Compass Experience Design — Personalized Nature Experiences

Welcome

Hi, I'm Benya. I've spent most of my adult life in the mountains — hiking, camping, paddling, guiding, and learning what wild places can do for people. I've learned that the most meaningful experiences outdoors aren't the ones you planned or knew what to expect. They're the ones that unfolded in the ways you unknowingly needed…and were ready for.

Your personalized nature experience will emerge from an in-depth conversation with me, where we leverage the Experience Compass framework to understand who you are, what you're seeking, and why.

Experiences

Three ways to work together.

Every experience I offer draws on the same foundation: deep listening, custom design, and skilled guiding in wild places. What changes is the context, the scale, the activities and your inner landscape.

Rites of Passage

For thresholds worth marking.

Some moments in life deserve more than a dinner out. Coming of age, milestone birthdays, major life transitions — I design experiences that honor the magnitude of the moment and help you cross the threshold with intention.

Personal Nature Immersions

Designed around you, specifically.

We start with a real conversation. I want to understand where you are in your life before I ever think about where we're going in the mountains. From there, I design a one-on-one experience that meets you exactly where you are.

Outdoor Expeditions

Small groups. Big intentions.

Adventure is better with people who share a purpose. These small-group experiences are part challenge, part play, part transformation — shaped around what the group is genuinely seeking, not a preset itinerary.

The Process

The Experience Compass

Before I design anything, I want to understand what you're actually looking for — not just the surface request, but the texture of who you are and the experience you're seeking.

I use a framework I developed called the Experience Compass. It maps eight qualities an outdoor experience can hold: Empowering, Challenging, Explorative, Playful, Embodied, Nourishing, Connective, and Spiritual. Early in our process, I'll ask you to weight these dimensions — to tell me, in a concrete way, the flavors of experience you're hoping to have and why.

That calibration becomes my design brief. It's the difference between a beautiful day outside and an experience that actually lands.

Someone loading up on Challenging and Empowering is asking for something very different than someone seeking Nourishing and Connective. The Compass makes that visible.

About

Hi, I'm Benya. I'm glad you found this.

I've spent most of my adult life in the mountains — hiking, camping, paddling, guiding, and learning what wild places can do for people. I've noticed that the most meaningful experiences outdoors aren't the ones you planned for. They're the ones you unknowingly needed, and were ready for.

My professional background is in qualitative research and experience design. I've spent years learning how to ask the right questions and listen carefully to the answers. I bring that discipline to every client I work with — before we ever set foot outside.

What I offer is the intersection of those two things: the rigor of a researcher and the presence of a guide who genuinely loves being outside. I'm not here to impress you with a summit. I'm here to design something that matters to you, and to be the kind of guide who makes it feel like spending time with a trusted friend who happens to know the terrain.

I'm based in Boulder with my family. When I'm not guiding, I'm usually immersed in new and cherished ways of playing outside.

The Scholarship Fund

This shouldn't only be for people who can afford it.

The experiences I offer are priced to reflect their depth — the hours of preparation, the custom design, the skill of the guiding. That's not something I will sell short.

But I also believe that transformative time in nature shouldn't be a luxury reserved for the affluent. Some of the people who need it most — young people navigating hard transitions, individuals who've never had access to wild places — are the ones least likely to be able to pay for it.

So here's what I do: after every experience, I invite clients who felt the value of it to contribute to a scholarship fund. No pressure, no set amount — just an honest invitation to pay it forward if the experience moved you. That fund goes toward subsidizing experiences for people who can't afford them, with a particular focus on young and marginalized people at meaningful thresholds in their lives.

If you've been on an experience with me

Thank you. If it was meaningful, consider contributing to the scholarship fund. Even a small amount creates a real opportunity for someone who couldn't otherwise afford it.

Contribute to the fund →

If you're hoping to receive a scholarship

Reach out. Tell me a little about where you are in your life and what you're hoping for. I can't promise anything, but I read every message — especially from young people at meaningful thresholds.

Send me a note →

Get in Touch

Let's start with a conversation.

Every experience begins here. Before I design anything, I want to hear about where you are — what you're navigating, what you're reaching toward, what kind of experience might actually help.