A 3-Day Restorative Experience with Arisa White, Melissa Small Cooper, and Isabel Saez

Friday, August 21 – Sunday, August 23, 2026

The Garrison Institute, New York

Registration Link: https://www.garrisoninstitute.org/event/the-unburdening-an-expressive-arts-retreat/

Cost: $785

The Unburdening retreat offers those who identify as BIPOC women of color, a chance to reconnect with themselves and remember that our imaginations hold the power to make new futures.

Why Join

The psychological malaise caused by living in America is peculiar and heavy, and intergenerationally held. As BIPOC women, we feel this. In today’s world of white supremacy, racism, xenophobia, and genocide—we are often operating on our last nerve. What we truly need is care for ourselves. This care allows us to set down our burdens, remove our armor, and finally breathe. It helps our hearts find grounding in the dark depths that grow our potential.

We invite you to this three-day retreat to unburden and recreate with the intelligent beauty of your body, mind, and spirit. You will explore somatic attunement to the body’s wisdom. You will have the opportunity to enjoy the summer sun and wander the gardens and forest. Portions of the retreat will be held in silence, providing space to listen deeply to yourself and find the voice that may have been quieted or overlooked in your daily life.

What You Will Gain

• Reconnection with yourself through expressive movement and theater, poetry, painting, and bookbinding
• Tools for regulating the nervous system through creativity breathwork, chanting, meditation, and gentle movement
• Discovery of how process-based art-making serves as a mirror for the self, guiding you toward a deeper, more authentic alignment with your emotions
• A deep remembering that you are creative, a dreamer, and that your imagination holds the power to make new futures

What We Will Do

• Arriving: Ground into the space and into each other. Begin setting down what you’ve been carrying.
• Moving: Through Kundalini yoga, expressive arts, contemplative practice, and somatic exploration woven across the three days. Each experience is an invitation to listen more deeply to yourself.
• Resting: Time in creative stillness. Time in artful absorption. Time in nature. Time that belongs entirely to you.
• Returning: A closing that honors what has shifted and prepares you to carry it forward.
• All practices are optional, trauma-informed, and accessible regardless of prior experience.

Who Should Attend

This retreat is for BIPOC women who are ready to set down their burdens and finally breathe. Especially relevant if you are:

• Feeling the weight of living in a body the world does not always make room for
• Carrying grief, exhaustion, or stress that has built up over time
• Longing to remember what pleasure, rest, and joy feel like in your own body
• Seeking connection with others who understand what it means to hold space for others, and are ready to remember what it feels like to be held
• Ready to remember that your creativity, dreaming, and imagination are sources of power
• Craving beauty, play, stillness, and the company of people who get it

No prior experience with yoga, meditation, or expressive arts is needed.

Our Commitment: We cultivate a respectful, contemplative space that honors diverse experiences, identities, and backgrounds. All practices are optional and trauma-informed. You are invited to participate in whatever way serves your well being.

Questions? Contact us at CBRProject@garrisoninstitute.org Learn more about CBR: www.garrisoninstitute.org/programs/contemplative-based-resilience