Can you get familiar with the unfamiliar? Beyond all the external noise of society and the culture, what are truly the most meaningful aspects of life for you? Would you be willing to meet yourself in honesty and openness?
In this podcast episode, Lisa Lewis speaks about reconnecting with Self and a deep dive into darkness retreats with Scott Berman.
Meet Scott Berman
Scott is the founder and owner of Sky Cave Retreats, the first darkness retreat centre in the United States. He completed his first darkness retreat in 2012 and has spent over 70 days in multiple darkness retreats. Over the last few years, he has supported hundreds of people in their dark retreats and has been pioneering the darkness therapy movement at his centre in Ashland, Oregon.
Visit Sky Cave Retreats and connect on Facebook and Instagram.
IN THIS PODCAST:
- What is a darkness retreat?
- What does true safety look and feel like?
- Meet your Self as you are
What is a darkness retreat?
A darkness retreat with us is where people enter these hobbit-homes … You walk into the hillside, down some steps, and walk into the earth. They’re very cozy, comfortable spaces … These spaces are completely blacked out.
Scott Berman
In the darkness retreats hosted by Scott and his team, people live in cosy small homes that are fully equipped with a bathroom, bedroom, living space, and room to roll around in and explore.
The homes have proper ventilation, so even though they’re underground, people still get fresh clean air. Additionally, because they are underground, the homes are essentially soundproof except for some sounds of passing wildlife now and then.
You are immersed in an unchanging reality. You are in direct contact with eternity, with the timeless, with the unchanging, with this boundless presence and ultimately it exposes … ourself to ourself.
Scott Berman
Within darkness retreats when you are in this present moment that is heightened by silence and darkness, you see all the ways that you used to insulate, deflect, and disassociate from your life as coping mechanisms to avoid discomfort.
All the habits that you used to engage in throughout your daily life are highlighted because they are no longer accessible to you, and so you are presented with the rare and powerful opportunity to address and release them and to get to know yourself truly.
It’s a fascinating exploration of our psyche, of our mind, of our emotional state, of our body, and ultimately of connecting with the spaciousness within [us] … mirroring the darkness where we begin to touch a space in ourselves that can allow all of it.
Scott Berman
What does true safety look and feel like?
People often imagine that they feel safe when they feel in control of their behaviours and surroundings.
However, in a darkness retreat that almost doubles as a silence retreat, you cannot “make” yourself do anything other than relax into what you are truly experiencing and feeling.
When you are present with those emotions within yourself, and you can sit with them and feel them, that is where a genuine sense of safety in who you are and your life begins to develop.
Here’s this exploration where we feel uncomfortable, there’s nothing to control so we don’t necessarily feel in control, but we feel safe, and so we get to ride these new edges in our being, our body, our mind, and our emotions of not being in control … but feeling safe.
Scott Berman
Ask yourself: where does your comfort come from in your home? By distracting yourself with television or food, or by creating a deeper sense of peace and quiet?
Meet your Self as you are
Finally you’re actually meeting yourself as you are, without using any mechanisms to change how you feel. To change, to fix, to awaken, to alter, to change anything, and not that anything’s wrong with those … [but] when we really enter into a timeless reality, we really begin to meet ourselves exactly as we are without trying to change, because at a certain point we get exhausted [by] doing any kind of technique [or] any way of managing ourselves.
Scott Berman
When you never look further into who you are or how you are, you think you know yourself but what you only know are your managing techniques, your coping mechanisms, and how you structure your life without living your life.
Through acts of consistent meditation and doing dark retreats can you put a real pause button on the mindless actions of day-to-day life and actually face yourself, all the way through, and see what you need to work on, give love to, and accept within yourself.
There’s almost like this near-death moment where you know you [can] directly make contact with what is most meaningful and it’s not accomplishments, success, money, power, fame, being validated … None of that matters when you’re in the dark, none of that matters when you’re on your deathbed, so there’s this real direct contact with what is most meaningful.
Scott Berman
If you are brave enough, you can meet yourself honestly and genuinely and strengthen your relationship with yourself on a deeper, truer level.
RESOURCES MENTIONED AND USEFUL LINKS
Visit Skycave Retreats and connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Find Out More About Sensitive in Nature
The Path Less Traveled: Camino Primitivo and the Highly Sensitive Soul | Ep 97
Practice of the Practice Network
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CONNECT WITH ME
Email me: lisa@amiokpodcast.com
ABOUT THE SENSITIVE IN NATURE PODCAST
So you’ve been told that you’re “too sensitive” and perhaps you replay situations in your head. Wondering if you said something wrong? You’re like a sponge, taking in every word, reading all situations. Internalizing different energies, but you’re not sure what to do with all of this information. You’re also not the only one asking yourself, “am I ok?” Lisa Lewis is here to tell you, “It’s totally ok to feel this way.”
Join Lisa, a Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, as she hosts her, Am I Ok? Podcast. With over 20 years of education, training, and life experience, she specializes in helping individuals with issues related to being an empath and a highly sensitive person.
Society, and possibly your own experiences, may have turned your thinking of yourself as being a highly sensitive person into something negative. Yet, in reality, it is something that you can – and should – take ownership of. It’s the sixth sense to fully embrace, which you can harness to make positive changes in your life and in the lives of others.
This may all sound somewhat abstract, but on the Am I Ok? Podcast, Lisa shares practical tips and advice you can easily apply to your own life. Lisa has worked with adults from various backgrounds and different kinds of empaths, and she’s excited to help you better connect with yourself. Are you ready to start your journey?