Beyond Talk Therapy:
Nature, Music & Expressive Arts Training for Clinicians
A 12 CE experiential training for mental health professionals who want practical, trauma-informed ways to integrate nature, music, rhythm, movement, and expressive arts into clinical practice.
Some clients do not find healing through words alone.
They may struggle to explain what they feel. They may be disconnected from their bodies. They may carry trauma, grief, anxiety, or emotional overwhelm that does not shift through insight alone.
Beyond Talk helps clinicians expand their therapeutic toolkit with creative, sensory, and nature-informed practices that support regulation, expression, connection, and meaning-making.
This is not about becoming an artist, musician, or outdoor expert. It is about becoming a more flexible, embodied, and creative clinician.
September 1–3, 2026 | Camp Puh’tok, Monkton, Maryland | 12 NBCC & ASWB CEs | $780
When Words Are Not Enough
Traditional talk therapy is powerful, but it can also have limits.
Clients often need more than conversation. They may need rhythm before reflection. Movement before meaning. Image before language. A natural object before a direct question. A sensory experience before a cognitive insight.
This training gives clinicians practical ways to bring nature, music, and expressive arts into therapy with clinical purpose and trauma-informed care.
Participants will explore how natural materials, sound, rhythm, movement, and creative process can enrich sessions, strengthen the therapeutic relationship, and support clients across a wide range of presenting concerns.
This Training Is Designed For
Beyond Talk is for clinicians and helping professionals who want more creative, embodied, and nature-connected ways to support healing.
It is especially relevant for:
Mental health counselors, social workers, psychologists, marriage and family therapists, and graduate-level clinicians
Therapists working with anxiety, grief, trauma, burnout, emotional shutdown, adolescents, groups, or clients who struggle with verbal expression
Nature-informed therapists who want to deepen their experiential skill set
Clinicians who want practical interventions that can be adapted for indoor, outdoor, individual, and group settings
Helping professionals who want to use creativity without losing clinical grounding
You do not need formal training in music therapy, art therapy, or outdoor leadership to benefit from this course.
What You’ll Learn
By the end of this training, participants will be able to:
Use nature-based and expressive arts interventions to support emotional regulation and therapeutic engagement
Incorporate rhythm, sound, and music-based practices in clinically appropriate ways
Use natural materials, image-making, movement, and metaphor to deepen reflection and meaning-making
Adapt creative interventions for individual therapy, group therapy, indoor settings, and outdoor settings
Apply trauma-informed principles when using experiential, sensory, and expressive methods
Identify ethical considerations, scope-of-practice boundaries, and client readiness factors
Design simple interventions clients can use for grounding, self-expression, grief work, anxiety reduction, and nervous system support
Why Nature, Music, and Expressive Arts?
Nature
Nature offers texture, pattern, metaphor, seasonality, and relationship. A leaf, stone, trail, tree, or threshold can help clients access reflection without forcing disclosure too quickly.
Music & Rhythm
Sound and rhythm can support regulation, emotional expression, connection, and group cohesion. These practices can be especially useful when clients feel stuck in overthinking or verbal shutdown.
Expressive Arts
Art-making, movement, symbol, and creative process help clients externalize what may be hard to explain. The goal is not artistic product. The goal is expression, insight, and integration.
Together, these approaches help therapy become more sensory, relational, creative, and alive.
Not Just Creative Activities. Clinical Integration.
Many trainings offer a list of activities. This training goes deeper.
You will experience the interventions yourself, reflect on how they work clinically, and learn how to adapt them for real therapy settings.
Each practice will be connected to questions such as:
What clinical goal does this support?
What client population might benefit?
When would this intervention be inappropriate?
How do we make this trauma-informed?
How can this be adapted for indoor settings, outdoor settings, groups, or individual sessions?
This training is experiential, but it is not fluffy. It is designed to help clinicians use creative methods with clarity, ethics, and purpose.
A Training That Feels Like Practice, Not a Lecture
Beyond Talk is immersive, experiential, and practical.
Expect a grounded mix of:
Nature-based experiential practices
Music, rhythm, and sound-based interventions
Expressive arts and creative process
Movement and sensory awareness
Trauma-informed clinical discussion
Application to real client scenarios
Time outdoors at Camp Puh’tok
You will not be asked to perform. You will be invited to participate at your own level of comfort, with attention to consent, accessibility, and nervous system safety.
Training Themes
The training will explore themes such as:
Grounding through sound, rhythm, and sensory attention
Nature as metaphor, mirror, and co-regulator
Expressive arts for grief, anxiety, trauma, and identity work
Using natural materials in indoor and outdoor therapy
Creative methods for clinician self-awareness and burnout prevention
Designing experiential interventions with clear clinical intent
Bringing the work back into your own practice setting
Training Details
Dates: September 1–3, 2026
Arrival: September 1, beginning at 5:00 PM
Training Days: September 2–3, 9:00 AM–5:00 PM
Location: Camp Puh’tok, Monkton, Maryland
Cost: $780 per clinician
Early Bird Discount: 10% off through July 3 with code MUSART
CE Credits: 12 NBCC credit hours and 12 ASWB general continuing education credits
Lodging: Shared cabin, camping, and gear rental options available
Scholarships: Limited need-based scholarships available
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Led by Clinicians and Educators Who Live This Work
This training brings together expertise in music therapy, expressive arts, clinical counseling, art therapy, and Nature-Informed Therapy. Participants will learn from instructors who have used creative and experiential methods in schools, hospitals, private practice, higher education, and community settings.
Peggy Tileston
MA, MT-BC, CMSII-BC, LYT, NIT
Peggy is a board-certified music therapist, educator, counselor, and Nature-Informed Therapy practitioner with decades of experience integrating music, psychodrama, creative process, yoga, meditation, trauma-informed care, and nature-based practice. Her work spans schools, residential treatment, behavioral health hospitals, higher education, cancer care, and clinician self-care.
Olivia Bankard
LGPAT
Olivia is a Licensed Graduate Professional Art Therapist with experience in group practice, intensive outpatient, and inpatient settings. Their work centers the creative process, connection, identity, and the natural world, with clinical experience supporting adolescents and adults navigating anxiety, mood disorders, OCD, ADHD, personality disorders, schizoaffective disorders, and more.
Heidi Schreiber-Pan
Ph.D., LCPC
Dr. Heidi Schreiber-Pan is the founder of the Center for Nature Informed Therapy and a leading voice in Nature-Informed Therapy. She has spent more than two decades helping clinicians understand how nature supports psychological well-being, anxiety reduction, grief work, nervous system regulation, and meaning-making. She is the author of Taming the Anxious Mind, The Outside Within, and The Ground Beneath Our Work.
Led by Clinicians and Educators Who Live This Work
This training offers 12 NBCC credit hours and 12 ASWB general continuing education credits.
Center for Nature Informed Therapy has been approved by NBCC as an Approved Continuing Education Provider, ACEP No. 7473. Programs that do not qualify for NBCC credit are clearly identified. Center for Nature Informed Therapy is solely responsible for all aspects of the programs. The Beyond Talk Training course will receive 12 NBCC credit hours.
The Center for Nature Informed Therapy is solely responsible for all aspects of the program
The Center for Nature Informed Therapy, Provider No. 2022, is approved as an ACE provider to offer social work continuing education by the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB) Approved Continuing Education (ACE) program. Regulatory boards are the final authority on courses accepted for continuing education credit. ACE provider approval period: July 9, 2025-July 9, 2028. Social workers completing this course receive 12 general continuing education credits.
Credit requirements and approvals vary per state board regulations. Please save the course outline, the certificate of completion you receive from the activity and contact your state board or organization to determine specific filing requirements
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need to be artistic or musical to attend?
No. This training is not about performance or artistic skill. It is designed for clinicians who want to use creative, sensory, nature-based, and music-informed practices in clinically appropriate ways.
Is this a music therapy or art therapy certification?
No. This training does not certify participants as music therapists or art therapists. It helps licensed and pre-licensed mental health professionals responsibly integrate selected expressive, sensory, and nature-informed interventions within their own scope of practice.
Can I use these interventions indoors?
Yes. While the training includes outdoor and nature-based experiences, many practices can be adapted for office, group room, school, hospital, community, or outdoor settings.
Is this training trauma-informed?
Yes. The training emphasizes consent, pacing, nervous system safety, client choice, grounding, and ethical adaptation. Participants will consider when expressive or experiential interventions are helpful and when they may need to be modified or avoided.
Who is this training best suited for?
This training is best suited for mental health professionals, graduate-level clinicians, social workers, counselors, psychologists, art therapists, music therapists, and helping professionals who want more embodied, creative, and nature-connected tools for clinical work.
What will I be able to use right away?
Participants will leave with practical interventions for grounding, emotional expression, metaphor work, group engagement, grief, anxiety, self-awareness, and client reflection.
Are scholarships available?
Yes. Limited need-based scholarships are available.
Bring More Life Into the Therapy Room
If you are ready to move beyond over-reliance on verbal processing and help clients access healing through the body, senses, creativity, and the natural world, this training was built for you.
Join CNIT for a hands-on, clinically grounded training in nature, music, and expressive arts.