Press Release Summary: A meditation retreat is the perfect opportunity to give yourself the space and time to do some soul searching. Led by yoga and meditation experts and an energy psychology therapist, you\'ll learn deep meditation practices, understand how your awareness can change your life, and deeply listen to your soul.
Press Release Body:
Hints of Zen serenity infuse the mood of the meditation retreat. Hours are filled with stillness and then balanced with periods of the gentle, yet powerful, movement of Kundalini yoga. I let myself be transported into a realm of sheer relaxation.
I had been to retreats before-some for renewal, some designed to recharge and regenerate the body, mind and soul, and some were bare bones getaways. (Think no running water and peculiar varmints rummaging through the rafters.) But none reconnected me with my inner peace and helped me to discover a new enthusiasm that would inspire and sustain me for so long as this one did.
Each of us (there were about 15 in all, men and women) came with our own ideas of what the weekend would hold. I, for one, wanted some much-deserved R. and R. I'd spent the last year-and-a-half homebound caring for my newborn baby. I needed to cram the Eay, Pray, Love experience into about 48 hours. My friend Liz came to get away from her teenagers. Her friend Therese came to find balance and an escape from her dental practice. One couple who came wanted to move to Sedona. They were disgruntled with the education system in their hometown and had suffered a myriad of health problems
None of us had any idea that we'd come away profoundly affected in so many ways.
The purpose of this retreat was for meditation renewal. I expected to deepen and enhance my meditation practice and spiritual connection in the perfect setting in the red rocks of Sedona. However, I didn't know that going for three days without meat or junk food would be part of this process. (Even though the food was organic and prepared with love, it was vegetarian and healthy and led to a junk food breakdown). One night after a session, my group of friends headed to our hotel room and devoured an entire bag of Dangerously Cheesy Crunchy Cheetohs and a bottle of 2005 Châteauneuf-du-Pape, but the next morning we got up bright and early and were back on the yoga mat breathing our breaths of fire.
The retreat food was, by the way, nutritious and yummy. Our fleeting affair with the chips and alcohol was probably just our addictions fighting a slow death. Or perhaps even a stress-induced blow-up from all of the internal changes we were experiencing from the surplus of meditation.
And the retreat was surprisingly chic. For a retreat. Some people need a luxury resort with a high thread count in their sheets to find enlightenment. I wasn't exactly looking for a posh getaway, but what I got was much more of a pampering-sort-of-transformation than the incense-induced, Bohemian-looking, guru-chanting, legs-crossed in-an-ashram kind of experience that one might expect from a meditation retreat (although my teacher did actually once live in an ashram in India).
In addition to reviving my meditation practice, I engaged in several mindfulness exercises which helped me to experience my life in the present moment-not my life at home in the valley or my life projected into the future.but in the now. Having stepped out of my chaotic and stressful life for a few days, I enjoyed the opportunity to truly live in the moment. Mindfulness was integrated into every activity of the weekend. Each experience was designed to heighten the senses and coax us into slowing down long enough to focus on the moment. From hikes through the Coconino Forest and vortexes to quiet journaling exercises, I increased my awareness and learned how to integrate moments of calm and stillness into my life.
I'd heard it before, but it finally made sense to me. When you learn to appreciate the present moment, rather than worry about the past or future, life gets better.
I'd read about this concept before in Eckhart Tolle's Power of Now and had only recently studied the same powerfully simple (yet oh-so-challenging) theory in Byron Katie's books and exercises about Loving What Is.
When I returned home, my husband was happy I'd found my chi (and he did say that I smelled a bit like curry). I was overjoyed by the dramatic changes in my attitude and peace of mind that the serene escape had offered. In this short period of time, I learned to become peaceful with the fragmentation of my everyday life. My spirit had craved nourishment and growth. And through the retreat, I had given it the deep calm, rest and focus that it needed. I learned that whatever you give your attention to grows.
And it would do us all good to focus on our spirit and ignite it.
If You Go Sedona Meditation Training Company Workshops and Retreats meditate@esedona.net 928.204.0067 www.sedonameditation.com Radiance Retreat at the Sanctuary on Camelback Mountain September 12-14, 2008
Web Site: http://www.sedonameditation.com
Contact Details: Sarah McLean, http://www.sedonameditation.com, meditate@esedona.net, 928-204-0067
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