376: The Midlife Wilderness: How Nature Heals Women’s Bodies, Minds, and Spirits w/ Sylke Laine

Transcripts are auto-generated.

Courtney Townley 0:01
What if the key to navigating midlife challenges isn’t found in the latest trendy supplement or self help book, but rather in reconnecting with something that we’ve always had access to in this eye opening episode of the Grace and Grit Podcast, we are going to explore how nature therapy serves as incredibly powerful medicine for women in midlife, offering a path to help regulate the nervous system, restore hormonal balance and rediscover your authentic, wild self during one of life’s most transformative transitions.

Courtney Townley 0:36
Welcome to the Grace and Grit Podcast made for women who want their healthiest years to be ahead of them, not behind them. Join your host Courtney Townley right now as she breaks down the fairy tale health story you have been chasing all of your life into sensible action steps and lasting change.

Courtney Townley 1:04
Welcome to the Grace and Grit Podcast. Specifically, welcome to episode 376, of the Grace and Grit Podcast. I am your host, Courtney Townley, and I am so delighted that today we are doing a deep dive into the healing power of nature with my incredible guest, Sylke Laine, who brings a unique blend of nature therapy and life coaching, specifically designed for women traveling through the wild of midlife.

Courtney Townley 1:31
Now, I was first introduced to Sylke through a friend, and the best word that I can use to describe how I felt when I first met her is enchanted, and I shared that with you. I don’t know if you remember that from our conversation, and I say enchanted because I feel like number one, you like you help curate the space of safety, which is very evident from any to anyone who spends time with you, which I so appreciate. But then you also have just this wisdom about you that is so enchanting, and it also sparks a lot of curiosity for me, like I just want to know this person more. I want to understand, like, how she came to be. So I wanted to share that from the outset of this episode, because I do find you incredibly enchanting.

Courtney Townley 2:16
When Sylke invited me to do a nature therapy session with her on Marshall Mountain, which is just outside of Missoula. Of course, I said yes, but I’m gonna be totally honest, I was very stressed at the time because I had a lot going on, which typically I do, but at that time, I just had more than usual, and I did contemplate 1000 different reasons for why I should bail. It’s not a good time. It’s a Saturday, all the things. But I ended up going, and I cannot tell you how incredibly grateful I am that I did go, because it was an early it was a morning in early summer, which, if you’ve ever been to northwest Montana. Listeners may know that it’s really cold here in the in the mornings of summer. So there was dew on the grass, but there was really nobody on the mountain. It was myself and one other participant, and you basically walked alongside of us all over Marshall mountain, and you extended us a series of invitations.

Courtney Townley 3:19
I have to say that it really felt like I was experiencing nature in a way that I’ve never experienced it before, and I don’t, I really want to stress how profound that is, because I’ve lived in nature. I feel like for my whole life, I’ve been I’ve lived in beautiful places. I’ve been a regular camper, outdoor enthusiast. You know, I feel like I’m always in nature, but experiencing nature is something totally different, and that became really clear to me after that day on Marshall mountain. And I want to start this episode Sylke by saying thank you, because I really do think that you forever changed the way that I’m in relationship with nature.

Courtney Townley 4:07
And for the listeners, I just want to elaborate and tell you that I did invite Sylke to be a guest presenter at the Grace and Grit Montana retreat, which we’ve run for two years now here in Montana. And not only was she a presenter, but she kind of opened the entire event. We kind of we decided that because people were traveling from all over to come to this retreat, they needed a little bit of orientation. And what better way to orient yourself to this magical place than an experience of force bathing or forest or nature therapy, which you’re going to tell us more about. But as somebody who was kind of facilitating the retreat, it was such an awe inspiring experience to witness women having kind of a similar experience to i to what I had felt that.

Courtney Townley 0:56
They were coming from busy lives. They were coming from a lot of stress and a lot of responsibilities, and they traveled and had to deal with, you know, airplanes and hotels and all the things they landed on the ranch, and to watch them walk in to the forest bathing experience, and then also witness them walking out they were different people, and I want to share that from the outset of this conversation, because for the listener, I just really want them to grab on to this idea that no matter how wound up you are, no matter how stressed out, how dysregulated, however you want to label that you feel nature is always right there, and she is begging you to let her do her thing. And you are such an incredible guide to help us do that. So I’m so glad you’re here. Thank you for being here.

Sylke Laine 5:00
Thank you for saying all that. Courtney, thank you.

Courtney Townley 5:02
Yeah. I mean, it’s truly from the heart like I really, you know, I always say I don’t sugar coat like this. It just is my genuine experience. And I know that we’ve been talking about doing a podcast episode forever, and finally, here we are. But this is such simple and incredibly profound work that I really wish everybody would accept the invitation to start exploring it, because I really think it is the key, not only to regulating our nervous systems, but to healing ourselves. Like to heal our wholeness, we need to be in communion with nature on a regular basis. I agree. So all that being said, I would love you to tell listeners just a little bit about who you are and how you came to do this incredible work that you do in the world. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 6:49
So I was born and raised in Germany, which you may hear, yes a little bit, and I grew up outside, pretty much like our house. It was an apartment, but it was like the last there was one more street, and then it was fields, and then it was forest. So I was out there all the time, playing there, you know, walking to school, all of that, and all the vacations that we did as a family, we’re always to the same little village in Austria. So while I didn’t grow up in the mountains, I think I have a very deep connection to the mountains. So when we first, my husband and I first traveled to Montana in 2004 there was a strange pool to be here. And we, we kept talking about it.

Sylke Laine 7:43
And so, because my husband is a dual citizen, we immigrated in 2008 and I brought my corporate job with me. And I did that. You know, I started working remotely then, and making lots of good money, but I felt drawn to do something different, and picked up the bread crumbs here and there, and yeah, eventually that led me to life coach training. And then all of that was happening remotely. And then specifically after the pandemic, I was like, I need to coach outside. Like, I want to do this thing called nature based coaching. And so I just made something up and and did it, and it was so effective. And I just talked to somebody who was on one of those first practice walks in 2022 and she’s like, I still think of that. I still think of the bird that was in the tree. And so I wanted to give it more structure. So I thought, thought, sought out nature therapy training and, yeah, that’s where I landed, where I am with combining those two modalities, yeah,

Courtney Townley 9:00
yeah, I love that. It sort of sparked, you know, towards the tail end of COVID, when we were so isolated, not just from nature. And I think maybe we experienced that a little bit less in Montana, because a lot of us were maybe still out and about, but certainly the world at large was isolated in a lot of ways, and then also really isolated from community and that, you know, face to face connection in the flesh, rather than through zoom and all this technology, the

Sylke Laine 9:29
thought of just seeing another client on Zoom, yeah, can we just, can we just go to the woods?

Courtney Townley 9:38
Yeah. So I’m curious, because you you did your life coach training with Martha Beck, who I adore, and I have so much respect for, how did you like enter those waters of starting to take that that level of education and that capacity you had to help people and weave it together with you. The Nature therapy. And this, this experience of being outdoors and using that as a as a tool. Yeah.

Speaker 1 10:06
I mean, as you said, my my teachers, Martha Beck and she, she wrote a whole book, finding your way in the wild, new world about nature connection. So that is not something that was new, sure, but, yeah, I think when I I literally just made it up at first. You know, I was like, okay, What? What? How can I bring a coaching sessions and the tools that I know of helping my clients connect with their truth that is always there they’ve just forgotten. And how can I bring that outside?

Sylke Laine 10:51
And so I just made up this format, and it worked brilliantly. There was one woman who was like, if you’re gonna ask me to take off my shoes, I probably won’t. I’m like, okay, that’s fine. I was going to, but you don’t have to, yeah, and then by, you know, 90 minutes later, take off my shoes and dip my feet in the water. I’m like, you should put your feet in the creek. And yeah, it’s, it’s a wonderful way to connect with your inner child also, you know, and that is a great gateway to connecting with your with your true nature and nature, just, yeah, that inner child who used to jump in tunnels and, you know, look at the clouds,

Courtney Townley 11:36
yeah, witnessing, you know, the retreat participants, Doing the forest baiting experience and having lots of conversation. Lots of conversations around that. In the aftermath, there was so much talk about people having childhood memories and becoming childlike and like really being re inspired to play and just be outside for the sake of being outside, not to run or to hike or to swim, but just to be in nature, right? Yeah,

Speaker 1 12:04
yeah. And I had the same experience, you know, I as a child, you play, you run, you jump, you roll down the grassy hill. And then, you know, you learn from somewhere that, as a grown up, you you don’t do that, and so you don’t and, and it becomes, like, almost like a gym, you know, like, yeah, I go out there to exercise and, you know, and, yeah, that’s great. But if you’re always just constantly trying to improve your Strava stats or close your move ring, or whatever you’re using to track, then you’re missing out on so much connection and so much healing power that, I mean whenever people go outside, that’s great. I will never tell anybody to not do that, but it’s just different when you when you just are, rather than always do something.

Sylke Laine 13:01
It’s so true, I had the same experience. I hadn’t just been sitting in nature by myself for years. That was just not something that I had the time for. So when that became part of my training, at first, there was a strong resistance, yeah. And always is like, Well, can I just look at my phone and, you know, I could just write an email real quick? You know, gonna do that in 20 minutes.

Courtney Townley 13:30
That you really you start off by inviting, because everything you you present is an invitation, which I also love, because you want people to meet themselves where they’re at. But one of the things you’re pretty firm on is not using the cell phone and keeping it in your pocket or in your car or turn it off, whatever the case may be, because, of course, it is such a distraction. Well, the reason I ask you about kind of the weaving together of life coaching and nature therapy is because I think so much of the work that we do in life, coaching can challenge obviously, a lot of beliefs we have about ourselves. They can certainly have us question, you know, how we came to be in this place.

Courtney Townley 14:15
And I think to reconnect with yourself on that level and be radically honest, there has to be this container of safety. And I don’t know a better container for safety than nature, which is interesting, because, like, the day that you and I went to Marshall mountain, you were like, well, you know, the bears are coming out of hibernation. Like, there is wildlife. Of course, there are always threats, but compared to, like, kind of the threat in my head, in my nervous system, that that didn’t scare me, right? It just kind of it more than anything, it settled me, right? It settled me. So do you find that, like with with all of your experience now, of taking people. On these into these nature therapy sessions. Do you find that people are more open and connected in nature than they are through a zoom call?

Speaker 1 15:13
Yes, certainly. Although you can also, you can come on a remote walk with me via zoom. I also offer that too, you know. So you are outside, I’m outside, but we’re in different places, and we still can do the same thing anyway. But yeah, I you know, for during many a coaching session afterwards, I felt like, Hmm, I I don’t know, we didn’t really get to them the core of it, and there was so much, you know, she just needed to vent and vent and vent, which is great. I love that, right? But then at some point you want to move, like, past the story and into the, you know, what’s actually happening. And the more I learned about nervous system regulations, like, oh, they were in this heightened state. They were in a fight or flight nervous system state. And so, no, that’s not a good state where you can start challenging your your limiting beliefs, right?

Sylke Laine 16:20
That you’re not able to look past the top layers of what’s going on, or even if you’re even worse, and if you’re in a freeze response and everything is just too much, and you just want to, you know, pull a blanket over your head. That’s not a good place to go into inquiry about what’s what’s happening in your life? So, yeah, I’ve, I’ve started to bring a little bit of a flavor of nature therapy sessions, even into my Zoom calls. You know, I asked them, What do you need? What does your body need right now? Do you feel like you need a breath, or do you need to move? And at first they’re like, when, when we start working together? And I was like, I don’t even know what that means. Like, what are you asking me? Just listen to your body compass right now. What do you need? I go, I think I want to move. And like, okay, let’s shake right? And she’s like, No, I think I want, you know, I feel like I need to, like I need a breath, like I need a minute. And it’s like, Okay, then let’s breathe for a minute. Let’s invest a minute and just breathe and be and look out the window, and what do you see? You know? So, yeah, I that’s one of the ways I weave that together.

Courtney Townley 17:42
I love the way you said, even audio like tapping into that body compass, because there is so much wisdom there. And there is, I think we have, in a way, been conditioned to, obviously, to disconnect from that, right? And someone else knows better. And this is the way the structure is. And I should be in front of a computer screen for a gazillion hours a day. And so for someone just to pause and ask, like, what do you really need? Right now, I can see where people would be almost disoriented by that question, right, right? And yet, I think it’s all the more reason why we need to be asking that question so often, because the wisdom is there, but we have to be willing to pause and kind of check in and find out what that where that compass is pointing us right?

Courtney Townley 18:25
Yeah, you use the phrase midlife wilderness, which I love so much, yeah, so I would love you to speak a little bit specifically to how nature therapy, how forest bathing, which really are one in the same, like we’re using those terms a little interchangeably. Is that? Is that correct to say

Sylke Laine 18:43
there are nuance differences? But in for the container of this podcast, I think we should just use them.

Courtney Townley 18:51
We can use them interchangeably. Okay, yeah. So specifically, let’s talk about that, that mid, that midlife wilderness, and how this type of work and being out in nature and really experiencing nature more in the way that you invite people to how does that help a midlife woman, beyond what we’ve already talked about, like, we’ve talked about the container of safety, we’ve talked about feeling more connected. But what else is an extension of that? Yeah,

Sylke Laine 19:23
I would say it is a way of reconnecting with that inner compass. You know, midlife can’t feel like a wilderness. I’m in it. You know, sometimes you’re just like, Oh my God, I don’t even know. It’s a jungle, yeah, and I don’t even know, like, between the parents and the kids and the dog and the church and whatever commitments else you have, work, career, retirement, it’s a lot. You. And

Courtney Townley 20:00
then chemistry shifting alongside of that, right?

Sylke Laine 20:03
Yeah, yes, yeah, waking up in the middle of the night like in a puddle. Like, oh gosh. And so it is. We are just thrown. It feels like to me, we were just thrown into the like, okay, here you are. You know, your hormones are changing. Your life is shifting. Deal with it, you know. And as you mentioned, you we have lost either completely the connection to our inner compass, to our body compass, or we have learned to distrust it, because we’ve had all these other outside influences telling us what to do and what not to do. This is what a girl does. That’s what a girl doesn’t do. This is what a woman looks like. This is what she doesn’t this is what she wears. This is how she talks, you know, and so, um, to come into nature and observe how nature. We haven’t talked about swearing on your podcast. I think

Courtney Townley 21:13
there’s no swearing on your face. Yeah, we just marketed this flip it, which is almost every episode. Okay.

Speaker 1 21:20
Can and nature doesn’t. The beings out there don’t give a shit. They don’t. They’re so unpretentious, right? There is no shoulds and woulds and coulds and should have. There’s only I am. There’s also no judgment, right? There is no like, Oh, I wonder if this tree is prettier than my you know, like, I should trim my limbs. You know, it’s like, sure, if I’m a ponderosa pine, I’m gonna trim my limbs to make myself more resilient towards fire. But there is no like, Oh, what if I don’t, you know, there is no humans have this single capacity, this unique capacity, to stress ourselves out so much. I just heard mathematic talk about how humans are the only species that can and so creative about what might happen in the future, and our imagination is so vivid that some of us choose to rather commit suicide rather than live in this imagined world. You know, so to just be and and observe and notice how everything is just going through cycles. And there is life and death, there is growth and and, and and pause. There is rest. There is imperfection, meaning imperfection, right?

Sylke Laine 23:01
Who’s to say which tree is perfect? I mean, we humans say, like, Oh no, this is the perfect Christmas tree. It’s like, who’s to say that that? You know, that’s just some weird human esthetic. And the more I feel my my clients, participate in just noticing this and and relating it to how different they’ve been operating in the world. I think that’s just eye opening. That’s just eye opening to ask like, who am I past these cultural demands and these social unwritten rules and the rules, who am I when I’m not a daughter? Who am I when I when I’m not a wife? Who am I when I’m not a director of very important things? Who am I when I’m not the chairperson of the whatever committee? Who am I? Right? And she’s there. She’s always been there, right? And I think midlife is a point for many of us where the essential self that’s in here, our true nature, will no longer tolerate all the bullshit, right? We are pretty good at tolerating a lot of bullshit. As women, I always

Courtney Townley 24:28
say I think it’s kind of the magic of losing the very hormones that allow us to tolerate stress, truly like I know we look at it as such a burden and such an inconvenience, but there’s such a gift to it, because, like you said, we get more intolerant of our own Bs, and so then we’re faced with a choice. I can either stay this way, or I can start to experiment with different ways of being. Yeah,

Sylke Laine 24:58
exactly, yeah. And. It. And I think it’s, I mean, you know so much more about hormones than I do, but I think it’s also that we’re losing the hormones that made us such great caretakers, right? And like, Oh, if I’m, if I don’t, if I’m not taking care of these other people who might I take care of, who might I take care of? Now,

Courtney Townley 25:24
what a concept, right? Absolutely. Well, I’m always like with certain topics that I’m certainly, by no stretch, an expert on. I always love to do a little research before my interviews, and I want to read some stats, because I think that this is really compelling for people to understand, listeners, to understand how nature helps with our chemistry. Like, it’s literally not just a philosophy. We’re not like there is actual evidence that it’s shifting our chemistry. So if you study,

Sylke Laine 25:55
I have, like, this little pile of studies, you know, totally Yeah. So I just

Courtney Townley 25:59
want to highlight a few. And if you have anything to share too, please chime in. But in 2019 there was a study published in Scientific Reports that found that women who spend at least 120 minutes per week in nature showed significantly reduced stressed hormones and improved mood regulation compared to those who didn’t, research from the University of Michigan showed that forest bathing Shinrin Yoku, is that? How you say it? That’s the Japanese word for Shinran Yoku. Of just 20 minutes, significantly reduced cortisol, and they said by an average of around 14% in women aged 45 to 60. So just 20 minutes, that’s a pretty significant drop. The International Journal of Environmental Research showed that midlife women who practiced mindfulness in nature settings experienced a 31% improvement in cognitive function, function and working memory. And I want to highlight that word they use the mindfulness in nature.

Courtney Townley 27:02
Because I really feel like that is what you challenged me to do in in the work that I’ve done with you, and certainly I’ve witnessed you doing that with, you know, retreat participants and whatnot, as well as it’s not again, just being in nature. It’s like, can we be fully present and mindful of how we’re being in nature and what nature is doing all around us, which I can think of so many moments where you know you had us observing nature, and initially I’m thinking, There’s nothing happening, there’s no wind, there’s no sound, there’s no there’s nothing. But then the longer you look all of a sudden, it’s like everything starts to come to life, and you see the movement, and you see the patterns, and you hear the sounds. But that requires such a level of awareness that man, have we lost, right? We’re not even aware of what we’re eating for breakfast, let alone like the little bug that’s crawling on the blade of grass, yes,

Speaker 1 28:03
yeah. And that’s why I always start my sessions, the nature therapy sessions, with this meditation, yes, called pleasures of presence that is really there to turn on and awaken all the senses. Right? It’s really taking you, like, touch, smell, taste and and that’s really, there is a purpose to having that in the beginning. And then always next comes the what’s in motion, right? Where it’s like, Okay, now we’re moving into that space. When are we are awakened, and what do we notice? And then we can become more playful and, you know, but there is always the sequence of guiding people slowly into this process where then, you know, in my training, they always said nature is the therapist and the guide opens the doors. I’m not a therapist, you know, but nature is but I am trained to open the doors, and that’s why, you know, people are like, well, I could just sit in the Force. I’m like, Yeah, you can like, you can do you can practice yoga at home, right?

Sylke Laine 29:11
You don’t, you don’t need to go to a studio. But there is something about my training that is really helpful, and to do it in a group, right? You mentioned connection too, and loneliness is such a detriment to our mental health. In this isolation, the older we get, the more isolated and lonely humans feel, and to be able to connect with the other participants on the walk, as much as we reconnect with nature and ourselves is a huge benefit. I think that’s why we like going to the yoga studio, right? Because somebody we’re doing it a communion, and it does feel different. And there’s a guide who keeps track of time and has thought about the flow, and you don’t need to come up with your with anything, right? You just show up and then in the. And you get a snack and a tea, and you, you know, and then you sleep very well. It’s so

Courtney Townley 30:05
true. And beyond, you know, all of that, which is so to me, was so powerful, because you’re right. I can go into nature anytime, but doing it in the way that you invited me to is something quite different. And also, I think you do such a brilliant job, especially in groups, of protecting the container, which to me is like you you make it very clear like you know, you’ll ask certain questions after certain invitations, but you also ask the rest of the group just to listen and not respond. And that too is a practice that I think we have lost. We don’t an important listen to just listen. We listen to respond and react and all the things.

Courtney Townley 30:46
And so I think that, yeah, the work just has so many layers. And so I know that most listeners do not live in Montana. I would invite them, because you do sessions through, like you said, you do sessions virtually, where you’re both in nature and you’re still doing the same type of guidance that you would be doing in person. And I cannot stress to people listening enough that if you want to gift yourself a really unique experience that will truly, I think, be something that you carry with you the rest of your life. A session like this could be life altering, because it is showing you a different way of looking at something that you think you’ve seen, like you think you’ve experienced, but you really haven’t so yeah, so obviously I’m a big fan. I think you should do it.

Speaker 1 31:41
It creates a lot of new synapses in the brain. Yeah, it is this, there’s always so much more than what we think that there is. And that is just such an important lesson for every part of life. You know? It’s like there’s always something that we cannot yet see. And, yeah,

Courtney Townley 32:03
yeah. And there’s also this, you know, certainly there’s a lot more research and definitely conversation around the importance of getting out into sunlight every day. And you know, getting getting the light into our eyes and and breathing in the air of nature and being around plants, which you’ve taught me, has helps our immune system. Yeah, right. So it’s the advantages, it’s they just reach so far.

Courtney Townley 32:28
Okay, so let’s, let’s maybe talk a little bit about gateways for someone who maybe they’re not ready to have a session yet, or it’s just not the right time, or they’re not in a place, you know, where they can do that right now. How do we get people to enter these waters in a way that doesn’t feel overwhelming? Because I know some of the logistical reasons that we don’t make time for this type of work. We’re so busy, yeah, but also we’re so uncomfortable being quiet, right? Right? Right. Like I would say, that’s a barrier. A lot of people aren’t comfortable just not doing anything, right?

Speaker 1 33:08
Yeah, yeah. My favorite invitation is called sit spot, and it’s very it’s as simple as it is difficult. It’s simple as it is what it says it is, you just pick a spot and you sit. But that’s also the hard part, and it was part of my training, and they made us do it multiple times a week. I mean, there’s no police, right? They couldn’t tell whether we were doing it. The training was at that part very much remote, but I think they could tell if people had engaged in it, because it changes you when you and it was a it was that long, hard, never ending winter here in Montana.

Sylke Laine 33:50
So I sat outside in a blizzard. I sat outside in the rain, I set out, you know, and I just did it, and oh my god, after I can always, I could always tell, like clockwork, after 10 minutes I was, like, just agitated, yeah, you know, I got things to do, and then, if I managed, which I was pretty good at, because I, I was really Curious about how it would impact me. And then always, always still to this day, after 20 minutes, I was like, Wait, did I 10 or just go off? I wish it was just so beautiful. I don’t want to go inside. And sometimes I just keep sitting. So just sit without purpose. It is such a strange concept. It is even different. You know, I feel, even in meditation, I feel like we’re trying to achieve something

Courtney Townley 34:48
even not thinking is, is right, yeah,

Speaker 1 34:51
right, yeah. But to just sit there and, I mean, the only requirement is that you don’t bring a book. You don’t bring a phone, you don’t bring, you know, you just sit and I’m doing it in my backyard. People can do it behind a window. You can do it just looking out the window. You can be under, you know, by the tree in the parking lot at work. It doesn’t really matter. You can do it in a big city. You can go to a park, or you can go, you know, you can do it with a house plant for all I care, you know, like it’s all nature, like I have my desk is made out of wood. That is nature, right? Yeah. So nature is everywhere we are nature, right? That is such an important thing to realize.

Sylke Laine 35:34
And, yeah, so just start sitting. And 20 minutes is a is great. I know that seems like a lot, and I, I always say you can ease yourself into start with a minute, set your timer to a minute, and see if you want to stop after one minute, you know. And then to five to 10 to 20. And you know those statistics that you just read, they’re they’re so compelling, you know, you can solve so many mental and physical health issues by just engaging in that a little more so just sit. And then I also have, for your listeners, a recording that I did of the pleasures of presence meditation that I mentioned. It’s about 20 minutes long, and you can just put it on your phone, and you can have me guide you through,

Sylke Laine 36:25
Oh, brilliant, this awakening of the of the senses, right? And, yeah, so that’s a that’s a good way. And there’s also, there’s a website called forest bathing finder, and I’ll get the link to you. And there people can find people who do this work all over the world, right? You can type in your location and you can find somebody, I’m pretty sure that’s somebody,

Courtney Townley 36:50
yeah, well, I started this episode talking about that experience I had with you on Marshall mountain, and I was so amped up that day. And I think what was so profound for me is when I left Marshall mountain, I felt just like I was in a radically different space. I was clear headed, I was calm, and all the outside world still existed. All my problems were still there. The To Do list was still full, you know, like again, I hadn’t changed my circumstances, but just taking that little bit of time to observe what was alive around me

Speaker 1 37:28
and how alive you are, right? And I think

Courtney Townley 37:31
that’s what it just kind of reinforced, like it brought, I always say, like to me, healing is putting more life in your life and and being on that mountain that day, and being a part of so much life, which somebody who wasn’t aware could say, there’s nothing alive around me, but it’s all alive. When you start looking, it’s all moving, and it’s all, you know, intricately dancing together.

Courtney Townley 37:55
And so, yeah, leaving the mountain, I definitely felt like I was so much more alive. And now you might be happy to hear this. My son is 15 now, but we still do this where we’ll go for walks, and we, we just collect things that are interesting to us, right? And we, we kind of share them at the end of our walk, like why we picked it up, and then we leave it or we just look for really interesting things along the walk to point out to each other.

Courtney Townley 38:24
And it’s like we’re we’re able to be in nature together in the experience, in such a deeper way than I would have been had I never done this work with you. And again, it sounds crazy coming out of my mouth, like, why would I need a guide to actually help me improve my relationship with nature? But until you try it, it’s, you know, I just, I’ll just say, try it, because I think you will be very pleasantly surprised that it just awakens the world around you in such a big way, too.

Speaker 1 38:58
I was, you know, I was like, Okay, let me get to the summit. Let me get, you know, let me do it a little faster than I did last time. And now I’m like, Oh, I’m winning everybody’s Strava, right? Because I was like, Oh, look at that. Oh,

Courtney Townley 39:15
that’s funny. Well, before we wrap this up, I wanted to ask you, because last year you ran your first retreat where you put how many women was it? 10 women? Yep, 10 women in boats and you went down. Which River were you on? The main Salmon River in Idaho, the main Salmon River. Okay, so tell us a little bit about that. Yeah. So

Speaker 1 39:38
I did it with my colleague, who is also a nature therapy guide and also a matter back coach, and we felt like we wanted to offer something super deep, right? It is, what happens if you don’t drive home after the three hours? What happens if you just do. It again the next day, and when there is no cell phone reception, there isn’t even, you know the optional temptation, you know that the guides have a satellite phone in case something tragic happens. You know, if something major happens, you’re safe. But what is it like to sleep in nature?

Sylke Laine 40:20
And most of the women there had never done that. They hadn’t camped. I think none of them had ever been on a multi day river trip. And in this routine of, like, setting up, taking down, setting up, taking down, two days in one of the one was like, I can’t do it. I hate this. I have to be honest, this is just not for me. And then by the end, she was like, she signed up again, like she’s coming again this year, right?

Sylke Laine 40:45
Because it was so transformative. And they they learned how strong they are and how resilient they are, and how much they can help each other. It was beautiful to see, you know, to have women ask each other for help, ask the guides for help. You know it was beautiful, yeah, so one week of full immersion in this beautiful landscape of Idaho was amazing, yeah, and this year we’re going on the rope River in Oregon, which is such a different landscape, but

Courtney Townley 41:17
I can’t wait. And it’s in September. Is that right? This year. Okay, and we still have lots left. Yes, okay, so we’ll put those details on the page where this is podcast is found as well. So we have lots of resources for you listening to tap into different ways of experiencing nature. So Excellent. Any any parting words you have for listeners? Anything that you would like to say in closing?

Sylke Laine 41:43
Yeah, I think, you know, even if, after listening to all of this, you feel, you might feel skeptical, and that’s okay. You know, not everybody needs to do this, but if there is this little spark of curiosity, and was like, Oh, I wonder. I wonder, what happens if I sit in my backyard without reading or pruning or sewing or, you know, without doing happens, without doing. Who am I when I am, where am I when I am? Just give it a try. I think, yeah, follow your curiosity. That’s what I always say with the invitations. Follow my invitations or don’t, but follow your curiosity. So

Courtney Townley 42:24
absolutely I love, I love that you have that guided meditation too, which we’ll put in the resources, because I think that could really help people to, like, give them a starting point for for doing that. So good. Well, I think I’ve expressed my profound enthusiasm for the practice, and more than the practice, just your work in general, your energy, who you are embodying, like the way that you are moving through the world. I think it’s such a testament to the work that you’re doing, like you, you walk, you talk.

Sylke Laine 42:54
It feels good to be seen that way.

Courtney Townley 42:58
No, I definitely see that in a big way, and I appreciate it so much so. Thank you.

Sylke Laine 43:04
Take a deep breath before people like, before the podcast finishes, can we close with one deep breath?

Courtney Townley 43:10
Yes, let’s do it all right

Sylke Laine 43:13
before you you know like, do whatever you’re going to do next. Just take a deep breath. Like, breathe in. Breathe. Out and notice what you’re noticing. Thanks, Courtney, thanks for having me.

Courtney Townley 43:32
Oh, always, I’m always privileged to be to be with you. Thank you for making the time, and I’m sure I will be seeing more of you in the future, but thank you for doing this today. I think you’ll benefit a lot of people. Lot of people. Thank you.

Courtney Townley 43:50
Thank you for listening to the Grace and Grit Podcast. It is time to mend the fabric of the female health story, and it starts with you taking radical responsibility for your own self care. You are worth the effort and with a little grace and grit anything is possible.