Golf instructor Christopher Smith is running luxury retreats in Los Cabos, Mexico, combining traditional ayahuasca ceremonies with 18-hole golf instruction. Priced at $8,999 per person, the program aims to help players tap into the subconscious to overcome mental blocks, fear, and self-sabotage on the course.
Fantasy & Market Impact
- Mental Game Overhauls: While traditional sports psychology relies on cognitive reframing, this retreat targets deep-seated emotional barriers via Amazonian plant medicine.
- Luxury Golf Tourism: At nearly $9,000 per five-night stay at a seaside home in Los Cabos—including access to Puerto Los Cabos Golf Club—the offering targets high-net-worth golfers seeking unconventional performance breakthroughs.
- Safety and Screening: Because ayahuasca can interact negatively with medications, rigorous pre-screening is enforced, with professional supervision on-site around the clock.
Unlocking the Subconscious on the Course
Golf courses feature plenty of physical hazards, but the game’s most debilitating obstacles are internal. Thoughts, feelings, and suppressed expectations often live in the subconscious, well beyond the reach of conventional lessons or traditional sports psychology. Christopher Smith, a GOLF Top 100 Teacher with more than 35 years of coaching experience, has spent decades wrestling with why players experience paralyzing fear during a low-impact, non-contact sport.
To break through those mental barriers, Smith looks deeper than mechanical adjustments. Since 2023, he has organized exclusive retreats in Mexico that pair traditional ayahuasca ceremonies led by a shaman with on-course instruction. Ayahuasca is a psychedelic tea brewed from Amazonian plants, utilized by Indigenous cultures for centuries. Smith first experienced the medicine in the early 2010s and recognized its potential to help players work through trauma, replace detrimental thought patterns, and cultivate a more fearless mindset.
Inside the Los Cabos Retreat Schedule
These experiences are designed for comfort rather than roughing it. Guests spend five nights at a high-end seaside residence in Los Cabos, with access to the Puerto Los Cabos Golf Club included in the $8,999 price tag. The structured itinerary features three shaman-led ceremonies, an initial 18-hole evaluation round under Smith’s supervision, and ongoing coaching both on and off the links.
The psychedelic effects typically last six or more hours, requiring carefully timed schedules. Participants are provided with private indoor spaces equipped with seasoned practitioners to supervise the experience safely. The objective is not to swing clubs while under the influence, but rather to translate the internal insights gained during the ceremonies directly to the first tee. Attendees arrive with varied intentions, ranging from mechanical golf swings to deeply personal struggles with self-sabotage.
“Everyone gets something different out of it,” Smith says. “But generally what we’ve seen is people coming away more fearless, kinder to themselves, more compassionate and freer.”
Broader Golf Industry Developments
While experimental retreats target individual psychological barriers, the broader golf ecosystem continues addressing systemic access and course design. In California, a newly signed law by Gov. Gavin Newsom tackles third-party tee-time brokers who exploit municipal booking systems. The legislation prohibits middlemen from listing, selling, or transferring tee times at public courses without explicit operator permission, aiming to curb high-profile reservation hoarding in Los Angeles and across the state’s 200-plus municipal facilities.
Meanwhile, in South Florida, PGA National Resort is expanding its portfolio by adding Triple Stick Golf Club, a new members-only layout designed by Love Golf Design. Lead architect Scot Sherman, a longtime collaborator of Pete Dye, utilized railroad-tie bulkheads, flat-bottomed bunkers, and challenging par-5s closing both nines to shape the par-70 course amidst the region’s trademark water hazards.
