Cultivating the Joy of Aging: A Ketamine-Assisted Mindfulness Retreat
About this Retreat
Details of this retreat
“Perhaps aging is not a process of becoming less. Perhaps it is a process of remembering more.”
For much of our lives, many of us have worked very hard to be good: a good daughter or son, a good partner, a good parent, a good professional, a good citizen of whatever tribe we happened to belong to. We were so good at it that we forgot we were performing. The role became the self. Then, without asking permission, the cracks appear. A certainty dissolves. A role no longer fits. And we find ourselves asking a question that refuses to go away: what if this is not the whole story?
This retreat is an invitation to meet that question in community and to discover the unexpected joy of aging. The stories crack, the masks loosen, and beneath it all we find something ancient, something tender, and something surprisingly intact. Not a new self. The self that was waiting all along.
The retreat is open to individuals from all walks of life, ages and all levels of experience, whether you arrive with a personal intention, a professional lens, or simple curiosity. It is designed for those ready to deepen their personal growth within a supportive group setting. Together we will slow down, move gently beneath our defenses, and reconnect with the emotions we may have set aside in order to survive. Awakening contains grief: not because something is wrong, but because something is ending. We will honor the identities that carried us here even as we make room for what is emerging.
Ketamine is offered not as a mandatory component across three sessions. When chosen, it can support this process by softening defenses and reducing anxiety, allowing access to stillness, insight, and love. Many participants experience increased clarity, compassion, and a non-defensive perspective that supports meaningful transformation. Alongside the medicine work, we offer many portals for cultivating joy: meditation, breathwork, poetry, art, and time in the gardens and mountains that surround Menla. These practices open space for creativity and wonder and help create the conditions for cultivating joy.
At the heart of this retreat is the circle. Healing rarely happens in isolation. Wisdom is shared, truth ripens in community, and the group itself becomes the medicine. Again and again we watch the moment of sacred recognition arrive: the realization that we are not alone. So come. Pull up a chair. Bring your questions, your grief, and your joy. The circle is forming, and there is room for you.
Safety is our highest priority. Each participant is carefully screened to ensure readiness for the group experience and the safe, appropriate use of ketamine if chosen. This retreat is not a residential treatment program and is not appropriate for individuals experiencing an acute mental health crisis or unmanaged chronic psychiatric conditions. A medical interview is required for attendance.
Schedule:
Thursday, June 24
4 - 6 pm Check-in starts
6 - 7 pm Dinner
7 - 9 pm Evening program
Friday, June 25
7:45 - 8:30 am Meditation and yoga (optional)
8:30 - 9:30 Check-in and opening program (no breakfast)
9:30 - 10 am Meeting the medicine
10 am - 12:30 pm Ketamine session
12:30 - 1:30 pm Lunch
1:30 - 3:30 pm BREAK (book a massage or spa treatment!)
3:30 - 5:30 pm Afternoon program
6 - 7 pm Dinner
7 - 8 pm Evening workshop
9 pm Bonfire (weather permitting)
Saturday, June 26
7:45 - 8:30 a, Meditation and yoga (optional)
8:30 - 10 am Morning program (no breakfast)
10 am - 12:30 pm Ketamine session
12:30 - 1:30 pm Lunch
1:30 - 3:30 pm BREAK (book a massage or spa treatment!)
3:30 - 5:30 pm Afternoon program
6 - 7 pm Dinner
7 - 9 pm Evening workshop
9 pm Night activity
Sunday, June 27
8:15 - 11 am Check out of rooms
9 - 11 am Ketamine session (optional)
11 am - 12:30 pm Group process
12:30 - 1:30 pm Lunch
2 - 3 pm Group activity
3 pm End of program (optional stay Sunday night)
*Please note this schedule is subject to change.
Getting Here
Accommodation
Deluxe King
Deluxe Queen
Deluxe Double (Shared Room)
Standard Single - Shared Bath
Economy Premium Single - Shared Bath
Economy Single - Shared Bath
Economy Double - Shared Bath (Shared Room)
Economy Quad - Shared Bath (Shared Room)
Customer Reviews
5 Stars for an Incredible Weekend!
Beautiful but…
Let’s Talk about appropriation
However , I attended the Wisdom Warrior retreat more than once , where the leader Kareema should get one star or less. She uses names like Iylana Vanzant and others big named people to demonstrate her so called authority in knowing what she is doing. Turns out Iylana and her had a falling out.
She pretends to be oh so spiritual when all she does is appropriate. When you go to her retreats she’s expects you to work like setting up etc. She poorly plans the retreat and actually it really is not much of a retreat because her co-partner also had a falling out with Kareema and she did most of the retreat prior where it was fine much better.
Kareema picking up the coordinating , designing and more of the retreat herself demonstrated just how much she does not know what she’s doing. Total incompetence.
Furthermore she throws tantrums when she do not go her way and she is perceived by me to be manipulative and verbally and emotionally abusive. Especially when her poorly planned retreat gets someone sick. She has no saftey measures in place and no one available to support her in necessary situations . Her retreats from my experience is Not a safe space at all.
She’s about to make a professional documentary using yet another persons skills for her credit, on the wisdom warriors where it will be used to mislead people on how experienced she is and what a “Queen” she thinks she is personally.
During the retreat she actually told a head staff what she wanted and that she was going to get other staff to do it because this lead staff told her no.
I felt Menla deserves 5 stars itself but wisdom warrior retreat is a façade meaning, I felt I should state the facts as I see them so people do not blindly believe the documentary or any publicity she used to collect peoples money. That’s what she’s really about cash to cash business so she doesn’t have to claim it probably ?