The Boundless Heart: Cultivating Loving-Kindness, Compassion, Joy, and Equanimity

The Boundless Heart is a restorative meditation retreat at Kripalu Center for Yoga & Health in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, devoted to the brahma-viharas, the four ancient Buddhist practices of loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity. It is for anyone who wants to step out of overwhelm and nurture a more open, resilient heart, whether meditation is new to you or already part of your life. Yoga teacher Larissa Hall Carlson leads the retreat.

What to Expect

Known as the four immeasurables or divine abodes, these practices are metta (loving-kindness), karuna (compassion), mudita (sympathetic joy), and upekkha (equanimity). Over the course of the retreat you work with each one as a way to meet the full range of human experience with more awareness and care. The teaching is rooted in ancient wisdom and supported by modern research, and it is kept accessible, experiential, and useful in everyday life.

The retreat is meant to help you:

- Expand your meditation practice with four timeless, research-based techniques
- Bring more kindness and compassion into your life and relationships
- Make more room for joy, appreciation, and connection
- Feel more grounded amid change and uncertainty
- Return home with simple practices for times when life feels full

Each day also includes gentle mindful movement and deep relaxation.

The stay runs six days with six nights on campus. Arrival day begins with check-in at 2:00 pm, a Kripalu Yoga class from 4:45 to 6:00, dinner, and a first program session from 7:30 to 9:00 in the evening. On the full days in between, the rhythm is steady:

- 6:30 to 7:45 am: Kripalu Yoga class
- 7:30 to 9:00 am: silent breakfast
- 9:00 to 11:30 am: program session
- 11:30 am to 1:30 pm: lunch
- 1:30 to 4:00 pm: program session
- 4:45 to 6:00 pm: Kripalu Yoga class
- 5:30 to 7:30 pm: dinner

On the last morning there is yoga, silent breakfast, and a final program session from 9:00 to 11:00, followed by lunch and departure. Times may shift, and the schedule given at check-in has the details and room locations.

About Larissa Hall Carlson

Larissa Hall Carlson is a member of the Kripalu faculty and a yoga teacher. She draws on more than two decades of teaching meditation and mindfulness, and she guides these practices with an emphasis on making them approachable and genuinely helpful in daily life.

The Setting

Kripalu sits on a 300-acre campus in the Berkshires of western Massachusetts. Accommodations are intentionally simple, designed to help you unplug and feel grounded. You can choose a private room or a shared, community-style dormitory. Rooms are ready by 4:00 pm, and a luggage room is available if you arrive earlier. Three meals are served each day, with breakfast taken in silence, and the grounds are open for you to explore between sessions.

Before You Go

The retreat is open to all levels, from people new to meditation to experienced practitioners. It is offered in English. Your stay includes six nights of accommodation, three daily meals, all program sessions and meditation instruction, more than ten daily yoga and movement classes, and access to the grounds. Healing Arts sessions and purchases from the Kripalu Shop and Cafe are separate.

On the day of departure, room check-out is at 10:00 am, and you are welcome to stay on campus and take part in workshops until 2:00 pm. Yoga teachers can earn 23.5 Yoga Alliance Continuing Education credits for this program.