Relationship & Communication
Website program category as of 2022
COME TOGETHER! A Festival of IntraConnectivity and Spirit | Day Pass
With Daniel Siegel, Elissa Epel, Little Bear Tom Nason, Rhonda V. Magee and Douglas Drummond
We live in times of high existential stress with both ever-increasing personal, societal, and global pressures and the constant pain of witnessing ecological crises and widespread social injustices. These challenges also create opportunities to reconsider our relationships to self, one another, and the planet — and to choose a life of peak purpose and interconnectedness. […]
COME TOGETHER! A Festival of IntraConnectivity and Spirit | ETMC Day Pass
With Daniel Siegel, Elissa Epel, Little Bear Tom Nason, Rhonda V. Magee and Douglas Drummond
We live in times of high existential stress with both ever-increasing personal, societal, and global pressures and the constant pain of witnessing ecological crises and widespread social injustices. These challenges also create opportunities to reconsider our relationships to self, one another, and the planet — and to choose a life of peak purpose and interconnectedness. […]
Erotic Ecology: Awakening the Senses and Healing through Nature
With Lindsay Branham
Love is an ecological process. — Andreas Weber Most of us have lost our sensual connection to our bodies and to the living world. We have become numb to the Earth's touch. This weekend workshop offers an immersive experience in the erotic ecology pathway — a space to reawaken our sensory, pleasurable, and nourishing connection […]
Autumn Enchantment: Ritual Connection with Land and Spirit
With Fletcher Tucker and Micha Merrick
For thousands of years, autumnal holidays such as Samhain, Hallowe’en, and Vetrnætr have served as ceremonial foundations — connecting pre-modern peoples to landscape, ancestors, and ritual time. Many cultures believe “the veil thins” during this time, letting enchantment flood back into our world. The time is rife with opportunities to renew sacred relationships with the […]
Relational Gestalt Practice: Presence, Contact and Communication
With Dorothy Charles
In 1938, researchers at Harvard University began a 75-year study that addressed life’s fundamental question: What makes a good life? The Grant Study, also known as the Harvard Study of Adult Development, found strong relationships to be the clearest predictor of life satisfaction. In Relational Gestalt practice, direct and response-able communication is essential for creating […]
The Beauty of Simplicity
With Jovinna Chan
Breathe. Move. Pay Attention. These three simple actions, natural and always available to us, provide potency to our vitality. They are the legs and wings that carry us into the three worlds within us — the physical, the subtle, and the mystical. Join Jovinna on the sacred land Esalen Institute resides upon to slow down, […]
Healing Waters: Return to One
With Douglas Drummond and Little Bear Tom Nason
We invite you to step into a powerful, immersive experience weaving the dynamic energy of 5Rhythms® movement with the deep wisdom of Indigenous traditions. Rooted in the teachings of the Esselen people, this workshop is an invitation to reconnect — with yourself, your community, and the natural world. For millennia, rites of passage and sacred […]
The Spirit Bridge: A Portal Between Realms
With Aja Daashuur
There’s a threshold where the seen and unseen meet. A bridge between this life and the spirit world — and we can learn how to access it with openness, practice, and trust. Join AJA Daashuur, medium and spiritual guide, for this weeklong experience designed to open the veil between worlds and deepen your personal connection […]
Gestalt Practice and Principles: Cultivating Embodied Wholeness in Daily Life
With Steven Harper
Gestalt Practice at its core is an awareness practice in which we cultivate embodied, present-moment awareness of the unfolding experience of the here and now on a journey toward authentic growth, wholeness, and aliveness. Drawing from the foundations of Gestalt Practice, wisdom traditions, and contemporary approaches that cultivate awareness, we’ll learn to become increasingly aware […]
Healing Wisdom for Modern Times: You Are Your Greatest Healer
With Erika Gagnon
Join ceremonial leader and wisdom carrier Erika Gagnon on a sacred journey, as we gather together and explore the healing wisdom of the “Americas.” We will learn about the importance of ancestral lineage, ceremonies and rituals, sacred altars, medicinal plants, and the origins of dis-ease in our physical, mental/emotional, and spiritual bodies. You are your […]
The Practice of Slowing Down
With Ayana Young and Brontë Velez
In a time of constant noise and urgency, this is an invitation to slow down and enter into a deep and quiet rhythm with the more-than-human world. Through silence, movement, prayer, and time on the land, this workshop is a space to listen to our bodies, to the Earth, and to what arises when we […]
The Luminous Darkness: Imagination, Possibility, and Conscious Intentions for 2025
With Deborah Eden Tull
All light arises from darkness, including insight, creativity, vision, joy, and possibility. The luminous darkness is the spacious presence and receptivity through which we also access light. It is the field of all potential and emergence that we sometimes forget in the context of ordinary life and habit. In this deeply restorative retreat, at the […]
The Shared Heart New Year's Couples Retreat
With Barry Vissell and Joyce Vissell
Imagine your relationship expressing the true depths of your love and commitment. If you are in love, this retreat is an opportunity to rise even higher in love. If you are in crisis, it is an opportunity for healing on the deepest level. We all carry some degree of negative programming from our past, and […]
The Body of Belonging: An Exploration of Community and Connection
With Rahshaana Green
The Body of Belonging invites you to explore feelings of kinship, acceptance, and community on a somatic level, identifying the elements most significant to you. Through gentle yoga-inspired movement, breathwork, sound, and meditation, we will engage in self-inquiry practices within a group setting. Together, we will create a safe and brave space to experiment with […]
Nurturing Connections Through the Art of REPAIR
With Hazel-Grace Yates
An apology will shut a conversation down. A good repair opens one up. — Dr. Becky Kennedy Conflict is inevitable. The health of a relationship depends not on whether conflict happens but on how skillfully we repair. The Art of REPAIR is a practical, embodied, and deeply relational process that transforms rupture into connection, clarity, […]
Personal Empowerment Through the Wheel of Consent®
With Betty Martin and Marcia Baczynski
When you engage with another — whether a lover, friend, or colleague — are you doing what they want you to do or what they allow you to do? What is the difference, and why does it matter? Betty Martin's Wheel of Consent is a groundbreaking model of relating that brings greater clarity and authenticity […]
Love, Sex, and Intimacy for Individuals and Couples
With Linda Bloom and Charlie Bloom
For one human being to love another, that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks; the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation. — Rainer Maria Rilke Explore intimacy, love, and sensual pleasure — and learn to connect and successfully fulfill your desires. Nothing […]
A Black History Month Celebration: Exploring and Restoring Our Path to Healing through Empathy and Music
With LaVerne McLeod and Melanie DeMore
Join LaVerne McLeod and Melanie DeMore for a weekend of exploration and celebration of Black History Month as we express ourselves, connect, play, and honor humanity. Together, we will explore what it is like to walk in another person’s shoes to understand and empathize with viewpoints that might differ from our own. We will build […]
The Ecology of Being: Gestalt Practice, Somatic Intelligence, and Embodied Awareness
With Steven Harper
At the heart of Gestalt Practice lies the understanding that we can grow into greater wholeness and interconnectedness, both inside and out. Gestalt is an awareness practice that invites us to focus on the present moment as a path toward authentic growth, resilience, embodiment, and aliveness. Its core principles are: Cultivating embodied presence and awareness […]
Role Mate to Soul Mate: The Art and Discipline of Love
With Warren Farrell
Since falling in love is biologically natural, but sustaining love is biologically unnatural, Soul Mate focuses on the art and discipline of sustaining love. You begin with learning how to appreciate your partner so specifically and frequently that your partner feels fully seen and loved. You then practice both the art and discipline of hearing […]