Date: Thursday, July 21, 2022 – Saturday, July 30, 2022

Location: Rocky Mountain Ecodharma Retreat Center, Jamestown, Colorado

Rocky Mountain Ecodharma Retreat Center is an ideal location for nature meditation retreats. The area is extraordinarily beautiful, pristine and peaceful, with a wide variety of trails, wildflower-covered alpine meadows, creeks, and rocky crags. The mountains, forests and river naturally work to settle the mind, while living and practicing together creates personal connections and mutual support.

Part 1: Ecodharma Training Retreat, July 21 – 30, 2022

The ecological crisis is the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. And we have Covid to deal with too. Are you feeling overwhelmed? How does modern dharma help us understand and engage with all of this? New teachings and practices are now emerging in response to the realities of the current situation: we are calling this Ecodharma.

This training and nature retreat is a ten-day experiential immersion into ecodharma, specifically for dedicated practitioners, dharma leaders and teachers. Our sense of separation from nature is at the root of the ecological crises our civilization faces, and ecodharma is a path of deconstructing that separation, thus reuniting our inner nature with outer nature. Ecodharma practice is about healing our relationship with the rest of the natural world, so that an appropriate and authentic response to suffering can arise, which unifies our personal and spiritual transformation with social engagement. In this time of pandemic, and ecological and social crisis, the earth calls upon us to do what we can in response.

In the first few days, we will connect deeply with the natural world, grounding ourselves in the joy and healing of being and practicing outside, while building a supportive and safe sangha. Then we will begin to explore the more challenging side of our relationship with nature: the grief, fear, anger, and guilt we feel while watching the earth’s climate and ecosystems deteriorate, along with increasing social, economic and political unraveling. Together we will touch into eco-trauma and eco-grief, including the trauma and grief of the pandemic; working with them while supported by deepening nature practice and sangha relationships. Then, after detailed preparation, there will be a two-day/two-night solo, in which solitude and silence increase our individual capacity to see, hear, and feel the connections between our inner and outer nature, building strength, resilience, and joy. Afterwards we gather in sangha together for integration and finding our ways forward.

This training retreat is not about learning a set, prescribed method, and a lot of the program is experimental and flexible. Both individually and collectively, we will respond appropriately to the situation at the time we gather. Our goal is to support and catalyze deep personal learning that you can apply to your own dharma practice and leadership, in order to develop ecodharma in your own way. The uniqueness and authenticity of our own experience shapes how each of us understands dharma, and this training will reflect that in everything we do. Our hope is that this experience informs, motivates, and empowers you to bring ecodharma into your own dharma and your own life.

The retreat is often but not always silent, and will include instruction and practice in both sitting and walking meditation in nature, Q&A, discussion, sharing, a dharma talk, individual one-to-one meetings with the teachers, and open practice time as well. The intention is to co-create an ecodharma lab, where we are all experientially learning together and discovering the best ways to do this crucial work.

Note: The retreat is half full as of end of January, 2022.