ISTA Level 1 Guatemala – Luxury Edition / Araminta Barbour, Caitlyn Cook & Blake Zealear
In 2026, The International School of Temple Arts will be hosting its transformative Level 1 Spiritual Sexual Shamanic Experience residential retreat at one of the world’s most majestic destinations: Lake Atitlán, Guatemala.
From January 18th through 24th, ISTA Guatemala level 1 will take place at our luxurious and eco-friendly resort, located on the shores of the lake, surrounded by three breathtaking volcanoes.
This magical location, combined with a dynamic team of facilitators: Araminta Barbour, Caitlyn Cook and Blake Zealear, it promises to deliver a powerful and life-changing experience for those that are ready to step into their power.
As humans, our deepest desire is for connection, but when our connection to ourselves is not optimal we can get stuck in repetitive relationship patterns or accepting and tolerating relationships that don’t serve us. Continually living with these kinds of patterns can cause us to feel lost, afraid or out of control.
The level 1 SSSEx residential experience gives you a space to clear your physical, emotional and mental bodies of shame, guilt and fear. We use guided visualizations, emotional release, energy tracking, conscious touch and ceremony to open a doorway into a deeper a knowing of the Self as whole and complete.
Do you feel like something in your life needs to shift?
Does it feel like you’re not accessing your full power?
Does your current relationship feel like it needs a reboot?
Do you keep attracting the same type of people into your life?
Unable to keep the relationships that you really want?
Araminta Barbour
Araminta is an international speaker, group facilitator, and 1-1 guide specializing in empowerment, relationships and sexuality, transformational healing, soul initiation, and the esoteric mysteries. Lead Faculty with ISTA (the International School of Temple Arts) with whom she has collaborated since 2011, Araminta is the founder of The Sanctuary Guatemala, creator of The Resilience Journey, and co-creator of the Women Who See In The Dark project.
Weaving together an academic background in History, Ecology, and Theravada Buddhism (BA Hons & MA), over a decade spent in the international development NGO world (reproductive health focus) with 25+ years traveling, studying, and practicing a wide range of alternative healing modalities, and philosophical/ esoteric traditions, Araminta’s work can be encapsulated in the phrase “spiritual sexual shamanism” – an attempt to address the fullness of our human gifts and capacities. In 2005, Araminta’s heart settled in Guatemala’s Lake Atitlan – her home base for continued event facilitation around the world.
Araminta’s life path has been shaped from the learnings brought from death, grief, travel, and the deep questioning of collective beliefs. She supports clients to transform painful experiences into power, heal from parental and relationship wounding, step-free from sexual or emotional abuse, and navigate the psychological hurdles to self-acceptance, self-belief, and self-love. Her deeper focus is awakening to expansive levels of Self untangled from collective consciousness.
Araminta utilizes skills from Meditation, Non-dual Spirituality, Shamanism, Sacred Sexuality, Tantra, Breathwork, Yoga, Bodywork, Shadow Integration, Emotional Release, and Initiatory rituals. Her teachings aim to bring together the tools and maps that reactivate our full human capacities. Araminta’s core passion is the process of radical self-acceptance – the inner marriage of love with power. She is here to support humanity’s evolution as liberated, heart-centered creators.