Healing is always available… all you need to do is pause….
Pause…rest in the stillness of silence. Listen to the quiet… So still, empty…yet so full. The possibility to connect with this moment, this body, this breath, this heart. To sense the energy….awareness…compassion…to feel into this moment. Can you sense the vibrant aliveness that is here? Beyond thoughts, beliefs, and stories there is life.
We live so much of our moments lost in thought. Lost in fantasy; past memories or future stories. Mindfulness practice invites us to come home to the present. Silence supports us on this journey. When we go on retreat it helps us open to the potential of resting in this silence, where aliveness, compassion, and wisdom reside.
Silence is an essential part of this practice. Going on retreat supports this; both by providing the container of retreat as we turn the attention towards the inner world of heart/mind. So the silence is supported both by the practice and the environment. As one of our retreatants stated at the end of the retreat, “I loved spending time in the meditation room…there was a feeling of being in a sacred space.” Erika U.
“We allow the silence and the calmness to penetrate our flesh and bones. We allow the energy of the Sangha/spiritual community and its mindfulness to penetrate our body and mind. We go back to our activities slowly, aware of every step. ” Thich Nhat Hanh
This is the invitation on retreat. As we set aside the busyness, distractions, and demands of daily life and enter the container of retreat, we connect with life as it is. We allow the silence and calmness to penetrate deeply. And as we do, we move beyond concepts and ideas about the way life should/shouldn’t be. We slow down the rhythm and pace of thoughts, shifting from thinking mind; we connect with the alive sensation of the breath, the hum of the body, the healing power of the heart. The retreat is arranged in such a way that the conditions are set up for a journey that offers the possibility of deep healing and transformation.
Stay Patient and Trust Your Journey…
In this secluded and sacred space there is an opportunity to see life beyond the conceptual world of thoughts, stories and beliefs. It’s not that the thoughts and stories don’t arise, it’s that we get to see it in real time, to experience the effect it has on our mind/heart and the body. In shifting from living in our heads, to experiencing life as it happens, there is choice in how to relate to what is happening. When pain arises, whether it’s emotional, physical or psychological, can we stay present for it? Can we feel it in our body and heart without adding to it? Or do we resist it through our thoughts. If we resist it, how does it affect our body, mind and heart? And when this happens can we meet this resistance with the compassionate power of the heart and the acceptance of the wise mind? This is the journey towards purifying the mind and awakening the heart of compassion.
Within the sacred space of retreat, surrounded by like minded travelers, you have the opportunity to go on this very special journey of freeing the mind and opening the heart to life, love and joy. Won’t you join us? As Rumi so wisely asks “And you? when will you begin that long journey into yourself?”
Our next retreat is Jan 5th-7th, at Casa San Carlos Retreat Center in Delray Beach, Fl. To register, go to 3 Day Mindfulness Retreat.
May you be well…