Kailash Ashram is a social enterprise that is able to operate thanks to the generosity of students who have attended a retreat.

All earnings are retained in the organisation which exists to serve humanity by sharing the practices of mediation and yoga for the benefit of individual and collective flourishing.

We welcome contributions both above and below our costs; as the gift of those contributing more offsets the costs of those able to contribute less.

Your contribution should not be viewed as an opportunity for a ‘cheap retreat’ but as a chance to support the Ashram and future students.

In the past we charged a commercial rate of up to $3495 for the Soul Retreat, but found that as our Ashram grew, a commercial pricing model was at odds with our Soul.

We welcome contributions of any amount.

We welcome all contributions as these support a future student having the benefit of the experience.

As a guide, if you are unable to contribute around $1700 once-off or via a payment plan of $140 per month for 12 months, we feel you will most likely be eligible for a scholarship.

As such, we do not offer payment plans for less than $140 per month.

The Soul Retreat is 5 days and 4 nights of accommodation, food and a life-changing program. We ask prospective students to consider the real world costs of such a program, noting that there isn’t a charitable institution or wealthy donors that back our Ashram.

One may also reflect upon the true value of overcoming suffering, and also to the kindness of gifting the experience forward. 

To us, the practices we share on retreat are priceless.

Financial Hardship

If you are in a place of financial hardship and are unable to contribute $140 per month for 12 months, you most likely are eligible for a scholarship and we welcome you to apply.

No. The registration fee covers the direct cost in promoting and administering the retreat.

When we charged a commercial rate for our retreats, our cost of advertising per person would be about $500+, not factoring in the labour of talking to prospective students.

Spending close to $10,000 a month on advertising is not an effective use of our Ashram’s money and we feel that if we can support people joining our retreats for less cost (in effort and money) that the additional resources can go to supporting our mission of disseminating yoga and meditation.

Your $300 Registration Fee is a non-refundable, once-off contribution to the cost of administering the retreat.

Unfortunately, when we allowed for free registration, our no-show rate was close 90%.

The registration fee is your commitment towards attending the retreat.

If $300 is too big of an investment for you, rather than attending a retreat without the means to ‘Pay-it-Forward,’ we suggest applying for a scholarship position. 

Note; scholarships are entirely funded by those students who pay-it-forward in excess of our retreat costs.

Based on past expenditure, it costs us around $300,000 to maintain and administer the Ashram and it’s retreats each year.

Our retreat capacity is 9 retreats per year, 15 students each retreat.

This works out to around $2000 per student, per retreat. 

If every student donated less than the cost amount, Kailash Ashram would not be viable in the long term.

If every student donated the cost amount, Kailash Ashram would be able to continue to operate. 

If every student donated more than the cost amount, there would be the opportunity to expand the facilities and offer free services to those in need.

We welcome contributions of any amount, and invite students to connect internally to the view that their contribution will support a fellow Soul in need.

When we charged a commercial rate for our Soul Retreats, our students felt that the experience was good value because we were able to assist them in overcoming very significant problems regarding their outlook on life and overcoming past trauma. 

We know for a fact that our retreat has saved multiple lives of people who were on the edge of suicide.

As you can imagine, when paying this significant amount in advance, prospective students needed to be convinced that our retreat would work for them. 

This meant that we needed a very involved application and sales process. For every person that booked in, at least 3 or 4 other people who applied, wouldn’t. 

This meant hours on the phone, listening to stories of trauma and life difficulties, offering our heart and Soul via 1-on-1 guidance and coaching for free.

Then it required consistent effort in patiently following up as people ‘thought about it’ for months.

Too often, after giving an hour on the phone or via zoom, people would simply ignore us.

We have formed the belief that Yoga should be something that is sought out from interested individuals, not pushed or ‘sold.’

The Soul Retreat and Kailash Ashram exist to serve others; but service does not mean convincing others of the merit of the path, but simply sharing from our passion and joy.

As a family run endeavour, with limited means and time, this follow up process began to take it’s toll on our enthusiasm. After an intense retreat finishing on Sunday, on Monday morning we would be back to talking to prospective students. This was not sustainable and left us running on empty.

Oftentimes people would book without paying, and then simply ignore our calls. 

Worst were the times when we offered payment plans, only to have a student not attend the retreat, then not pay.

After 18 months of this process, we realised that this is simply the wrong energy and process to be running our Ashram from.

In our effort to make our Ashram economically viable, we had inadvertently built an operating model that was at odds with our deeper values.

Pay-it-Forward represents the start of a chapter where Kailash Ashram has put the onus back onto the individual to arrive at their own decision based on the plethora of available online information, interviews, and reviews. 

After speaking to hundreds of prospective students, the single biggest objection most people had was quite simply, is the investment of time and money worth it?

With Pay-if-Forward, we have addressed this issue head on.

We believe the retreat is worth infinite times the cost. Yoga saves our life every day. We’ve seen hundreds of people go through our retreat experience, and many find their way back ‘home.’

Many have shared that this was literally priceless.

With Pay-it-Forward, all we ask is that you let us guide you on retreat, and then, if it was a valuable experience, to contribute forward to support someone else having the experience.

If the retreat doesn’t help, we suggest you take it as a gift as it was paid for by the generosity of another student who wanted nothing but the best for you.

No. Since antiquity, students in many traditions have been expected to pay for teachings. 

Why is this? In a householder tradition like ours (i.e. shared by people who still have a worldly life) charitable giving (danaa) is offered to cover the cost of the guide’s time.

Danaa also helps a student value what is being given.

Some teachers prefer to offer teachings for free, and others on a donation basis, and others commercially. Each has its benefits, and downsides. Commercialisation can create conflicting priorities. Donation can mean a lack of economic viability. Free can mean students don’t value what is given.

We have personally received free teachings, and also paid for teachings and are happy in both instances.

Where accommodation and food is involved, especially for 5 days and nights, such as on our retreats, only someone who is naive would think that this should be provided free as there is significant cost in running a facility and maintaining it.

Kailash Ashram subsists entirely on the revenue generated by our retreats and there is no large wealthy organisation financing or supporting us.

At the end of the retreat you will have the option to either transfer money, pay by card or to set up a recurring payment over 12 months. We prefer upfront payments by bank transfer as this incurs no fees. Second priority would be an upfront card payment.

For those with more limited means, splitting your contribution across 12 monthly instalments reduces your contribution to a manageable amount. 

To minimise administration, monthly instalments are able to be offered below

$125 per month x 12 = $1500 total 

$140 per month x 12 = $1700 total

$200 per month x 12 = $2400 total

$250 per month x 12 = $3000 total

For contributions less than $125 per month, we invite you to offer a once-off contribution or to consider a scholarship.

Not directly. David and Rajni are the full time Sevadari (service givers) of Kailash Ashram. Their living expenses are covered by the Ashram and they are paid a small monthly stipend to support their young family.

All profits are retained within the organisation to support the dissemination of mediation and yoga, and to develop the facilities.

Contributions made over the cost price subsidise the contributions lower than the cost price, with additional funds going towards our scholarship program.

All earnings are retained within Kailash Ashram to support our mission and purpose.

No. When we established Kailash, we set it up as a Pty Ltd for the flexibility of a company structure, thinking it would be easy to become a not-for-profit if we needed to register as charity.

We have since learned that this is a difficult transition.

As a social enterprise, we have a clearly stated vision, purpose and mission and feel that this structure is suitable for this phase of the Ashram’s growth.

In the future, on the back of a thriving social enterprise, we plan to establish a not-for-profit to conduct purely charitable endeavours both in Australia and abroad.

Kailash Ashram is grateful for any contribution and makes no judgement towards your decision to contribute.

That said, we suggest you do some background research regarding the cost of 5 days of accommodation and food, and also reflect upon what drew you to connect with us.

Many people reach out when there is a need and wish to overcome trauma, find stability through significant challenges or to learn authentic practices.

The reality is that these require an investment of your time and energy through daily practice.

A suggested minimum payment plan option of $100 per month is around $25 per week.

Some level of austerity or sacrifice may be needed to make this a reality, but we feel that it can be a useful way of valuing the experience. 

No. Regrettably we are unable to offer Pay-it-Forward to students who have already booked in. 

You do however, qualify for our Karma Free Guarantee, so if you attend a retreat, and complete our online program and wish to be refunded, you will be eligible for this.

Certainly not! Contributing is as per your capacity and means. It genuinely costs us over $2000 per student to sustain the Ashram , and we pray that for every student who cannot afford the cost amount, that we attract another student that can cover their cost.

We are deeply appreciative of contributions above our cost price as this offsets those who aren’t able to pay in full. We encourage this to be seen as a selfless gift to a future student, rather than a means of building the ego.

Oftentimes, we arrive in a place of prosperity through hard work, and also a little luck. The ability to give back to a community that has allowed one to prosper is a gracious way to live.

Yes, on the worldly plane of existence, it is. People are free to come, and then not contribute. If all students came on retreat but then did not contribute, we have enough capital to last about a month.

We are fully trusting that who is meant to come, will, and that those that derive benefit, will pay-it-forward.

No. Our retreat is the same program we used to charge over $3000 dollars for.  

By removing the financial barriers for attendance, we are trusting that our costs will be reduced, and our time freed up to focus on developing the Ashram’s other activities, but the power and impactfulness of the programs remain.

No. I hope you can feel that we are genuine in our effort to find a financial model for our Ashram that encourages kindness and charity whilst removing the burden of having to ‘sell.’ 

No. We didn’t invent the idea of Pay-it-Forward, other social enterprises have used this method successfully. In ancient times, Danaa, the act of charitable giving, was common in the spiritual domain. Like tithing to a church, when we offer according to our means, we connect to the inner feeling of offering which benefits us, rather than a more commercial and transactional feeling of ‘purchasing’ or ‘buying.’

As an Ashram, we are committed to a long and prosperous future where we can support Souls achieving freedom from suffering. 

We believe the Pay-it-Forward model is the correct one for us to utilise (as opposed to a commercial on.)

No. Many years ago, we offered donation based retreats because we were indeed afraid to charge our worth (we had yet to see the impact that a retreat would have in our students lives.) 

We teach that people should live in alignment with their nature, and our nature is to focus our energy on what we love, rather than in convincing people of the merit in what we do. 

We feel that by enabling people to have the retreat experience first, and then to determine the value, that it will make for a more balanced and sustainable life for us at the Ashram, and to also allow people the joy in feeling that their contribution is supporting others.