Why I Attended Another Joe Dispenza Retreat

After attending Dr. Joe Dispenza's weeklong retreat in Cancun last year, I knew I wanted to do the Advanced Follow-Up Retreat (AFU) at some point, but I was loose with my plans. Cancun had been one of the best weeks of my life, and I wasn't sure any retreat after could top it. But in late winter, as I was finishing You Are the Placebo (I'd been reading his books in reverse chronological order), I found myself walking over to my computer and booking the AFU taking place in Denver, Colorado for July 26 to 29, 2026. While I had continued meditating regularly on my own after the advanced weeklong retreat, I missed meditating with a large group, especially the walking meditations.

In Cancun, I believe my Kundalini was activated during a kaleidoscope meditation. At the time, I wasn't sure whether the physiological sensations and movements would last beyond the retreat, but they continue to this day (more on that later). I had a feeling more mystical experiences were in store for me if I attended another retreat.

Denver appealed to me because I'd never been there, and I wanted to keep attending retreats in places where I could go into the unknown and have new experiences. Plus, the Gaylord Rockies Resort, with its mountain ski lodge vibe, was different enough from Cancun's tropical beachfront mega-resort that I wouldn't be as inclined to compare the two locations.

Still, I knew I had been spoiled by Cancun. Could the Denver retreat be as magical?

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What Is the Advanced Follow-Up Retreat?

While the Advanced Week Long Retreats welcome students who have never attended a Dr. Joe retreat before, the AFU is only for those who have completed the advanced retreat, which should be reflected in your profile on Dr. Joe's website.

AFUs are typically four days (3.5 days, to be precise), and a lot can happen in that time. Now that I'd already done the weeklong, I knew the schedule would be packed, with days starting at 6 a.m. How we managed to fit several advanced meditations, three walking meditations, three Coherence Healing sessions, teaching sessions from Dr. Joe, and lectures from two guest speakers into those three and a half days, I don't know. Time bends at these things.

What I like about the AFU is that since everyone is already familiar with Dr. Joe's work, we jump into the advanced meditations straight away. There's less introductory teaching, and he seems to incorporate new material and insights as he discovers them. It's experimental at times, as we get to practice new meditations before they're potentially released to the wider community.

I don't know if this happens at every AFU, but another difference was that Dr. Joe led all three walking meditations live. In Cancun, we'd listened to prerecorded meditations through the Mind Over Matter app on our own headphones as Dr. Joe observed us. In Denver, the organizers provided wireless party headphones for all 1,800 attendees, which were sanitized after each use, while Dr. Joe stood under a tent with his sound team, leading us through the meditations with a microphone in hand. I was impressed by the whole team's effort to give us this experience.

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Practical Info

Attendees in Denver had the option of staying elsewhere and commuting to the venue, which is great for locals. I chose to stay on-site at the Gaylord Rockies Resort because our days started so early. The resort, technically in Aurora, Colorado, is a short taxi/Uber ride from Denver International Airport.

Registration cost $1,499 USD plus local tax when I attended, not including airfare and accommodation. Prices seem to have increased since then. Breakfast and lunch were included, but dinner was not.

The theme of this Denver retreat was Electric Multiverse. Apparently, the first evening of the AFU includes a Future Self party, where attendees are encouraged to dress up. I traveled with only a backpack, so I just wore my regular clothes. I want to walk the Camino de Santiago in Spain, so this trip was good practice in traveling light. I was impressed that I could pack all my essentials into this backpack and fanny pack.

Check out the What to Pack section of my Cancun retreat review for what's recommended to bring. I had to forgo the yoga mat and blanket this time in favor of packing light.

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My Experience at the Denver Retreat

Venue, Atmosphere, and People

I thought Denver would be boiling hot, but it was a dry heat that I don't typically experience in sweaty, humid Toronto summers. It was nice, like being in a sauna.

Cancun had more of an international crowd and more variety in terms of age and background. The Denver group seemed to be an older crowd, mostly 45 and up, and predominantly American, although there were people from over 50 countries. I didn't run into anyone I had met last time, except one woman from Toronto.

I was really trying to avoid comparing this experience to Cancun, but Dr. Joe seemed enamored with the place too. The first night, I sat next to a Jeff Bezos lookalike as Dr. Joe talked about some of the cool things the group got to do at the last Cancun retreat. "Why is he always talking about Cancun?" my seatmate asked. "Should I go?"

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Dr. Joe was less jocular this time, less stand-up routine and more serious about the work. After the first walking meditation, he commented that people seemed to be arriving late or taking their sweet time walking over to the field. He pointed out that some attendees in wheelchairs or with serious illness were ready to go, so next time he wouldn't be waiting for latecomers. I thought that was totally fair, though I didn't think he should've waited to begin with. But people got the message because they were much more punctual for the remaining walking meditations.

Lectures

Dr. Joe introduced some new teachings on plasma, so it seems he's adding new material as he explores them. He also approaches familiar material from fresh angles, such as with this concept of entanglement, becoming entangled with our future selves.

We also had two guest presentations. Anatomist Gil Hedley joined us in person to discuss the relationship between the heart, brain, and nervous system, including the vagus nerve and how information travels between the heart and brain.

Scientist Dr. Hemmel joined us remotely to present research on the effects of group meditation during Dr. Joe retreats, including experiments involving chemical compounds in the meditation environment. I don't necessarily need scientific explanations and research data to motivate me to meditate, but I can see how they might appeal to people who are more scientifically minded, such as the doctors I sat next to, who were trying to figure out how to incorporate this work into their practice with patients. We even participated in an experiment ourselves in which those of us in the ballroom focused on generating love and compassion to send to a smaller group in another room, who were monitored for physiological changes.

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New Sensations During Meditations

Something I had to keep reminding myself throughout the retreat was not to expect the same meditation experiences I'd had in Cancun. But I couldn't help it. During the first meditation, which ended with us lying down for what seemed to be the Body Electric BOTEC meditation, I was waiting for that familiar feeling of electricity all over my body. This time, I only felt a little bit of electricity. I was disappointed, but I told myself during the meditation that it was okay if nothing happened. I could only surrender to the present experience and not force anything to happen.

When we neared the end of the meditation, focusing on the eighth energy center, I felt a completely different sensation. Starting at my feet, I felt what I can only describe as a voluminous cloud or foam engulfing me. It was as if I had also turned into foam, though I felt both a sense of density and lightness. Overall, my body felt less solid. It's difficult to describe, but it was a new sensation that I haven't experienced since.

In another meditation, Dr. Joe guided us to move our awareness beyond our physical bodies. Lying down, our consciousness was supposed to go through a door. I must've gone through the door, because at one point during the meditation, I stopped hearing his voice or any sound at all. When I became aware of that, I jolted myself back "awake."

I was startled. Where had I gone?

Later, I asked the attendees sitting next to me, wondering what the point of this meditation was. What was supposed to happen after we went through the "door" in the meditation? They didn't really know, figuring some people just wanted a mystical experience. I wasn't satisfied with that answer, so I asked one of the experienced meditators, who wore green hats to signal they were available to answer questions. She disagreed that the meditations were purely about having mystical experiences. We should always go into meditation with an intention. As for where I went during the meditation, nobody knows. I could've briefly fallen asleep or entered some other state of consciousness. She encouraged me to simply enjoy the experience rather than try to overanalyze it. Nobody would have a definitive answer, not even Dr. Joe.

The Body Electric Dance

One new addition to the meditations was the Body Electric Dance. It seems that Dr. Joe had only taught this once before, at the last Cancun retreat. It's like BOTEC but with a dance element to bring energy from the field into the energy centers. He demonstrated the dance for us a few times, and we got to practice it during our walking meditations. As of this writing, he hasn't released this to the public yet, but I am waiting for a recording so I can do it at home.

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I didn't go into detail about a lot of the mystical experiences I had in my Cancun post, but what the heck, I'll share a little more here. I'm also doing it because I want to know if anyone else has experienced anything similar, so drop me a note in the comments below.

Basically, in Cancun, something got activated during a kaleidoscope meditation. My head started moving on its own during certain meditations, like an antenna receiving signals. Occasionally, my upper body will move too. Sometimes, my body will even fold forward. My theory is that my Kundalini got activated. I thought these sensations might lessen after that retreat, but they have continued, especially when I listen to guided meditations, not only from Dr. Joe, but also from other meditation teachers. Or sometimes, I'll simply think about changing a limiting belief, and I'll have these movements, which I interpret as the change is taking place. There's a rhythmic pattern to these movements. They're gentle, and they don't scare me because I can stop them at any time, but I definitely don't force the movements. They just happen as a reaction to certain things. Maybe it's my body taking in energetic information and then balancing it out?

I mention this because when I started doing the Body Electric Dance, my lower body got activated this time. My hips began moving on their own to the music. When I say my hips were moving, they really were, in dramatic, rhythmic movements in sync with the music. I allowed my body to move without trying to control it. I felt like Shakira. It's a very feminine feeling.

Every time the music started for one of these meditations, my hips would just begin moving. I talked to a few attendees. The men didn't seem to experience this, but a couple of women I spoke to told me their hips had also moved.

I fell in love with my body during this retreat because it became so clear that my body really had an intelligence of its own. I thought about all the things I had put my body through over the years—storing stress and anxiety, mostly—and it had always been there for me. It was always trying to work for me, despite the limitations I had subconsciously placed on it. Now I'm taking steps toward unlocking its power.

Walking Meditations

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As I mentioned, the theme of this AFU was Electric Multiverse. During the first walking meditation at sunset, the sky was literally electric. I thought I was seeing things at first, but there really was lightning striking in the distance, even though the rain hadn't started yet. (Apparently, thunderstorms are common in Denver during the summer.)

Each walking meditation was a combination of the Body Electric Dance and the Entangled Walking Meditation. I'm assuming that when they become available as recordings, they will be separate meditations.

My first two walking meditations were fine, but it was the third one that really sealed things for me. I felt a sense of total peace. All my trivial worries had washed away. Even the goals I thought were so important to achieve seemed insignificant. As I focused on this feeling of peace and love, I began to cry. I simply felt whole.

I had tapped into something similar during a walking meditation in Cancun, but this one felt stronger and clearer. It's not ecstasy or intense joy. It was more of a relaxed feeling. Now that I know I can tap into peace and wholeness, I want to keep accessing that feeling in future meditations until it becomes a natural part of my everyday life.

Dr. Joe always talks about feeling elevated emotions without waiting for external circumstances to change before we can experience them. I don't need everything to fall perfectly into place before I can feel peace and wholeness.

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Coherence Healing

Coherence Healing sessions are really powerful experiences. We break into small groups. Several "Healers" sit around a "Healee" and focus their attention on sending them love and healing energy. I always find these sessions moving because the Healees are usually dealing with serious illnesses. They're sitting there vulnerable and open to receiving support from complete strangers.

This time, Dr. Joe introduced something new to the routine: chanting words as part of the healing process. I'm not sure if I'm allowed to share this process, but it was pretty cool.

During the sessions, I experienced that familiar pulsating sensation in my palms that I'd first felt in Cancun. When my group synchronized our energy, I could feel that pulsating heart energy so strongly.

The last Healee we worked with was a young woman dealing with a rare form of throat cancer. She hoped to recover and step onstage to share her story soon. I told her I'd look out for her testimonial.

Manifestation Story

I didn't know the last Coherence Healing session would be the final event of the retreat, and I had a flight scheduled for 6 pm that would cause me to miss it. I loved participating in the sessions as a Healer so much that I set an intention for my flight to be delayed so I could stay and do this. I didn't visualize or do anything elaborate. All I did was set this intention and trust that things would work out.

I kept checking my email for two days for my flight to be delayed. When nothing happened, I packed my backpack for the last day, preparing to leave early for the airport if necessary. Letting go of the outcome is an integral part of the process. When I emerged from the last meditation, I pulled out my phone absent-mindedly to check the time, and I saw an email saying my flight would be delayed by an hour and 40 minutes! It was the exact amount of time I needed to finish the retreat and get to the airport comfortably. Apparently, a storm had delayed the incoming aircraft.

I freaked out, thrilled by how things had aligned, and I was able to stay until the very end of the retreat, when we got to applaud the staff and say our goodbyes.

Was the Advanced Follow-Up Worth It?

What I love about meditating is that nobody can do the work for you. While I've witnessed people in other spiritual communities show up to receive blessings and energy from teachers and other students, this work requires a lot of personal accountability. Sure, Dr. Joe and the community are there for guidance and support, but only you can sit with your naked thoughts to overcome yourself. Nobody's going to make you get up at the crack of dawn. Nobody can force you to meditate every single day. And nobody can make you feel worthy enough to receive.

I loved the AFU because we jumped into the advanced meditations straight away. Heck, the second meditation got us to produce our own DMT. I also preferred being around advanced students because I was able to talk to a couple who had experienced similar things and compare notes.

The only downside to Denver was that the food wasn't as abundant as it was at the all-inclusive retreats. In Cancun, a variety of amazing food was available at pretty much every hour of the day. The Toronto acquaintance I ran into was a vegetarian and found the food in Denver so unappealing that she bought a lot of her own meals. I'm not a picky eater, so this wasn't a big deal for me.

Denver had its own charms with the thunderstorms and the dry heat. Apparently, the field where the walking meditations take place is considered sacred ground because attendees in the past had gotten out of their wheelchairs or stopped using their crutches.

Before the retreat, I'd been mulling over a major life decision for months. Denver reminded me how exciting stepping into the unknown could be, and I finally decided to take the leap.

What Changed in the Three Months After Denver?

My main intention going into the Denver retreat was to have inner peace. I'm someone who was used to running on stress and adrenaline, and it's something I've been actively shifting out of in the last few years. I had tapped into that feeling of peace in Cancun, and experiencing it again even more strongly in Denver gave me a strong foundation for making that my default mode.

Between doing Dr. Joe's meditations and working through my backlog of limiting beliefs (you can get an idea of my process through my Alchemy Healing Substack), I don't really experience anxiety anymore. Worries pop up occasionally, and that's normal; I don't think we'll ever completely stop having negative thoughts as human beings. When they do come up, they don't hook me in as they used to. It's a lifelong practice to stay aware of our thoughts.

On a practical level, I'm still transitioning to this big life change, but I continue to meditate every day. Lately, I've been challenging myself to do the Pineal Gland meditation, which is kind of a pain to do, because it involves lying down and almost falling asleep, then sitting up again and doing the breath. But it really makes a difference.

Right after the AFU, I played around with doing different Dr Joe meditations. One morning, I did the Generating Abundance meditation, which I had tried before, but this time I did it properly by really tapping into the feeling. Later that same day, Mejuri messaged me, offering to gift me $1000 worth of jewelry with no obligation to post about it. (I had never worked with them before, but I did review their jewelry in 2020 that I'd bought with my own money.) I chose this lab grown white sapphire tennis necklace, which I wear all the time now as a reminder of abundance. I'll come back to abundance meditations at a later time, because I have other intentions that are more pressing. I learned that it's better to focus on one intention at a time and to keep focusing on it until it manifests.

Overall, I'm living life in flow state. This month, a couple of unexpected opportunities dropped into my lap, things I once thought were impossible for me. I don't know what will come of them, but I'm enjoying seeing what happens when I stop trying to control every outcome.

I definitely want to attend another AFU because who knows what else I'll experience? When and where, I don't know; I'm letting my intuition guide me.