Somatics Yoga Training Retreat

Somatics Training Retreat for Yoga Teachers with Charlotte Watts

Can be attended as part of Charlotte’s Teaching Therapeutic Somatics course, or simply to experience Somatic practice and restore resources – includes a Soundbath event on Saturday night!

Upcoming dates at Gayles, East Sussex

August 4th-6th 2023

July 26-28th 2024

Emerson College, Forest Row*

November 10th-12th 2023

April 19th-21st 2024

*options for non-residential at this venue

This teacher training retreat is open to yoga teachers, yoga therapists and anyone else interested with at least a year’s yoga experience (although you will need to be a qualified teacher to continue the full module, see below). Whether you simply need the therapeutic effects of a weekend of deeply nourishing Somatic practice or want to take this into your teaching, this will be a retreat of deep connection, self-compassionate practices and embodied awareness.

The Somatic teachings for the weekend will be by their nature fluid, explorative, restorative, meditative and influenced by Feldenkrais, Qi Gong and other practices that step away from an emphasis on reaching particular forms or goals within asana. Through embodied awareness, there will be an emphasis on recognising and offering kind attention to the habits and expectations we may spend our time retreading in our work and personal lives. For each session, there will be a short introduction and time for discussion and Q&A at the end.

Part of the full course is an online course that includes videos of the practices on the retreat (taught and with a teacher’s commentary) that can be purchased before or after, either to complete the full course or simply for your own practice and learning. See the online course here.

This retreat sits as the main experiential practice portion of the full Therapeutic Somatics for Yoga Teachers certification (170 hours CPD), with this breakdown:

Yoga & Somatics for Healing & Recovery: moving beyond stress, trauma, burnout, anxiety, fatigue and post-illness through embodied awareness – the more theoretical, philosophical and enquiring part – 100 hours
Teaching Somatics: the art of leading others inwards towards whole – the more experiential and practical component including this retreat – 70 hours

The course/retreat can be taken simply for 15 hrs CPD experience and understanding of Somatic practice or as part of the total 70 CPD hours of the Teaching Somatics course for Yoga Teachers.

The retreat content:

(see separate venues for specific times)

FRIDAY

Arrival 4pm Gayles / 3pm Emerson
1.5 hours – Central axis and skull-sacrum polarity: spine undulations, forward and side
c. 7pm – dinner
1 hour – Continuing earlier content into stillness

SATURDAY

30 mins – Qigong-inspired practice
c. 8–9am – breakfast
2 hours – Shoulders, neck and jaw: reptilian to all-fours/ dorsal sheath
c. 1-2pm – lunch
2 hours – Hips, sacrum and belly: prone and baddha konasana/ ventral sheath
c. 7pm – dinner
8.30-9.30pm – Soundbath with Ruth Summers

SUNDAY

30 mins – Qigong-inspired practice
c. 8–9am – breakfast
2.5 hours – Diaphragm, ribs, lungs and heart: twists/ spiral sheath > moving to remaining part of Arms, legs and eyes: moving and reaching/ core sheath (standing parts of this practice included in two pre-breakfast sessions)
c. 1-2pm – lunch
Departure 3.30pm Gayles / 3pm Emerson

Learn more about each location and sign up

Gayles Retreat

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