Our Mission
To improve your overall well-being by guiding you towards a deeper connection with the natural world.
What We Offer
Slow and gentle 2-3 hour walks in your local forested green space. Your certified Nature & Forest Therapy guide will offer you a series of “invitations” that will help you slow down, relax and experience the subtleties and the restorative qualities of nature. All our walks include a wildcrafted tea to taste the forest.
What is Forest Bathing?
Forest Bathing is a direct translation of “Shinrin-Yoku” which is the evidence based Japanese activity of immersing in nature for one’s physical and mental health.
Why a Guide?
One can certainly Forest Bathe without one, but a guide is useful to hold space and to allow your executive functioning mind to take a rest. Much like a yoga teacher or meditation teacher, your Nature & Forest Therapy Guide will show you new techniques and refine the old to deepen your experience and grow your practice.
*Certified by the Association of Nature & Forest Therapy
About Us
DUNCAN MURDOCH
NATURE & FOREST THERAPY GUIDE
FOUNDER
Duncan is a Certified Nature & Forest Therapy guide living and working in Vermont. As an interdisciplinary thinker, Duncan has accrued his experience and knowledge from improvisational theater and TV/Film acting in SAG-AFTRA, teaching, producing, painting & sculpting, horticulture, land management and music performance. Duncan grew up on the shores of Lake Champlain in rural Vermont where his deep connection to Nature was formed. After receiving his Nature & Forest Therapy Guide Certification from ANFT in 2015, he began his official practice in New York City guiding the first Forest Bathing groups in Central Park. He worked as a Horticulturalist for the NYC parks Department and co-created the first shinrin-yoku forested walking trail on Randall’s Island. He moved back to Vermont in 2015 and began his work with the Intervale Center growing and planting native trees and stewarding the land. He now serves on the South Burlington Natural Resource Committee and is a board member of the South Burlington Land Trust. He is part of the UVM Integrative Health Practitioner Network and frequently conducts Forest Therapy walks throughout the beautiful state with his organization, Nature Connection Guide.
ANDREW TEPPER
LICENSED CLINICAL SOCIAL WORKER
CONSULTANT
Andrew Tepper brings 15 years of individual and group psychotherapy work to consulting Nature Connection Guide.
Andrew specializes in working with pre-adolescents, adolescents, adults and families. His areas of interest include anxiety, depression, mood disorders, stress reduction, anger management, and conflict resolution. Andrew holds a Bachelors Degree in Psychology from Bates College and received his Masters of Social Work degree from Columbia University School of Social Work. He has received extensive training in Psychodrama, Sociometry, and Group Psychotherapy from the Hudson Valley Psychodrama Institute. In addition, he draws from years of training in Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), Collaborative Problem Solving (CPS), and Mindfulness techniques to mitigate symptoms of depression and anxiety.
NCG would like respectfully acknowledge that we are guiding in Vermont, the ancestral and unceded territory of the Abenaki People.
- Becoming a Forest Therapy GuideJanuary 13, 2020 - 1:50 am
- Silence in Nature & What To Do When It BreaksMarch 27, 2019 - 7:14 pm
- Indoor Forest Bathing in a “Forest Room” is Now A ThingFebruary 27, 2019 - 7:39 pm
- US Doctors are Prescribing Nature in 34 StatesJanuary 7, 2019 - 4:33 pm
- 10 Tips for Winter WellnessDecember 5, 2018 - 6:59 pm