Coming Back to Ourselves: A Contemplative Practice Retreat
With Sarah Manchester
December 6 - 8, 2019
Update: This event has been cancelled due to a family illness. We apologize for the inconvenience! Please consider one of Sarah Manchester's one-day mindfulness retreats, offered on February 29, April 18, and May 9. During these dark short days before the winter solstice and when our culture is in the middle of the busy holiday season, it is the perfect time to retreat and "come back to ourselves." Through the contemplative practices of meditation, listening, movement, discussion, eating, journaling and art making (optional and no artistic experience needed), we will slow down and tune in and nourish the deeper part…
Inner Knowing: Women’s Retreat for Mindfulness, Empowerment and Enjoyment
With Judith Waldman and Kara-Lee Ruotolo
December 6 - 8, 2019
Inner Knowing: Women's Retreat for Mindfulness, Empowerment and Enjoyment Welcome to our journey together. We invite you to join us, Judith and Kara-Lee, and this gathering of women, as we nurture our senses, create energy and balance, and enjoy our creativity. We bring women together to deepen our connection with ourselves and with others and to strengthen our ability to create change within and in the world at large: We care, we share, we learn, and we have fun. We are providing a time for reflection and growth, self-care, and self-knowing in order to enhance our ability to live with…
Transforming Racism Drop-In Support Group
December 10, 2019
Storyhouse
A recurring drop-in support group to strengthen awareness about racism, including the more subtle microaggressions that often go unnoticed. Awareness, reflection, and compassion will be at the heart of the group. Facilitated by a person of color, this group will offer a safe space for participants to give voice to their questions and observations of racism in their daily lives. The group will also offer a brave space for self-reflection on how racism might show up in oneself and ways to shape change towards a culture of anti-racism. Diana Sandoval is a Whidbey Island resident and a long time facilitator…
Alleluia! Alleluia! 2019 Holiday Concert
December 15, 2019
Thomas Berry Hall
Join the Open Circle Singers, poet Judith Adams and singers Greg Garbarino, Steven Merritt, Barbara Dunn, Karen Calhoun, plus island friends in Thomas Berry Hall for a musical celebration of the winter holdays and the return of the light. Plan to stay after the music for coffee, tea, cookies, and conversation. IMPORTANT NOTES: Admission is free, but RSVPs are required. Additional seats will be released on Tuesday, December 3. Get on our waiting list now to be notified when more tickets are released. Parking is limited, and carpooling is strongly encouraged. Choir members do not need to RSVP. If you are…
Warrior Monk: Threshold Retreat
With Dan McKee
December 29, 2019 - January 2, 2020
Whidbey Institute
WHO AM I? WHERE AM I GOING? AND, WITH WHOM? Take this opportunity to enter the new year with intention and grace. This powerful experiential retreat is designed to bring about greater depth and integration of our spiritual, emotional, and psychological development. The work combines a deeply beautiful and mindful environment with powerful heart-opening emotional work, reflection, play, and community. Warrior Monk staff and participants create a transformative environment, blending intense experiential work with a full immersion in personal retreat space. This powerfully grounds and reinforces your growth and healing. Participants pay food and lodging cost in advance, and at the…
The Paradox of Belonging: Womxn Writing Our Way Home
With Anne Liu Kellor
January 3 - 5, 2020
1.3.20 - 1.5.20, a weekend retreat for womxn Where, with whom, or in what ways do you feel most at home in your body? How do you move between solitude and community, or between silence and speech? How can you lean into areas of discomfort, while offering yourself self-compassion and care? What do you need to write about and embrace? In this retreat, we will gather to write, listen, and share from our unique voices. Each day we will: write from prompts and poems; discuss short readings by writers such as Rebecca Solnit, Natalie Goldberg, and Audre Lorde; and be…
Aligned Yoga
With Jenny Rhodes
January 3 - 5, 2020
Join Jenny Rhodes & fellow yogis for this special weekend away at the enchanted lands of the Whidbey Institute. Retreat invites us to slow down, breathe, feel & bathe in a stillness that re-connects us to ourselves in a deep and meaningful way. Enjoy delicious, healthy meals prepared just for you, practice yoga in the awe-inspiring Sanctuary made of reclaimed trees from the property, cozy up in your cabin alone or shared with one person, relax in the gardens, walking meditation through the Labyrinth, or a wander through the wooded paths throughout the lands. Cost includes: 2 nights accommodation in clean,…
Powers of Leadership (2 of 4)
January 9 - 11, 2020
Whidbey Institute
The Powers of Leadership retreat series convenes a diverse cohort of people across strategic fields to gain perspective on the currents of change moving in these times.
Rewilding Retreat
With Mary DeJong
January 11, 2020
Storyhouse
Learn and Practice Seasonal Rhythms & Rituals for Sacred Guidance Through the Natural World to Grow an Earthen and Elemental Guidance How are your spiritual practices changing in the face of climate change? How does your faith flourish as our forests burn? How do you engage the wild edges of your life, not as a place of chaos, but as a place of profound creativity? How do our prayers hold the ecological grief that howls within our hearts? A response to these probing inquiries demands a return to a whole-relationship with creation and re-membering, or rewilding, ourselves to a profound…
Transforming Racism Drop-In Support Group
January 14, 2020
Storyhouse
A recurring drop-in support group to strengthen awareness about racism, including the more subtle microaggressions that often go unnoticed. Awareness, reflection, and compassion will be at the heart of the group. Facilitated by a person of color, this group will offer a safe space for participants to give voice to their questions and observations of racism in their daily lives. The group will also offer a brave space for self-reflection on how racism might show up in oneself and ways to shape change towards a culture of anti-racism. Diana Sandoval is a Whidbey Island resident and a long time facilitator…
Love, Power & Purpose
With Christiane Seuhs-Schoeller and Peter Kessels
January 14 - 18, 2020
Note: Register here for meals and lodging only after registering for the program via the Evolution at Work page. CO-CREATING NEW NARRATIVES FOR A POWER SHIFTED WORLD What does a world look like, where love and power are united in service of purpose? In offering this program, we invite you: let us build a global community to explore this question and create new narratives. Let us envision and embody this world. Let us put our minds, hearts, and hands into service of people and planet, into service of wholeness, and into service of the human future on Earth. Together with…
Whidbey Winter Gathering
With Rick Ingrasci, Victoria Santos and Peggy Taylor
January 23 - 26, 2020
Whidbey Institute
An invitational leadership conference imbued with a heartfelt sense of community, spirit, and service.
Bet Alef Meditative Retreat
With Rabbi Olivier BenHaim
January 31 - February 2, 2020
The Chasidic masters of 18th century Eastern Europe called the practice of contemplative meditation Hitbonenut. Following in their steps, each participant in the Bet Alef Shabbaton Meditation Retreat will be given tools to discern for him/herself what is, at present, most calling for attention in their lives; and set for themselves a Kavanah, an Intention/Focus, for the retreat and beyond. They will then choose a sacred word or phrase commensurate to their Kavanah to use through this weekend of Hitbonenut, contemplative meditation practice. As an inclusive and open congregation, Bet Alef engages people from many spiritual and faith traditions. “The messages and teachings which the Bet Alef…
Transforming Racism Drop-In Support Group
February 11, 2020
Storyhouse
A recurring drop-in support group to strengthen awareness about racism, including the more subtle microaggressions that often go unnoticed. Awareness, reflection, and compassion will be at the heart of the group. Facilitated by a person of color, this group will offer a safe space for participants to give voice to their questions and observations of racism in their daily lives. The group will also offer a brave space for self-reflection on how racism might show up in oneself and ways to shape change towards a culture of anti-racism. Diana Sandoval is a Whidbey Island resident and a long time facilitator…
Environmental Leadership Program (2 of 3)
February 20 - 23, 2020
The Environmental Leadership Program supports emerging environmental and social change practitioners eager to connect their specialized work to larger environmental and social concerns. ELP is committed to selecting Fellows that represents diversity of race and ethnicity, gender, sector, sexual orientation, education levels, professional background, values and traditions, and expertise. The Whidbey Institute is home to ELP's Pacific Northwest Regional Fellowship. To learn more, visit elpnet.org/pacific-northwest-regional-fellowship.
Dare to Connect WE-LAB
With Placida Gallegos, Akasha Saunders, Steve Schapiro and Carol Wishcamper
March 7 - 11, 2020
Whidbey Institute
This workshop with Solfire Consulting Group will provide a space to explore and support our capacity for a “we-space” that embraces our differences and maximizes our practice in connecting with each other across those differences with curiosity and love. Are you called to join with others to counter and heal the divisiveness and suffering you see in the world? Are you drawn to engaging with others across racial, generational, ethnic, gender, religious, and class differences? Do you desire to experience novel ways of being together in complex and divisive times? Are you ready to communicate across race in ways that…
Transforming Racism Drop-In Support Group
March 10, 2020
Storyhouse
A recurring drop-in support group to strengthen awareness about racism, including the more subtle microaggressions that often go unnoticed. Awareness, reflection, and compassion will be at the heart of the group. Facilitated by a person of color, this group will offer a safe space for participants to give voice to their questions and observations of racism in their daily lives. The group will also offer a brave space for self-reflection on how racism might show up in oneself and ways to shape change towards a culture of anti-racism. Diana Sandoval is a Whidbey Island resident and a long time facilitator…
Powers of Leadership (3 of 4)
April 2 - 4, 2020
Whidbey Institute
The Powers of Leadership retreat series convenes a diverse cohort of people across strategic fields to gain perspective on the currents of change moving in these times.
Rewilding Retreat
With Mary DeJong
April 4, 2020
Storyhouse
Learn and Practice Seasonal Rhythms & Rituals for Sacred Guidance Through the Natural World to Grow an Earthen and Elemental Guidance How are your spiritual practices changing in the face of climate change? How does your faith flourish as our forests burn? How do you engage the wild edges of your life, not as a place of chaos, but as a place of profound creativity? How do our prayers hold the ecological grief that howls within our hearts? A response to these probing inquiries demands a return to a whole-relationship with creation and re-membering, or rewilding, ourselves to a profound…
Kindling Words West
With Karen Boss
April 5 - 12, 2020
Kindling Words is a retreat for published authors, illustrators and editors of children's books. For more information, go to KindlingWords.org.
Transforming Racism Drop-In Support Group
April 14, 2020
Storyhouse
A recurring drop-in support group to strengthen awareness about racism, including the more subtle microaggressions that often go unnoticed. Awareness, reflection, and compassion will be at the heart of the group. Facilitated by a person of color, this group will offer a safe space for participants to give voice to their questions and observations of racism in their daily lives. The group will also offer a brave space for self-reflection on how racism might show up in oneself and ways to shape change towards a culture of anti-racism. Diana Sandoval is a Whidbey Island resident and a long time facilitator…
Awake and Alive: Mindful Living with Cancer Retreat
April 20 - 24, 2020
Erica Rayner-Horn will lead Awake & Alive: Mindful Living with Cancer Retreat. We warmly invite anyone ever diagnosed with cancer to our annual 5 day rejuvenating, healing retreat. Join us for this unique opportunity and leave refreshed, inspired and renewed. Imagine practicing the healing arts of mindfulness, meditation, self-compassion and Qigong, that help you calm fear and anxiety, boost immunity, build resilience and cope better with stress. Imagine the gift of spending five days in a warm and nurturing community of kindred spirits also impacted by cancer, sharing stories and insights in a safe, supportive circle. With time for self-reflection, journaling and…
Transforming Racism Drop-In Support Group
May 12, 2020
Storyhouse
A recurring drop-in support group to strengthen awareness about racism, including the more subtle microaggressions that often go unnoticed. Awareness, reflection, and compassion will be at the heart of the group. Facilitated by a person of color, this group will offer a safe space for participants to give voice to their questions and observations of racism in their daily lives. The group will also offer a brave space for self-reflection on how racism might show up in oneself and ways to shape change towards a culture of anti-racism. Diana Sandoval is a Whidbey Island resident and a long time facilitator…
Transforming Racism Drop-In Support Group
June 9, 2020
Storyhouse
A recurring drop-in support group to strengthen awareness about racism, including the more subtle microaggressions that often go unnoticed. Awareness, reflection, and compassion will be at the heart of the group. Facilitated by a person of color, this group will offer a safe space for participants to give voice to their questions and observations of racism in their daily lives. The group will also offer a brave space for self-reflection on how racism might show up in oneself and ways to shape change towards a culture of anti-racism. Diana Sandoval is a Whidbey Island resident and a long time facilitator…
Powers of Leadership (4 of 4)
June 11 - 13, 2020
Whidbey Institute
The Powers of Leadership retreat series convenes a diverse cohort of people across strategic fields to gain perspective on the currents of change moving in these times.
Realization Process Retreat
With Judith Blackstone
June 17 - 21, 2020
Judith will teach all aspects of the Realization Process: nondual meditation, embodiment, relational attunement and the release of trauma-based constrictions from the body. This is a chance to do deep, intensive practice of the Realization Process in this beautiful natural setting. The Realization Process is a direct path to embodied nondual awakening. It is a series of powerful but gentle, precise attunement practices for realizing your own nature as fundamental consciousness– an undivided expanse of luminous transparency, pervading your body and environment as a unity. Pervading your body, fundamental consciousness is the basis of your sense of existing as an…