Resources

Resources on Council, Wilderness Rites of Passage, Four Shields:

What is a Wilderness Rite of Passage (by John Davis)
Wilderness Vision Fasting and The Four Shields of Human Nature, by Stephen Foster and Meredith Little, founders of School of Lost Borders
The Practice of Council (From Ojai Foundation, posted on Wilderness Guides Council)
The Four Shields Model

Related Organizations & Networks We Adore:

Joanna Macy and The Work That Reconnects
EarthWays
School of Lost Borders 
Ariana Candell and The Earthbody Institute
Bill Plotkin & Animas Valley Institute
Joyality: Empowering Conscious Changemakers
Canadian Ecopscyhology Network
Wilderness Guides Council
Craig Chalquist, Emmanence Journal, and WorldRede
Holos Institute
Emergence Magazine
Holos Institute: Holistic Counseling and Ecopsychology Education

Earthy Poets, Authors, Podcasts, and Creatives We Adore:

Robin Wall Kimmerer, Author Of Braiding Sweet Grass
David Abram, Founder of Alliance for Wild Ethics and Author of Becoming Animal: An Earthly Cosmology
For the Wild Podcast 
Michael Meade’s Living Myth Podcast
On Being with Krista Tippet Podcast
David Whyte
Mary Oliver
Kai Siedenburg, Poems of Earth and Spirit
Andy Goldsworthy – Nature Artist
Rainer Maria Rilke
James Hollis
Gary Snyder

Forms:

Wild Nature Heart Program Evaluation

Wild Nature Heart Program Participant Agreement

Wild Nature Heart Medical and Information Form

Wild Nature Heart Backpacking Gear Pack List

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HONORING THE PAIN AND RESILIENCY Scratch the surface of everyday life and you’ll find many people holding a lot of unexpressed grief and other emotions about what is happening in the world. It is not easy to absorb the enormity of the crises we face, and yet we know it is not meant to be borne alone, but in community. Our intention is simply to offer an opportunity for people to gather together and share our grief and sense of loss at what’s happening with climate crisis and the loss of members of our other-than-human family and habitats. New terms that are becoming increasingly popular—"ecogrief," “climate distress,” “climate grief,” “climate anxiety” or “eco-anxiety.” Whatever we call it, it signifies both our struggle to be with and express our complex emotions AND our interconnectedness with our Earth Home. Pain is the other side of our love. We are in a collective initiatory moment. How can we show up, feel all of it, including the difficult emotions, while moving forward? By sharing grief and other emotions, and moving through them (not wallowing!), we can step into new ways of seeing and reconnect to each other and nature, and thereby become even better stewards of the world and the work that needs to be done to heal. We will heartstorm empowering ways to stay/become engaged annd build resiliency and courage. What to expect: This is a FREE, non-religious, simple earth-based gathering and everyone is welcome. Together we will do an opening circle, share a moment of silence, and an opportunity to share our grief, gratitude, and other emotions. Attendees may expect poetry, movement, a truth mandala, and singing. It will be about an hour and a half. Facilitators: Ryan Van Lenning, Certified Ecotherapist and Kelly Noble, LMFT RSVP on Facebook Event Page. (Link in bio) 🌞MYSTERY OF THE EAST It was the final session before his solo wilderness rite-of-passage ceremony next week. He will cross the threshold and mark what is alive, what is calling, what is waiting to be heard. But for now, we were in a redwood and bay forest along a creek and Opening to the East. East was the last of the four shields (School of Lost Borders) or four facets of the psyche (Bill Plotkin) that we’d been diving into over several sessions among the trees, along the river, on the rugged wild coast. That meant today we were Being, much more than Doing: Spaciousness, Lightness, Play. We have all the other parts of ourselves and our lives, for the all the Doing. East signifies the Dawn after the long night, the New, the Spring after the long winter. Its Archetypes include the Innocent/the Sage/the Sacred Fool/the Trickster, and abounds in Paradox, favoring both/and over either/or thinking. It’s living from Joy, lightening up, finding the humor in things, making fun of our ever-so-serious selves: “Hey, we’re out here in/with nature talking about wholeness and doing activities, we’re going to conduct a fasting ceremony in the wilderness, how freaking weird!” - It is Beginner’s Mind, fresh eyes, a young heart. The East is living with Mystery, knowing we don’t know and Living that largest Non-ego Transpersonal narrative, Belonging to Universe, Belonging AS the universe. Expressing and Embracing Spirit and spiritual love. It is relinquishing attachment to outcome, it’s accepting—maybe even reveling in—being thwarted in getting what we think we want. It WON’T turn out how you think. The trickster energy means things get turned on their head, Rules get ignored or overturned. It’s also being spontaneous, so we find ourselves picking up rocks and sticks and drumming rhythmically without a why, climbing trees, and splashing our feet and faces with creek water. We Imagine our colorful robed-mountaintop sacred fool selves reacting to our mundane take-every-little-thing-so-serious selves. We Simply rest on a boulder with the flow of the water. Yes, this is East. This is a rounding out. How miraculous and amazing it is to be alive! THE MOON HAS A LONG MEMORY The moon has a long memory and hasn’t forgotten your true name It is mere habit to shrink when the sun sinks Have you tried standing up and meeting the gaze of the Swordsman when he asks you what luster’s tucked under your supernova skin? Have you considered lifting the lid off your day-time self stitched tight oh too tight and oh! Or are you only a lover of butterflies despiser of bats? One of the half-time lovers of the world? The moon has a long memory and hasn’t forgotten your name— the one you uttered so assuredly back in the season of leaping before the great gremlins of approval stole it from you with foggy breath Be big with midnight and tempt the stars out with Cheshire desire Behold, some belly bold cries your full name from the old deeplier than ever told— Perhaps it is your own. -Ryan Van Lenning
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