The Journey of Building Begins

I sit on a straw mat by my large round table, handmade with bamboo legs. Beneath me lies a handmade clay tile floor; a floor I sanded and varnished myself. Views of the mighty mountains of Tzununa are outside my oversized handmade wooden windows. Actually, almost everything around me is handmade. The building I am living in was constructed with no electric tools. We built our first ladder to reach the roof, we dug out the huge rocks to make room for the columns, and I designed the house to go around the pitaya tree – dragon fruit – that had already made its home there.

On Christmas Eve 2016, I move into the building that is my new home. It was still half under construction. My kitchen has running water, but is still filled with piles of wood and cement bags. My windows have no glass yet (I covered them with cardboard at night where my loft bed was, because it was so cold), and all around is still jungle. There are three workers and myself, with my main workers’ children running around. It became their new home as well. We ate together and celebrated New Years around our new fire pit. We hit the piñata, which I did not realize was empty, but the kids were still happy even without candy. I showed them how to roast marshmallows – they only knew it as a candy to eat from the bag.

There was a feeling of a mission, of doing something great, or at least potentially great. I could endure anything. I was there to make something happen.

There was no Internet and no electricity. I was negotiating bringing a line in; I was delighted when I found out we could indeed have internet at some point.

Building Something out of Nothing

Five months later, we had two new buildings with seventeen beds ready for guests. Mariano, my guardian (land keeper) and LaChelle, a student of mine that came to help set up all the admin side were my family. I cooked, we ate together, worked full days, and saw the vision come to life. It evolved. There was no clear design of the entire place, or even an official business plan.  We had a long debate on where to build the kitchen. Finally, we created a large deck set atop a massive bamboo structure. I learned to work with wood, cement and bamboo. We used local stone from our land, gravel and sand from the river, and wood from nearby mountains.

Days were a mix of joy, creation and stress. Mostly good stress, helping things move faster, but sometimes personal stress, burning away at my health. I am a perfectionist at heart so my first lesson was: do your very best and learn to forgive imperfections. Better to get stuff done than to fuss forever and have nothing accomplished.

I am still a perfectionist and love seeing things done right. However, I learned I cannot do it all on my own and I must respect that other people work differently than me. This was a hard one for me to accept and I paid with many moments of frustration. Unjust exasperation many times – all the people that worked with me gave their hearts to the project. I am forever grateful for the amazing souls that stopped by to share their building gifts. Some helped with administration and some with their creativity. We have beautiful wall paintings, amazing hand painted signs, and handmade bamboo soap dispensers among other things.

Learning and Growing

In May 2017, we ran our first yoga Teacher Training which seemed like an impossible mission; it was probably too early to open for guests but we made it. The kitchen was up but not running. Instead, we ate at my house and practiced on the kitchen deck, soon to be the Buddha Café. We completed our huge eco septic tank around August. 7x4x3 meters, it is like a huge bunker underground. Now you will only find grass on top. We created a leech field to release the gray water into a food forest. It’s exciting to implement perma-culture principles and work on being as zero waste as possible.

In August I flew to run a TTC in Nepal, and in October we ran our second training. Midway through the training we shifted to our brand new yoga shala.

The Shala is born

Building the shala was an amazing journey. I needed to find out how to construct a supporting wall on a hill filled with river cane. Wise people told me: “As long as it’s not a round construction, you’ll be fine.” Of course I wanted a round front. I hired only local workers. They had no idea how to measure a round front.

After a week, we had pipes up to mark the lines – very old school. We used a stick with a long string to create the curve, slightly angled towards the volcano view. It was going to be a one-story building, simple and clean. Today, I walk in to the 2-story structure and still have a hard time believing that this is the yoga shala I teach in.  The view and the energy creates an enchanting space. A building on sacred Maya land, right by the river, with crazy strong reinforcement for the riverbanks.

The Struggle Within

The October TTC was one of my most challenging times of my life. I was teaching full time, running the kitchen and wanting everything to be perfect. It wasn’t. I took the situation personally I got really frustrated and even angry, which just made things worse. I thought my understanding of reality would save me from these feelings. I felt like I knew all of this is nothing – a constant changing screen of projections. And yet I fell into moments where I felt the movie was real. So real in fact, that I felt I failed miserably. I was ready to give up. Close the center and go back to writing in a little hut by the water. At times, it was so bad that I was ready to die; I felt that maybe I was not worthy of ever teaching again.

I read the book about Jeff Bezos of Amazon, saw videos about Steve Jobs and other great leaders and realized that things were not always pretty for them either. But they persisted and walked through the fire to the other side.

I am still here.

In January 2018 we had our unofficial opening as we hosted a wedding for our beautiful neighbors, right after our third TTC program. Over 200 people were there and it was in a way a blessing for the new space.

Staying the Course

We spent the following dry months reinforcing the riverbanks, buying more land and creating a new entrance for the Doron Yoga & Zen Center. We used to walk in and carry wood and supplies through a 60cm wide path with barbed wire on one side. It took lots of negotiating to buy the additional land. Now, we have a nice wide entrance where even cars can enter. So far I bought a total of 17 small pieces of land and pieced them together to create what is now one flow of energy of land and water.

March was turmoil. Our fourth TTC program was in progress, staff were leaving and I was running almost all the show while teaching. It was insane; an impossible mission. I had my friend Tina helping me with emails, working from Germany. The amazing thing of most hardships is that they pass. Don’t give up.

The truth is, I would give up if it were not something I was truly passionate about and believed in the vision. If you are going big (relative to what you consider is big), make sure you chose a project that is close to your heart. It will help you move through difficulties.

Flowing with Focus

Have the vision in mind, but focus on the present moment. Some troubles seemed way too big to deal with. But instead of totally freaking out, I needed to look at one thing at a time and find solutions. Most urgent – deal with first, find a solution, and then move on to number two. Sometimes number three was just a phone call to start setting things in motion, and then I was moving to number four. It is amazing how the universal flow works with you and adapts to your needs if you just clear the mind and be present with what is the right thing for that moment. And the right thing may seem completely illogical. This is still okay. 

“Logic is useful, but gut feeling, working with the force, the universal flow, is far more powerful.”

At times it feels like I wasn’t running the show, but simply surfing a wave –sometimes having a hard time breathing as foam started rolling over, other times completely washed under, but mostly a sense of the wave carrying through – showing me the way, if I am just willing to have my eyes and heart open.

Waves are not always predictable, and so adaptability and flexibility are also a must. It is not always easy to accept that plans are not happening as expected. Ordering supplies that are canceled on the night before delivery, a bamboo supplier that disappears for an entire year with a part of the roof missing (some is still missing now after 14 months), workers quitting while in the midst of a TTC, building errors and more.  I have expectations, but I work hard to not be attached to them, so I can skip the disappointment. Or even be disappointed, but let it go so the pain is released as well.

The Future of DYZC

Six Teacher Trainings so far, Airbnb and Booking.com guests galore, and a new website with a new application which promoted more direct bookings. (Have you checked out our website recently?)

We sold out our New Years Rejuvenation Retreat, are growing the TTC numbers, and are finishing a new 2-story building with our second yoga space on top.

These are exciting times. Two years ago this was a jungle, and now in our second year, we are becoming profitable. 2019, our third year, looks very promising, a year of growth, expansion and maturity of quality. Our kitchen is offering ridiculously amazing vegetarian food, and our grounds look and feel wonderful. The river flows year round, and little touches of art and love are abundant. We get so many amazing reviews and wonderful comments and gratitude from our guests and students. Do come join me here while we are still young and small.

I am beyond grateful to all those that were part of this creation. Some were here and helped physically, some gave advice from afar, some donated time and money, and many of you were actually here as guests and students. I bow down deeply with great appreciation and love.

Blissful Living,

Doron Hanoch