Katie Dutcher, MA, and Marianne Rowe, MS, founding teachers of Monterey Bay Meditation Studio, are honored to propose a menu of mindfulness offerings to support wellness and wellbeing throughout your team’s retreat in Carmel, California.
Our Intentions
We at Monterey Bay Meditation Studio offer opportunities to develop, sustain, and deepen your meditation practice while helping to create a diverse and supportive community of people interested in being, learning, and evolving.
With an eye on providing a safe, comfortable environment for practice, growth, and community, we at Monterey Bay Meditation Studio are committed to making mindfulness and compassion both accessible and relevant. With an intention of cultivating awareness and kindness as way of being in the world, we offer a variety of classes, workshops and retreats based on secular teaching, ancient wisdom, and current application.
In addition to guided and silent sittings, we provide opportunities for awakening the senses through nature, opening the heart through relationship, cultivating body awareness through movement, nourishing the soul through creative process, and developing community through shared exploration.
Our overall intention is to cultivate capacity for being aware and being kind.
Our Offerings
At our studio in Pacific Grove, California, we offer regular drop-in meditation sessions, community events, courses, and retreats.
We also work with groups from various sectors (non-profits, corporate, educational, healthcare, and more) to offer unique day-long and multi-session experiences and trainings which help build community, deepen experience, and explore topics related to mindfulness, daily life, and work. We’re skilled in adapting meditations and trainings to be applicable and accessible for each group’s context and needs. Whether it’s a 20-minute meditation to open or close a session, or a half- or full-day workshop or retreat, we complement other planned events to create experiences that offer a chance for participants to ground themselves through meditation and gentle movement, team-build and connect with each other authentically through mindful relating, and process transitions and change in a way that promotes creativity and growth.
Program Components
Meditation
Sitting meditation is the heart of mindful practice. Pausing to meditate with a group, whether offered as a grounding practice at the beginning of the day, as a way to intentionally transition and re-set between sessions, or as a meeting closer, allows participants to recharge and avoid a sense of “meeting burnout.“ Our approach is appropriate for total beginners, long-time meditators, and everyone in between.
Movement
Through gentle, meditative movement we cultivate awareness and connection between body, mind, and heart. Especially during a day of meetings, standing, stretching, and bringing awareness to the body in stillness and motion, can be a way of offering self-care and refreshment to participants.
Nature Practices
Having easy access to a beautiful garden, as well as Carmel Beach, allows access to nature, a natural stress-reliever. Research has demonstrated that cultivating present-moment awareness in nature cultivates a sense of physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being. The richness of all that can be felt, seen, heard, and smelled is invigorating and grounding, and facilitates a sense of awe and connection.
Relational Practices
The quality of relationship in a team directly affects the individual’s sense of satisfaction, as well as impacting the quality of the work produced. Mindful Relating Games engage curiosity, vulnerability, transparency, and awareness of oneself and others in service of deeper connection. Through co-creation and co-discovery, participants come to experience shared humanity on a profound level. This allows teams to operate in a way that’s more authentic, connected, and productive.
Program Options
All options include a customized web page with resources for post-retreat support in beginning or continuing mindfulness practice.
Option 1: Pausing
“Refresh the screen” and take a breathing space.
Morning Grounding Session
20-30 minutes: morning insight + meditation
Afternoon Refresher
30 minutes: 2 concurrent groups:
Relational Practices in the meeting room with Marianne
Nature & Movement Practices in the Garden with Katie
$3,400 (includes 3 days - Tues/Wed/Thurs)
Option 2: Deepening
Re-set and access spaciousness for clarity and inspiration.
Morning Grounding Session
20-30 minutes: morning insight + meditation
Afternoon Refresher
50-60 minutes: 2 concurrent groups:
Relational Practices in the meeting room with Marianne
Nature & Movement Practices at the Beach with Katie
$4,900 (includes 3 days - Tues/Wed/Thurs)
We are open to additional suggestions about the combination of offerings that would best serve your group.
A la Carte
Additional ways to invite mindful presence and connection
Evening Activities
Bonfire at Carmel Beach
Begin with nature meditation to awaken awareness of the senses, leading into informal time for connection and tasting of local wine and snacks.
$1000 + food and bonfire set-up
Mindful Wine & Cheese Tasting at a Local Tasting Room
Bringing mindfulness and meditation to a tasting experience awakens the senses and opens awareness to subtleties of flavor, texture, and aroma as we enjoy local wines and cheeses.
Cost TBD pending arrangements with winery
Morning or Afternoon Mini-Retreat
3-hour deep dive into a pertinent topic related to mindfulness in the workplace
Devote a morning or afternoon session to growth and wellbeing with a customized signature retreat with Marianne and Katie.
Topic Suggestions:
Intro to Mindfulness at Work
Deepening Relationships
Navigating Transitions
$2000
Taking It Home, Taking in Forward
Mindful Moments Desk Set
A full-color deck of 31 mindful awareness reminders, created by Katie Dutcher and Marianne Rowe, offers inspirations to pause, notice, connect, and reflect in the course of daily life. Taking opportunities to “be aware and be kind” can lead to feeling more joy, satisfaction and belonging in the world.
Cards are presented in a muslin gift bag, and set includes a mini easel.
$1300 (one set for each participant)
Your Guides
Founding Teachers of Monterey Bay Meditation Studio
Marianne Rowe, MS, LMFT
Marianne Rowe has been studying and practicing meditation since 1996. As founder of the Mindful Education Project, she has been teaching mindfulness to children, youth, and adults since 2007. Marianne also teaches courses in mindful relating and facilitates retreats to develop mindful awareness as an essential part of the creative process. Through the Institute of Noetic Sciences, she is a Certified Conscious Aging Facilitator and teaches workshops exploring emotional, psychological and spiritual responses to the challenges and opportunities of aging. As a Certified Forest Therapy Guide through the Association of Nature and Forest Therapy, Marianne leads Forest Bathing sessions, a way of sensing deep connection with the natural world through a meditative walk in the forest. In private practice as a Marriage and Family Therapist since 1986, Marianne focuses on healing, transformation and evolution through awareness and connection. Her therapeutic work incorporates developing consciousness of and integrating the physiological, cognitive, emotional, relational and spiritual aspects of being.
Katie Dutcher, MA
Katie Dutcher has been an educator since 2004 and has studied and practiced meditation and mindfulness since 2009. She is a Qualified Teacher of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) through the Center for Mindfulness, and she has received training from Mindful Schools. She enjoys collaborating with local organizations to offer mindfulness practices through Monterey Sports Center, through Monterey Peninsula Regional Park District, and she teaches MBSR at the Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula. She has special interests in reflective writing, practicing mindfulness in daily life, and awareness of the natural environment. Katie writes about mindfulness and offers personal mindfulness coaching at katiedutcher.com