About us

We are a family united by years of experience in spiritual work and conscious relationship with plant medicines. Mahanse was born from what once shifted our lives in a profound and lasting way, and today our purpose is to carry that change forward, creating spaces where others can meet it for themselves.

About Fransie

Our Ceremony Guide

The project was founded by Fransie, who serves as the ceremony guide and holds the central responsibility for the retreats.

Fransie brings a deep, lived understanding of sacred plants and many years of experience holding and guiding ayahuasca retreats. Over the years, he has accompanied hundreds of people through intense inner processes and has studied closely with elders and teachers from different regions of the Amazon. This long-term dedication has shaped a way of guiding that is grounded, attentive, and rooted in direct experience rather than theory.

Within the retreat, Fransie serves as the main ceremony guide, guardian of the yagé, and voice medicine. He leads each ceremony with clarity and care, holding the space with steadiness, patience, and a strong sense of responsibility. His presence is calm and focused, allowing participants to feel supported while remaining fully engaged with their own process. He understands how to respond under a wide range of circumstances and knows when to intervene and when to give space, always prioritizing safety and respecting the process of every participant to not interrupt them.

Fransie is also a musician and songwriter, and his relationship with sound, breath, and rhythm is an integral part of his work. During the retreat, he guides breathwork sessions and explains each stage of the process in a clear and structured way, helping participants understand what may arise and how to navigate it with greater awareness. His way of communicating is direct and caring, combining structure with warmth and presence.

He has experience facilitating different plant medicines, including yagé, tobacco, and kambó, always supported by the Mahanse team. During ceremonies, he may offer energetic cleansings using his tools, tobacco, and sahumerios, adapting each intervention to the individual and the moment, without imposing interpretations or promises, knowing that everyone must get their own answers.

Born in Spain to a Spanish father and a Dutch mother, Fransie moves fluently between cultures and languages, guiding in both Spanish and English. He plays several instruments and brings a broad, embodied understanding of music, breath, and ceremonial space. He also dedicates time to studying mental health, addiction, and the ways in which disciplined work with plants and traditional diets can support long-term change, always emphasizing responsibility, preparation, and integration.

Fransie has completed several plant «dietas» and continues to return regularly to the Amazon to deepen his learning and maintain a living connection with the roots of this work. What once touched him deeply is now shared with humility and commitment as an invitation for others to look honestly at their habits, patterns, and ways of living, and to take responsibility for creating a more coherent and conscious life, for the next generations to come to find a better place.

His strength lies not in grand gestures, but in consistency, integrity, and the ability to hold demanding spaces with clarity and heart, while walking the path himself.

About Marcelo

Ceremony Guardian

Marcelo brings to the retreat a warm, joyful, and deeply human presence. His energy naturally expresses itself through movement, dance, and body-based practices, creating spaces where participants can release rigidity, reconnect with sensation, and step out of excessive mental activity. During the retreat, he guides movement sessions and meditations that invite exploration of expanded inner states, always respecting each person’s rhythm and personal process.

He has many years of experience facilitating ceremonies and accompanying people through intense and varied processes. This experience allows him to respond with calm, clarity, and discernment in different situations. Within the ceremonial space, he supports the work as a guardian of the yagé, with a very special connection to stelar beings from other dimensions, and facilitates rapé when appropriate, holding the space with attention, respect, and responsibility.

Throughout his path, Marcelo has explored and trained in different forms of accompaniment, including conscious bodywork, massage therapy, inner child work, Akashic records, and the Theta Healing approach. During his sessions he combines his wisdom, studying every one, to help you release tension, open understanding, and accompany emotional processes. His individual sessions and energetic cleansing work are experienced as deep and careful, always adapted to the person and the moment they are living. He brings deep cleanse during the ceremonies and in his optional 1:1 sessions during the retreat.

Marcelo is originally from Brazil and lived for several years in London before settling in the area of Mataró Beach. Thanks to this background, he speaks fluently in Portuguese, English, and Spanish, allowing for clear and natural communication with participants from different places.

Those who share space with him often highlight his clean, loving, and approachable presence. Marcelo connects easily with people, creates trust, and contributes to making the retreat feel like a safe and welcoming environment, where each person can feel at home while remaining fully responsible for their own process.

About Raúl

Ceremony Guardian

Raúl González has been walking a conscious spiritual path since 2012, working as an energy healer and facilitator across different practices. His work is rooted in ancestral wisdom, the vibration of sound, and the power of conscious, respectful touch. These elements come together as ways of supporting balance, clarity, and a deeper connection with the body and inner experience.

During the retreats, Raúl plays a key role in holding and protecting the ceremonial space. He serves as guardian of the fire and the room, facilitates sahumerios and rapé when appropriate, and remains present throughout the night. His presence is steady and grounded, often described as strong and unwavering, so they call him the Buffalo. He stays attentive until the last person has settled, capable of holding complex or intense situations with calm, confidence, and care.

Before ceremonies, Raúl offers sound baths that help participants arrive more fully into the space and their bodies. During the retreat, he also makes his one-to-one sessions available, offering individualized support for those who feel called to receive it.

In his therapeutic work, Raúl combines three complementary approaches. He begins with deep tissue massage, helping release physical tension and areas of accumulated stress. This is followed by Reiki-based energetic work, aimed at supporting balance across the body and emotional field. Sessions often close with sound healing, using vibration as a way to accompany relaxation and internal harmony. These methods are offered as supportive tools, always respecting the person’s own process and limits.

Originally from Madrid, Raúl lived in London for 16 years, an experience that shaped both his personal path and his way of relating to people from different backgrounds. He speaks Spanish and English fluently, allowing him to accompany participants with clarity and ease.

Raúl’s strength does not come from force, but from presence. He brings reliability, attentiveness, and a quiet confidence to the retreat, contributing to an environment where people can feel safe, supported, and free to move through their experience at their own pace.

About Magda

Facilitator and Movement

Magdalena supports the retreat as part of the core support team, guiding movement-based and somatic practices that help participants reconnect with their bodies and integrate their experiences before and after ceremonies. Her work draws from trauma-aware, nervous-system-informed approaches, including conscious movement, breathwork, and embodied awareness. She focuses on creating a sense of safety, presence, and grounding, allowing each person’s process to unfold naturally without force or expectation.

Her path has been shaped by early sensitivity to energy and emotion, as well as personal experiences of physical and emotional challenge that led her to explore healing beyond the mental level. Over time, she came to understand the body and nervous system as essential gateways for integration and long-term change. Through years of personal practice and training in energy work, embodiment, and somatic approaches, Magdalena developed a way of supporting others that is gentle, intuitive, and deeply respectful of individual limits and rhythms.

Within the retreat space, she also supports the energetic field through intuitive awareness, sound, and presence, helping maintain clarity and stability in both group and individual moments. Outside the ceremonial context, she contributes to the overall care of the retreat and to the communication of the project. Her way of holding space is quiet and steady, centered on softness, listening, and embodied connection—offering support without directing or defining anyone’s experience.

About Ju

Vegan Chef

Juliane supports the retreat through food prepared with care, simplicity, and deep awareness of the process participants are going through. She is a Brazilian-born vegan chef who designs a conscious ceremonial diet specifically aligned with the retreat, creating meals that are light, nourishing, and supportive before and after the ceremonies. Her approach to cooking is attentive and intentional, understanding food as an essential part of grounding, digestion, and integration.

Vegan in her daily life, Juliane has a strong foundation in plant-based cooking and knows how to prepare meals that are both healthy and genuinely satisfying. During the retreat, she remains attentive to each participant and can adapt the menu when needed, taking into account individual sensitivities, dietary requirements, or specific needs that may arise throughout the process. Her presence in the kitchen is calm and caring, contributing to a sense of being looked after without excess or intrusion.

Juliane lived in London for nine years and has traveled extensively, experiences that have shaped both her culinary perspective and her way of relating to people from different backgrounds. She holds a degree in anthropology and has a deep interest in human culture, history, and traditions, which naturally informs her respect for ritual, process, and collective spaces. Through her food and presence, she helps create a supportive and grounded environment where participants can feel nourished on a physical and human level throughout the retreat.

Have questions or need more clarity?

If you feel this experience might be aligned with you, we offer a calm, one-to-one conversation to share information openly, clarify expectations, and ensure this retreat is appropriate and safe for everyone involved.