I hope to flesh this out at some point, but I just want to put somewhere that by default (from personal experience and experience as an instructor and teacher) I think sleepaway experiences (retreats, workshops, camps) are potentially emotionally intense for at least 20% of participants, even entirely setting aside content (CFAR has noted this as well): away from normal environment, new social scene with all kinds of status-stuff to figure out, less sleep, lots of late night conversations that can be very powerful, romantic / sexual stuff in a charged environment, a lot of closeness happening very quickly because of being around each other 24⁄7, anything going on from outside the environment that’s stressful you have less time and space to deal with. This can be valuable in the sense of giving people a chance to fully immerse themselves, but it’s a lot, especially for younger people and it is worth organizers explicitly noting this in organizing, talking about it to participants, providing time for chillness / regrounding and being off the clock, and having people around who it’s easy to talk to if you’re going through a hard time.
I hope to flesh this out at some point, but I just want to put somewhere that by default (from personal experience and experience as an instructor and teacher) I think sleepaway experiences (retreats, workshops, camps) are potentially emotionally intense for at least 20% of participants, even entirely setting aside content (CFAR has noted this as well): away from normal environment, new social scene with all kinds of status-stuff to figure out, less sleep, lots of late night conversations that can be very powerful, romantic / sexual stuff in a charged environment, a lot of closeness happening very quickly because of being around each other 24⁄7, anything going on from outside the environment that’s stressful you have less time and space to deal with. This can be valuable in the sense of giving people a chance to fully immerse themselves, but it’s a lot, especially for younger people and it is worth organizers explicitly noting this in organizing, talking about it to participants, providing time for chillness / regrounding and being off the clock, and having people around who it’s easy to talk to if you’re going through a hard time.