July West Online Teen & Young Adult Retreat
July 27th @ 6:30pm – July 31st @ 1pm, 2020
Online via Zoom

Do something different
Take part in your life in a new way. Turn the page, try out new things, meet great people, be you and be accepted. Oh, and have some fun! We’ve adapted our signature style to the online environment to bring you a meaningful and transformative retreat experience. This unique retreat weaves iBme’s relational approach with periods of silent guided meditation, yoga, small-group discussion, workshops, and wisdom talks.
Who is this retreat for?
Any teen with an open mind and heart who is willing to try something new and do their best to be themselves and accept everyone else in being themselves. We provide everything you need to make that happen.
You leave the incredible iBme Teen Retreat Experience with mindfulness practices and communication skills that you can practice whenever you want to, to restore inner balance and harmony, create focus and follow-through, or just because it feels good to develop your inner life (you won’t believe how good it feels!).
Learn the fundamentals
Meditation
Using a variety of formats and teaching frameworks, we impart lessons in self-awareness, compassion, and offer techniques to increase concentration and focus the mind.
Mindful Movement
Spend time each day with a small group of peers, connecting and deepening authentic relationships with other teens who are experiencing the world in similar and different ways from you.
Inner Stillness
Being on retreat offers a rare opportunity to experience a life without constant distractions. We create a technology-free environment that flows back and forth between silent and social times.
What does the retreat consist of?
During this retreat, we will be fully immersing ourselves in a contemplative space for four nights. We ask that you commit to this as fully as possible, particularly to the small-group discussion periods. This online retreat will include periods of:
- guided mindfulness meditation
- instruction on integrating mindfulness into daily life
- small-group periods for discussion and social connection, and
- workshops on various topics such as mindful eating; restorative yoga; mindful communication; and how to use digital technology wisely (with a focus on the pressures of the current moment).
All participants will receive ongoing, personalized support and practice advice in small groups from highly experienced meditation teachers and mentors, just like we provide on our in-person retreats.
How can I prepare?
We encourage you to create a designated practice space for yourself that will be uninterrupted during your retreat time and have as much silence as possible. You should let your family and friends know that you won’t be available — but this retreat will not require complete isolation such as on a traditional silent retreat. We also encourage you to separate as much as possible from the use of technology (other than for the purposes of the retreat!
We are excited to provide these new offerings at a time when mindfulness practice can be particularly supportive and when many of us can benefit from opportunities to connect deeply with others in a compassionate and authentic space.
Please note that while this live retreat is scheduled toward those in the PDT time zone, it is open to participants in all time zones.
Suggested Age
15 to 25 years
Application Deadline
July 26th at Midnight PT
Please note this retreat will be cancelled one week prior to retreat if a minimum of 12 teens have not registered.
Cost
Sliding scale. Learn More.
Duration
5 days, 4 nights
Retreat Staff

Khalila Archer

Khalila Archer is a mindfulness and yoga instructor with 20+ of personal practice. Introduced to yoga and meditation in her teen years, she has attended many multi-day silent meditation retreats, including two month-long retreats. Her background includes over a decade as a wilderness educator leading multi-day expeditions for a variety of educational organizations, as well as teaching interdisciplinary curriculum in formal classroom settings and beyond. She holds a B.A. in Adventure-based Environmental Education from Prescott College and over 500 hr Yoga Teacher Training hours. Khalila teaches meditation retreats for all ages through Inward Bound Mindfulness Education (iBme) in both residential settings and remote wilderness environments. Her teaching is grounded in nature awareness and connection, mindfulness meditation as a means for insight, care, and well-being, and social justice praxis that recognizes our interdependence and collective need for freedom. Khalila currently serves on the iBme Board of Directors and is part of the core faculty for the iBme Mindfulness Teacher Training.

Enrique Collazo

Enrique Collazo is a new generation Mindfulness meditation teacher. Born and raised in Los Angeles and has been teaching and living in the Bay Area for the last 6 years. His passion is teaching the practice of mindfulness to teens. He is well loved and respected for his inspirational work at Challenge Day during the school year where he facilitates social and emotional learning workshops for thousands of young people all over the country. Enrique’s skill with teens has led to teaching internationally for Inward Bound Mindfulness Education. He is on the Guiding Teacher Counsel and Equity and Interdependence Committee for Ibme. Enrique is a frequent co-facilitator for teens at Spirit Rock and a committed advocate for bringing meditative interventions into jails and addiction treatment facilities.
Enrique is a champion for helping young people create pathways that align with their goals and deepest intentions, and empowering them to broaden their confidence by opening their eyes to what’s possible when negative internal narrative is transformed into positive effort.
He believes deeply in the power of marginalized voices to change the world.
Enrique was trained by Noah Levine and Vinny Ferraro at Against the Stream Buddhist Meditation Society.

Dori Langevin

Dori began meditating in 1985 while attending a monthlong retreat at Esalen Institute entitled Mystical Quest: Attachment, and Addiction. During that retreat the mindfulness and compassion meditations and the teachings of suffering and freedom from suffering mirrored her direct experience of addiction and recovery (1980) and her professional work with others. Her meditation practice became the wellspring of her life.
In 1996 Dori moved from Moscow, Russia to the Washington DC area and met Tara Brach who founded Insight Meditation Community of Washington and invited Dori to teach in 2003. IMCW became the community ground of her life. Dori graduated from the 4-year Spirit Rock/IMS Teacher Training in 2010. She began teaching Teen Retreats in 2008 in Virginia and co-developed iBme Teen Retreats in the Pacific Northwest where she currently lives. Dori is delighted and feels honored to again be part of iBme Teen Retreats.
What teens are saying
“At this moment I feel I have learned more lessons about myself and others in the past five days than I did in the last year of school.”
Ben, age 17
What parents are saying
“The day after he came home he asked to do yoga with me in our back garden, and we went for a bike ride together…connection I have been yearning for all summer.”
Parent
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