Nature as Refuge – Cultivating Awareness, Love and Awakening in Nature

For millennia, seekers have turned to nature for refuge, clarity, and wisdom. In this silent, fully outdoor retreat, you will meditate amid mountains and meadows while exploring accessible yet powerful sensory awareness practices that invite insight, interconnection, and well-being.

This immersive experience offers a welcome counterbalance to busy, digital, and stressful lives. Throughout the retreat, you will develop a receptive, embodied quality of mindful attention that supports learning from nature’s teachings on change, letting go, equanimity, and the intimate sense of being connected with all life.

You will also discover how nature can awaken not only deep insight, but also a profound love for the earth and all species. That love becomes a source of inspiration and action in these ecologically challenging times. Participants will cultivate a contemplative relationship with the earth, deepen their understanding of what it means to be mindful in nature, and experience themselves as earth, while encountering nature as refuge, teacher, and source of wisdom and awakening.

The program includes sitting and walking practice in nature, Dharma talks, and group meetings. There will also be time to explore the beauty of the natural surroundings with contemplative presence, both in solitude and in community. Come ready for unexpected delight, awe, mystery, silence, and illumination.

Testimonials

KB
“Mark is a wonderful and natural guide. The practices and teachings invited me to connect with a spectacular place in an intimate and sacred way. The poetry Mark read matched the poetry all around us and the poetry I felt inside. When I was challenged by the practice, he offered helpful tips.”

SA
“I really appreciated the freedom in Mark's approach, which encouraged us to inhabit a place fully and to be present to all its wonders without demanding strict discipline or rigid adherence to protocol. The silence, the sitting, and the other mindfulness practices awakened my senses and created fertile ground for falling in love with everything around me, reconnecting with the divine, and expanding my capacity to be present with myself and others.”