Nature as Lover: Reawakening the Art of True Intimacy

Lorenna Bousquet-Kacera, Founder of Shamanu: Earth Wisdom Teachings

We are, by nature, relational beings. At the core of our humanity lies a deep yearning for connection, intimacy, and the shared flow of love. Yet the modern world rarely nurtures such closeness. Instead, it steers us toward separation, busyness, distraction, and surface-level interactions. In this climate, our natural longing for intimacy often hides beneath layers of protection and unspoken needs.

But beneath it all, something remembers. When we soften into the fluidity of the heart, a portal opens—a doorway into the remembrance of our true nature as loving, connected beings. From here, fulfillment arises not through striving, but through an instinctual knowing of how to engage with life in ways that are meaningful and nourishing.

Our Path Together

Shantree and I have been on this journey together for nearly 30 years. Our relationship has never been perfect. Honestly, it’s been messy, complicated, and sometimes hard as hell. We live together, work together, create together, often side by side from sunrise to sunset. We don’t have it all figured out. What we do have is a commitment to each other and to our love, and that keeps us showing up, learning, and growing- again and again.

Costa Rica has been a particularly special place for us. We were drawn there by a calling, spent many winters offering retreats, and even got married under its warm embrace. When we’re there, intimacy feels easier, more natural, more present. It’s not just being in a new environment with fewer responsibilities—it’s the land itself. The energy of Costa Rica invites honesty, vulnerability, and real change. Perhaps that’s why it had the first Peace University, abolished its military seventy years ago, and hosts countless eco-villages. It calls us to show up, to face raw truths, and to meet the edges of who we are becoming. 

It’s been a place of growth, especially for our relationship and our creative partnership. But the real test comes when we return to Canada, where we spend six to nine months a year. Running a center, managing work and life, tending to endless details—it’s the perfect setup for intimacy to slip away. We never lose the love, but sometimes the intimacy doesn’t come easily.

Women and men experience life differently. I can hear many of you nodding—yes, that’s for sure. While everyone is unique, most women need to talk, and most men have their caves. Learning to truly hear, see, feel, and trust one another takes time. Our responses to stress affect our bodies, minds, and capacity for closeness. Depending on our histories and traumas, it can take years to truly trust another—even when we love them. The schism between our hearts, minds, and bodies can be deep. That must heal first before we can enter the realm of trusting intimacy. And make no mistake: intimate relationships are sacred paths—a return to wholeness.

I’ve spent years learning how Shantree expresses his feelings, how he listens—or doesn’t—and how to communicate in ways that are heard, not debated. I’ve learned to see myself more clearly, through his eyes and my own, even when it meant facing parts of myself I’d rather not. Our relationship has become a container for recognizing how deeply we’ve been shaped by societal beliefs about men, women, and relationships—beliefs that have little to do with who we truly are or the freedom to grow into our best selves.

Even after thirty years, seventy-six years on this planet, I still encounter blocks. Fortunately, we’ve found compassionate, kind, yet intentional ways to support each other in those inevitable times of challenge and life-changes.

One of our greatest insights: we are not meant to give each other everything we need. No one person can do that. Movies and songs have fed us this illusion, bringing frustration and pain to countless relationships. Strong community and satisfying work are essential to personal and relational happiness. But as a culture, we’ve mostly forgotten that we are part of a larger community: nature itself. We are not just in nature—we are nature, in human form. Her laws govern our lives and our love. 

Nature as Teacher, Lover, Self

Over the years, we’ve come to understand that intimacy doesn’t exist in isolation. Our relationship, messy and human as it is, has taught us a lot, but it is our connection with the natural world that keeps us grounded. Water, forests, winds, and soils offer a kind of reset, a way to step back and remember what truly matters. They remind us that love isn’t just about the two of us; it’s bigger than that.

Nature, in her quiet, patient way, becomes a teacher. She shows us how to yield and renew, how to listen and respond, how to move gracefully through life’s changing seasons. We are made of the same elements, and when we remember that, we rediscover how to love: how to meet each moment fully, how to open to new possibilities, and how to repair what has been fractured so we can live awake and whole.

Without this relationship with the Earth, we lean too heavily on human relationships. And as many of us know, human relationships are fragile. People change. People leave. Stuff happens. Spring always returns, trees grow, rivers flow, and the wind dances through the forest. Nature offers refuge from a stressful day, a broken heart, or the turbulence of life. The elements—rivers, forests, winds, soils, sun—give our love balance and replenishment. They remind us that love is meant to circulate freely: through us, our relationships, and the wider world.

The challenges intimacy brings, the moments of frustration, vulnerability, and fear, they are not just obstacles. They are allies. They shape us, teach us, and make us more whole. With the support of the living world around us, we’ve learned to welcome them, knowing that they are part of what keeps love alive and real.

The Shamanic Journey of Love

The journey into the heart of love is perhaps the most powerful journey we can take. It is a shamanic initiation—a call to walk consciously, with tenderness and courage, into the mysteries of love.

Love asks us to meet both our deepest passion and our deepest fear. Each can be overwhelming, yet both are gateways to our most authentic longing: to connect, to belong, to love and be loved, to share in fearless communion with ourselves, with another, and with the living Earth.

An Invitation to Remember

Romanced by the Elements: Awakening the Sacred Union Within & Between takes place in the tropical sanctuary of La Ecovilla intentional community—a land alive with the rhythms of plants, rivers, and sunshine. Each day we will weave embodied practice, reflection, and time in nature, inviting your heart to remember its original connection to life.

Through guided explorations, eco-somatic movement and breathwork, Earth-centered meditations and rituals, Ayurvedic teachings and intentional time in nature and reflection, you will discover deeper intimacy—with self, with partner, and with the more-than-human world.

This retreat is for those who long for conscious love: love that is grounded, practical, and able to guide us into the unremembered parts of ourselves where intimacy has no fear.

Join us in Costa Rica, and journey into the heart of love.