The 2024 retreat has concluded.
Join us for next year’s Living Systems Leadership retreat in Northern New Mexico, Sept 1-6, 2025!
Registration opens in the spring.
Join us for this year’s Living System Leadership Retreat, taking place from September 1- September 6, 2024, at Ocamora Retreat Center in Northern New Mexico. This retreat is for women who share a belief that we can build a better world, and that connecting with the Earth and with each other is the first step in this process.
Each year, we work to create a healing space where women from all over bring together different backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives, and learn nature, for nature. We’ll help you harness the strengths of your unique leadership style and collaborate more effectively with women who lead in other ways. You’ll build professional connections, lasting friendships, and develop a framework to see nature’s intelligence as a model for leadership and social change.
What might you experience during the Living Systems Leadership Retreat, and what might you walk away with? Last year’s participants said:
“I learned that what I bring to the table as a leader is valuable, and that I can't change the world on my own. Nature can show us how to create the world we want to live in, and by building diverse teams and implementing the framework of life's principles we can reimagine what's possible and recreate our future.”
“I truly have never felt a community as academically, mentally, and emotionally expansive as I found here. I am in awe of the different perspectives and tenacious humanity I got to experience.”
“I learned that I can create change by understanding the systems that influence shared context, and making these systems work to our advantage. I really valued being in a shared physical and emotional space with other women leaders who are also working to better our world.”
The call of our time is for women to step forward to lead in new ways, embodying approaches that are adaptive, resilient, collaborative, networked – practices that the natural world has masterfully evolved over nearly 4 billion years. This is what the Indigenous Women of Bears Ears call the “rematriation of the Earth,” by which they mean nurturing the cycle of life, restoring our relationships with the land and our nonhuman relatives. Join us in this work at the 2024 Living Systems Leadership Retreat.
Click below to learn more about the retreat details
What to Expect
Imagine yourself awakening to the sounds of elk bugling in the early morning light, walking barefoot in the creek to explore how beavers collaboratively build community structures, soaking in the hot tub under the starriest sky you’ve ever seen, and experiencing the unique privilege of solitude in nature as well as the joy of sharing these connections with other amazing women/womxn.
“This was a unique and special opportunity to connect with and learn from women from all over the country in a secluded and wild environment (i.e. elk and bears at our doorstep!). I really appreciated that the LSL workshop was intergenerational and brought women from different ethnicities and perspectives to learn from and share their wisdom with each other. I hope that that this retreat will be repeated and replicated across the country and perhaps the world!”
— 2022 participant
Our days will be filled with intimate experiences of the local ecosystem, getting to know the plants, animals, and birds of this special place, and what they can teach us about ourselves and our own communities. We will learn what it means to be both visitors to and stewards of a landscape. We will practice the art of listening, observing, wondering, and distilling insights from direct experiences of nature, and practicing Dekaaz, a form of poetic interpretation based on the Fibonacci Sequence and the Golden Mean.
Direct coaching with our dedicated instructors and collaborative engagement with a diverse group of purposeful women/womxn will help you connect deeply with the place and local organisms who call this place home, distilling complex ecological processes into specific pathways and practices to inform your own leadership.
“This workshop allows a closer, more informed relationship to the Natural world that we can mirror in our own professional and personal lives to become a creative force in reshaping the future.“
- 2024 Participant
Learning Objectives
Practice skills to connect with nature and deepen your understanding of and relationship with life
Translate principles of healthy ecosystems into transformative leadership tools for cultivating thriving communities, organizations, social change initiatives
Distill a set of regenerative nature-inspired leadership practices relevant to your work and life
Foster curiosity and wonder about the natural world as inspiration for your evolving leadership
Build your capacity to inspire others when you return to your community and work
Who Should Attend?
The workshop is for leaders who are interested in connecting with nature as a source of inspiration and guidance. Designed as a program specifically for women/womxn, we aim to convene an extraordinary community, diverse in age, race, class, and interest area to learn with and from each other about how we can collectively re-birth a society inspired by healthy, thriving ecosystems. This retreat is for people of all ages and backgrounds who identify as female or as non-binary, including a wide realm of gender expression. Among us you will find:
Change agents who want to deepen their commitment to sustainability as a central practice in their work as leaders
Women leaders in both non-profit and for-profit environments, and those who may not consider themselves to be “leaders,” but who want to help with the social transformation necessary for the “ecosystem age”
Sustainability leaders looking for new models, methods, and metaphors that align with the purpose of their work
Women wanting to deepen their understanding of the natural world and develop skills to connect with and discover nature in their home habitats
We believe in reciprocal partnership as the way that the world can work for everyone. Limited scholarships are available for women from under-resourced communities and those who would otherwise not be able to attend. The Registration Application includes a place to apply for scholarship funding.
The Place
Founded in 1981, the Ocamora Retreat Center is a 265-acre haven nestled in a high valley at 7,500 ft elevation on the eastern slope of the Sangre de Cristo range in northern New Mexico. Located in a mile-long valley of irrigated organic agricultural, forested Oak and Ponderosa Pine woodlands, perennial grasslands, a creek, year-round spring, and mountain wilderness.
Ocamora is two hours northeast of Santa Fe and an hour east of Taos. Although it receives only 10-20” of rain a year, with 340 sunny days on average, Ocamora lies within an uncharacteristically fertile valley within a high desert plateau, providing habitat for abundant wildlife, birds, and plant life.
At its essence, the Ocamora experience offers a relationship to nature that is unusually precious in our increasingly urbanized world. Here survives a rare, quiet space far from the cacophony of civilization, fostering an intimate relationship with the land, soulful connection with community, and transformative personal renewal and regeneration.
2024 Instructors
Toby Herzlich
Founder, Biomimicry for Social Innovation; Senior Trainer Rockwood Leadership Institute; Key faculty, Biomimicry Professional Certification Program
Toby, leadership trainer and master facilitator, is the Founder of Biomimicry for Social Innovation. Toby is committed to the creation of a just, healthy, and regenerative society, and heartfully enthused about the transformative potential of applying nature’s wisdom to humanity’s sustainability aspirations. With 25 years of facilitation experience, she is a Senior Trainer with the Rockwood Leadership Institute, co-founder of Cultivating Women’s Leadership, a consultant to organizations such as The Sierra Club and the AgroEcology Fund, and on the faculty of several national training programs. Toby is a certified Biomimicry Specialist and key faculty in Biomimicry 3.8’s two-year professional certification program. She finds much of her purpose in catalyzing diverse networks of social change innovators, including the Young Climate Leaders, and intends to germinate a co-evolving network of leaders using nature’s intelligence as guidance and inspiration.
Brandi Mack
Director of Community Engagement, Designing Justice Designing Spaces
Brandi Mack is a mother of three beautiful daughters, holistic health educator, therapeutic massage therapist, permaculture designer and living systems thought leader. Brandi has worked and trained in the trauma informed youth and community development sector for over 15 years using living systems as a tool for personal and community development. Brandi is currently the Director of Community Engagement with Designing Justice Designing Spaces, an Oakland-based architecture and real estate development non-profit working to end mass incarceration by building infrastructure that addresses its root causes: poverty, racism, unequal access to resources, and the criminal justice system itself. Brandi is also the co-national director for The Butterfly Movement, a non-profit organization committed to personal, and professional development for black women and girls, and women of color in food, land ecosystems. Brandi uses living systems principles to activate, support and guide individuals and communities' connection back to the land and a renewed self.
Karen Allen
Biologist, Restoration Ecologist, & Certified Biomimicry Professional
Early on, Karen discovered her true passion in life is to cultivate connections with nature and restore resilience. She’s been doing just that over the past 25+ years through her business, Aequinox. Karen regularly collaborates with others on large-scale habitat restoration, sustainability, and biomimicry projects to help protect and restore ecosystems, generate sustainable innovations, and foster connections to nature. She brings her deep love of natural history to workshops, translating nature’s strategies for non-biologists. Karen is a key faculty member of the Biomimicry Masters Degree program at ASU and an international biomimicry trainer. In workshops aimed at connecting with and understanding natural systems, Karen cultivates curiosity, inquiry, and deep respect for the natural world. Karen hopes participants connect with nature as well as connect with themselves as part of nature. Find out more about Karen at: www.aequinoxhabitat.com
Guiding Faculty - not teaching in 2024
Rachel Bagby
Award Winning Activist / educator and Vocal Artist
Rachel is an award-winning author/artist/activist/educator; a former member of Bobby McFerrin’s a cappella ensemble, Voicestra with a Stanford Law Degree. Founder of Singing Farm Sanctuary, Rachel supported organizing that successfully stopped fracking gas pipelines threatening to transect rural West Virginia, Virginia, and North Carolina. Her clients include leaders in grassroots organizations and social enterprise C-Suites. An internationally recognized keynote speaker who has mentored women to unleash their voices as instruments of transformation for over 30 years, she is the bestselling author of Daughterhood and Divine Daughters: Liberating the Power and Passion of Women’s Voices. Rachel originated “dekaaz” (pronounced [deck-ahs]): a wisdom-catching form that hones principles of nature, inquiries, and ahas into just 10 syllables of shareable insights that you consummate out loud.
Program Costs
Program cost, TUITION, which includes all materials, instruction, and experiences on the land, is $1950. In addition, lodging and meal costs are based on room selection (see below).
Lodging #1: single occupancy rooms, cabins, or orchard yurts (includes meals, and facilities use): $950 for the week, plus tuition
Lodging #2: double/triple-occupancy lodging (includes meals, and facilities use): $775 for the week, plus tuition
Lodging #3: Orchard camping, using your own equipment (includes meals, and facilities use): $600 for the week, plus tuition
Course fees do not include transportation to the site, which can be cooperatively organized from the Albuquerque and Santa Fe airports. Some partial scholarships are available (see below).
Buddy Discount
We want to encourage you to attend this course with someone you know as a way to reinforce learning and to support you both in implementing new practices. Sign up with a buddy and you will each receive a $150 discount. This offer is limited to 3 buddy pairs – those who apply with a buddy or in a pod are eligible for double/triple lodging options – apply soon for this opportunity.
Scholarship applicants are not eligible for Buddy Discount, as they are reserved for two full-paying applicants.
Scholarships – limited availability!
In order to ensure that participants include a diverse network of change agents, funds have generously been offered by the NoVo Foundation to support a limited number of partial scholarships for leaders who would otherwise be unable to attend.
Scholarship applications are due by June 1st, 2024, as part of the workshop application. There will be consideration for applicants who apply early. See the Financial Aid section of the Registration Form to apply.
Scholarship applicants are not eligible for Buddy Discount, as they are reserved for two full-paying applicants.
Registration and Deadlines
Registration deadline: June 15th, 2024. Due to the limited number of spaces, early registration is highly encouraged.
If you are accepted into the cohort, a deposit of $500 will be due within ~10 days of acceptance for all non-scholarshipped applicants. Full payment of final balance (including lodging) will be due on August 1st, 2024. See the registration form for full details.
Important Dates
March 19th: Registration Opens
June 1st: First Round of Scholarship Applications Accepted
June 12th: First Round of Scholarship Applicants are notified of their acceptance status/scholarship award
June 15th: Second Round of Scholarship Applications Accepted/Registration Deadline
June 28th: Second Round of Scholarship Applicants are notified of their acceptance status/scholarship award
July 12th: $500 Deposit is due
August 1st: Full payment is due
Logistics
Flights are available into Albuquerque (ABQ; 3 hours drive time to Ocamora) and Santa Fe (SAF; 2 hours drive time to Ocamora). Please note: many more flight options are available into Albuquerque. Please plan to arrive with ample time to get to Ocamora by 4:00 pm on Sunday, September 1st, 2024 with departures from ABQ or SAF no earlier than 5:30pm on Friday, September 6th, 2024.
Upon acceptance, you will receive detailed information about what to bring, driving directions, a spreadsheet for carpool self-organizing, and other details.
Covid-safety Protocols
We are working closely with the Ocamora Retreat Center to establish and maintain COVID-safety protocols and ask that all participants be up to date on their covid vaccinations and prepare accordingly to keep themselves and others safe in a group setting.
For more information please e-mail sharon@bio-sis.net