Dark Nature: The Initiatory Descent into the West

Dark Nature is a seven-day initiatory immersion into the West—the season of descent, endings, and inward turning. Together we explore how life initiates us through loss, disruption, and change, and how meeting these passages consciously shapes our character and capacity to love. Through daily council, time alone on the land, and an overnight solo vigil on the fifth day, participants engage the lived arc of descent and return. Guided by the teachings of the West, this work strengthens our ability to remain present in uncertainty, release what no longer serves, and allow transformation to take root—restoring vitality within ourselves and within the communities we belong to.

Of all the movements within human nature, the dark—or fall—shield can feel the most compelling and the most frightening. It asks us to let go of what has come before, to release familiar identities, and to turn inward—toward feeling, memory, uncertainty, and dream. This is initiation. Here, what is no longer essential falls away. Here, we are asked to risk everything—or remain shaped by patterns that have outlived us. The way we meet this passage shapes our character, our destiny, and our capacity to love.

Initiation is woven throughout the life cycle. We are initiated by the turning of natural rhythms and by times of crisis, loss, and disruption. Each ending brings us again to a threshold. We may resist and become caught in the Underworld, or we may enter the descent and allow it to mature us. This movement—descent and return—is the ancient pattern of the hero’s journey lived in real time. The teachings of the West offer orientation and practices for walking this path with awareness, restoring balance and vitality within our own lives and within the families and communities we belong to.

During our days together, we will move through the four directions of the West, strengthening the parts of ourselves that allow us to meet endings and uncertainty without shutting down. This work restores vitality at the root and ripples outward into the lives we are part of.

This is a seven-day seminar, beginning mid-day on the first day and ending mid-day on the seventh. Each morning we gather in council. Each day you will go alone into the surrounding land to meet this terrain directly—through body, psyche, mind, and spirit. On the fifth day, the work deepens into a 24 hour solo vigil, a time of silence and descent held by the land. After each solo, and upon returning from the overnight vigil, we gather to give voice to what has emerged, allowing experience to settle into shared meaning.

Program Questions Contact: Betsy via [email protected]