ELEMENTAL QUEST is a branch of offerings of ELEMENTAL NATURE. Within this subset of programs, we offer a multi-disciplinary approach to mentoring teens towards healthy maturation, focusing on nature-based rites of passage. We also offer guide training and apprenticeships, to expand the work and support future guides. Mentoring & coaching services are available for 1-on-1 support of teens, parents, and guides in training.
Read more about our Vision & Mission
Threads of Connection
Nature Connection
In practicing survival and ancestral skills, we too develop our capacity to thrive as an individual with visions of a beautiful future for life as we know it. Outer nature skills of wilderness tending and regenerative agriculture are balanced by the inner nature skills of emotional resilience & rebalancing, deep listening to nature and the elements, and the cultivation of peacefulness.
Personal Connection
Our adventures are designed to not only build connection with the land and with each other, but also with oneself. Be it through solo time or other opportunities for reflection, invitations will be made to attune to one’s body, mind, and spirit. From gaining clarity about intentions and goals, to practices and commitments to manifest these goals, we will explore the power of will and creativity in creating a heart-centered life as a teen, and as a human.
Community Connection
In unity with our relations, we strengthen our social threads, which allows us to collaborate to create shared visions. Through games to embody the wild ones and develop agility, we seek to find and express joy and full vitality. By being truly helpful and developing care for humans and all sentient beings, we learn by building relationships with other species and learning their basic needs for surviving and thriving in a landscape.
Founder and Director
Spencer has been leading youth nature connection practices since 2005, and guiding rites of passage since 2011. Spencer guides tweens, teens, and adults in nature-based ceremonies, weaving permaculture and land tending, music and mantra, yoga and qigong, herbalism and astrology, eco-psychology and neurobiology.
Guides and Mentors
Our guides and mentors collectively have a century of work with youth, and each bring their unique gifts and passions. We are all wilderness first aid trained and are local educators and guides committed to supporting the next generation.
Trainers
The journey of mentoring is a long one, we bring in experienced guides, therapist, educators to train guides.
Advisors & Elders
We need mentorship too – so we have our advisory council and elders council to reach out to. They support guides on many levels, programmatically and beyond.
Deep Gratitude to my teachers and guides along the way
Elemental Quest is inspired by the direct teachings of John Young (8-Shields Institute), Bill Plotkin (Animas Valley Institute), Michael Meade (Mosaic Voices), Emerald North and Betsy Perleuss (School of Lost Borders), Dave Talamo and Amy Beismeier (Wilderness Reflections), Jeffrey Szilagyi (Stepping Stones Project), Amos Clifford and Shay Sloan (with Way of Council), Jack Kornfield, Donald Rothberg, and Joanna Macy (Spirit Rock Meditation Center), John Stokes (The Tracking Project), as well as indigenous elders and wisdom keepers: Tata Erik Gonzales (Deer Mountain Sanctuary), Philip Scott (Ancestral Voice), George Bertelstein (Medicine Path), Don Ryberg (chairperson, Tsi Akam Maidu), Edward Willie, and many more from The Bioneers Conferences, Buckeye Gathering, and beyond.
Understanding of universal life force and the healing journey have been supported by Teja Bell (Qigong Dharma), Saul David Raye (Atma Yoga), Jerry Alan Johnson (International Institute of Medical Qigong), Damo Mitchell (Lotus Nei Gong & Xian Tian College), Master Zhongxian Wu (Chinese Wisdom Traditions), Dr. Nida Chinensang (Sowa Rigpa, Traditional Tibetan Medicine), and many more.
Spencer has led hundreds of teens in rites of passage programs, from Summerfield Waldorf School, Marin Academy, Credo High School, as well as through programs with Back To Earth, Vilda Nature, and Elemental Nature. Spencer continues his efforts to weave the presence of indigenous and non-indigenous elders into programs. Over the years, Spencer’s co-guides across numerous schools and organizations have also been amazing mentors, contributing to the continual evolution of programming.
ELEMENTAL QUEST 