40 DAYS AND 40 NIGHTS

BE REBORN AT EASTER

In Celebration of Love, Truth, Wisdom

February 22nd – 6 April 2023 

Lent is a significant holy season of the year for Christians. Beginning on Ash Wednesday, Lent is traditionally a period of 40 days, which ends the Thursday before the triduum of Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Sunday.

Lent is a powerful opportunity for renewal. It is a season for reflection and preparation before the celebrations of Easter. By observing the 40 days of Lent, Christians replicate Jesus Christ’s sacrifice and withdrawal into the desert for 40 days before beginning his public ministry. By rejecting temptations, Jesus Christ’s role modeled the challenge of sacrificing i.e. ridding ourselves of unwanted habits. Highly symbolic was his fast of forty days.

Some people choose activities because they are challenging. Such a choice helps build discipline, and while it may be a personal goal, and has merit, however, holy fasting should not imply adding religious encouragement to a difficult goal, such as losing weight, stop watching pornography, or giving money to charity. Your journey can also enhance other aspects of your life. You can shape it to fit your spiritual needs and desires.

A FLIGHT OR FIGHT WORLD

We live in a stressful world. The underlying dread is that the world is in terrible danger and that we have very little time left in which to make the changes that are so desperately needed, in so many areas of life.

The flight or fight response is our body’s specific way to deal with stress. But life is not war. It is not a contest, and it’s not a race. Living is being.

FINDING PEACE IN A STRESSFUL WORLD 

To see this truth, and to live it in each moment, now more than at any other moment in our history, in this time of great change, I invite you to join me on a mystical, meditative retreat, of 40 days and 40 nights, inspired by spiritual traditions through the ages and culminating in our Easter Retreat: Mindful Living, Mindful Being. 

This 10-day holistic retreat is a live integrative program that incorporates mind/body practices, meditation-in-action, easy-gentle yoga, breathing exercises, philosophy, and psychology, in a comprehensive set of self-care practices, which will then support you as you employ them in your daily life.

The journey that we will be taking together during this time, will be during Lent. It can be a concentrated and radiant celebration, helping us to prepare for the light of our resurrection by making unique and different commitments. This journey will take us systematically and joyfully, through different stages of awakening, to embolden and strengthen us for the great work of rebuilding humanity. People change the world every day, despite everyone around them telling them that it can’t be done. If you think you can do it, you can. Don’t listen to them, believe in yourself and keep going.

BEYOND THE GLASS CEILING 

You have unlimited wisdom and creativity at your core. You just need to learn a few tools to quieten the voices of the ego, the senses, and the unconscious mind, in order to access this wisdom.

Once you understand how your mind works, you can begin to learn new habits that will lead to better health and more joy.

You will see how each day builds on the previous one and prepares us for the final ten days,

when you’ll receive the fullest inspiration to reimagine a sacred world and ourselves as new kinds of human beings, nothing less than our resurrected selves.

You know the cliche about putting your oxygen mask on first. If you know yourself, trust yourself, can sit with yourself and feel what you feel, and know what you know, you can show up for everyone else when they need you. By tapping into the core of who you are, you can beam that powerful light back out into the world. An essential planetary spiritual renaissance is slowly emerging from the ruins of our civilisation. We can change the world, one life at a time.

To live our day-to-day lives, in the midst of the great noble shift into what we are all becoming, and divinely tune into what has always been true about life, death, love, fear, pain, and hope, is to be empowered. World peace cannot be achieved without our own mental peace.

YOUR MIND POWER

There is no power outside yourself that is superior to the power within you. It is time to decide how you will accept the season of renewal this year.

– Choose goals that are worthwhile, with motivating, transformational qualities. The purpose of goal setting is to move you forward to spur positive change.

– Choose resolutions you can accomplish and sustain within six weeks. But make them challenging.

– Sharing your decisions with a trusted friend or mentor gives you a witness and supporter.

– Follow your resolutions for the entire six weeks. You can start with a modified version of your ideal in the first week, and work on it gradually, reaching your goal in the weeks ahead. The secret of high performers is that they practice specific things repeatedly.

In your life today, over the 40 days and nights, would you consider fasting from despair, paralysis, self-absorption, arrogance, and your separation from divine love? Being mindful of the person you are and of the person you would like to be, how will you make the world a better place? It is time to get to know the person in the mirror, the one you have always been avoiding.

40 DAYS AND 40 NIGHTS

1. Start your day with more focus and end your day with peace.
2. Hone in your ability to listen to yourself and tap into your inner wisdom.
3. Wander in the garden, breathe in the sky, and know the earth as poetry.
4. Nurture your self-esteem.
5. Love a little more.
6. Let go of comparing.
7. Let go of competing.
8. Let go of being judgemental.
9. Let go of self-righteousness.
10. Let go of regret.
11. Let go of worrying.
12. Let go of blaming.
13. Let go of guilt.
14. Let go of fear.
15. Let go of shame.
16. Let go of feeling unworthy.
17. Let go of feeling unloved.
18. Have a proper belly laugh at least once a day, especially if it’s about your inability to let go of any of the above.
19. Whether you are falling apart or coming together, whether you need to scream or sit in silence, laugh, or cry your eyes out, promise yourself that you will enjoy every minute of the day that is given to you to live.
20. Work with what you have, without waiting for anything.
21. Don’t ever save anything for special occasions. Being alive is a special occasion.
22. Eat some comfort food, go on a wild adventure, and reacquaint yourself with the colour of the sunset, and the earth beneath your feet. Thank the air that surrounds you with every breath you take.
23. Eat real food – diseases disappear. Get sunshine – anxiety disappears.
24. Plant fruit trees on the nature strip so that everyone including the homeless can eat.
25. Be whatever you need to be.
26. Harness your gut.
27. You have the ability to create, and creative flow is how you move through the world. So, trust that edge. Be daring. Be bold. Deepen yourself out loud.
28. Be fearless and blaze your trail. You inspire others so much.
29. Believe in your magic.
30. Be the reason someone smiles.
31. Review your assessments.
32. Forgive someone’s debt to you. You are a steward of the treasure and abundance entrusted to you.
33. Find new meaning and pleasure in the time you spend alone. Rather than doing anything to distract yourself, relish your own company. Being alone doesn’t have to mean you have to feel lonely.
34. Practice being present in the moment.
35. Check up on your lighthouse… the place you shine so that we can all find our way back to shore and avoid the rocks.
36. Sign up for love.
37. Meditate.
38. Practice yoga.
39. Whatever comes, let it come. Whatever stops, let it stop. Whatever goes let it go.
40. Use your voice for kindness, your ears for compassion, your hands for charity, your mind for truth, and your heart for love.

You now have some decisions to make. During these 40 days of Lent, you have made some changes. Do you want to go back to the old ways? Or will some of these changes remain? You have my full permission to be awesome, brilliant, and amazing. Life can’t wait to celebrate with you!

TO BOOK:

Thursday 6 April 2023 – Monday, 10 April 2023

Thursday, 6 April 2023 – Sunday, 16 April 2023

Monday, 10 April 2023 – Sunday, 16 April 2023