Sometimes it takes a great sky to find that first, bright and indescribable wedge of freedom in your own heart.
David Whyte, The Journey
Threshold Walks in Nature
Do you struggle to take time for yourself and the questions that matter to you? Would you love to have a format and people to support you in these questions?
You don’t go out into nature often, even though you know how spending time outdoors relaxes, centres and inspires you?
Do you want to (re)connect to your intuition and tune into the qualities of the natural seasons and cycles?
A threshold walk, or medicine walk, is a practice through which you cultivate your relationship with nature and yourself, open up to listen to what emerges from your subconscious and to what the ecosystem you are part of calls your attention to. After the walk, we share stories among participants and weave a collective tapestry of insights. Going for a threshold walk supports you in cultivating your ability to follow and trust your intuition, take new and unknown paths, be present, listen wholeheartedly, be heard by a group of peers, and accept what is being revealed in your life.
What happens at our Threshold Walk Workshops?
During our threshold walks, you can expect to spend time with yourself in nature, feel invigorated on your personal development path, meet diverse people and experience being part of a wholehearted community.
A Threshold Walk Workshops constitutes of three parts:
1. Preparation
We meet as a group, introduce you to the format, get to know each other, share some seasonal inspirations, and help you to define your intention for the walk.
2. Solo walk
You go out by yourself to a place where you can be in nature alone. It can be close to your home or be a wild(ish) area you feel attracted to. During the solo time (1-12 hours, depending on the format) you wander in nature while fasting and staying offline. The goal is not to get far, but rather to explore and connect with your surroundings. You go out to get lost and find yourself again. 😉
3. Group integration
After the walk we meet with the group, each participant shares about their experience, the guides and the group offer mirrors (this is a feedback method in which one shares in an appreciative wholehearted way the imprint left by the person who shared a story) and we come to a common closing.
We offer two formats of threshold walks which can be done both in presence in the surroundings of Berlin or Online:
- Threshold-day: The whole experience takes place during one day (preparation in the morning 1h, solo walk of 1-6 hours, group integration 1.30-2h).
- Sunrise to sunset-day: We prepare in the evening (1h), your solo-walk takes place from sunrise until sunset (10-14h), the next day we do the group integration (1.30-2h).
We offer Threshold Walks as open events. One can sign up on this website.
We also offer threshold walks to groups like teams or intentional communities serving a group transition such as a member leaving, new orientation, etc. Get in contact if you are interested.
6 skills you will train
- Deep wholehearted listening and presence
- Learning from nature’s dynamics
- Observation of your own experience and expression in form of storytelling
- Ability to be in unknown situations and find creative ways to be with them
- Intuitive ability of the body to guide you and find your way
- Individual and collective embodied sense-making
Upcoming Events:
Further dates
Authentic Relating Game Nights in Berlin, 19:00-21:30
- Tuesday, 14.11.2023
- Tuesday, 5.12.2023
- Tuesday, 16.01.2024
- Tuesday, 6.02.2024
Join the waiting list to be the first to be informed of the opening of the registrations of new events.
Martin Buba
What is a Threshold Walk?
A Threshold Walk, or medicine walk, is an ancient, simple and powerful practice during which one spends time in nature by themselves with a specific frame, typical to a ritual (a practice with a clear intention, a beginning, middle part and ending).
Wandering by oneself in nature while pondering one’s life, identity and decisions is something many people intuitively do. When we move in the natural environment, we seem to gain clarity and inspiration.
During a Threshold Walk we define the intention / question we bring to the land. We find the right place to start the walk and cross a threshold, marking the transition between everyday life and a time when we are fully present and receptive to the environment we are in. There is no way to do this correctly nor incorrectly. After having wandered, we close the ritual by crossing one more time a threshold. Participants then come together around a circle and share stories about their experiences. These are mirrored (a feedback form honoring the narrator and the story while highlighting significant aspects) by the guides and/or by other participants.
The philosophy at the core of a Threshold Walk is the assumption that nature mirrors the human, and the human mirrors nature. The human and non-human beings reflect back to us the way we experience the World and the place we have in it. During a Threshold walk, we pay particular attention to the feedbacks mirrored us back from our environment.
Medicine walks have been used by humankind since immemorial times and many indigeneous communities across the World share this practice. The format we offer has been brought back to the west by Steven Foster and Meredith Little from the School of Lost Borders.
Who facilitates the workshops?
Arne Drews
Arne is working as a trainer and coach, is a certified ART International Authentic Relating facilitator, and a Gestalt therapist in training. He’s passionate about exploring human development, nature connection and human-to-human relationships. His heart beats for the union of freedom and connection as well as an all encompassing belonging to the earth and all that lives on her.
Learn more about Arne on his website.
Majka Baur
Majka Baur is a trained systemic-integrative coach, facilitator and guide of wilderness based rites of passage. She accompanies people going through major life transitions and on wild personal development journeys. Majka loves movement, dance and hikes, as well as touching conversations during which time stops flowing.