Women’s Wild Threshold Crossing
A 48-hour solo fast
Mar 26 - 31, 2023
I am clearing a space
here, where the trees stand back.
I am making a circle so open
the moon will fall in love
and stroke these grasses with her silver.
I am setting stones in the four directions,
stones that have called my name
from mountaintops and riverbeds, canyons and mesas.
Here I will stand with my hands empty,
mind gaping under the moon.
I know there is another way to live.
When I find it, the angels
will cry out in rapture,
each cell of my body
will be a rose, a star.
~ Morgan Farley
Somewhere deep inside, we know when it is time for us to stop and listen. Really listen. To put down the phone, the to-do lists and the middle world concerns, and head to the wilds on our own. To put our ear to the earth, our nose to the true scent trail of our life and radically open ourselves to the kind of communication not available on google; engage in a conversation that, as Derrick Jenson suggests, is older than words. As our outer world tremors and shakes, those with the courage to heed this call are greatly needed.
Since earliest times, people from many earth-based cultures have received profound insight about themselves and their world by means of a vision fast – a multi-day solo fast within nature, seeking personal truth, emotional release and spiritual knowledge.
Stepping into the Vision Quest circle, we take pause of the day-to-day, and begin a larger conversation. What message is mystery holding for our heart, if only we had space to hear it? What wild longing is clawing for attention? What parts of us need to be welcomed home?
Our traditional Vision Quest program is 11 days, including a 4 day fast. However we know this is not possible for many including those with family responsibilities. So, after successfully trialling this program last year, we are again offering a shorter version - a 6 day program including a two days and two nights fasting in nature in solo ceremony. This journey will be divided into the three classic phases of a passage rite: Preparation, Threshold and Incorporation. Efficient - yes. Powerful - definitely!
Structure of the Program
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 two 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 day is 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.
Who is this program for?
This ceremony is for those who are ready to step out of their comfort zone and make space for deep listening. We offer this as an alternative to our longer Vision Quest for those who are not ready for a four day fast or are unable to take 11 days out from their other commitments.
The program is offered to all those identifying as women.
Facilitators
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 the Yarra Valley with her family, including newborn baby River. Claire is the author of memoirs My Year Without Matches and Rewilding the Urban Soul. Claire has received Vision Quest Protector Training through the Earth Heart Institute of Vision and Healing in the USA. This traditional sacred ceremony has been passed down through Tom Brown Jr from his mentor, a Southern Lipan Apache called Stalking Wolf. Claire is trained as a Quest Protector Trainer.
Yonke van Geloven
Yonke is a mother, teacher, farmer and rewilding facilitator. She facilitates community gatherings on her honeybee, permaculture property ‘La Fleur de Soul’ in Central Victoria such as seasonal celebrations, moon gatherings, olive harvest festival, dandelion festival etc.
She is passionate about deep listening to the sacred wild for healing. Always in wander and wonder, she is co learning the crafts which bring us into deeper relationship with nature and the more than human world.
Emily Coats
Emily is passionate about guiding people towards their unique way of contributing to the world. A lifelong student of the wild mysteries of the Earth, she loves deep nature connection practices that awaken full sensory awareness and enliven body and Soul, and is honoured to be a link in the chain that passes these practices on to others.
Emily is continually humbled by the power of Vision Quest to offer beautiful and surprising transformations. During her time working with Nature's Apprentice she has completed her Vision Quest Guide Training and supported multiple quests of varying lengths and formats. She has also nearly completed her Advanced Diploma in Transpersonal Counselling with College of Complementary Medicine.
When not in the bush (and when in it), she loves to dance, especially her life-long practice of classical ballet.
Eve Williams
Eve is most comfortable in the bush, fireside, barefoot, in deep conversation about the mess and joy of being human.
She has sought the counsel of wild places since growing up as an only child who carried many worries. Her experience of Vision quests has confirmed what her child self knew - so much can fall away and also be revealed when sitting quietly, alone in nature.
Eve is a mother of two sons, a facilitator, gardener, community builder, nature connection mentor in schools and family camps, and support worker.
She seeks to create spaces that welcome all feelings, and is particularly passionate about creating connection to self, community and earth for mothers and children.
Testimonials
“I am so deeply grateful to the Nature's Apprentice team for such a life changing ceremony of reconnection to self and inner knowing. The experience of sitting with self and nature was so empowering and restful and the support to bring that back to be heard and processed was warm, understanding and as needed.” - Lisa, participant in 48-hour Vision Quest Express program, 2022
“If you want to feel alive, dream about what you're here on earth to do, in what Joanna Macy calls 'the great adventure of our time' and come home to connection to yourself, others and the land, then I couldn't imagine a better way to spend your time.” - Pru, participant in 48-hour Vision Quest Express program, 2022
Program info
The 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. Previous experience with spiritual retreats and camping is not essential. A beautiful selection of whole food and mostly organic meals will be served during preparation and incorporation. An essential element to questing is both the physical and spiritual preparation, so if you feel the call to Quest, please be in touch as soon as possible to complete the application process, although late registrations are also accepted upon application. The program is limited to a maximum of 12 participants.
Cost:
The full cost of the 6 day program includes all food, accommodation, guide fees and materials. We recognise that participants come from diverse backgrounds and income capacities and so we offer a concession rate for students and unwaged.
Sliding scale: $900 (conc)/$990 (low income)/$1150 (average income)
Deposit $300
A scholarship place is available.
** Participation is subject to approval of registration and medical form **
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.
Please pay either the deposit ($300) or full program amount to register for the program.
You will then be sent a registration/medical form. Receipt and approval of this form will secure your place. If your form is not approved your deposit/fee will be fully refunded.
Full program fee is required to be paid by 31st January (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 31st January, 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 31st January, 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 31st January, 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 it, 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
Please register by paying either the deposit or full program amount. On receipt of payment you will be sent a registration form.