Serenity in the South of France:
The Radical Rest Retreat
Rest Without Guilt, Without Rush, Without Having to Earn Your Rest
7 - 13 September 2025
When was the last time you gave yourself permission to rest? I mean deeply rest—NOT closing your eyes for a moment between appointments, NOT pausing for a long exhale before you begin your next project—but a profound break from everything and everyone?
If you’ve been longing for an extended moment to be as kind to yourself as you are to everyone else; If you’ve been putting off caring for yourself; If you’d love to have someone tenderly attend to YOU—without guilt, without rushing, without putting it off again, then this Radical Rest Retreat is for you.
Savor a gentle adventure in the South of France, surrounded by the Beauty of France in an intimate setting where you are free to breathe and be, with someone who lives and breathes France. Come, ready to be cared for, ready to be seen and celebrated, and ready to take home this restored you, this re-energized you, this loving mirror that allows you to see and feel your serenity.
Picture this:
Quiet, slow mornings sifting into gentle afternoons of guided exploring of local wonders melting into evening restorative practices settling into lively dinner camaraderie leading us to bedtime bliss and blessings.
No interruptions.
No clamoring for attention.
Just you, savoring the slower, flowing rhythm of this magical place called France, a world apart from your everyday.
Over the week, you’ll savor nourishing food, nourishing conversation, nourishing activities curated to support your need for simplicity,
softness, and rest.
The women around you feel and seek the same: They want to experience a softer version of life that feeds your need to be cared for as you care for others, a version that you can carry within you forever.
This is your invitation to a gentle adventure of body-mind-spirit—one that will redefine how you approach your life.
Why This Retreat?
Our Radical Rest Retreat is NOT just another day-on-the-beach retreat. It’s an epic, life-altering moment in time designed for those who feel at wit’s end in this wild world and seek not just refuge for the moment, but ways to carry this serenity forward into your everyday lives.
This is about stepping away from life, into the slower flow of life in France, creating space in you for you and discovering ways to embody this Beauty so that you feel it every day of your life.
This weeklong retreat is tailor-made for women who have been caring for others-first for your entire life and who love without boundaries but feel and see the need to care for themselves as well.
This is for women who understand and seek to take to heart Thich Nhat Han’s words:
“We are here to take care of each other; to do this, we must first take care of ourself."
Who’ll You’ll Be Retreating With...
This is an intimate gathering of women who believe in and value time away. And who love the idea of being in France with someone who is a lifelong lover-of-all-things-French. Some are first-time travelers; others are seasoned veterans. All of them are offering themselves a week among like-hearted others who choose time away in order to live more fully, more deeply, more joyfully.
Our Promise: You’ll return home feeling greater ease, greater energy, greater trust in yourself, greater joy in your life, better able to sit with the world and honor yourself within it.
What Makes This Retreat Different?
This is a retreat that embodies and enriches your life with its intentionality, its soft edges, and its quiet focus on you trusting and honoring you.
Immersing and basking in the slower pace of life in the South of France illustrates and embodies the possibilities for your own life.
Each experience—before, during and after the retreat—has been designed and curated to evoke and encourage within you an ever-deepening appreciation for your Beauty as sacred.
This retreat will remain forever in your heart as a moment in time when you shed the guilt of wanting time to yourself, released yourself from the reluctance to care for yourself, and embraced your whole self with love.
Why You Should Be Here:
Day in, day out, you care for others and your cup drains, then empties.
This retreat refills your cup to overflowing AND sends you home with sacred tools, strategies and simple, yet meaningful ways to integrate all the gifts of the retreat into your everyday life.
You’ll be among women who get every fiber of this way of being and whose presence will be a powerful ally in France and beyond. You’ll feel seen and heard and celebrated just as you are, in ALL that you are.
Over the course of these six days, you’ll feel shifts happening and you’ll be better and better able to embrace and flow with life, bringing home with you these finest-ever, keep-for-a-lifetime souvenirs—a deep appreciation for rest without having to earn it, renewed energy and love of life, an abiding sense of support, and recognition that you are among a powerful and growing element of women that promotes making space for you to care for yourself at the same time as you care for others.
Here’s What Awaits You—Beauty Around You, In You, For You
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Food: Lovingly prepared by the chef at The Frogs’ House, breakfasts, lunches, and dinners are vegetarian masterpieces of wholesome, locally grown produce and locally prepared cheeses and breads.
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Panoramas and Excursions: The South of France is gorgeous and glorious. You’ll see that the light is unique to this part of the world and the reason so many painters came here to create.
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Each activity has been carefully designed and curated—our day trips to Nice, Biot, StBarnabe, and Nice, the local vineyard and winery—to include time to pause with and savor yourself.
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Breathwork: A kinder and gentler approach to using the breath as a way to invite and receive softness of body-mindspirit will support our glass-blowing excursion and allow us to forever remind ourselves to remember to be present right here, right now.
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Gentle Movement: An optional morning practice to softly waken your body-mind-spirit to the gifts of the day.
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Restorative Yoga: Every evening before dinner, you’ll be able to luxuriate in being, NOT doing. You’ll be supported in all ways by blankets and pillows and Paula, the fairy godmother of Restorative Yoga. Magic happens when we let it be.
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Company: The women who come to France are your kind of people—open-hearted, loving, curious, caring. They know in their heart of hearts who they are and they want to live in the best possible alignment with her.
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And Beyond: Before, during and after the retreat, you are offered practices and inspirations to prepare you to invite and to receive the softness of the retreat. Paula’s signature gift bag provides you physical tools to extend tenderness and care to yourself beyond the retreat.
Paula, should I join you?
That’s an undeniable YES if…
You’re feeling drained and need a dose of adventure, connection, and creativity to reignite your passion.
You feel a calling deep inside to experience the beauty, magic, and mystery of France—and what it could unlock within you.
You feel a profound need for rest without guilt.
You’re ready to savor time alone and with other women who get it—and you!
A Heartfelt Note from Paula Gardner…
Living Life as someone who cares deeply is not easy.
The tenacity required to make it through each day can be
overwhelming and draining.
Because of this, I have made it my mission to care for those
who care. Everything we do is an expression of our spiritual path
and as we serve others, we must remember to refill our own cup
or we won’t be able to serve anyone.
I have found, in my own life, that unless I make the time to be away from everyone and everything—it’s easy to lose my way, to get distracted, to get caught up in everyone else’s needs that I forget my own. When I travel, it is a way for me to remind myself to remember the joys, the peace, the serenity of just Being.
And so I retreat—to rediscover, to rejuvenate, and to bring back into my day-to-day life the awe and the magic of pausing in a time and place away from my every day.
It is my greatest joy to share this time with you—my fellow care-giver and heartcentered women.
We live in a crazy world where slowing down, pausing, and resting are often perceived as lazy or unproductive when, in fact, they are radical ways to be true to who we are even in the midst of
madness. Radical Rest allows us the space we need to continue to be our loving self, no matter what, to experience the joy and serenity that grants us the abilities to bring the same to others.
“We are here to take care of each other; to do so, we must first take care of ourself.” Thich Nhat Han’s words inspire me to offer you this Radical Rest Retreat, Serenity in the South of France as an opportunity for you to allow me to care for you—so that we may continue to care for the world, in whatever ways we desire.
The Program
Adjustments in the schedule may be made due to outside circumstances.
Arrival in Nice
Group transfer from airport/train station to the frogs’ house
2pm-5pm
Check in at the frogs’ house
5pm-6pm
Opening Circle and Restorative Yoga Session
6pm-9pm
Welcome buffet dinner and tour (wine included)
Price, payment terms, early bird discounts
● Full retreat with accommodation in a shared ensuite twin/double room with sea view & balcony reduced from 4865 € to 3900 € / person - sharing with another guest of the same gender, or as a couple
● Full retreat with accommodation in an ensuite double room with hill view reduced from 5165 € to 4200 € for one person
Deposit to reserve your space: 500 € - not refundable
Balance to be paid by 15 June 2025
Early bird discount deadlines
● 1000€ off if booked by 14 February2025
● 800 € off if booked between 15 February and 20 March 2025
● 500 € off if booked between 21 March and 15 May 2025
Paula has now discounted the price of the retreat for all bookings, without deadlines or restrictions, because in this turbulent world, we all need a gentle pause, to breathe.
INCLUSIONS
● Transfers in groups of 3 or more to the airport or train station in Nice on arrival and departure days
● Accommodation during your stay - please feel free to explore our accommodation further by clicking on the link
● Breakfast and dinner every day including Farewell dinner at La Table des Baous, sumptuous picnic lunch on days 1 and 2, lunch during gastronomic tour of Nice
● Wine at all meals other than during the gastronomic tour of Nice
● All activities (including two-way transport): wine tasting, guided walks, guided visit to the Chapel of the Rosary, glassblowing workshop, gastronomic tour of Nice, day out in Antibes
● All yoga sessions with Paula
● Breathwork (pranayama) integrated into our practices
● Paula’s signature care package
● Your personal empowerment portrait session will be scheduled with our photographer.
● pre- and post-retreat care
The frogs' house has 6 bedrooms, 3 with balconies and sea views and 3 with views of the foothills of the Alps, locally called "Baou".
What to bring ?
Comfortable shoes that have a good grip and support your ankles for the walks - if you have running shoes that fit that description, those suffice.
Sunscreen and sunglasses, a hat, swimsuit for a dip in Antibes, a windproof jacket and/or a rain mac just in case.
The nearest ATM is a 15 minute walk downhill to the lower part of our village. It’s fine to go there, but coming back up might take a little longer! There is however a bus. It would be advisable to bring cash if you mean to spend some in the village, though most if not all village shops accept credit cards. There are of course ATMs
available in the towns and cities you’d be visiting during your excursions.
What you don’t need to bring ?
The water in saint-Jeannet comes from under the hills we can see from our rooms. It is crystal clear and of high quality. It is treated right next to the source and pumped in our pipes. You don’t need to buy bottled water. We can provide you with metal water bottles that you can keep for the duration of your stay here.
There is no need to bring a yoga mat, unless you really want to use your own. We also provide blocks and small stools to sit on if you need them, and blankets for comfort in yoga sessions. As the focus of our yoga sessions is not “achieving postures” we do not provide props such as belts, wall fixings, backless chairs etc.
Towels, including beach towels and basic but high quality organic toiletries are provided.
The frogs’ house will provide backpacks and walking sticks when you need them.
OPTIONAL EXTRAS
● A limited number of personal healing sound experiences are available at 75 €.
● Two in-depth personal coaching sessions are available at 150 €.
EXCLUSIONS
● Air fare, travel insurance or other personal insurance, any transport other than to the
activities on the schedule
● Lunch in Biot, Lunch in Antibes, drinks during the gastronomic tour of Nice
● Any activities not included in the schedule
● Laundry or dry cleaning services (these are available in the village at extra cost)
