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Wilderness Therapy Programs

A major impetus for the development of what has come to be known as Wilderness Therapy Programs was the recognition that traditional therapeutic experiences, especially with adolescents, frequently fail to produce hoped for changes. Educators at a number of western universities had noted that when students were required to take outdoor based classes unexpected yet profound results transpired. This eventually led to the creation of the first wilderness program. These programs were initially innovative, daring, and often extremely successful in their outcomes. It has been said that people favor a lot of sameness with a little difference. Outdoor wilderness programs, at least through the lens of traditional mental health and psychological services, had tremendous difference with little sameness. One of the founders of wilderness therapy programs remarked that the mental health “professionals” would either try to eliminate such wilderness programs or would eventually see the value and join forces with them. Thirty years later the success of wilderness based programs cannot be denied. However, there is an increasing concern about a trend to take “office therapy” and simply conduct it in an outdoor based setting and proclaim it to be a wilderness program. The intent of many wilderness based programs has also shifted to what could be described as “assess, stabilize, test, and move on”. The therapist journeys out to the field for a somewhat typical one hour office visit, relays information back to referents and parents, and when the child eventually capitulates to go to the next placement, treatment is deemed successful

The Alldredge wilderness program has the power, effectiveness, and ability to create dramatic life changing breakthroughs through skillfully utilizing the context of a different environment. The majority of wilderness programs have one of two philosophies. The first is that there is something inherently therapeutic about being in the great outdoors. It is our experience that this fact is lost on the majority of Alldredge students in the beginning. The other and more prevalent standard is based loosely on behaviorism, i.e., if you do what the instructors tell you, you will either get a positive or negative consequence, and then instructors and counselors use the concept of metaphoric transfer to hopefully help the student take what they have learned through these natural laws back to their home environment or boarding school. In contrast, in the Alldredge wilderness program, the environment is used in a way that creates opportunities of emotional vulnerability that moves the student to a state of desire for wanting something different in their life. It is a very gentle process that utilizes extremely sophisticated therapeutic modalities. It is our presupposition that very few teens initially enter programs desiring a significant change. They develop strategies to attempt to persuade the counselor or therapist that they are getting better and constantly search for criteria that will allow them to exit the wilderness program as quickly as possible. To combat this widely recognized and well known concept of adolescent resistance, we developed a model that is consistent with the major quest of early adolescence, which is unconsciously answering the questions “Who am I?”, “Why am I on this earth?”, “What is my purpose or mission?” This is the reason that when students are placed at Alldredge they are told that they are becoming a part of a search and rescue team. There is no mention of their presenting issues or problems and they are greeted by excited instructors who tell them that we live in a rural area and there is need for qualified search and rescue personnel to assist people who are in trouble. Without it ever being made explicit, the teens’ typical hedonistic perspective on life is challenged as they are told they are here to help others, not simply feel better about themselves. They will eventually move to become certified search and rescue team members and will participate in elaborate mock, and sometimes genuine, missions that allow them to get an extremely powerful and rare experience at such a young age of participating in a meaningful way towards making a difference in another’s life. Sandwiched around these life transforming experiences are sessions with our uniquely trained therapeutic staff. A profound distinction between the Alldredge wilderness program and other wilderness programs is the uncovering of unconscious limiting belief systems that have ultimately resulted in the presenting problems or poor behavioral choices that have led to their admission. A tremendous amount of what might be called “resistance” is thus bypassed, because instead of focusing on “bad behaviors” students are engaged in deep level dialogue where they come to see how their interpretation of significant early life events have created the formation of a belief structure that has then propelled their choices in life. Our goal is not to talk about “issues” but to create a rupture of paradigm. To relate this to your own life, think about a time when you made a significant change. Rarely has it been the result of reading a self help book or even talking to a therapist. Human beings tend to make changes when they see no other solution or recourse. What we would describe as “therapeutic” would be getting in touch with one’s authentic self and then making choices that are consistent with who you truly are at the identity level. When we engage teens in this deep level therapeutic process, it is as if you see a light bulb go off over their head. They become free to stop defining themselves by their past history of poor or negative behaviors and literally become empowered to dream again and become who they thought they were going to be when they were much younger. Augmenting these incredible transformative experiences are intensive family workshops where the young people and their parents come together to explore multi generational patterns of pain. We consistently receive feedback about facilitating the most healing and transformative workshops for parents in the country.

I have been a therapist for many years, which gives me a perspective as to what works and what doesn’t in any therapeutic encounter. Any competent residential program will have an impact on a young person’s life. In essence they need to be detoxed not necessarily from drugs but from their way of thinking and from an often poisonous culture that convinces them that “image is everything.” I am, however, convinced that is where many programs start to plateau. The therapist recurs to “office therapy” in the outdoor based setting, and there is not a coherent formulation of why they are doing this work in the wilderness other than the kids are somewhat captive and may learn some things through the concept of positive or negative consequences. It is my contention that an incredible amount of emotional growth opportunities is missed if the novelty of being placed in an unfamiliar environment is not utilized to its full potential.

Part II

As previously discussed, effective wilderness programs use the environment for its novelty and tendency to create a perceptual stress that causes students’ old coping patterns to become immediately apparent. However one of the paradoxes of wilderness programs is that at some point the novelty wears off, and it is actually very easy to live in an outdoor based environment. Recognizing this fact, the environmental setting is dramatically altered after completion of the Search and Rescue phase. At that point, students enter a “mythical Village” and once again they are taken out of their comfort zone. It provides a powerful way to test our work and begins to prompt the process of creating evidence as to whether a student is ready to go home or not. The well known book Wherever You Go, There You Are distinctly explains in its title what we are looking for. When we can see novel responses to old situations in different environments, it provides compelling evidence that a true emotional shift has occurred. The Village phase also provides an opportunity to demonstrate the limitations of what could be termed “literal learning”. Many programs, therapies, even parenting are largely based on cognitive theory strategies. The limitation of this theory base is exposed when confronted with the disease I called “adolitis.” This could simply be defined as the thinking disorder that occurs between the ages of thirteen and about twenty one. The latest neuro-research consistently highlights that it takes the better part of twenty-one years to grow a prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain responsible for judgment, mature decisions, emotional regulation, etc. Perhaps some of you have sat in a therapist’s office where behavioral contracts were drawn up, and I can guarantee that if your child followed it, you would need no further visits. There is a reality that is rarely discussed however that logical, cognitive-based interventions do not work when the unconscious belief system of the person is in conflict with the information being presented.

In the first phase of the wilderness program, we have specific therapeutic interventions that are designed to uncover these unconscious limiting beliefs. In the second phase, we begin to explore them on a deeper level through such non-literal means as ceremony and paradoxical symptom prescription. When students first enter the Village Phase, they are told they will learn things they will not be able to put into words. Again so this does not sound like some new-age mysticism, if I ask you to think about times when you profoundly shifted the course of direction in your life it will often be an event that to quote the popular phrase, “left you speechless.” Using metaphor and powerful guided imagery, traveling to powerful places such as wild caves and high vistas, students are led on experiential learning processes that allow them to tap into the sources of long buried pain. These students are being exposed to the wisdom of the ages and in effect are being led through a rite of passage. For thousands of years, there was an initiation into adulthood that required perceived risk and the surmounting of some challenge. What emerges as a result of this experience is the uncovering of authentic self. As people become aligned with their true identity, a context is provided where they are able to begin developing a sense of purpose or mission in life. The value for young people being involved in this kind of learning is immense. Once again as opposed to focusing on behavioral problems, there is a much more compelling vision that provides them with inspiration in contrast to telling them what they need to do more or less of. Gandhi was once attributed to saying, “Your problem is you need bigger problems.” Students in the Alldredge wilderness program are stimulated through these various mediums to focus on what would be so compelling utilizing the gifts that they bring to this earth that they wouldn’t have time to engage in their former negative behaviors.

The final key ingredient of this life-transformative process is students beginning to identify with the Alldredge term, Source. This is simply defined as what is the greatest thing greater than self. Through powerful metaphorical experiences, various ceremonies and guided imagery, young people are invited to rediscover the part of them that has always known right from wrong and can discern truth. Our students from religious backgrounds will generally enhance their connection to what they would describe as God. Young people who have had other backgrounds may label the Source as their moral compass or their conscience but find that there is tremendous value in paying heed to this guiding light. Contrasting these approaches with more “traditional” therapy, we have found that many therapists are uncomfortable letting go of their secular background and talking about matters of faith. In reality people use faith every day. An example is when you say you love your spouse. That is a relationship that cannot be scientifically proven, no more than we can quantitatively measure how a person comes to believe in the greatest thing greater than self.

Involvement in the kind of intense emotional growth experiences that have been described provides a scaffold upon which young people can begin basing their decisions connected to what they have discovered is true, moral, and in Alldredge terms, virtuous. Once a person has a sense of destiny, mission or purpose and has developed a moral structure that supports their life purpose, certain choices are simply no longer possible. Teens who embrace these concepts either return to their communities or to various boarding schools with a desire to contribute to society, not simply stop old negative self-defeating behaviors. An interesting aspect of this approach is when a young person has some sort of behavioral relapse, be it negative thinking, minor drug use, disrespectful language, etc. they find themselves uncomfortable reverting to the old way of being. I have had many conversations with students where in their words they relapsed in some old behavior and they called up to say, “It just wasn’t me anymore.” From my perspective, that is a successful “therapeutic” outcome. Through the Alldredge wilderness program, we provide mentoring adults that can facilitate this powerful rite of passage. It defies some of what is thought of as conventional therapy but it is clear to me that if the traditional methods worked you probably wouldn’t be reading this article.

Mike Beswick, CSW
Alldredge Wilderness Journey
Clinical Director