Into-the-Heartwood outdoor workshops offer intentional nature experiencing for 'helping professionals' / 'human relations practitioners' to support the development of a nature-relatedness and creative expression amongst the living world.

Working with processes involved in Rites of Passage (thresholds between severance, liminal space and incorporation), sensing into the reciprocity of your relationship with the living earth, and allowing your own unique creative voice to express and respond is the bedrock of the nature relatedness offered here.

Approaches that underpin this work include eco-psychology, eco-philosophy, environmental expressive arts, rites of passage and somatic mindfulness.

As we acclimatise to being amongst the living world, our capacity to attune grows: we notice more, become more mindful, and over time our relationship with the more-than-human is profoundly deepened. Attuning in this way fosters an embodied state of being, offers up wisdom, and invites a shift in our perspective of the animals we are, within the ecological web.

By getting curious about the queries such as, ‘who am I in nature?’, we begin to open ourselves up to a rich, interconnected experience that can lead to an expansion of awareness. Over time, this awareness supports the growth of an ‘ecological intelligence’ that is embodied, emotionally cohesive and innately creative.

Working creatively offers an opportunity to explore through curiosity and without fear of product outcomes. The focus is on the experience of the process, garnering greater understanding, expression and communication. Entering into a reciprocal relationship with the living world we offer back our gratitude, understanding and creativity.

Through engaging in Into The Heartwood process, we can cultivate..

• a vital aliveness, offering a deepened sensory awareness

• an engagement with creative expression that is free of value-judgement

• an intentional engagement with the more than human world

• an altered pace and a reciprocal relationship with the natural world

• working in alignment with the seasonal turning of the earth

• our appreciation, respect and care for other species and living organisms

• a sense of a shared self

Into the Heartwood Workshops 2026

Thresholds of Growth 13th March        

How does marking thresholds support growth – or our relationship with growth? What do engaging with thresholds really offer us? Where are the thresholds in the living world – and why is it important? This first workshop of the year acknowledges the slow unfolding out of the winter, heading towards the spring. If you have been hibernating, join us to mark this threshold of stepping up and out into the emerging light.

Nature in Time and Place 8th May   

Who am I when I’m out here? When I’m with you? How have I been in relationship with nature throughout my life? These are questions that this workshop invites us to lean into. Holding presence in the here & now, we will remember other times and places, and creatively explore who we are in this green place at this time.

Becoming animal 3rd July

At the peak of the growthful arc of the year, let’s find our feet and pad through the forest; notice our opposable thumbs and discover the living world with our hands; let’s inhabit our bodies to fully know who we are as one of earth’s animals. Expect to engage in your animal body in this workshop, enhance your senses and attune to your needs and impulses.

Working creatively with reciprocity in our relationship amongst nature 11th Sept 

On this day, we’ll be paying attention to how we are received in nature and what we offer. Sensitively weaving our engagement with the living earth to bring greater awareness of our nature-relatedness. The group will be invited to come together to co-develop a creative piece, to hold, symbolise and express their experiences.

Descent towards the earth 13th Nov  

On this final workshop of the year, we will gather in our growth, allow composting to process, and be with the slow spiral of descent towards the earth in readiness for Winter’s rest. This is a time of letting go, moving into the dark and the dreaming.

Location

Held in ancient woodlands and low moorland meadow in Derbyshire, UK.

We have the use of a compostable toilet, a woodland hut (if required) and fire-pit.

Fees £75 per group day

Please bring your own lunch. Refreshments provided.

Please contact me (see email below) and we’ll arrange a brief conversation to consider your readiness at this time. Following this you’ll receive a booking form and further information. Please return your completed forms, along with your fee and this will book your place.

Into The Heartwood is CPD for human relations practitioners who are wanting to develop an ecological practice to support their work. This is not supervision, therapy, or a training in how to take your practice outside, but will be a personal underpinning to support your professional practice.

It is urgently understood that our species’ separation from nature is having very serious consequences on many levels. Restoring our relational position within the living earth feels like an appropriate response to our world in these times, providing the opportunity to develop a healthier affiliation with the natural world, as well as our own being.