Replenish Your Soul: Give Yourself a Mini-Retreat Today!

To live a soulful life you must take time for retreat. A retreat allows you to turn away from the busyness, routines, demands, expectations and distractions of everyday life and to turn inward. A retreat allows you to: • Connect with your inner self. • Begin to hear your voice within. • Find your natural rhythms. • Give your breath some room. • Soften toward yourself. • Feel your own true feelings. • Reconnect with the inner wellsprings of your soul. A retreat is soul medicine only you can give yourself. You must become aware of the richness in you and come to believe in it and know that it is there…Once you become aware of it and have faith in it, you will be all right. ~Barbara Ueland A retreat can be done at a spa, a mountain cabin, a luxury hotel, an urban artist community or in your own living room. A retreat can be a year, a month, a weekend….or ten minutes long. If you feel a yearning for a long retreat away from home, then start getting curious about how you might make some version of that happen. Starting right now, commit to yourself to take time every day, in small and powerful ways, to give yourself this priceless gift of self-care and soul replenishment. Whether they are ten minutes or an hour long, mini-retreats have a magically restorative benefit. Here are ten ideas for mini-retreats to get you started: 1. Relax in a bath with fragrant oil or bubbles, soft music or a relaxatio CD 2. Lie down on the earth and feel your weight melting down. 3. Go on a meandering walk. Open your sense to the beauty of the outer world and to your inner world. (Notice how different this feels than a power walk!) 4. Lie down with your feet up the wall or on a chair. 5. Sit outside and watch the world with soft eyes. 6. Listen to your breath. 7. Close your eyes and repeat a phrase or word. (This week’s audio mediation, Just This, is a great one to try.) 8. Put on music. Choose something quiet and dreamy or wild and crazy, depending on your mood and just tune into your body and move in a way that feels great. 9. Doodle around. Just draw, scribble and play with crayons or paints on large drawing paper. 10. Daydream. Imagine, remember, let your mind drift. What will your next mini-retreat be? What would be nourishing and replenishing and fun for you to do today? Guidelines for creating mini-retreats: • Let it be easy. • Let it be enjoyable. • Create mini-retreats that appeal to you and your senses. • Claim the power. Say to yourself-- I am taking a retreat! --and the experience will take on more importance and power and you will more fully open to the benefits • Feel yourself shifting into a slightly different reality of space and time. • Re-enter “ordinary reality” fully aware of the jewels of your time away. Notice what feels good in body and soul and let those qualities grow and move with you into your day. • Remember: when you take retreat time it is a gift to yourself and to those you love. Replenished, refreshed and happy you bring your best self to the world. You have a solemn obligation to take care of yourself because you never know when the world will need you.” Rabbi Hillel Start today. Let yourself get addicted to mini-retreats. Connect with your rich inner reserves, live your life refreshed and revitalized and enjoy the magic!