Guiding principles of an individual retreat: 10 S +10 R

When you craft your own retreat experience, you pave the way for your brilliance and growth. A self-led retreat away from home is a great choice for you because you need a new environment to truly relax, shift your focus and start the transformation. Since each space radiates its own energy, you can gravitate towards one that moves you further in self-transformation. The new space with uplifting vibrations gets you unstuck.

Here are the guiding principles of DIY retreat that can help you on your way of expansion and improvement. Keep the 10 S and 10 R in mind when planning your personal retreat, choosing your getaway venue, and putting together your retreat schedule.

Self-discovery

Start your own transformation, led by you. Trust yourself and your path. No one knows you better than you do. Self-discovery starts when you tap into your own self-knowledge. Individual retreat vacations are the ones that can give you enough time and space for expanding knowledge of your own feelings, sensations, beliefs, attitudes about life, and other mental states.

Stillness

Dive deep into silence. Be still and listen. Cultivating stillness means being free from distractions and disturbance. In this way, wisdom arises from within, a pure one with no narratives around it.

“Be the silent watcher of your thoughts and behavior. You are beneath the thinker. You are the stillness beneath the mental noise. You are the love and joy beneath the pain.”

– Eckhart Tolle

Solitude

Enjoy your precious ‘me-time’. It allows you to focus on yourself fully. Solitude stimulates your creativity and problem-solving skills. It gives you the time for deep and transformative reflections. In solitude, you learn how to lean on yourself. You get in touch with your soul and what you truly desire in your life. In the absence of noise, you find deep peace, calmness, and unexpected answers.

Space

Create your sacred space: a meditation corner, a writer’s desk, an artist’s creative room, a cozy seating area in front of a fireplace that gives you instant inspiration. Using sacred space helps you connect with yourself. It’s also a sanctuary where you can think about your intentions and dreams. Create it with great attention and care. Think of those items that have personal meaning for you and how you can include them in your retreat space.

Simplicity

Make your environment as simple and distraction-free as possible. Less stuff usually means more happiness. Be immersed in spaciousness so that you can feel openness to new experiences. Simplicity helps you shed light on what’s essential for you. Simplify everything during your retreat, eliminate anything that distracts you from your peace of mind and balance in each aspect of your life.

Security

Find a retreat place where you feel safe, protected, and at peace. Follow your gut. Tune into your own intuition and feel if the place you choose gives you the space for growth. Check out whether your personal retreat venue fulfills the criteria of safety, security, and protection. When you feel safe and grounded, you can smoothly design your self-care retreat and guide yourself through it.

Strength

Generate inner strength, discipline, willpower, determination, and commitment to move towards your dreams. When you learn to navigate through your goals and dreams, it means that you also increase your mental strength.

“If we make a commitment to do something, the process of following through, in spite of real or imagined obstacles, automatically builds willpower. On the other hand, neglecting even a casual commitment, putting it off for another day, weakens the will.”

– David A. Cooper

Schedule

Follow an empowering routine to stay focused and be in control of your time. It gives you stability and balance. Reflect on how you can effectively create your daily personal growth and development schedule. Write down your plans, visualize your goals or steps, and complete them throughout your day. It is important to plan out main activities of the coming day. This helps you maintain your new daily routines and habits.

Search

Go ‘soul searching’. Whether you want to find your purpose or passion, know that you’re on your personal growth journey. Question the status quo. Knock on closed doors and they will open. Create the doors where they don’t exist yet. Don’t settle. The answers you’re looking for will come to you in your own time. Trust the process.

Support

Firstly, be aware of what kind of conversations, connections, and social interactions you seek for. While retreat is much about solitude, do keep in touch with like-minded people in difficult moments. Connect to those who can assist you on your journey of transformation. Connect to your tribe who can motivate you, bring value to your life, and fill your heart with joy and happiness. The Growthcation team is here to support you too.

 

Retreat

Move away from outer distractions. Move within, into the presence, into the core of your existence. When you step out of the currents of thought that are connected to the past or the future, you rest in stillness. In the present moment, joy, happiness, and creativity arise. The more you are in the now, the more abundant you become. Wherever you are, you return to the source of power deep inside you.

Resourcefulness

Don’t wait for the perfect future moment when you are finally able to afford a retreat. Create an opportunity right now with the resources you already have. Turn inwards and reflect on inner and outer resources that you have in the present moment. As an example, your inner resources can be your imagination, creative spirit, courage, or passion. Your outer resources can be technology, people connections, and so on.

Rituals

Define those important daily steps that will lead you towards achievement and fulfillment. Creating your rituals helps you specify your developmental phases and their beginnings, middles, and ends. Celebrate your transitions. Rituals set you free from distractions. They improve attention and reduce anxiety and stress. They also increase emotional stability and boost confidence.

Reconnecting

Reconnect to that ‘still small voice’ within you, the voice that knows what you truly want in life. It is also important to be aware of another louder voice - your critical voice that drags you down. When you ignore the critical voice and find your true authentic voice, your energy rises. You are able to grow and explore your talents and utilize them.

“If your inner voice is telling you that you can't paint, by all means, hurry up and paint and silence the voice.”

– Vincent Van Gogh

Reflection

Pause to reflect how you have arrived at this point in your life and in what direction you want to move in the future. Ask yourself deep questions such as what inspires you the most? Allow yourself to receive the answers with no attachment to the specific outcome. When you’re in a state of openness, it gives you a much broader perspective.

Receptivity

Have a beginner’s mind. Be open to new ideas and different opinions. If you look at things from different angles, you can notice that there are no endings, but only new beginnings. Cultivating gratitude increases your receptivity. Reconnecting with your childlike curiosity and a sense of wonder in exploring new things makes you more receptive as well.

Rest

A retreat is not about overdoing and overachieving. Find a balance between action and rest. Focus on one task at a time and notice how you feel in the present. Explore the deep rest that resides within you. Explore the light of your own existence with no clouds of overthinking. Allow your mind to be like an open blue sky. With your awareness in the present moment, allow everything to happen as it is. Notice how spontaneous actions nourish you.

Recharging

Nourish your body, mind, and soul to replenish your energy. It’s time to focus fully on yourself. Make healthier food choices that give your body more energy. Journal and practice mindfulness to renew your mind. Indulge yourself in your favorite activity that feeds your soul. Recharge yourself with the beauty of your full presence.

Returning

After your retreat, return to daily life, routine, obligations. But never again let your dream out of sight. Self-guided retreats give you the tools and knowledge that you can apply to your daily life and activities. It boosts your confidence and courage to continue your journey of growth. It reconnects you with your highest values and who you want to become in the future.

Repetition

What have you learned/understood/decided to change during your retreat? After your return, continue your way towards this dream, practice it daily in order to achieve mastery. When you cultivate an independent mindset, you know your own abilities and strengths, and easily adapt to an ever-changing environment. Repetitions create new habits. Turn your goals into actions. Repetitive practice leads to proficiency. 

 

We wish you good luck on your journey of self-growth, rediscovery, expansion, and improvement. Let your personal retreat be about your highest self-care and self-love. We hope it helps you connect the dots and become the best version of yourself. As Rumi once said:

“Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray."