“This wasn’t just a retreat, it was an immersion. A deep remembering.

Rose didn’t just take us to beautiful places on the island of Samothraki, she introduced us to them. Each place felt like a living, breathing being with its own essence, its own medicine, its own message and conversations to be had, with the energy that lived in each space. We weren’t there to do, but to be, to listen, to feel, to receive. At times I found myself wondering what practices we might do that day, what rituals or movement or teachings might unfold… and instead, we were invited into nothingness. And in that “nothing,” I received everything.

One day, Rose led us to a hidden waterfall. We climbed barefoot over sun-warmed rocks, feeling the earth beneath us, shedding our layers—both literal and unseen—as we reached the pools. There were no instructions, no talking. Just an invitation into silence. We slipped into the cool water, let it hold us. We played, freely, joyfully—with the waterfalls, with our bodies, with the sun and the dragonflies. Movement emerged like song. Stillness came like prayer.

It was wild, ancient, and sacred. A homecoming. 

When was the last time you spent hours, without words, just being… with women, rocks, waterfalls?

No agenda. No performance. Just presence. And if you can’t remember … or if you’ve never experienced it. Please gift yourself that. Rose’s connection with the land is intimate and reverent. It’s as though the island speaks to her, and through her, to us. She doesn’t lead with control, she follows the whispers of the earth, of where the island tells us we need to go and we get to walk with her.

I fell in love with Samothraki. It’s the most healing place I’ve ever been. So much so that I returned for six more weeks. She is medicine. And even when I’m not there, I’ve regularly felt her as a resource, from a distance.  I’ve never been in a retreat like this before. To be held by nature, truly… is to remember there’s nothing left to fix. Nothing more we need to do.

Just be. And let it in.”

— Alex