CourtingVisionary Sacred Partnership
With A Drum of Power in The Great Turning
July 2025 Tahoe Natl Forest, California
Registration $565
Venue: Tahoe National Forest
With: Palika Rewilding & John Lynch
Back Country Camping, No Backpacking In
THE CALL
Begin a conversation that matters - you, your drum, Nature & Mystery. The times is now, your vision, prayers, gifts are being called forth. Deep down in your bones, is there a desire in you to uplevel your partnership with a Sacred Drum of Power in order to serve The Greater Good in these times, offer vision, hope, healing, a new narrative ? Is there something about rhythm, skin and wood and breath and wild, voice, vision, and prayer that is resonating with you and your drum? Could a committed and well tended relationship between yourself and your Living Drum draw you and others into a deeper belonging to the Circle of LIfe with delight and joy and beauty? Might courting a soulful visionary relationship with your drum help you mature and amplify your ecovisionary leadership and participation with Gaia?
Mystery and Earth all calling those of You who know deep in your heart and soul that your committed partnership with a Drum of Power is one of the threads you are meant to carry in this world to bring your soul's mythopoetic purpose to life with. You know that the realms of ecological, emotional, embodied, relational healing in and between humans and the Earth is vitally necessary. You intuit - even if you don't know fully how yet, that midwifing individual and collective psycho spiritual maturation and awakening is yours to do and be, and that one of the ways you do/be that is through a deep soulful animate practice with your precious and holy Drum Partner.
We will dive into a basket of powerful embodied practices to activate the enchanted, animate, imaginal, energetic and mythic marriage with your Sacred Drum. We will leave our cell phones, vocational and social identities, business as usual, dualistic mind and fast paced consumer life behind. We will slow down, listen, wonder wander, imagine, dream, sing, pray and dance, and give our attention in a ceremonial way to entering this sacred marriage with our Drum of Power and change the shape we live through in these times to be more deeply us.
THE WAY
Under the auspices of the waxing moon and the undomesticated landscape, Palika and John will midwife the way into intentional purposeful and animate partnership with your drum, facilitating experiences that help you gain the skills you need to serve the Greater Good in the way that is yours. This partnership with a Drum of Power is one of great responsibility and privilege and calls forth radical truth telling and insists we be turned toward the world to give back and to serve The Blue Green Pearl. Because your drum is an amplifier of what you are committed to, and where your consciousness and attention lies, we are called to commit to psycho spiritual and ecological integrity for the Greater Good - this relationship is NOT just for our own healing, pleasure and transformation, but what that belongs to the village and the web of life. Its and honor and responsibility to be a carrier of a living sacred drum.
We will inquire into the ancient relationship between drums and humans who cross the threshold between and under worlds into the language of Soul and Earth. We will invite these kinds of questions to permeate our hearts and our prayers: What speaks to my heart and soul about initiating a relationship with a Sacred Drum? Why this why now? How could praying, grieving, praising, celebrating, visioning, and listening with a Sacred Drum help me belong more authentically to the Circle of Life and discover more of who and what I am? How might it deepen my authentic participation and contribution in these times? What responsibility am I committing to, to be a Carrier of A Drum of Power and responsible to Who and What? What practices and tools and attitudes lead me into a vibrant, activated, soulful and connected Apprenticeship? How will I be irrevocably altared in this process? How do I converse with and recognize and partner with the rhythms of life woven through and around all things?
For 5 days and four nights we will engage in the conversations that matter, diving into the ancient language of the Circle of Life, that is preverbal, limbic, native, animal. We will inquire what is the voice and rhythm of our own drum, how does it long for me to be with it? We will ask and notice what are the rhythms of the WEb of LIfe and how do we wend our own way with them. What do they say, feel like, look like and how do they move and court us? CAn we remember how to shapeshift, how to see with our indigenous eyes and how to converse in our native tongue in partnership with our Drum of power in the rhythm and language of LIfe, under the stars, sunsets, in circle and by the fire, astride the creek, under an Elder Sequoia, or Redwood, or Pine? We will rekindle the knowing of our wise animal bodies and the mythopoetic imagination and intuition through experiencing Soulcraft, Somatic and Deep Nature Connection and Ceremony with our own Living Drum as portal, magnifier, and partner.
Expect trance work, drum journeying, deep imagery, dreamwork, council, conversing with and romancing the More Than Human World, mirroring, praising and grieving, personally designed ceremony, prayer, singing, somatic inquiry and movement and very deep listening, song and poetry and befriending the Dark. The feelings and states of being that will come forth like grief, gratitude, awe, presence, death and dyings, falling in love, being the right kind of lost, and discovering and falling through portals between worlds will sharpen our awareness and attention to our unique soul threads and the particular heart of our Sacred Drum which help us begin and deepen our lifelong romance with it. As a group we'll court curiosity about our unique partnership with a particular Living Drum and how to feed the web of life with that relationship. This Nature immersed deep dive into this way of "being" and "conversing" with the heart of the World through your relationship with your drum will give you a solid foundation to walk with a Drum of Power for the rest of your life, should you choose to nourish this garden.
THE DEEP PURPOSE
This offering is not a "learning drumming techniques or rhythms workshop" though we will drum and explore and learn techniques to enter into altered states ourselves and facilitate the same for other humans- and rhythms are a part of that. Rather, this will be a facilitated container for a deep experiential dive to those of you responding to an unavoidable, and resounding psycho spiritual call to enter into or deepen an active and sacred relationship with a Drum of Power - for a lifelong responsibility and relationship in service to the Greater Good. You are Ones who want to say Yes more deeply to this profound relationship between the two of you, Mystery and Soul in these urgent times on Earth. You are Ones who notice, track, apprentice, court, surrender, feel, vision, soften and lead through doing and being, you cannot keep capitulating and upholding paradigms, stories, myths and behaviors that kill the human soul and the precious Blue Green Pearl. You know that now is the time for you to show your true colors and participate passionately and with vision in the Web of Life, not to save anything, but to love the Circle of Life and be in right relationship with it.
All Wild Mythos Drums offerings are founded on the biggest questions that have cracked my heart wide open in these times - What does it mean to become fully human? What is our individual and our collective place in the miraculous and Great Web of LIfe? How do I live a meaningful eco and soul centric adult life that gifts the Greater Good of the village and harmonizes with the Dream of Earth itself during uncertain, tumultuous times? What new story can reenchant our dance with LIfe? And what does the More Than Human World long for?
THE LANDSCAPE
We will be in the fall to your knees beauty, of back country wilds of California, akin to Elder forests, ancient singing waters, blue indigo skies dotted with diamond stars and in the chorus of all the birds, animals, stone people, green beings that weave together in community. The East Fork of the North Fork American River in the Lake Tahoe National Forest has called us - "carriers of living sacred drums" - perhaps just because of this offering. Alder, Willow, Cedar, Pine, Dogwood, Oak, Current, Granite, Starry Dark Sky, Steelhead, Raptors, Songbirds, Wild Flowers and many Others waiting to meet the song of you and your drum and for us to love them up in just this way.
The Maidu, Miwok, Nisenan, and Wintun peoples inhabited the American River in Sacramento for at least 5,000 years before Spaniards and Americans settled the region, although human habitation in Northern California is believed to date back as much as 12,000 years. They utilized the vast amount of resources of the American River for shelter, clothes, baskets, and other goods before Europeans arrived in the late 18th century.[10] The Nisenan called the river Kum Mayo, meaning "roundhouse river". We'll be closer to the headwaters of this river in the Sierras that originate near Lake Tahoe and on the part that is wild before it is dammed to energize Sacramento. This East Fork of the N.Fork that we are gifted to be on, is still wild, flowing from its headwaters up close to Tahoe.
THE FINE PRINT
I cannot make any assurance that if you dive into this offering, that your life as you know will not be irrevocably altered and changed by this "ceremonial time". Your apple cart may get tumbled over, the shape you have inhabited may shift, and you may get lost in the best ways of being lost, and you may not be able to come back and live in the way you have been living. Dyings and birthings will most likely occur that are ecstatic, uncomfortable, challenging and you may come face to face with the unknown, loss of control, Mystery and huge Angels who defeat you (and who doesn't want to be bested by Angels of Mystery and Earth? You may fall through cracks, be completely undone, and deep wells of grief and longing may find you. Mysterious images may appear that you don't understand and connection and love and beauty might break your heart wide open. This immersion may be as troublesome as it is life affirming.
This intensive is designed to invite you to surrender to the mysterious, emotional and somatic experiences you encounter on this journey to begin or deepen into a responsible, visionary and purposeful partnership with a Sacred Drum of Power. Remember, the truth of what you encounter may
require you to change your life as you now know it; to let go of things you love; to be in the world in ways that were formerly unthinkable to you; to live a deeply satisfying and meaningful life, to change the shape of you……….
I can make one promise, if you give yourself to this - you will find a Belonging, an At Homeness here with the Earth Community that you've been yearning for and seeking your whole life.
I DONT HAVE A DRUM - BUT I AM SO CALLED TO THIS
If you don't have a drum, but you know this call is speaking to YOU - I can help you find a drum so you can join us and begin your sojourn into the mysteries of being One Who Carries A Sacred Drum. Please email me. palikaji@wildmythosdrums.com
DETAILS THAT MATTER
FOOD:
We are committed to creating community meals that are beautiful, nourishing, organic and healthy! For all camping programs; drinking water, lunches, snacks, tea and special needs foods are the responsibility of each participant. Breakfasts & dinners are shared and prepared communally. Participants will be divided into meal teams, 4 dinner and 4 breakfast teams. Each meal team will be responsible for planning, purchasing and preparing their group meal, this keeps food costs low and quality very high. Most of the time each individual cost for the group meals is under $40 and thats all you pay. Awesome camp kitchen is provided by Wild Mythos Drums.
TRAVEL:
Participants are also responsible for their own transportation to and from the program location. We'll provide a travel share spreadsheet to the group after registration. Please do not make travel arrangements until the program is confirmed with minimum enrollment. Carpooling will be absolutely necessary as we can have only 6 vehicles in camp.
Details for Meal Share Teams, Travel Share and Camping Supplies List are sent after registration, prior to our program.
Start time 3 pm
End time 1 pm
From San Jose Airport its 3.5 hours to camp and less traffic. From San Francisco Airport - 4 hours to camp.
*there is a small paypal service fee included
Registration and Refund Policies Here.
AN APPLICATION & HEALTH FORM ARE REQUIRED TO PARTICIPATE THANKYOU!
Your Community Guides:
Palika Rewilding
Palika was found by Wild Mythos Drums in 2015. She is a Rewilding Elder, weaver of ceremony, carrier of Drums of Power, midwife for women's mature emergence and leadership, guide to becoming fully human, and humble guide of the journey to soul and tender of deep nature connection. As a becoming fully human guide, her center of gravity is the question of our species' place and participation in the web of life and the deep evolutionary impulse of the Cosmos individually and collectively. She understands her own place as a threshold midwife and visionary shapeshifter of culture, consciousness and heart; and an imagineer of new stories and shapes of human habitation on Earth, that cooperate with the heart and intelligence of the Circle of Life. Committed to cracking open the aches in human hearts for meaningful and connected lives, she helps deconstruct soul destroying paradigms of our modern times, and midwives our psycho spiritual maturity, evolutionary mythos, and soul centric ways of living that grow relevance, deep belonging and an irresolute Yes towards a life affirming culture.
She has been guiding humans of all ages and developmental stages on the ecological and psycho spiritual journey of wholeness, soul and leadership for many moons and suns. Her leadership has been shaped training with Bill Plotkin and Animas Institute, teaching at the Womens Herbal Symposium, midwifing the Death Journey, mentoring and facilitating Moon Circles and Red Tents and Deep EcoFeminism, The Work That Reconnects with Joanna Macy, and study with many guiding Elders of the Great Turning, teaching Permaculture, serial entrepreneurship, music, art and contemplative practice. She serves in private practice in Santa Cruz offering soul centric dreamwork, council and mentorship for individuals, groups and village on the path to reindigenize, and become mature and fully human.
John Lynch
In the everyday world, John is a university lecturer, where he weaves outdoor and eco-centric experiences into his offerings. He has degrees in outdoor education & leadership, sustainable communities, and ecopsychology. Underneath his cultural roles, John is living into his continuing unique unfolding as an open-hearted man in these times. His soul has impossibly requested that he show up for his people as a desert spring, a heart seeder, a tender of innocence and death, and a creator of eddies in the mainstream. John’s way of stepping into all of the above has been assisted and supported by rhythm, where he listens deeply for the voices of others in their unique patterns of sound, cycles, and songs. His drum journey has been a crucial aspect of his own self-discovery and a lens through which to experience the more-than-human world. John maintains heartfelt support towards fellow seekers negotiating the terrain of possibilities waiting within the field of nature and psyche. Finally, he is also a guide at the Animas Valley Institute and has training and certifications in gestalt practices and dialogical processing. John is an avid adventurer of wild places, professional outdoor educator, musician, wilderness guide and local initiator of soulful practices in his northern Arizona community.