Summer is the season to get outside and enjoy the naturally therapeutic fresh air. Our program operates year-round and has special activities for all seasons. With summer right around the corner, let’s explore all the incredible programming that will be happening at blueFire PulsaR.
Bouldering & Rock Climbing
Bouldering and rock climbing foster our clients’ patience, trust, problem-solving, and communication skills. At PulsaR, clients have opportunities for experiential learning—learning while doing an activity. Our staff incorporates therapeutic initiatives into every experiential learning opportunity.
In these experiential moments, clients experience patience while waiting for others to complete their climbs, communication skills while communicating with the belayer, trust while relying on others to hold the belay rope to keep them safe on the rock wall, and problem-solving skills while planning their route.
At the top of the climb, many clients realized that this was something they could complete; a task they felt was impossible. In a final group, clients discuss how what they learned in the rock climbing activity can translate to their lives outside PulsaR. Clients begin to realize they are more capable than they once thought.
They can do hard things and succeed. This amazing euphoric feeling will bolster them to try things outside of their comfort zone and outside of the program, which will help them grow even further.
White Water Rafting
White water rafting is a refreshing, exhilarating group activity and a group favorite during hot summer days. Therapeutically, rafting is a great way to foster leadership skills, team building, coordination, delegation, and unity. When on the water, everyone needs to work together to keep on the course. Clients must accept instructions or feedback from their raft guide to keep afloat and safely maneuver the rapids. Though it is a popular activity, it may be the first time many of our clients take part in river rafting.
The newness and excitement can be a source of stress and tension—not all our clients take direction well or feel comfortable overcoming unknown challenges. The exhilaration of rafting on rapids can help bring them to the present moment, away from any stress or negative emotions they have been holding onto. Thrilling sports such as white water rafting can also release endorphins that make you happier and more receptive to life. When they conquer the rapids as a team, clients deepen their peer bonds and feel empowered to overcome challenges in the future.
Hear from clients who have done hard things and succeeded.
Mountain Biking
Mountain biking allows you to explore the wilderness faster than traditional hiking. It’s an excellent opportunity to get out and have adventures while honing the skills to navigate the trails and landscape. Mountain biking requires endurance, balance, technical skills, muscle, and coordination to navigate the terrain. In return, it can alleviate stress, help you sleep, and put you in a good mood. Mountain biking is an exhilarating sport that uses every muscle group in the body, providing a strength-building workout. Regular exercise helps clients regulate their nervous systems and settle into a healthy resting state, eventually easing into mental and physical relaxation.
Keeping balanced while maneuvering the bike over rocks, logs, or around corners can be difficult, but in time mountain bikers see the trails as challenging playgrounds. Our clients face challenges in their lives, and mountain biking can act as a physical manifestation of working through and overcoming challenges, preparing them for the future through experiential learning.
Hiking
There is nothing that says summer like going out into the wilderness and camping out. The smell and crackle of a burning campfire and the sounds of chirping insects and birds is ingrained in every mind as a symbol of summer. So what are the benefits of hiking, backpacking, and camping?
They are great at getting you out of your comfort zone and bringing you to a new frame of mind. Hiking helps support our mindfulness practice, where we encourage our clients to have time to be introspective and process their emotions and thoughts. Hiking is a great form of exercise that releases endorphins in the brain, which makes people happy; happiness helps to process negative emotions or conflicting feelings because we are in a calm, even space to think logically through these issues.
Backpacking & Camping
Similar to hiking, backpacking supports mindfulness, gets us in tune with our bodies, and gives us space to process emotions. Backpacking is more involved than hiking, providing opportunities for clients to gain confidence in their outdoor skills. Our clients are taught how to plan routes to camping sites by learning how to read maps and use a compass to navigate. They are also taught meal planning, packing, and how to set up and bring down their tents and camping sites. We take our clients to beautiful wilderness areas and various national parks, making it essential to know how to leave no trace and respect the nature around them.
Camping is a great activity for bonding with peers, learning presence and self-sufficiency, meditating, and having fun crafting. Clients work together or independently to set up camp, cook meals, and then share a campfire with others who share goals, strengths, and struggles. This is a great barrier-free environment where clients can express themselves and possibly even share personal experiences that they would only usually share in group therapy situations. Something magical happens when you sit around a campfire in the middle of the wilderness.
Our location in south-central Idaho provides an expansive area to enjoy getting outside and into the great outdoors. blueFire PulsaR provides the ultimate summer experience alongside clinically-sophisticated therapeutic practices.
blueFire Wilderness and PulsaR are outdoor-based wilderness and adventure therapy programs for clients ages 11-17 and 18-28. blueFire combines clinical expertise, family, animal, wilderness, and adventure therapy in their program, providing an approach to treatment that produces long-lasting, internalized change. blueFire is licensed by the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare, is accredited by the American Experiential Education (AEE), and has professional memberships in the National Association of Therapeutic Schools and Programs (NATSAP) and Outdoor Behavioral Healthcare (OBH).