7 Day Contact Improvisation and Meditation Retreat in the Sahara Desert

In this retreat, Durward Burrell will be teaching the art of meditation each morning, helping you find the spaces between your thoughts and connect with who you are beyond the surface agitation of habitual mental chatter and worries.

While this is a meditation retreat, you will not be jumping up at 4:00 a.m. to chant mantras; rather you will have a morning group meditation for those who wish to join and also when you climb the high dune in silence at sunset. The retreat has more of a gentle focus on mindfulness and connecting with the heart through all of our activities.

You’ll find that just being in the Sahara increases the awareness of your mind, your breath, your feelings. Just taking a walk in the dunes is already like a meditation.

Contact improvisation

Elisa will be teaching contact improvisation dance in the afternoons. There are no steps and no experience is needed, just a willingness to listen, feel and discover.

Contact improvisation is all about finding new ways to communicate, move, and express yourself without words. It's an amazing journey of discovery that can be slow and subtle or free-flowing and acrobatic. Check out a contact improvisation jam in the video below to get an idea of where it can take you.

Aikido - the art of the third way

Durward will also be running aikido workshops in the afternoon. Aikido can be seen as the art of negotiating the challenges you face in your lives and creating a middle way between resistance and surrender. Through gentle physical exercises, Durward will show you how to bring the mindfulness of meditation into each of your movements. It makes a perfect complement to the contact improvisation sessions.

Itinerary

Sunday

Today, your bus from Marrakech will arrive in the village on the edge of the dunes. Welcome dinner in the village of Hasalbied on Sunday at 9:30 p.m. You will sleep and have your dinner here.

Monday

In the morning, you will put your bags on the camels and start walking out into the dunes where you will have an opening circle.

Tuesday to Friday

Each of the following days will be structured around meal times, meditation, workshops, and music around the fire at night.

Saturday

Today, in the morning, you will load your bags onto the camels again and head back to town arriving around 2:00 p.m. You can stay an extra night in the village or take the night bus out.

This retreat will take place in the Sahara Desert in Morocco.

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During the retreat, while there will be some meat served, there will always be vegetarian and vegan food so there's no chance of you going hungry. You’ll be eating traditional Morocco cuisine with bread, jam, olives, and tea in the morning. Soup, biscuits, and dates in the afternoon and a huge plate of tajine for dinner.

• Daily morning group meditation
• Silent meditation session at sunset
• Contact Improvisation sessions
• Afternoon Aikido workshop
• Daily meals
• 6 nights accommodation

• Airfare
• Airport tranfers
• Personal expenses

• A reservation requires a deposit of 100% of the total price.
• The deposit is non-refundable, if the booking is cancelled.