Before a wahine must protect herself, the fundamental questions are:

Does she believe she is someone worth protecting?

If not, are there those she loves who she would protect?

If so, is she prepared to protect if that moment comes?

Our focused workshops will be on Kānaka Wāhine identity, personal sovereignty as wāhine protectors, ancient and modern cultural perspectives, and precision movements.

“Before a wahine learns to protect her body, she must remember that her body, her voice, her boundaries, and her future belong to her.”

Leadership is not merely a position. It is the ability to remain present enough to perceive what is happening, make decisions, communicate clearly, and act swiftly when action is required.

Using principles found within Lua warrior training, participants will explore presence, observation, boundaries, adaptability, decision-making, and the difference between reacting emotionally and responding deliberately. We will learn how to speak as protectors. We will learn more about how we can lead, visibly and invisibly, as Kānaka Wāhine. We will also hear from those who lead us now in these ways during a powerful panel discussion with Manu Powers, Kumu Ka’ea Lyons, and Kumu Michelle Manu, moderated by Ke’ala Hill.

Sometimes leadership requires advancing.

Sometimes it requires holding position.

Sometimes it requires redirecting.

And sometimes the most powerful decision is to be silent or leave.

“Leadership begins before anyone follows or trusts you. It begins with the ability to remain standing inside your own decisions.”

Resilience is often mistaken for endurance. Wāhine are conditioned through expectation and occasional praise for how much they can carry, tolerate, survive, and continue doing (for others). Koa Wāhine Retreats would like to offer another definition of resilience: the ability to recover structure after disruption, including when our growth and success cause disruption in others.

Through breath, movement, nervous-system awareness and connection, physical training, and Lua principles for koa wāhine lua, participants will explore how the body responds to pressure and how we can return to balance without remaining trapped in freeze, fight, and survival mode.

The principles explored throughout the gathering will progressively move into realistic self-protection. Participants will work with awareness, distance, boundaries, positioning, environmental considerations, grabs, close-range encounters, pressure against incoming force and situations on the ground. Ground training will emphasize protecting the body, creating space, disrupting an attacker’s control, recovering position, and returning to the feet as soon as possible.

The objective is not to teach wāhine how to stay and fight. It is to increase their ability to recognize danger, make decisions earlier, protect themselves when necessary, and create an opportunity to escape.

This special experience will introduce wāhine, young and grown, side-by-side, to the relationship between movement, confidence, awareness, culture, and personal safety.

Wāhine will first experience movement through Hula and then discover how familiar body mechanics—stance, stepping, turning, shifting weight, hand pathways, and spatial awareness—also support protection and escape.

Instruction will be age-appropriate, with younger keiki emphasizing movement, confidence, boundaries, voice, escape, and reaching a safe adult, while older keiki may explore more developed applications. The goal is not to teach keiki to fight. It is to help them become more aware of their bodies, their surroundings, their boundaries, and their ability to move with confidence.