Cultivating Kindness: A Women’s Retreat of Mindful Self-Compassion through Practice, Writing, and Movement
With Susan Steinberg-Oren, Christine Suarez and Lesley Hyatt
September 25 - 28, 2025
A retreat for women and women-identified folks. Open to both beginning and experienced practitioners.
Registration for this retreat closes on September 10, 2025 at 11:59pm Pacific Time. If looking to join after this date, please inquire at guestservices@bigbearretreatcenter.org.
Through mindful self-compassion, reflective writing, and movement, we will connect with each other and ourselves, cultivating and deepening our capacity to move through our lives with loving awareness. Come together with other women and woman-identified folks to explore practices that help us find compassion and kindness when we face stressful situations, painful emotions, and challenging relationships.
Our framework builds upon teachings and core practices from the Mindful Self-Compassion program. As a safe and caring community, we’ll engage with MSC’s principle concepts of mindfulness, common humanity, and kindness to self, deepening our engagement with reflective and imaginative writings and joyful, expansive movement.
This 4-day and 3-night retreat will include personal and relational practices with time for rest, journaling, and exploring nature in the beautiful surroundings at Big Bear Retreat Center. There will be silent time in the early morning for contemplative meditation, and evenings will be varied with reflective writing, movement, a sound bath, and dance.
You’ll leave the retreat with new tools to face life’s challenges, a transformed relationship to yourself, and friends to share the journey of cultivating kindness.
WHAT IS A RELATIONAL MINDFULNESS RETREAT?
Mindfulness and nature-based Relational Retreats and Workshop Intensives at BBRC are a different style of retreat than a silent meditation retreat. They are more interactive while still holding similar themes of connection with self, each other, and nature. The intention is to cultivate a mindful awareness that can be integrated into our everyday lives. Read more here on what to expect and sample schedule.
GENEROSITY
Retreat Cost & Fees:
Registration fees for this retreat support the cost of developing and offering BBRC programs, which include lodging, meals, and staff compensation. Teacher compensation for this retreat is included in your registration fees. We price fees to make programs as financially accessible as possible.
Is cost a barrier? Nobody is turned away at Big Bear Retreat Center due to finances. We ask that financial assistance be prioritized for those who self-identify as BIPOC, hold marginalized identities, or are in financial need. For more information, please contact us at guestservices@bigbearretreatcenter.org.
FEEL WELCOME AND INCLUDED: A PLACE TO BELONG
Our intention is to be as accessible as we can, even in ways that we may not be aware of yet. We hope this is a space of inclusivity where people feel welcome and held. For us, it is a practice of consistent attunement, presence and care to our community. However you identify – race, gender, sexuality, disability, mental health, and so on – it is our wish to meet your needs for belonging.
Please consider this about our environment:
- The center is on a hill with outdoor walkways between dining, gathering, and residential spaces.
- We are located at an elevation of 6,500 feet altitude in a ski town in the mountains of Southern California.
- We experience weather of all four seasons.
- We are located about 2 hours from Los Angeles and near 3 major airports. Learn more about getting here.
- We have a commitment to everyone’s mobility needs. Please contact us about ADA accessibility.
See our FAQs for more detailed information on accessibility to our campus and programs.
SIMPLE YET COMFORTABLE, NESTLED IN NATURE
Simple and elegant lodgings to support rest and renewal. Our rooms are uniquely designed to offer comfort, convenience, and simplicity. All of our cabins are surrounded by nature with forest sights and sounds. Lodgings are a short walk from spaces for dining and gathering. See a video tour of a cabin.
Our Meditation Hall is spaciously designed to provide an atmosphere that feels deeply integrated with nature and the surrounding forest. The versatile space is conducive for meditation, movement, workshops, training, and other community gatherings.
Food that nourishes to support healing, restoration, and community. Our organic and seasonally inspired menus feature creative and nourishing vegetarian meals, tailored to support meditative practices. We use fresh and locally-sourced ingredients when possible. Lunch is the most substantial meal of the day and dinner is lighter. Our indoor and outdoor dining hall is open 24/7 with self-service coffee, tea and healthy snack options.
HEAR MORE ABOUT BIG BEAR RETREAT CENTER
Big Bear Retreat Center is exceptional in every way. The accommodations are outstanding, food exceptional, staff very responsive and helpful and the teachers are always so loving and knowledgeable. Just a top notch retreat experience!! – Sheila
I love Big Bear Retreat Center. It’s my dharma home away from home. Everything about it – staff, teachers, food, accommodations, setting – is exceptional. A true gift to the community!!
Big Bear Retreat Center is indeed a refuge. A safe space to open your heart. – Laura
Teachers & Facilitators
Since 1990, Susan Steinberg-Oren, PhD has been a clinical psychologist at the Greater Los Angeles VA Healthcare System (VAGLAHCS) where she has worked in many different areas including Substance Abuse, Women’s Mental Health, Trauma, and Comprehensive and Integrative Health. In 2010, she started her own deep dive into mindfulness where she found wisdom and healing not afforded to her through traditional psychology training or technique. She became a Mindful Self-Compassion (MSC) trained teacher through the Center for Mindful Self-Compassion in 2020 and has provided MSC groups to Veterans ever since. She became a certified Mindfulness Teacher in 2021 through InsightLA. …
Learn more about Susan Steinberg-Oren
Christine Suárez is a choreographer, performer, educator and Pilates instructor based in Los Angeles. Born in Caracas, Venezuela & raised in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, she has an unshakable faith in the transformative power of moving & creating together. She has been awarded grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture, & California Arts Council. Her work has been seen in theaters, galleries, churches, synagogues, houses, sidewalks, parks, and beaches in over 20 cities -including P.S. 122 (New York), REDCAT (Los Angeles) and The Schwartz Theater (Atlanta). She is co-creator of Dance for…
Learn more about Christine Suarez
Lesley Hyatt has been teaching students of all ages and backgrounds for over thirty years. She leads creative workshops and mindfulness groups at UCLA Ext Writers Program, Skirball Cultural Center, and privately throughout the L.A. area and on Zoom. A writer of fiction and creative nonfiction, Lesley holds an MFA from UMass, Amherst and was a Fulbright Scholar to Mexico. She became a mindfulness meditation student in the late 1990’s. Lesley began leading mindfulness groups in 2017 and is a certified mindfulness instructor, trained to teach Trauma Sensitive Mindfulness, Awakening Joy, and Mindful Self-Compassion. Lesley lives in Studio City, CA,…
Learn more about Lesley Hyatt