“Grief is a path to understanding entangled shared living and dying; human beings must grieve with, because we are in and of this fabric of undoing. Without sustained remembrance, we cannot learn to live with ghosts and so cannot think.” — Donna Haraway, Staying With the Trouble

As we face increasing uncertainty and social and environmental losses, we are asked to delve into the depths and breadths of our spiritual lives and face these times with compassion, integrity and clear seeing. How do we, as critical scholar Donna Haraway suggests, “stay with the trouble of living and dying in response-ability on a damaged earth”? To become response-able is to become responsive, and responding entails opening to our lines of connection with self, kin and earth.

I offer one on one mentoring and provide workshops for schools, educators, non-profit institutions, and activist organizations to help develop the self-knowledge, emotional resilience and spiritual resource we need to sustain our commitment to learn and invest in this changing and increasingly precarious world. Workshops, trainings and mentoring are customized based on the individual and intention of each group; I draw upon deep nature connection, wilderness-based rites of passage, nature based ceremony, council practice, grief and empowerment practices, and dharma/meditation (please see my “About” page for more information related to my relevant training). Examples of past and/or current offerings include the Buddhist Eco-Chaplaincy Training Program, Radical Resilience trainings at UC Santa Cruz, Grief and Empowerment Councils, and Nature Based Ceremony/Meditation Retreats.

Contact me at kirstenrudestam@gmail.com



EcoChaplaincy

The Buddhist Eco-Chaplaincy training program is taught and facilitated by Gil Fronsdal, Susie Harrington, and Kirsten Rudestam. It offers basic Buddhist training in the wisdom and skill needed to be a Buddhist Environmental Chaplain, i.e., those who work to establish people in a healthy, compassionate, and mutually supportive relationship with the natural world.

Resilience and Reconnection Workshops

I provide workshops for schools, educators, non-profit institutions, and activist organizations to help develop the self-knowledge, emotional resilience and spiritual resource we need to sustain our commitment to learn and invest in this changing and increasingly precarious world.

Nature Based Mentoring

How do we step back into our own belonging, allow the grief of all we have loved and lost, while opening to the ever present gifts of this life? How do we live whole lives, in connection with and in service to the earth, each other and ourselves? I offer individual sessions for those interested in exploring these questions, as well those who would like mentoring in nature based practices and meditation.