Chances are, you’ve heard about one or two of your favorite celebrities talking about a retreat, or exercise, known as the Hoffman Process. But what exactly is it, and why have so many A-listers sung its praises?
Well, the Hoffman Process is a personal growth retreat that’s a part of the Hoffman Institute Foundation, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.
The process was founded by Bob Hoffman in 1967, and, according to their website, is described as a “week-long personal growth retreat that helps participants identify negative behaviors, moods, and ways of thinking that developed unconsciously and were conditioned in childhood.”
Their website also sums up their business as “transformative adult education, spiritual growth, and the personal dimensions of leadership.”
But what is it that they actually do? There’s an extensive questionnaire that prompts you to reflect on your childhood, as well as digitally disconnecting. Plus, there are “cognitive, intuitive, and cathartic exercises,” but keep in mind, they said it shouldn’t replace psychotherapy.
It’s supposed to be highly transformative, and celebrities can’t stop singing its praises.
Below, see which celebrities have spoken about doing the Hoffman Process.
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Katy Perry
Image Credit: Gilbert Flores/Variety Back in 2017, Katy Perry attended a week-long program at the Hoffman Institute
“For years, my friends would go and come back completely rejuvenated, and I wanted to go, too. I was ready to let go of anything that was holding me back from being my ultimate self. I have had bouts of situational depression and my heart was broken last year because, unknowingly, I put so much validity in the reaction of the public, and the public didn’t react in the way I had expected to … which broke my heart,” she said about why she decided to go.
She added what she believes with mental health, “I believe that, essentially and metaphorically, we are all computers, and sometimes we adopt these viruses via our parents or via the nurture that we are given or not given growing up. They start to play out in our behaviour, in our adult patterns, in our relationships.”
Not only that, but she gives Hoffman gift certificates to friends when she sees them struggling. She said, “I recommend it to everyone, my good friends and other artists who are looking for a breakthrough. There are a lot of people who are self-medicating through validation in audiences, through substances, through continually running away from their realities – denial, withdrawal. I did that for a long, long time too.”
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Naomie Harris
Image Credit: John Nacion/Variety Naomie Harris talked about her experience with Net-a-Porter in 2018, saying, “I do a lot of self-development work. I’m always reading and wanting to improve. At the moment, I’m doing Landmark a form of self-help group therapy, and I’ve done the Hoffman Process as well, which is really about healing the relationship with your parents. It’s incredible. No matter how wonderful our childhood was, we all have issues with our parents. No parent does it perfectly. And that unpicked something for me. Instead of seeing everything from my perspective, I was able to see things from my dad’s perspective, and have much more compassion for him. It’s been several years since I did Hoffman, but that was the start in terms of being able to forgive him.”
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Sienna Miller
Image Credit: Rich Polk/PMC Sienna Miller called the Hoffman Process “f****** amazing,” adding, “It’s terrifying but extraordinary. It’s 10 years of therapy in a week. It takes a while to settle. What Hoffman does is analyse who you can trace your patterns back to, either parents or surrogates, then you kind of let go and examine who you would have been if you hadn’t taken on all these negative traits. There’s an immense amount of space in my head and there’s no fucking noise in it for the first time. All that noise has just gone.”
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Justin Bieber
Image Credit: Brian Friedman/PMC Justin Bieber revealed to Vogue that he found it all very odd at first, but he discovered a lot of hidden feelings about his childhood by doing it. However, he ended up walking out due to not being emotionally prepared to evalute it all (which is valid)!
There were these séances,” he said. “Or not really séances but these traditions. They light candles, and it kind of freaked me out. You sit on a mat, you put a pillow down, and you beat your past out of it. I beat the fact that my mom was depressed a lot of my life and my dad has anger issues. Stuff that they passed on that I’m kind of mad they gave me.”
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Gwyneth Paltrow
Image Credit: Alberto Rodriguez/Variety Gwyneth Paltrow has gone to a retreat at the Hoffman Institute, and her website Goop has even written about the experience multiple times over the years.
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Hoda Kotb
Image Credit: Paul Zimmerman/Variety/PMC Hoda Kotb is no stranger to trying new things. She said to SELF, “I’ve done all the things. I’ve lived with nuns. I walked with the Dalai Lama.” However, the Hoffman Process retreat? “This one retreat, I would trade my Georgetown degree for. I was a different person.”
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Oliver Hudson
Image Credit: Nina Westervelt/PMC Oliver Hudson talked about his experience on his podcast, Sibling Revelry. “It’s an incredible week of enlightenment. My mother was the one that I had almost the most trauma about, interestingly enough, because she was my primary care giver and I was with her all of the time so I felt unprotected at times she would be working and away or she had new boyfriends I didn’t really like,” Hudson said. “The forgiveness the compassion you feel towards them at the end of this process is unbelievable because then you realize they’re only repeating the s–t they went through with their parents.”
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Scooter Braun
Image Credit: Michael Buckner/PMC Scooter Braun not only went to a retreat but also spoke about his time on the Hoffman Process’s podcast. The bio read, “Scooter shares that both sides of his familial line experienced great trauma and struggles. He was aware enough to know that his life as a child was good. Through the Process, he came to realize that he felt guilt for having struggles because his paled in comparison to those his parents and grandparents experienced.”
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Orlando Bloom
Image Credit: Gregg DeGuire/WWD Orlando Bloom said on Oprah’s podcast, via People, in July 2025 that he credits the Hoffman process for becoming a better parent. He said, “I think my job as a parent now is to allow my children to grow without getting in their way. It’s sort of like don’t get in the way of anyone else’s journey. Don’t let anyone get in the way of your journey, and just be grateful for the opportunities that are presented to you, and see the challenges of the dynamic that are in front of you as an opportunity for you to grow.”
