Unplugged and Re-Wilded
A 5-night off-the-grid Immersion to Reconnect with Wildness, Land and Story
with Sarah Bullen and Niall Campbell
Langeberg Mountains, Garden Route South Africa
Gabarone, Southern Botswana
'When last did you step out of everything and allow a time of deep reconnection'
In older times our ancestors were a part of the environment they lived in. Their lives were determined by the nature of the place. The seasons, the climate and those they shared the land with, were the powers that determined their lives. It was no a global village, but a very real one. Nature was real. At times it was bigger than anything else.
We are so far removed from natural laws and those powerful forces. In our lives, as modern Western people we are constantly influenced, moulded and fed information. New technological myths are being created and feed to us more and more ideas. Technology is now our God. It promises convenience. Profit. Entertainment.
We live in a world of:
Less effort.
Less risk.
Less time.
Less connection.
We are so far removed from natural laws and those powerful forces. In our lives, as modern Western people we are constantly influenced, moulded and fed information. New technological myths are being created and feed to us more and more ideas. Technology is now our God. It promises convenience. Profit. Entertainment.
We live in a world of:
Less effort.
Less risk.
Less time.
Less connection.
Man feels himself isolated in the cosmos, because he is no longer involved in nature. . . . natural phenomenon. . . . have slowly lost their symbolic implications. Thunder is no longer the voice of an angry god, nor is lightening his avenging missile. No river contains a spirit, no trees the life principle. . . .no snake the embodiment of wisdom, no mountain cave the home of the great demon. No voices now speak to man from stones, plants, and animals, nor does he speak to them believing they can hear. His contact with nature has gone, and with it has gone the profound emotional energy that this symbolic connection supplied."
James Hollis
‘The retreat with Sarah and Niall was so much more than just a writing retreat. I came away with a deep appreciation for land and storytelling, for wilderness, for myself, for my writing and for my connection to other people. The retreat was a profound space within which to reflect and explore both my place and the place of my writing in the world. The retreat was lightly structured with daily group activities, including walks into the wilderness, one-on-one time with the facilitators and a lot of individual time to write, to walk or swim in the river or dam or walk the labyrinth plus wonderful storytelling after supper. The meals were simple and tasty and plentiful, everything freshly cooked and baked. The retreat centre itself is a haven of wilderness and land, a place to get away from busyness and city – for me it became another facilitator. I came away with a clear sense who I am and a firm direction for my next writing project. I can’t recommend this retreat highly enough’
Kerry Hammerton, poet. Wilderness Walk at Towerland
WHY DO WE SPEAK OF 'THE LAND' ?
As humans, leaders and visitors to this planet we look to move our present system towards greater balance. What wisdom might be brought forward and how might we reintroduce it?
It is hard to see the way as we live, caught in these growing addictions of security, comfort and entertainment.
Over the course of the six days, living closer to the earth, we will strip away these things to open new possibilities.
When we slow down and connect with the rhythms of nature, our activities and our thinking become more rhythmic, more enlivened, more whole. This is the space – inner and outer – that this immersion offers. It is a place for open conversation, between ourselves who are there, between ourselves and our world, and within ourselves.
Come and sit for a while and be still. Open your ears to myths and tales from the soil.
Read about Rainmakers, Initiation and Climate Change
It is hard to see the way as we live, caught in these growing addictions of security, comfort and entertainment.
Over the course of the six days, living closer to the earth, we will strip away these things to open new possibilities.
When we slow down and connect with the rhythms of nature, our activities and our thinking become more rhythmic, more enlivened, more whole. This is the space – inner and outer – that this immersion offers. It is a place for open conversation, between ourselves who are there, between ourselves and our world, and within ourselves.
Come and sit for a while and be still. Open your ears to myths and tales from the soil.
Read about Rainmakers, Initiation and Climate Change
We are working with wilderness as a portal into story
We will invite you to seek out and uncover the story of where you've been, what has happened and where you are now.
But we will also go deeper into the stories of those who came before you walked on this earth.
The land is where we experience oneself and nature in an ongoing interdependent dance.
How has land shaped you through the generations?
What happens when we avail ourselves to what is bigger, older, richer, ancient and timeless?
Niall has been teaching natural law for decades and to government's, institutions, NGOs and
Read this Guardian article - Reclaiming Wildness, Soul Dancing and Story
He is not surprised that he is seeing a growing flood of Westerners coming to find answers for life in traditional cultures. He believes, as do many shamans around the word, that the soul is searching for older ways and way of life that is more in tune with the earth.
“People the world all over are seeking alternatives to the North Atlantic paradigm. This is the model of work, spend, and produce.”
“Most of us live in cities and we work from the age of 18, most of the day. Most of us never actually ever touch the soil with our feet. We never take off our shoes until we go to bed and then it's a carpet or a tile. We are totally out of touch with nature and with the cycles of life. We work to buy things, to accumulate and to spend.”
“We are kept busy working and we are told not to look inside ourselves. It is conditioning that makes us think this is normal. I don’t think it's normal and the end result is that there is a disconnection between the things that keep us connected with each other, and with nature.”
We will invite you to seek out and uncover the story of where you've been, what has happened and where you are now.
But we will also go deeper into the stories of those who came before you walked on this earth.
The land is where we experience oneself and nature in an ongoing interdependent dance.
How has land shaped you through the generations?
What happens when we avail ourselves to what is bigger, older, richer, ancient and timeless?
Niall has been teaching natural law for decades and to government's, institutions, NGOs and
Read this Guardian article - Reclaiming Wildness, Soul Dancing and Story
He is not surprised that he is seeing a growing flood of Westerners coming to find answers for life in traditional cultures. He believes, as do many shamans around the word, that the soul is searching for older ways and way of life that is more in tune with the earth.
“People the world all over are seeking alternatives to the North Atlantic paradigm. This is the model of work, spend, and produce.”
“Most of us live in cities and we work from the age of 18, most of the day. Most of us never actually ever touch the soil with our feet. We never take off our shoes until we go to bed and then it's a carpet or a tile. We are totally out of touch with nature and with the cycles of life. We work to buy things, to accumulate and to spend.”
“We are kept busy working and we are told not to look inside ourselves. It is conditioning that makes us think this is normal. I don’t think it's normal and the end result is that there is a disconnection between the things that keep us connected with each other, and with nature.”
WHO ARE YOUR HOSTS?
Sarah Bullen is a storyteller, multi-published author and literary agent. She has been running international creative writing retreats and workshops for a decade all over the world.
Niall Campbell is a shaman, a storyteller, a weaver of magic and a traditional nyanga (medicine man). Niall has over 25 years of apprenticeship with African teachers in ancestral and nature spirits, divination and medicinal herbalism. He facilitates rites of passage, coming into adulthood and manhood and is widely regarded as one of the foremost holders of traditional ways.
Niall Campbell is a shaman, a storyteller, a weaver of magic and a traditional nyanga (medicine man). Niall has over 25 years of apprenticeship with African teachers in ancestral and nature spirits, divination and medicinal herbalism. He facilitates rites of passage, coming into adulthood and manhood and is widely regarded as one of the foremost holders of traditional ways.
EXPECT
A break from technology
An immersion in pristine wilderness
A huge open time and space
A place where nature will dictate the rhythms of day
Writing
Storytelling,
Deep and quiet reflection
Working with the four communities (the living, the non human, the ancestors, the descendants)
Exploring Wildness and the Wilderness
A half day hike
Swimming in mountain rivers and dams
A Sebolobolo traditional ritual steam.
The power of place, participation and reconnecting.
Exploring belonging on all levels.
Working with your story, your purpose and you service to this world.
Myth and the symbolic language is how we convey “soul material” and it is this we will explore in language, writing, and in the land.
An immersion in pristine wilderness
A huge open time and space
A place where nature will dictate the rhythms of day
Writing
Storytelling,
Deep and quiet reflection
Working with the four communities (the living, the non human, the ancestors, the descendants)
Exploring Wildness and the Wilderness
A half day hike
Swimming in mountain rivers and dams
A Sebolobolo traditional ritual steam.
The power of place, participation and reconnecting.
Exploring belonging on all levels.
Working with your story, your purpose and you service to this world.
Myth and the symbolic language is how we convey “soul material” and it is this we will explore in language, writing, and in the land.
WHAT MAY YOU HEAR IF YOU STOP, AND SHUT OUT ALL THE NOISE?
We will gather in the Langeberg mountains in the southern Cape, South Africa, in a wilderness retreat which enables the living flow of nature to be present in all aspects of life. Join writing mentor and author Sarah Bullen and shaman, sangoma and ritual doctor Niall Campbell for a thrilling exploration into a relationship with the wild - both within and without.
Long long ago, when the earth was still soft. In the time when people and animals spoke the same language....
So many oral myths start this way. They start in a way that removes us from our present rational restrictions. They take us to another place and time, where things are matted and tangled. Where things are murky, where the boundary between the dream and our daily drive is blurred together in a multilayered tapestry. These kind of stories are the heritage of cultures the world over. Fireside narrations have had listeners spellbound for millennia. Maybe even going back to times before we were fully human.
Join us and explore.
So I have to tell the story while we sit together. |
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THE LOCATION
Towerland Wilderness is in the Western Cape region of South Africa in the Garden Route area. It is 5 hours by car from Cape Town and an hour from the GEORGE AIRPORT. It is a rare place. Surrounded by mountains, riverine valleys, exultant fynbos and abundant wildlife, it offers a space to reconnect with yourself – a place where you can walk far, swim in crystal clear rivers, watch the stars, sink deep into silence, let your thoughts unfurl in freedom, enjoy rigorous conversation and much laughter, and be nourished by great food.
ACCOMMODATION
The accommodation consists of individual cottages built from natural materials of clay, straw and wood, all situated at the top of a hill amongst pristine fynbos, giving a beautiful perspective of the surrounding area. The units are thoughtfully situated in relation to one another to allow both privacy and a sense of interconnectedness. All the units are pentagonal in shape, with a pentagon of glass in the ceiling through which the night sky can be observed. Windows offer beautiful views to the surrounds, and stable doors extend the flow between inside and outside, whilst the living roofs keep the rooms cool in summer and warm in winter.
Towerland Wilderness is in the Western Cape region of South Africa in the Garden Route area. It is 5 hours by car from Cape Town and an hour from the GEORGE AIRPORT. It is a rare place. Surrounded by mountains, riverine valleys, exultant fynbos and abundant wildlife, it offers a space to reconnect with yourself – a place where you can walk far, swim in crystal clear rivers, watch the stars, sink deep into silence, let your thoughts unfurl in freedom, enjoy rigorous conversation and much laughter, and be nourished by great food.
ACCOMMODATION
The accommodation consists of individual cottages built from natural materials of clay, straw and wood, all situated at the top of a hill amongst pristine fynbos, giving a beautiful perspective of the surrounding area. The units are thoughtfully situated in relation to one another to allow both privacy and a sense of interconnectedness. All the units are pentagonal in shape, with a pentagon of glass in the ceiling through which the night sky can be observed. Windows offer beautiful views to the surrounds, and stable doors extend the flow between inside and outside, whilst the living roofs keep the rooms cool in summer and warm in winter.
ITINERARY WEDNESDAY
Arrival by 3pm Settle in and explore this land 5pm opening fire circle and session THURSDAY We explore the power of place, participation and reconnecting. The promise of convenience and the three addictions of security, comfort and entertainment. Can we enter the the world of risk. The world of Magic. The world of Wild. FRIDAY Crossing the Threshold We explore the four communities of the living, the non human, the ancestors and the descendants. SATURDAY The Innermost Cave When last did you confront your discomfort? How invested are you in convenience? What would happen if something other than human spoke to you? SUNDAY Return with the Elixir This gentle day is about bringing back your story, your myth. What happens when we avail ourselves to what is bigger? MONDAY Farewell breakfast and departure |
COSTS 2022R18,000 - only 10 single rooms available
Deposit R8,000 COST INCLUDES * 5 nights / 6 days * Single occupation * All meals for the duration * All tuition and group material. COST EXCLUDES * Cost of flights, travel insurance, VISAS * Transfers from George airport |
Niall Campbell
Sarah Bullen
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Niall Campbell is a shaman, a storyteller, a weaver of magic and a traditional nyanga (medicine man). Niall has over 25 years of apprenticeship with African teachers in ancestral and nature spirits, divination and medicinal herbalism. He facilitates rites of passage, coming into adulthood and manhood and is widely regarded as one of the foremost holders of traditional ways. He and his brother Colin Campbell are the subject of numerous international documentaries on shamanic healers and both consult and work all over the world.
*He is an ancestral family constellations specialist * He is a doctor of ritual and ceremonies * Facilitator of a large number of public & corporate courses, drawing on traditional medicine, Western complimentary medicine, and process-oriented psychology. * Working and teaching indigenous Amazonian peoples, and Cree and Algonquin traditional healers in Canada in partnership with the Gaia Foundation and Gaia Amazonas. * Consulting with indigenous shamanic elders in the Altai region of Siberia Sarah Bullen is a writing coach, storyteller, author and literary agent. She has run writing retreats and deep immersion processes since 2003. Sarah weaves some ancient stories into modern life. In telling them she asks what stories in your life have connected you to a larger community, time or place? What are the stories that have shaped your life? Who tells you these stories? How do you know a true one from a tale? And are tales even more important than real life ones?
As an agent she represents (by invitation) authors of non-fiction and breathtaking memoir. Sarah is a regular guest on talk shows, podcasts and writers circles. |
This breakaway was a powerful reminder of how I’ve come to accept a life of stress and its daily impact on my system. It helped me to take time to nurture my essential self and to reflect on better ways of combatting the strain of daily living. The creative and spiritual sustenance offered in pristine surroundings should be a regular part of our toolkit for daily survival. Sylvia Vollenhoven, writer, award-winning journalist, playwright and filmmaker 2021
Sarah and Niall are engaging and knowledgable facilitators who pushed me out of my comfort zone and inspired me to break free with my writing and work. The blend of the writing and nature aspects made for a time in which I was able to retreat from my ordinary life and drop into stillness, in the most magical place. It was deeply enriching. I left feeling inspired and energised. - Nicola Fanucchi, lawyer and author 2021
If you want to escape your everyday life do it with Sarah and Niall on this retreat. I came to the retreat as a writer but with a (somewhat) open mind about the explorations side. And I enjoyed it all - even when it made me question my comfort zone. Group of people was lovely - all with an interest in writing and all different ambitions which was lovely.
Louise Cooke, CEO 2021
The retreat with Sarah, Niall and our group of participants was incredible. There was a wonderful balance between facilitated process, story telling, time to explore my writing and what felt like an abundance of extended moments immersed in the environment connecting with and receiving many gifts from mother nature. Meals were wholesome and abundant, infused with love and presented with care. I highly recommend taking the opportunity to join this masterfully held and facilitated intentional adventure retreat.
Paul Hudson - Business Owner at Sett Digital 2021
Land writing was a time of deep immersion and reset. I addressed personal difficulties with writing and standing in my ground truth, as well as resourcing from the land, rivers, birds, and skies. Feeling myself connected through the facilitators and the hosts to other communities that make up this living world, gifted me a sense of belonging to something irrevocable and mysterious. It definitely gave me a deep reason to care for the land and wild spaces.
Nan McAughey, imaginalbody therapy 2021
On Stories by Niall Campbell
Long long ago, when the earth was still soft. In the time when people and animals spoke the same language....
So many oral myths start this way. They start in a way that removes us from our present rational restrictions. They take us to another place and time, where things are matted and tangled. Where things are murky, where the boundary between the dream and our daily drive is blurred together in a multilayered tapestry. These kind of stories are the heritage of cultures the world over. Fireside narrations have had listeners spellbound for millennia. Maybe even going back to times before we were fully human.
Modern culture is marked by a plethora of addictions. Excitement and it’s twin, entertainment are often overlooked in the long list of substances and habits that we are addicted to. But we can wonder if ‘entertainment’ was always an end in itself. Nowadays, history, psychology and religion would not be classed as entertainment. But poetry, ‘fairy tales’ and the epics and sagas fall into this category of things. Yet there was a time when they served as the conduit through which these subjects were broached.
Mythic stories serve a purpose, and, well told, they have a powerful effect. They take the listener first out of the humdrum, day to day rationale of existence. They entice by drawing us close to familiar scenarios, domestic, familial or humorous. Once caught, they take us slowly into the deep. Like Alice down the rabbit hole. They take us clinging to our now beloved hero, into worlds of utter insanity. Places where logic is contorted. Thought and reality are interchangeable, and space and time follow rules beyond our daily capacity.
Once in the depths of the realm of chaos, the story moulds and shapes us. We are now malleable, ductile, soft and vulnerable. Ready for the story to do its work. Our soul is bare and open, the thread of Ariadne the only thing that keeps us vaguely in touch with the upper day to day world.
The telling of these stories is a performance. Maybe not a drama or a play, but like a poem (which many of them are) it’s a rhythmic, repetitive chant. The teller seems to be elsewhere, to be not them self. Maybe taken over, inspired as the ancients say. Bringing forth a whole world, the narration becoming both a music, a dreamscape and a worship of the ancestral realm.
In Africa these are called Potent stories, or Stories with Power.
They change you, they draw you in so deep that you become a part of them. Then they stay with you, as if your deepest most ancient ancestral taproot has tapped a mystic water.
You know there are stories and there are stories.
There are those you read, that can be long, that draw you in, that influence your life during the time you read them.
There are those you hear. Told by our friends. Embroidered and embellished to suit the mood.
Then there are those ancient stories. Those stories that seem to grip the deep, old knowing part of us.
Why did the bards recite the epics and sagas?
Why do the griots sing about a king for four nights running?
Why, to what end?
There are the legends of the heroes
The history of the tribe.
There are the descriptions of places and how one might visit them.
There are the cautionary tales of dire warning
There are the instructive stories that help one find the way.
But these are a layer in a soil that runs deep. This layer is where the tap roots of the giant trees lie. Here in the dark, the ancient and mysterious underworld. Here lie the stories that carry our communal soul.
A good poet may not be a student of grammar. A good poet may not know the names for different forms, or the definition of a metaphor or onomatopoeia. Yet a good poet feels a good poem, and a good poem arises from the poet. The poet may obey the rules without knowing them, or break them exactly where their breaking would work best.
Long long ago, when the earth was still soft. In the time when people and animals spoke the same language....
So many oral myths start this way. They start in a way that removes us from our present rational restrictions. They take us to another place and time, where things are matted and tangled. Where things are murky, where the boundary between the dream and our daily drive is blurred together in a multilayered tapestry. These kind of stories are the heritage of cultures the world over. Fireside narrations have had listeners spellbound for millennia. Maybe even going back to times before we were fully human.
Modern culture is marked by a plethora of addictions. Excitement and it’s twin, entertainment are often overlooked in the long list of substances and habits that we are addicted to. But we can wonder if ‘entertainment’ was always an end in itself. Nowadays, history, psychology and religion would not be classed as entertainment. But poetry, ‘fairy tales’ and the epics and sagas fall into this category of things. Yet there was a time when they served as the conduit through which these subjects were broached.
Mythic stories serve a purpose, and, well told, they have a powerful effect. They take the listener first out of the humdrum, day to day rationale of existence. They entice by drawing us close to familiar scenarios, domestic, familial or humorous. Once caught, they take us slowly into the deep. Like Alice down the rabbit hole. They take us clinging to our now beloved hero, into worlds of utter insanity. Places where logic is contorted. Thought and reality are interchangeable, and space and time follow rules beyond our daily capacity.
Once in the depths of the realm of chaos, the story moulds and shapes us. We are now malleable, ductile, soft and vulnerable. Ready for the story to do its work. Our soul is bare and open, the thread of Ariadne the only thing that keeps us vaguely in touch with the upper day to day world.
The telling of these stories is a performance. Maybe not a drama or a play, but like a poem (which many of them are) it’s a rhythmic, repetitive chant. The teller seems to be elsewhere, to be not them self. Maybe taken over, inspired as the ancients say. Bringing forth a whole world, the narration becoming both a music, a dreamscape and a worship of the ancestral realm.
In Africa these are called Potent stories, or Stories with Power.
They change you, they draw you in so deep that you become a part of them. Then they stay with you, as if your deepest most ancient ancestral taproot has tapped a mystic water.
You know there are stories and there are stories.
There are those you read, that can be long, that draw you in, that influence your life during the time you read them.
There are those you hear. Told by our friends. Embroidered and embellished to suit the mood.
Then there are those ancient stories. Those stories that seem to grip the deep, old knowing part of us.
Why did the bards recite the epics and sagas?
Why do the griots sing about a king for four nights running?
Why, to what end?
There are the legends of the heroes
The history of the tribe.
There are the descriptions of places and how one might visit them.
There are the cautionary tales of dire warning
There are the instructive stories that help one find the way.
But these are a layer in a soil that runs deep. This layer is where the tap roots of the giant trees lie. Here in the dark, the ancient and mysterious underworld. Here lie the stories that carry our communal soul.
A good poet may not be a student of grammar. A good poet may not know the names for different forms, or the definition of a metaphor or onomatopoeia. Yet a good poet feels a good poem, and a good poem arises from the poet. The poet may obey the rules without knowing them, or break them exactly where their breaking would work best.
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