Take Me Back to Eden

Eden on the Chocolata is not just a hotel, but a yoga retreat. It was one of the only ‘affordable’ ones we could find, and availability was really limited, which meant we could only wedge in three nights. We had to do a higgledy piggledy route around Nicaragua to see stuff in the north before heading back down south to it, before leaving the country from the north again. But oh how it was all worth it, and I’m really grateful to James for not just suggesting it, but being up for it. Even when it meant dancing around like lunatics at 8am! In this post you’ll get to hear from both of us, for reasons that I think will become clear.

But first, a round up of the pictures and our itinerary of what turned out to be way more than a quick yoga retreat.

Day 1

• Welcome from Samana and fruit smoothie
• Get settled into our huge cabin, a palace compared to our Aloha shack!
• Meet Chelsea and Jack in the beautiful pool
• Enjoy a quick swim
• Receiving a warning about the intensity of the upcoming breath workshop and how we must go ‘all in’ to get the most out of it…
• Breathing workshop with Remy, one of the founders of the retreat
• Family-style three-course dinner meeting everyone else
• Finding a scorpion in our bed frame

Day 2

• Yoga at 7:30am, learn how to do warrior poses correctly and stretch muscles we didn’t know we had
• Delicious fresh fruit, cooked breakfast and juice
• Call to wish Heather a Happy Birthday from the yoga shala
• Laze about by the pool, practice getting comfortable getting my head under water, practice jumping in the water (where James doesn’t let go of my hand this time 😜)
• Head over to The Space hostel opposite for an unhealthy lunch of schnitzel, burger, chips and frappuccino
• Read and chillout in a giant loveseat in The Space
• Back to Eden for a Cacao Ceremony run by Samana, writing down and throwing things we want to let go into the fire, sharing vulnerabilities
• Another wonderful 3-course dinner
• Early to bed

Day 3

• ‘Freestyle Friday’ yoga at 7:30, including a dance around the shala
• Wonderful brekkie
• James checks out the ‘jungle gym’ and calls John back home, I finish The Gunslinger (book)
• More swims and lazing around
• Back to The Space for unhealthy pizza, club sandwich and a brownie, swim about in their pool
• Wind-down yoga at the shala
• 3-course dinner of chickpea curry
• Play Bananagrams (James won)

Day 4

• Final morning yoga session including doing the splits!
• Last family breakfast
• Saying goodbye to all the wonderful people we met
• Onto León…

My Experience (Alex)

For some reason (my money is on a consistent lack of proper sleep), my mental health at Popoyo wasn’t at its best. Falling back into negative thought patterns and unsure how to get out of them. Thankfully, our trip to Eden provided a perfectly timed opportunity to break down not just my negative thoughts from Popoyo, but potentially a lifetime of them.

Our breathwork workshop with Remy involved learning about the benefits of nasal breathing, a couple of different breathing exercises to either wake you up or calm you down, and a round of holotropic breathing. If anyone saw the BBC series with Wim Hoff, it’s the part of that where everyone lays on their backs, hyperventilates, the facilitator gives you affirming statements, some people have breakdowns wailing and sobbing, and you scream into the air. Repeat. The experience can cause some people to hallucinate, and can make you feel physically uncomfortable. Remy gave us some tips for what to do if we want to control our experience… but we’re only here once, and after Popoyo, it was time to go all in. Whilst I didn’t hallucinate, the rest followed much of the celebrities on the BBC series. It provided not just a physical relief (by crying and screaming) but a mental one, having some profound realisations about myself, and also how fortunate I am having James in my corner. At the end, Remy brought us back to ‘ground’ telling us to visualise someone we were grateful for, someone we love, and someone we forgave. As I sat up, I realised the physical effects the breathing had had, as though I had been out drinking and unable to co-ordinate myself or stand up. Nothing to do then but crawl over to James, have a big hug, and watch the amazing scene in front of us of the sunset yellow haze, the birds gliding around, the waves rolling into the bay, as the levels of whatever in our brain returned to normal and I began to process what I’d experienced. What a first day!

The second profound experience for me was at the cacao ceremony run by Samana. We sat around the fire pit, flowers strewn around, as she lovingly poured cacao into mugs and handed them out to each of us. It had a bitter taste to it that was nothing like a hot chocolate, but was filling and tasty. If yesterday was about realising my own worth and strength in undo-ing a lifetime of poor mental pathways, this day was about realising the work to be done to finding those new pathways to self-love. Our time was spent with Samana and some of the rest of our group asking profound questions, such as our takeaways from our time there, our greatest moment in our lives, our biggest fear, and who we are grateful for, and each member of the group providing their answers. Everyone was so open and vulnerable in their answers, it was kind of contagious. To steal a comment from Chelsea in our group, these are normally the kinds of deep and meaningful conversations you might have at 2am in the kitchen after a long night partying on your substance of choice, and here we all were sharing such deep vulnerabilities after nothing more than some cocoa. Samana explains how much care and love she puts into making the cacao drink, to pass that on to us all who receive it. It’s something she drinks every day, and reading up about it later, I find out cacao does also have some physical benefits to it.

Alongside these two profound experiences, it was just a magical space to be in and wonderful to have a yoga teacher like Samana not just improve my understanding of how to hold certain poses, but in opening up our spiritual sides, and an example of blissful calm and true self-confidence in your skin. The ‘confessions’ of our group also showed how much we all have in common, with shared fears and concerns. One share from a member of our group is one I particularly wanted to include, from someone who had found the troubles and sadness of the world overwhelming and wandering how they can make any difference. Their advice. Start local. Smile at a cashier, talk to a neighbour, don’t underestimate the power of the little things.

So that’s where I am now. Still with a lot of work to do, but with a renewed hope and perspective on how to get there, rewiring those pathways, with my best cheerleader by my side (and this blog!), serving as a reminder for all that I can be.

James’s Experience

First the breath workshop. Very interesting stuff, some nasal breathing exercises similar to what we’ve learned at Chasing Lights combined with the methods made famous by Wim Hof.

Remy believes in the importance of nasal breathing so much that he tapes his mouth shut at night to ensure he breathes through his nose while sleeping (do not try this at home).

My healthy stress release is running, my unhealthy one is drinking booze!

Right then, the main event. The Holotropic breathing was one of the most intense experiences of my life, both physically and mentally. This practice digs deep into the mind palace… some rooms you love to revisit, happy memories with loved ones, friends and family, thoughts of hope, joy and bliss; other rooms have had their doors closed for a long time, memories of rejection, trauma, depression and anxiety thoughts of sadness, fear and guilt.

During all of this is an orator reminding me between tracks of elevating music that this isn’t supposed to be easy. You need to put in the hard yards and feel uncomfortable to be born again. I now see why we were warned about this experience.

Compared to some people who do this practice to relieve deep psychological scars, I didn’t feel like I had a burden of trauma that needed to be processed. I’ve got pretty good at dealing with my demons and I’ve been blessed with a loving family and great friends. I’m at a much better time in my life than I have been in the past.

It was moving though, a mental marathon, ploughing through acres of memories. Feeling like you’ve been through the ringer and thrown out the other side. I went as deep as I dared to go and still feel comfortable, my hands and feet felt really numb so I had to come down a bit and revert to the less intense nasal breathing. I screamed, I cried, I felt like something had been released even if I didn’t know quite what it was. 34 years of experiences and memories processed in one intense hour.

During the practice we had to choose a happy thought, I thought of a group hug with my Mum, Dad and Sister. A thought of someone we love, I thought of Alex smiling on a sunny beach. A thought of someone to forgive, I forgave myself for all of the times I’d been my own worst enemy.

After it was over, I slowly crawled over to Alex and embraced her as we watched the beautiful sun set, both of us with damp eyes, clearer minds and elevated spirits.

Cacao Ceremony

I enjoyed throwing something into the fire I wanted to let go of, as we sat around the warm fire pit and sipped the delicious cacao.

It was a beautiful and moving experience to share what are often our most private and sacred thoughts and fears with a group full of strangers. Speaking about things in front of Alex that I’d always been too scared or ashamed to say before. Even the most confident, self-assured people have anxieties, regrets and fears. There was a commonality between all of us around that campfire, from all walks of life and everyone’s personal history, the good, the bad and the ugly.

I said I was grateful to be travelling, to have this opportunity to see the world, meet amazing people and embark on new experiences.

My takeaway from Eden is to be more in touch with my spiritual side. A lot of my ways of dealing with mental health back home are physical, going for a run or to the gym etc. Sometimes all it takes is some nasal breathing and a minute of inner reflection.

The best moment in my life was to keep going when the storm clouds gathered, when I was down I knew if I just kept going that the dark would eventually turn to light. From that I’ve been able to enjoy a marathon, a triathlon, drinks with friends, holidays, adventures with my family, meeting Alex and many, many more moments.

My biggest fear is not having the confidence to be myself and looking back with regrets about this.

Something that makes me unique is getting people involved. Whether that’s bringing friends and family to a running crew or simply rallying the troops for a night out.

The thing I love most about myself is my willpower, it’s how I got through the bad times to enjoy the good and here I am loving life on this trip of a lifetime.

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Adventure – Exploring The Space, floating about in the pools, exploring parts of our minds we hadn’t explored before

Excitement – Staying in a room we can stand up in, having an actual wardrobe!, the amazing food (and eating everyone’s leftovers)

Trauma – The hotel worker bashing the scorpion with a padlock, bludgeoning it’s tail off after promising to ‘ethically remove it’.