Editor’s Note: This is a first-person founder essay by Jenna Tasker, shared as part of Universal Traveller’s Beyond the Spa series. It reflects her personal experience and perspective.
Costa Rica has a way of finding me, again and again.
Over the past 20 years, I have traveled there more than 26 times, each journey weaving its way deeper into who I am and the work I create in this world. What began as assisting on a raw living foods retreat two decades ago slowly evolved into something I could never have imagined then, the birth of Soul Alive Retreats, a sacred extension of the healing work that fills my life.
It did not happen through force or planning. It unfolded on its own, like nature does when we simply allow it.
What we now call Soul Alive Retreats became a graceful uniting of two worlds: the land that feeds and inspires me, and the spaces of CenterPeace Healing, which I have built with my whole heart here at home in Michigan.
You could say that Costa Rica has been quietly shaping everything I do, and in return, CenterPeace has been shaping what Soul Alive is becoming. The two have grown together almost unknowingly, an organic dance between place, purpose, and people.
Creating Safe Spaces
I have often been told that I have a gift for creating safe spaces. For me, that means crafting environments where people can be seen and met exactly where they are.
Spaces that invite openness, curiosity, and healing without pressure or expectation. Bringing that same energy into Costa Rica, into a place that makes me feel held and safe, felt like the most natural thing in the world.
A Retreat That’s More Than a Wellness Escape
When I began shaping these retreats, the goal was not to design another wellness escape. I wanted to create something that invited people to slow down, reflect, and reconnect, a sacred pause and a return home to themselves.
These retreats are a co-collaboration with my colleague and friend, Dr. Lawrence Bell, bringing together a small group of trusted healers and practitioners from both CenterPeace and Costa Rica.
What we have built is more than a retreat. It is a living experience that continues to evolve and remind us all what it means to feel alive.
Mornings in Costa Rica
Each morning in Costa Rica is always my favorite. You can literally feel the land waking up. The sunrise stretches across the sky, the mist lingers over the mountains, the howler monkeys call in the distance, and the symphony of birds fills the air.
You step outside, barefoot and heart open, and the air itself feels alive. There is a moment when you look up at the sky, filled with gratitude and awe, and realize the clouds above you are the same clouds that drift over you at home.
In that simple awareness, everything inside you quiets. You remember that healing does not belong to one place. It lives within you, wherever you stand.
The Space Between Stillness and Joy
That, to me, is the heart of this experience. Yes, there is bodywork, breath, sound, and ceremony, but it is what happens between those moments that changes people.
The laughter that echoes by the pool, the stillness of a shared sunset, the freedom that returns when someone remembers what it feels like to play again.
We often talk about healing as hard work, about the discomfort, the release, and the shadow, but we forget that joy is medicine too. Awe, wonder, and adventure can shift our energy in ways just as profound as any traditional modality.
What Wellness Travel Means to Me
That is what wellness travel means to me. It’s creating containers where people feel safe enough to explore, to rest, to laugh, and to remember what being alive truly feels like.
In Costa Rica, surrounded by the hum of the jungle and the rhythm of the sea, people come back to themselves. They breathe again.
And as the sun sets over the rainforest each night and the stars rise one by one, I feel that same stillness in my own heart. The same gratitude. The same knowing that this meeting of land, light, and love is exactly what I was meant to help create.
For me, this is not just a retreat. It is a reunion, with self, with nature, and with the quiet magic that lives inside us all.
Every time I return, I am reminded that healing is not something we chase. It rises naturally in the moments we allow ourselves to be still, to feel, and to simply be.
That is what these retreats have come to mean to me, the place where stillness meets the stars and the soul awakens.
Jenna Tasker is the founder of CenterPeace Healing & Events in Farmington and Troy, Michigan, and the visionary creator of Soul Alive, a transformational retreat experience in Costa Rica. Known for her ability to create spaces of deep safety and connection, Jenna’s work blends body-based healing, sacred ceremony, and community to help others reconnect to the wisdom within.
