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School of Simple Living · Community Apprenticeship

Learn by living it, not just studying it.

The Community Apprenticeship is a defined season of immersive learning — working, living, and reflecting alongside the School of Simple Living community. Not a course. Not a retreat. An apprenticeship in the full sense: learning through doing, in real conditions, with real accountability.

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Thriving vegetable garden — growing food at School of Simple Living

What an apprenticeship includes

Living in the community context

The apprenticeship is not virtual. It involves being present in the context — on the farm, at events, in the daily rhythms of simple living. Theory is tested immediately against reality.

Working contribution

Apprentices contribute real work — in the garden, at events, on the olive harvest, in administrative and organisational tasks. The contribution is part of the learning, not separate from it.

Direct mentorship

Weekly structured sessions with Bharat and the School of Simple Living team. Direct access to the thinking, practice, and ongoing questions of the school — not a recorded library, but a living conversation.

Personal simple living project

Each apprentice develops and implements a personal simple living project during the season — something real, measurable, and in service of their own dharma and the community.

Who the apprenticeship is for

The Community Apprenticeship is a rare opportunity. Places are very limited — typically one to three apprentices per season. It is for people who are serious about simple living as a vocation, not just a philosophy, and who are ready to serve as well as learn.

An apprenticeship is not a holiday, a retreat, or a way to receive teaching while remaining comfortable. It is hard, revealing, and transformative — in the way that only real conditions and real work can be.

  • People who have completed SLHT and want to go deeper
  • Those considering a life centred on simple living, community, or education
  • Younger adults in a formative season who want a real alternative to institutional education
  • Practitioners and teachers who want to rebuild from first principles

Apprenticeships run for one season (3 months). Applications open quarterly. A preliminary conversation is required for all applicants.

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A word about this path

"Most of us have learned only through being told. An apprenticeship teaches through the experience of doing — which is an entirely different kind of knowledge. The body learns. The character learns. And what is learned this way does not leave." — Bharat Berwing

The Community Apprenticeship is the closest School of Simple Living comes to the traditional guru-disciple relationship — not in any mystical sense, but in the practical sense of extended, embodied transmission through shared life and work.