Some day, if you are lucky,
you'll return from a thunderous journey
trailing snake scales, wing fragments
and the musk of Earth and Moon.
Eyes will examine you for signs
of damage, or change
and you, too, will wonder
if your skin shows traces
of fur, or leaves,
if thrushes have built a nest
of your hair, if Andromeda
burns from your eyes.
Do not be surprised by prickly questions
from those who barely inhabit
their own fleeting lives, who barely taste
their own possibility, who barely dream.
If your hands are empty, treasureless,
if your toes have not grown claws,
if your obedient voice has not
become a wild cry, a howl,
you will reassure them.
We warned you,
they might declare, there is nothing else,
no point, no meaning, no mystery at all,
just this frantic waiting to die.
And yet, they tremble, mute,
afraid you've returned without sweet
elixir for unspeakable thirst, without
a fluent dance or holy language
to teach them, without a compass
bearing to a forgotten border where
no one crosses without weeping
for the terrible beauty of galaxies
and granite and bone. They tremble,
hoping your lips hold a secret,
that the song your body now sings
will redeem them, yet they fear
your secret is dangerous, shattering,
and once it flies from your astonished
mouth, they — like you — must disintegrate
before unfolding tremulous wings.
- Geneen Marie Haugen
“When the fires that burn inside youths are not intentionally and lovingly added to the hearth of community, they will burn down the structures of community just to feel the warmth,” says mythologist and storyteller, Michael Meade, drawing from an old African proverb. What does this mean for the soul of a society that does not initiate its youth? Its elders? Some believe this is the crux of the predicament western culture now faces (as well as the many lands and land-based cultures its systems have laid to waste globally). Perhaps the chaos of this time stems from an epidemic of elderlessness, the result of generation upon generation of uninitiated youth. Perhaps the perpetual summer has ended and this is our collective initiation.
The Olympic Mountain Women’s Vision fast is a modern-day adult rite of passage. The initiatory process is a symbolic death and rebirth characterized by three phases: A Severance Phase, a Threshold (or threshing) Phase, and a Return (or Incorporation) Phase. Throughout these archetypal seasons, the initiate “dies to the old self,” ceremonially releasing patterns, behaviors, addictions, or beliefs that do not affirm life. Through ceremony, fasting, and wilderness vigil, the initiate opens to the stirrings and longings of the Soul self, then returns to incorporate their vision, mission, or gifts into their life and community.
This process is guided by clear intention and supported by elders, guides, women and the wild. It is a unique opportunity to step into a circle of initiated women while answering the call of Soul and Earth.
- Community Send-Off Song Circle: June 27th
- Preparation & Fast: June 30th - July 8th
(3 Days Preparation, 4 Day & Night Solo Wilderness Fast (No Food))
- Location: Olympic Mountains Wilderness, WA
- Day of Integration: July 8th
- Community Welcome Home Ceremony: July 11th
- Rite of Incorporation: Registration includes monthly mentoring integration calls and participation initiates you into our circle of initiated women. We hold integration circle monthly and journey back to the mountain quarterly (Equinox and Solstice times)
Helen Kolff (She/Her)
Helen is an initiated elder with several years of experience leading wilderness quests with Rite of Passage Journeys. An avid backpacker and hiker, she has been exploring the Olympic and Cascade mountains for the past 50 years. She completed her Wilderness First Responder course and set up an organization called Wild Women Soul Adventures. When she is not out in the mountains with friends, she enjoys living at the Port Townsend EcoVillage, painting with watercolors, and being with her husband and family including 2 teenage grandchildren.
Lea Aurora (She/Her)
Lea has been courting the Olympic Mountains for over 20 years. In 2021, she co-founded the Olympic Mountain Women's Vision Fast with Sylvia Talavera and Molly Rose. Lea is certified in ecopsychology through the Holos Institute of Ecopsychology Counseling and Education. She is a Shamanic Reiki master teacher, threshold keeper, and ceremonial midwife. Lea serves as a mentor and co-facilitator for Shamanic Reiki Worldwide, and she's been tending women's wilderness rites in the Olympic Mountains for the past 4 years. Lea completed her NOLS wilderness first responder training in 2019.
Molly Rose Stebbins (She/Her)
Molly Rose has lived on the Olympic Peninsula for 18 years. She is a threshold keeper, weaver of community, guardian of childhood, song carrier, and steward of the land. Her work as a preschool teacher and community tender is deeply woven with her relationship to the land. Her home is a sanctuary for healing, gathering, playing, growing. She has supported women’s rites of passage for the past 4 years.
Silvia Talavera (she/her)
Inspired by wild places without borders, Silvia guides from a full life experience. She blends the wild, sacred, and profane with humor and grace. School of Lost Borders Wilderness guide since 1993, seasoned hospice nurse, and Reiki practitioner, Silvia continues to hold the symbolic death and the physical death as mirrors for each other, as each has informed her life. She is a supporter of deep immersion into the natural landscape where exploration of the mythic, the archetype, and the imaginal dimensions is a gateway to the hero/heroine’s journey.
Silvia is an elder, great grandmother and mentor and she embraces her elderhood with great joy, deep humility and daily gratitude. She currently serves the OMVF as a distance support elder and mentor for the facilitation team. She tracks and supports the evolution of clear intent for each participant and holds the peripheral container in deep prayer.
Integration ~ Community ~ Sisterhood
A place where, after the fires were lighted, and the drumming, and the silence, there would be a hush of expectancy filling the entire chamber...a knowing that each woman there was leaving old conformity to find herself...a sense that all of womanhood stood on a threshold.
And if, during the hush, the other women, slightly older, had helped you to trust your own becoming...to trust it and quietly and prayerfully to nurture it.
How might your life be different?"
-Judith Duerk