The Annual Feminist Shamanic Foundations Intensive is an integral part of both  Feminist Shamanic Counselor and Apprentice Training, and is held each summer at the Center in Surry. (For an overview of the Feminist Shamanic Counselor Training Program, see below.) During the Intensive the Center position on the Medicine Wheel Mandala is explored and its teachings shared in many ways. It is also a time of intense focus upon creating and performing feminist shamanic ceremony and ritual, of community building, and of learning to work together cooperatively within a feminist shamanic community. Participation in the Intensive is also a requirement for all  apprentices. (Beginning apprentices have their own version of the Intensive appropriate to their stage of training.) The final day of the Intensive is open to any woman who wishes to seek shamanic advice or guidance from the community by means of attending a feminist shamanic goddess council.  No set fee is charged for participation in this council, but donations to the Center in any amount you can afford are welcomed and gratefully accepted.

The Intensive begins with the creation of feminist shamanic ceremonial spaces within and without, and with  readying the student Medicine Wheel on the Center's property for the work that is to come.  We begin with a talking circle within which each apprentice shares the shamanic highlights, challenges and accomplishments of the year past, without being challenged, questioned, or asked for clarification. She is simply heard, allowed to speak at length about her shamanic life without interruption. 

Two major ceremonies are held each year during the Intensive:

The first is the Snake Medicine Transmutation Ceremony, during which we bring up and then release to Snake all anger, pain, resentment, and grief that we may still be carrying within our psyches as a result of our responses to the past year's events.

The second is the Sea Turtle Incubation Ceremony, during which we work with Sea Turtle Medicine to "bury" goals that we wish to accomplish, so that they may mature in the right way before being brought out into the world. For those who have participated in this ceremony the previous year, "buried" goals are revisited and brought into physical reality for action, and new goals may be set.  

The process of creating and carrying out feminist shamanic ceremony is learned first-hand as we also create special ceremonies for individuals in the community who may request them. 

The Intensive is also a time for those in the community to share their shamanic work and experiences of the past year. Those in the Feminist Shamanic Counselor program who have have successfully completed the first three levels of Feminist Shamanic Counselor training present their first shield, which can take many forms. Apprentices may also present shields at this time that reflect their particular shamanic callings, achievements, accomplishments, and skills, as a way of making oneself known shamanically to the rest of the community.

Feminist Shamanic Counselor
Training and Certification Program
New program description soon to come.