Turning Towards the Soul

Choosing your accommodation

 Each space at Pachawa has its own character. If you have a preference, please let us know when booking and we will do our best to accommodate your choice, subject to availability. Accommodation preferences will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis.

 To enquire about availability and our initial screening questionnaire, please contact us at:

turningtowardthesoul@gmail.com

 After the initial call and screening process to ensure this is the right retreat for you, to secure your place we require:

• A non-refundable deposit of £280,

• Followed by 50% of the remaining on the 5th of February 2027.

• With the outstanding amount due on the 5th of April 2027.  

Your hosts

Leah

From my early twenties, I felt drawn towards exploring more spiritual ways of being, although I did not fully understand that pull at the time. After completing my degree, I went on to study a Masters in Psychoanalytic Studies. I valued the richness of the subject but found it did not fully capture the layers I was trying to reach and understand in myself. I was always very curious and pulled by the mystical dimensions of being human as well as our more western ways of understanding our inner worlds.

In my mid twenties, I began working in social care with young people while training in Eastern traditions of bodywork and began studying more contemporary psychotherapy. I settled as a Thai yoga massage therapist and began my training to become an integrative psychotherapist. The more relational, contemporary and transpersonal approaches of psychotherapy offered me new ways of understanding myself and the world around me.

 Yet, there came a time around twelve years ago, where I was drawn to explore shamanic perspectives of healing alongside psychotherapy. I began to learn about the old ways of being and plant medicines. How our ancestors worked through life in relationship with nature, spirit, ceremony and ritual as ways of honouring the spiritual elements of nature and who we are as stewards on this planet. This satiated a part of me psychotherapy had not been able to; though, I know the reason I arrived here is in part because of what therapy enabled in me.

 I went on to train as a shamanic practitioner, learning from the traditions of the land I come from, the land I live on and those of others. I have also worked with various plant medicines from Europe and South America, spending time learning from teachers both in human and plant form. I have also completed a two year psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy training.

 Today, my respect for psychotherapy is interwoven with a deep commitment, reverence and fundamental need for a more spiritual connection to all that surrounds us and each other. These are the forces I believe can support meaningful inner and outer change. In the current poly crises this feels a crucial time to try to play a part, in however small a way, stepping towards a kinder and more peaceful world within each of us and the collective.

Rebecca

Before completing my MA in Integrative Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy in my early forties, I gained a degree and diploma in social work and trained as a probation officer, specialising in training and group work addressing male-perpetrated domestic abuse. This experience inspired me to work therapeutically with children affected by trauma.

 I subsequently worked in practice-management roles across youth offending services and statutory children's social care, including child protection, leaving care and safeguarding. I later became a therapy team manager for an adoption charity, combining my social work and therapeutic experience to provide therapy to adopted children and their adoptive parents affected by attachment loss and relational and developmental trauma.

 Alongside this work, I gained further qualifications in Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy and trauma-informed yoga and undertook training in Theraplay and nature therapy.

 Growing up near the Peak District, surrounded by ancient woodland, rivers and rolling hills, I developed an early connection to sacred places in nature and a fascination with shamanic and magical practices. Over the past decade, I have deepened this connection through shamanic approaches, animistic ritual and ceremony as part of my own healing and spiritual practice.

 My experience includes pilgrimages, vigils and participation in ceremonial and healing circles, both with and without plant teachers. I have also trained as a shamanic initiate and studied within wisdom schools drawing on Brythonic and North and South American traditions.

 I am passionate about living in a way that honours the natural world, expresses gratitude and serves the communities to which I belong. In both my daily reflective and land-based spiritual practices and my private therapeutic work, I bring these values together with psychological approaches and animistic ways of relating to the world.