About Zach:

I am a certified Forest Bathing Guide, Heart-Based Meditation Teacher, and Spiritual Mentor. I also hold certifications in Outings Leadership, Wilderness First Aid, Mental Health First Aid, and have been trained in Behavioral Neuroscience, Herbal Medicine, Foraging, and Basketry.

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What Moves Me?

• I am driven by a deep Love- a Love for the world, a Love for the Earth, a Love for others, a Love for the deeper Spirit, and a Love for Life!

• All Life is Sacred- the Forests, Rivers, Plants, Animals, Fungi, and all Beings seen and unseen. This also applies to the Life that is each of us. What would it mean to become aware of and fully present to the incredible gift of Life, the context within which we exist and the Essence that we are? What would it mean to allow our Hearts to be deeply woven into this web of Life?

• How would our experience of Life deepen, grow, and change when we anchor into a felt oneness with Being and all that is? How much more peaceful, joyful, connected, and full could our experience of being alive be if we were to fully awaken to the truth of our Being, the reality of our interconnectedness, and the fabric of Love that we are? What would it mean to step out of our narrow framework of separateness and fear, and instead become present to our true nature of boundarylessness and expansiveness?

• What would it be like to anchor our awareness in the Light and Love that we are, and feel the deep peace and freedom that comes from this felt connection with our true nature and inner essence?

• What would it mean to truly feel at one with the Beloved?

• These are the questions that drive my life. With the awareness of the sacredness of Life and the gift of Existence, I am endlessly seeking how to honor this fully and walk each day with an awakened Heart.

My Journey:

• From a young age, I was intensely drawn to the Beauty and Excitement of the Natural World. As a child, I spent countless hours watching Animal Planet on TV, endlessly fascinated by the exploration of all the Beings we share this world with. For much of my childhood, my idol was Steve Irwin, and I would fawn over his loving and awe-inspired relationship with the plants and animals he encountered. From this point forward, I felt deeply called to an intimate and Loving relationship with this world.  

• My young adulthood was filled with contradictions and changes of direction. I had to  release ideas of what a “good life” meant and open myself to deeper Truths about what it truly means to be Alive. For the first 20 years of my life, I pointed my compass wholeheartedly toward what I thought would make me happy- a respectable profession, a wife and kids, a nice house in the suburbs, and the prioritization of stability above all else. My goal in life was to feel secure and be successful in the way society approved of- all I wanted to be was a “proper citizen”.

• As I went about my life in this way, I would often fall into deep depressions. Externally, I was doing great! I went to good schools, got good grades, had good internships and jobs, and was all around “successful”. However, internally, I felt empty. I began to lean on substances to distract myself from this inner sense of lack. One of the most powerful shifts in my perspective came when I realized that I didn’t actually want to be successful, I wanted to be happy.

• Once this realization came to me, I began to shift my approach to life. I began to allow myself to let go of my preconceived notions of how I and my life SHOULD be. I began to gravitate toward practices and ways of being that cultivated true well-being, not just well-being on paper. I realized how precious and sacred this Life is, and decided that I wanted to dedicate myself to exploring the Truth behind this. 

My Current Path

• One way I explored the sacredness of Life was through my connection to the Natural World. In college, I spent much of my time in environmental activism, advocating on behalf of wild spaces and the health of our ecosystems. I moved to West Virginia to work in community development after college, and saw how intertwined community and ecosystem health truly are. Afterward, I spent a few years in small-scale organic farming, working intimately with plants and animals and seeing clearly the deep interconnectedness of their well-being and ours. I explored various wildcrafting practices, including herbal medicine, basketry, animal tracking, and foraging to further deepen my connection to and awareness of the Life around me. 

• At the same time, I began moving more slowly during my hikes and walks in the woods and saw that, as I slowed down and began to truly pay attention, I could feel into the deep peace and joy that arose from my Heart’s connection with the world around me. This led me to learn and become certified in Forest Bathing and Nature Connection Intensives with the Wildcraft Forest School. I felt  enlivened by the possibility of opening doors in the Hearts of others to truly feel the joy of this experience of Beauty and Interconnectedness.

• I also began to explore the realms of Spirituality. I was introduced to the practice of Heart-Based Meditation, which I now teach. I also began to engage in Spiritual Mentorship, a process through which I was guided to look at my blockages and entanglements while anchoring myself in my Heart Space, and through that was able to dissolve many of the illusions that kept me trapped in cycles of anxiety and emotional pain. This process was so powerful for me that I felt called to share this with others and trained as a Spiritual Mentor myself. It is a great joy to accompany others on this journey to inner freedom. 

  So, I invite you to take my hand and walk with me on this journey toward Freedom, Joy, Love, and Light. Won’t you join me?