I went to a number of different workshops, and here were my favourites.

Sacred Intimacy – Connecting Earth and Sky by Lindsey Wise

I wanted to go to this workshop, to give me new insights into how to help people who have had their hearts broken and had placed protective walls up around their hearts. Lindsey had us pair up and got us to ask and answer some questions relating to our fears around intimacy and letting people into our lives.

Then we did a wonderful rose ceremony, announcing what we would like to shed. Which was a wonderful experience full of tears and laughter (hey it’s me, I “shedded” something that had my partner in stitches).

We then did some singing and walking meditation and a whole load of hugging. It was a beautiful experience

There are definitely elements in this workshop that I am excited to try out.

TRE: Tension and Trauma Releasing Exercises by Maria Alfaro

This was sold as a way to release stress and trauma through the Psoas Major muscle. In Kinesiology, the Psoas Major muscle is the muscle we test for the Kidney Meridian. And the Kidney meridian is all about – if we don’t trust our innate wisdom and inner knowing, then we allow fear to rule our lives. When we Kinesiologists think “fear” we automatically know that we need to look at the Kidney Meridian

Maria explained the origins and the mechanics of the process. Which involves us fatiguing our leg muscles through a series of stretches and stances. Me, being so tight already, it was easy for me to start fatiguing straight away. The aim was to get our legs to uncontrollably wobble. It was this wobbling that was going to release the Psoas Major muscle (you cannot massage this muscle as it is located deep internally). Anyways, I wobbled like crazy as you can see from the video on the right.

I can tell you that I definitely released something. This was the first session of the day that I attended, and I was unable to do anything else. For the first hour I laid in the Abundance Lounge. And then I thought that I might as well lay on a bed, so I went into the Abundance Bathroom to lay on the bed (see my tips section to understand). I was on that bed for 3 hours. I was incapable of doing anything else. Things were energetically shifting within and I just had to let the process unfold in its own time.

I wasn’t able to attend any of the other talks that day, which I was a bit disappointed about. But I trusted what I was being told I needed by my body.  The next day I woke up feeling lighter and freer.

I would definitely recommend this process. It works very well. My only advice is to do it on a weekend, so, if you have a reaction like I did. You have the time to process it. You might not have the same reaction. Another woman who did the workshop just danced it off and she felt great.

Alchemy of Love by Silvia Mordini

The workshop was about the mindset of Abundance, how to prioritise self-care and healthy boundaries. Again, we broke into groups of two and shared secrets that nobody knew about you. Easy to do when you know that you will never run into that person again. My partner was from Denmark.

Silvia taught us a concept that is so simple yet so profound, that I find myself using all the time now. It is about the elimination of “should” from your life. Because the ultimate goal is to remove all “shoulds” from our life. And the process goes like this . . .  

Replace the word “should” with “could” and then follow it with but I choose to . . . e.g. This was actually me during the trip. This is what I was saying to myself.

• “I should paint every day – became – I could paint every day but I choose not to”

• “I should walk around the island every day for exercise – became – I could walk around the island every day for exercise, but I choose to relax at Scallywags all day instead”

This phrase is taking a lot of stress out of my life. I am applying constantly whenever I find myself saying a “should” statement

Dolphin and Whale Sound Journey by Julian Silburn

Waking up – Opening up your unique spiritual gifts

You might notice that I am not mentioning who gave this talk. Because I am not in the field of naming and shaming. But I felt that it was important to share my experience of this workshop with you.

I went to this workshop because I was interested in how they were planning to explain the process of “waking up”. As that is what I feel that my life purpose is. To help people wake up to who they truly are and why they are here. What I didn’t realise was – was this wasn’t going to be a “talk”. It was going to be an “energetic healing”. As I have already “woken up” I thought, what harm could it do? Well, actually it could do harm.

I had lowered my energetic shields partially, and that was a mistake. About 10 minutes in, I started to feel awful. And that’s when I realised that the presenter was pulling in – what I could only describe as “wrong energy”. Once I felt this I brought my shields back up again. But it was too late. The damage had been done and I was feeling really nauseous. I tried some techniques that I knew, but the sensation wasn’t shifting.

I left the session and went and sat in front of the Coco Love Stage. Which is where music acts perform in the centre of what I am calling the food court. I sat there for four hours trying to get myself right. What it took was to listen to the music of Rizal and the Rasendriya (an Indonesian artist). As he was playing and singing, I could feel his music healing me.

The reason that I mention this is because I want you to know, is that when I channel healings, I take a lot of precautions to make sure that the energy is pure. Whenever an Archangel, God, Goddess or Ascended Master comes through. I make them go through a series of checklists that my mentor has taught me. And only if they pass all of the checklists are they allow to proceed.

Healing Masculinity by Eamon Strong

I was especially interested in going to this talk. As I am very passionate about helping Men. Especially in this age of rampant feminist agendas.

He only had an hour but I could have listened to him all day. We discussed what messages that men have been getting from birth. i.e. emotions are bad, suck it up princess, men have to be tough and not have or discuss their feelings.

That men feel that they have to fit into a narrow archetype. What a man should be and how they should act. We talked about addiction to pornography is profoundly wounding to men. And the fallout from the #metoo campaign and how it has affected men’s’ lives.

Honestly, we needed a whole day. Maybe even a 3-day workshop to cover what needed to be covered

The Abundance Pass is worth it – right about now, they will be offering early bird deals for the 2019 Bali Spirit Festival. In the form of the Abundance Pass. It gives you access to all parts of the Spirit Festival. A separate area to relax in air-conditioned comfort during the day. Access to special events only for Abundance Pass holders. But most importantly (for me anyway), it gives you access to a private room with a normal bathroom. Call me a toilet snob, but I absolutely detest using port-a-loos. So, this in itself was worth the extra cost

You can Volunteer – If the Abundance Pass (or even the next level down – Spirit pass) is a bit out of your price range, then you can be a volunteer. This year there were 270 volunteers from all around the world. You work a 5-hour shift (either morning, afternoon or night) and then you are free to participate in the rest of the festival. All the volunteers that I talked to seemed to be having a great time

Must sure that you have Cash on you – While there is an onsite ATM machine. Every time I wanted to get money out, it was down. So, I would have to go back into town, get money out and then go back to the festival. Which is both time-consuming and annoying. So, my advice to you is to make sure that you have at least R2,000,000 on you. That way if you want to buy something or have a private session you can

Pocari Sweat Drinking Water – Sounds sexy right!!! 😉  Bali, in April, is hot and humid. Every day was 30C with (at least) 90% humidity. You sweat. You sweat a lot. Let me tell you, if I could sweat fat like I sweated fluids over in Bali, I would have lost 20kgs in two weeks. It was not pretty. I was a hot sweaty mess.

And on the second night, in the middle of the night, I got a cramp in my leg. So, the next day, after explaining to a couple how I had cramped the night before, they put me onto Pocari Sweat, a Japanese Sports Drink designed to replace lost essential minerals through sweating. This became my lifesaver. I drank about 2 litres every day. And I didn’t get another cramp. 2 litres will cost you about $A3.50

Sweat rag and Fan – Again, sounds super sexy right 😉 You will sweat while you are there. You might sweat a little, you might sweat a lot. But you will sweat. So, it’s nice to be able to cool yourself and wipe the sweat away. Trust me, you will thank me for this bit of advice.

Mosquito Repellent with 40% DEET – Most of you who know me, know that I am a completely natural girl. I use only organic skin care and deodorant. Why am I advocating using such a chemical concoction? Because there have been outbreaks of Dengue Fever in Bali. And I definitely didn’t want to catch that. I also had Mosquito Coils burning in my room every night.

I shall share something ironic with you. I was catching a shuttle back from the venue to Ubud Central. And there was a woman in the front seat chatting away. And she mentioned how she got Dengue Fever here two years ago. I piped up, saying that that’s why I decided to use the strongest DEET mosquito repellent possible even though I usually only use organic products. She shot back that I had undid all of the good that I had done with the organic products. And the chances of getting Dengue Fever are extremely rare – 1 in 10 million. And I was thinking to myself – You just told us that you caught Dengue Fever 2 years ago!!! Anyway, I thought it was amusing.

Myself, personally, I was not (and am not) prepared to risk catching a disease like that when I can easily prevent it. I did get bitten in a few places when the villa staff left the door to the bathroom open after fixing my shower. I didn’t realise it was open until too late. Two weeks later and these MF mosquito bites are still itchy

If you miss the Spirit Festival Shuttle, take a Motorcycle Taxi – This is if you are staying in Ubud central. The festival is about 9 km south of Ubud. And the traffic can get pretty bad. So, if you take a motorcycle taxi, you can get there faster than a car will. I negotiated the rides from R40,000 ($A4) to R70,000 ($A7).

The one honest taxi service in all of Ubud – The Provence of Ubud has a ruling that commercial taxis are not allowed. It is all done by private operators. Whether you are getting into a car or hopping on the back of a motorbike. Which means that you have to have razor sharp negotiating skills. And have some idea of what a reasonable price for certain distances is.

I found one operator that offered me a price for taxi service that I didn’t have to haggle down. Because they offered a fair price straight away. You can find this operator about 10m along Jl. Suweta (up from Jl. Raya Ubud) on the left-hand side. I can’t recommend them enough.

Ubud is known for being the cultural centre of Bali. And the Balinese are a very spiritual people. So, there are lots of temples and lots of ceremonies going on. When I arrived, I got the message from the Gods, Goddesses and Spirits of Bali that I wasn’t welcome in any of the temples. And I was like, fair enough. So that took out a fair bit of sight-seeing. But there are two activities that I tried that I would recommend.

The Pyramids of Chi – One of the ladies from the festival told me about the Pyramids of Chi. That there were two pyramids on the property that they do sound healings in. For our session, we went into the Sun Pyramid. The set up is awesome. You each get to lie on a mattress. I was told that the best spot was to have your head pointing towards the main gong.

I would have to say that that was one of the best sound healings that I have ever had. I didn’t go into a deep sleep like I normally do. I don’t know how to explain it. My soul went elsewhere. I was told that it went several galaxies away to gain knowledge. But also, part of me kept slipping in and out of consciousness.

There is a beautiful restaurant at Pyramids of Chi, so it’s nice to grab something to eat after your sound healing. That also gives you time to process it as well. For $A25, it’s well worth a visit. It is a bit out of Ubud, so it is advisable to hire a scooter or arrange for a taxi to pick you up at a certain time after the sound healing.

Tegalalang Rice Terraces – These are World Heritage listed rice terraces. They are about a 20-minute drive north of Ubud central. You have to park about 500m before the rice terraces, pay an “entry fee” of about 10,000 Rupiah ($A1). As you walk through the rice fields, you will have to give “donations” to the farmers. 10,000 – 20,000 rupiah at each waypoint is acceptable. Make sure that you have lots of small notes on you. I went through about 5 checkpoints and I did about half of the terraces.

The rice fields are super photogenic. You will have an Instagram field day. The best shots will be when the sun is right overhead so that there are no shadows. But it will also be hot, humid and busy at that time. I went at 9:30am and I was still super-hot and dehydrated from the experience. I would recommend wearing shoes, not thongs, as there are some slippery inclines. And it’s not worth spraining an ankle.

Was it worth it? Yes, it definitely was. I have learnt some really great tools that I can incorporate into my practice. Plus, it’s opened my eyes to areas that I want to further investigate and receive further training in.

The Bali Spirit Festival is for anyone who wants to delve more deeply into your spiritual self. Trust me when I say that you will have an amazing time there.