True Nature Travels Blog

Into the Jungle Yoga Retreat with Missy Balsam

1512086_638863206167130_5202010020011765157_oJune is upon us, and that means that we’re just days from the launch of our next yoga retreat journey, Jungle Love! A Costa Rica Experience with Missy Balsam.

For what is sure to be an incredible seven days, Missy and her students are preparing to embark on a journey of yoga retreat and adventure. Hosted at one of our favorite retreat centers, Finca Luna Nueva Lodge, the retreat will be hosted in an environment of self-healing, fostered by the nearby Arenal Volcano and the town of La Fortuna. Arenal is the adventure capital of Costa Rica, and the group is planning on taking full advantage of it through activities like hiking, hot springs excursions, canopy tours, waterfall expeditions, and more.

10422565_10152074903686930_2296553190345365648_nA bit off the beaten path, this peaceful yoga retreat will be nested in Luna Nueva’s jungle paradise. meditative walks on the property’s lush rainforest trails. Daily yoga sessions will be inspired by Missy’s teaching style of empowerment, inspiration, and joy, encouraging students of all levels to keep growing and evolving, discovering the happiness that is already inside of all of us.

Luna Nueva is world-renowned for its fresh, organic, nutritionally-dense food grown right on-site. Altogether the group is ready to set foot on a path of rejuvenation and recharging for the mind, body, and soul. Days will be complete with meditative walks on the property’s lush rainforest trails and plenty of personal reflection time in this unique wilderness.

To immerse directly into the local land and community, Jungle Love! will be incorporating service “karma” yoga and Bhakti yoga elements through projects during the week.

We’ll be posting updates “from the road” with some reflective writing and photos to keep you posted on the retreat in action so you can share in the experience. Stay tuned with us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram (@TrueNatureEducation) for a peek into the action!

True Nature Travels Blog

The True Nature of Family

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Just a couple of hours ago our Chant Together: A Family Bhakti Yoga Celebration with David ‘Durga Das’ Newman, Mira Newman, and Friends departed. It was a wonderfully rich week of retreat. Bhakti Yoga is also known as the yoga of devotion and love. The essence of this week was just that.

Standing on the incredible Finca Luna Nueva Lodge property, I gaze into the distance at the vast rainforest before me. When looking with one point of view, all I observe is a sea of green; when looking closely I see the intricate web of life before me, with the vast array of flora and fauna. Trees, flowers, birds, water.

The journey of retreat reveals a similar comparison. Each retreat in a way is very similar: a group of people coming together, practicing together, residing as a community, and then journeying onward. But, when we really move into the intimate intricacy of retreat, what beholds is truly an exquisite, unique experience to live through.

This week we explored a new facet – opening to the potential of sharing the retreat experience with families. Our retreat had three families with children: a mother and daughter, and another couple, along with some single adults. In the past I have had apprehension about the potential distraction that the family element might bring into retreat. I have been familiar for many years with a paradigm of retreat that was quiet, introspective, and focused towards a sense of personal time. I was curious about how this would be impacted with the element of children and family.

photo (19)David brought forth a beautiful reflection through his teachings this week. Sharing with us the profound transformation he had experienced over the past several months, his message was that “we all have the opportunity to awaken to the perfection of our ordinary selves.”

This message was a perfect teaching for this retreat, which was filled with

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True Nature Travels Blog

Chanting Together in Costa Rica

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IMG_0217We’re nearing the end of our Chant Together Kirtan yoga retreat with David Newman (“Durga Das”) and Friends, and it has been such a delightful journey!  Our group is wonderfully diverse, with participants ranging from age 2, all the way up beyond 60.  It has been so sweet to have parents and kids, husbands and wives, and friends all here to chant together.

The power of retreat is something I wish everyone could experience. Feeling the support of the community and taking part in daily practices such as yoga, satsang (“discussions of truth”), and kirtan (“chanting”) have all added the fullness and richness of this True Nature Experience.

IMG_20140126_123038It has been such a blessing to spend the week on this magical land near the Arenal Volcano at Finca Luna Nueva Lodge. Everything is so lush here.  This is a place where trees grow on trees, toucans with bright yellow beaks fly overhead, and a three-toed sloth makes an occasional appearance.  This is a place where all you have to do is sit quietly and watch, and magic will present itself.

The other day we went to a local village and worked on projects for the school’s community garden.  The school is responsible for feeding the students lunch, and it has become a necessity to grow food to support this.  It felt great to help out with the project.  We also made sugar cane juice and drank from coconuts straight off the trees.  After our work (which was mostly play!), we enjoyed a home-cooked meal where we made our own corn tortillas.

Today, we spent the morning at the Tabacon Hot Springs.  We soaked up the warmth of volcanic water, as it poured through rivers and waterfalls that meandered through the trees and vibrantly colored plants.  Our afternoon ended with a sunset horseback ride to a waterfall.

It has been a wonderful week blending lots of time relaxing, chanting, and adventuring.  It is always sweet to get to know other people (and ourselves) better.  It is a gift to be able to spend a week away from our day-to-day lives and to live in a way that more deeply connects us with our own True Nature.

 

Eliza Volk
Asheville, North Carolina

 

 

 

 

True Nature Travels Blog

Guest Post: Rhythms of Joy Yoga Retreat Great Success!

This was written by Tiina Kivinen, retreat leader of our first yoga retreat of the 2013 season, the Rhythms of Joy: A Costa Rica Experience, from 1/12-1/19:

Love from Nosara Costa Rica! We just completed the Rhythms of Joy Costa Rica Yoga Retreat last week, and I am basking in the afterglow. The experience brought people together from Peterborough, Bobcageon, and Thunder Bay Ontario, Alberta, Minnesota, New York City, Holland, and our beloved co-facilitators from Asheville, North Carolina. One participant, Fern, described a ‘magnetic pull’ that brought her to the retreat, and I can attest that a force of love and grace brought all these beautiful souls together at the right place and time to experience rhythms of joy, deep connection and awakening.

During the 7 days of Retreat, we rode the waves in the ocean, diving into high and low tides, and felt the healing ocean waters caress our feet during sunset. Each day, attending to the grace and epic beauty of the setting Sun reminded me of the blessing of life, another day of loving as the sun melted into the ocean and the day turned to night. The week began with the new moon, a symbol of new beginning, a time for setting intention. Throughout the week Moon grew from new to a sweet sliver and into a radiant half moon that became illuminated by the setting sun. As Moon grew more and more illuminated, so did we, and our intentions ripened as our community and experience deepened.

Our days were full of Yoga, Mindfulness Meditation, Yoga Dance, Kirtan (mantra singing) among many other experiences. Many participants also went on excursions, like zip lining, visiting the Monkey Sanctuary and rehabilitation centre, as well as an early morning journey to see mama sea turtles laying eggs and baby turtles making their first journey to the ocean… Epic!

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True Nature Travels Blog

Yoga, Nutrition, and Costa Rica: Shayna Hiller on her Upcoming Retreat with TNE

As our 2012-2013 retreat season continues into February, we will be offering one of our new yoga programs, Where Heaven Meets the Earth: A Costa Rica Yoga Experience, from February 16-23  for a week of yoga, nutrition, and music in nature.
Hosted at the Finca Luna Nueva Lodge, True Nature Education co-owners Joshua Canter and Kristin Luna Ray will be alongside yoga instructor and nutritionist, Shayna Hiller, in the mountain Costa Rica jungles with views of Mount Arenal. Within the lush surroundings of Finca Luna amidst thriving gardens, a sustainable farm, and secluded jungle hiking trails, the week-long retreat will foster an illumination of heart, mind, and soul through the practices of Hatha and Bhakti yoga, meditation, and mindfulness.
Following her yoga certification at the Nosara Yoga Institute, Shayna hosts yoga and nutrition retreats in Costa Rica each year, and we are so grateful to have her along with us for this unique program. She is also a Board Certified Holistic Health Practitioner through the American Association of Drugless Practitioners, with a mission to share the benefits of a steady yoga practice and healthy lifestyle with people from around the world.
We were lucky to catch up with Shayna as the momentum for the retreat builds, to tap into her thoughts, insights, and expectations for the upcoming program.
True Nature Education: Greetings, Shayna, and thank you for taking the time to interview with us. We are looking forward to this retreat and having you join us to host a new Costa Rica retreat through TNE. How did your relationship with Joshua and Luna and the inspiration for this program first arise?

Shayna:  I met Joshua and Luna in Nosara, Costa Rica, this past Winter. I was teaching yoga there

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