HAND-PICKED EXPERIENCES

Editor's Picks

Curated events selected by the BrightStar team — transformational gatherings worth your time.

10 events curated

yoga workshop

Shake Loose: Fall Release With Yoga and Foam Rollers

This five-day workshop at Esalen Institute invites participants to explore autumn's natural rhythm of letting go through yoga, foam rolling, and somatic movement. Led by Ulrika Engman, a certified Anusara and Halprin Life/Art practitioner, the program weaves together dynamic vinyasa flows, long-held poses, and myofascial release techniques to bridge the tension between holding and releasing. The work addresses the seasonal shift toward winter by cultivating deeper sleep habits, grounding the nervous system, and reconnecting the body's natural patterns of rest and activity. Participants will practice alignment-based asana, explore stillness through savasana, and use soft foam rolling to awaken proprioceptive awareness and emotional resilience. The emphasis falls on concrete somatic techniques rather than conceptual teaching, allowing practitioners to discover their own embodied wisdom as the season changes.

Mon, Oct 5, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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yoga retreat

The Turning Season: Aligning with Autumn's Sacred Rhythms

This four-day retreat gathers participants to pause and realign with autumn's natural rhythms, honoring the season's invitation to release, reflect, and prepare for renewal. Led by yoga therapist and author Jillian Pransky, the program weaves together slow-flow yoga, somatic movement, restorative practices, and Metta meditation to meet this moment of transition with grounded presence. Each session emphasizes nervous system balance while cultivating both rootedness and openness to change. Participants engage with seasonal rituals, journaling, and practices conducted outdoors to deepen their connection with autumn's elements. Double bassist Garth Stevenson contributes acoustic support, adding resonance to the work of settling and releasing. The retreat invites practitioners to move through fall with intention and ease, creating space for deeper self-nourishment that extends outward to the wider world.

Fri, Oct 9, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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yoga workshop

Contacting the Space Between: Gestalt, Feldenkrais, and the Subtle Body

This five-day workshop at Esalen explores the relationship between habitual physical patterns and our capacity for ease, presence, and relational awareness. Drawing on the Feldenkrais Method and Gestalt process, Kate Flore and Dwight Pargee guide participants through experiential inquiry into how the body organizes itself through gravity, contact, and environment. The faculty investigate the role of fascia, early developmental patterns, and self-organization in shaping movement and sense of self. Using Esalen's natural setting as a laboratory, participants learn Awareness Through Movement lessons designed to refine functional movement and cultivate sensitivity to the subtle body, the space between self and other, and the ground beneath. The work is grounded in the premise that when bodies are given conditions for curious, attuned engagement with their surroundings, greater freedom and choice become available. This is not a physically demanding workshop but rather an invitation to slow down, notice, and refine how we meet the world through our flesh and awareness.

Mon, Oct 19, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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yoga retreat

Gratitude Retreat

A three-day gathering at Esalen Institute in Big Sur designed around returning to what nourishes the heart and spirit. Led by Vinyasa teacher Janet Stone, participants explore gratitude through the body and mind, moving from dynamic yoga asana and pranayama to seated meditation and yoga nidra. The retreat weaves together group practice with solitude, hot spring bathing with forest walking, and shared meals with moments of reflection. Guest teachers and musicians join the faculty, creating a retreat shaped equally by instruction and community presence. The weekend emphasizes the connective tissue between personal practice and collective remembrance, offering structured sessions on Saturday morning and more intimate opening and closing circles. Professional photography documents the retreat, with images shared among participants afterward.

Fri, Nov 20, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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yoga retreat

Giving Thanks: A Yoga Retreat

Held at Esalen Institute during Thanksgiving week, this retreat explores the practice of gratitude through the lens of sufficiency. Guided by instructor Janet Stone, who has practiced yoga since 1996, participants engage in a carefully sequenced progression of asana, breathwork, meditation, journaling, and yoga nidra. The retreat honors the land and the Esselen people, the indigenous stewards of Big Sur. Rather than dwelling on scarcity, the week offers a structured inquiry into recognizing and appreciating what is already present in one's life. Daily practices build toward a deeper attunement to the natural world and the life force within the body. The retreat culminates in a felt sense of wholeness and the capacity to extend gratitude and generosity into the world beyond the retreat grounds.

Mon, Nov 23, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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yoga workshop

The Stories Behind the Poses: Mythology in Motion

This three-day workshop at Esalen Institute explores the mythological foundations embedded within yoga asanas. Led by Sanskrit scholar and author Raj Balkaran, the program treats myth not as historical study but as living practice. Each posture carries an encoded psychological and spiritual significance, drawn from stories of figures like Śiva, Hanumān, and Indra. Rather than analyzing these narratives intellectually, participants engage them experientially through breath, movement, and relational presence. The weekend unfolds in thematic arcs: from the conditions that enable practice, through the tensions that deepen it, to the surrender that completes it. No prior knowledge of mythology or Sanskrit is required. What matters is a willingness to meet ancient India's wisdom traditions as a continuing source of insight, allowing the stories to inhabit the practitioner's own embodied experience.

Fri, Nov 27, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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yoga workshop

Creative Tai Ji Experience: Change, Transformation, Metamorphosis

Chungliang Al Huang, a master teacher with more than five decades of continuous instruction at Esalen, leads a five-day intensive that approaches Tai Ji as living practice rather than fixed form. The workshop weaves together ancient Tai Ji rituals, the Five Moving Forces of Nature, and traditional motifs through playful reinvention and improvisation. Grounded in the Taoist principle of Wu Wei—the art of not interfering with what is already happening—participants explore renewed ways of moving and meditating within the open structures of this classical art. Huang combines storytelling, energy cultivation, and qigong mastery to create a container where practitioners at all levels can access the deeper dimensions of movement as meditation. The workshop unfolds against the backdrop of Big Sur's dramatic coastline, where Esalen's natural hot springs and contemplative atmosphere support the slow unfolding of embodied practice.

Mon, Nov 30, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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yoga retreat

Aligning with Nature: A Winter Solstice Yoga Retreat

As the year darkens into winter, this three-day retreat at Esalen Institute invites practitioners to align with the season's natural rhythm. Winter solstice marks a threshold, a moment when the sun appears to pause before returning. The retreat uses this astronomical pivot as a frame for inner work, combining asana practice, seated meditation, and chanting to cultivate presence and renewal. Guided by instructor Sarana Miller, whose teaching draws from Iyengar and Forrest traditions, participants work with the body and breath to build steadiness and brightness before returning home. The practice unfolds in Esalen's clifftop setting overlooking the Pacific, where the natural environment becomes part of the teaching. Rather than treating winter as a time to endure, the retreat positions the darker months as an opportunity for reflection and self-care, encouraging practitioners to slow down and build inner resources for the year ahead. All levels welcome.

Fri, Dec 11, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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yoga retreat

Ground Control: Cultivating Steadiness in Wild Times

This three-day workshop at Esalen addresses the particular strain of modern acceleration on the nervous system. Participants explore how contemporary life's relentless pace accumulates as fragmentation and exhaustion in the body, leaving little room for genuine presence. The workshop proposes steadiness not as escape but as a practical capacity—one that allows for responsive engagement with life's uncertainty and intensity. Through sequenced practices in yoga, breathwork, meditation, and rhythm work, participants investigate the internal mechanics of acceleration: how it shapes breath, posture, attention, and emotional response. Drawing on nervous system science and contemplative tradition, the work approaches groundedness as a trainable skill rather than a fixed state. The faculty guides participants in reconnecting with the body's deeper rhythms, distinct from clock time and productivity metrics. This is practical inquiry into what becomes possible when presence is sustained beyond the retreat space and carried into daily life.

Fri, Dec 25, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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yoga retreat

Wintering Within: Meditation, Music, and Gentle Yoga for the New Year

This five-day retreat at Esalen Institute invites participants to slow down as winter settles in, exploring what Buddhist teacher Chandra Easton calls the art of "wintering" — a deliberate embrace of rest, renewal, and the inward movement this season naturally invites. The program weaves together seated and moving meditation practices, mantra recitation, and therapeutic yoga designed for bodies of all abilities. Meditations are offered both indoors and in open-air settings with views across the Pacific, where participants may observe migrating whales. Central to the offering are teachings in shamatha, or calm-abiding practice, paired with Buddhist-based awareness techniques including mindfulness of breathing. Guest musicians Cassian Rose and Robert James Ryan III of Sorelia contribute immersive soundscapes using violin, percussion, flute, vocals, and looping to deepen contemplative experience. The retreat draws both newcomers and experienced practitioners into a community grounded in accessible practice, spacious accommodations, and the particular gifts of the winter solstice season. All teachings emphasize that this work is fundamentally available to everyone, regardless of prior experience or physical ability.

Mon, Dec 28, 2026Esalen Institute, Big Sur

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