The Joy of Yoga: New Year, New Beginning
The Joy of Yoga: New Year, New Beginning
13395 Lagoon Dr NW, Seabeck, WA
Up to 23 in group
January 4 - 5, 2025
About this Retreat
Your Guides
A lifelong artist and seeker, Denise originally found a spiritual home in the beautiful, heartful practice of Yoga and has been offering classes, workshops, and retreats for over 35 years. She hopes to make the teachings and the practices of both Yoga & Meditation open to all who wish to deepen their relationship with themselves, to become kinder, more tender, and more intimate with their bodies and hearts, and ultimately expand that out to the wider world, for the good of all beings. Her practice is rich and integrated – using breath, mindfulness, Metta meditation, Yoga therapy, somatic movement, stillness, rest, poetry, and art – and is both gentle and therapeutic.
Grounded in this long-time practice and teaching, and coming to recognize her own long-held sorrows and how they have impacted her life, Denise set out on a path to explore grief and loss, both her own as well as the universal experience of grief. What she discovered is that we are a culture in grief and the healing of grief requires deep attention, our great love and a safe community in which to welcome and tend our broken hearts. Her wish became to extend the Yogic practices even farther out to offer a space for all of us to do just that.
As a Chaplain (trained in the Buddhist tradition through Upaya Institute & Zen Center in Santa Fe NM) and a Compassionate Bereavement Care Yoga Provider (through the work of Dr. Joanne Cacciatore), upholding the vows of care, kindness, and compassion in a world that is suffering is an integral part of what Denise brings into her work in the world. And moving in the space of grief and sorrow, grounded in the breath and the body, is elemental and necessary.
Denise is a part of the esteemed Faculty of Harmony Hill and here has found a place in which to gather with others where “healing is an act of communion” (bell hooks). She leads one to three-day Yoga & Meditation Wellness Retreats and offers a variety of Grief Programs including an ongoing, virtual Living with Loss circle, a quarterly one-day gathering, and a 2-day overnight retreat. She also co-facilitates Harmony Hill's signature 3-day Cancer Healing Retreats as well as the 2-day Health Professional Renewal Retreats.
Denise offers weekly Yoga & Meditation classes for both the cancer and the wider communities, in person and online. And serves as a volunteer Chaplain at Mason General Hospital and as a hospice volunteer with Providence SoundHomeCare & Hospice.
When not leading programs or gathering in circles, she walks the quiet woods of Harmony Hill every day as a spiritual practice with her dog Mickie (and sometimes her cat Bella) and hikes the mountains of the Olympics as often as possible. She cherishes what is holy and beautiful in this world: her grandchildren, the body in motion, calligraphy, the rivers and forests, art, poetry, & kindness. These words of St Teresa of Calcutta guide her life and work: “We can do no great things; only small things with great love.”
Details of this retreat
THE JOY OF YOGA: NEW YEAR, NEW BEGINNING
Begin again to the summoning birds
to the sight of light at the window...
Begin to the...bridges linking the past and future
old friends passing though with us still.
...Though we live in a world that dreams of ending
that always seems about to give in
something that will not acknowledge conclusion
insists that we forever begin.
~ Brendan Kennelly (from the poem "Begin")
We invite you to this very special retreat! Give yourself the spaciousness of time & attention, and immerse in the opportunity to deepen your practice of welcoming the New Year, a New Beginning.
Please join Denise Carrico, Chaplain, Yoga, & Meditation Teacher, for a weekend to gather ourselves and reflect on where we have been this past year and envision a course for the next year, in a world that 'insists that we forever begin.'
How shall we 'begin again to the summoning birds'? How shall we orient our hearts in the 'soul's direction sure' (Wendell Berry) and towards our highest aspirations?
In the generous space of the weekend and through the practices of gentle yoga, sitting & walking meditation, breath, community, silence, art & poetry, we will allow ourselves to unfold and our intentions to become clear. We'll breathe the heart open and we'll listen for what is insisting. And allow that to be our compass guiding us into a new beginning.
All are wholeheartedly welcome!
Here is the retreat schedule: New Year Renewal Schedule
Saturday January 4th, 10:00 AM - Sunday January 5th, 1:00 PM PST
Tuition:
$512 per person (Single-occupancy accommodations and four meals)
$462 per person (Shared accommodations with another person attending with you and four meals)
About Seabeck Conference Center:
Seabeck Conference Center provides non-profit organizations with the perfect escape from the hectic pace of daily life. The facilities are on 90 beautiful acres with sweeping views of Hood Canal and the Olympic Mountains. The grounds are reminiscent of a small village, complete with walkways that meander past manicured lawns, wooded trails, and resident deer. Follow this link for more information: Seabeck Conference Center.
Cancellation Policy: Cancellations 60 days or more before the event can receive a full refund – less 10% for payment processing fees and program administration. Cancellations 59-16 days before the event can receive a 50% refund. Cancellations less than 15 days before the event are non-refundable. The program registration can be transferred to another person at any time.
Begin again to the summoning birds
to the sight of light at the window...
Begin to the...bridges linking the past and future
old friends passing though with us still.
...Though we live in a world that dreams of ending
that always seems about to give in
something that will not acknowledge conclusion
insists that we forever begin.
~ Brendan Kennelly (from the poem "Begin")
We invite you to this very special retreat! Give yourself the spaciousness of time & attention, and immerse in the opportunity to deepen your practice of welcoming the New Year, a New Beginning.
Please join Denise Carrico, Chaplain, Yoga, & Meditation Teacher, for a weekend to gather ourselves and reflect on where we have been this past year and envision a course for the next year, in a world that 'insists that we forever begin.'
How shall we 'begin again to the summoning birds'? How shall we orient our hearts in the 'soul's direction sure' (Wendell Berry) and towards our highest aspirations?
In the generous space of the weekend and through the practices of gentle yoga, sitting & walking meditation, breath, community, silence, art & poetry, we will allow ourselves to unfold and our intentions to become clear. We'll breathe the heart open and we'll listen for what is insisting. And allow that to be our compass guiding us into a new beginning.
All are wholeheartedly welcome!
Here is the retreat schedule: New Year Renewal Schedule
Saturday January 4th, 10:00 AM - Sunday January 5th, 1:00 PM PST
Tuition:
$512 per person (Single-occupancy accommodations and four meals)
$462 per person (Shared accommodations with another person attending with you and four meals)
About Seabeck Conference Center:
Seabeck Conference Center provides non-profit organizations with the perfect escape from the hectic pace of daily life. The facilities are on 90 beautiful acres with sweeping views of Hood Canal and the Olympic Mountains. The grounds are reminiscent of a small village, complete with walkways that meander past manicured lawns, wooded trails, and resident deer. Follow this link for more information: Seabeck Conference Center.
Cancellation Policy: Cancellations 60 days or more before the event can receive a full refund – less 10% for payment processing fees and program administration. Cancellations 59-16 days before the event can receive a 50% refund. Cancellations less than 15 days before the event are non-refundable. The program registration can be transferred to another person at any time.
Getting Here
Harmony Hill, 13395 Lagoon Dr NW, Seabeck, WA
Accommodation
Seabeck Shared Room and all meals
All rooms have two twin beds. Some of the rooms have an attached bathroom and some have a bathroom in an adjacent hallway.
Seabeck Single Room and all meals
All rooms have two twin beds. Some of the rooms have an attached bathroom and some have a bathroom in an adjacent hallway.
