Initiation has always been essential to human life — a holy heartbeat time of forging a sense of belonging, recognising where we are on the road of life and opening the way to becoming who we are. Every indigenous community we have been blessed to work with over the past four decades understands this in their bones: initiation isn’t just ceremony — it’s an essential element of life, creating connection and sacred continuity.
When I turned 60, I sat in ceremony, looking back at each initiation I'd been blessed to go through. When I say blessed, and I'm sure you'll recognise this, that doesn't mean they were easy! As I recapitulated the first six decades of my life, I noticed something extraordinary. Far from fading, the threads from all those initiations, even the very early ones, had only grown brighter with time, weaving a vibrant, living tapestry across the span of my days, that over the years, has made more and more sense.
initiation - movement medicine style
For the past 33 years, we have offered the Initiation workshop, and we’re honoured to offer it again this Autumn at the wild and beautiful Rill Estate, close to our home in Devon. Though we have trained others to carry this medicine forward, every time we teach it ourselves, we come to it anew. It ripens. Just like us. I was 28 when we first taught it — a new father, only a few years into my teaching work. Now, having just turned 61, my understanding of life, death, and everything between has matured — and so too has the medicine of Initiation.
The week-long journey takes you through the 9 cycles of life - incarnation, birth, childhood, puberty, adolescence, adulthood, maturity, old age and death. The purpose is to make medicine from the past so that it's not a weight you are to carry but an inspiration that carries you. Movement is of course key to the journey, and no matter what age you are at, it will bring you new insights and clarity as you alchemise the past and dream into the future.
the ancient song of initiation
For thousands of years, humans have honoured the critical transitions of life through rituals of Initiation: birth, coming-of-age, marriage, loss, eldership, death — each threshold with its own challenges and opportunities, each one, an opportunity to build on the foundations of what came before. And each one, an opportunity to remember what is most important to us and to strengthen our relationship to it as we cross that threshold into the next landscape of our lives.
Anthropologist Arnold van Gennep wrote in The Rites of Passage (1909) that initiation rituals help individuals "cross the threshold" from one stage of life to another, providing structure and communal acknowledgment for the chaos of change. Without it, the soul wanders, lost and moved in all directions like a feather in the wind.
In indigenous communities, Rites of Passage for the young are not optional. They are the necessary crucible that transforms children into adults who have a reliable compass for their direction in life, and who are emotionally, spiritually, and practically prepared to take their place in the world.
And research backs this up too: studies show that young people who undergo structured rites of passage are more resilient, confident, and equipped to handle life's inevitable challenges. Initiation and Rites of Passage have been shown to:
Enhance resilience and coping mechanisms, strengthen cultural and personal identity and promote community engagement and social responsibilit
"Rites of passage are essential processes that help young people navigate the transition from adolescence to adulthood, providing them with a sense of purpose, belonging, and responsibility within their communities." — Blumenkrantz & Goldstein, 2010
Why initiation is needed more than ever
Initiation isn't a luxury. It's a lifeline. In a world where an Instagram "like" has more weight than inner knowing, the absence of proper Initiation leaves a wound. Without it, many young people seek out all manner of experiences in an unconscious attempt to initiate themselves.
As Dr Anita Sanchez says: "Rites of passage mark the transitions of life and ground us in our community, our sacred purpose, and the natural cycles of the Earth. Without them, we drift untethered from our deepest selves."
Good initiation does more than acknowledge and celebrate change — it trains us for it. It strengthens the psyche, builds emotional intelligence, and gives individuals a deep anchor of purpose. It teaches grit, humility, and a sense of the sacred. It teaches responsibility.
It also weaves the generations together, allowing Elders to fulfill their role as wisdom keepers. It offers a map through the wilderness of life, not by giving answers, but by forging in us the kind of questions that lead to a deeper, richer existence.
The fallout of forgetting
Without initiation, adolescence stretches on and on. We see it in the “failure to launch” phenomenon, the epidemic of anxiety and fragile confidence, and the loneliness and desperate hunger for belonging met with the hollow algorithms of social media.
When Initiation is missing, what Jung called the "midlife crisis" can feel less like an opportunity for renewal and more like a panicked return to unresolved teenage chaos. Without the wisdom of formal rites, the existential initiations life naturally brings — grief, loss, failure — become a source of trauma rather than a source of transformation.
As Dr. Robert Bly wrote in Iron John, “Where a real initiation is missing, individual men and women must undergo the ordeal alone, without the help of their community or its spiritual elders."
And this is even more firmly put by the late Dagara Medicine Man, Malidoma Somé:
"Initiation means a rite of passage from one stage of life to another. The absence of formal initiation in the West is why young people create their own informal initiations, such as engaging in reckless and dangerous behavior. Maybe drug addicts and alcoholics are trying to break into a different state of reality, as happens in a true initiation. The problem is their initiations never end."
The wound is real. But even for wounds of the soul, there is medicine.
it's never too late
If you're breathing, it's not too late to be initiated, to revisit the past with the resources you have now so that you can have the opportunity to change your relationship to past experiences and make different meanings from them. This work creates dignity and the feeling of a warm hand at your back as you prepare for the next chapter of your life.
You don’t have to be 13, standing barefoot before a council of Elders to say yes to your becoming. You can choose to initiate the different aspects of who you are at any age. Life offers opportunities for initiation often — we just need to develop the courage and the skills to meet them fully.
As I share in Jaguar in the Body, Butterfly in the Heart, initiation is not about escaping the world, but about rooting more deeply into it — learning to walk with both feet on the ground and the soul tethered to the stars.
When we dare to say yes to true initiation — messy, mysterious, magnificent — we remember who we really are. We reclaim our sacred role as stewards of life, keepers of wisdom, and wild hearts unafraid to meet the river of change.
So why not take the time to cross the threshold with us. Your life — your real life — is waiting.
your personal invitations
We have two upcoming events that fit the mighty need for rites of passage. The first is our Summer Long Dance July 19-25, to which you are warmly invited to.
The second is Initiation 2025 happening this Autumn. We will gather once again at the stunning Rill Estate in Devon Fri 24 Oct - Thu 30 Oct 2025. This odyssey is a profound rite of passage held in the heart of nature, crafted from decades of practice, devotion, and love.
This isn’t just another workshop. It’s a genuine threshold time that will support you to know where you are, where you've come from and where you're going. Again, please take this as our warm invitation to join us. It’s a gathering for those ready to step beyond old stories and into the deeper, truer song of who they are becoming.
It’s for those who sense the call of life itself, whispering: There is more for you. It’s for those who know that becoming an adult — a real adult, alive with purpose, rooted in wisdom — isn’t just about getting older. It’s a choice.
If you are standing at the edge of something new — if you are ready to meet life fully, eyes open, heart steady — we are holding the doorway open for you.
Come and be initiated by life itself.
👉 Learn more and book your place here.
Spaces are limited. The threshold is waiting. And so are we.
If you want to know more about Initiation - the Workshop, why not come to our FREE Online Fireside in which we'll be sharing more about it and taking your questions too.
See you there. 💚🐆🦋🌎🦋🐆💚
Wherever you are in your life's journey, sending you strength to go on discovering your medicine whilst your heart still beats. Enjoy those Beltane fires.
YDK. May 2025.
