...Prior to this retreat, my experience with Buddhism was limited to Zen, and I so appreciated the perspective that my Vallecitos retreat gave me. I left the retreat with a renewed sense of love for the Dharma. I left feeling inspired and joyous, and wanting to tell anyone who would listen about the amazing experience I had.

...Vallecitos has always been one of my spiritual homes. It is a place where I have learned so much about the refuge of wilderness. It is where I have discovered so much about my own nature, from the wildness of nature there. Not only is it exquisitely beautiful and pristine, it is also profoundly serene and a place of deep renewal. I feel so blessed to have been able to visit every year for the past twenty years. I am eternally grateful for that land.

...17 years ago, I received an invitation to sit for 10 days of silence at Vallecitos.  I accepted the invitation with no idea of the lasting impact the retreat would have on me.  Over the years, the annual pilgrimage has provided me with tools to sustain and deepen my ongoing mediation practice. Sweeping fields of wildflowers, star-dotted nights, and bubbling streams provide a unique opportunity to directly experience interconnectedness.   This gentle, wild setting is a profound environment to recharge mind, spirit, and body.

...This experience has reminded me that it isn't just our human communities that can hold us on our path in moments of transformation, anguish, unknowing, but the more-than-human world is one of the most important teachers and an important home to continue to come back to.

...I had a tremendous experience at Vallecitos, which is one of the most rewarding and positive things I’ve done within my lifetime. I have incorporated many of the things I learned into my daily life, and it has been very healthy for me. I had to experience loving kindness, sympathetic joy and generosity to understand the full power and grace of these profound feelings and actions.

...My connection to sangha and retreat spaces has been on hold since the pandemic, so it's been five years since my last retreat. This is such an important part of practice, and really only accessible when centers can make accommodations for folks with food sensitivities (also me) and financial limitations. I wouldn't have been able to consider attending without financial support, and I feel such a strong reconnection now to my practice and myself. 

...The time and the space to reflect and cultivate inner calm were so valuable. This was a very healing experience for me. It also started me on the practice of meditating. I meditate every day now, just for 10 minutes, but it makes a huge difference in my everyday life and with work.

...I am so much more aware of the path I want to be on and the power of the sacred in my life.

...I cannot express in words alone how important the retreat was for me. One of the most valuable lessons I learned is the importance of listening to my inner self. Vallecitos provided the necessary environment that makes it impossible not to go inward. When I returned home, I hit the ground running, but with a more focused direction. I attribute that to my stay at Vallecitos.

...I was teaching at Vallecitos one year in August, during the meteor showers. Our sensitivity heightened by hours of silent meditation, we would stand outside at night and watch trails of light cross the vast dark sky, signs from what I call the Greater Reality. Unforgettable.

...The view of the Aspen trees outside my casita, the cool silent mornings of meditation, the warmth of the lodge, and the exquisite majesty of the land created a gentle but powerful impression... in one short visit I have come to treasure Vallecitos.

...I came to Vallecitos for a retreat years ago and fell in love with it.  Now as a volunteer and yogi I try to come back every summer to soak up the stunning landscapes as well as the rich dharma.  This place truly calls me home.

...Since the retreat, my pace of personal breakthroughs has quickened and old dynamics seem to be changing in positive ways. I am better able to deal with previously tense situations and successfully resolve them. I have increased feelings of peace. Thank you!

...The retreat experience helped ground me after four turbulent and scary months, and it gave me a useful set of tools to persist and hopefully thrive in my field in the long term. Also, I need to note that the food was incredible -- the cooks are talented people. The whole experience was wonderful and I really can't recommend it enough.

...Vallecitos has truly become a home to me. Working with such great teachers and mentors is an honor and being able to absorb all the knowledge and blessings that flow through the gorgeous land has shaped my soul and nourished my mind. It really is a magical place that I am forever grateful for.