Strategist · Ceremonial Facilitator · Sound Healer
I am
Michelle.
I built Rich in Full from the wreckage of burnout, self-abandonment, and a body that had stopped cooperating. What I found on the other side changed everything. This is that story.
Former Wall Street accountant. Medicine guide. Ceremony holder. Certified coach. Sound healer. Retreat creator.
I have worked with MAPS on the leading clinical study for MDMA and psilocybin for PTSD. I have sat with plant medicine across Egypt, Mexico, and beyond. I have healed my own body from fibromyalgia, my own heart from trauma, and my own business from the ground up.
Rich in Full is the fullest expression of everything I have lived, built, healed, and become.
I didn't know I was drowning until I couldn't remember my PIN.
It was New Year's Day. I was a young mother — anxious, depressed, and completely burned out. I didn't have language for any of it yet. I just knew something was deeply wrong when I stood at an ATM and went completely blank.
I started crying in the car. My boyfriend and I were on the way to exchange Christmas gifts and I couldn't stop. My nervous system took over. At a red light, I got out of the car — not realizing it was already accelerating. I ended up with nine staples in the back of my head.
The next day, bedridden, I had a flight home to Connecticut — the place that held so many memories of sadness and trauma. And for the first time in my life, I said it out loud to myself: I hate my life. I hate myself. And I need it to change.
I had no idea how. I was broke. I had been diagnosed with fibromyalgia. Making maybe $20,000 a year. But something in me had cracked open — and through that crack, light started getting in.
"I didn't find plant medicine. It found me — at the exact moment I was finally willing to be found."— Michelle Escalera
I volunteered to clean the puke buckets.
I started listening to self-help podcasts. Went back to painting. And then I heard about plant medicine — I didn't even know how to spell ayahuasca or psilocybin, but something in me had to know more.
I found a church two hours away. They told me if I volunteered for three weekend ceremonies I would qualify for a free one. So I showed up and cleaned puke buckets, changed sheets, fetched pillows — and witnessed something that stopped me completely.
I saw people being held in a love I had never experienced. I saw true service. I walked into the dorm room mid-ceremony because I couldn't stop crying — and I wrote a letter to my son apologizing for never extending that level of love to him. I didn't even know it existed.
I left that weekend knowing I wanted to be of service in whatever way I could. And I never looked back.
I built the credentials and the calling at the same time.
I went back to college. Got my degrees in accounting and business. Landed my first real job and eventually worked on Wall Street — asset management, investor relations, multi-entity operations. Later I moved into the cannabis and psychedelic industry, and then to MAPS, where I supported the leading clinical study on MDMA and psilocybin for PTSD in veterans spanning sites across the US, Mexico, UK, Egypt, and Australia.
At the same time, I was deep in the work. Certifications in holistic medicine facilitation, trauma-informed ethnogenics, dharma coaching, life purpose coaching. Hape, temazcal, cacao, bufo, kambo, psilocybin, acacia, ayahuasca — I didn't just study these. I sat with them. I was changed by them.
I healed my sexual trauma. I healed my body from fibromyalgia. I found love for myself. I built a real business with real infrastructure. And I learned how to carry the safety I found in ceremony into every other area of my life.
Today I also create retreats around the world in lands that have healed me — Mexico, Egypt, and beyond. I bring people to these sacred places for the same reason I was brought to them: because some healing can only happen when the land holds you.
The Foundation Behind the Work
Every certification is a practice I have lived — not just studied.
Holistic Medicine Facilitation
Sol Roots · Hape, Temazcal, Rose, Cacao, Bufo, Kambo, Psilocybin & other plant allies
Introduction to Ayahuasca
Sol Roots · Shipibo Style · Ayahuasca & Mapacho
Brewing Plant Medicines
TRUYU · Chacruna, Acacia, Mimosa
Trauma-Informed Ethnogenics Guide
Unchurch Church · Psilocybin, Ayahuasca, Bufo, MDMA, Ketamine
MAPS Clinical Research
Supported the leading MDMA & Psilocybin study for PTSD in veterans across US, Mexico, UK, Egypt & Australia
Dharma & Life Purpose Coaching
Dual certification · Integrating purpose work with ceremonial healing and business strategy
Acacia Arcana
Free Spirit Experiences · Acacia brewing & ceremonial facilitation · Legal church operator under this lineage
Integration Coach
Supporting clients through post-ceremony integration — holding the process long after the experience ends
Safety & First Aid
First Aid certified · Mental Health First Aid certified · CPR trained — every container is held with your safety as the foundation
Whether you're here for the business,
the ceremony, or both —
there's a place for you.
Every offering inside Rich in Full is built from this story. The healing, the structure, the medicine, the music. All of it lives here — for you.