eco-resilience trainings

A day in the life

Wake up with the dawn chorus of bird song, the buzzing of the bees and gently swaying branches on the edge of our camas meadow. Start the day with a cold plunge in our woodland creek and join in our morning wellness practices, or sleep in and enjoy a leisurely cup of coffee before joining our 10:00 am class start time.

From 10:00 am - 5:45 pm we will explore together alongside our teachers and guides through deep nature connection and meaningful projects, developing new skills as we get to know the plants and animals of Lost Valley and surrounding areas. Enjoy an hour lunch break with nourishing organic food, sourced from our land and gardens and neighboring farms and local wholesalers. Join in conversation along the meadow, or take a moment to rest in the glory of the forest, and come back to the group to continue weaving baskets, tanning hides, or practicing calling forth fire from a friction hand drill.

In the evenings we will nourish our bodies and souls during a more leisurely community dinner and relaxation, take a silent walk in the woods and/or rejoin the group for evening celebrations, song circles around the fire, storytelling and games under the stars.

Beyond our regularly scheduled class offerings, you will experience the richness of life in community with opportunities to participate in song circles, community governance meetings, saunas, dream journeys, jam sessions and so much more. There is also time and space for solo nature excursions, a good book or quiet conversation in one of our libraries, silent group meditation and other wellness practices.

Take a cool dip in our woodland creek, or soak in the hotsprings just up the road. We have the Cascades Mountains to the East and the glorious Oregon Coast to the West. Our land and the surrounding areas offer experiences like no other course in the country!

grandmother maple

Our primary teacher is the living relationship we share with this land and all the elements and beings who flow through to connect us to our whole and higher self, through the waters, wildfire, the soils we feed to the gardens that feed us. We listen to the teachings of the world around us in all manifestations of life. Foxes & bears, rivers & stones, evening fires and the stars at night all serve to help open our awareness to the beauty and magic of those places lovingly cared for over countless generations. We honor and cherish this Teacher that is our home.

Esther Stutzman

Esther Stutzman (Yoncalla) is a traditional storyteller and educator. Stutzman, who is Komemma Kalapuya on her mother’s side and Hanis Coos from the Oregon coast on her father’s side, is an enrolled member of the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians. Stutzman works with schools, museums, libraries, and universities to share her culture and history; she is also involved in a Kalapuya language revitalization project. For over 50 years, Esther Stutzman has told Kalapuya and Coos stories learned from family members and Tribal Elders. She provides an indigenous perspective for didactic tales and histories that dismantle stereotypes and bridge cultural chasms.

Dan Wahpepah

Dan grew up immersed in American Indian Movement culture and his traditional ways. His father is a spiritual leader and his uncle founded West Coast AIM. He has traveled extensively with his father learning about the Red Road, a Native American Spiritual path of purpose rooted in living in right relationship with all beings with whom we share this Earth. He eventually landed on the reservation where he participated and held an officers position in ceremony. Dan teaches from the indigenous perspective, focusing on decolonization, healthy thinking, and “returning to being a human being.”

peter bauer

Peter Michael Bauer has been a rewilding catalyst since the late nineties. He created rewild forums, authored the book “Rewild or Die”, founded the organization Rewild Portland, and created the annual North American Rewilding Conference. He dedicates his life to living as a “gatherer-hunter wannabe”- creating something new inspired by the resilience of our gatherer-hunter ancestors who lived on the planet for 3 million years without causing the sixth extinction (and continue to live in some places to this day).

daphne singingtree

Daphne Singingtree is an author, educator and storyteller. She shares her expertise through writing, workshops and media, in plant medicine, permaculture, midwifery, emergency preparedness, and Indigenous ways of knowing. Daphne grows many of the herbs she uses in her medicine making. By learning from the traditions of our ancestors, as well as modern science, she believes in herbal medicine as a path to healing that empowers individuals and protects the earth. She recently retired from her business Eagletree Herbs, to work on the forthcoming book “Eagletree Herbs Guide to Medicine Making”.

Daphne’s heritage includes Lakota from the Standing Rock Tribe, as well as Spanish and European. She is the mother of four grown children and the grandmother of eight. She lives in Eugene, Oregon, where she grows herbs, makes medicine, and is an activist for protecting the earth and water.

Bryan Burnoski

Bryan Burnoski has been teaching and leading natural building workshops for over 17 years.  He has built over 16 earthen structures through the workshops he's taught. Using just clay, sand, and straw as the raw materials for building, allows for participants in a workshop to get involved, no matter, age, ability, or skill level.  Natural buildings breathe, are natural, free from toxic chemicals and compounds, are DIY friendly, and can be quite inexpensive. Bryan enjoys teaching people natural building so that they can learn the skills our ancestors learned over centuries. Natural building is an age-old technique that still works very well in today's world.  "It's more like remembering how to build than anything else, and once people get the hang of it it's really quite intuitive and fun"

Patience Love

Patience Love has been tanning hides in her backyard since being gifted this knowledge four years ago. In that time she has tanned close to 200 hides of various animals including sheep, goats, squirrels and rabbits.  She has taught 5 workshops, educating over 30 participants in the ancient art of transforming skin to textile. She emphasizes Process over Product in her workshops, so as to allow people to hone their skills and discover nuance overtime, as she has.  She has chosen to dedicate her life to serving women, reducing waste, and protecting water. Salvaging hides from the waste stream of the industrial meat industry is just one way she creates a positive, tangible change in the world. 

DEITRICH PETERS

Deitrich Peters was born in Dallas, Oregon and is a member of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde. Deitrch is Kalapuya, Rouge River, and Umpqua. His given name is Cosa Tance, meaning "Sky Dancer".

He loves his culture and traditions - making things with his hands, working with feathers, beadwork, traditional dancing, storytelling and his all time favorite, flute playing. He has learned these many things from his elders, and have been gifted these things by the Creator.

khyla allis

Khyla Allis (she/her) is a Queer, Eco-Sensual Somatic Intimacy Guide and Regenerative Land Steward. She teaches deep intimacy through stewarding relationships with our more than human friends and relatives. Her favorite places are the forests and the gardens where she infuses philosophical conversations, authentic relating, ritual and ceremony into the hearts and hands of the community through guided meditation, movement, and play, while also growing an abundance of food and medicine for the people.

Khyla has learned from many great teachers in the form of plants, animals, and amazing humans from across the world including Hawaii, Australia & New Zealand. Her life has been one of deep study and friendship with the Earth.

Khyla received her PDC at Lost Valley in 2016, her Permaculture Teacher Training Cert. in 2020 with Jude Hobbs, and an advanced PDC in Social Forestrywith Tomi 'Hazel' Ward in 2023. She is currently in the process of receiving her Somatic Sex & Intimacy Coach Certification through Somatica Institute.

BRIAN BYERS

Brian (Executive Director) is a permaculture designer, educator, and activist with over a decade of agricultural experience working in the Willamette Valley. He is passionate about building resilient local communities, reconnecting people to nature, and growing nutritious food. He has a bachelors degree in philosophy. He has studied and taught permaculture alongside Andrew Millison, Heiko Koester, Tom Ward (aka Hazel), Jude Hobbs, Rick Valley and many others. Brian is certified in permaculture design, as well as holding advanced certificates in surveying, forestry, and teaching. Brian has been the lead teacher of the Lost Valley PDC since 2016. He is also a founding member of the Center for Regenerative Peoples.

Sage Siera

Sage grew up in Dexter, Oregon, just a few miles away from Lost Valley. As a child, Sage was fascinated with mothering, birth, and making potions, so when she discovered the world of herbalism and birthwork as a young adult, she was awestruck and felt deeply called. In her early 20's, her personal healing journey turned her on to the profound power of plant medicine, and she has spent the better part of a decade deepening her relationship with plants and developing her skills and understanding of herbalism. Sage has participated in multiple doula trainings with renowned doulas, midwives and birth activists over the years, expanding her knowledge and inviting in the ancestral remembrance of birthwork. The first birth she ever supported was a deeply spiritual experience, a primal and natural flow state beyond anything she had ever felt. Today, her offerings of herbal medicine and birthwork are both a humble service to the earth and her community, as well as a joyful act of ritual and gratitude to the cycles of life, death and rebirth.

Nathaniel Nordin-Tuininga

Nathaniel (Education Director) is a long-time environmental educator, born and raised within the Intentional Communities Movement. He spent much of his childhood learning directly from 1200 acres of meadows and forests and from the elders who helped him cultivate a deep reverence for the more-than-human world. His life has been an ongoing exploration of alternative educational models, especially those that focus on the influences of the natural world. He holds an undergraduate degree in Environmental Studies from the University of Oregon, two graduate degrees in Waldorf Education, and an Ecovillage and Permacultural Certification from Lost Valley Educational Center. Nathaniel has been living off of the grid and electricity-free for the better part of the past decade. He brings patience, joy, and an intimate appreciation for the ecological interdependence of life.

Elizabeth ribeiro

Elizabeth Ribeiro has been teaching yoga since 2016. Her classes are a container for connecting to your inner guide and supporting your physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual wellbeing.

She has studied traditional Hatha Yoga in an intensive residential course in India, Kripalu style yoga in the United States, and lived and served for many years at an ashram in Trinidad & Tobago. These traditions all support her teaching and each class is made accessible for all body types and daily needs!

DIMA TSATSKIN

Born in Odessa, Ukraine in 1983, Dima has also lived in Tiraspol, Moldova (Transnistria), Sarasota, FL, and Jackson, MS. Dima has been practicing Pranayama Breathwork for 10+ years. Studying under Dmitry Lapshinov (practicing adept of five spiritual traditions:Taoist Qigong of Shen family traditions and traditions of Wudang mountains; Japanese art Zen; Cossack Spas of “Topor’” clan; Yoga of the “18 Tamil Siddhars” tradition; Tibetan “Bon” Zogchen tradition and Tibetan Tantra of Jonang tradition which saved the secrets of six yogas of Naropa and six yogas of Niguma.) Breathwork practice has significantly improved his life and health in all directions and he is excited to share his experience with you!

Paul Deering

Paul's primary studies in Tai Chi & Qi Gong are from 1987 to 2010 and are supported by an ongoing study in improvisational dance since 2006. Paul continues to study and teach a variety of movement arts for physical and spiritual wellbeing through a deepening exploration of overt physical and more subtle energy patterns that surround us. Paul focuses their classes on the principles of centeredness, rootedness, balance, relaxation, focus & reciprocity, working with forms passed on through Chinese masters who have carried the lineage of these practices through many generations. Paul is looking forward to playing and continuing to unfold the wisdom of the body with you.

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