Hoffman Process graduates from every state will tell you the same thing: once you’ve experienced genuine emotional breakthrough, ordinary wellness holidays start to feel like putting a band-aid on a broken bone. Yet every week after week, thousands of Australians still google “best health retreat” and find themselves torn between booking a luxurious Victorian health retreat or an equally tempting health retreat New South Wales. Both states promise transformation, both look breathtaking on Instagram, and both will leave you relaxed—so how do you choose the experience that actually moves the needle on the issues you’ve carried for years?
Let’s start with the environment, because it’s usually the first thing people notice. A Victorian health retreat is almost always wrapped in cool-climate serenity. Think rolling hills in the Yarra Valley, mineral springs around Daylesford, or ocean cliffs on the Mornington Peninsula. The air is crisp, the vineyards are close, and the overall mood is introspective and restorative. Programs here tend to lean into spa rituals, forest bathing, magnesium flotation tanks, and slow farm-to-table cuisine. It’s perfect if your nervous system is frazzled and you simply need to down-regulate, sleep deeply, and remember what silence feels like.
Cross the border (or fly over it) and a health retreat New South Wales usually offers a very different energy. Byron Bay hinterland, the Blue Mountains, or the South Coast deliver sub-tropical warmth, crashing waves, and wide-open skies. The vibe is lighter, more expansive, often infused with salt air and barefoot luxury. You’ll find more surf therapy, ecstatic dance, ice baths, breathwork circles, and plant-based menus that feel like you’re dining at a fashion-week after-party. NSW retreats market themselves as places to “reconnect with your wild self,” and remember how to play.”
So far, both sound incredible—and they are. The difference appears when you ask what happens three months after you leave.
Most Victorian health retreat programs and health retreat New South Wales programs excel at physical and short-term emotional reset. Guests lose a few kilos, sleep better, cry happy tears in a cacao ceremonies, and swear they’ll never go back to their old life. Then real life starts again: the demanding job, the complicated family dynamics, the same inner critic who’s been running the show since childhood. Within weeks or months, the glow fades and the same reactive patterns return.
This is exactly why a growing number of Australians in 2025 are skipping the comparison altogether and enrolling directly in the Hoffman Process, whether it’s held on a private estate in the Yarra Valley (Victoria) or in the lush Byron hinterland (New South Wales). The Hoffman Process isn’t marketed as another “health retreat.” It’s an intensive, evidence-based, seven-day residential program that systematically identifies and resolves the negative patterns you absorbed—usually unconsciously—from your parents and early caregivers. Using a blend of guided inquiry, expressive work, somatic practices, and cutting-edge neuroscience, participants move through anger, sadness, forgiveness, and ultimately self-compassion in a way that rewires the brain and the nervous system.
Unlike almost every other Victorian health retreat or health retreat New South Wales, the Hoffman Process is designed for lasting change. Independent studies and ongoing Australian surveys show that more than 93% of graduates report significant positive shifts in self-esteem, relationships, and life direction that are still present a full year later—and often decades later. That’s not a relaxing long weekend; that’s a before-and-after moment.
So if you’re trying to choose between a Victorian health retreat and a health retreat New South Wales in 2025, ask yourself one question: Do I want to feel amazing for a week, or do I want to become someone who feels amazing for the rest of my life? If it’s the second, the location becomes almost irrelevant. The Hoffman Process is held multiple times each year in both states with the same curriculum, the same exceptional facilitators, and the same life-altering results.
Thousands of Australians have already stopped scrolling through pretty retreat websites and simply booked the Process—whether that meant flying into Melbourne or the Gold Coast. They’ll tell you the flight was the easiest part of the journey. The real journey began the moment they said yes to real, lasting change.
