History and Vision of the Return to Reverence Immersion
- My journey into 'shamanic' practice began in 2007 when I asked a Vancouver based bean feasa for insight about the many poisonous spider bites I had received.
After this, I entered into a 3 year Celtic based women's 'shamanic' self healing & practitioner apprenticeship. - In 2011 I moved my existing Reiki practice from Vancouver to Squamish BC and began incorporating 'shamanic' healing services into both my neurofeedback and Reiki clients' sessions. My offerings also began to include community ceremonies.
- By January 2013 I was offering earth based, soul tending, community gatherings and workshops in both Squamish and North Vancouver. Later that year, regular monthly journey circles had been established and my practice became known as 3 Fold Balance with a focus on trauma and personal crisis recovery.
- I began a small focus group called 'Shamanic' Living in support of a handful of dedicated journey circle attendees in 2015, and I undertook two 'Shamanic' Teacher courses with Sandra Ingerman with emphasis on connecting earth and soul tending skills with people from all faiths and cultural backgrounds.
- The small focus group evolved into full year long 'Shamanic' Living Immersion program in 2016 and a second year program, 'Shamanic' Medicine Ways was developed. These programs supported people in reclaiming their lost cultural traditions, cultivate a spiritual practice that is meaningful and seamlessly merges with day-to-day living, and reconnects and aligns us with the natural world.
- During 2017, a home & studio space on the Upper Sunshine Coast began its journey to becoming a healing retreat. Community supported and carefully cultivated, "The Sanctuary" is a dream made reality. This space allowed me to expand my practice and offer services to my hometown of Powell River.
- 2018 saw the implementation of greater online supports with workshops and an augmented virtual 'Shamanic' Living Immersion program for long distance members.
- In 2019 I moved fully into The Sanctuary. Able to dedicate to full time care taking and development, it became the hub for 3 Fold Balance ceremonial activity, medicine gatherings, soul-tending retreats, and mentorship opportunities.
I took a year hiatus to re-write the SLI and SMW programs & websites into a more cohesive 2 year Return to Reverence Immersion with continued mentorship available after completion. This re-write was largely influenced by the recognition of "shamanism" and "shamanic" being appropriated, misunderstood, and unfortunately, trendy buzzwords here in the West. The re-write also saw the program move from monthly gatherings into 4 extended weekend immersions set to begin in 2020
There is also an aim to bring the Return to Reverence Immersion program into book form for greater accessibility, home study, and to allow for beginning at any point within the year. - 2020 will see continued Return to Reverence content re-writing to rely less heavily on words I am phasing out of use.
Hopefully, this year will also see the book come to full fruition! We will also be solely online for the 2020-2021 offering due to the pandemic and the full Year 1 in-person experience has been converted into online formats as much as is possible. Year 2 is also being converted for interested Alumni and will require a strong dedication to move through the Vision Quest portion in a new way.