Folk Art and Meditation Retreat Center in Crestone Colorado Usa
The Colorado town of Crestone may well be the well-nigh spiritual place in America, habitation to more than ii dozen retreat centers and sacred landmarks. It'due south a surprising spiritual mecca.
Several years ago, a friend of mine was astonished when he learned that I'd never been to Crestone, Colorado. "You call yourself a spiritual travel writer and you haven't been to Crestone?" he asked.
In my defence force, Crestone isn't almost as well known equally many other spiritual destinations. But one time this pocket-size town in southern Colorado was on my radar, it seemed similar references to it kept popping upwards all over.
Then when when I received an invitation from the Colorado Tourism Role to visit sites in the San Luis Valley that included Crestone—well, there was no question but that I would go, for Crestone was calling.
As is true for many holy places, you have to desire to go to Crestone. After a long drive beyond the high desert of the valley, we came at last to the Sangre de Cristo Mountains (Spanish explorers named them "Blood of Christ" after the red glow that often lights the peaks at sunset).
At 7,500 feet in elevation and ringed on three sides by mountains, Crestone is both cute and isolated, bailiwick to extremes of weather, wind, and temperature. It includes an astonishing assortment of spiritual sites: more than two dozen ashrams, monasteries, temples, retreat centers, stupas, labyrinths, and other sacred landmarks. There's fifty-fifty a ziggurat, a construction modeled on the temples of aboriginal Babylon.
To use a homely metaphor, you can hardly throw a stick in Crestone and not hit something spiritual.
Crestone didn't start out equally a spiritual mecca. From the 1870s through the 1930s it was a mining town, and and so a middle for ranching. Only its identity underwent a dramatic alter in 1977. That'southward when Maurice Strong, a Canadian businessman and United nations diplomat, and his married woman, Hanne Marstrand Stiff, purchased a large tract of state in the Crestone area. It had been subdivided for use as a retirement community, but the Strongs changed their plans for information technology afterward a wandering mystic told them that the land had unique spiritual qualities (a bulletin echoed later past Native American elders).
So the Strongs decided to give costless land to religious groups that agreed to found centers in that location. To coordinate the program, they founded the Manitou Foundation. Through the years information technology received significant support from donors who included Laurance and Mary Rockefeller.
Today the Manitou Foundation works to preserve both the spirituality and the ecology of the region. The wilderness in the surrounding mountains is home to behave, elk, and mount lions, while the Baca National Wildlife Refuge in the valley protects nearly 100,000 acres of wetlands and grasslands.
Crestone itself has just 150 people (the entire county has half-dozen,100). I know of no other small town in the world with as many spiritual sites of and so many varied traditions. Centers hither represent faiths that include Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Native American spiritual traditions, and a diversity of New Age behavior.
A strong strain of quirkiness runs through Crestone. While people accept to get a permit to build, they don't have to follow many regulations on how things get constructed. As a result the buildings here are a glorious hodgepodge of architectural styles. Solar and other forms of culling energy are pop, and the community has attracted many artists and healers as well every bit spiritual seekers.
Let me put it this fashion: there are a lot of people wearing necktie-dye in Crestone.
Unfortunately I didn't visit Crestone under platonic conditions for contemplation. We were running behind on our tour schedule and so saw but a sampling of sites. Our first cease was the Vajra Vidra Retreat Center, which was founded by the Venerable Thrangu Rinpoche. This Tibetan Buddhist master was drawn to Crestone by its proximity to the high mountains of the Sangre de Christo range, which reminded him of the mountains of his homeland. In Tibet, it's considered very auspicious to locate a monastery against the side of a mountain, because its local deities tin can serve as protectors for the sacred space and its practitioners.
In the middle'due south shrine room, our grouping marveled at the gilt Buddhas that filled the altar. We learned that in May, a group of practitioners had completed a three-year meditation retreat (yep, that's right: three years). This is the gold standard of Tibetan Buddhist practise and requires an isolated spot where the practitioners will non exist disturbed.
The Venerable Khenpo Lobzang Tenzin gave us a blessing and then nosotros had the chance to inquire a few questions.
"Is there some sort of synergistic effect from having so many spiritual centers in Crestone?" I asked.
The Rinpoche nodded. "I think the spiritual energy is increased past having so many practitioners praying and meditating in this expanse," he said.
Equally nosotros left the middle, our guide, Crestone Mayor Kairina Danforth, told us that Crestone is believed to have more than Rinpoches (a term for a revered teacher) than whatsoever place outside of Tibet.
"For a long fourth dimension Crestone was a well-kept secret," Danforth said. "Simply word is getting out most the spiritual treasures we have hither."
We too visited the Shumei International Institute, which promotes spiritual growth through interfaith and cultural events and the practice of Natural Agronomics (similar to sustainable agriculture, only with more emphasis on the spiritual aspects of raising food). Founded in Japan, Shumei has three sacred centers. Crestone is the only one outside of Nippon.
My favorite end was at Dharma Sangha, the Crestone Mountain Zen Heart. Nosotros arrived hurried and a scrap disheveled after a boisterous ride beyond a gravel road. And hither's how we greeted the monk who welcomed united states of america:
"We've got x minutes."
Tell me, is there a more than ridiculous way to enter a Zen monastery?
Just the monk, Zenki Christian Dillo, was gracious, saying he realized the constraints of our schedule (though I bet he privately shook his head at just how many Buddhist precepts we were ignoring).
During our ten-minute introduction to the temple, we sat in its meditation room, which is ringed by Japanese-style wooden platforms for sleeping. Overlooked by a carved wooden Buddha, it is a serene and welcoming identify, and when our guide said information technology was fourth dimension to leave, I plant myself wishing we could spend the residual of the twenty-four hours there.
But those Zen masters are capable of finding a spiritual lesson in even the shortest of experiences. Here'southward what Zenki said to us:
"The fourth dimension nosotros have together is what we have. Let us make it plenty."
Or he said something similar, because I didn't go it copied downwards exactly in my bustle to get back to our vehicle. All I know is that his words struck me equally profound. None of u.s.a. think we have plenty time, wherever we are. Whether we accept x minutes in a Zen monastery or a 90-year-life on earth, it'southward just a blip on a cosmic screen.
But whatsoever time we take, it tin exist plenty. Especially if you're in Crestone.
Postscript: I ended up going back to Crestone to exercise research for my book About the Go out: Travels with the Not-So-Grim Reaper, which is almost places that have helped me come to terms with mortality. Crestone has a starring function, thanks to its open-air cremation basis. If you're curious near this remarkable spiritual destination, I invite you to read my book.
And finally, here's a lovely video that conveys something of the spirit of this special place, this oasis where Tibetan lamas, New Age gurus, Buddhist masters, and Carmelite nuns share common ground.
If You Go: Virtually of the spiritual centers in the Crestone area are open up to the public, though information technology's best to call ahead. In the town itself are several shops and lodging facilities. There'southward also camping at North Crestone Creek. The Colorado Tourism Office has information on other attractions in the San Luis Valley.
Lori Erickson is one of America's top travel writers specializing in spiritual journeys. She'south the author of The Soul of the Family unit Tree, Nigh the Get out and Holy Rover. Her website Spiritual Travels features holy sites around the globe.
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