Walking the Veil
Our Journey with Grief and Loss.
Grief is one of the hardest emotions and experiences we will need to traverse in our human experience, to be with death of any kind, to navigate loss, is not an easy feat.
What horses have held for me and many others over the years, is the capacity to walk with grief and know how to wear it when it shows up for us.
What can feel hard about loss is that we lose the physical connection to what has been lost. There is a void that is suddenly there for us to be with, and the intensity of that can be very trying to move through.
Horses have taught me more about death and grief than any other experience, the initiation into this place, the teachings of how they hold it has been profound.
To sit with the herd as they hold us and show us a way to be with the veil of grief and loss is a potent one, it is healing and it allows us to find a pathway to be with our loss in a way that no longer feels crippling to us.
This retreat is about entering into the healing space of the herd, to allow the horses to tend to our grief, to give us the teachings and the healing we need to hold it, and to seek out their medicine and wisdom around it.
We will also be sitting with our own spirit herd, to show the link between those we have lost in physical and the connection to them still in spirit. You will be met where you are in this journey, and held in it the way that feels soothing for you.
Grief and loss does not have a one way it looks for all of us, it is not meant to be completely healed from us, and there is a journey and pathway to healing that can allow us to be in relationship with it in a way that feels more soothing to us and where we feel the capacity to walk with it.
If you are in a place right now where grief and loss are part of the fabric of your experience, however that looks, we would love to help tend to that with you and the herd.
We don’t need to walk the journey with our loss and grief in isolation, we can still honor our boundaries of how we need to tend to that that feels supportive.
The beauty of being held by the herd is we don’t have to find the words, we simply can allow ourselves to be held, and shown a way forward, and be soothed in our pain. We will offer gentle rituals but always come from a place of honoring each person and what their journey needs in order to support it.
When we have another place to land around our grief, it is a soothing balm for our soul. We will never not grieve and there are losses that we truly never completely recover from, and we can find a way to function and thrive around the places our grief and loss are held within us.
In our own journey we have walked through the transition of 15 of our beloved horse partners over the last 11 years, and we will have many more to see through. The loss of our grandmother at a young age was a turning point for us in terms of how that death shaped our life and our trauma.
Hillary is the founder and lead facilitator of the Epona Rise Retreat Center and Horse Medicine Leadership Academy, she has been leading and teaching retreats and trainings with her herd for the last 13 years.
Passionate about bringing the teachings of the horses to impact the lives of humans, she has been devoted to her own vision and purpose of creating a space in nature where people can come and receive the wisdom of horses, the land and their own inner guidance.
She has over the last 13 years had the privilege of hosting and leading retreats for a range of people who are seeking to become more masterful in their experience of being a human with their own passion of personal and professional growth and development.
Hillary Schneider
What is included in the retreat.
The Retreat Includes:
5 nights accommodation
4 days of being held by our herd and guided by gentle ritual
Stay in a private cabin
Shuttle to and from the ranch
Catered meals
When: Thursday October 15th - Sunday October 18th (Arrive on Wednesday, depart late Sunday or Monday depending on travel)
Investment: $2900 CDN plus taxes
Custom and extended payment plans are available.
Meet your facilitators:
Carol Archie is from the Stswecem'c Xget'tem First Nation, from the northern part of Secwepemcúl’ecw, located south west of Williams Lake. She now resides in Kelowna and has raised two beautiful daughters.
Learning from parents & elders grounded her in traditional teachings that shaped a resolute and enduring path to understand and help those in need navigate systems bureaucracy.
Her journey and dominion over many traumatic experiences resulted in achieving a refined intuition and connection to spirit help others discover to their own gifts and abilities. She will bring the divine feminine, quiet strength and vision to hold space for a deep inner journey.
