Camano Farm Ashram

Simplicity – Brotherhood – Self-Realization

The Farm-Ashram of Camano is a 25-acre Nature Farm and Yoga Ashram on Camano Island, Washington, founded in December of 2012. There are around 12 full time residents, and many surrounding friends, dozens of critters, gardens, orchards, meadows, and woodland.

The Farm-Ashram functions as a plain-living monastery for the modern age.

The twin ideals of the Ashram are:

1) Universal, Loving Service to all life.

2) Self-Realization for all Souls.

The central tenets of the Ashram are Simplicity, Sisterhood/Brotherhood, and Sadhana.

As a community, we are established as a religious order: the brothers and sisters of simplicity of Camano. Members of the order are residents, and share stewardship of the common treasury.

To become a brother or sister, one must have participated in each of the four seasons of life at the Ashram, must no longer have a job in the world, nor possess any debt, and should be of one heart and mind for this way of life. 

Aspirants should feel inspiration to be a natural person and a foremost desire to realize God. This requires one to cultivate humility and spiritual courage, and to practice harmony and trust with the natural flow of Farm-Ashram life. 

We make our Living by Living

Our way of life is to meet all basic needs directly through natural farming, building, healing, and living. In this path, we seek to become free, natural people; To devote ourselves to the daily practice and freedom of meditation; To live happy in the seasonal rhythms of life; To sow in the spring, and harvest in the fall; To expand and share in the summertime, and to internalize and rejoice in the winter; To live in harmony and oneness with God’s Creation.

We are not run from donations, but rather are operationally supported by the return on the offerings we make to our greater community. Our prerogative is not to escape society, but to serve in loving and universal ways. These offerings include produce from the gardens, plants from the nursery, and medicine, food, and crafts from our hands.  We host events and education pertaining to natural farming, homesteading, and ashram life,  as well as meditation and yoga philosophy and techniques – all ways to share the natural abundance and happiness of our life lived for God.

We participate in local farmers markets and events at the South Camano Grange, and host open hours, meals, meditations, and a farm stand at the ashram.

We hope as a farm ashram to be a universal template to others, as one way to live a holistic, integrated and spiritual life in community and to inspire in friends everywhere a simpler, more natural, and God-inspired life.