Sanctum: Bali Retreat
April 22nd - April 26th, 2026 • Nyuh Kuning Village, Ubud, Bali, Indonesia
A retreat on self-compassion in relationship
So many of us move through life carrying more than anyone can see — tending, holding, giving, reaching — until the relationship that falters most quietly is the one we have with ourselves. We lose track of our own longings. We override our limits. We forget the sound of our own inner voice. And somewhere in that slow drift away from ourselves, connection with others becomes heavier than it needs to be.
Sanctum is for anyone who feels that something needs to shift — not in their productivity or their plans, but in the quiet interior space where worth, belonging, and boundaries live. If you’re ready for a deeper, more honest relationship with yourself that can reshape the way you connect, Sanctum offers the space to explore it.
Sanctum is a contemplative, evidence-informed retreat exploring how self-compassion shapes the way we love, connect, and stay centred in relationship.
Led by therapist, compassion researcher, and contemplative teacher Dr Amy Finlay-Jones, Sanctum is a four-day immersion into the profound work of transforming how you relate to yourself — and through that, how you relate to the people in your life. This retreat offers a rare chance to pause, listen inward, and rebuild your relational foundations from a place of integrity and self-respect.
Set in Nyuh Kuning — a village shaped by ritual, community, and the daily gestures of devotion — we explore what it means to meet ourselves with the same tenderness we so readily offer others. Through compassion-based practice, relational inquiry, somatic grounding, and culturally rooted encounters, we explore how to stay open without losing ourselves, how to repair without abandoning ourselves, and how to love in ways that honour the truth of who we are.
This is a retreat for those who feel everything deeply, who give easily, who long for connection yet find themselves tired from the weight of it. For those who want boundaries that feel alive rather than defensive; who want relationships that breathe. For those who sense that compassion is not a soft skill but a way of belonging to life with their whole being.
Here, you’re invited to listen — with the body, with the breath, with the part of you that already knows the path home. You’re guided into an awareness that restores dignity to your inner world and creates room for repair, reconnection, and genuine intimacy.
Sanctum is where you tend the relationship you have with yourself, so the relationships around you can become steadier, warmer, and more true.
What to expect
What your days will look like
Early Mornings
We begin the day in the soft light of Nyuh Kuning — meditation, gentle movement, breath, and writing to bring you back into conversation with yourself.
Late Morning
Compassion sessions follow: relational inquiry, somatic grounding, and practices that reveal how we relate to ourselves and how that echoes outward into our relationships.
Midday Following this session, we share lunch, family style, after which the day widens. Optional one-to-one sessions or massage may be woven into the early afternoon.
Mid Morning
Early morning sessions are followed by a shared breakfast by the pool, accompanied by the sound of birdsong and the inimitable smell of Balinese dupa (incense).
Afternoons
You may walk the village paths lined with frangipani, rest by the pool, wander through rice fields, journal under palm shade, or simply let your body exhale.
Late Afternoons
We gather again for a practice shaped by the energy of the day — softening tension, exploring repair, learning to stay with ourselves when emotions rise.
Evenings
Individual meals, unhurried conversation, and time to let the day settle. Nights are intentionally spacious so your inner work can breathe.
Your Daily Experience
Relational Inquiry
Throughout the retreat, we engage in gentle, guided relational inquiry — practices that help you explore what happens in the spaces between people. These sessions help us to explore how compassion can reshape relationship - how to love with a steadier heart, to offer care without erasing yourself in the process. You will learn to:
• Trace the subtle movements of connection and disconnection
• Sense the difference between yielding and collapsing
• Recognise protective patterns with compassion
• Allow relationship to become a site of clarity rather than confusion
The emphasis is always on safety, pacing, and attunement.
Somatic Approaches
Compassion deepens when it is felt in the body. Each day you will be supported by practices that bring you home to yourself - breathwork to settle and enliven, yoga to open space in body and mind, massage to release places of holding. As you breathe, move, and release, you’ll discover how the body itself can teach compassion: how grounding makes space for clarity, how softening allows connection, how balance in your own system opens new possibilities for relationship with others. Together, these practices create an embodied foundation for the inner work, so that compassion is not just understood, but lived.
Movement & Meditation
Each day begins and ends with practices that are designed to lay the groundwork for self-compassion: gentle yoga to open the body, meditation to steady the mind, and simple rhythms of breath to anchor the nervous system. Adapted for all bodies and levels of experience, these sessions invite you to experience movement as a form of listening inward, and meditation as a way of inhabiting the life you are already living.
Cultural Learning
Guided by local knowledge holders, you’ll encounter Balinese traditions through shared practice and authentic exchange. In offerings, ceremonies, and community life, care is expressed in ways that connect the everyday with the sacred. These moments of learning open a wider understanding of relationship—how compassion can be lived as a rhythm that binds self, other, and community.
Integration & Application
Insight takes root when given space. Dedicated time will be set aside to reflect, to shape your own practices of compassion, and to imagine how these can continue when you return home. You’ll receive written materials that weave together research and lived wisdom, offering practical pathways for bringing compassion into daily routines and relationships. The retreat becomes a seed, unfolding into a more tender and intentional way of being.
Your Expert Facilitator and Host
Dr. Amy Finlay-Jones
Amy is a therapist and meditation teacher whose work sits at the tender meeting point between science and the sacred. For two decades she has explored what helps human beings feel held, connected, and alive — not only through research, but through the lived, unrepeatable moments of practice, relationship, and attention. Her work is an ongoing enquiry into how we meet the holy in the everyday: how we honour our interbeing, how creativity becomes a way of listening, and how compassion allows us to inhabit our lives with more truth and less armour.
Known for her grounded presence, Amy holds spaces where people can soften without collapsing, feel without being overwhelmed, and return to themselves in a way that is both tender and transformative. Her teaching invites participants into deeper contact with what matters — the quiet instincts, old longings, and half-remembered wisdom that shape a meaningful life.
Amy brings a rare blend of contemplative tradition and contemporary science. She is an Associate Professor with a Masters degree in Clinical Psychology, a PhD in the mechanisms of human suffering and healing, and lead editor of The Handbook of Self-Compassion. She is certified in Compassion Cultivation Training, Mindful Self-Compassion, and Mindfulness-Based Compassionate Living.
She is also the founder of Kindful, through which she creates programs that weave evidence-based approaches with contemplative practice, offering pathways back to belonging — with oneself, with one another, and with the wider world.
Your co-facilitator and guides
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is a seasoned clinical psychologist who brings compassion and clarity into everyday life. With a Doctorate in Clinical Psychology and 15+ years’ experience across Australia and Singapore, she supports individuals and groups with trauma-informed, attachment-aware, evidence-based care. Her work integrates nervous-system regulation, contemplative practice and human connection, cultivating “relational presence” — meeting oneself with clarity, listening to the body, and staying connected without losing inner ground. In retreats she draws on CBT, ACT, DBT, schema therapy and mindfulness-based approaches. Alla creates safe, unhurried spaces for honesty, reconnection and repair, helping people reclaim steadiness and care from wholeness.
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guides breathwork and somatic practice to return to the body as a source of memory, intelligence and renewal. With a background in the humanities and physical education, she explores how instinct, thought and emotion meet beneath daily life. After moving to Bali in 2019, she immersed herself in local healing traditions, deepening her understanding of how we carry experience and how breath can reveal what the mind overlooks. Her approach blends somatic therapy, breath-based and meditative practices to build steadiness, support emotional repair and foster sustainable connection. At Sanctum, her sessions help participants settle, release long-held patterns and reconnect with inner capacity.
Suites & Rates
A 10% Early Bird discount applies to all bookings made prior to November 30th, 2025
Pool Suites
Each suite has a king bed + daybed, private bathroom, and private pool. USD$2400 per person triple share | USD$2800 per person twin share | USD$3200 single occupancy.
Deluxe Suites
Each suite has a king bed and private bathroom. These suites have a separate living space or terrace and can accommodate an extra guest on a single bed. USD$1800 per person triple share | USD$2200 per person twin share | USD$2600 single occupancy.
Superior Suites
Each suite has queen bed and private bathroom. One single bed can be added. USD$1400 per person triple share | USD$1800 per person twin share | USD$2200 single occupancy.
Standard Suites
Each suite has a queen bed and private bathroom. All suites have beautiful garden views. One single can be added to some rooms. USD$1200 per person triple share | USD$1600 per person twin share | USD$2000 single occupancy. *Almost SOLD OUT*
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This retreat is for anyone who seeks time to reconnect with themselves, explore compassion, creativity, and landscape, and experience renewal in community.
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Each day blends contemplative practice, creative workshops with local artists, gentle movement, nourishing shared meals, and generous time for rest and reflection.
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Yes — programs are paced with spaciousness so you can integrate insights, journal, or simply enjoy the surroundings.
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Not at all. While prior experience can be helpful, it is absolutely not required. The retreat is designed to welcome both beginners and those with existing practices.
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There will be between 10 and 16 participants, ensuring an intimate and supportive group environment.
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This retreat is not a therapeutic intervention and does not replace therapy or mental health care. Participants are responsible for their own wellbeing and mental health during the retreat.
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The retreat and materials will be conducted in English. However, we welcome the expression of all languages during our retreats.
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The group will be diverse, inclusive, and welcoming — participants range in background, profession, age, and identity, united by curiosity and openness to self-growth.
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Before the retreat, you will be provided with information, materials, and the hosts are available for questions. After the retreat, they will share follow-up resources to help you continue your practice and integration at home.
