Theresa Benson, PhD, REAT, REACE
Dancing Water’s Heartfire

Theresa guides individuals and groups into a deeply integrative process of rewilding the self, cultivating wholeness across mind, body, spirit, and soul. Through deep imagination, dreamwork, expressive arts, wilderness exploration, and relational practices — she helps people reconnect with their innate wild nature, heal the divides within themselves, and rediscover their relationship with the more-than-human world.

Her life has been shaped by difficult childhood experiences, which instilled both a profound sense of being broken and a relentless drive to understand what it means to be whole. Spending time alone in nature as a child, she began to witness the healing potential of ecological immersion and relational awareness, learning to embrace paradox, complexity, and vulnerability as pathways to growth.

Theresa’s professional training spans counseling psychology, holistic health, mindfulness-based practices, expressive arts, and spirituality — with over 20 years of experience guiding people in transformative, experiential practices. She draws deeply on the wisdom of land, dream, myth, deep imagination, and ceremony — helping participants find personal insight, creative expression, and embodied clarity while navigating the challenges of contemporary life and Western cultural pressures.

Her work emphasizes the interconnection of personal healing and ecological reciprocity, encouraging a shift from individualistic models of wellness toward collective, community-centered practices. She creates spaces where people can witness one another’s truths, embrace imperfection, and cultivate courage, compassion, and connection.

Theresa’s hope is to help others:

• Reconnect with their innate wildness and embodied intelligence

• Heal separation from themselves, others, and the more-than-human world

• Engage in practices that honor reciprocity, creativity, and soulful purpose

Through her guidance, participants find that healing is not about fixing what is broken, but returning to a whole that has always been present, and contributing to a world that supports life in all its complexity.

"My deepest grief is the divide within hearts of the humans in the world that brings harm to Mother Earth and the more-than-human world. A belief in a new world story in the midst of this Great Turning ignites a passion to contribute to an unfolding world that prioritizes reciprocity of the more-than-human world. My heart is broken open, clear, full, and strong enough to continue to be broken open even deeper. Nothing that I can foresee will stop me from engaging in this continued unfolding." — Theresa