NATURE BENEFITS
Creative Paths
EACH JOURNEY IS UNIQUE
Retreating into nature has been a creative habit for artists, thinkers, makers, and more for so many years. Breaking away from your normal routine allows you to engage your brain and senses in a different way. Each journey here is unique, but paths will cross in interesting ways.
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This residency is for all walks of life and career stages. It can be an alternative to grad school or a sabbatical rest stop especially as your host and founder is a former Graphic Design Professor able to act as a sounding board and mentor for those seeking that interaction. Val's not just a graphic designer, though, she loves photography, travel writing, reading, film studies, sewing, pottery, and general tinkering. She's learning more about the natural world daily on the land and is now a certified Forest Therapy Guide.
forest therapy WALK
What is Forest Therapy?
Engage all of your senses at your particular time at the camp to make close observations to the land as a disconnection intention. Often known as "Forest Bathing" or "shinrin-yoku", this philosophy came about in Japan when the social healthcare system recognized an increase in health problems brought about by the intensity and demands of their urban work environment with the economic boom of the 80s. You'll learn more about this at the start of the walk, but consider that humans have spent more time in natural environments than in the industrialized world over the course of history.
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For all residencies 14 days or longer included in your residency fee is a Forest Therapy session that will be scheduled based on several factors and could be at the beginning, middle, or end of your tim. Engage in wonder and wandering in this sensory experience in the natural surroundings of the 17-acres that Val found to embark on this journey. Certified by ANFT, your host, Val, will be your guide to slowing down which can be difficult for us in our fast-paced society. A guide works in partnership with the more-than-human world to accompany and support others on the journeys through which they encounter and embody the whole of who they are.
