Hey. Welcome.
I'm Simka (they/them), and I'm so happy you're here! It's my life's work to support sensitive, creative folks like you to build subtle, aligned relationships with the wild places inside yourself and all around you.
Each of us has a unique place in the mycelial web of the world – but it's not easy to find and inhabit that place without support. My own path to finding rootedness in my body and my life has been – and continues to be – a long and winding one. I want it to be easier for you.
The Wild Path is the name I give to my holistic, interdisciplinary practice of coaching, guiding, and teaching, weaving together the tools and approaches which have been meaningful to me so I can support you on your own wild path.
here's why
For me, nature isn't something out there, to be visited or consumed. Nature is something in here, in my body and experience as a messy, healing human and in my relationships with other beings.
It's so basic, isn't it? A sunset, birdsong, the moon, swimming in a lake – nature helps us come back to ourselves, because we are nature. We are animals. We belong to this earth. Its complexity, its ambiguity, its intensity is reflected in us.
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I haven't always moved in these rhythms. There were a myriad reasons why, as a young person, it didn't feel safe for me to be myself, animal or otherwise.
As an adult, I did years of work across modalities, learning to open my senses and pay attention to my body's responses. But it took a painful burnout in the midst of the pandemic for me to figure out that being with subtleties of the more-than-human world brings me – whumpf – back down to earth, into my body and into a sense of grounded safety. Practices of foraging, land-tending and nature-based mindfulness have been a compass for me, giving me orientation and direction, opening up a path to being me.
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Changing my orientation to nature set the foundation, but working with a coach is what gave me the tools to truly come home to myself. Part of that was witnessing the way the changes in me rippled out to the people around me.
It fills me with so much hope and delight to see how – in the words of Robin Wall Kimmerer – when each of us is strong in who we are and carries our gifts with conviction so they can be shared with others, the whole flourishes.
That's what drove me to train as a certified Nature-Connected Coach through the Earth-Based Institute in 2021. I so deeply believe that each step we take individually towards being in tune with our messy, complex selves, giving our imperfect gifts into the world and receiving those of others with joyful delight, is a step towards a collective radical future.
And – I just fucking love this work. I love the way that textures of lichen make me feel. I love gathering handfuls of wild herbs from my city lawn to make delicious free food for my loved ones. I love understanding the different moods of the birds around me through their calls. I love coming back to favorite mushroom spots in the off-season, knowing that below my feet mycelium and tree roots are in mysterious invisible relationships.
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And more than anything, I love seeing how this knowledge, these ways of being – relationship, reciprocity, abundance – are absolutely fundamental to our collective souls. I love guiding others into their own awareness and watching, cheering, as they plant seeds, tend to their needs, and begin to blossom.
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This is my calling. It's such an incredible gift to be able to share it with you.
what I do
I'm a nature-based life coach. My goal is to help you find your way to confidence in yourself & your gifts, grounded in deep relationship with your body and the earth.
I do a lot of interrelated things, all feeding in to my dream of a spreading network of folks who feel fully alive in a living world. Some of these offerings are:
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1:1 nature-based coaching for artists and weirdos uncovering their full complexity, online or in-person
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Foraging workshops in and around Berlin
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A range of nature connection experiences and workshops
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Parts Work workshops, groups, and trainings
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Retreats and group courses in nature connection and coaching
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I often mix and match these for clients, depending on what serves them best.
The Nine Sisters Academy for Revolutionary Pedagogy and Adventure
The name of the homeschool my father and I founded after I dropped out of public high school at 15 (I was done getting chastised for asking too many questions).
26
The age at which I learned to swim.
Doctor
What I wanted to be when I grew up. I loved flipping through anatomy textbooks before I could even read. Anatomy still enthralls me!
Singing
Keeps me grounded. Singing with others most of all. A current favorite is Batya Levine.
tidbits
The devil's in the details. Here are some insights into who I am.
Cognitive Science
The subject I studied at the University of Edinburgh, bringing together philosophy, psychology, linguistics, sociology, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence.
Emetophobia
The official name for my pathological fear of vomiting, which has caused me not to throw up since I was two years old - or is it caused by that fact? Who knows! No puking here.
Ursula K. Leguin
The author who has influenced me more than any other.
2
The number of tattoos I have of one dead language written in an unrelated ancient alphabet. (My third tattoo is a sheep.)
Yarrow
My first and dearest plant friend: a glorious weed that stops bleeding, helps with headaches, brings down fevers, eases cramping, and tastes wild and earthy.
Joy
The Hebrew word my name comes from.
