October 14-17, 2026 | Temple By the WaterSeducing the Muse:
the art of aliveness
Who will you be and what will you create when you finally allow yourself to be fully alive?
Join us for a transformational creative immersion in New Orleans. Reclaim your freedom, awaken your creative force, and rediscover the most alive and expressive version of yourself.
You were never meant to live a muted life.
Many of us have spent years fitting inside other’s boxes. Being small, accommodating, efficient, and endlessly available to the needs of others.
Somewhere along the way, we buried the parts of ourselves that felt spontaneous, playful, sensual, creative, and fully alive.
Creativity became a luxury instead of a necessity. But your creativity IS necessary, essential, and waiting to be unleashed in its wildest forms.
Your buried parts are stirring, begging to reawaken. Ask yourself: Can I live bigger? Can I be freer? Can my creativity unlock new paths and possibilities that might just change the course of my life?
Seducing the Muse was created for people standing at the threshold of change — people longing to reconnect to their vitality, creativity, desire, freedom, and deeper sense of self.
This is not self-improvement.
It is self-reclamation.
A Retreat Designed as an Immersive, Transformational Experience of Creative Activation
Created by immersive experience designer Joanna Garner and transformational facilitator Lara Blackin, Seducing the Muse blends immersive storytelling, ritual, artistic exploration, embodiment practices, and carefully curated New Orleans experiences designed to awaken creativity, connection, sensuality, and transformation.
Unlike traditional retreats centered around lectures or productivity, every aspect of this experience is intentionally crafted to help participants step outside ordinary patterns and reconnect with a more vivid, expressive way of being.
For over a decade, Joanna has designed large-scale immersive experiences and transformational story worlds for audiences around the world, including as Senior Story Creative Director at Meow Wolf.
Lara brings years of experience guiding transformational and Tantric work centered around embodiment, authenticity, intimacy, and creative awakening.
Together, they create experiences that are emotionally resonant, deeply immersive, and unlike anything else in the retreat space.
This is What Changes
Pictured: A Yoruba blessing ritual offered by Nana Sula Spirit, grounding creative expression in devotion to place and culture.
You stop trying to “be creative” and begin trusting yourself again. You are a living expression of art.
You reconnect to your intuition, your desire, your spontaneity, and your capacity for self-expression.
You remember what it feels like to:
feel fully present in your body,
take up space unapologetically,
express yourself without self-censorship,
experience beauty and pleasure deeply,
and approach your life as a creative act.
Participants often leave with:
renewed confidence,
clarity around their next chapter,
a stronger relationship to creativity and intuition,
deeper self-trust,
and a profound sense of aliveness.
New Orleans: An Invitation Into Your Most Creative Self
A city of ritual, music, devotion, improvisation, and art that refuses to stay contained.
Here, creativity isn’t something you schedule. It bursts in your back door unannounced and dripping glitter.
Throughout the retreat, New Orleans becomes more than a backdrop.
It becomes part of the transformation itself.
Through immersive excursions, artist encounters, ritual experiences, live music, hidden spaces, and sensory exploration, participants are invited into a new relationship with inspiration, embodiment, and possibility.
Spend an afternoon in the intoxicating presence of painter James Michalopoulos in his private studio.
A Glimpse Inside
*
A Glimpse Inside *
Seducing the Muse is not a retreat you simply attend.
It’s a living, breathing world designed to awaken creativity, sensuality, expression, connection, and aliveness through immersive experience.
Over four days in New Orleans, participants move through a carefully curated blend of ritual, artistic exploration, embodiment practices, sensory immersion, spontaneity, and transformational group experience.
You might find yourself—
Deep in ritual,
calling in the muses through a ceremony of invocation.
Adorning yourself as a version
you don’t usually let the world see.
Dropping into a guided creative trance
soundtracked by live improvisational music.
Moving your body in the morning—
shaking, breathing, waking up sensation.
Finding the freedom to try new expressions:
painting, writing, music, building, making.
Letting go of the voice that says,
“I’m not good at this.”
Spending afternoons in deep creative flow state.
Wandering into the city at night—
live jazz, hidden bars, unexpected encounters.
Being invited into studios of working artists.
Sharing a multi-sensory dinner
where food becomes art—
blindfolded, tactile, alive.
Being photographed as your most expressed self.
Following the thread of an image, a feeling, a desire—
before your inner critic can interrupt.
Finding yourself witnessed by a circle of people
who see something in you
you’ve almost forgotten yourself.
No two retreats are exactly alike.
Each experience evolves in response to the group, the city, the artists we encounter, and the creative energy that emerges throughout the week.
But every element is intentionally designed to help participants reconnect to the most alive, expressive, and creatively liberated parts of themselves.
What participants are saying
“I feel like something incredibly big shifted for me this past weekend, and I walked back into my life feeling a new energy. Thank you for making me feel safe, seen, and welcome to indulge in parts of myself that feel like they have been buried since 2013.”
Jess, University Professor
“I can sense tectonic shifts happening within me. Creativity, play and relationships are truly transformative. So subversive! I can't wait for all the ripple effects. I know I'll look back 5/10/15 years from now and recognize it as a pivotable weekend.”
Rebecca, Interior Designer
“So rich, nourishing and thoughtful. I came home inspired in multi-hyphenate ways.”
Alison, Filmmaker
“The experience was filled with intention, presence, and creative energy, and I saw profoundly how place and share purpose can shape our ability to connect, reflect, and create.”
Chris, Architect
“It’s hard to express the gratitude I have for Lara and Joanna for co-creating and co-leading Seducing the Muse. When I left the first workshop in the fall of 2025, I saw everything differently. I saw shape, form, shadow, color, and movement in ways I never had. When a family crisis hit, I found calm in watching watercolor tutorials. And then I started painting. There was no inner voice saying, “Watercolor is too hard.” There was no, “You can’t paint. You’ve never been able to paint.” There was only, “I bet I could do that.” I painted every day from then to the second workshop. And like that, I became an artist.
”
Facilitators
Lara Blackin
Lara is a Tantric Educator, Sacred Intimacy Practitioner and Visual Artist specializing in therapeutic, sensual & energetic touch bringing aliveness to the art of living + loving. With her partner Michael, Lara is the co-creator of Temple By the Water in New Orleans and Temple in the Trees in Virginia.
A creative leader & guide who brings multidimensional vision to her offerings, she facilitates the ignition of personal transformation in others & community. Supporting the curious on their journey toward mindfulness and connection with conscious communication tools, intimacy practices, tantric embodiment exercises, and acclaimed artistry, Lara is a leader in the field of sacred embodiment with over 25 years of professional experience as a 1000 e-ryt Kundalini Yoga Educator & Sacred Sexual Somatic Arts Practitioner.
Lara has a BA in Theatre Arts and creates artistry with ritual, theatrical event design, and is known for creating alchemic spaces for authentic self expression. Weaving art, tantra and mindfulness practices, teaching individuals and partners the art of intimacy is Lara’s greatest mission in life.
An herbal alchemist and ceramics artist, she calls upon the elements of nature to create pleasure and harmony. Lara is the owner of Tendrils of Green Tantric Arts and writes beautifully poetic essays and creates erotic art at tendrilsofgreen.com.
Co-FacilitatorJoanna Garner is an award-winning playwright, immersive experience designer, and former Senior Story Creative Director at Meow Wolf, where she helped shape groundbreaking large-scale immersive worlds including Omega Mart and Convergence Station.
Her work explores transformation through story, ritual, participation, emotional immersion, and the creation of experiences that invite people into deeper authenticity, expression, and connection.
She has collaborated with visionary artists, filmmakers, neuroscientists, and experience creators including Jon Favreau, Chloé Zhao, Beau Lotto, and Virgin Voyages.
Through Seducing the Muse, Joanna brings together immersive design, creativity, embodiment, and transformational experience to help participants reconnect to the most alive and expressive parts of themselves.
Learn more about Joanna and her work at www.joannagarner.com.
Co-FacilitatorJoanna Garner
Details
Dates: October 14-17, 2026. Opening ceremony will be in the evening on Wednesday, Oct 14. We will close by noon on Sunday, Oct. 17.
Location: New Orleans, Louisiana at the Temple By the Water in the iconic and artistic Bywater neighborhood
Cost: $999 until August 31. $1200 after. Full and partial scholarships are available.
Optional Add-On Experiences:
Get juiced up with us at these three lead-up experiences. If you’re coming from out of town, consider joining early. Or come to any as stand-alone experiences.
Friday, Oct 9: Touch and Tempo, an evening of embodied connection, playful exploration, live music, and the art of presence.
Saturday, Oct 10: Please Open Your Mouth, a sensual, sensory multi-course chef-created dinner experience.
Tuesday, Oct 13: Night Swim, a blindfolded water experience exploring intuitive movement and touch, dancing with the unknown, and trusting the wisdom of the body.
Includes:
Immersive artistic and sensory experiences throughout New Orleans
Guided transformational workshops and embodiment practices
Rituals designed to awaken creativity and self-expression
Curated encounters with local artists, musicians, and cultural spaces
Intimate group experiences and facilitated connection
Creative exploration designed to expand possibility, intuition, and aliveness
Daily practices integrating creativity, embodiment, sensuality, and play
Artist studio visits and inspiration salons
Multi-sensory dining experience plus daily snacks and beverages
Frequently Asked Questions
Take a look at the FAQ or send an email with any other questions, and we’re happy to talk through anything. If you’re feeling ready, go ahead and apply.
-
We generally start at 10am and finish around 6pm, but some days will have an evening experience. There will always be at least 90 minutes for a lunch break.
-
We include one incredible immersive dining experience as well as plentiful daily snacks, coffee, tea, and other beverages. There are many restaurants and cafes within walking distance for you to sample the amazing food of New Orleans for lunch. We will organize some special optional group dinners to iconic restaurants.
-
We have connections to many local hosts, as well as boutique hotels and B&Bs within a few blocks of the venue. We are happy to help you find something within your budget.
-
Yes. We have scholarships available to those in need. Let us know in your application, and we are happy to talk more about options.
-
Both Lara and Joanna are trained in Tantric traditions, which means you will learn some core practices around breath, sound, movement, visualization, attention, and activating your aliveness. Seducing the Muse doesn’t explore sexual practices outside of your own intimate relationship with your art and creativity. That being said, we are very welcoming of sexual content appearing in your art, and of complete, full expression of self, including nudity.
-
Yes! Based on participant feedback (“We want more!”), this October event is twice as long. This will give us time to explore not only our own creative practice and process, but to go into much deeper exploration with the city and its artists. We will see more art, music, and performance— with special access to learn from artists directly about their process. We will visit wild and inspiring places in the city and sample some of the incredible cuisine. The curriculum will also be largely different, with new exercises, experiences, prompts, and mediums.
Your Next Chapter Is Waiting
If you feel the part of yourself longing for more aliveness, beauty, creativity, freedom, expression, and possibility…
this experience was created for you.
Applications are now open for Seducing the Muse: The Art of Aliveness in New Orleans.