Mother Bear Sanctuary and Retreat Center

05/28/2026

In a culture increasingly shaped by outrage, division, and the diminishing of empathy, it takes profound inner work, courage, and vision to remain hopeful. To stay open-hearted instead of hardened. To believe that our presence, our healing, and our actions still matter. Real empowerment is not becoming numb to the suffering of the world; it is learning how to remain connected to humanity while still choosing to contribute love, wisdom, and conscious action.
Patriarchal assumptions killed the inner sacred union of heart and mind that has been honored across cultures for thousands of years.
Shiva and Shakti in the Hindu tradition.
The Taoist dance of yin and yang.
The alchemical marriage of sun and moon.
The Divine Masculine and Divine Feminine in mystical Christianity.
Indigenous traditions that honor the balance between Earth and sky.
In Jewish mysticism, the union of Shekhinah and Tiferet symbolizing the sacred reunion of the feminine and masculine energies within the soul and the wold
Again and again, humanity has tried to remember that wholeness is born through this holy marriage within
Yet in much of modern Western culture, we are given very few living models of this sacred integration.
We polarize and reduce ourselves.
We construct ourselves into narrow identities and rigid roles. We are taught to amputate parts of our humanity in order to belong.
Sacrifice our authenticity for temporary safety

What has moved me so deeply in the retreats Dave Tuscany and I facilitate is witnessing people rediscover the vastness of who they are. Not only the hurting parts. Not only the defended parts. But the genius, creative, joyful, courageous, and deeply loving parts as well.
A human being is not a fixed identity. We are more like a great living tree, many branches, many seasons,
many forms of intelligence held within one living whole.

When men, women and they are invited to reclaim a broader definition of self, profound change begins to happen.
People begin listening to Nature, to intuition, to each other, and to their own inner knowing with greater reverence.
The violence of the world requires us to go deeper, get resources and cultivate vision

DM me tonight for UBUNTU radical self-loveCommunity. 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. online. Or join us here at Mother Bear Sanctuary and Retreat Center for rattle workshop 12-3pm with Asia Sikkila

05/26/2026

May 31st 12-3 Rattle Making
Next Ecotherapy and Radical Self Love
June 20th 12-4pm

🩷🩷🧸🐻♥️

05/25/2026

05/21/2026

Why is it that so many who have walked through profound tragedy still carry faith?
I believe it is because, somewhere in the great breaking open, they discover that hate has no true intelligence. Violence has force, yes, but not wisdom. Suffering can mark the body, haunt the mind, alter the landscape of a life, yet it rarely offers a coherent gospel. We may spend years interrogating our pain, asking it to explain itself, turning it over like a shard of glass in our hands, only to find that explanation alone cannot restore joy.

Comedian Stephen Colbert lost his father and brothers in a plane crash.
Trevor Noah was shaped in the fires of such violence, abuse, and apartheid.
Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl endured the machinery of human cruelty and emerged committed to helping others find meaning. Again and again, we witness this strange and sacred truth: some souls are not reduced by suffering, but enlarged by it.

Perhaps healing begins when we stop demanding that suffering make sense
Perhaps peace comes when we release the compulsive need to solve every wound,
every betrayal, every injustice with the mind alone. And instead, we become available.
Available to curiosity
Available to insight
Available to Life
Available to the quiet, enduring current of Love that remains beneath circumstance.

The hate, and extreme violence of the beginning years of my life did not destroy my capacity to love.
I wonder .. is it when violence becomes so ridiculous, so center stage, that surrender becomes the only option?
And then the Presence of Creation emerges in our awareness.

Will you courageously choose to be available now?
I think for most people --it's a daily practice--
It's something you must do everyday...
a few times a day....
>> Choose to be available even if part of you doesn't feel like it---
This is radical self love

05/14/2026

Think about walking through a park and thinking, “This seems healthy.” But maybe 30 years ago that same park had twice as many birds, wildflowers, or insects. If you never saw that version, you don’t feel the loss — and that quiet forgetting becomes the new baseline. Over time, we start accepting degraded ecosystems as normal.

Researchers warn that this shift lowers our expectations, increases our tolerance for decline, and reduces our urgency to protect what’s left.

What helps:

Intergenerational conversations that reconnect us with what nature used to be.

Direct experiences with nature that sharpen our awareness of change.

Remembering (knowing) the past is the first step to restoring the future.
Shifting baseline syndrome (SBS) is what happens when we forget how vibrant the natural world used to be. Each generation grows up with a more depleted environment and calls it “normal,” simply because it’s all they’ve ever known.

05/13/2026

Be present--It is way too simple for achievement spirituality. Right here. This moment is enough. Not as a concept. Not as something abstract. Something profoundly biological and relational.
When you are fully present in your body—in the sensorium, in the lived, felt, phenomenological experience of being alive— the system organizes itself. Life that is always seeking to express more life. But you must stop efforting, to become available to what's already here. Surrendering into a felt, nervous system attuned connection.
A skill and inward capacity that can be developed
Yet we worship at the altar of complexity.
So simply we miss it.

Healing is inherent as you come back home---into you
Stop looking outside
What needs to metabolize, metabolizes.
What needs to move, moves.
Without force. Without strategy. Without striving.

Like a tree.
A tree does not try to heal.
It does not chase growth.
It does not override its own seasons.
Simply present

Nature shows us an enoughness outside of striving

And in that being, everything happens. In the non doing everything becomes done.
Somewhere along the way, we lost that.
We replaced it with protocols.

With the belief that more effort equals more happiness. But for many of us—especially those with trauma, neurodivergence, or sensitive nervous systems—That effort is the injury. We use the spiritual tool to lose the tool. All our tools are to surrender to What is Already Here.

Our minds worshiping at the altar of complexity. Too simple we miss it. Radical presence.
Deep acceptance of what is, without needing it to be different.
Not passivity.
Not bypassing. But profound, embodied nervous system relationally attuned listening.

Trusting that life—that the body—
already knows how to restore itself.
No more forcing.
Just being.
And letting that be enough.

2nd and 4th Thursdays 6-8 online. Inspiring talk, meditation, parts work, community connection, and soothing our nervous systems.
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/6281228937?omn=83315583211

You can donate per night $30-45, for the eve, or pay for the whole summer season (8 gatherings for only $155). And as always if you are struggling to make basic needs (food, shelter) no donation is necessary.

How YOU can help – Mother Bear Sanctuary & Retreat Center
https://www.motherbearsanctuary.com/donate/
Mother Bear has recently begun supporting two more survivor groups. More programs for summer have been planned. Thank you for your donation to this mission to humanity and nature.

05/12/2026

When emotion surges—fear, grief, anger—the nervous system can get hijacked. The amygdala fires, and suddenly the body is leading the experience.
“Name it to tame it” is the simple, powerful practice of bringing awareness to what you’re feeling.

When you gently name your experience—
“I’m noticing anxiety,”
“There’s sadness here,”
—you activate the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that helps you make sense of what’s happening, rather than be overwhelmed by it.

This isn’t just psychological—it’s biological.
Naming an emotion begins to calm the amygdala. The intensity softens. The system starts to regulate. The body receives a subtle cue of safety. Neurochemically, this shift supports the release of calming, organizing signals—helping you feel more steady, more present, more you.
You’re no longer lost inside the emotion.
You’re in relationship with it.

Even something as simple as:
“I notice I’m feeling nervous right now”
can interrupt the stress response and create space.
Space for the system to reorganize.
Naming doesn’t eliminate the emotion—
it integrates it.
And in that integration, the nervous system finds its way back toward balance.

✨ Upcoming Offerings ✨

• Thursdays | 6–8 PM (Online)
Inspiration, meditation, and soothing the tattered nervous system
https://www.facebook.com/share/1B2EbAPaez/

• May 31st | 12–3 PM (In Person)
Rattle Making Workshop
https://www.facebook.com/share/1PQ68w58jo/

• June 20 | 12–4 PM (In Person)
Ecotherapy & Radical Self Love

To register or support the sanctuary:
"Mother Bear Sanctuary & Retreat Center"
How YOU can help – Mother Bear Sanctuary & Retreat Center https://share.google/sc9nVTpKKWAIdkjBK

(Labeling and naming emotions is a universal regulation practice used across science and contemplative traditions by teachers such as: Dr Dan Siegel, Matthew Lieberman, Lisa Feldman Barrett, Mahasi Sayadaw, Thich Nhat Hanh, Pema Chödrön, and Joseph Goldstein)

05/11/2026

Trusting Connection: When unhappy or hurting, INSTEAD of asking: “Why me?” or “What’s wrong with me?” Ask: “Where can I lean into connection?” Relational attunement leads to inherent healing. YOU cannot heal entirely by yourself because a human being is not an isolated object. We are composed of psyche, body, Nature, and society woven together in relationship. In ecopsychology, this interconnected web is often called the relational field.

The state of your nervous system shapes what you see, how you interpret reality, and what possibilities you believe exist. When the nervous system is trapped in survival states, perception narrows. Fear feels absolute. Shame feels personal. Isolation feels true. Pioneer of the now popular vagus nerve toning and polyvagal coregulation, Dr. Stephen Porges reminds us: “Neuroception shapes perception.”

This is why learning to consciously co-regulate with Nature, animals, safe people, and the living world itself can save you years—even decades—of unnecessary suffering.

Interpersonal Neurobiology, Polyvagal Theory, attachment research, and ecopsychology scholarship all point toward the same understanding:healing occurs THROUGH connection.

Dr. Dan Siegel’s work in Interpersonal Neurobiology demonstrates that the mind is not only within us, but between us. Ecopsychology expands this further, recognizing that the more-than-human world also participates in this relational matrix. Forests, birdsong, rivers, animals, wind through the trees, and living ecosystems can all function as cues of safety and co-regulating presences.

If you continually ask: “What’s wrong with me?” the mind can spend decades generating explanations rooted in old wounds, conditioning, and survival adaptations. This is not an exaggeration. BUT when you connect FIRST—when you breathe with the trees, hold your dog, sit beside water, receive safe eye contact, or allow another regulated nervous system to support yours—your body begins to shift into restoration.

From this state, insight becomes available. Creativity emerges. Compassion returns. Perspective widens. If you try to analyze the issue BEFORE regulation and connection occur, the mind often recycles past understandings and protective patterns. Survival states interpret the present through the lens of the past. Being available to insight and creative solutions starts with co-regulation, with Nature, animals, or another person.

Gain practical tools and embodied skills to remain grounded, connected, and resilient even when life conditions are not ideal. Strengthen your capacity to reconnect instead of being trapped in suffering. Let us help you anchor yourself back into a FELT sense of belonging within the fabric of Life.

Please join us

Thursday nights online 6-8pm inspirational messages, chi-cong, meditation and connection. 100% goes to mother bear’s mission. led by Barbra

May 31st for the Rattle Making Workshop 12-3 led by Asia. $85
30% goes to mother bear mission

June 20th for the Ecopsychology & Radical Self Love Workshop from 12–4 PM. led by Barbra—100% goes to mother bear’s mission.

E mail motherbearsanctuary@gmail.com for zoom link

Donate to register
How YOU can help – Mother Bear Sanctuary & Retreat Center https://share.google/odNaHyVCMDDLzIu59