You have probably heard about spiritual retreats, yoga retreats, mindfulness retreats, religious retreats, silence retreats, vipassana retreats, Shamanic retreats… Many have attended retreats, encounters, personal growth workshops.
But, what are they and what are they for?
As its name implies, the goal of the experience is to withdraw. To withdraw from daily life in all its forms, to learn how to open the door to what isn’t mundane, the “not-mind”. Answering an internal call that claims for a “change” in order for life to regain a more balanced and deep meaning, to feel fulfilled, to heal, to live in peace and harmony…
Generalized anxiety, depression, nervousness… are sound indicators of the need to find oneself. These symptoms, disorders, ailments, illnesses appear when one pushes themself to maintain a lifestyle full of adaptations, tries to be accepted by a sick, violent, unhinged, destructive society, in short, unconscious and ignorant.
To retreat is to be with oneself every second of the experience. It is to avoid fleeing with a thousand excuses and excesses.
There are different spiritual retreat levels, according to the preparation and preferences of the participants. Knowing that we live in a society where fear has been used since the beginning of time to manipulate and control the crowds, people are “guided” to buy products and services to escape from their empty lives, searching for lots of mundane distractions. Unfortunately, most of today’s spirituality tends to offer more or less the same than the conventional lifestyle, but with good intentions. It is in fashion to practice yoga, to be vegetarian, vegan, to join a somewhat “commercial” retreat to try to appear “different”, either consciously or unconsciously, with good intentions. But for many with the minimal required effort and without any true desire to change their way of life. It is a pious hypocrisy! As the mind is easily bored, there is a need to renew distractions both in concept and intensity. There are distractions that are directly destructive and others that have a placebo effect that doesn’t promote making the jump towards the much desired liberation…
The common trait of everyone who joins one of the aforementioned retreats is the desire to live in peace and harmony. But one cannot be in peace and live in harmony if they don’t learn how to love themselves from their essence again, uniting body, mind and spirit, but without forgetting that hormones, influenced by others people’s magnetic fields, can be even more in control than the mind if one doesn’t learn to connect with what is essential, with the transcendental reality that is one for all beings. It is also important to note that all living beings are energetic receptors and transmitters, especially sensitive people…
Traditions feed destructive distractions, making people live in an endless loop. Distractions stem from and for the mind. Nowadays people look for distractions, thinking that is how happiness is obtained. But, ironically, every year, people activate the same mundane rituals (celebrations, superficial trips…), because they haven’t reached the so desired peace and harmony, behind an ephemeral and fleeting happiness.
When someone is at peace, they do not need to look for it, or to try to reproduce said search as they are in it. Only by enjoying the ever changing fullness of each dawn, dusk, following the rhythm of Nature that is always moving straight ahead, creating life, transforming everything, peace can be reached. Seasons pass, but the Tree grows taller and straighter each year, looking up at the sky with its feet on the ground, opening its branches to life, letting itself be surprised by existence, sharing what is offered… living in fullness…
Distractions are very limited and unreal life approaches that the mind creates for its own egotistical satisfaction, for having an instilled fear of the unknown, for being far away from real life which is sharing what has been offered.
The need to join a retreat, is born from the necessity to remember how to live in harmony with the All. The mind thinks and lives in a loop. The spirit, the soul, manifests itself through intuition, and only feels from the heart its interaction with this earthly environment, actively living and not drowsing in virtual dreams.
Choose your individual or group retreat to keep growing freely and in peace, according to your spiritual level of preparation. The process of liberation should be progressive and pleasant, without any haste or expectation.
Many times people have contacted me because they wish to offer one of my transcendental retreats as a gift to a friend or relative. Joining a spiritual retreat of minimal distractions is a very personal thing. It shouldn’t be given as a gift nor should someone ask to be accompanied to one. There are certain things we can only do on our own, just as we come to and leave this world, alone.
Many people join a retreat accompanied by their partner or their friends. That is a clear example of a distraction because of their fear of the unknown, of being alone, of getting bored without TV, radio, newspaper, internet, close company… This denotes a low level of preparation.
Yoga retreats:
Learn how to take care of your body, mind and soul.
Let a sincere and noble Master guide you.
With higher or lower religious philosophical connotations.
In a group: The distraction level can be high.
Individually: The distraction level is usually medium to low.
Alone: There is a low distraction level.
Preparation level: low/medium if in group, and high if alone.
Mindfulness retreats:
No comments.
Religious retreats:
No comments.
Meditation, silence and Vipassana retreats:
Dare to look into the eyes of your mind and ego. Make sure you are prepared to enjoy the experience. If you are not ready, this experience can be hard and temporarily destabilizing. The rush to liberate oneself is a consequence of restless and impatient minds.
With patience everything arrives sooner…
With higher or lower religious philosophical connotations.
In a group: The distraction level is usually medium to low.
Alone: There is a low distraction level.
Preparation level: high/high.
Shamanic retreats:
They will help you to connect to another existential dimension. But make sure that you are ready, in order to avoid unpleasant and destabilizing experiences.
Do not take hallucinogenic substances.
Let a sincere and noble Schaman guide you.
Without religious connotations, but shamanic ones (spirits).
In a group: The distraction level can be high.
Individually: The distraction level is usually medium to low.
Alone: There is a low distraction level (if there is no “fantasy”).
Preparation level: medium/low.
Transcendental Spiritual Retreat by AtelTrainer:
Only if you feel prepared to transcend your mind to connect with your essence. A search for ancestral healing techniques and transcendental knowledge. Care for and unite body, mind and spirit, using a fusion of universal and millenary techniques, from Japan (only the art of martial arts, shiatsu), China (tai-chi, chikung), India (healing yoga), Shamanism without psychotropics. Transcendental meditation by AtelTrainer. Ancestral healing energetic therapy…
Learn to live from the feeling and not thinking, letting yourself be guided by your intuition. Reconnect with your transcendental intention.
It is far from any religion and mundane belief, laic and secular, and focuses on the connection to the essence, the transcendental…
In a group: The distraction level is usually medium to low because of the small number of participants allowed (2 to 4 people).
Individual (one on one): There is a low distraction level.
Preparation level: high/high.
AtelTrainer’s Transcendental Training Center. A few times a year I interrupt my permanent retreat, to share universal knowledge through the transcendental spiritual retreats of ancestral healing. The payment from the participants help us keep sharing with others said universal knowledge; the previous “customers” ‘ generosity, make possible that we continue sharing with you as well as the future participants to come.
Thank you!
Your best choice in this life, will be what you choose from your intuition, without caring about what others may say or think. Your intuition will manifest your good intentions. Whenever you start walking freely and peacefully again, you will leave behind the heavy burdens that anchored your existence to the “slavery” of the mind and caring about the opinions of others.
In the beginning, to many friends and family you will be “the different one” that walks away. But you will feel how, with every step forward, you get closer to living a fulfilled and harmonious life…
If you are interested in knowing more about The AtelTrainer Method, Transcendental Training, the three first books are available in Amazon International:
AtelTrainer Method:
Book I: Psycho-Fitness Holistic.
Book II: Zen Sport.
Book III: Transcendental Training.
(Available in Spanish & English)
Thank you very much!
Transcendental Love Hug,
Alain Tello Robledo
