Retreat into nature at Healing Gardens

Submitted by SPA Sisters

SPA Sisters will host an Awakening Retreat from 8:45 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, July 24.

Participants will meet at Healing Gardens, 37W249 Dean St., St. Charles. Using nature as a guide, SPA Sisters teaches simple yet powerful ways to connect with your true spirit, empowering expression of your authentic self with all of life’s to-dos, so you have more for yourself and others.

A SPA Sisters Awakening Retreat offers a great return on the time you invest by teaching a way to sustain yourself. The retreat reawakens you to the profound life and lessons that nature reveals and enables a focus on you again.

This retreat will be led by Deborah Marqui, a licensed clinical social worker and owner of Healing Gardens at Stone Hill Farm. SPA Sisters has now conducted more than 50 retreats led by Marqui and other trained facilitators.

“Nature has the power to heal, teach, renew and sustain the spirit, however, in our lives of multiplicity and diversion going ever faster we often forget our richest resource is as simple and accessible as nature,” Marqui said.

Through journaling, poetry, drawing, time in nature and sharing, the retreat offers you a way to reconnect with you, creating a personal practice of contemplation and inspiration that is accessible anytime, anywhere. All are welcome, no experience is necessary. The women will be given journals and art supplies for their journey and begin with a discussion of its purpose. The group will be encouraged to sense and explore the attractions each person has to particular things in nature and become aware of distinct and personal meanings.

There will be a time of teaching, time for solitude in nature for personal reflection and time to connect with other women in a non judgmental atmosphere. The cost is $85 for the retreat and scholarships are available if needed. Participants must bring a sack lunch. Check www.spasisters.org for more info or click on registration to sign up or find other dates.

SPA Sisters is a nonprofit educational organization whose mission is to inspire, educate and awaken women to their true selves through interaction with nature, creative expression and connection with other women. The SPA Sisters’ Programs consist of the Awakening Retreat and an optional six-step follow-up Wellspring Group, where you learn to live life with integrity, discovering what you need to restore a true sense of yourself while giving to others. Retreats are held in natural settings primarily around the Chicago area. All are facilitated by trained therapists. Scholarships are available if needed. To register or for more information, visit spasisters.org, call (630) 377-1846 and leave a message, or email deb@dmarqui.com. CEUs available for mental health professionals.