Vision Quest Guide Training
A training in contemporary wilderness passage rites and threshold crossings
Dec 4 - 16, 2022
We used to ‘know’ our belonging in our bones. As a culture we have grown away from intimacy with the more-than-human world, yet it waits for us. This initiatory journey is an invitation to remember what we most deeply belong to, what we have always belonged to.
This training draws on the work of pioneers in the field of contemporary wilderness rites of passage and will attend to both the experiential work of learning the skills and approaches to holding initiatory work, as well the theoretical underpinnings of this work. The training is based around a four-directions eco-centric wheel of development (see Bill Plotkin’s general overview and a summary below) and the approach to the vision fast that comes through the School of Lost Borders. It also draws on elements of Claire’s training in Vision Quest Protection through the lineage of Tom Brown Jr and Stalking Wolf.
For much of our story as a people Individuals have crossed the threshold into wild places to attend more closely to the movement of soul, to remember what is at one’s core, what is most important. Such transitions in a person’s life were often marked through ceremony as initiatory events or passage rites, as a means of reinforcing both to the initiate and the community the new orientation, direction or phase of a person’s life. The wider natural world has long been respected as a necessary partner or companion in such initiatory journeys, the land offering itself as mirror, as ally, as fertile container in which to draw close to the roots of our life.
The ceremony will be divided into the three classic phases of a passage rite: Preparation, Threshold and Incorporation:
The first days serve as our preparation as we come together as a community to clarify our intentions. Here we listen to each other’s stories of where we find ourselves in life and what brings us here. Specifically, we explore in some depth our intention for this passage rite, what is it in our life that is asking to be honoured or marked through an initiatory journey.
The threshold phase will be a traditional four day and night fast. Each person goes alone into the wilderness (with the support of guides at base camp), without food and minimal external trappings. The threshold time allows for one’s intention to be revealed and to be unfolded in the mirror of Nature. It is a time for self-generated ceremony, for becoming intimately receptive to one’s life and for experiencing both the challenge and the beauty of taking our place amongst our relations as a simple human animal on this Earth.
The final days are devoted to incorporation. We share the stories of our threshold time and explore its gifts and implications for the life we return to. We sit in ‘story council’, sharing our stories and having them mirrored back to us by the community, offering the opportunity to see our individual narrative in a wider context. This can be one of the most touching and heartening parts of our time together: being witnessed and affirmed by those who have come to participate and create this ceremony.
It is important to note that as trainees, you will be required to wear two ‘hats’, being both in the role of participant and trainee facilitator for the course. This will entail working with fellow curse participants in both the preparation (intent) and incorporation (mirroring) phases of the threshold crossing. Integral to this training is the willingness and capacity to engage with a depth of personal introspection - this is actually the ground that matures our own ability to facilitate such work with others. Trainees will have the opportunity to fully immerse themselves in this ceremony as participants, whilst also exploring how it feels to sit in the guide’s seat and to take a measure of responsibility for holding this ceremony.
This whole training is offered as an initial meeting with threshold crossings and initiatory practices for those who are called to offer this work. In the tradition of this work, it marks a beginning, if one is so called, towards an extended relationship and apprenticeship to this ceremony. This course will be of particular benefit for those offering any type of wilderness solo or initiatory experience to young people or adults, through gaining exposure to and competence in the practical tools and approaches as well as the theoretical underpinnings of contemporary wilderness threshold crossings.
The wider context of this training is the inseparability between our own well-being and empowerment, and the health of our people and the wider Earth community to which we belong. Initiatory work is at heart about belonging; finding our particular place and deepening our capacity to engage in the work we are called to do in attending to the times we are living through, so that we can become a good ancestor to those who come after us.
Trainees are required to have sat a three or four day guided Vision Fast to be eligible for this training.
Areas of learning
The practice of ‘Council’
Shaping and honing of Intent as a foundation for threshold experiences
Exploring the role of contemporary wilderness rites of passage or initiatory journeys in our times including the challenges to this.
The four Directions of Human Nature – An eco-centric model of human development.
The nature of self-generated ceremony and the role of threshold crossing.
Nature as mirror
The role and art of Mirroring for empowerment and community witnessing.
Tools and Obstacles for Questing.
Physical safety during the Threshold time
An overview of the four-directions wheel we will use as a template for the program
Clearing
Do not try to save the whole world or do anything grandiose.
Instead, create a clearing in the dense forest of your life
and wait there patiently,
until the song that is your life
falls into your own cupped hands
and you recognize and greet it.
Only then will you know how to give yourself
to this world
so worth of rescue.
- Martha Postlewaite
Program Guides
Rupert Marques
My background is in environmental and outdoor education with an emphasis on experiential approaches to exploring ecological identity and personal agency. For several years I trained and guided with the School of Lost Borders (U.S.) in Contemporary wilderness rites of passage, and now offer this work here in Europe.
The other thread of my livelihood centres on contemplative practice. I have practiced in the insight meditation tradition for over 25 years in Europe, America and Asia, and teach at various retreat centres in Europe and beyond.
In recent years I have sought to bring the fields of contemplative practice and wilderness immersion together. This has been supported by living and working at Ecodharma, a contemplative retreat community in the Spanish Pyrenees dedicated to the movements for social justice and ecological sustainability.
I currently work with individuals and organizations offering a range of retreats and trainings that explore personal empowerment and resilience in service of creating a more just and beneficial human presence on this Earth
Claire Dunn
Claire is passionate about connection - to earth, self, and other - and believes that a rewilding of our inner world is the key to rewilding our planet. For the last 15 years, Claire has been facilitating groups and individuals to dive deeply into their soul, through the pathways of traditional earth skills, deep ecology, dance, meditation, and contemporary wilderness rites of passage. Claire currently lives in Melbourne where she writes, facilitates rewilding workshops, offers personal mentoring, and lovingly tends her garden. Claire is the author of memoirs My Year Without Matches: Escaping the City in Search of the Wild and Rewilding the Urban Soul. Claire received Vision Quest Protector Training through the Earth Heart Institute of Vision and Healing in 2008. This traditional sacred ceremony has been passed down through Tom Brown Jr from his mentor, a Southern Lipan Apache called Stalking Wolf. Claire has been facilitating Vision Quests since 2010 and has welcomed back dozens of courageous souls to the hearth-fire after their powerful journeys. Claire was also trained as a Quest Protector Trainer in the Stalking Wolf lineage in 2015.
Program info
The Vision Quest Guide Training program will be held on wild land in the Strathbogie Ranges, 2.5 hours north of Melbourne. A reasonable level of fitness is required. Accommodation is tent camping. This program includes a 4-day Vision Quest. A beautiful selection of whole food and mostly organic meals will be served during preparation and incorporation. The program is limited to a maximum of 12 participants.
Cost:
The full cost of the 13 day program includes all food and materials. This ceremony is a significant commitment and the monetary exchange reflects this.
Cost: $2400 / $2000 (conc)
Deposit $300
Payment and cancellation policy
This program requires a significant commitment and we encourage you to really feel into whether it’s right for you before booking in. Also have a good read of our cancellation policy below. It has been updated for this program, and we will be adhering to it to ensure a full program of registrations.
It takes some time to prepare for a Vision Quest. So even though our programs generally sell out, we often can’t fill places if we receive last minute cancellations - which is a shame given how many people are hungry to do this work.
We understand that all kinds of things come up that thwart the best of plans. If you do need to withdraw from the program, please give us as much notice as possible to give us the best chance of finding someone else, and so we (and you) don’t end up out of pocket.
This program is by application. If your application is accepted you will have three days to pay your deposit.
Payment of this non-refundable $300 deposit is required to secure your place.
Full program fee is required to be paid by 4th October (unless you have made alternative arrangements with us). If we don’t receive your payment we will open your place to someone on the waiting list.
If you cancel before 4th October, your deposit is not refundable, but you have the option to forfeit your deposit or transfer it to a future program for a transfer fee of $50. If you have already paid the full amount, it will be refunded, minus the deposit.
If you cancel after 4th October, and we can fill your place, #4 above will apply - we will refund the program fee minus the deposit, and give you the option as to whether to transfer your deposit to a future program for $50.
If you cancel after 4th October, and we can’t fill your place, we will not refund the program fee or the deposit, and you won’t have the option to transfer to a future course, except in exceptional circumstances.
When the course is full we will create a waiting list. If a place comes up and you are offered, you’ll have two days to respond and pay a $300 deposit, or we’ll offer the place to someone else.
We’re open to payment plans. Please be in touch to discuss.
How to apply
This program is by application, and trainees are required to have sat a three or four day guided Vision Fast to be eligible for this training. If your application is approved, you will be required to pay a $300 non-refundable deposit to secure your place.
Click here to apply. Applications close June 28.