We are not separate from the natural world, though we may feel out of touch with wildness.  Ecopsychology nourishes our awareness of the interdependence of all living beings.  Nature teaches us about the physical and spiritual interconnectedness of life forms and life cycles, and can guide us through the death/birth/rebirth cycle of deep psychic change.

I have gone on vision quests in remote deserts, fasting and exposed to nature, alone but supported by guides and companions.  It is an experience I recommend to all who are called.  On a wilderness spiritual quest our senses are heightened.  We can allow the tree, rock, lizard, flower, or cloud to take on symbolic significance, personal meaning.  Seen in the light of teachings, the messages received from the natural world can provide inspiration and guidance.

My approach to ecopsychology has been shaped by my training as a vision quest guide; and by my association many years ago with Gregory Bateson, who was a mentor and friend.  Bateson was a trailblazer in the application of systems theory to both biological and cultural systems.  He expanded the idea of biological processes to include mind—as well as the reverse: mind includes nature, as expounded in his book Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity (1979).

I was privileged to be part of Bateson’s circle in the mid-seventies. Stephen Nachmanovich, my colleague and friend since that time, wrote a personal portrait of the man and his contribution called “Old Men Should be Explorers” (1981) http://www.freeplay.com/Top/index.m2.html
Gregory Bateson’s ideas are continuing to influence theory and practice in many disciplines.  See: http://www.interculturalstudies.org/Bateson/index.html

Though Bateson was a scientist and liked to say he was an atheist, he was always interested in the concept of the sacred.  There is a profound spiritual underpinning to his understanding of the interconnectedness of living beings and systems:

Freudian psychology expanded the concept of mind inwards to include the whole communication system within the body— the autonomic, the habitual, and the vast range of unconscious process.   What I am saying expands mind outwards.  And both of these changes reduce the scope of the conscious self.  A certain humility becomes appropriate, tempered by the dignity or joy of being part of something much bigger.  A part— if you will— of God.
—Gregory Bateson, “Form, Substance, and Difference” in Steps to an Ecology of Mind, 1973

Bateson liked to say “the map is not the territory.”  We have to get out there, to see and touch our world to know it, and thereby to know human nature.  To know about wilderness we must go to it, be in it.

I have training in nature-based healing through questing and other forms of earth-based ceremony and ritual.  I seek ways to integrate ecopsychology into psychotherapy, and to bring the quest for spiritual vision home to our daily territory. 

For information on wilderness therapy and the vision quest or vision fast:
http://www.wildernessguidescouncil.org/wgc/index.cfm