Engaging Nature:
An Alternative Spring Break Retreat
for Lewis & Clark Students

Join fellow Lewis & Clark students for a three-night, Thoreau-inspired retreat to renew the spirit and consider how to live an engaged life with nature.

Where: 
TreeSong Nature Awareness and Retreat Center, a lovely, rustic cabin in a lush forested setting along the Washougal River, WA. This is the ideal place to reconnect with nature. (TreeSong is about a one hour drive from Portland, OR.)

When:
March 26-29, 2018

About Your Retreat Leader:
Monica Vilhauer, Ph.D. has been a college philosophy professor for over a decade. Her specialties are in ethics and the philosophy of communication. She is eager to expand the discipline of philosophy beyond the classroom and revive the ancient tradition of philosophy as a way of life. 

Retreat Description:
Inspired by Thoreau’s famous experiment to go to the woods to live deliberately, to live simply, and to consult nature to learn what the essence of life really is, this retreat challenges us to pare down, slow down, quiet down, unplug, and begin to look and listen to our natural environment.

We will work with Thoreau to distinguish between luxury and necessity, as well as distraction and meaning. We will think critically about popular meanings of success, and we will think creatively about how we might forge new bonds with the natural world.
  • What might it be like to reduce one’s possessions down to what one really needs?
  • What might it be like to put down the phone and laptop, and to be present with one’s own thoughts, one’s sensory experience of the external world, and other human beings?
  • How might one’s relationship with others, with nature, and with oneself change when one has a chance to live in the present?
  • What might it be like to begin to notice, and perhaps even harmonize with nature’s rhythms?
  • Which parts of our experiment might we want to incorporate back into our regular lives, and how might we do that?

Our retreat will include short readings and interactive discussions on the way Western philosophy has conceived of the relationship between the human being and nature, as well as short readings from contemporary environmental ethicists and, of course, Thoreau. We will spend plenty of time in nature -- hiking, watching, and pondering -- and we will reserve special time for silent meditation, journal writing, drawing, and campfires. 

Cost: $300
  • Includes lodging, food, philosophy program, transportation to and from TreeSong Retreat Center, and to and from trail-heads
  • This reduced rate is made possible, first and foremost, by the generous support of the Lewis & Clark Office of Religious and Spiritual Life.  Thanks also to TreeSong Nature Awareness and Retreat Center and Curious Soul Philosophy for discounts to support this student program

Registration Deadline:
  • Registration and payment deadline: February 24, 2018. 
  • As space is limited, please apply early to have the best chance of reserving a spot for yourself.

If you are a Lewis & Clark student ready to apply for this March 2018 spring break retreat, fill out the application form below.  After reviewing your application, Monica Vilhauer will email you a registration form to fill out, and a link to pay through PayPal. 

“I went to the woods because I wished to live
deliberately, to front only the essential facts of
life, and see if I could not learn what it had to
teach, and not, when I came to die, discover
that I had not lived.”
(Henry David Thoreau, Walden)
This retreat will be of special interest to:
  • Individuals who want to experiment with unplugging, and with solutions to the high-stress, on call 24/7 lifestyle.
  • Individuals interested in holistic health
  • Individuals interested in simplifying life
  • Environmentalists or ecologists
  • Nature writers
  • Philosophers interested in the practical side of philosophy
Lewis & Clark Group, 2016