Heart and Mind Yoga
Yoga in the Deepest Sense

Following a Dream

Sarah Lionheart visits the new retreat centre on Holy Isle in Scotland

This article appeared as Days of Heaven on Holy Isle, Yoga and Health, December 2003
By Sarah Lionheart © 2003,

Over the years yoga students have asked me to run a week retreat somewhere special.  We toyed with the idea of Spain or Greece but the cost of flights, the difficulty of assuring good vegetarian food and the high cost of some of the centres made us think again.  Then I heard of a private island west of Glasgow in the Firth of Clyde which has a Centre for Peace and Health. The centre only opened last May so in August I went over to have a look.  The ferry ride from Adrossan to Arran to was spectacular.  We watched dolphins and porpoises leaping in the waves and a seal floating and diving.  Then we took a wee boat from Arran to Holy Island and the Executive Director of the Holy Island Project, the Venerable Lama Yeshe Losal Rinpoche, abbot of Samye Ling Tibetan Buddhist Monastery in Eskdalemuir, Dumfriesshire shared the boat with us.  (see picture left).

As Lama Yeshe showed us round the centre and the island, he shared the story of how it all came into being.  Apparently, when he was in long retreat, he had a dream that he was sitting on an island looking out over the water at lights on land.  Meanwhile the lady who owned Holy Isle was thinking of selling it and had a dream that Mother Mary came to her and told her to sell it to the Buddhists at Samye Ling.  She contacted Lama Yeshe and he realised that this could be the place where he could build a Centre for World Peace and Health – a place where the different faiths could meet and get to know each other.  He followed his dream, came over to see the island, recognised it from his dream, raised the money and bought it and built a lovely centre.  Truly a dream come true!

I was astounded by the beauty and serenity of both the island and the centre and its facilities.  The large conference room has an oak floor and sweet smelling cedar panelling, very high ceiling and large windows.  It is a separate building behind the main buildings and it would fit over 60 yoga students plus mats with ample room.  It feels so good, with smooth wooden floor and large skylights and the quality of the materials used is superb.  It would be a delight to teach in. (see picture) I then inspected the rooms.  There are 30 single, 4 twin and 3 dormitories, which sleep 8, people each.  So 62 beds in all.  (see picture) Again the attention to detail in each room is very lovely, using beautiful wood and natural materials including non-toxic paint.  The views from the windows were breath taking with the blue sea and the heather, the hills of Arran and the white sails of the occasional sailboat.  There were beautiful hand crafted stained glass windows, solid hand made wooden dining tables in the spacious dining room which overlooks the bay, a cosy library and marvellous organic gardens which included herb gardens and flower gardens with meditation areas and ponds and quiet corners for sitting and taking in the view.  The food felt so pure and was plentiful– organic and mostly produced in the gardens on the island.  There has also been a great deal of attention to ecologically sound building with solar panels and a reed bed for waste treatment.  The island is officially designated as a UK sacred site – in the sixth century the Christian saint, St Moliase, lived in his hermits cave on the island.  Near his cave is a spring whose waters are reputed to be both healing and holy and we tasted the clear sharp water.  .  At present there are 12 international Buddhist women in a three-year Tibetan Buddhist retreat at the south end of the island.  This takes place in strict seclusion so one is asked to avoid that area of the island.  There are also monks and nuns who help to run the centre and daily meditation and prayer continues there too.  This helps to deepen the atmosphere of peace and healing.  It felt an enormous privilege to be within such a spiritual sanctuary.  This Tibetan Buddhist community could have continued to keep the island private for their own use but they felt that this precious combination of spiritual and environmental purity made Holy Island an ideal place for meditation, retreat, courses and interfaith harmony and so they built onto the existing farmhouse to create the beautiful new Holy Island Centre for World Peace and Health.  Whilst I was visiting,  there was a Reiki course in progress followed by a Tai Chi programme.  

Wildlife on Holy Isle

Eriskay ponies	Sanaan Goat

I walked with Lama the length of the island and we saw wild Soay sheep, Eriskay ponies, Sanaan Goats,  seals, butterflies, cormarants and oystercatchers.  He showed me the carved rock paintings which are of Lord Buddha and Tibetan Buddhists saints and we drank from the holy wellspring. Rare plants and wild flowers flourish in the Gulf Stream climate.   The sea all around the island sparkled in the brilliant sunshine and the following day I walked up the surprisingly high mountain ridge (1,030ft) of the island which took me nearly two hours as the views were so stunning, blue sparkling sea all around me and the mountains of Arran to the west.  After watching the seals I walked back along the western shore, stopping to quench my thirst at the holy spring, I arrived back at what appeared to be a boathouse but which is now a tearoom and sat and chatted to the monk who runs it.  Like the dining room it has a wood burning stove and I imagined snug winter nights huddled in close to the fire with the dark of the island around me and a sense of safety and refuge settling over me.  Day visitors who had come over on the small boat ferry from Arran popped in and shared their own experience of the beauty and special ness of the place.   Later on I swam in the sea and warmed myself on the rocks when I came out.  

Overall I was struck by the stillness of the place – a sense of deep restful silence and of sanctuary.  As I moved through the centre and then walked the island itself, I felt the atmosphere of prayer and purity.  The beauty of the place – both the buildings and the island itself – is just so heavenly, so beautiful.  I think we are very fortunate that the island has been made available for us to visit and to use to promote our health and well being at all levels.  I thoroughly recommend it as a place to run a course or a retreat and also as a place to visit for a break or holiday

Practical details.  Holy Island is off the East coast of Arran, which is itself off the West Coast of Scotland.  Arran is not as far north as I thought, being one of the first of the string of islands on Scotland’s magnificent west coast in teh Firth of Clyde.  It is west on a line almost with Glasgow.   Prestwick Airport, south of Glasgow, is close to Ardrossan (where the ferry leaves for Arran).  Prestwick Airport runs flights from  Stansted, Cardiff, Bournemouth and Dublin.  Some are as cheap as £10 each way. Glasgow Airport also has cheap flights from all around Britain eg Manchester to Glasgow £25 single including taxes   We drove to Ardrossan and took the ferry from there to Brodick on Arran.  Three miles south of Brodick is Lamlash which provides a frequent ferry service to Holy Island, a distance of only one and a quarter miles across the bay.  Bus services are excellent on Arran.  
For Bookings call the Holy Island office 01770 601100. The Ardrossan/Brodick Ferry is 01294 463470. The Holy Island Ferry is 01770 600998.  Also look up www.holyisland.org  For more information about the main monastery on the mainland of Scotland you can view their website on www.samyeling.org

Sarah Lionheart is a senior British Wheel of Yoga recognised yoga teacher and has been teaching yoga and meditation and running retreats since 1989.  She has trained within the contemplative Christian tradition and also as a nun within the Hindu tradition but for the last several years has been doing further training in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.  Sarah will be running a 7-day meditation and yoga retreat on the island July 30th to August 6th 2004.  She also will be teaching a Meditation Training module for the British Wheel of Yoga in Autumn 2004. Contact her on sarah@heartandmind.org or 01663 732 701.

Back to Heart and Mind