Leading with Mindfulness & Wisdom – 2.0

Leading with Mindfulness & Wisdom is a six-month hybrid meditation retreat training for environmental professionals, offered through Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre, California. Rooted in Buddhist wisdom, insight meditation and nature-based practice, it is for people who carry the weight of ecological work and want to meet the climate crisis with steadiness and resilience rather than burnout. It is taught by Mark Coleman, Kristin Barker and Bonnie Duran.

The program is part of Spirit Rock's EcoDharma offerings. Its central idea is regeneration: just as ecosystems continually renew and evolve, participants are invited to cultivate that capacity in themselves and in their organizations.

What to Expect

The training weaves three streams: Buddhist mindfulness practice, community building, and a regenerative arc connecting inner renewal with outer impact. It has four parts:

- Two five-night residential retreats. The first, at Mount Madonna Center near Santa Cruz, California, focuses on personal regeneration: deep contemplative practice to restore your relationship with yourself, your body and the natural world. The second, at the Garrison Institute in Garrison, New York, turns toward collective and ecological regeneration, working with others, systems and the living world.
- Monthly online sessions. Live gatherings with guided practice, dharma teaching, community connection, and Q&A with faculty and guest teachers.
- Practice support. Readings, podcasts, videos and reflection prompts for the time between gatherings.
- Optional peer groups. Participant-organized spaces for shared inquiry and mutual support.

The program opens with a virtual kickoff gathering and closes with a final integration gathering online. Each retreat day follows a regenerative rhythm of sitting meditation, movement, guided reflection and Buddhist teachings, with time to consider how the practice applies to your environmental work, including organizational life and systems thinking.

Over the six months you will explore compassion for the pain of this work, mindfulness and nature-based strategies for resilience, your relationship to leadership, power and influence, and different styles of leadership. You will also begin shaping a professional vision and sustainability plan. The cohort is kept small on purpose, and participants are chosen through an application process.

About Mark Coleman

Mark Coleman holds a master's in Clinical Psychology and has trained extensively in the Buddhist tradition, in both Insight meditation and Dzogchen. A senior teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center, he has taught insight meditation retreats since 1997 and has led wilderness nature retreats worldwide for over twenty years. He founded Awake in the Wild, which offers yearlong nature meditation teacher trainings, and co-founded the Mindfulness Training Institute. He is the author of Awake in the Wild, Make Peace With Your Mind, From Suffering to Peace, and A Field Guide to Nature Meditation.

About Kristin Barker

Kristin Barker is co-founder and director of One Earth Sangha, which cultivates a Buddhist response to ecological crises. A graduate of Spirit Rock's Community Dharma Leader program, she teaches with the Insight Meditation Community of Washington, DC, and co-founded White Awake, which supports white people in a Dharma approach to uprooting racism. Her background spans software engineering and environmental management, including work at several international environmental organizations. She is a GreenFaith Fellow.

About Bonnie Duran

Bonnie Duran, DrPH, began her Dharma path in 1982 and graduated from the Insight Meditation Society and Spirit Rock retreat teacher-training program. She has taught meditation retreats for over twenty years and sits on the Spirit Rock Guiding Teachers Council. She is involved in Native American spiritual practices and is studying the Jodo Shinshu Buddhist tradition. Professor emeritus in Social Work and Public Health at the University of Washington, she has worked primarily with Tribal, urban Indian and international Indigenous communities.

The Retreat Settings

Meals are included during both residential retreats, which are held at Mount Madonna Center in California and the Garrison Institute in New York. Meals outside the retreat periods are not included.

Before You Go

No prior meditation experience is required; the program welcomes people at any stage of practice. It is held in English. The program is for anyone whose work serves the environment, including land, fire and water stewards, scientists, engineers and policy professionals, educators and communicators, organizational leaders, and community facilitators.

Grant funding covers most of the cost, so the participant fee is modest, and financial assistance may be available for those who need it. Travel reimbursement of up to a set amount per retreat is offered, though additional travel costs are not covered.