An Animas Quest at Beauty Mesa – 2025
An Animas Quest at Beauty Mesa – 2025
July 7 - 18, 2025
Retreat Highlights
- Identify - or clarify- your unique note in the symphony of life
- Arouse your wild imagination and earthly senses
- Encounter fierce and alluring aspirations of your soul
- Recover and integrate the forgotten voices of your own wild psyche
- Experience your conscious membership in the community of Earth
- Join other visionary leaders in shaping a soul-infused future of the word
About this Retreat
Gene Dilworth is dedicated to the project of rewilding the human spirit as an essential dimension of being fully human in these times. By nurturing meaningful relationships with the more-than-human world and facilitating deep inquiry into the mysterious depths of one’s true nature, he supports individuals to discover, re-member and live from the center of their soul-rooted sense of belonging to the world. Gene has been guiding groups and individuals in transformative nature-based experiences since 1986. He has taught ecopsychology and environmental studies at the university level, and has served as an academic administrator and other leadership roles in a variety of educational and environmental organizations. Gene lives near Lyons, Colorado, where he is founder of the Wild Heart Center for Nature & Psyche.
Brian Stafford is a guide to the wilderness of nature, wildness, and soul. Called out of academic medicine to serve as a guide to the depths and to serve as an agent of cultural awakening and transformation, he guides with humor, playfulness, fierceness, compassion, discernment, and a deep remembering of the fullness of what each human life can, should, and was meant to be. A native of Colorado and the former holder of an endowed chair and professor of psychiatry and pediatrics, he is currently a guide, Board Member, and Training Director of the Wild Mind Training Program at Animas. He is also an adjunct faculty member at Pacifica Graduate Institute where he teaches Human Development and directs the Psychedelics and Depth Psychology Certificate programs. He is an avid outdoorsman, teacher, writer, mentor, partner, and parent. He delights in helping individuals rewild and ensoul their lives by assisting in the dissolution of their current life so that they may discover and live from their deeper life, their soul-life. Brian currently makes his home in Ojai, California.
Details of this retreat
THE ANIMAS QUEST
This is an all camping Quest.
This contemporary Western embodiment of the ancient, pan-cultural vision fast is a dynamic wilderness rite for all who are seeking greater depth and clarity about life purpose and meaning. As a rite of initiation, the quest is a ceremonial descent to the underworld, in which you die to your familiar way of belonging to the world, uncover the passion and wisdom of your soul, and retrieve the gift that is yours alone to bring to the world, enhancing personal fulfillment and genuine service.
The Animas Quest catalyzes the encounter with soul by temporarily displacing everyday consciousness through five primary means: (1) solitude for three or four days and nights while (2) fasting (i.e., drinking water only), (3) being fully exposed to and enfolded within the forms and forces of nature, (4) enacting a series of ceremonies, and (5) employing a set of practices (soulcraft) that support you in crossing into the mysteries of nature and psyche.
Our quests take place over a total of 12 days, which are spent in the wilderness. Preceding your time of solitude are five full days of preparation activities that enhance your ability to benefit from the fast.
During the five preparation days, we work with dreams, poetry, deep imagery, ceremonial drumming and dance, dialogues with nature, the way of council, and other practices to help us slip out the door of our everyday lives and access our own deeper, wilder currents.
The heart of the quest consists of the solo: three days and nights without human companionship in nature, fasting, engaging in personal ceremonies, saying yes to the mysteries of soul, tending the true mythos of your life, praising and grieving, and birthing a vision. Upon your return to base camp, there are three days of reincorporation activities, preparing you to embody among your people what you received on your fast.
We’ll gather at Nizhoni Campground near Blanding, in Southern Utah where we’ll spend our first two days together. From there we will caravan to our base camp on Beauty’s Mesa where we will be for the duration of our time together.
No previous backpacking experience is required. (In fact, many of those who have quested with us have never before been camping or backpacking).
We ask that couples, family members, or friends not attend this program together.
Registration is ultimately contingent upon our guide's review of your completed application questions you will fill out upon registering. This is so that our guides can get to know you and confirm that an Animas Quest will be a good fit for you and your journey at this time. If they have any questions they will reach out to you directly.
MANTI LA SAL NATIONAL FOREST
Utah’s Manti-La Sal National Forest is over a million acres of under-explored beauty, every bit as beautiful as its national parks.
Read More
This is an all camping Quest.
This contemporary Western embodiment of the ancient, pan-cultural vision fast is a dynamic wilderness rite for all who are seeking greater depth and clarity about life purpose and meaning. As a rite of initiation, the quest is a ceremonial descent to the underworld, in which you die to your familiar way of belonging to the world, uncover the passion and wisdom of your soul, and retrieve the gift that is yours alone to bring to the world, enhancing personal fulfillment and genuine service.
The Animas Quest catalyzes the encounter with soul by temporarily displacing everyday consciousness through five primary means: (1) solitude for three or four days and nights while (2) fasting (i.e., drinking water only), (3) being fully exposed to and enfolded within the forms and forces of nature, (4) enacting a series of ceremonies, and (5) employing a set of practices (soulcraft) that support you in crossing into the mysteries of nature and psyche.
Our quests take place over a total of 12 days, which are spent in the wilderness. Preceding your time of solitude are five full days of preparation activities that enhance your ability to benefit from the fast.
During the five preparation days, we work with dreams, poetry, deep imagery, ceremonial drumming and dance, dialogues with nature, the way of council, and other practices to help us slip out the door of our everyday lives and access our own deeper, wilder currents.
The heart of the quest consists of the solo: three days and nights without human companionship in nature, fasting, engaging in personal ceremonies, saying yes to the mysteries of soul, tending the true mythos of your life, praising and grieving, and birthing a vision. Upon your return to base camp, there are three days of reincorporation activities, preparing you to embody among your people what you received on your fast.
We’ll gather at Nizhoni Campground near Blanding, in Southern Utah where we’ll spend our first two days together. From there we will caravan to our base camp on Beauty’s Mesa where we will be for the duration of our time together.
No previous backpacking experience is required. (In fact, many of those who have quested with us have never before been camping or backpacking).
We ask that couples, family members, or friends not attend this program together.
Registration is ultimately contingent upon our guide's review of your completed application questions you will fill out upon registering. This is so that our guides can get to know you and confirm that an Animas Quest will be a good fit for you and your journey at this time. If they have any questions they will reach out to you directly.
MANTI LA SAL NATIONAL FOREST
Utah’s Manti-La Sal National Forest is over a million acres of under-explored beauty, every bit as beautiful as its national parks.
Read More
Schedule
Soulcentric Dreamwork
Deep Imagery Work with Animal Guides
Talking Across the Species Boundaries
The Way of Council
Soul Tasks in Nature
Self-Designed Ceremony
Shadow Work
Soul Poetry
Sacred Wound Work
Synchronicities: Working with Nature’s Signs and Omens
Befriending the Dark
Ecstatic Trance Drumming and Dancing
many others!
Deep Imagery Work with Animal Guides
Talking Across the Species Boundaries
The Way of Council
Soul Tasks in Nature
Self-Designed Ceremony
Shadow Work
Soul Poetry
Sacred Wound Work
Synchronicities: Working with Nature’s Signs and Omens
Befriending the Dark
Ecstatic Trance Drumming and Dancing
many others!
Note: Schedule is approximate and may change
Read MoreGetting Here
Directions
Directions depend on location
Read More
Accommodation
Meals
Menu Types
Vegan
Vegetarian
Pescetarian
Ayurvedic
Includes Meat
Organic
Gluten Free
Dairy Free
Nut Free
What's Included
- All of our field programs are camping based, some include catered meals.
What's Not Included
- airfare or transportation
- room accommodations
