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By Tara Nelson
For Rodrick Williams,
of Seattle, the idea for his Peaceful Mountain Retreat Center came to him
in a mid-night vision.
“I woke up at 3 a.m. and I had this vision to draw a picture of building
design I had twirling in my head,” he said. “And I thought as we
tend to do, I would get up and do it in the morning but something said, ‘No,
no, no!’ So after two hours of tossing and turning, I got up and drew
this 8-sided design with a circular courtyard in the middle.”
It was that
vision that sparked Williams to construct the 5,000-square foot center on
26 acres of forest near Maple Falls. His goal was to create a space conductive
to personal growth.
Williams, owner of the
Seattle-based Energy Specialists, Inc., calls himself an “energy specialist,” having
worked more than 25 years with federal and state low-income energy programs
to help make low-income housing more efficient, and said he is now moving
into transcendental forms of energetic work.
“Since I started
this here, I’ve sort of blended paths,” he
said. “My business was energy conservation and now I’ve got
into Reiki and sound therapy and massage work, and that’s all energy,
too.”
So in 1999, Williams,
who asserts “there has never been
an accident in all of creation,” started with the construction
of a 72-foot in diameter 5,000-square foot building with a 26-foot
in diameter atrium in the center that allows for maximum passive solar
heating during the day and stargazing at night.
A circular hallway
throughout the building passes through six individual and group guest
bedrooms, an exercise room and a library and opens up into a well-lit
gathering area with vaulted ceilings .
The lower level features additional sleeping areas, meditation room,
bathroom and a five-person dry cedar-lined sauna with infrared light
heat therapy. Williams said he is also working on a second building
that will include additional guest housing, a yoga studio and Jacuzzi.
Williams, who was originally baptized as a Baptist, said he has since
studied Buddhism and Sufism, Hinduism, to name a few but that the
center is open to people of all faiths and philosophies.
“I
just tell people it can be whatever you want it to be,” he
said. “I
basically wanted to create a place that feels like home where you
can truly come out and unplug. In this journey here, finding this
little spot, not totally on top of the mountain, but not totally
buried in the valley. It’s like
the crossroads.”
Peaceful Mountain Retreat
Center is open to groups of 10 to 20 and can be reached by calling 360/599-9988
or toll-free at 866/311-7445. Their website is www.peacefulmt.net. |
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