Summer Groove Series Week of June 12, 2023

America in the late 60s occupied a period of major social transformation and Esalen Institute amplified that feeling, capturing that energy with a wild, unbridled sense of curiosity and openness to explore and pioneer big ideas. There was music! The art! The literature! The call for change! Human potential personified!

This June we are thinking big and looking back on what was good and magical about the late 60s while applying some deeply reflective and vulnerable wisdom of 2023 to launch some very special summer programming. Think of this as Esalen’s thoughtfully curated social phenomenon.

Real talk: The last few years have been depleting for many. Esalen is all about collective potential, collective fullness. So, to help you refill your love tank, we excitedly present to you our Summer Groove & Grow Series! Expect to fill up and get mindfull, heartfull, and soulfull together in community. Let’s amaze and delight, get expansive and be inclusive!

With Esalen’s first ever foray into a summer series, we are curating the playfull with the joyfull. Think throwback meets future forward: floating flower mandalas and flower crowns in the Art Barn, mass metta meditations on the lawn and in hidden corners of the property. Evening soul shakedowns with summer loving dance parties and an Afrobeat homage to Babatunde. Together we will honor the sacred indigenous land we co-steward through cacao ceremony, share circles, and more. Esalen’s own faculty will be joined by very special guests to add meaty, amazing, and delightful programming to each uniquely different week and weekend!

Imagine the halcyon elements of the Big Sur Folk Festival and Summer of Love — from live music, dance, poetry, painting and throwback crafting, to the tech embrace of silent DJ-led discos and music-driven experiential altered state parties. After all, according to Edward Rosenfeld’s, The Book of Highs, there are indeed 255 Ways to Alter Your Consciousness without Drugs.

But let’s also get real vulnerable and transparent right there with you — about our past and who we want to be for everyone. While much of the late 60s messaging was about love and peace, access to the sentiment was not a reality for everyone. That the Summer of Love wasn’t all love for all people. Across the country it was a “Long, Hot Summer” as riots erupted in cities nationwide in response to a serious lack of equity and equality that disproportionately affected Black and Brown citizens, and which our society continues to face today.

The parallels between the harsh realities of yesteryear and the present are far too numerous, but we now face them with more self-awareness, more knowledge, a greater capacity for change, and a deepened commitment to making Esalen, and the world, a welcoming, equitable, and safe place for all. Now 60 years in operation, Esalen has continued to embrace much of the 60s glow and afterglow, retaining the gold and transmuting the rest.

It’s happening right now, Baby!