All Things Stewart Springs
Independent tribute, watchdog & blog site since 2011
Click here if long-time fan of Stewart Springs
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Rant
& in-depth scoping
What the #@%! Happened
to Stewart Springs??!!
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New 'owners' erased popular bohemian culture
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Privatized realm for own quasi new-age shtick
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Subsidizing costs by letting in select groups only - no more individual visits
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No nudes became good news
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Bathhouse tubs, stalls and sauna torn out
"Surprisingly [Stewart's] has not been bought out and turned into a high dollar 5-star resort spa. Interesting, that, because several times that has been looked at, but something seemed to intervene. Its almost like the amazing dual springs are meant to be for all the people, especially the ones drawn there for spiritual refuge and healing rejuvenation. "
-- James Tyberonn
"In the circle of life are the laws of nature. If you stay in that circle everything will be OK. Outside that circle are the laws of man. If you only follow those you are in trouble."
--Russell Beebe, of Ojibway tribe
"...[A]nyone who claims to be spiritual wouldn't take away the healing powers of nature from the public...this company is an utter sham, a terrible plague of what used to be an amazing experience...
give this land to someone who can treat it right..."
-- Tt J., Mesa, AZ Yelp review, May 2024
​
Stewart Mineral Springs has long held a special place in the hearts and minds of countless mineral-spring spa and rural retreat fans around the world. ​
Many of its most ardent former fans and supporters saw the clothing-optional ban enacted in November 2016 as the harbinger of a long string of abysmal changes that eventually would erase the very spirit of the place. It was one that, even by itself, marked such a repressive giant step back that it defied all understanding by the place's more open-minded visitors.
A year later, words couldn't begin to register the dumbfoundment over kicking out the grounds' Karuk sweatlodge, ostensibly done to gain affordable fire/liability insurance coverage, though the lodge was reportedly informed the new 'owners' had their own shaman and so no longer needed or wanted them on 'their' new grounds.
Then, upping spa devotee shock and outrage clear into the ionosphere -- after being unable to successfully switch bathhouse operation to mandatory cover-up, following the 17 year policy which had allowed a bit of (mostly) mindful low-key body freedom -- the absentee stewards gutted the bathhouse outright. They appeared intent on repurposing the entire hundred-year old structure, with its dedicated purification and healing tradition, just to suit their own private-minded, non-spa intentions...
​
...and the realm's fitful but enduring 147 year legacy of benefiting greater humanity be damned.
One might've suspected this was the intent all along, that the public's rejection of their new mandatory cover-up policy, combined with the global upheaval of COVID-19, was used only to mask their less than altruistic intentions for buying the Springs in the first place.
Later depressing developments included officially changing the place's name to Pneuma Retreat Center and disallowing individual (if by then spa-less) visits beyond reportedly super picky multi-day bookings by groups of sufficient size willing to drink their Kool-Aid.
Writer, a local former work-trade volunteer, had been psyched to create and maintain the bathhouses's cold plunge on an informal work-trade basis for 17 years. During the first two years of new ownership, a Pollyanna hope was kept alive. Surely the outrageous first misstep of banning simple nudity would prove only a de-facto breather...a chance to let the dust of the old management-indifferent clothing-optional scene settle before an enlightened, all-new management forged a more thoughtful policy that enabled a super-grounding with the elements...
...one inclusive of the place's diverse visitor base...one that would naturally attract management and staff as much or more motivated in fostering genuine service than plugging into just another gig to cover rent or mortgage.
by Stu Ward
​
Longtime Springs volunteer, suspended all support December 2017 and hasn't set foot on grounds since.
First posted late 2017, this former-insider spiel (as well as many other pages) is tweaked every now and then for continued relevancy. Remaining are a few skeletons of earlier sussing of developments and admitted former over-focus on radical body freedom; make due allowances. Writing's arbitrarily split into 11 parts.
(For similar analyses, see Home Page, New Day Dawning, Earlier Take, and towards end of Yet More Rants & Raves.)
part 1
​
Simon says, "Take three giant steps back":
Clothing-optional bites the dust, then sweatlodge,
then the time-honored spa.
The deluded thinking went that with at least a some open mindedness by the new, possibly clueless, way-y-y absentee group 'ownership' (some living thousands of miles off), once gaining a deeper understanding of the place's sterling if faded dedication to serving the public and the druthers of its once-substantial bohemian-leaning support base they would naturally reinstate clothing-optional. (That is, until learning that one 'co-owner' reportedly owned a popular mineral springs resort in Mexico, most assuredly NOT clothing-optional...'Ayy-yy carumba! No nudistas aqui, por favor!')
The realm would then happily be brought back into alignment with the time-honored tradition of every other popular rural mineral springs resort in the greater northwest U.S., all of which allow some measure of mindful radical body freedom during spa rounds in order to foster optimal purifying, healing and relaxation...often triggering profound body-mind-spirit reintegration and re-awakening of authentic self in the process. Similarly, the reported rate increase was seen as done only to absorb covering paying workers better than the two bits over minimum wage long doled out by Stewart's former, sometimes penny-pinching steward, John Foggy.
Nope. It took the further calamities of removing the gazebo's spring-house altar, slashing masseuse's and gift shop consignee's take and, coup de gras, kicking out the weekly ceremonial sweatlodge, to make the writer realize something was indeed rotten in the state of Denmark. Devastated, I broke away from the place that had been home away from home for decades, contentedly doing volunteer work service while enjoying the grounds the same as everyone else. I vowed never to set foot on its grounds again as things stood -- the same as everyone else, that legion of now-estranged devotees of the long-cherished mystical healing realm.
​
As it turned out, while management had maybe started getting better pay (more motivation to do what one's told, no questions asked), any poor schmuck holding, say, a grounds handyman position, a job requiring certain valuable skills, was reportedly still sweating away at California's minimum wage, then the poverty-level pittance of $10.50 an hour.
The first new 'ownership' in 34 years as of 1-19-2016 seemed such a slam-dunk perfect time -- a golden window of opportunity -- to forge a dramatic rebirth of the healing realm...one infused with dedicated energy bursting with fresh focus and positive, grounded perspective no longer clouded by any chronic profit-hungry preoccupation or its attendant chaotic snafus, disconnects and assorted downers...
...at last gone, a dire situation so abysmal at times it seemed the place was maybe vying for the 'Most Dysfunctional Management' award in some bizarro alternate universe.
Finally -- the last straw for many -- telling Karuk medicine man Walking Eagle to leave, ending the lodge's some 45 years of open-to-the-public weekly sweats on the indigenous ancestors' healing lands, held sacred by regional tribes for time untold.
The later tearing out of the tubs in the bathhouse was only a later, post-apocalyptic tragedy. One showing, lest any doubt whatsoever yet remained, that the new "owner'" intentions for the beloved place were heartbreaking beyond belief.
Whether one ever participated in the sweatlodge or not, its loss was incalculable. It had represented both the last cultural link to the renaissance days of 1970's progressive Goodpasture family's stewardship and the prehistoric reverent use of the medicine land.
The lodge, along with the spa operation's re-introduced clothing-optional (c/o) policy in 2000, enabled keeping and building a modicum of bedrock diversity and quasi bohemian-friendly spirit at the Springs -- despite the frequent, off-putting, profit-lusting headwinds. And, crucially, it served to continue neutralizing the horrible karma of the place created by the 1870's massacre of natives on and around their sacred medicine grounds by bigoted, narrow-minded settlers.
So what happened? Obviously, the place got sold to the wrong people.
Last owner Foggy apparently wouldn't lose any sleep over what the new deed holders might do with the place for which he'd spent 34 years as 99% absentee legal steward, alternately neglecting it and lavishing money on it to increase its ultimate sale value. That's what kept retained management, locked into such baldfaced profit jonesin' that it eclipsed ever providing any more mindful service, from even searching for a good match for a new legal guardianship: one(s) who'd be happy to fine tune the realm back to its original state as the thriving, public-dedicated healing spa retreat it's always longed to return to...an open sharing spirit being locked in its very DNA (if often having gotten buried by woefully inappropriate stewards' tenures over time).
Wanted: workers willing to work cheap
Instead, snatched up by people who are perhaps by their own lights well-meaning, but to fans little more than clueless, private-minded opportunists, the place became the horrible, jaw-dropping, slow-motion train wreck of a disaster it is now: a dismal cultural disruption felt around the world. First banning clothing-optional and reverting to a retread pre-millennium mindset rife with a depressing alienated body attitude so many came to the Springs in part to get away from. Then removing the gazebo altar of countless prayer and love offerings -- almost like tearing down a living church.
part 2
Enter Dragon Lady with Gilded Visions
& Mar​ching Orders from Former
All-Business Absentee Boss
Without going any deeper here into the historic cause and affect that made the Springs to become the way it was over time (explored in History and latter part of Yet More Rants & Raves), what happened in more recent times was the former 12-year general manager, Rowena P. -- along with operations manager husband, Ted D. -- coming aboard in 2006 with their cockeyed vision of "Refining the Culture."
It was, of course, the predictable result of relentless pressure from former San Francisco absentee 'owner' John Foggy to incessantly work to maximize profits, as they no doubt had promised to do in order to have secured the post.*
_____________________
* The co-managers once felt forced to take time out in Rowena's private office during peak season's super busyness to work through a thorny problem the writer had created: I'd encouraged a housekeeper to report not getting overtime after being made to work extra-long hours without compensation to the state labor board, as the owner had recently gotten into trouble with the board and was forced to compensate many former workers who'd filed complaints. Scared of my having suggested taking such radical action, she instead reported me to them. They concluded the stormy 20 minute session in which I almost got banished by Ted fixing me with a baleful stare and saying, "You just cost the place $300." Time is money, time is money...
________________
Again (not meaning to over-dwell on the subject, but radical body freedom was writer's crusade at the time of original posting ages ago and one can only re-write so much without going nuts), the clothing-optional policy offered visitors the chance to, if one chose, shake free of a lifetime of socially ingrained negative and/or false modesty body image. Visitors were free to be their undisguised, essential selves, as when newborns and toddlers, getting any lingering, spirit-demeaning body objectification, shame and/or exaggerated self-consciousness out of their systems and awakening to a vital reintegration of body, mind and spirit. Radical healing is what any mineral springs resort worth its salt was all about; the option to experience it nude if one chose has always been deemed a vital component for gaining the most profound benefit.
The policy, when consciously upheld by daily group energies despite little to no support from management (which instead offered mere tolerance, as it appeared great for business), fostered such a worlds more relaxed and liberated atmosphere that the place became wildly popular among everyone even the least bit open-minded.
As it turned out, the new 'owners' seemed to like the apparent old-culture destroying refinement idea just fine, thank you. Their unspoken message, once showing their true colors: 'Cover your asses, you shameless heathens.'
"Refine the culture" was her mantra, spoken with glazed eyes as she and her accomplice seemed perversely determined to turn what had long been a unpretentious and profound healing place steeped in rustic, down-home service -- a simple dedicated spa with no-frills lodging and event space -- into some improbable wannabe exclusive upscale resort...on one level at least, and perhaps predictably, not too unlike the one we have now. One that seems to embrace a shadowy Babylon world's bass-ackwards, bourgeois, control-freak mindset all dressed up in smiley face for public consumption.
Their Field of Schemes fantasyland vision was fed by money-siren whisperings of "If you ban it, they will come" -- it being the place's former bohemian-leaning, free-spirited, sometimes even holy stoned, culture. An operation with an at least tenuously abiding embrace of lifestyle diversity and universal spirit, including weekly Native American sweat lodge, medicine card readings -- and mindful nudity in suitably unsuitable areas of the bathhouse, sundeck and creek area.
Lao Tse once said the cause of anything is everything and the cause of everything is anything.
It perhaps came as no great surprise, as she herself had brokered the sales deal, reportedly for a 10% cut, or over a quarter-million dollars. Some might view this as the ultimate sell-out: handing over the once de facto if tenuous public-dedicated spa and spiritual retreat to the first buyer coming up the hill with a shitload of money. Ones with, it turned out, initially well-hidden intentions at mindboggling odds with the public-friendly, spa-focused tradition of the institution... a place, again, with an open-sharing spirit hiding just below the surface, clamoring to re-emerge.
Writer later heard an inside rumor that the operation's reported revenue figure had been exaggerated during the protracted sales negotiations and the legal transfer. If true, perhaps such a ploy was felt needed to cinch the most lucrative deal possible with the eager but -- due to Foggy's reportedly not being more forthcoming in sharing the books -- largely uninformed buyers.
It might explain why the vibe of new stewardship at times seemed so sour and put out, as if they had buyer remorse, realizing their coveting of the place had perhaps stymied exercising better due diligence and they were left trying making the best of a bad deal.
When banning clothing-optional predictably went over like a lead balloon, causing visitor volume to evaporate overnight, their thinking, once coming to terms with having suddenly lost most of the visitor base, might've gone something along the lines of, "Well, good, we didn't want to run any damn hippie spa anyhow. Now we'll be justified, especially with COVID, to end bathhouse service altogether and recycle the building into something more to our own liking. We own it now and can do whatever we damn well please; people might not like it but, hey, whose property is it, anyhow?"
In any event, que lastima.
How did the protracted negotiations go? No idea. Maybe the former manager did a big song and dance about the lucrative untapped potential of place, possibly-inflated figures and all -- "The upside potential's enormous!" -- then took the money and ran. Possibly she railed how "Everyone hates clothing-optional except for a few low-spending, kinky locals; it's killing business, I tell ya..."
Maybe she didn't have to say anything, the place selling itself.
Believe it or not, Mathew Engelhart, founder of Cafe Gratitude, a small, popular California vegan restaurant chain, was initially one of the new co-owners. Many thought this a promising sign indeed... that the place would at long last experience a grand turnaround in consciousness and renewed dedication to offering the public a genuine healing spa and simple lodgings. But he soon sold his interest. One perhaps doesn't have to wonder too much why in light of the sorrowful developments that unfolded after he bailed.
Rumors plentiful
Rumors abounded as to what exactly they were up to.
One was that they were determined to ratchet up a bigger spending, ostensibly more respectable (i.e., unabashedly bourgeois), visitorship, including Pneuma-interested therapists and practicing psychologists
Maui's little beach
irregulars>
who could afford Pneuma's pricey two-year course programs to gain credentials to integrate its transpersonal psychology approach into their cushy therapy practice and/or teach others how to better tap into the lucrative high end of the healing field.
​
(See a 2013 academic article questioning the transpersonal psychology branch's effectiveness; also the 2015 book, "Revamping Psychology: A Critical Review of Transpersonal Psychology",
reviewed on Amazon)
Seemingly towards that end, for a while they appeared busy incubating a wannabe tony resort. Former regulars had earlier witnessed the bathhouse's two new fancy tiled tub rooms, replete with shiny, ostentatiously elaborate faucet fixtures. (They were so blindingly shiny, they reminded the writer of a Marine Corps honor guard's steel helmet.) That they were renovated at a snail's pace, kept offline for over half a year, was maybe a strong indication of how disconnected the new owners were from the idea of keeping the spa chugging along as a place dedicated to serving the great unwashed masses with a public-minded spirit for, at best, modest profit. Early on the bathhouse, no longer referred to as such, briefly became "The Wellness Center." And the humble A-frame house? Upgraded to "The Chalet."
In the immortal words of Annie Hall, "Well, la-de-dah."
Another rumor: that they were only homogenizing the place by erasing the undesired countercultural imprint -- sweat lodge, clothing-optional, gazebo's love altar and all -- in hopes of attracting more everyday, less discerning, travelling mainstream visitors. Those who'd buy a watered-down spa experience and relatively cheap out-of-town lodgings en masse, who'd better reflect their own conventional mindset. (And yet, hearty souls, wouldn't mind if in cold weather the heating in lodgings might be sketchy. That, or they'd be left feeling too numb to even think of demanding a refund the next morning in the office -- assuming the office was even open -- before having to leave.)
Unwitting enablers early on had included several longtime annual workshop retreat event organizers. It seemed perhaps they loved the place more for being their own money generator, disregarding the owners' obvious, shocking intentions. It struck some that they appeared either indifferent to or perhaps in denial of how restrictive and oppressive the operation's seismic shift had become to the place's legion fans, the very ones who'd driven its level of operation through the roof in recent decades.
Similarly, some visitors were so hooked on the place, they seemed willing to endure the squirrelly new regime IF it meant getting another long-accustomed mineral soak, sauna fix and (now textile-compromised) sun bath and river dip. They were determined not to let such things keep them from spending more time with a dear old friend now in such dire straits. With a cynical, "Sure it sucks, but what can you do? -- management NEVER gets it right" attitude, they suffered the new slings and arrows. Or, again, went into denial, driving from mind the fact that through their continued patronage -- even if dropping coin there just once a year -- they were effectively helping the private-minded occupational forces tighten their stranglehold over the once uber-public-friendly healing realm.
Either way, time revealed their overarching intent -- if not all along, then in midstream after droves of fans long accustomed to body freedom rejected mandatory cover-up -- was to upend the entire place's 145-year, genuine-spa dedication simply to accommodate their own shtick: first and foremost, serving as world headquarters, retreat and teaching and indoctrination center for their Pneuma Institute - a peculiar seeming amalgam of conventional Judaeo-Christian mindsets and transpersonal psychology, with strong focus on mindful breath as a psycho-therapeutic aid, mixed in with the abiding interests of other co-owners, Central and South American shamanism.
Many wondered how long everyday people might still be welcome at the place such as it was, especially when in 2020 the bathhouse's century-old spa service tradition vanished into thin air...
...which brought up yet another dismal rumor: that some long-range plan was afoot to close the gates to the public outright. Maybe only after years of suffering them to help finance the changes -- and perhaps give people time to get so disenchanted with the place that they'd no longer cared what the hell they did with it.
In this scenario (which, alas, as of late 2023, has essentially come to pass), obviously no one would even have a chance to try still enjoying the place, let alone be able to gripe about it. It's essentially become exclusively for private use only by the 'owners' to enjoy, hold their Pneuma workshop courses, retreats and intensives in, and host related international social gatherings, workshop classes, intensives, maybe embark on one of their oft-rumored ayahuasca ceremonial journeys (while at the same time reportedly condemning cannabis use)...
...maybe, again, allowing in a few select outside workshops, whose participants can stomach, possibly even embrace, the rock-ribbed, buttoned-down regime, to help cover insurance, management, utilities -- and the place's new, sky-high annual county property taxes.
Based at roughly 1% of the 2016 sale price ($US 2.6 million), it's now about $28,000 a year.
That's over $500 a week, or $77. every day of the year. Like having to feed the parking meter thirteen quarters an hour around the clock to keep the county from towing the place away for tax default (again, as first happened in the early '80s, when Foggy snagged it). history
It's no wonder they reportedly filed for bankruptcy protection early on from creditors, if true employing the age-old corporate trick of setting up a separate legal offshoot entity, whose debts the mother corporation can't be held legally liable for and its deep pockets ever tapped to make things right.
It turns out that a nonprofit like Pneuma is allowed to own a for-profit business under California law and then pay regular taxes on it (or run at a loss). Perhaps they had no real incentive to work the place any more, taking a tax write-off somehow by legally juggling against some more profitable operation of one or more of the 'owners', or Pneuma footing the bill (or, again, declaring bankruptcy for the offshoot to shake off creditors), thereby enabling the luxury of remaking the place into their own essentially private scene with little to no concern of ever making their nut as does any regular sink-or-swim for-profit business operation or on-the-ball nonprofit.
Regardless, in every scenario the remedial first step was obviously to purge place of the riff-raff; exterminate the freaky infestation of bohemian-minded and countercultural-friendly who leaned toward freedom-loving, status-quo scoffing, alternative lifestyle ways...essentially anyone who liked to skinnydip, sunbathe nude and sauna in the buff. Or was at least open-minded enough to give them a try in the appropriate and supportive rural atmosphere Stewart Springs so richly provided.
Such unacceptably unconventional ways (yet for countless, sensible and holistic) of rejecting anything over-structured, unduly profit-minded and/or life-affirmation challenged were deemed strange, distasteful, offensive, even dangerous, for the shocking refusal to worship Mammon and pay obeisance to the arbitrary authority and tightly-organized sensibilities of the ambitiously over-wound and control-minded...along with would-be gullible, well-healed patrons, willing to buy into the crock narrative of being nobly dedicated to spiritual uplifting and planetary healing.
So it became almost a no-brainer to scrap the popular longstanding clothing-optional policy, get rid of the springhouse gazebo's prayer altar, end the longstanding weekly First Nations sacred sweatlodge ceremony...
...plus -- before it became blindingly obvious the public wasn't buying their new 'respectable' bathhouse operation and so shut down spa operation permanently -- before that sad day having chipped away at the longtime Locals Day deal so as to render the price break meaningless; raised rates in general twice; and upped the takes on massages and consigned gift shop items. (Again, bear in mind their umbrella outfit's a nonprofit. How's that for irony? It proves intent is always the bottom line, not profit or nonprofit status alone.)
The invisible 'co-owners' appeared maddeningly indifferent to how such monumentally egregious changes would systematically erase a rich culture lovingly built, nurtured and supported for decades by legions of nature-friendly Springs devotees and rural spa enthusiasts around the world.
Getting rid of the place's former quasi bohemian, spiritually diverse, egalitarian vibe had, again, become the first order of business. Adding further insult to injury, workers -- those who didn't quit in shock and loathing the second day out -- trying to endure the new oppressive regime to put food on the table (or who never really got the place) -- no longer received a free monthly mineral bath, the thoughtful perk that was offered for decades, a reward for dedicated efforts that kept workers in sync with the spa refuge's time-honored reason for being -- and otherwise not affordable for most at the previous, near-starvation wages.
For, as said, it was the former fans -- those who fully resonated with genuine mineral spring spas -- who had largely funded the place's upgrades by their enthusiastic repeat visits over the decades and turning friends and relations onto it. It reported a robust annual quarter-million dollar revenue towards the end of the old 'ownership' (again, assuming this figure wasn't just a calculated exaggeration bandied about to goose a higher sale price).
Business is business
But hey, business is business. It's our baby now and we'll do whatever we damn well please with it, so nyaah; possession's nine-tenths of the law, ya know. And, maybe, under their breath: And the sooner we turn all you yahoos off to it, the sooner we can quit having to suffer your tiresome howls of protest, gritting our teeth trying to make nice just to keep a few paltry dollars rolling in before we finally pull the plug. Then we can enjoy it all for ourselves, heh-heh, hah-hah, hee-hee, ho-ho! And maybe, if we get tired of it sometime down the road, we'll just sell it to the highest bidder and make a killing, How 'bout that? 'Public good'?...gimme a break...
part 3
Bohemian lifestyle
became suspect overnight
If the rumor of plans to slam the gates shut to the public is true (rather than the current effective 99.99 % exclusion rate), then at first blush it appears fans are royally screwed.
That is, if 'owners' actually think they can close such a priceless public treasure and still enjoy it with even one nano-particle of spiritual integrity or peace of mind in light of the righteous condemnation of a global community for trying to bogart a realm that had been more dedicated than not to serving the well being of a greater humanity for some 147 years.
​
Again, it's possible their overarching reason for buying the place (or what it later boiled down to after driving the long-established spa operation into the ground) was indeed to serve primarily as a long-term realty investment. Are they even now just toying with using it a while, before sometime down the road selling it at an ungodly profit to the highest bidder, indifferent to what they might intend to do with the place?
A Japanese-American acquaintance once told the writer he was stunned that such a great natural treasure as Stewart Springs wasn't a protected public spa, as is sometimes the case in his old homeland with its own historic developed rural mineral springs. Others had assumed the place actually was some sort of public trust; it just had that kind of vibe: A place that existed to serve the well being of humanity.
part 4
Envisioning a
perfect future stewardship
Any cynic suspecting this was what was happening might've grumbled, "Well, why not just shut the damn gates now and be done with it?" The fact they haven't (at least absolutely, last known) provides some hope it isn't true, one supposes...that the extent of the closely-guarded intent (or playing it by ear effort) is only to try upscaling and/or sterilizing the place, just now without its time-honored spa, and seemingly only to suit their own groups and related clientele seeking training-wheel level enlightenment and to have their own place to trip on ayahuwasca.
...that is, unless they want to keep halfheartedly milking a few select, unwitting groups who think everything is hunky-dory, until one day, tired of trying to make nice with people increasingly realizing how indifferent they appear to serving the public, the imposing front fortress gates indeed swing shut and clueless trekkers are greeted by signs growling:
Private Property - Keep Out - Violators Prosecuted
No Peak Experiences for You
Parapets Manned 24/7
Transcend Yur Sorry Naked Butts Elsewhere
​
And maybe even, if they eventually decide to move on and flip the place:
Auction next Tuesday
For Sale to Highest Bidder
(above our secret reserve minimum, of course)
Assuming the last rumor isn't their actual ultimate goal (and maybe even if it is, if they indeed actually ever agreed on one; group ownership can make for conflicting intents and interests that hamstring any clear course of action)...if everyone who has ever loved the place steps up a positive focus on the place, holding its time-honored energy and visualizing a future stewardship redeeming the scene, one having the means and intent to do so, be it an individual benefactor, group of philanthropists or an existing nonprofit -- THEN the current 'owners' might never generate a critical level of patronage...or, if indeed having pockets deep enough to just slam the gates to the public and not be bothered, manage to have one iota of peace of mind in trying to enjoy the Shangri-la that was so callously legally stole away from the public.
Instead (here giving them credit for having a social conscience), they'd rightly feel like doo-doo. This -- on top of their coveting the place having blinded any better judgement -- their socially destructive changes hampering the overall ability of the outfit to actually help people feel better and in closer communion with the planetary oversoul, such global consciousness-raising -- ahem -- claiming to be the overarching mission of the Institute.
They will have come to their senses and redeemed a now-tattered honor by transferring the grounds to appropriate stewards...at a fair price.
In photo: former zenned-out mandala pattern of bathhouse floors, including sauna. Old boards were torn out around 2012 due to longstanding moisture rot. Management and/or owner were unwilling to take the time, expense and effort to replicate the longtime meditation-friendly touch that had helped make the place exceptional. (Legend has it that it was
fashioned a Black carpenter.)
They'd realize the current widespread public condemnation -- reflecting the mountain of squirrelly karma their diverted scene has created since soon after the legal transfer in early 2016 -- has been neutralizing the effect any good works the outfit might ever hope to achieve.
Former devotees, no longer feeling welcome, stayed away in droves long before they ever scrapped spa service outright. Annual workshop and performance events that had gone on forever there (notably Zavada's and DeLong's) soon faded into oblivion. Would-be participants and event bookers realized they'd been unwittingly drinking the Kool-aid, supporting a staggeringly egregiously Ill-advised diversion of the place's spa and lodging dedication, by remaining dependent on it. They'd at first perhaps been in denial of how the operation's former, often-relaxed atmosphere, flowing like the creek running through it, had been so unceremoniously pushed off a cliff.
Whether or not the current 'owners' ever come around on their own, realizing they'made a monumentally wong-headed miscalculation (here assuming they didn't buy the place primarily as a realty investment), energetic forces, especially leavened with positive visualization and the spirit of forgiveness, could hasten the day the universe convinces them it'd be the best thing to move on and let new, appropriate stewards resurrect the operation that can further the 78-year Henry Stewart family legacy and that of a select few following them.
One under energized, service-dedicated stewards, who find more reward in genuine service than trying to get rich off the place or bogart it to do their own thing. A fresh stream of mindful visitors building up a thriving scene again serving the public. An oasis for any seeking healing nature's way while attuning to the land's rare vortex properties.
A weary world might then again begin to breathe a little easier.
Even current and would-be followers and supporters of Pneuma and adjunct group-ownership outfits and causes might sour once connecting the dots. They'd realize how its bureaucratic mucky-mucks had essentially waged cultural genocide -- what more than one stunned fan called a crime against humanity.
They'd be shocked to learn how the general public -- notable among them the myriad nature friendly seeking out what had been one of the few genuine rural healing mineral-water spas left -- were so mindlessly thrown out in the cold...how the former nature-attuned lifestyle of thousands has been suffering frostbite ever since, their long accustomed natural body-mind-spirit health regimen derailed, just so a few private-minded people with enough dollars could toy with enjoying it privately while pursuing half-baked fantasies, hawking remedial new age classes, maybe anticipating making a killing by selling the 'property' sometime down the road.
Part 5
Redeeming a frayed honor
Barring some miraculous change of heart, the current property holders could -- saving grace -- work to neutralize their gnarly karma (assuming here, again, they're mindful enough to realize they have it) by selling the property at a fair price to one(s) who would restore its legacy, ideally transforming the realm into a legal nonprofit healing and retreat center in order to make the place affordable and protect it from any further such derailings. Stewards who would engage the global community that treasures the realm to plug into it with their diverse and plentiful gifts, talents and resources. Current holders might even take a bit of financial loss by way of penance for all the destroyed goodwill they created, or at the very LEAST, sell it at cost, adjusting for inflation and allowing for the outlay of any upgrades and repairs -- minus the estimated cost to replace all the historic bathhouse tubs they sold off and to restore the bathhouse's spa plumbing, tub stalls and sauna and any other disruption to the grounds' mineral-water plumbing system.
The international outfit, its headquarters relocating to a place unhindered by the mountain of bad vibes of their own making, free at last from the consequences of having pursued such an egregiously unwise course for so long, might thereby regain a healthy measure of their now-mortgaged integrity and credibility...and ultimately gain something of an offhand POSITIVE role in the realm's age-old healing legacy while at the same time strengthen the potential effectiveness of their transpersonal psychology schtick. (And, of course, be free to still enjoy the place, along with everybody else -- perhaps even learn to embrace their apparently suppressed inner bohemian, or at least learn no longer mind so much if others do.)
If the third rumor -- eventual privatization, regardless -- is indeed the case, they will soon realize, if they haven't already, that such action is NOT doable in the real world...
...that is, not without mindbogglingly self-defeating consequences which an apparent state of denial has maybe been keeping them from realizing is happening, holding that material wealth and controlling power trumps any genuine spiritual healing focus...even as they toy with mustering it into the often dismal, super-structured field of psychotherapy.
Again, assuming that they DO have enough awareness, the global wrath and disdain of their actions will guarantee their inability to ever enjoy the legally stolen place with any true and abiding peace of mind. It will leave them feeling like shallow-water pretenders, having zero credibility for trying to push a focus supposedly dedicated to increasing spiritual awareness and heart awakening at the exorbitant cost of destroying the spirit-attuned atmosphere and spa services legions of fans and supporters and (mostly) dedicated stewards have fitfully built up over the course of 145 years...
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...one that echoed the indigenous pre-history cooperative use of the extraordinary realm
for healing all Earth's children seeking its purifying and transforming properties.
Stolen paradise is hell
A foundation built on the sandy grave of a destroyed popular culture cannot support anything without stinking to high heaven.
If indeed they bought the place only to mold it to double as their headquarters and have a specialized semi-private retreat and teaching center -- one maybe subsidized a tad by the general public, maybe not, and had zero interest in ever running a spa beyond on the attempted and rejected superficial level -- then they've a monumental reality check in store. At some point they'll realize that, for their own sake, they need to relocate and turn over the place to one(s) willing to honor and restore the realm to again serve the people.
Ones who will recognize that it as a blessing and gift to be shared with all humanity and once again enable people to follow their path towards greater being while harmonizing with the land's transformative healing properties and helping each other along the way.
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Or, barring their having the requisite social conscience and spiritual awareness to reach such an obvious mindful realization, the universe could still cause them -- for totally unrelated reasons, like the place becoming too much a luxury in not paying for itself -- to want to abandon occupation of the property and relocate, selling to the first party making a reasonable offer...and fans pray it's the right one.
That's why it's crucial fans visualize and search for an appropriate benefactor, potentially lined up and ready to step in when and if that moment comes.
Holding one's breath
The former, surviving co-manager, Rowena P., finally stepped down in late November 2017 after two interminable years of surreally remote management post-sale from hundreds of miles away, during which time an un-empowered on-grounds staff rubber-stamped changes mandated through her from even more distant 'owners'...most living THOUSANDS of miles away.
First remote owners, then remote managers. Both out of sync with the place's once dedicated if long fading tradition. No great surprise then that such a lamentable situation eventually made for remote visitors (that is, NO visitors).
It's hard imagining the writer had been alone in the hope that with stewardship change might've at long last come a new, progressive-minded management...one bringing a generous infusion of the grounded, aware focus cultivated by every other popular rural spring resort in the wider region of the northwest United States worth its salt.
Surely we'd hit bottom and the only way was up.
Nope. Nowhere near the bottom. Writer, perhaps among a few others, was an Egyptian fish living in denial, refusing to even consider the possibility that the new 'stewards' had zero intention of ever returning the place to its former glory or even the remotest facsimile thereof.
Or consider that maybe they were only jonesin' to strip it down and build it back to suit their own private interests, while now and then subsidizing costs by renting out the grounds' remaining, now spa-less, facilities to a few uninformed or indifferent groups...or not.
...making for an egregiously misguided use, utterly disconnected from the historic roots of the realm. One that served for most of its years as a genuinely service-dedicated, nonprofit-in-spirit, purifying, healing and rejuvenating retreat open to the greater public for the whole bloomin' world to enjoy and benefit by...
One-percent wannabees
believing end justified means
The last, longtime general manager set a sterling example of such desired refinement...not. On days she was in the front office -- before being advised that she, er, perhaps wasn't the most gracious welcomer -- then, depending on mood, unless in a rare mellow one, she'd offer either stony indifference, her best forever-put-upon, how-dare-you-invade-my space-and-make-me-have-to-deal-with-you scowl; or, if REALLY pissed, unleash her patented fire dragon outburst, in the twinkling of an eye biting off the head of the latest unsuspecting arrival for no apparent reason whatsoever.
...a place untold thousands have long cherished as one of nature's extraordinarily special, mystical healing realms, nestled near a magical mountain.
Her late co-managing, slowly dying husband, Ted -- whose dire condition was no doubt largely the cause of such rude meltdowns -- in turn would display a frosty, all-business cordiality, while still on his feet...as if perhaps practicing for serving a richer clientele. He'd almost grudgingly (but quickly, nonetheless) take one's money, as if resenting having to wait on such low-brow traffic when he'd rather be sucking up to refined big spenders and having their money-to-burn lifestyle rub off on him...
...or at least have more time alone to cope with his terminal illness, feeling put out for having to deal with a demanding public but being semi-resigned to suffering it as the price to pay for having ready access to the purifying waters that could, if not reverse, at least postpone catastrophic liver failure.
Living sacrifice?
A formerly little known fact: at the beginning of the tenure, his partner sought the purchase of a chicken down the road; she wanted to make a living sacrifice in hopes of auguring greater success and prosperity for the operation now under their management. Sounds a tad self-defeating, no? Violently taking a life as a means of helping an operation ostensibly dedicated to healing and perpetuating life? It didn't compute.
Even allowing for the sometimes pronounced wayward inclinations of the old regime in recent decades, under the present regime things have gotten ten-fold more out of whack...to the point that, when still offering the spa, long-time devoted fans drove down the hill stunned, shocked, utterly devastated at the dismal sea change, as if wanting to wake up from a bad dream, in jaw-dropping disbelief that such a long cherished healing place could be so willfully destroyed by anyone for any reason.
Bland leading the bland
Of course, constantly working with a teeming public as Ted and Rowena did could be a bear even under the best of circumstances. But with a right-intentioned stewardship at the helm, rather than any chaotically wiping-out, spilling blood out the gate for luck and ratcheting up a graceless siege mentality, one learned to surf the energy waves...not trying to control or resist them, embracing even monster waves by working in a can-do team spirit and keeping things flowing with minimal snafus. Oregon's Breitenbush Springs among others has proven that a positive, practical, dedicated, nonprofit business approach works wonders in running a successful mineral springs resort beloved by the public.
Such basic hospitality-biz 101 was ignored beyond the superficial level, in seeming indifference to and/or abject ignorance of the place's former glory as a service-loving, charitable-minded rejuvenation retreat dedicated to serving long-suffering humanity.
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There was no longer as much there there.
Not much hope for transcendent experiences in that...except perhaps by spirit-awakening newbies; general public students with money to burn, wowed by the grounds and appreciating Pneuma's seemingly super-structured, over-intellectualized, material world approach to try understanding the human mind and heart; and perhaps by practicing professional therapists drowning in over-analytical, negative-dwelling methodology, often becoming chronically depressed themselves in the process and desperate to incorporate some more positive approach into their cushy practice (the median pay bringing in between $212,000 and $317,000 a year in the U.S. in 2024).
A recent study revealed 40% of long-term psychotherapy cases didn't improve the patient's condition and sometimes actually worsened it.
Part 6
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Outlawing baringmade the place unbearable
While banning c/o under the timeworn reasoning of wanting to make the place "family-friendly", to countless its overarching intent instead seemed to be wanting to make the place bourgeois-friendly -- to the point the more impressionable and cynical-minded might've started viewing it as some kind of peoples'-culture alienated clip-joint for people with more dollars than sense, a lost-in-space, keep the riff-raff out, man the parapets, highfallutin' hideaway for haughty hosers of the humble, high-minded hordes...
..that, or some similarly profit-focused operation catering to the undiscriminating masses...non-connoisseurs of genuine healing mineral springs and spa culture, those happy to dabble with something different and trendy in a nice setting and are okay with threadbare, under-heated lodgings and body-repressive c/o ban and the scrapping of a 145-year-old spa tradition; clueless and energetically disconnected...zipping in, dropping lucre, and herded out in one fell swoop. (Before the bathhouse closure, it was, "Sorry, it'll cost extra to sauna now because it's after check-out time...well, we don't CARE what other places allow...")
...or actually intent on swinging the gates shut, perhaps following suit of the Saint Germain compound on the northern outskirts of Dunsmuir, for ages also open to the general public as similarly historic Shasta Springs, now strictly a private-use, walled-off, gated compound except for a token one day a year, last known.
Writer would love to be proven wrong but developments aren't assuring. There appears no way they can redeem themselves now, short of becoming aware of how self-defeating their actions are on the karmic level...and, chastened, re-locate and salvage credibility by finding the right person(s) to sell it to and at a fair price. (That or, again, if remaining cluelessly unrepentant, for some other reason feel pulled to sell and fans having visualized an suitable new legal steward ready to snap it up.)
The right person(s) would be a philanthropic person or existing nonprofit with a positive, can-do mindset. Parties would be psyched at the idea of once again sharing the blessings of the land for the greater good -- and on a new level, setting it up a nonprofit 501(c)(3) public benefit charity (enabling a WORLDS lower operating cost), dedicated to serving as an affordable, down-to-earth purification, healing and rejuvenation retreat open to all, thus at LONG last resurrecting the realm's former glory.
Any so-inclined Springs devotees might bestir themselves and tap possible connections to work in manifesting such future stewards. Maybe study the procedures of how other places, like Harbin and Breitenbush have successfully turned mineral springs resorts into popular nonprofit healing retreats. Learn how they built the legal frameworks to satisfy the regulatory powers that be (most importantly the IRS) and eliminated the prohibitive property-tax bite that for-profit enterprises must forever keep forking over (current holders are shelling out some $26,000 a year), keeping their managements scrambling to increase revenue to prevent falling behind the eight ball, making visits outrageously expensive and thus far less relaxing and healing.
Are you one with the financial means and interest in possibly manifesting the vision? Or do you know of someone with an embarrassment of riches who might leap at the chance to resurrect the realm as a good-karma deed, allowing for there currently being no practical organized effort being made by its former fans? It's beyond this recluse writer's ability, but maybe not yours or that of someone you know. It's magnitudes easier to convince someone to cut a generous check for an already established nonprofit organization, so any so inclined might be inspired to work on building an organized social media campaign and mobilizing the existing global fan base.
In any event, the more people visualize its resurrection, the more critical momentum is generated to make it happen: a progressive-minded benefactor ready to jump when and if the current occupiers decide to at last throw in the towel.
Glory days
of the Springs
On the community level of having plenty of there there -- the place being a veritable cornucopia for personal transformation -- the Springs devolved from when, in the 1970's, the Goodpasture family stewards lived right on the grounds, serving as engaging, down-home hosts. Now it's one in which no one besides an opaque management and a possibly nondisclosure-signing staff even knows who the new, 'stewarding-by-remote' owners' are (or maybe even care; a job's a job).
There was zero outreach to the former myriad faithful. What could they have said at that point, anyway? Their one brief site statement, essentially saying "We're sorry we changed the Springs you knew and loved, but hope you can still enjoy it" rang a bit hollow.
Unlike some regional sister springs, transparent in operation and upfront in communication with both staff and visitors, the decades of nontransparent 'owner' vibes at Stewarts had long set it apart in a bad way. The former opaque, locked-down Batmobile management under the old 'owner' continued its un-merry way, new 'owners' invisibler than a cloaked Klingon warship ready to strike, keeping everyone in the dark except those who needed to know...
...and obviously those who loved the Springs the most didn't need to know diddly squat.
Not until after four years, on May 1, 2020, was there even one peep of direct, relevant communication offered the legion of once-faithful visitors through a news release or their website or (as far as known) even posting in the office, beyond the upcoming nudity ban notice of almost microscopic print slapped on the sundeck door's window. Only after two years did they announce their intent to make over the place as Pneuma's world headquarters and retreat center...on their own site...and then had the gall to start referring to Stewart's as Pneuma Retreat Center. (And then penned a website notice, dripping with crocodile tears, of the 'painful' decision to permanently end spa service.)
It struck the writer as something akin to the executioner empathizing with the condemned's right to live just before whacking his head off. As if they knew they were in the grip of something so incontrovertibly wrongheaded, so dumfoundingly nutzoid, so egregiously misguided, that it defied all reason...yet, being financially and professionally committed and locked into a scientific discipline that traditionally doesn't acknowledge the existence of anything that can't be quantified -- like spirit -- they proceeded with grim resolve. The love of the idea of headquartering their own private, lucrative shtick amid such a sumptuous, secluded nature setting obviously eclipsed any love for the great unwashed masses or the 147 year-old tradition of (mostly) serving the well being of a wider public.
The wizard was well hidden behind the curtain...had the gold and made the rules...issued thunderous God-like pronouncements of new oppressive policies suiting private-minded schemes and dreams.
Such public-minded natural wellness institutions are needed now more than ever by both regional residents and myriad mindful travelers seeking respite from the rigors of the road -- those often feeling discombobulated by the intense urban/suburban/rural realities and the still-dominant, oppressive energies yet troubling this fair planet -- all seeking the sweet relief such places can offer.
And, crucially, one in which there is a constant need to continue erasing the karma of the horrific massacre that occurred on and around land in 1870's (history) --that's obviously when things first went wrong for the place -- by keeping focused on genuine healing service rather than bent on exploiting nature's gifts for gain and/or the grounds being diverted for mostly private use and enjoyment.
No doubt they felt they'd earned the right after shelling out $2.6 million. But time and public response in the fullness of time could prove such a material world assumption a big error.
With most any other business, sure. But not such a historic sacred healing ground with a generations-old, dedicated tradition of serving the public as a non-profit-in-spirit, peaceful purifying and rejuvenating retreat, locked into a time-honored mission of affordably sharing its healing waters and mystical land with all who seek its medicine.
While the price increases to visitors and decreased take for gift-shop consignees and contracted masseuse staff would've conceivably been understandable, maybe even acceptable, IF it had gone to cover more decent work wages for all, that wasn't the case.
At some point it became painfully obvious they were only scrambling to try mitigating the not inconsiderable financial investment they'd taken on heedless of how price increases hurt visitors' pocketbooks. It was terminally dispiriting, putting an even deeper pall over the place. For while there was a bigger staff -- some in management roles getting decent pay, in effect bribed to enact and enforce the oppressive changes -- others, as said, still toiled at slave wages.
Former faithful visitors vanished in droves. Not exactly the best formula for success or proper focus to continue serving the greater good. Better to still have the former exploited skeleton staff working for peanuts because they loved the place and turning others onto it more than any better-paid but clueless workers even further crimping the ability of the healing energies of the land to be openly shared with the public.
All who have treasured the realm and the growth-minded culture it's evolved in recent times now play Toto, pulling back the curtain and revealing the misguided attempt to detour the place from its longtime de facto public trust tradition (see History) while visualizing a future perfect steward with the means and heart to rescue the realm to once again serve the public after fans merrily mobilize to help make it happen.
Otherwise, if one gives up on it like it's gone forever and ignores their own inner higher power to effect transformation through collective grounded visualization, it could be gone forever. The 'owners' might, despite themselves, actually establish some permanent invasive beachhead and forever hold the one-time people's retreat hostage, or tire of the place at some point and sell it at an obscene profit to another, perhaps even more clueless, party.
Do enough people who have so long cherished the realm find such a fate unacceptable?
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An Independent Stewart Springs watchdog, tribute & blog site since 2011