Ep 353 A Wildflower Spoke to Me: What Actually Happens at a Joe Dispenza Retreat
In this episode of The Wholesome Fertility Podcast, I’m sharing my personal experience attending my fourth week-long Joe Dispenza retreat. From spontaneous moments of connection with the quantum field to powerful coherence healing experiences, I’ll walk you through what actually happens at these retreats and how Dr. Joe blends science and spirituality to help people transform and heal. I’ll also share the unexpected manifestation that left me speechless… and how I’ve started writing affirmations into thin air (yes, really!). Whether you're on a healing journey, exploring meditation, or just curious about how your mind shapes your reality, this episode is filled with practical inspiration, quantum insights, and deep personal reflection.
Key Takeaways:
What it’s really like to attend a Joe Dispenza week-long retreat (and why they sell out so quickly)
How Dr. Joe bridges quantum physics, neuroscience, and ancient wisdom
The science behind the breathwork technique that activates the pineal gland
Why becoming “nothing” during meditation is actually the path to transformation
A real-life manifestation story involving a wild yellow flower
The role of coherence healing and how it’s helping people shift physically and emotionally
How letting go of control is key—especially on the fertility journey
A simple technique to encode intentions using your finger in the air (yes, it works!)
Why you don’t have to attend a retreat to benefit from the work
If you’re curious about how to quiet your mind and gently support your body with mindset tools, my Rooted Membership is designed for you. It’s a space where I share hypnosis audios, meditations, and mindset practices to bring calm to your fertility journey. You can even try it free for 7 days and see how it feels. https://www.michelleoravitz.com/rooted-fertility-mindset-membership
Disclaimer: The information shared on this podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as medical advice. Please consult with your healthcare provider before making any changes to your health or fertility care.
For more information about Michelle, visit: www.michelleoravitz.com
Check out Michelle’s Latest Book: The Way of Fertility!
https://www.michelleoravitz.com/thewayoffertility
The Wholesome FertilityFacebook group is where you can find free resources and support: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2149554308396504/
Instagram: @thewholesomelotusfertility
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thewholesomelotus/
-
[00:00:00] Episode number 3 53 of the Wholesome Fertility Podcast. Welcome to the Wholesome Fertility Podcast. I'm your host, Michelle Orvi, and today I am going to be doing something that I've been doing in the past, which is having a little summary of my experience at a Joe Dispenser retreat, and I have just completed my fourth week long retreat at Joe Dispenses.
And of course, I have a lot of interesting kind of feedback. Coming back and I also wanted to talk to you about what he does and how it's impacted so many lives, and it's just really fascinating work. So stay tuned.
Welcome to the Wholesome Fertility podcast. I'm Michelle, a fertility acupuncturist here to provide you with resources on how to create a wholesome approach to your fertility journey.
Michelle: [00:01:00] So today I am talking about Joe Dispenza and my experience on the fourth week long retreat. So all in all, I've had four week long retreats and there are seven days of meditation instruction getting together with lots of different people and also doing a coherence healing or a couple of them. And it's a really, really amazing experience.
Michelle: And then I also, on top of that, went to a fifth. But it was a shorter follow up retreat, which is about four days doing similar, but a little more advanced things than the week long. So if you guys are not familiar with Dr. Joe De Spencer's work, his work really is amazing in the sense that he bridges science and spirituality and I think like really how his main objective is to help people change.
Michelle: What that means is literally we know we have this identification, and the idea is that we have this identification in a certain body, and when we have certain patterns and we [00:02:00] become that personality or that certain type of person not only embodies an identification, but it also has a lot of other things that go along with it.
Michelle: And part of what he sees, or in his research is that. Part of it is how our bodies respond and reflect and express themselves, and that can have certain patterns of diseases or imbalances that show up as specific conditions. And many people who go to his retreats or even implement his work, like his meditations heal.
Michelle: So that's really what's amazing about it, is that. They are finding lots of data and testimonials of people that go to his retreats and do this meditation, and he has a very specific breath and they heal from their conditions after being told that they can't really do that. With what's available. So that being said, a lot of people that go to this are also having doctors oversee their [00:03:00] conditions.
Michelle: So they're not doing this instead of going to the doctor and seeking medical care. So this is many times a complimentary to trying to heal with many different types of medicine. And many different approaches. So the books that he has written thus far, the most common ones, uh, that you'll probably hear about, and there's probably other ones that are out there, but the most common ones that you'll probably hear about are how to break the habit of being yourself.
Michelle: And that really focuses on changing and why we don't change as humans, why it feels so uncomfortable to change and really. How to overcome that because when our subconscious mind is so used to a certain pattern, then it really feels painful to change that. It feels very unsafe to shift course when you're adding a new behavior or changing the way you're thinking it's going to feel.
Michelle: Very uncomfortable at first until the body gets used to [00:04:00] it. So other books that he's written about are You Are the Placebo and that's a really fascinating book. Talking about really mind, body, and how the placebo has always been looked at as a nuisance when it comes to research because they were trying to overcome the placebo 'cause it got in the way of them seeing if the medicine worked because the mind is so powerful.
Michelle: But what is interesting is that. This is an amazing thing. It's not a nuisance. It's actually something that needs more attention and needs more research in its own because this tells us that the mind can really impact us physiologically. So the book shares a lot of different research and a lot of different case studies.
Michelle: How the mind is so powerful and it can really shift so much in the body. And then another book that he has, which is also another very well-known book, is Becoming Supernatural, and that also is an amazing book. So all his books really talk a lot [00:05:00] about what he's seen at his, in his research, and in his week-long retreats and other in-person retreats.
Michelle: What's amazing about his retreats is usually they sell out, and I would say it depends. It's maybe anywhere from 1500 people to 2000 people. Depending on the venue and what they do is, uh, many times they'll get a certain amount of people that sign up to be part of the research, and there's a research team that works there at the retreats and they will check.
Michelle: People's blood. They will take their stool samples to look at their microbiome. They check genetics and ins insert like a little swab in the cheek and they'll, they'll really do a lot of different data points and they also check a person's e, EG. So they'll look at the brain waves. Of the meditators and they find a lot of really amazing things, and they've already had some studies they don't really like for [00:06:00] you to videotape or anything like that, but they have had studies published, so you can actually see that on Dr.
Michelle: Joe's website. They have some studies published and they talk about some of the studies that they're doing. It's really fascinating work. It's showing that literally major changes are happening in the body. And besides even their research, just getting people's stories and hearing their testimonials are mind blowing.
Michelle: So the way Dr. Joe teaches is he tries to give you an understanding based on a lot of quantum physics and even just scientific aspects of our minds, and really to understand and put information and. A purpose to what we're about to do. So when he gives us information, we can then apply meaning, and then we apply meaning to an act, which is the meditation and the breath.
Michelle: We're not just doing something blindly. So he's amazing in that sense because he really educates us. Based on facts, and then he does [00:07:00] whatever it is that he's teaching. So these things are not just haphazard. He doesn't use a lot of spiritual terms either because he wants to use science as kind of like the way he approaches it.
Michelle: And by doing that, he feels that science is the language of everybody can really connect on. Whereas if you get spiritual or use certain words that are too out there for some people, you're gonna lose a good amount of the population. Plus it is really amazing when science is catching up to a lot of old wisdom that has been taught about thousands of years.
Michelle: So it's really fascinating to see that a lot of these things do actually have connections with spirituality, teachings that have been passed along for. Thousands of years, like Kundalini, and he talks about energy centers and he uses the word energy centers rather than chakras, but ultimately they are referring to chakras.
Michelle: But he talks about them more in matter of fact of what is happening in the body [00:08:00] and really putting our attention. Onto certain areas of our body. Now, we haven't been taught this in schools. This is not something that anybody's really like come in contact. In the average mainstream. We're really not taught about how important our attention is and where our attention goes.
Michelle: It really impacts our bodies and really our lives. Now, there is definitely research coming out there that talks about how our minds and our thoughts can really impact our bodies. There's been studies that have shown that visualizations really impact our bodies and it really makes a difference on the outcome of our life too.
Michelle: Writing things down, really putting our intention out there. So these are things that we have, but we don't really know that we can use them. And so his work, he's very passionate about showing us. As humans, what we're able and capable of doing. So when it comes to fertility, and the reason why I love this so much is because for me, one of my core messages for my [00:09:00] patients and my clients and my audience really, 'cause I have the podcast, is that I want people to realize that they have more power than they might think.
Michelle: That being said, it shouldn't take any place of medical advice or going to the doctor and doing kind of like regular real life things, but that's not what he's saying either. He's not saying to take a place of anything else. This is an addition to. What you're doing. But having that as an addition too, it could be very empowering, knowing that our minds can really make a difference.
Michelle: Why not utilize that aspect of our life and body? So my personal experience was really interesting and a lot of what he focuses on is this breath. And the breath is basically when you exhale completely out of your lungs from your nose, and then you tighten up the area in your. Space chakra, that you tighten that area as you're exhaling and then as you're inhaling, you're [00:10:00] tightening all these different areas in your energy centers and really tightening up as you're inhaling and imagining that you're drawing up energy that we usually hold in our lower centers, which is really survival.
Michelle: And he teaches a lot about that. Like a lot of us have that energy and is kind of sitting there pulling in the bottom area. And so we're pulling that energy and slowly by, slowly through our breath, and you're doing this like repeatedly throughout the week, you're pulling that energy and tightening at the same time all the way up through the top of your, into the sixth center, which is really the penial gland in the middle of your brain.
Michelle: And you can watch a lot of videos on this. You can find tons and even ones where Joe Dispen. Speaks specifically about how to do the breath. You can even find this on his website if you're interested. I would definitely recommend doing that. And so by doing that, you're actually activating a lot of energy that is sitting [00:11:00] dormant in the lower centers.
Michelle: So it's kind of like the energy centers that connect with our spine. A lot of what I do in Chinese medicine, we actually do also work on the spine as well, and that correlates to the same thing. What's interesting to me is that there's so many different backgrounds and so many different philosophies, and a lot of times if you really look at some of the ancient information and the ancient wisdom, they all point to very similar things.
Michelle: So that's what I find really fascinating about this. But he's doing this in a little bit more of a modern way. So people are able to relate to the information a little bit more easily. So that's one of the things he always does many times with many of the meditations to prep before the meditation. And what that does is it stimulates your penial gland, which is in the center of your brain, and that he describes, has crystals in them.
Michelle: And it also is like a radio receiver. So it's able to pick up on messages. And what's interesting to [00:12:00] me about that personally is that when I began meditating like about 20 some years ago, I really started to meditate a lot. And the more I would meditate, the more I would sit kind of in peace and quiet, and I would focus on like sensations in my body.
Michelle: And a lot of times I would focus on like the crown of my head and the area around my head, or the area between my eyebrows when I did that. One day, like little by little, I started to feel just this natural feeling like I was drinking light through the top of my head. It was really interesting. It was like I felt like I was literally drinking gulping light at the top of my head, and it was a very spontaneous feeling that I had.
Michelle: It's not something that was repeated, but it was something that I felt. And I said, I have no idea what this is, but I'm just feeling really good with it and I'm just gonna keep doing it. I'm just like, I have no idea what this is, but I feel like I'm downloading information. [00:13:00] And I started to feel in my real life out outside of meditation.
Michelle: That I was getting downloads, getting information, getting information that I had no idea where it came from. And then years later when I started talking to other meditators, they would say, they would talk about these downloads. And I totally understood what that meant because I feel like people say that for a reason.
Michelle: 'cause there's no other way to really describe what that is. But you're getting downloads of information when he talks about being a radio receiver. You're literally working on that antenna, and when you're getting quiet in meditation, you're able to connect with that. So his type of meditation is different than what I'm talking about, what I started.
Michelle: So meditation in general, there's so many different types, and part of that meditation is really getting quiet. And a lot of ancient teachings talk about also becoming non-self, like letting [00:14:00] go of your identity. And it's really interesting. It's like this emptying, this unbecoming, like this, releasing from any kind of identification that we had.
Michelle: We're really releasing from the clutches of your ego, which is very, very strong in that identification. It wants to know the known and it wants to have control. So what Joe Dispenza talks about is getting to this place of this unknown, and he always, many times the majority of his meditations, I don't even know that there's any that don't do this.
Michelle: He gets into this place of nothingness and he. Has you really let go and become nothing so that you end up in a space of no time, no one, no thing, no nothing. And that has happened to me just spontaneously with my meditations before I actually got into his work. And when I was drinking that light, I was like in no place.
Michelle: I just like completely surrendered myself. And in [00:15:00] so doing, it's really interesting how the ego will let you feel. It'll fight that because it doesn't wanna be nothing. It feels, uh, very scared to let go. And part of that is also our plans and I can kind of attribute it, you know, to how the fertility journey could be, is really our plans and our need for control of what's gonna happen.
Michelle: And so. It's interesting how you'll get convinced through your thoughts that that is how you'll have control, but ultimately the power comes from letting go. Also, you do both you, you act and you also let go. It's kind of like that, that balance. And so he puts you in this place where you're completely nothing.
Michelle: You're letting go. And as you're doing this, and I find personally as I've been doing this, I actually feel a sense of relief. I'll tell you why. Because for that moment I can let go of everything. Kind of like all of the responsibilities, [00:16:00] the heaviness of just life. It started to feel very freeing to just completely let go of my identity.
Michelle: 'cause I know that it's a short time that I'm doing it. It's just during the meditation and I'm like, okay. Agreeing, I'm making an agreement with myself that during this time I can feel free to let go. And so little by little I'm training myself to feel safe in that place. And when you're doing that, you're actually allowing your nervous system to kind of reset itself.
Michelle: Because you're moving away that pressure of your thoughts and your mind, and you're allowing your nervous system to reset itself and to feel free and to kind of like wander and through that you have access to information because again, you have this radio receiver. You're allowing yourself a state where you're able to bring that information down and that information can help you physically to rewire your body, to rebalance your body.
Michelle: You're getting into that [00:17:00] state. Where you're able to actually receive that into your physiology, but then you're also able to do that in just your intuition and. What your next steps would be in life to be guided. So I find that really, really fascinating. So he has many different meditations and some of them are really balancing the energy centers and the other ones are actually working on creativity and manifesting, on bringing in and tuning in states of consciousness that you would like to have.
Michelle: And so the idea, which actually is very much in link with Kabbalah. Is that there's multiple timelines and there's many infinite possibilities in the quantum field. And getting to the quantum field requires us to let go of everything we know here in this physical. 3D reality. So we're in this 3D reality.
Michelle: The more we respond and react to this 3D reality, we are making it more real. The idea is when we take [00:18:00] ourselves away from that, temporarily go into this place of like nothingness, then we're opening ourselves up. We're going into the control center. And then we're able to access these infinite possibilities, and then we can see that happening, whatever it is that we want really to bring in.
Michelle: We just keep doing it little by little until we get into from there into our reality. But typically what we do is, is we actually see ourselves as victims to this reality rather than realizing that our consciousness is contributing to the reality. And what's fascinating is that. This concept has been seen as new agey and woo woo for a very long time, and now he is actually bridging science with these concepts and bringing it really to parallel with quantum physics and a lot of quantum physics aligns with a lot of kabbalistic.
Michelle: Teachings, but also some of the Buddhist teachings as well, [00:19:00] which I personally find really, really fascinating. So before we go, I wanna talk to you about a couple of things that happened. So I went with my daughter, I was finally able to convince her to come. To a Dr. Joe Dispenza retreat because I think that whether she realizes now or not the benefits of the teachings, it'll stay with her really forever.
Michelle: So she'll always kind of come back to it if she needs to. She understands the concepts, she understands that her mind really makes a difference and her reality based on the science and what he's really shared. So I thought that was just so amazing. But then, um, we also do these walking meditations because he says that.
Michelle: It's not enough to just think about these things and visualize them, but it's actually like when you're closing your eyes and you envision something and then you open your eyes and you walk and you walk as it. And when you're doing the walking meditations in the retreats, you're kind of in a bubble.
Michelle: You're with a lot of other people that are doing the walking meditations. Everybody's walking around like. Totally zoned in [00:20:00] sometimes dancing, and you don't care what you look like because everybody's in the same boat, and it's so freeing to be around so many people that are in the same exact boat and nobody's gonna judge you.
Michelle: So for that alone, it's amazing. And then they block off streets and you're really protected. So we were in Denver at the time and before my walking meditation, we were doing something called tuning into your Potentials, which means You're bringing in an object of any kind, just bringing it into your 3D reality.
Michelle: So you're actually bringing that projection. Into your reality. So typically I'll always think about something deeper. You know, a bigger thing that I wanna change in my life. But this time I said, you know what, I'm not gonna do that. This time I'm just gonna focus on a yellow flower. So I focus on this yellow flower.
Michelle: And then I remember in my mind, during the meditation thinking, what should it look like? Should it look like this, that, and I [00:21:00] kept like thinking in my mind all these different things about how it should look. And then this kind of inner wisdom whispered to me, let it go. Don't worry about how it's gonna look.
Michelle: Just focus on the yellow flower. Just bring that out there. So I said, okay, let it go. So. Fast forward to the walking meditation. I think it was a day or two after, and I started walking and doing the walking meditation. Usually he starts you with your eyes closed, you're focusing on his, uh, guidance, and you're, you're basically standing up with doing the meditation with your eyes closed.
Michelle: Then he says, open your eyes. Look around. Then walk, and then you walk and then he starts to have music. It's very powerful and really gets you into this walking meditation saying Walk as it, and really focusing on who you wanna be. And then at one point he says, okay, hold it. And then I'm walking. Usually he has, uh, these streets blocked off.
Michelle: So in [00:22:00] this specific place, he had streets blocked off and on the side of the streets there were areas where it was really kind of like wild weeds growing everywhere. And it was just kind of random. So I closed my eyes, I walk away from the street a little bit and then I kind of like stand facing out 'cause there are still people walking.
Michelle: Everybody's at a different timeline on their meditations. So I would. Close my eyes and I look out and I have my eyes closed completely. You have no idea what even I'm facing, and I close my eyes. I do the meditation. Then he says, open your eyes. And I open my eyes, and the first thing I see right in front of my eyes is this beautiful yellow wild flower and this flower, I mean, I didn't see flowers around it.
Michelle: I saw a couple small ones right next to it. But the big one was right in front of my eyes and I was just shocked. 'cause for [00:23:00] that moment, not only did I see the flower, but I felt like the universe was speaking to me because the way the flower looked, had almost, it looked like a sunflower and it looked like an eye, looked like an iris looking back at me.
Michelle: And it was, it dawned on me even before I realized it looked like an eye. I thought about that actually after. Even before that, as I'm sitting there looking and I was like, thank you. I know you see me. I know you hear me. Like you are aware of me. And I think that that was the biggest aha for me at that moment, is that the universe is aware of us and the universe is aware of our thoughts, even though we don't think it is.
Michelle: So that to me was the mind blowing. Message that I got and took with me and I'm gonna take with me forever. So that was one of the things that really caught my eye. And then when I came home, I. Told myself, I'm gonna start [00:24:00] writing things down. But I always feel like it's kind of a pain to do because I need my, notebook and I need to find it and make the time.
Michelle: So now I came up with this new thing and I'm gonna share it with you guys. What I started to do is, is when I'm doing something alone, instead of writing something down with a pen and paper, I just in script it into. The air. So I basically move my finger into the air and say whatever it is that I want to say for the day.
Michelle: So if it means that I feel amazing, I feel strong, whatever it is that you wanna like really bring out into the day or into your life. You can write it down. I am like, say something in its current time, like as if it's already happened. So I am, and you can say whatever it is, and you're literally writing it into the energy around you.
Michelle: So inscribing it into the air. And so this is something that I. Decided to do. And then I realized, okay, what happens if I run outta space? I just go in circles until I finish [00:25:00] writing whatever it is I wanna write. And I look a little crazy doing it, but I do it most of the time alone, and it really feels powerful.
Michelle: So it was something that I thought to share with you guys as well. So that was. My experience with the Joe Dispenser retreat, I definitely highly recommend looking into his work. His work really works, literally, and it's something that I find really fascinating. So I would definitely look into his books, look into trying his meditations.
Michelle: If you can't go to an actual workshop. You could still heal. He showed us testimonials on people who have healed before they even went to a workshop. So you can heal doing the work before even going, you don't even have to go. So that's really fascinating. And then another thing is you can actually submit an application to have a coherence healing, which is all virtual and live so.
Michelle: People swear by it. People say that they've really felt a big [00:26:00] difference by doing those. So you can do that and you can find it on his website as well. So thank you so much for tuning in today, and I hope you have a beautiful day. [00:27:00]