The Belly of the Night
22nd - 26th January 2025
Our five-day women's retreat in wild Southern Sweden will take place two hours from Stockholm, deep in the forest beside a lake at a beautiful retreat centre.
Guided by Natasha Lythgoe and Geeta Stillwell
Blending old wisdoms with contemporary culture;
coming home to your natural self
Traditional cultures throughout time were intimately bonded with the more-than-human world, which included nature ‘out there’, the realm of imagination, dream and myths. This way of relating located us humans deeply within the family of things, within community in the largest sense of that word. Over time, these relationships have been severed along with it our sense of belonging and connection to the sacredness of all life.
Is there is a way to remember and embody this primal belonging? We believe so.
We will gather as a community of women, draw on the wisdom of our matrilineal lineage and connect to the wild, both within us and around us.
Sensing your belonging to the world
Come gather with us and journey into the soulful fertile territory of the deep winter, softening beneath the surface of things and into the depths.
In the Inuit language there is a word - qarrtsiluni - which means something akin to sitting together quietly in the dark waiting expectantly for something creative to happen. Expectant. Emergent. Not yet known.
This collective inscendence will sit at the heart of our days together.
‘Inscendence’ as opposed to ‘transcendence.’ Whereas transcendence is our drive away from the world and away from our bodies, inscendence is the movement within, an inward flow. This season offers to us a period where, as individuals and as community we can descend into our instinctive wisdom to open to a fresh becomingness.
Here we will court the quintessence of Deep Winter; her elements, her gifts of quietness opening to what waits to be known.
Our days together will shape themself along a weave that includes:
Call and Response
The nature of ritual in relationship with the Elements including that of heat and darkness through some sauna traditions - a much loved cultural heritage of the Scandinavians and the Balts
Following embodied awareness through movement and experiential anatomy
The felt sense of Embodied Focusing - cultivating an interior friendship with our own authentic being, and a natural confidence in our own intuition.
Listening deeper - beneath the words and below the neck
Our final day will tend to how, both our personal and collective lives might be enriched through our time spent together. We, as guides, will share ways, tried and tested, to help land this experience into your everyday lives.
Re-enchantment of the World is Possible
Over the course of five days, we will guide an embodied and experiential journey with the elements. Courting nature, coming into deeper intimacy within us and around us, unearthing wisdom for these times. To enter into women’s community in this way is to also cultivate relationship with the divine feminine within you.
Courting A deeper Intimacy with Life
Sweden gets to experience the full depth of this season, in the northernmost parts of the country, the sun doe not rise above the horizon for about a month. Contrary to popular belief the season of the long dark is not pitch-black. The snow wraps the Arctic landscape in sparkling light and of course the sky is sometimes painted green, red and purple by the Aurora Borealis.
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Spending time in nature immersed in awe-inspiring landscapes re-humanises us. Nature supports rest, opening up to a bigger perspective, and reconnects us with what matters most.
At its core, our work is about relatedness, how to cultivate healing and belonging by weaving yourself into deeper intimacy with life.
Exploring both our inner nature and outer nature, the binding thread of our work aspires to collude with wild medicine; awakening your true nature, connecting you with your innate wisdom and bringing you home to your inner compass, a compass aligned with your heart.
Ultimately our work is in service of becoming elders and coming into right relationship with each other and the more-than-human community.
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This community orientated project first began in 2005 an artist collective of yogis simply living in nature, and has slowly, throughout the years, opened its doors to those that wished to experience this way of living in communion with nature in the form of a retreat.
Tending a regenerative eco-retreat centre, 100% of all the energy that is used comes from renewable sources, and the majority of their food is organic, local and sustainably sourced.
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Our group size is limited to 16 participants to ensure an intimate experience.
PRICING in Euros below.
We also accept Pounds.
Early Bird Prices are available until 18th August 2024Twin Room E 1195 | Early Bird E 1090
Triple Room Euros 1135 | Early Bird E 990
Quadruple Room Euros 1135 | Early Bird E 990
Room choices will be allocated on a first come first served basis.
FOOD
The food is delicious, abundant, and wholesome. It’s vegan, Ayurvedic-based, mainly organic and gluten-free.
Using the best possible ingredients and taking care of food combinations to ensure that you are nourished and energised throughout the retreat.
All meals, snacks, hot drinks are provided. We can cater for dietary allergies if you let us know in your booking form beforehand.
ACCOMMODATION
The accommodation consists of seven buildings in nature, within which you can find two yoga shalas, a yurt, a sauna on the lake, ten twin bedrooms, four triple bedrooms and one four-bed dormitory.
The Venue & Accommodation
Geeta and I feel extremely lucky to be able to welcome you to this beautiful retreat centre in the middle of the Swedish forest, beside a lake with a floating sauna.
What once was an artist community of yogis simply living in nature, slowly, throughout the years, opened its doors to those that wished to experience this way of living in communion with nature in the form of a retreat. Tending a regenerative eco-retreat centre, 100% of all the energy that is used comes from renewable sources, and the majority of their food is organic, local and sustainably sourced.
The dense forests are a fantastic place to encounter the very best of Sweden’s wildlife. Other than enjoying its abundant nature, trees and plants, you can also find the magnificent ”king of the Swedish forest”, the moose in its natural habitat, and the many lakes and watercourses are home to beavers too. The surrounding area has also proven to be one of the best regions in Sweden to see other wildlife such as wolves, bears, lynx and owls.
What is Included
5-night stay with all meals and snacks included from dinner on the 22nd to brunch on 26th January
All guiding and facilitation offered by facilitators over 5 retreat days
A shuttle service available from Skinnskatteberg train station to retreat venue
Insurance to cover any activities during the retreat, facilitated by retreat leads
Daily saunas
What isn’t Included
Travel to and from our pick up point at Skinnskatteberg train station
Personal travel insurance
OUR EARLY BIRD RATE IS OPEN UNTIL 18th AUGUST 2024
Twin Room
FULL PRICE | Euro 1195
EARLY BIRD
Euros 1090 | £928
Triple Room
FULL PRICE | Euro 1135
EARLY BIRD
Euros 990 | £842
Quadruple Room
FULL PRICE | Euro 1135
EARLY BIRD
Euros 990 | £842
One of our greatest fears is to eat the wildness of the world.
Our mothers intuitively understood something essential: the green is poisonous to civilisation. If we eat the wild, it begins to work inside us, altering us, changing us.
Soon, if we eat too much, we will no longer fit the suit that has been made for us. Our hair will begin to grow long and ragged. Our gait and how we hold our body will change. A wild light begins to gleam in our eyes. Our words start to sound strange, nonlinear, emotional. Unpractical. Poetic.
Once we have tasted this wildness, we begin to hunger for a food long denied us, and the more we eat of it the more we will awaken. It is no wonder that we are taught to close off our senses to Nature. Through these channels, the green paws of Nature enter into us, climb over us, search within us, find all our hiding places, burst us open, and blind the intellectual eye with hanging tendrils of green.
— Stephen Buhner
Your Guides:
Natasha Lythgoe and Geeta Stilwell
I’m Natasha, also known by my Buddhist name Nagadipa which means light in the depths - this name was given to me as a mirror of my own essence and as life teaching. I guide individuals and groups through transformative nature-based experiences. With over twenty years of experience leading programmes I have been moved and honoured to witness countless stories; listening and attending to what has purchase on folks’ hearts.
The way I work weaves together nature-based rites of passage which support life transitions in nature, somatic practices that understand the wisdom of the body, myth-making and the guiding of sacred soul journeys for women.
Maria do Carmo Stilwell, also known as Geeta, is a certified Forest Therapy Guide based in Portugal. She creates and facilitates restorative programs that promote wellbeing and health through nature connection practices, clean eating and self-care.
Her passion is to bring human beings back to nature and support the reconnection to the restorative potency of the natural world. Based on her own recovery journey, she creates a safe space for the nature connection and self-care journey to unfold. Over the past 20 years she has dedicated a great part of her time and resources to her own development and self-care journey. This life experience is the foundation for her work.