Rites & responsibilities

A 5-Day Seminar on Navigating Transitions in an Ever-Changing World

Ages 18+ | July 17-21, 2025

And whoever you are, wherever you are:

It’s okay if you’re scared
when you’re opening.
The seed,
she was scared too.
Do you think the coal
wanted to become
a diamond?
Ha!
She was scared
out of her wits
of change!
It took her 10,000 years
to even be able
to pray for it.

~ From Stubborn Resistance by Chelan Harkin

The last decades have seen dizzying levels of cultural, political, technological, and ecological change - and those changes appear to just keep moving faster. These changes call on us to remember and re-engage the wisdom and traditions of our elders and ancestors at the same time we learn from the children and those future generations who will be living in a future that we cannot yet even dream.

How do we tend to our ever-changing personal and professional realities as we honor and reckon with the complex lineages we have inherited, and move forward into unknown futures?

How do we navigate the inner and outer barriers to change we experience as we simultaneously hospice that which is dying and midwife that which is already being born?

Practices of initiation—conscious crossings from who we have been to who we are becoming--offer us a powerful and time-tested means of navigating change. Engagement with these processes help us step ever more fully into our leadership, as well as offer a specific set of tools we can offer to our community. When we restore rites, the whole community can flourish.

In this 5-day seminar, we’ll build a community of practice and inquiry together. Through ceremonial process, critical analysis, and hands-on practice, we’ll explore key tools for bringing forth meaningful, culturally responsible rites of passage. We’ll help each other uncover what it means to step fully into one’s role in our families, communities, and society, and how to most effectively carry our gifts with responsibility and grace. As we study, share, reflect, practice, grieve, organize, and celebrate, we will create space for our points of connection and shared experience as well as honoring the differences between us.

Learning Objectives:

Explore human development from neurological, psychological, cultural and ecological perspectives, and the role of developmental transitions in soulful leadership
Build capacity to design and/or lead healthy passages, for ourselves and others in their community
Dive into key orienting frameworks for personal, collective, and co-liberatory transformation
Explore the disruption of rites of passage over recent centuries and the resurgence of rites of passage today, and how these efforts fit in with the decolonization and other global change movements
Explore and contextualize the role of identity development in rites of passage, and how this impacts our work and those we serve
Investigate the causes, consequences, and complexities of cultural appropriation, and explore the co-creation of ancestrally-rooted, culturally respectful alternatives
To exchange and evolve practices and skills with respect for lineage, supporting their implementation in meaningful projects in diverse communities and organizations.
To develop a relationship with Rites & Responsibilities as a holistic framework through which to engage in the work of restoring cultural habitat and with that, rites of passage for our lives and communities.
To explore practices for living an initiating life on an everyday, ongoing basis

Photo credit: Photos above copyright to David Moskowitz, Darcy Ottey, or Clement Wilson. Used with permission.

PROGRAM DETAILS

Frequently Asked Questions

Ages 18 +
All Genders

July 17-21, 2025

Arrival Time: 11am PST

Departure Time: 4pm PST

River Root Farm, Deming, WA

Participants may camp on-site or arrange their own lodging nearby. Please consider this an immersive program though, which will not have a concrete daily start and finish time. Participants will provide and cook their own breakfasts and lunch. Dinners will be provided Thursday - Sunday evenings, with food provided by Journeys. There will be a tea station set up at all times.

Bring all that you need to camp & sleep outside in the level of comfort that you prefer. (Tents are recommended as tarp space may be limited) An info/recommended equipment list will be provided

$750-$1995 Sliding Scale
$300 Deposit Due at Registration
Financial Aid is currently available

Please note there is a $100 minimum payment for anyone applying for financial aid and applications must be received at least one week prior to the start date of the program.

Staff

Darcy ottey

Guide
Darcy Ottey (she/they) is a cultural practitioner, educator, writer, and researcher. The descendant of Quaker settlers, British coalminers, and Ukrainian peasants, rites of passage have been part of Darcy’s life since her youth.

Tarek Kutay

More About Tarek

Tarek Kutay (they/he) grew up in a family of travelers and activists, immersed in youth political movements and cross-cultural experiences around the world from an early age. They earned a B.A. in Political Science and Communications with a minor in Environmental Studies from Franklin University Switzerland. Their path also led them to the Wilderness Awareness School and the National Outdoor Leadership School, where their passion for guiding took root. Tarek’s guiding journey began in Guatemala, leading rite of passage road trips through Central America that helped participants deepen their connection to self, nature, sacred sites, and learning from indigenous wisdom keepers. This calling eventually led them to Northern California, where they co-founded an off-grid community and educational event space, and working within the conscious music festival scene. Since joining Rite of Passage in 2018, Tarek has held a variety of roles—from apprentice and multi-trip summer guide to Assistant Program Director in 2021 and Program Director through 2024. Their work continues to center on cultivating resilience, honoring the land, and guiding transformative experiences in nature. Tarek believes that journeys into the wild, immersive cultural experiences, and conscious celebration are powerful catalysts for awakening our truest selves. Their work is rooted in the conviction that these paths can lead to lives of deeper connection, healing, purpose, belonging, and joyful service.

Clement Wilson Fonseca

Clement Wilson Fonseca, LCSW (he/they) is a clinical social worker, rites of passage guide, group facilitator, and somatic practitioner who helps guide people to the intersection of sacred solitude and community healing. With a deep understanding that healing is inherently relational, Clement supports individuals as they navigate transformation within the interconnected web of self, community, ecology, and ancestral legacy. Clement was born in England and moved to the U.S. as a pre-teen—the first of many major transitions in his life. Their Anglo-Celtic ancestry includes dairy farmers, bootmakers, and agricultural workers who tended the soils, fed, and outfitted their communities for centuries in Scotland, England, and Ireland. They are especially drawn to supporting people in times of transition, guiding individuals through life’s thresholds with care and intention through somatic attunement, expressive arts, and group healing. Clement helps others integrate the wisdom of peak experiences into sustainable, embodied change. Clement’s experience as a transgender man offers him a unique relationship with gender - a perspective shaped by movement across, between, and beyond binaries. This lived complexity informs his practice, where he invites others to deconstruct socialized identities and to see initiation not as a solitary act, but as a relational, ongoing process shaped by culture, community, and systems of belonging. Clement enjoys photography and capturing the beauty in the people and places they encounter. They love swimming in rivers, oceans, and lakes, biking through the city, playing soccer, and connecting with loved ones over long dinners and rich conversation. They live in Portland, Oregon with their spouse, two dogs, one cat, and a thriving collection of plants.

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