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OUR FRAMEWORK
Passages exists to regenerate cultural memory, rebuild relational bridges, and help the modern heart return to the rhythm of the Earth.
At the heart of our work is nature literacy—a way of learning that unfolds through lived experience, ritual practice, and embodied attention.
Pillar I
The Self as Ecosystem
Nature literacy begins within.
We learn to read the body as a living landscape—breath as weather, emotions as climate, grief as an ecological response, and the womb and bones as archives of memory. This pillar grounds self-knowledge as ecological awareness.
Pillar II
Time as a Living System
Nature remembers through bodies and land.
We explore lineage, plant kinship, and biocultural memory as living transmissions. Knowledge is not abstract—it is carried through story, soil, bone, and ritual repetition.
Pillar III
Kinship & Reciprocity
Nature literacy restores relationship.
We cultivate ethics of reciprocity, sacred exchange, and responsibility—relearning how to live in right relationship with land, community, and the more-than-human world.
Pillar IV
Ceremony & Practice
Nature literacy is learned through practice.
Through ritual, breathwork, ceremony, and seasonal return, knowledge becomes embodied. Practice transforms information into lived wisdom.
OUR APPROACH TO LEARNING INTEGRATES:
01
Anthropology & Archaeology
Understanding how ancient cultures oriented themselves through myth, ritual, and ecology.
02
Indigenous Cosmology & Oral Tradition
We honor the stories, ceremonies, teachings, and cosmologies that shape Indigenous worldviews. We walk alongside earth-based, and lineage-rooted wisdom keepers — held with respect, humility, and right relationship.
03
Plantcestor Wisdom
We study the beings who have shaped human consciousness. Cacao, corn, copal, Tabacco - as ancestors and teachers with their own intelligence and relational ethics.
04
Depth Psychology & Mythic Inquiry
Exploring the archetypal forces that shape our descent, initiation, and transformation.
05
Embodied Practice
Returning to felt-sense knowing, presence, community, and relational integrity.
THE HUMANS BEHIND
PASSAGES EARTH SCHOOL
MARIANA BANDERA
Founder
Mariana Bandera is an Anthropologist and Archaeologist, whose work rests at the intersection of ancestral studies, depth psychology, Indigenous cosmology, and the study of el Camino Viviente (the living path).
Her path weaves the foundation of academic research with years of walking alongside Mayan, Mexica, Wixarika, and Diné mentors; the path of plantcestors, ceremonial traditions, and the mythic landscapes of Mesoamerica. Her work explores the wisdom found in death, grief, womb consciousness, story, and the elemental forces that shape human experience.
Mariana’s teaching carries both scholarly rigor and spiritual devotion, grounded in relational ethics, reciprocity, and embodied presence.
Through Passages, she creates spaces of remembrance where individuals can reconnect with their lineage, reclaim their purpose, and live in deeper conversation with the living world.
Guest Teaching, Speaking & Facilitation
Mariana is available for guest lectures, workshops, panels, and facilitated conversations in academic, cultural, spiritual, and community-based settings. Her work bridges anthropology, ancestral studies, depth psychology, and earth-based cosmology, offering grounded and relational approaches to themes of death, lineage, embodiment, and cultural memory.
In facilitation roles, Mariana supports groups in navigating thresholds — including grief, transition, initiation, and collective meaning-making — with care, presence, and cultural sensitivity. Her facilitation style emphasizes listening, embodied awareness, and ethical container-holding, allowing insight to emerge through dialogue rather than prescription.
Speaking and teaching engagements may include:
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Guest lectures for universities, institutes, or study groups
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Workshops and immersive sessions for retreats or gatherings
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Panels and moderated conversations
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Keynote-style talks rooted in ancestral and mythic inquiry
Each engagement is shaped in dialogue with the hosting community, honoring context, intention, and relational ethics.
Honorarium / teaching contribution available upon request.
To inquire about inviting Mariana to teach or speak, please reach out directly.
Lineage & Mentors
Those Guiding Passages Earth School
Passages arises through relationship. This work has been shaped by teachers, elders, mentors, and guides who have offered knowledge, correction, and care across many years of study and devotion. These relationships continue to guide the ethical, cultural, and pedagogical orientation of this work: Their guidance lives quietly within the rhythms, questions, and practices of Passages.
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Collaborating with Passages
Passages collaborates with facilitators, educators, elders, and practitioners whose work aligns with our values of lineage, reciprocity, embodied learning, and ethical engagement with ancestral knowledge.
These collaborations arise through relationship and invitation. Guest facilitators may be invited to contribute to Open Studies, special series, or community offerings, bringing their distinct voice and experience into dialogue with the larger Passages ecosystem.
If you feel resonance with this work and would like to open a conversation about possible collaboration, you are welcome to reach out.
Partnerships
Walking in Relationship
Passages collaborates with individuals, collectives, and organizations who share a commitment to ancestral knowledge, biocultural responsibility, and ethical engagement with the living world. These partnerships arise through relationship — grounded in trust, reciprocity, and shared values rather than extraction or visibility alone.
Our collaborations may take the form of co-teaching, shared research, ceremonial gatherings, pilgrimages, educational programs, or community-based initiatives. Each partnership is approached with care, honoring the distinct cultural, spiritual, and ecological contexts from which the work emerges.
Passages seeks partnerships that support living lineages, protect cultural memory, and contribute to collective healing and remembrance — always in dialogue, humility, and mutual respect.
