...Connect with Nature

In-Touch, In-Tune, and Simple

Parents often come to us with deep concern and feelings of helplessness over how much time their teens spend immersed in technology, computers, and electronic entertainment. At Finding the Good, we are far more concerned with the lack of time that youth are spending in close contact with nature. Some may think that one displaces the other, but that is not necessarily true. We know young people who are immersed in computer games on a regular basis, but who also spend time in nature -- to observe, to play, to lose themselves, to find themselves again.

We have taken young people out into the wilderness for over twenty years. A lot has changed in the world in those past twenty years, and yet people are not that different. Though we realize and readily admit that the obsession with and “addiction” to material objects such as video games, cell phones and iPods is widespread and pervasive, it never ceases to amaze us how resilient and receptive young people are to nature once they are exposed. After a day or two living outdoors, beside a river, or on a mountain, a deeper part of them relaxes into the elements and finds a home there, a place to love and feel inspired. A part of each student is touched and awakens to a self whom they either had not yet met or had not seen in a long time. And they realize, if they are lucky, that they cannot afford to live without that awakened self.

It is not a matter of Technology vs. Nature. Rather, it is a matter of discovering the right relationship to both.

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During the Finding the Good semester program, we’ll focus on listening to nature and working effectively within our natural surroundings. By developing a relationship with nature while simultaneously simplifying and slowing the pace of our lives, we can start to see the world in a different, more harmonious way. We’ll study natural systems as a team and begin to understand how people can work in concert, rather than in conflict, with those systems. We have found that true environmentalism and a deep understanding of sustainability begins with a realization that people are not separate from nature, but an integral part of it.