Breathe with Elephants
an unforgettable breathwork retreat experience hosted
by an indigenous Karen community in the enchanting forests
of Northern Thailand
18th-25th November 2024
Embark on an unforgettable retreat experience in the enchanting forests of Northern Thailand, where ancient traditions, breathtaking landscapes, and transformative experiences await. This unique journey combines the exploration of indigenous cultures, close encounters with majestic elephants in their natural habitat, and the practice of healing breathwork.
Often times, retreats invites us into a bubble to escape, which can be powerful but often exploits those that provide their land, water, work and wisdom. Retreats should help heal not only ourselves but the land we work on, the people we interact with and the planet. This retreat will take us high into the rainforests where you will stay in a traditional, Indigenous Karen village, we will breathe together, learn together, walk into the forest together and convene with the elephants that these forests protect.
If you are in deep need of nature, of real connection, this is an affordable and sustainable way to travel. There are limited spaces of course, so if you're interested please send me a message and we can get you on this trip!
What’s Included:
Daily Sunrise Meditation and Breathwork
Guided Breathwork Journeys
Sacred Forest walks
Observational Hikes to see the Elephants
A Traditional Karen Weaving & Crafts Workshop
A Traditional Karen Cooking Workshop
Medicinal Plant Walk
Traditional Music Gathering
Accommodation at The Teak Hotel in Mae Sot (beginning and end of your trip)
Travel up to the village
Accommodation at traditional homestay for 5 nights
Daily Breakfast, lunch and dinner
Traditional Karen Village Tour
Daily Sunset meditation at The Temple
Personal Guidance on Mindfulness
Personal Guidance on Breathwork
Retreat Menu
In our collective efforts for the intersectional approach, Breathe with Elephants repair relationships with the land and nature by hosting a completely plant-based, vegan menu. Each meal will be prepared by the members of the indigenous Karen community, providing traditional meals and experiences. We will be eating collectively together each day, and have a chance to speak with and learn about their local lived experiences.
Accommodation
There are two options for boarding on this unique experience.
Homestays: You will be hosted by a local family that is participating in the programme. You will be immersed in their way of life, living within their houses and connecting with their families. This is a wonderful experience to really get an honest depiction of how others live and fully dive into an indigenous lifestyle. With this opportunity you will board with another member of the retreat.
Guest Lodge: There is a guest lodge at the top of the village. This lodging experiences allows you to have a few creature comforts and have your own private space. This is an extra £50. As the village is small, this opportunity is for shared boarding.
Both options provide hot water and a comfortable bed.
Retreats don't always need to be so self-indulgent, they can be reciprocal, loving, caring and innovative. I am so excited to share that we have three dates for 2024 for this retreat experience in the forests of northern Thailand. I am trying to cultivate a blueprint of retreating ethically that offers sustainable ways for us to travel to more remote places that work fairly and justly with the indigenous communities we are hosted by.
2024 Dates
January 22nd-28th 2024
20th-27th May
18th-24th November 2024
Price
We offer a sliding scale of £1050-£1350
Group Size
These retreats are deeply intimate as we cannot walk with too many people into the forests safely, so it is a maximum of 9 people per retreat.
Indigenous Karen Community
The Karen communities are indigenous to the area between the northern Thailand border and Myanmar. They have been subject to the ongoing war and have suffered severed families, displacement and increased levels of animosity from both states. Many members of the Karen community have had to seek refuge within the mountains and many are trapped within a naturalised refugee camp that hosts 100 000 people.
It has been nearly impossible for indigenous people to find stability, sources of income and seek independence. Many still live within their traditional settings and have little no opportunity to advance or develop.
The Karen community that we will be staying with sits atop a forest mountain and is home to 4 elephants within an area of 90 000 acres high above the refugee camp. There are 28 households and around 200 members of the community. Though they have found this place of refuge only 30 years ago, they have maintained their traditional ways of life and their ancient relationships to the forest and the elephants.
‘Mahout’ means ‘the one who walks with elephants’. The indigenous Karen community are known to have cultivated a long-lasting loving relationship with elephants. One that dates back centuries.
This community maintains the tradition and we get a chance to immerse ourselves in the rich cultural heritage of the indigenous Karen community that call these forests home. We will have the opportunity to engage with local people and learn about their lives, traditions, customs, and their struggles. Through immersive experiences, we’ll gain insights into their profound connection with nature and discover the wisdom that has been passed down through generations despite their lived oppressions.
Joining Breathe with Elephants, you will have the opportunity to support this community directly, help sustain their way of life and help fund the preservation of these forests through the support of the elephants.
The Mahouts Elephant Foundation
The Mahouts Elephant Foundation rescue elephants caught in the tourism industry and introduce them to protected forest in our projects across Thailand. Their approach ensures that elephants, the forest and the local community benefit. Elephant tourism is rife in Thailand, and many exploit the animals and forces them to engage in activities outside of their nature. Asian elephants are the original forest gardeners, they are climbers, planters, composters and fertilisers of the thousands of acres of forests within that region. Unfortunately, many have been forced into the tourist industry leaving the forest for logging. The efforts to rescue these elephants and return them to their natural habitat as forest gardeners is a noble one.
The support of elephants within this region have multifaceted consequences that are beneficial to many parties. When an elephant gets rescued and returned, it protects the forests. It bans deforestation and protects our already endangered rainforests. Secondly, these elephants are rescued and returned back to their traditional symbiotic relationship with their human communities, this brings people back to the village. The Mahout Elephant Foundation helps support these communities and gives the local people and opportunity to support the livelihoods.
About the Teacher
Hannah Kendaru is an Indonesian-British Breathwork Practitioner and Breathwork Trainer with 8 years of experience rooted in embodied social justice and decolonial healing.
She approaches intergenerational, historical, institutional, and personal trauma through an embodied lens, implementing specific breathwork techniques, the conscious-connected breath, and embodiment to bring us back into the deep remembrance of what love, liberation, and justice means.
She uses the breath to remember our connection to the earth, to our lineages, and ancestors—decolonising and indigenising our “civilised” minds, bodies, and spirits.
Find out more about Hannah.
Hear what others have said about the experience:
“This was a profound experience of breathwork, nature and community. It was exactly the kind of retreat I was looking for and I feel restored, nourished, re-aligned and ready to take what I have learned (mostly gentleness and patience, among other things) back to my clients and community. Hannah’s work is revolutionary and essential.”