"Barbara & Masen are generous and powerful teachers and guides. Their work is top notch, well organized, well thought out, presented masterfully, direct, healing, revealing, supportive, loving, compassionate, complete & life changing. They help their students to realize that it is they themselves who are doing the work!" Scott Carlson ~ Managing Partner “Barbara & Masen are masters at guiding both the group as a whole and individuals through the tricky depths of an emotional morass. The honesty and courage they are able to extract from the participants is amazing”. C.W. / Attorney

Masen and Barbara have been married for over 23 years. They created the Bonding Weekend because they observed numerous friends and colleagues who had done plenty of personal growth work, therapy, healing of their past issues, found some purpose in their lives, and yet still seemed unable to create healthy partnerships and bring these qualities into their relationships.

The main questions they have asked themselves are these:

"What goes wrong in intimate relationships?"
"How is it that people who are so clearly in love seem unable to maintain that and build from it?"

They do not pretend that they have any easy answers or that they don't have problems of their own. However, they provide effective tools for you to begin to ask the right questions and get a clear sense of what you need to do in order to create the types of relationships that you want. 

Barbara and Masen have devoted their lives to personal exploration and brought that committment into their relationship.

Through their own journey together as a couple, they have continued to explore what it means to be a "partnership", what it really takes to set boundaries, yet compromise, and what it is that keeps love alive.

They believe that it really is possible to maintain a high level of passion and excitement in relationships and with compassion, humor, love, and ruthless honesty provide a safe and clear environment for people to create the types of relationships they truly want by telling the truth, taking risks, and honoring each other.

Barbara Reiner Yaffee has been involved in the field of personal growth for over 35 years. She has been active in varied large group personal growth seminars as a participant numerous times as well as acting as an assistant, team leader, facilitator, supervisor and producer. Together with Masen, she has been producing and leading The Bonding Weekend since 1997.

As a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, she maintained a private practice for many years, working with individual clients and groups and specialized in working with women in healing their relationship with food and their body, training other clinicians in supporting clients in healing from disorder eating, and providing in-depth psychotherapy for a variety of issues. She has extensive experience with inner child healing, rebirthing, emotional release work, communication skills training, addiction recovery, and in supporting healthy relationships. In addition, she developed and taught a counseling skills training program and has directed and been involved with many non-profit agencies.

Although The Bonding Weekend is NOT therapy, Barbara brings her extensive training and skills to this work. She is committed to supporting people in living their lives fully with integrity and passion.

Masen Yaffee has been involved with spiritual and personal growth work and trainings since he was 4 years old when he received a meditation teaching from an eastern guru, Maharaji. His life has been devoted to pursuing his own spiritual path as well as supporting others in finding their own way and being true to themselves.

He has participated, assisted, and facilitated at numerous seminars, including such varied topics as empowered speaking, goal achievement, communication skills training, and emotional release work.

Masen is a Licensed Avatar Master and Wizard; The Avatar Course is delivered internationally and is designed to teach people to seek out and discover beliefs that do not serve them, and to then create the beliefs that do. It also provides participants with the experience of themself as "Source" of their Universe. Masen was licensed as a Master in 1992 and has been delivering courses ever since.

The Bonding Weekend is NOT Avatar, however Masen brings his extensive experience as a teacher, mentor, and trainer to this work. He is committed to supporting people in working through their own blocks, in communicating through their blocks with others, and to supporting people in getting what they want in life.

Barbara & Masen live in Santa Barbara with their 3 kitties, Harley, Xena, & Spike.

Masen owns a web development company and is passionate about supporting people in growing their businesses.

Barbara produces the Bonding Weekend and she is a social media junkie and blogger. You can find her at inspiredgirl.me as well as on instagram, twitter, Facebook, pinterest, and more! In addition she designs and produces decadent Cashmere Legwarmers, fingerless gloves, and armwarmers and is an avid knitter - urbanknitta.com.

Their favorite pastimes include Su Bak Do Karate (Masen) & Mysore Asthanga Yoga (Barbara), Knitting (Barbara), Flying Planes (Masen), Piano (Barbara) Volleyball & Windsurfing (Masen), pampering their kitties, working on their computers, watching movies, and TV series with a message such as 'My Name is Earl', 'Joan of Arcadia', 'Quantum Leap', 'Heroes', 'Saving Grace', 'Once & Again' and of course 'Buffy', 'The Dead Zone', 'Star Trek TNG' & 'Battlestar Gallactica'. Barbara confesses that she binge watches teen coming of age shows such as Gilmore Girls, Friday Night Lights, One Tree Hill, and the OC, while Masen tends to get lost in shows such as Sons of Anarchy, Game of Thrones, and Justified.

In addition, they are both passionate about waterskiing & wakeboarding in tropical locations, as well as snowboarding & skiing. They spend their summers working and playing at their favorite lake.