The Essence of Being – Young Adults
The Essence of Being
Young Adults (18 – 30) Retreat with Deepa Gulrukh Patel & Jacob Miraj Ellenberg
Week 3C, August 6th – 12th, 2023
“When the unreality of life pushes against my heart, its door opens to the reality.” – Hazrat Inayat Khan
Sometimes life starts to feel curiously unreal. Between wars, climate change, comparing ourselves to others, being lost in scrolling, and feeling at the mercy of institutional power, we might ask ourselves: Is this all life is? Is this reality?
The wise people throughout all traditions, cultures, and eras have answered: No, there is more.
According to the wise, not only is the world more than it seems, but at your core, you are more than you seem.
Join us this summer as we explore Sufi approaches to reconnecting with the essence of being. In the essence, we find freedom from the unreality of life. And in that freedom, we find the joy of becoming who we’ve always known we truly are.
We will work with the breath, movement, mantric yoga, the invocation of sacred phrases, journaling, inquiry and guided meditations and contemplations for the heart as passed along through eastern and western mystical traditions.
Deepa Gulrukh Patel is a campaigner and facilitator with a special interest in the arts, interdisciplinary collaboration, contemplation, diversity, and equality: working with organisations like the BBC, ActionAid and the Arts Council of England. Deepa has been a student of the inner life since her teens and is the director of Zenith Camp. She is also currently working with the Helen Storey Foundation on a variety of projects with Syrian refugees in Jordan at the Zaatari Refugee camp. Volunteering is important part of her life; in the UK she is Chair of Tamasha Theatre Company and The Loss Foundation, a charity that supports people bereaved by cancer. In the USA she is an advisor to the New Monastic Foundation.
Jacob Ellenberg has been a student of Sufism for 20 years. He has 15 years’ experience in founding start-ups and working with them and Fortune 250 companies in the fields of organizational strategy, video production, marketing, and storytelling. Jacob holds a BA from New York University in Mysticism and Organizational Behaviour.
