Esalen Institute is open! However, Highway 1 to the south is closed — please review the current travel advisory.
Learn More.

Learn more.

Due to road closures along Highway 1 to our north and south, Esalen is closed through April 11.
Esalen Institute is open! However, Highway 1 to the south is closed — please review the current travel advisory.
past workshop

The Practice of Slowing Down

December 12–14, 2025

Ayana Young and Brontë Velez

In a time of constant noise and urgency, this is an invitation to slow down and enter into a deep and quiet rhythm with the more-than-human world. Through silence, movement, prayer, and time on the land, this workshop is a space to listen to our bodies, to the Earth, and to what arises when we release the need to speak and perform.

Each morning, we will begin with a grounding conversation and prayer followed by slow, intentional movement and breathwork. On Saturday, participants will be invited into a day of silent contemplation, concluding with an evening gathering to break our fast from speaking.

Afternoons will invite ecological attunement through shared time on the land. We will walk, witness, and rest with the trees, ocean, and wildlife of Esalen — receiving and remembering our belonging to the living Earth.

Evenings will be a time for warm food, shared reflection, and gentle conversation. We will gather to speak from the heart, to notice what has surfaced, and to be in community through the catharsis and insight that can emerge from stillness.

During our time together, you are warmly invited to slow down, listen deeply, and reconnect with your inner and outer landscapes through:

  • Extended periods of intentional silence and slowness.
  • Morning intention setting with prayer and reflection.
  • Gentle somatic movement and breath practice.
  • Guided land connection and nature-based sensing.
  • Evening gatherings for shared meals and heartful conversation.

Feel more rooted in quiet presence, connect to body, land, and spirit, and be gently restored through communion with nature and each other.

Ayana Young

Ayana Young and her daughter spend their days exploring the wilderness of Coastal Alaska while strategizing ways to halt large-scale industrial projects within wild salmon habitat. She is co-founder and host of For The Wild, a podcast rooted in land-based protection, co-liberation, and deep listening. 

Full Bio

Brontë Velez

brontë velez (they/elle) is a black-boricua transdisciplinary ritual artist, shepherd, and cultural worker. their eco-social art praxis is an intergenerational prayer to resanctify labor with land through rebuking the hauntings slavery has had on our precious relations with earth-rooted ritual and craft.

Full Bio