Nature & Sustainability
Website program category as of 2022
COME TOGETHER! A Festival of IntraConnectivity and Spirit | Day Pass
With Daniel Siegel, Elissa Epel, Little Bear Tom Nason, Rhonda V. Magee and Douglas Drummond
We live in times of high existential stress with both ever-increasing personal, societal, and global pressures and the constant pain of witnessing ecological crises and widespread social injustices. These challenges also create opportunities to reconsider our relationships to self, one another, and the planet — and to choose a life of peak purpose and interconnectedness. […]
COME TOGETHER! A Festival of IntraConnectivity and Spirit | ETMC Day Pass
With Daniel Siegel, Elissa Epel, Little Bear Tom Nason, Rhonda V. Magee and Douglas Drummond
We live in times of high existential stress with both ever-increasing personal, societal, and global pressures and the constant pain of witnessing ecological crises and widespread social injustices. These challenges also create opportunities to reconsider our relationships to self, one another, and the planet — and to choose a life of peak purpose and interconnectedness. […]
Nature and Contemplation: Cultivating Wild Mindfulness
With Steven Harper and Gary Marcoccia
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, how to be idle and blessed. — Mary Oliver From the beginning of time, the natural world has invited humans to pause, reflect, and reconnect with life’s essence. This workshop offers an opportunity to […]
Experiencing the Esalen Farm and Garden
With Candice Isphording, James House and Becca Gallagher
Have you ever wanted to learn how to grow your own food? Experience a dynamic week in the Esalen Farm and Garden and fully participate alongside our talented and experienced staff. Local food security is a major issue facing communities worldwide. It is said that there is no greater form of activism than growing one’s […]
Encountering the Animate World: Hiking and Animism in the Big Sur Wild
With Fletcher Tucker
The Big Sur wilderness lives and breathes, listens, and speaks. Beneath ancient redwood trees, a shimmering creek journeys toward the sea. In the oak woodland, a polyphony of birds sings to the rising sun. Fog dances across chaparral bluffs, caressing sagebrush and sandstone cliffs. Every cove, meadow, and forest of this biodiverse landscape is alive […]
Walk on the Wild Side: Exploring the Big Sur Country
With Steven Harper
"What’s the quickest way out of the city?" John Muir asked a stranger. "Where do you want to go?" the man replied. "Anywhere that is wild," said Muir. This week is simple and direct. Each day we step onto the mountain trails of Big Sur and walk into the living wild — breathing ocean air, […]
Earth-Body: An Eco-Somatic Backpacking Journey & Retreat
With Noël Vietor and Ariel Johnson
The Earth holds us, breathes with us, moves through us. Since time immemorial, human beings have lived in deep, reciprocal relationship with landscapes—our movements shaped by terrain, our nervous systems regulated by the rhythms of seasons and tides, our sense of self inseparable from the more-than-human world. Yet, in this modern, frenetic age, we are […]
While the Veil Is Thin: Autumn Ritual With Land, Ancestry, and Spirit
With Fletcher Tucker and Micha Merrick
For thousands of years, autumnal holidays such as Samhain, Hallowe’en, and Vetrnætr have served as ceremonial foundations — connecting pre-modern peoples to landscape, ancestors, and ritual time. Many cultures believe “the veil thins” during this time, letting enchantment flood back into our world. The time is rife with opportunities to renew sacred relationships with the […]