Mindfulness Practices, Nature Immersion and Poetry with Mary Alice Mastrovito, Nancy Stranahan and Jean Farkas.

Forest Therapy is so much more than a walk in the woods. The highest purpose is not to acquire more information, but to drop into the energy of the forest, where we can take a time-out from the hectic pace of the modern world.

Meeting the forest in a state of mindfulness provides lasting and proven benefits for body, mind, and spirit. Led by an experienced and certified Forest Therapy Guide, this weekend’s nature immersion will include guidance in mindful and deliberate walking, while facilitating a deeper connection and relationship with the more-than-human world. ‘Invitations’ are offered during the walk to help you drop into the natural healing energy of Nature.

Forest Therapy walks are a form of wellness practice. They are similar in some way to the mindfulness practices of yoga, meditation, tai chi etc.  This particular practice is based on the Japenese artfrom, Shinrin Yoku, which  can be translated as forest bathing.

Mary Alice Mastrovito is a certified guide with the Association of Nature and Forest Therapy Guides, an organization that is the leading global voice for forest bathing and forest therapy. Nancy Stranahan is the Director of the Arc of Appalachia, and Jean Farkas is a wellness and yoga teacher from Dayton.

Each participant will be gifted with a poetry book, The Essential Rumi,  written by a 13th C. Persian mystic and interpreted by Coleman Barks. Rumi’s poems are a unique blend of invitations to mindful presence, spiritual ascendance and joyful, earthy sensuality.

Join us this weekend for a time to celebrate our connection with each other, and with the living natural communities in which we are immersed.