DEVOTION: A Leadership Initiation at the Turning of Worlds

With Samantha Sweetwater, Tim Corcoran & Team, & Andrew Dunn of School of Wise Innovation

 @ The Shasta Headwaters Outdoor School

"The world we were born into no longer exists. The one that will be will arise as we live, love, narrate and create it."

— From True Human: Reimagining Ourselves at the End of Our World

ENTER THE WILD WITH US

Come to the sacred land of Mount Shasta to enter a non-ordinary learning container—a kinship journey to deepen your regenerative pattern tracking and refine the authentic impulse at the heart of your soul-centric leadership. Through connection with the land, the waters, the fire, human and more-than-human teachers and teachings, the body-in-movement and stillness, and the mythic zeitgeist of our collective moment, we'll tend the flame of soul-aligned devotion and courageous action at this time of Great Turning.

This is a soul quest at the wild edge of possibility. A six-day wilderness initiation for those already on the path—leaders and creators who know they want to engage their energy, intelligence, resources, and vitality in service to a flourishing future for all of Life.

Over six days and five nights at Headwaters Outdoor School, you will:

• Disconnect from the grid (tech fast—phones collected on arrival, returned at closing)

• Reconnect with the land as teacher, guide, and mirror

• Undertake a solo vision sit to discover what Life is asking of you

• Be held in ceremony & community (sweat lodge, council fire, storytelling, dance)

• Deepen embodiment of kinship and communion

• Emerge with renewed clarity about your soul's path in this critical moment

  
  

You will be guided by:

• The land and its more-than-human inhabitants

• Tim Corcoran and the Headwaters Ourdoor School team

• Samantha Sweetwater, author of True Human

• Andrew Dunn, founder of School of Wise Innovation

  
  

You will cultivate essential competencies for leading through civilizational transition: kindred belonging, biospiritual wisdom, and soul-aligned clarity about your unique path and purpose in devotion to the One Life — as a true human custodian, celebrant, and co-creator.

WHO THIS IS FOR

DEVOTION is for visionary leaders who:

Are already on the path

• You've done your personal work; you know this is about collective transformation

• You recognize the metacrisis as the defining context of our time

• You're not looking for comfort — you're looking for truth

Lead and build at the intersection of crisis and possibility

• You're building regenerative businesses, funding life-centered ventures, designing technology that serves rather than extracts, or catalyzing systemic change

• You hold resources, influence, or creative power

• You know your decisions ripple across systems, communities, and generations

Feel the call to serve Life

• Not as abstract ideal but as devotional practice

• You want to align your power with flourishing, not extraction

• You're willing to be changed by what the land shows you

Are ready for initiation

• You are in some kind of transition — it's time to shed one skin and live into the next one

• You're willing to spend a night alone on the land asking what Life wants from you

• You know that real leadership isn't about being in control — it's about being in right relationship

You might be:

• A founder building the regenerative economy

• A funder making investment decisions that span decades

• A technologist designing AI, biotech, or systems infrastructure

• A business leader transforming culture within legacy institutions

• A change agent weaving movements, communities, or new paradigms

• A public figure interested in leading on behalf of Life

What unites you: You refuse to look away. You're building the future while doing the inner work. You know that leadership divorced from soul becomes extraction. And you're ready to ask the land, the fire, and your own heart: How can I best serve Life at this critical juncture in human evolution?

WHY YOU SHOULD COME

The kind of leadership our moment needs cannot be taught in a classroom. The systems we're trying to transform were built on separation—humans separate from nature, leadership as dominance, success as extraction. We cannot heal what separation broke with the same consciousness that created it.

DEVOTION offers what no conventional leadership program can:

1. AN EMBODIED TECH FAST

Six days without phones, email, or connectivity—not as deprivation but as liberation.

2. RECONNECTION WITH THE EARTH AS TEACHER

The land is your primary teacher—you'll learn wilderness skills as relational practices and discover that leading for Life requires learning from Life.

3. A SOLO VISION QUEST

Twenty hours alone on the land, fasting and asking what Life wants from you — this ancient practice strips away the noise and reveals where your soul's calling meets the calling of the world.

4. CEREMONIAL ALCHEMY

Sweat lodge, Council of All Beings, fire circles, and storytelling weave you into kinship and communion with the Song of Life.

5. A COMMUNITY OF FELLOW SEEKERS

A circle of leaders walking together in devotion. The bonds formed in ceremony and wilderness become your Council of Kin for the work ahead.

6. INTEGRATION OF BODY, SOUL, AND LEADERSHIP

Full-spectrum transformation through movement, dream work, wilderness immersion, and metacrisis council — your body, dreams, and the more-than-human hold wisdom the mind cannot access alone.

7. CLARITY ABOUT YOUR SOUL'S WORK

Soul Craft reveals what only nature can reflect: your unique place in the web, your particular medicine, the work you are made to do.

WHAT YOU CAN EXPECT

THE ARC OF YOUR CEREMONY

We follow the classic arc of initiation: Severance → Threshold → Incorporation. Pause the ordinary. Immerse in the liminal. Return transformed.

THE SIX DAYS

Day 1 (Tuesday, September 8): CROSSING THE THRESHOLD

Arrive, surrender your phone, meet the land and community, light the fire both literally and metaphorically.

Day 2 (Wednesday, September 9): ATTUNEMENT

Learn to listen with your whole being through wilderness skills, Council of All Beings, a long hike into the land, and dream practices.

Day 3 (Thursday, September 10): SEVERANCE

Release what no longer serves through teaching and council on the metacrisis, time with the water, and sweat lodge, then depart at night for your solo vision quest.

Day 4 (Friday, September 11): SOUL QUEST

Spend 20 hours alone on the land, fasting and crying for a vision, then return at sunset to share your story around the fire.

Day 5 (Saturday, September 12): INCORPORATION

Explore your vision in council, embody it through movement, craft your covenant with Life, and celebrate with play.

Day 6 (Sunday, September 13): GOING FORTH

Speak your commitment and be witnessed by community, offer reciprocity to the land, receive your phone back, and return to the world in devotion.

PRACTICES INCLUDE:

• Circling & storytelling

• Sweat lodge ceremony

• 20-hour solo vision quest (fasting)

• Wilderness skills (tracking, fire-making, night walking)

• Dream work

• Metacrisis council

• Council of All Beings

• Dancing Freedom (embodied movement)

• Fire-tending & Water listening

YOU WILL:

• Disconnect completely (phones collected on arrival, exceptions granted for caretakers)

• Sleep in rustic bark tipis on the earth—the traditional dwellings of local indigenous peoples

• Unwind into Earth Time

• Eat nourishing communal meals

• Be held in ceremony

• Spend one night and day alone on the land

• Return with soul-vision and biospiritual wisdom

THE PLACE

SHASTA HEADWATERS OUTDOOR SCHOOL

Shasta Headwaters Outdoor School is an extraordinary place where the separation between humans and nature dissolves, where the songs of flowing waters, singing birds, and whispering trees blend with the life of the humans who inhabit it.

For over 30 years, this land has held young people and adults in the deep work of coming home to Life. Nestled in the valley opposite Mount Shasta—one of the most powerful volcanic presences on Earth—the school sits at the headwaters where ancient, artesian waters bubble to the surface, where forest meets meadow, where humans remember they are part of a greater Song.

This is not a retreat center—it's an initiation ground. The land itself speaks. The waters teach. The mountain witnesses. The staff is an intergenerational team of earth-warriors who have spent lifetimes loving and listening to this land.

You will sleep in simple, traditional bark tipis or under the stars. You will eat food prepared with care. You will move between forest, meadow, and stream. You will tend fire and be held by a place that knows how to hold transformation.

YOUR GUIDES

SAMANTHA SWEETWATER

Author of True Human: Reimagining Ourselves at the End of Our World

Samantha is a wisdom guide, transformation facilitator, and soul midwife who has guided thousands through personal and collective thresholds over three decades. Her work integrates embodied practice, ceremony, systems thinking, deep ecology, and visionary leadership.

She is the founder of Dancing Freedom and One Life Circle, and has trained hundreds of facilitators worldwide. Her clients include CEOs, founders, and change agents navigating the intersection of personal transformation and civilizational transition.

Samantha lives at the edge—between worlds, between stories, between what's dying and what's being born. She brings fierce clarity, deep care, and the kind of presence that makes transformation possible.

TIM CORCORAN & THE SHASTA HEADWATERS SCHOOL TEAM

Master wilderness guides and ceremony holders

Tim and the Shasta Headwaters team have been tending this land and the people who come to it for decades. They know the territory—both the physical landscape and the inner terrain of transformation. They are master trackers, wilderness skills teachers, and holders of ancient wisdom adapted for modern seekers.

They will keep you safe. They will teach you to listen. They will create the conditions for the land to work its magic.

THE CONTAINER

When: September 8-13, 2026 (Tuesday arrival, Sunday departure)

Where: Shasta Headwaters Outdoor School, Mount Shasta region, California

Who: 18 leaders maximum (intimate cohort for depth and trust)

Tech Fast: Phones collected on arrival, returned at closing

Physical Level: Moderate (hiking, overnight solo, wilderness immersion—you don't need to be an athlete, but you need to be able to walk 3-5 miles on uneaven ground and sit on the land)

What's Included:

• All meals (nourishing, locally sourced where possible)

• Accommodation (rustic traditional bark tipis)

• All ceremonial materials and wilderness gear

• Facilitation by Samantha Sweetwater

• Guidance by Tim Corcoran & Shasta Headwaters team

• Space holding by Andrew Dunn of the School of Wise Innovation

• Integration resources

TUITION

Weavers: $1,700

Sustainers: $2,500

Builders: $4,500

Our price tiering is designed to support access while enabling a viable living for the facilitators, producers, and space-holders of this retreat. Sustainers and builders provide the meaningful foundation for us to keep doing what we do. Weavers bring the vitality of a diverse community.

Our suggestion: if you make under $120K per year, join us as a Weaver. If you make anywhere between $120K-$300K per year, join us as a Sustainer. If you make over $300K, or are worth over $2 million, please consider joining us as a Builder. It takes a village to co-create a village.

We are also able to provide two partial scholarships to BIPOC participants and single mothers. (Please email samanthasweetwater@gmail.com to express interest.)