Day 85 - Full Retreat Mode

I'm still processing the adoptee healing retreat I co-lead this weekend with Pam Cordano. It's an amazing thing to have ten people--all but two I had never met in person--walk through the front door, and then four days later have them walk out and feel like I know them better than many of their families members might. 

It's an amazing thing to see how much change can happen in four days. Sometimes I forget I can change. Sometimes I get so used to habit I think I am my habits. 

Sometimes I get so used to the tension in my body, I think the holding is my body.

Fear keeps our bodies tight and our lives small. Love blows everything out of the water. Love is where the party begins. 

It's important to be with people who understand you, people who have similar life experiences, people who nod when you talk. It's important to feel heard, to have your feelings validated. 

One reason I write is because I didn't always feel heard. I had this internal life that didn't match my external life. I often thought one way and behaved in another. Writing is a way of bringing the internal and the external into the same river of language. It's a way of creating a unified self.

Writing to me is another form of breathing. It's anything that brings a person to life, that makes someone feel real, vital, seen and heard. It's a form of prayer. I see this world and I say the names of things. That is a form of love, of deep respect. 

Pam and I are doing a different kind of retreat the first weekend of August in Davis, California. This time it's not about adoption: it's about your creativity and your calling. Knowing why you are on this planet is such a good feeling, having a sense of purpose of love for your work. Sometimes people don't see the jewels that shine from deep within their being and they live a life that feels off-track. We are here to help you live like you won the lottery of self-understanding and commitment to joy. We are here to help you celebrate what you can create with your hands, your mind, your presence. 

It's all about love.

See you tomorrow. 

xoxo

OUR RETREAT:

What is Your Life Asking of You?

Explore your Creative Callings in a Transformative Retreat August 3 - 5 in Davis, CA

The idea of creativity can seem like something outside of you, a muse you must court, win over, wear a mask to please. But this is not true. Creativity is not outside of you. It is in each cell of you, in your breath, your heart, your feet.

Creativity is something you cultivate just as you would a garden, the garden of you, the origin of your creative offerings.

Tending a garden takes work. We need to understand the soil of us, our physical and spiritual constitution. We need to be able to identify things that are in our way, things that block our sense of freedom and growth, the weeds. We need pull each one out by the roots and tolerate the newly created space. Sometimes being crowded by the wrong things can feel like comfort but the weeds are actually in our way, blocking our true potential.

When we learn to care for ourselves, the gardens of us, we flourish. We become receptive, wild, vitally rooted. We feed on sun and water and we can’t help but grow the true seeds living inside of us because it is our nature.

What we’ll do:

* Spend the weekend tending to your creative soil

* Identify and practice pulling out the weeds

* Discover your most precious seeds and how to help them take root

* Learn to bear the powerful energy of living with your gifts & offerings

“For a seed to achieve its greatest expression, it must come completely undone. The shell cracks, its insides come out and everything changes. To someone who doesn't understand growth, it would look like complete destruction.”

~Cynthia Occelli

Times:

Friday, August 3 (5 pm – 9 pm) Saturday, August 4 (9 am – 12 pm, 2 pm – 5 pm, 7 pm – 9 pm) Sunday August 5 (9 am – 1 pm)

Location: Davis, California There are many wonderful Airbnb options in the area.

Cost: $750

Food and lodging not included, but we will have snacks and coffee/tea.

Group size will be limited to ten participants. To save your space and for payment instructions, email us at anneheffron@gmail.com or pcordano@comcast.net