Spiritual Development Retreat Program

1. STORY: PREPARATION FOR RETREAT

“Story” is an activity applied with a guide to review our life story, clean ourselves, mobilize our vitality and prepare ourselves for the end of our old story.

During a 1-month preparation period which we will enter a physical, mental and energic purification period:

• You will start a custom diet provided by us.
• You will start experiencing daily meditations specially designed for you.
• You will work with some of the adaptogen plants.
• If needed, special mixtures will be provided for energetic cleaning.

Diet: The diet is designed to detoxify the body and strengthen the immune system with 1-2 hunger cycles. At the same time, detoxification will bring emotional and mental cleaning.

Keeping your awareness open and sharing your experiences with the guides that accompany you will accelerate your purification process. A physical and mental diet followed to clean the body and collect the energy at the center will help you to keep your intention and energy pure.

The diet is planned individually but some of the common rules are given below:

• The diet will start at least 28 days before the retreat and you need to stop using alcohol, drugs, antidepressants etc. Remember, your energy must be clean and pure.
• You must avoid consuming raw or underdone onion and garlic, fermented foods and beverages, animal-based products, caustic spices, white flour, salt (some individuals might use it), sugar, coffee, black tea and processed food.
• You can consume all non-citric (acid-free) fresh fruits and vegetables, dried nuts, walnut or peanut, wholewheat flour, rice, chickpeas, peas, lentils, potato, olive oil, herbal teas. You can consume honey and oats. Don’t forget to drink plenty of water.
• You can make delicious cookies by using almond flour, wholewheat and honey. Remember your creativity to turn your diet into a more enjoyable experience. 🙂

Adaptogens: Adaptogens are defined as natural plants that increase the “non-specific resistance” in stress which is a physiologic situation linked with various neuroendocrine-immune system disorders. Studies on animals and isolated neural cells revealed that adaptogens show neuroprotective, fatigue preventive, antidepressant, anxiolytic, nootropic and CNS stimulating activities. Our guides will prepare different adaptogens or adaptogen mixtures depending on each participant’s status to revitalize our physical mental and energetic bodies.

Meditations: The meditations at the preparation process are specially designed depending on the participant’s state to improve the mental final energic cleaning and make the human experience deeper to re-connect with the Self with fewer filters.

2. NOW/START: RETREAT

Since the beginning, humankind gathered to increase the effectiveness and deepness of the applications (methods).

After the retreat preparation process, we gather in an area selected for historical, geographic and energetic powers. These meetings only have one purpose: to stay at the Moment and to observe the initiation process. The initiation process literally means transcending our old story and opening room for the new story. To trigger this process, we will use the training sessions as well as purification, meditation, body awareness, natural medications, integration sessions, noble silence practice, yoga, healing with voice and breathing sessions.

The meeting could be a 5 or 11-night activity depending on participant requests.

For all retreat types, we will start our noble silence practice after dinner on the first night. The noble silence requires understanding the Buddhist noble conceptualization. This defines the three dimensions of being which are the body, speaking and mind as one thing or one. Such unity enables individuals to reach an awareness of their entire body, understand who they are and let others be themselves in this process. This should not only be perceived as the absence of speaking because in some cases, not speaking is not considered noble. The noble silence is expressed to lead to the decrease of thought and investigation for a bhikkhu to enter a second jhana and live there. The second jhana is a meditative situation characterized by an inner trust and a united mind.

We will let go of our electronic devices, phones, smartwatches and other interactive dependencies which prevent our inner deepening. During the noble silence application, there won’t be eye contact or any other interaction with people and animals outside our session. This will initiate a deeper energy flow in us.

Similar to noble silence, we will use the Meditation, Yoga and Breathing Exercise to start the day with a physical, mental and energetic flow. Thus, we will be able to prepare ourselves for the days to come. These practices might initiate some emotional, physical and energic discharge. We will continue to pay attention to feel what is happening and to stay aware.

Lastly, the integration sessions will create a connective texture to link the experiences of all participants rather than the experiences created at the “Story” and “Now” stages. During these sessions, we will open ourselves to realize our own mechanisms that direct our lives by connecting with our subconsciousness with complete honesty instead of sharing with others. These sessions and relentless honest towards ourselves might be the most important part of the entire retreat process.

3. DREAM: POST-RETREAT/PREPARATION TO NEXT RETREAT

Purifying our old stories, petrified ideologies and our identifications about who we think we are will open us to a new experience full of infinite opportunities. In those times, there might be both chaos and stability simultaneously in every layer of our daily lives. We should remember that “this journey is not a one-step jump but a helical path with infinite layers and depths.” When we open ourselves to new opportunities and realities, the old “EGO” definition will start to get lost and some people might be lost without their old reference points. It is extremely important to create a stable attitude in a chaotic experience and it is easier to do that when we have other people walking in the same direction. At this point, we create a community with all participants to welcome everyone flowing in the same direction. The direction we will follow will be the shamanic lifestyle.

Especially in the post-industrial revolution period, humankind breaks off from the spiritual path in line with the evolution of the modern community. This impacted numerous aspects of our daily life but our existence as humans might be the most important and undiscovered impact. As humankind started to think that humans are different and superior to all living and non-living beings, we have lost our connection with our surroundings, inner world and other realms.

In the retreat, we will get rid of our unused weights (old stories), clean ourself and open ourselves to create a new story (NOW). “Dream” is at the same time is the stage which we write and experience our own reality. This is possible if we reconnect and reunite with everything. Thus, we will start the Shamanic life experience journey to reopen ourselves to be a whole. In this experience, we will sustain our attitude to know that we are not separate from all living and non-living beings, we are a part of a whole, how we approach a certain thing or everything in life. The problems are only in our heads and there are no problems in the reality. All words like positive and negative are only in our heads. These are only the experiences with different energies. The respect and authority from the heart guide us. Our self-love and love towards everything will bring us higher and surrendering permits us to flow.

The Shamanic lifestyle might come gradually as a challenge. But the salvation that comes with it is actually a strong driving power. We can observe numerous new experiences that occur in the meantime and especially in our life. For example, we can experience the strong impact of the law of gravity, dynamically changing daily situations (people’s behaviors towards you etc.), the universe around you that shapes according to your attitude and energy and daily new awareness and perceptions.

Attending online and face-to-face integration sessions with our leader instructors are recommended to further deepen your experiences in this period and to open yourself to permanent awareness.

When we have the courage to follow the light in our hearts, our dreams will come true.

Let’s meet on the path to unconditional love… 🙂