Where is Your Sacred Place?
Updated: Aug 14
As a Reiki Practitioner, channeler, yoga teacher, and sound healer, Rosie weaves together energy work, movement, and sacred sound to create deeply transformative healing experiences. Through the circles she hosts, she guides others on their healing journeys, holding intentional space for alignment, release, and reconnection to their inner wisdom.
Where is your safe and sacred place? Where do you find growth? Is it in nature, with friends, at home, or maybe in another country while on vacation? Where do you feel most like yourself? For me, it happens when I am away. When I have time to sit quietly without worrying about what's next or where I have to be.
When you strip away all of the titles: wife, mom, daughter, sister, what are you left with? Who are you, and how do you build from there? For the past several years, I have worked at a sleepaway summer camp. For me, it's not necessarily about the work I do for camp. Instead, it's about the work I pour into myself while I'm there. Camp has become one of my sacred places.
Stepping away to come back to myself
Every summer, I step away from my normal routine and enter this little bubble in the mountains. Almost immediately, something begins to shift.
Maybe it's the mountain air. Maybe it's waking up surrounded by green instead of concrete. Maybe it's the cooler temperatures that allow me to spend so much more time outside.
Whatever it is, I can feel myself reset. I currently live in Florida, where the heat and humidity can limit how much time I spend outdoors. But at camp, nature becomes part of my everyday life again. I walk, sometimes 15,000 steps or more a day. I wake up and meditate. I hydrate. I stretch. At night, I journal.
These aren't necessarily things I don't do at home. I do. But at home, they have to coexist with all of my other roles and responsibilities. At camp, I have space. Space to breathe, think, heal, and simply be Rosalba.
Something about that mountain air feels cleansing to me. It's almost as though with every deep breath, I'm clearing out some of the heaviness I've been carrying. My mind becomes quieter. My body feels different. My spirit feels lighter. I am cleansing and nourishing more than my physical body. I am tending to my spirit and soul.
Sometimes healing looks like stillness
I've realized that I don't need much to feel grounded. Give me nature, quiet, a journal, and a little space to hear myself again.
I enjoy the stillness, meditating, journaling, and simply sitting with myself. But being at camp has also taught me that healing isn't always about being alone.
Sometimes healing comes through connection. Over the span of a summer, you are thrown into this bubble with people from different countries, cultures, and walks of life. You live together. You work together. You eat together. You laugh together. Yes, sometimes you have to figure out how to coexist when personalities, habits, and perspectives are completely different.
In this environment, you learn so much about yourself and others. Somewhere in the middle of all of it, beautiful relationships begin to form.
Over the years, I have made friendships at camp that I know will last far beyond a summer. People who entered my life because we happened to be in the same place at the same time and became part of my story. Those bonds have become part of what makes this place sacred to me too.
Learning to recognize what I need
Camp has also helped me understand how important it is for me to regulate my nervous system. Living and working closely with so many different people can teach you a lot about your own triggers, boundaries, and needs. I've learned to recognize when I need a break, mentally, physically, or sometimes both. That lesson doesn't end when summer does.
Whether you're at college living with a roommate, at work navigating different personalities, raising a family, or simply moving through everyday life, we all encounter situations that challenge our sense of stability.
The question is, do you recognize when your body, mind, and spirit are asking you to stop? I'm learning to listen. I'm learning that taking a break isn't always about escaping. Sometimes it's about regulating, restoring, and giving yourself what you need so you can return differently.
Coming home different
Some people may look at spending this much time away each summer and think it's too much. But I have been fortunate to experience it alongside my two boys and with a supportive husband waiting for us at home.
Every year, I come home a little different. A little clearer, lighter, and a little more connected to myself. The interesting thing is that my sacred place isn't sacred simply because it's in the mountains. Camp has shown me what I need to begin creating more of that feeling wherever I am.
Nature. Movement. Stillness. Reflection. Connection. Space. Maybe that's the real gift of finding a sacred place. We think we're looking for somewhere to escape to, when perhaps what we're really looking for is a place that reminds us how to come home to ourselves.
So I'll leave you with the same question I started with:
Where is your sacred place?
Where do you go to reset, recharge, and grow? When you leave that place, what version of you comes home?
Follow me on Instagram for more info!
Read more from Rosalba De La Rosa-Ruiz
Rosalba De La Rosa-Ruiz, Spiritual Wellness Practitioner
Rosalba “Rosie” De La Rosa-Ruiz is a Reiki Practitioner, channeler, yoga teacher, and sound healer devoted to guiding others through transformative healing experiences. Blending energy work, intuitive guidance, movement, and sacred sound, she creates heart-centered spaces that support deep release and reconnection. Through her circles, classes, and one-on-one sessions, Rosie empowers others to align with their inner wisdom and step into greater balance and authenticity. Her writing carries the same intention, offering insight, inspiration, and practical tools for the healing journey. Connect with Rosie to explore more of her work and upcoming offerings.
