Shelby is a ceremonialist, facilitator and song carrier, as well as an herbalist and longtime student on the unbeaten path of life. She has spent the better part of the last 7 years living and apprenticing to the plants and their teachings in the jungle of Costa Rica, guided by her teachers NetaYa and Vismay. She is a certified Hatha and Vinyasa yoga instructor, The Work that Reconnects Facilitator, Wilderness Therapy guide and Somatic Plant Medicine Integration practitioner with a passion for holding space for individual's own wisdom to arise from their depths. She is driven by her mission of providing trauma-informed care to foster holistic, embodied healing for individuals, in service to the web of life.

Through her own winding path, it became clear that intentional preparation and integration is just as important as the ceremony itself. More specifically, how the careful re-patterning of trauma imprints and the embodiment of resources from altered states are essential components of meaningful and lasting change. For the last 4 years, she has studied with Trauma and Somatics, Atira Tan, and The Embody Lab to grow in her own capacity to provide body-based integration of psychedelic journeys, and has further grown her capacity to hold space for the embodied wisdom of the individual to arise from their depths. She holds one-on-one plant medicine preparation and integration sessions, from the knowing that these essential pieces provide the foundation allowing the plants to do their best work with us. Through somatic awareness and processing, deep imagery, parts work, and pattern tracking, Somatic Preparation sessions can lay a foundation of resources to draw upon during the journey, as well as help to clarify intentions and begin the work of self-healing prior to ceremony. Utilizing the same tools to reflect on the journey, Somatic Integration can assist in anchoring resources experienced in ceremony into our bodies, bridging the altered state experience to our daily lives. Integration can bring an experience from a mere potent memory to a deeply embodied transformation. Shelby sees this work of personal healing as an offering to the healing of our world, co-creating a culture better able to live in service to the web of life.

Deer Ryder is a wilderness and human development guide, writer, dreamworker, poet and storyteller. He resides in the American Southwest where he works supporting others to heal and deepen their soul’s path in relationship to the holy wild.

Deer's primary training is as a Soul Initiation Guide with the Animas Valley Institute, an international nature-based mystery school based in the southwest specializing in the Nature Based Map of the Psyche and Soulcraft (dreamwork, shadow work, cross-species communion, ceremony, ritual arts, trance states and more); specifically focusing on guiding their 10-day wilderness fast.

Deer spent two years as a senior field guide with Open Sky Wilderness Therapy and is certified in nature-based practices and eco-psychology from EcoDharma in Spain, and has been a dedicated meditation practitioner and occasional facilitator for 10 years, primarily in the Vipassana/Insight traditions. He has participated in many silent retreats all over the world, with contemporary and traditional teachers, with special emphasis on blending practice and service to the earth. In this vein, he honors his former teachers: Sangha Seva’s Nathan Glyde and Zohar Lavie and friend-mentor, Mai-Linh Leminhbach: teacher and co-founder of the Himalayan Dharmalaya Institute for Compassionate Living and Windhorse Village.

Deer lived in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta mountain range in Colombia, working with and spending significant time with the Kogui people in support of the Amazon Conservation Team’s efforts to help the Mamas reclaim stolen territory, make offerings, and cultural preservation. Deer does not offer or teach anything he learned directly from the Kogui, but was irrevocably transformed and imbued by their teachings and way of life. He supports them in their fight to curtail global ecological disaster.

Lastly, Deer has been training in ancestral lineage work with Solea Anana and is a certified Wilderness First Responder with field experience. He received his Permaculture Design Certification from LA Permaculture Academy and applied its teachings while living and working in gardens, farms, alternative communities, eco-centric and permaculture-based projects around the world, including ancestral land practices research at Navdanya Earth University in northern India. He has his BA in Literature and Creative writing from UCLA and is a student of worldwide mythology, storytelling, and traditional cultures. He is currently writing and seeking representation for a novel trilogy. He has traveled to 27 countries and lived in 9 before calling the southwest home. Read more about him and his offerings on his website.

Shelby Sly

Deer Ryder

A Colorado native, Scotty has lived a life of adventure and connection to the non-human world. Guided by spirit and a deep knowing of intuition, he has been on a lifelong journey to explore the deeper realms of life, love, and purpose. Working for 17 years as a professional Whitewater guide, and a professional snowboard instructor Scotty holds in reverence the power of community, the healing of family and the growth of facing our greatest challenges with willingness and an open heart. Guided by mother Earth and Father Sky. Taking the greatest lessons from the mountains, canyons, rivers, deserts, and grasslands of the west. A student of the plants for two decades and a lifelong practitioner of the healing arts including yoga, breath work, ecstatic dance, Reiki, and meditation. Scotty has a passion for natural and alternative healing, and believes in the power of food as medicine, and as a way to connect deeply to self and community. A father, son, brother, friend, and a warrior of the light. Let us walk this sacred path as one, and together, behold the magic that we bring forth.

Scotty Guttman