A space for self-discovery, growth, and meaningful connection.
Beautiful Minds is a network of practitioners, artists, therapists, and educators offering retreats, workshops, therapy, and educational experiences focused on personal growth, embodiment, creativity, and meaningful human connection.
At the heart of Beautiful Minds is a simple belief: that every person carries far more potential, awareness, creativity, and depth than they often recognize in themselves. We call this your beautiful mind.
Through individual guidance, group experiences, and online work, we create spaces where people can better understand their patterns, reconnect with themselves, and allow their beautiful minds to fully emerge.
Our guides share a common intention: helping people recognize what is already alive within them, even when they cannot yet fully see it themselves.
We call this your beautiful mind.
Personalized support for people seeking clarity, creativity, or a deeper understanding of themselves.
Our work draws from a range of approaches including somatic practices, meditation, breathwork, nature-based practices, conversation, and integrative therapeutic work, always designed for the individual.
Each process begins with a short introductory call with one of our directors to explore whether the work is the right fit.
Small-group immersive experiences designed to help people slow down, reconnect, and engage more deeply with themselves, others, and the natural world.
Most retreats take place in the Czech Republic, with selected experiences across Europe.
Preparation and integration are an essential part of the process. Before each retreat, participants receive a guidance and support package to help them arrive grounded and prepared. Afterward, we continue supporting the integration of insights into daily life.
Consistent support for meaningful change, accessible from anywhere.
Online sessions provide a grounded space to explore emotions, relationships, creativity, patterns of behavior, and personal growth through conversation and embodied practices.
Beautiful Minds is an invitation for people seeking greater clarity, emotional depth, creativity, healing, connection, or a more conscious relationship with themselves and life.
Some arrive during periods of transition. Others come with a desire to reconnect with something they feel has been missing beneath the speed and noise of modern life.
No previous experience is necessary, only openness, curiosity, and a willingness to engage honestly with yourself.
Beautiful Minds was created from a simple belief: that who we become is shaped through the people we meet, the experiences we live, and the questions we are willing to ask ourselves.
Over the years, our paths crossed with artists, therapists, educators, guides, and other deeply thoughtful people whose way of living and relating to the world left a lasting impression on us. What connected them was not status or achievement, but presence, curiosity, emotional depth, and a genuine commitment to continued growth.
Beautiful Minds grew from a desire to create spaces where these kinds of encounters could happen more intentionally.
Rather than offering one philosophy or fixed path, we bring together different perspectives, practices, and ways of understanding human experience. We believe growth is deeply personal, and that meaningful change often begins with honest conversation, reflection, community, and shared experience.
At its heart, Beautiful Minds is about creating spaces where people can encounter themselves - and each other - more truthfully.
— Jan Kysela & Mika Johnson
Our guides share a common intention: helping people recognize what is already alive within them, even when they cannot yet fully see it themselves.
Scroll down to explore our growing circle of practitioners, artists, educators, therapists, and facilitators from different backgrounds and disciplines.
Each guide brings their own perspective, experience, and approach to the work, while sharing a common commitment to presence, integrity, curiosity, and human connection.
Mika Johnson is an artist, therapist, and director of Beautiful Minds. His work brings together somatic awareness, meditation, ecology, ritual, and immersive artistic practice to create spaces for reflection, presence, and deeper connection.
Alongside his international work in film and immersive media, he offers one-on-one therapeutic sessions focused on nervous system regulation, mindfulness, embodiment, and compassionate inquiry. His approach is shaped by over twenty-five years of contemplative practice, training in Somatic Experiencing, and a long-standing interest in the relationship between creativity, healing, and inner life.
His artistic and therapeutic work share a common focus: helping people slow down, reconnect with themselves, and listen more deeply to what feels alive within them.
Websites
Jan Kysela is the founder of Beautiful Minds. His work focuses on holistic education, communication, contemplative practice, and human development, bringing together educational innovation, community-building, and interdisciplinary approaches that support deeper learning, awareness, and meaningful connection.
Over the years, he has collaborated with a number of educational and social initiatives across Europe and Asia, including projects connected to Montessori education, dialogue, and mindful communication. His perspective is shaped equally by practical educational work and long-term personal exploration.
Alongside his work in education, he spent extended periods in meditation monasteries in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, England, and France, experiences that continue to inform his understanding of attention, presence, and inner transformation.
Petra Jurečková works with the voice as a pathway to authenticity, presence, and emotional connection. Drawing from theatre, speech therapy, phonetics, and embodied practice, she explores the relationship between voice, breath, body, and inner experience.
She studied at DAMU and later worked as a language consultant at the National Theatre and as a teacher of voice training and speech. Alongside her artistic work, she has spent many years exploring personal development, communication, and practices that support deeper self-awareness.
Her approach combines technical understanding with emotional sensitivity and embodiment, helping people reconnect with a more natural, grounded, and authentic expression of themselves through voice and presence.
Lenka Brandtnerová focuses on embodiment, emotional awareness, and the connection between the body and inner life. Her work supports people in slowing down, reconnecting with themselves, and developing greater clarity, balance, and resilience in everyday life.
Drawing from mindfulness, somatics, movement, yoga, breathwork, and voice practices, she creates accessible and grounded processes that help people navigate stress, relationships, boundaries, and periods of personal transformation with greater presence and self-trust.
Her approach is rooted in the belief that the body carries important forms of intelligence, and that reconnecting with this awareness can open the way toward a more authentic and fulfilling way of living.
Jan Burian is a psychotherapist and mindfulness teacher whose work centers on emotional awareness, empathy, and embodied presence. Through mindfulness, therapeutic dialogue, and contemplative practice, he helps people develop a more conscious and compassionate relationship with themselves and others.
He completed mindfulness-based psychotherapeutic training and MBCT teacher training through the Centre for Mindfulness in Oxford, and has facilitated programs for the public, organizations, and prison communities. He also contributed to early Czech research on mindfulness meditation.
His approach combines psychological depth with warmth, humility, and careful attention to the body, creating spaces where people can meet themselves with greater honesty, openness, and emotional balance.
Hana Velechovská Šmýdová works at the intersection of improvisation, creativity, communication, and personal development. With roots in theatre and performance, her work explores spontaneity, playfulness, authentic expression, and the ability to respond more freely to life.
She studied at DAMU and has spent many years leading educational and innovation projects across artistic, commercial, and non-profit environments. Alongside her work in improvisational theatre, she has guided creative learning processes for individuals and groups of many different backgrounds.
Her facilitation combines insight, openness, and deep pedagogical experience, creating supportive spaces where people can discover greater confidence, creativity, connection, and trust in themselves.
Enzo Essenza is an educator, lecturer, and social innovator focused on the relationship between human development, sustainability, and the future of education. His work explores how learning systems can better support creativity, responsibility, collaboration, and meaningful contribution to society.
He is the founder of Institutions for the Future and co-founder of nextRenaissance, initiatives dedicated to rethinking education and social systems for the challenges of the modern world. Alongside his academic work, he develops projects centered on ethics, human potential, and cultural transformation.
His approach combines systems thinking with a deep interest in personal growth and collective wellbeing, encouraging forms of education and leadership rooted in awareness, responsibility, and care for people and the planet.
Schedule a 15-minute introductory call and we’ll help you explore what kind of support may be most aligned for you.
Mika@mikajohnson.com
