Into the Great Wide Open Retreat reflection

There has been so much movement. There have been many mountains.

I'm taking a minute to collect and recollect it all.

For the past few months, on my days off I holed up in the library hidden in a canyon of books by American Naturalists. In my blue floral notebook (the personal, creative space) I wrote quotes and ideas. Beth and I sat down together and saw where these Naturalists were directly sharing yogic and Buddhist philosophy (think Emerson and Helen Nearing, who was Krishnamurti's student) or where there was simply a natural echoing. In that ven diagram of thinking, we developed a curriculum for the Into the Great Wide Open Retreat to Boulder.

We hand wrote small journals with daily invitations to intention, quotes, writing prompts, and guided meditations for silent meals.

On Oct 6 Kevin and I flew out to Denver. We got our rental car and started into the mountains. Maybe it was the altitude but it was exhilarating. And I was nervous, which is always the case when I enter into facilitating a retreat. I take holding space very seriously.

We met Beth for food on Pearl Street in Denver. People were already trickling into Chautauqua. We all began gathering in the main room at Missions House, noshing on cookies, swapping travel stories, and getting settled in. If we looked out the "back yard" we saw the glorious rising of the Flatirons.

Dinner was our first official get together. As always, we clarified that every offering was optional and affirmed each participant following their own inner direction.

There's a small time difference between Boulder and Philly but enough that I was wide awake before sunrise the following morning. Kevin and I bundled up against the early morning icy air and began walking up the Flatirons. The trails were empty, leaving us ample space to look up and out over the endless spines of mountains or out into the valley of Boulder. It was pretty much the best space to gain perspective in advance of teaching yoga. I returned to Missions House where we practiced Jivamukti yoga, ate a lovely catered breakfast, and then we sort of organically went en masse up the trails. Originally, we all set out to explore. Again, as is the case in these sorts of things, some folks decided to turn back after remembering that we hadn't all acclimated to the altitude, and others of us went up to the Royal Arches.

Each day after unfolded similarly. An invitation into a deepening or evolving intention, yoga, beautiful food, adventures, yoga, and an evening by the fire eating and talking. We had several silent meals together guided by Thich Nhat Hanh's teachings on mindful silence. A group of us took a jaunt to hot springs in Idaho Springs. Others wandered into downtown Boulder. A few trekked to Rocky Mountain National Park in Estes Park. Others got massages and body work. We all found our way into the mountains, into that perspective, and into ourselves.

I love every retreat and rarely want to repeat them. The thing is, they can't be recreated. They're always a unique encounter between each participant, facilitator, and the space. While this experience could never be duplicated, its ease and yields make me think of offering it again! What do you say? Should we do it?