Ecotherapy Training Intensive | May 12 - 16, 2024

May 12 - 16, 2024, 2023WhisperTree Retreat Center (formerly Bell Valley Retreat Center), Boonville, CA (Mendocino County)

This 4 night/5 day intensive workshop is designed for licensed and pre-licensed mental health professionals and anyone sincerely working in the helping professions.

The program will cover principles of ecopsychology and the unique way that we may embrace the world from the ecological perspective. We will explore techniques and various processes of holding a clinical container outdoors, facilitating a deeper connection with and reciprocity to the natural world, and employing a nature-based approach in working with trauma and the nervous system. We will consider cultural, clinical and ethical considerations of ecotherapy. We will address the growing collective anxiety of climate change or “eco-anxiety” and ways to work with this. The program will also include ways of wilderness healing work, thresholds of initiatory processes and a solo time on the land.Primary instructor is Jan Edl Stein, MFT, director of Holos Institute.We will (hopefully) be joined by naturalist, writer and ecological consultant, Roy Blodgett.

It is hosted in the gorgeous, rolling hills of inland Mendocino County at the Bell Valley Retreat Center on over 600 acres of pristine, mindfully stewarded land.

This program has a limited group size to preserve an intimate learning environment ...so early registration is encouraged.

This program offers 20 CEUs for California BBSE licensees (reciprocity with other states may be possible)There will be an optional 2 hour (no extra charge) online follow-up to the program 2 weeks after the conclusion of the program to support the integration of the learning into each student’s particular application.

The course imparts the skills and confidence to lead nature-based healing work both in individual and group work. The program is designed for psychotherapists and facilitators of deep learning who are seeking to learn more skills and experience as they move their clinical work outdoors, expand into an ecologically based framework, develop nature-based programs and consider ways of addressing an growing phenomena of eco- anxiety. The learning style is practical, highly experiential and immersive. This workshop will fill you with new ideas, skills, confidence and approaches for your work and will also be very personally transformative.

The program will mostly offer the CEU curriculum during the daytime hours but we will also have a few evening programs that tap into our more creative sides as we deepen our connection to the natural world. However, there will be “free” time for students to integrate material and deepen into the landscape.

Participants will receive a certificate in Ecotherapy at the completion of the program

FEE:

• Fee ranges from $1100 to 2100 according to lodgfing preference and includies tuition, meals and lodging.

• We will offer very basic, self serve breakfasts that pariticipants may wish to augment on their own.

• There will be hearty, organic prepared lunches and dinners from Sunday dinner through Wednesday evening dinner.

• Very limited Work/Trade positions with discounts of $250 are available on request.

• Please visit the WhisperTree Gallery to see the various accomodations .

• The registration form has detailed descriptions of each lodging option

For an CEU certificate please add $40.

LOGISTICS:

Please plan to arrive between 4:00 and 4:30 on Sunday afternoon. You can plan on leaving the center around 11:00 am on Friday.We will help coordinate ridesharing and pickups from either the Marin or Sonoma Airporters (for SFO arrival/departures).Complete details will be sent in late April.

TO REGISTER:

Complete this registration form

We will confirm your registration and send you instructions on how to pay.To hold your place we will need a deposit of one half of your fee.The balance is due no later than April 20, 2024.All fees are non-refundable after April 15, 2024.In the event that the event is cancelled you will receive a full refund.

CONTINUING EDUCATION UNITS

Holos is an approved CEU provider through CAMFT.This course offers 20 hours of continuing education credits.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES (for CEU’s)

At the conclusion of this program, participants may expect to be able to:

1. Describe at least 4 fundamental principles of ecopsychology

2. Describe and design an eco-based program for psychological healing

3. List at least 6 interventions that will create a deeper connection with the natural world

4. Describe the 3 phases of an ecotherapy session

5. List at least 3 important practical considerations in setting up an ecotherapy session

6. Explain how ecotherapy impacts limbic system processing

7. Name at least 3 ways to foster reciprocity in eco-therapy

8. Describe an ecotherapy process that addresses dysregulated/traumatized self-experiences

9. Name at least 3 ways that working with liminal states can enhance psychotherapy outcomes.

10. List the 3 phases of wilderness therapy

11. Offer a basic description of a deep mirroring process

12. List at least 3 ways to clinically address eco-anxiety

13. Name the 4 part cycle of an eco-grieving process

14. Explain at least 2 ways in which eco-anxiety may drive emotional dysregulation.

15. List at least 3 considerations of race, culture and socio-economic situations that impact one’s relationship with the natural world