tools—guiding participants toward meaningful, sustainable transformation.

Magda

Certified Psychedelic Practitioner | Certified Coach | Psychosomatic Therapist

Magda is a certified psychedelic practitioner and coach who blends intuition with experience. Trained by the Synthesis Institute with dozens of group ceremonies behind her, she brings presence, care, and deep listening to every space she holds. Her work draws from psychosomatics, coaching, and mindfulness practices.

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Her journey has taken her around the world, led by heart and intuition, to find teachers and mentors who have shaped her experiential learning and transformation. Magda has explored mindfulness, meditation, Reiki, yoga Nidra, tarot, and various wisdom traditions, eventually discovering a passion for psychedelics that opened doors to profound understanding, compassion, and love.

With extensive experience facilitating group ceremonies at Acsauhaya, Rejuvyn the Synthesis Institute and other prominent centers, along with her private practice, Magda brings a wealth of knowledge and depth to her work. She is also a certified life, spiritual, and relationships coach, integrating these skills seamlessly into her psychedelic practice. Trained in psychosomatics, she holds a deep respect for the body’s wisdom and incorporates this insight into her approach.

For Magda, everyday life and relationships are continuous sources of growth and learning, adding layers to her own journey. Living in Amsterdam, she remains dedicated to her calling with a heart full of compassion and commitment.

Woman with brown hair, closed eyes holding a hand to her chest and using palo santo

Sofia

Lead facilitator 

Meet Sofia, your dedicated guide and facilitator for this remarkable journey. With years of facilitating psychedelic retreats working with various plant medicines, collaborating with both indigenous shamans and western retreat leaders, Sofia brings a wealth of knowledge and a profound respect for these sacred practices.

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Sofia’s mission is to cultivate a nurturing and safe environment that empowers you to delve into the profound depths of this medicine and establish a connection with your inner self. With the utmost care and expertise, she will lead you through this transformative experience, assisting you in unlocking your full potential and finding the healing you seek. In addition to her guiding role in Psilocybin retreats, Sofia also conducts cacao ceremonies, facilitates sacred rage release and trauma release sessions, and offers energy healing.

Embark on this journey of self-discovery, empowerment, and personal growth alongside Sofia. Together, you will navigate the realms of consciousness and emerge from this experience stronger, wiser, and more deeply connected to your authentic self.

Joe

Experienced Facilitator | Certified Personal & Business Coach | Meditation Course Leader

With a background in coaching and meditation, Joe brings a calm, grounded presence to each retreat. His facilitation style is steady, attuned, and deeply respectful—supporting participants to gently explore their inner experience at their own pace, with clarity, care, compassion, trust, and curiosity.

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Joe is a gentle and loving plant medicine facilitator, who has worked with sacred plant medicines for over 5 years. His own profound inner journeys provided a path of healing and transformation in his life. This process inspired him to shift his focus to be of service, so that other beings have an opportunity to be in touch with their inner core and this magical life.

His calming energy provides an atmosphere of trust and acceptance where one can truly flourish. With his work Joe supports those seeking personal development, inner connection and profound transformation. His warm presence creates a loving space that nurtures the spirit and encourages growth.

Joe understands the importance of both preparation and integration, skilfully guiding individuals through these essential steps in their journeys by sharing his knowledge and experience. Joe has already facilitated hundreds of individuals on their transformative paths and invites all those seeking true healing to attend one of his wonderful retreats.

If you’re seeking a guiding light for your personal journey, Joe can be that beacon with his gentle nature open heart. Embrace the calming energy and loving atmosphere he provides, surrounded by his unwavering support.

It’s a very brave decision to join a ceremony and to dive deep into your inner self. My intention is to create a safe and loving atmosphere, so that every beautiful person is able to let go, to surrender and to trust the process. I feel very honoured to be part of each ceremony and I feel a deep respect for the souls who are willing to start this inner adventure.

Robert

Lead facilitator | Mindfulness teacher

For over 13 years, Robert has been deeply committed to personal growth and guiding others on their transformative journeys. With 9 years of experience working with plant medicines and 7 years as a skilled ceremony leader and facilitator, Robert brings a unique combination of strength, calmness, and unwavering safety to every retreat.

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As a certified mindfulness trainer, Robert masterfully harmonizes ancient practices with modern understanding, creating a sacred space where profound healing and self-discovery can take place. Those who have worked with Robert often speak of his grounding presence and his ability to hold space in a way that feels both powerful and deeply nurturing.

With a quiet strength and a compassionate heart, Robert offers a trusted guiding hand to those ready to begin their own journey of transformation.

Shurandy facilitator

Shurandy

Experienced Facilitator | Trauma-Informed | Former Social Care Worker

Rooted in an Amazonian lineage and shaped by nearly a decade of ceremony work with ayahuasca, San Pedro, and psilocybin, Shurandy brings a rare blend of spiritual depth and grounded ease. His presence in ceremony feels both reverent and real—where ancient tradition meets steady, relational care.

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Shurandy can be described as a heart centred consciousness teacher and plant medicine facilitator. His approach is truly unique as he combines sensitivity, compassion, and broad-spectrum wisdom to provide a playful but practical space for development and spiritual growth.

With roots to the Amazon itself, Shurandy has the ancient knowledge and sacred connection to spirit running through his DNA and this can be felt within his ceremonies. His powerful spiritual connection invites the divine into the ceremonial space, whereas his playful grounded energy creates a secure bubble of safety within which you can explore your inner and outer worlds.

Working with sacred plant medicine for close to 10 years, Shurandy has led hundreds of Ayahuasca, San Pedro, and Psilocybin ceremonies all over Europe, working with thousands of people from all over the world.

Through this special work, Shurandy has learnt the true meaning of unconditional love, acceptance, and forgiveness. This he embodies through his ability to experience the essential oneness continuously present in everyone, no matter who they are and what they think they are. By seeing the Divine in all people, he helps you to connect to that sacred part of yourself empowering true change and healing.

Shurandy not only draws on his experience with plant medicine to help people overcome barriers, blockages, hindrances, and trauma, but his work in the social care sector before he found his true path as a ceremony leader. This has allowed other forms and tools of trauma work to be available to him as he guides people towards an empowered position of healing and consciousness.

“Plant medicine is an extremely powerful tool that raises your state of awareness and consciousness, so you have access to your higher self. This portal puts you in a position where you can be the creator of your own reality and implement real change and healing.’

‘The main difference between working with sacred plant medicine and other more Western approaches to mental health and healing is that you are forced to let go of control within the psychedelic space. When you allow the medicine to take over and completely surrender to this beautiful process, a higher evolved version of yourself, or ‘higher self’, can enter your body and lead you through a deeply profound journey of self-discovery, emotional cleansing, and consciousness expansion.’

‘My role as lead facilitator is to make sure that every person feels completely safe within the space so they can trust the process, which can sometimes be confronting and challenging. With trust, you can surrender. Another aspect is to create a sacred and healing energy field in the ceremony yurt so that divine connection can be made in the most loving way possible.”

Shurandy deeply understands the immense bravery and profundity of working with plant medicine and how different medicines can work synergistically together. He is every time humbled when he greats our guests who have taken this important and often life-changing decision to evolve consciously.

“This profound work has the ability to release patterns that do not serve us”, he says, “but these patterns do not only affect us but the people around us and our larger networks to some degree or another. Like ripples on a still lake, the healing you do for yourself is but the first ripple, and as those ripples multiply and expand so does the effects of your healing. Extending beyond our immediate field of vision.”

Shurandy is a truly unique Maestro of Plant Medicine and structures his retreats to include individual and social dynamics, as well as consciousness work and integration tools to make sure you receive the most out of your psychedelic experience. Invest in yourself and book your spot today!

Nigel

Facilitator & Integration Coach

Nigel has many years of experience guiding ceremonies and supporting integration, bringing a calm and grounded presence to every journey. His work is rooted in over five decades of lived wisdom, shaped by a life of exploration, personal transformation, and deep engagement with plant medicines and expanded states of consciousness.

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Having lived and travelled extensively across Europe, Africa, and Latin America, Nigel carries a global perspective that enriches his ability to meet people from all walks of life with empathy and respect. His professional background spans corporate leadership, non-profit initiatives, and the healing arts—allowing him to connect just as easily with business leaders as with spiritual seekers and those in need of personal healing.

Nigel’s own path of overcoming burnout, heartbreak, and self-discovery has given him profound compassion for the human journey. Today, he considers it an honour to walk beside others, helping them feel safe, supported, and empowered as they open to their own healing and growth.

Portrait of Michal, facilitator at Acsauhaya retreats

Michal

Lead facilitator | Life coach

Michael, a dedicated seasoned retreat facilitator, offers invaluable guidance and expertise in deeply transformative journeys. With extensive experience in facilitating psychedelic experiences, he collaborates closely with subject-matter experts, physicians, and therapists to establish truly safe and nurturing spaces for profound exploration.

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In ceremonial settings, Michael fosters an environment where participants can surrender and trust the healing and transformative process. He skillfully creates a secure container, allowing the enchantment of sacred entheogenic medicines to unfold gracefully under his guidance.

Begin your journey with the support of our dedicated team.

Volunteers

There is a dedicated team of volunteers active behind the scenes of Acsauhaya. Without them, we would never be able to manifest such a big “movement”/community. We are eternally grateful for everyone that contributes to this project in any way possible.

If you possess useful skills and would like to contribute as well in any form or shape, we would like to hear from you.

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volunteer
support-team

Support Team/Guides

Our support team has three main goals: to make sure you are physically safe and comfortable, to make sure you feel emotionally safe and welcomed to surrender to the medicine, and to support the integration of your journeys. All our staff members have personal experience with ayahuasca healing and are deeply committed to self-awakening. They have been through the challenges and difficulties of many years of deep healing. From this experience they can hold space for you and offer you authentic compassion, loving kindness, empathy and a genuine willingness to help you.

Our support team members regard it as a privilege to guide and support you when you do your deep inner work with us and treat you how they (would have) liked to be treated during their own healing process.

Attending an ayahuasca ceremony is an extremely exciting event for most people. You set out on the path to meet unknown people in an unfamiliar environment, and so it is extremely important that you feel heard, welcomed and accepted.Besides, working with ayahuasca can be very confronting and requires the willingness to live through emotional and physical pain when needed, for the higher cause of releasing your internal blockages. Acsauhaya’s support team is there to remind you of your courage and determination in these vulnerable, difficult moments. We will remind you of your inner strength, wisdom, and ability to let go and trust the medicine.

Acsauhaya’s commitment stretches beyond the dates of the retreat; it begins with medical and psychological screening during the booking procedure and continues after the retreat through our integration support. Your well-being and safety are paramount to us! We are constantly working on providing a safe and comfortable environment for you to get the most out of your ayahuasca healing experience with us.

Besides the support team and the integration guidance that will be present at the retreat, behind the scenes there’s a network of affiliated therapists (psychologists, psychotherapists, doctors, facilitators of breath work and body work, etc.) that are there for you as well.

Acsauhaya’s support team is there to help you finetune and focus your intentions before the ceremonies, to hold safe space that will allow you to surrender completely to the medicine during the ceremonies, and to support the integration of your “newly upgraded self” after the ceremony.