CO-llaborate – Couple’s Retreat in Costa Rica

March 23-30, 2025

Imagine spending eight days and seven nights on a small, yet lush,12-acre farm located in Alajuela Province, San Mateo, Costa Rica, a world away from the distractions of modern life. Surrounded by the breathtaking beauty of nature, you’ll experience an immersive CO-llaborate couple’s retreat emphasizing embodied practices of moving, touching, reflecting, and communicating. Guided practices are curated to promote a (w)holistic integration of aspects of the self (i.e., body, mind, spirit, energy) and a (re)connection with the natural world and a romantic partner, fostering increased intimacy between all three.

On the farm, you’ll enjoy nourishing food planted, grown, harvested, and cooked on-site. You and your partner will enjoy living and sleeping next to the earth in a spacious, comfortable glamping tent. In various embodied workshops, you will explore what it means to approach the human body and the earth as living partners of a sacred reality, co-creating and sustaining all physical and spiritual life. You’ll employ techniques and practices of spirituality, somatic movement (e.g., dance, contact improvisation, classical Chinese qigong, internal martial arts), and sustainable organic eco-farming to clarify your physical, emotional, and spiritual needs as individuals and couples. In doing so, you will learn to recognize and appreciate your vulnerabilities, reduce your emotional dependency on others, connect with various aspects of yourself to receive healing and guidance from within, cultivate and foster loving communication, and learn how to work through any hurt or resentment that may be hindering your relationship(s).

Retreat Options

If you are ready to reimagine intimacy with your partner through movement and touch surrounded by natural beauty and a supportive and joyful community, please join us for a transformative retreat that promises to revitalize your intimacy and develop your spiritual connection by rooting your relationship in your bodies and the earth.

• Couple’s Retreat 2025 – $1600PP
  March 23-30, 2025. A world away from the distractions of modern life. Surrounded by the breathtaking beauty of nature, you’ll experience an immersive CO-llaborate couple’s retreat emphasizing embodied practices of moving, touching, reflecting, and communicating. Guided practices are curated to promote a (w)holistic integration of aspects of the self and a (re)connection with the natural world and a romantic partner, fostering increased intimacy between all three. Register Now

• Couple’s Retreat 2026 – $1900PP (estimated)
  Can’t travel in 2025? No space left 2025? Join us in 2026! Same as 2025 with updated modifications. RSVP Now

• Self Care Intensive 2027 – $2100PP (estimated)
  A world away from the distractions of modern life. Surrounded by the breathtaking beauty of nature, you’ll experience an immersive restorative retreat emphasizing embodied practices of moving, being, energizing, and renewing. Guided practices are curated to promote a (w)holistic integration of aspects of the self and a (re)connection with the natural world, self, and body fostering increased vitality between all three.

Practices and topics will include (among others):

• Meditation

• Contemplation

• Qigong

• Somatic Movement/Dance

• Contact Improvisation

• Permaculture

• Herbalism

• Regenerative living

La Huerta in Costa Rica

La Huerta is a lush,12-acre farm located in Alajuela Province, Costa Rica that operates according to the ethical values and design principles of permaculture—a balanced, whole systems approach to community building and farming that promotes regenerative and restorative relationships between humans, nonhumans, and the earth. The folks at La Huerta implement efficient water harvesting and management systems, soil improvement processes, composting, effective use and re-use of resources, and edible landscape design. Working in community, they encourage recognition of the interconnection of all living beings and thus, foster health and healing in mind, body, and spirit in relationship with neighbors, visitors, and the other than human world.

Meet Your Facilitators

Brenda Haris

Brenda promotes health through a synchronized balance of movement and stillness. She is an acupuncturist and Chinese medicine provider who works to ignite the body’s innate ability to be strong, content, and joyful in daily actions to live the fullest life possible. Brenda holds a Masters degree, is nationally accredited and board certified. Her education emphasized scholarship and clinical practice, in East Asian philosophy and biomedical science, informed by classical texts and infused with case discussion and lineage transmission. Brenda’s long time practice of medicine, qigong, Yijing, and herbalism is her way of living and guide for helping others to Be Vital Now! ™

Jane Hawley

Jane’s research with Movement Fundamentals® (MF) investigates how the body is experienced as a primary source through guided phases of somatic improvisation integrating body, mind, and spirit for selfhood and artistry. Inspired to educate dancers as artists and empower people to love and feel gratitude for their bodies, she developed Movement Fundamentals as a creative, regenerative, and inclusive practice to challenge traditional dance training while inviting uncommon trans-disciplinary collaboration. The MF curriculum and paradigm have been presented nationally and internationally and in March 2019, Jane and MF alumni developed the Movement Fundamentals Institute for certification and ongoing research. Please visit: https://movementfundamentals.org/

Scott Hurley

Scott has studied martial arts for over twenty years and is currently studying internal Chinese martial arts, qigong, and Yijing (I-Ching) divination with Master Wu Zhongxian. He does Yijing readings for people upon request and has been teaching qigong and internal Chinese martial arts for ten years through the Acupuncture Center Decorah. He also is an associate professor at Luther College, teaching in the Identity Studies and Religion departments. His work focuses on issues of identity and power, Buddhist and Daoist practice in the twentieth century, self-cultivation and the body in physical culture and martial arts, and human-nonhuman animal relations.

Guy Nave

Guy Nave is a religious scholar and practitioner whose research and scholarship focus on the intersection of religion and social justice. This interest is part of a larger focus that explores and challenges socially constructed binaries and dichotomies—especially between so-called “material” and “spiritual” realities. Guy explores how these dichotomies often hinder us from living fully in the moment with awareness and appreciation for the “fluidity” of our existence as physical and spiritual beings. Guy believes awareness of this fluidity helps us better recognize our interconnectedness with each other and all of creation.