Thank you for registering for
the Grief Tending Workshop and Community Grief Ritual
Saturday, December 12 at Open Sky Retreat Space in Sebastopol.
We are grateful to you for taking this step on behalf of your heart, your life and your community.
Welcome Relative,
In preparing to attend the Grief Ritual, we highly encourage you to leave the next day open to honor yourself with a day of integration. When we dive deep and open to our vulnerability, we can have various degrees of contraction or expansion afterward. This is normal and it's good to expect it. Give yourself the next day to go somewhere in nature with your journal or a good friend.
Please Consider: Space is limited at this venue. We need to cap registration to 25 participants total.
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We ask that you say yes to this community ritual event only if you are committed to attending fully.
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If for some reason you are unable to fully commit to the whole day of ritual on 12/12 (keeping in mind it may extend beyond 6pm) please let us know ASAP, so we can offer your spot to someone else.
- Once you send your donation we will have you on our official list for the ritual.
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THE DETAILS
Facilitators: Maria Owl and Mike Shea
Assistants: Duane Vos, Anita Shankar, Kanna Angel, Oona Patchens
When: Saturday, December 12, from 10:00am – 6:00pm
Registration table opens at 9:30am
Doors close at 10:00am
Where: Open Sky Retreat Space, 4500 Bloomfield Road, Sebastopol, CA
Parking: Once you turn into the long rural driveway, go up the hill. People will be there to direct you.
Meals: Please eat a good breakfast before you arrive. Bring a water bottle, snacks, and a bag lunch. Lunch will be around 40 minutes in length. Filtered water, tea and snacks will also be provided.
Cost: Three-tiered sliding-scale based on ability
$200 - $150 You have a comfortable income and financial foundation
$130 - $80 You have an adequate income at this time
$60 - $50 You have a low, fixed or variable monthly income
HOW TO PAY:
Send through Venmo (preferred) to: @MariaOwl
Or PayPal to: Contact@Sacredfuture.org
If you would like to donate more, we would love for you to make a donation for the Dagara people, the keepers and originators of the tradition of the ritual we are offering. They are in need of a new well for their tribe and could use our support! You can learn more about the fundraiser here, and choose to directly donate to them as well:
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What Else To Bring:
- Flowers and greenery in abundance!
- Photos or list of names of your Ancestors
- Altar item for the Joy and Gratitude shrine – photos of loved
ones, things that hold joy for you etc.
- Wear: Comfortable layered clothing, including socks—please bring sure to bring extra layers for warmth as we will be in an open air facility and it may get windy or rainy (Warm hat, socks, scarf, etc)
- Pillows and squish for self and to share
- Water bottle, thermos for hot drink if desired, lids on your drink vessels!
- Snacks for yourself, and a potluck dish to share at the end of the day
- Journal w/pen
- Fabric to decorate altars: Black, Blue, Red, Yellow, White, Green
- ***NOTE***With the fabric, please bring what you have at home. No need to buy new unless you want to.
Please be aware:
- We will be entering sacred space together. Prayer, ritual, altars, drumming, singing, smoke cleansing and more will all be a part of our container.
- Know that we will be in an intimate and vulnerable space of grief. We welcome this vulnerability as healing medicine and ask that everyone in attendance be prepared to honor their own vulnerability and that of others as well.
- There is no wrong way to express grief. Some people may be quite loud with crying, wailing, yelling, or even anger. Others may be very quiet. All of this is welcomed.
- We ask that people are mindful of their bodies in the space and practice consent.
- It is a confidential space and we ask that all facilitators, assistants, and participants honor confidentiality and only share about their own personal experience outside of the ritual space.
- Grief ritual can be very activating. It can bring up past trauma in addition to grief. We encourage you to surrender to your experience as much as possible, and trust the process of this healing modality. We also ask that you practice appropriate self-care and only choose to opt in to participating if you are willing to be vulnerable, activated, potentially triggered, and ready to care for and regulate yourself as needed after the ritual. We will have time to ground and integrate together at the end of our ritual, but know that there may be more layers for you to tenderly hold in the days, weeks and months to come after the ritual.
- Please come sober!
- If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us and let’s talk about it and make sure this ritual is the right space for you.
We look forward to having you with us.
Questions?
Reach out to Contact@SacredFuture.org
Your Guides
Maria Christina Owl is an international transformational leader, healer and full-body channel. She has worked with over 18 different indigenous elders around the world, and is deeply rooted in her own indigenous identity. Maria credits her healing from post-traumatic stress to earth-based ritual work, which she discovered at age 19. She has held hundreds of people around the world through deep transformation through wilderness quests, grief rituals, women’s initiation, and many other forms of ritual and ceremony.
Maria began training in Community Grief Work in 1999, focusing her bachelor’s degree on community healing through the Work That Reconnects, the modality developed by Joanna Macy. In 2005 she participated in a 10-month Dagara-style women’s initiation process, later she participated in a Village experience with Sobonfu Some, and participated in many grief rituals with Sobonfu after that.
Maria has offered Community Grief Rituals in the Dagara style for over 15 years, while also training facilitators to carry on the work in Tel Aviv, Israel, the Big Island, Hawaii and Northern and Southern California.
Maria holds a Master’s degree in Integral Counseling Psychology with an emphasis on ecopsychology and trauma, and has taught Indigenous Wisdom at many institutions of higher learning, including Naropa and Dominican Universities. In 2012 she founded Sacred Future, a school devoted to re-integrating human culture back into harmony with Nature and Cosmos through the development of intuitive, authentic leadership.
Mike Shea, an initiated member of the Men of Spirit Program at Wisdom Bridge in Sonoma County, is deeply passionate about the healing and transformative power of ceremonies and rituals. Over the past two decades, he has personally experienced healing and transformation through rituals with both men and women. He has been instrumental in creating and supporting numerous rituals within his community.
Mike’s extensive personal and spiritual experiences are dedicated to healing and community building. He embarked on a vision quest in the Inyo National Forest and served as a vision quest guide and cook for six years with Ancient Path Vision Quests. As a guide, he utilized his gifts of holding community in deep reverence and his expertise in dream and heart medicine.
Mike shares his passion for helping others, stating, “My passion for helping others has always been a driving force in my life. I’ve held various roles, including vision quest guide, grief ritual co-facilitator, restorative justice community member, Court Appointed Special Advocate for foster children, and a member of a men’s movement in Sonoma County. For over 25 years, I’ve been on an unusual sacred and spiritual path. My healing journey has been guided by earth-based rituals rooted in the Dagara Tribe of Burkina Faso, Africa. Malidoma Some and Francis Weller were my teachers.