ADULT Programs

“I came away having felt things I did not think I could feel and having seen things that I did not think I could see. The course of my life has been permanently altered, in the most precious and meaningful ways. I am better equipped to serve my community from my heart and I am better able to see the humanity in myself and others.”
- Ben, Adult Participant

 
 

For more than 50 years, Rite of Passage Journeys has been offering youth opportunities to move more meaningfully and intentionally through the crucial passage from childhood to young adulthood. The more we witness these journeys, the more clearly we see that our society today needs Rites of Passage ceremonies and experiences for All Life Stages! We are committed to offering opportunities for adults to move powerfully into their lives, from the first step into adulthood to inhabiting the wisdom of elderhood with grace and confidence.

As adults hoping to hold a healthy community for everyone (and especially the youth), we ourselves need opportunities to cultivate deeper self knowledge, and to strengthen connections to our purpose and passion. We need time to connect to the world that surrounds and supports us, and a chance to reflect on how we can more powerfully bring ourselves and our gifts to our social circles and communities. These are the foundations of maturity that allow us to create space to invite the next generations to step into community life as powerful young adults.


What We Offer

In order to grow the community of adults who are capable of and committed to restoring soulful and ecological roots in our communities, we offer three kinds of opportunities:

  • Wilderness SoulQuest Experiences — your own Rite of Passage journey

  • Leadership Training — for those who would guide others

  • Community Workshops — explore the variety of facets of life that our communities need to strengthen and support, in order to grow a thriving culture that invites all people into deeper connection with themselves, each other, and the world

 
 

Adult Rites of Passage

Rites of passage for youth weave communities together around the effort to transmit healthy, regenerative culture to the next generation. Through initiatory processes, young people shed what has become too small for them, and are challenged and supported in developing the inner resources and understandings to fully bring their unique gifts forward – into a world that urgently needs what they have to offer. To navigate these transitions of adolescence well, young people need adults who understand the tasks, difficulties, and opportunities of this life stage. They need mentors who know how to mark transitions in meaningful and relevant ways. Most of all, they need adults who have themselves gone through a transformative Rite of Passage experience and understand the journey of self-discovery and community belonging.

 

adult mountain quest

Ages 18+
June 26 - July 8, 2024

with Colleen & Thompson Bishop

Find out more >

 

adult wilderness quest

Ages 18+
May 23 - June 2, 2024 with Jenny Macke & Sheryl Kent - Wild Rose

Aug 23-Sept 2 with Grae Gerlach & Sterling Broomfield


Find out more >

 

How is Adult Wilderness Quest Different Than Adult Mountain Quest?

There are two ways in which our adult quests are different by design:

TRIP FORMAT

Adult Wilderness Quest (AWQ) will be centered at a basecamp in the forest and on a wild river that is accessed by vehicle — car camping, basically and it is 11 days. This course is accessible for a wide variety of people and ages. It is adaptable to people with varied wilderness skills and physical abilities for example from an elder who needs to be close to camp to someone who wants to quest on a high mountain with more physical challenge and remoteness.

Adult Mountain Quest (AMQ) is a backpacking trip, and participants will carry everything they need for the 13-day quest on their backs up into the mountains. The main distinction here is that AWQ is designed to be adaptable related to physical challenge and comfort with wildness, and AMQ explicitly incorporates the potential difficulty of the trail as a part of the “trials” of the quest.

Restoring Youth Rites of Passage Leadership Training

Rite of Passage Journeys offers several important Leadership Training opportunities to support those aspiring to work with youth or adults in their communities. These programs are appropriate for folks from any background or level of experience.

Leadership Fundamentals Intensive

Spring: April 20,21 & 27,28, 2024
Ages 18+

Our Leadership Fundamentals Intensive (LFI) emerged from a community call for weekend-length trainings to delve into rites of passage methodology and practice. Initially offered as a series of stand-alone workshops, in 2023 Journeys will offer our collective fundamentals training topics as an intensive program over two, back-to-back weekends.

Combined with your own Wilderness Quest (see above for Journeys’ two Adult Quests) and a field Apprenticeship experience on one of our summer youth programs (see below), this collection of training opportunities provides a fantastic preparation for joining our team as a future guide, or to bring these skills home to your own communities.

 
 

Field Training Apprenticeship

Various Dates June - Aug 2024* Ages 18+

*please see dates for youth programs and courses you would be interested in apprenticing

Apprenticing is a crucial aspect of learning to be an effective guide for youth. Nothing truly prepares you for the realities of working with youth in the physically and emotionally intense setting of a rite of passage journey like assisting skilled guides as they lead a group through the experience.

Apprenticing moves beyond the exploration of ideas and concepts, into the experiential world of learning-by-doing. Our apprenticeships are designed to integrate apprentices into the guiding team and diminish the distinction between guides-as-doers and apprentices-as-watchers. Often called the “trial-by-fire,” each apprenticeship is unique because each trip is unique. In this way, the world itself offers up the learning opportunities and edges that each apprentice needs.

 

Integrating Transformative Experiences

Fall 2024 Ages 18+

Meant for anyone, but designed specifically with Rite of Passage guides and mentors in mind, this course explores the gaping hole that exists in both our culture today AND in most modern rites of passage programs: the lack of significant support for the crucial phase of Incorporation. Without sufficient opportunity to incorporate transformative experiences, they can easily become lost as we slide back into the “old way” of being we were living prior to our rite of passage. This 4 Day in person retreat program will dive deep into this crucial aspect of guiding and supporting rites of passage, and is designed to not just train us to be more effective guides, but also support us in our own integrative process!

 

Stay Tuned for future developments!

Collaborative Trainings

Journeys collaborates with other Rites of Passage organizations and trainers both in public offerings and for our core staff and field guide training. Our goal is to offer a collaborative training opportunity with one or more of these partners each year. Recently we have worked with Youth Passageways to offer training in how to navigate dynamics of privilege and power with grace and sensitivity. We have also partnered with Age-ing to Sage-ing International to offer Elder training, and Laurence Cole and Cascadia Quest to offer Grief Tending workshops for the community. We’ve also trained with inspiring diversity, equity and inclusion trainers such as Clement Wilson, Lux Gypsum, J Mace III, Darcy Ottey and Kruti Parekh, to continue to expand our own awareness and better serve our youth and adult program participants. We are excited to see what our future collaborations will bring!

[You can find links to these amazing folks and more on our Resources Page]

 

Community workshops and events

ongoing events and gatherings

 
 

HEART OF JOURNEYS

June 7-9 2024

Find out more >

 

community programs

Revitalizing the cultural settings of our communities is an important part of restoring rites of passage for youth and adults in the world today. Rite of Passage Journeys focuses on several key aspects of cultural revitalization in the programs that we offer to the greater communities that we serve:

Ritual, Ceremony, and Personal Development
Rite of Passage Journeys is committed to the revitalization of ritual and ceremony in our communities. Crucial to learning how to bring ceremony into our communities is doing the work to expand our capacity to be peaceful, grounded, and integrated people, courageously stepping into connection and collaboration with others.

Connecting to Nature
Now more than ever, as our social and economic worlds become increasingly digital and virtual, humans need the grounding and centering that the natural world provides. Rite of Passage Journeys understands that finding simple, tangible ways for us to connect to the natural world is essential for our physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being.

Embracing Elderhood
The role of Elders in strong, healthy communities is universal. In our modern world, the vital role of Elders in supporting and helping the younger generations (youth and adult) to move forward in their lives with power and grace has been greatly diminished. The idea of “Retirement” more and more seems to invoke the idea of “being done.” Journeys believes just the opposite: stepping into the role of Elder is the beginning of what can be the most important contributions that one can make to their community.

 

upcoming community workshops

 

THE ART OF STORYTELLING

Ages 18+
ONLINE
March 3, 10, 17, 2024

Find out more>

 

INTO SOUL WISDOM

IN PERSON

Ages 18+
March 23 & 24, 2024
Find out more >

 

TENDING THE SONG GARDEN OF THE SOUL


IN PERSON
April 6, 2024
Find out more >

 

COMMUNITY GRIEF RETREAT

Ages 18+
IN PERSON
April 13th & 14th, 2024
Find out more >

 
 

CREATING SOULFUL RITUAL

Ages 18+
IN PERSON
TBA June 2024
Find out more>

 

DRUMMAKING

Ages 18+
IN PERSON
TBA 2024
Find out more >

 

INTEGRATING TRANSFORMATIVE EXPERIENCES

Ages 18+
IN PERSON
TBA Fall 2024
Find out more>

 

RITES & RESPONSIBILITIES

Ages 16+
ONLINE
TBA 2024-2025
Find out more >

 

STAYING WITH THE TROUBLE

Ages 18+
IN PERSON
TBA Fall 2024
Find out more>

 
 

EMBRACING ELDERHOOD:
AWAKENING THE SAGE WITHIN

Ages 18+
ONLINE
Dates TBA
Find out more >

 
 
 
 
 
 

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