Courses
Contemplative courses offered by me are deeply informed by the work of Robert Sardello and Cheryl Sanders-Sardello, co-founders of the School of Spiritual Psychology. Founded in 1992, the School of Spiritual Psychology seeks to dissolve the divisions between ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ life by developing capacities of soul, spirit, and heart in individuals for the sake of the Earth, her creatures, and the world. If you are interested in learning more about the remarkable contributions Robert Sardello is making, please visit www.heartfulsoul.com
Additional influences include James Hillman’s Archetypal Psychology, Stephen Aizenstat’s Dream Tending, Christine Downing, Henri Corbin, Rumi and the rest of the poets, as “physicians and musicians of the soul.”
I also offer Dream-Centered Living courses, including a professional certification course.
For more information please click on the links below.
Alchemical Psychology: Towards a Vermillion Nobility of Soul
With Alchemical Psychology (Volume 5 of James Hillman’s Uniform Edition) as our guide, we will engage in simple contemplative practices that seek to develop our imaginal capacities.”Ever since Jung opened the door to alchemy for psychologists,” writes Hillman, “we have tended to go through it in only one direction. We apply our directed thinking to its fantasy thinking, translating its images into our concepts.” Suggesting that there is another way, one that doesn’t call for translation, we are instead invited to “speak to the dreams as the dreams themselves speak. The use of the word “dream” here means, however, “the dream, or fantasy, within behavior” in addition to those lit-up images revealed to us while sleeping.
Revelation, Radical Receptivity, and the Angel of Courtesy
An alternate title for this course might be The Art and Practice of Learning to Trust and Be Trusted, for as we will discover through simple, straightforward contemplative practices, trust is not a one-way street. Throughout our time together, special attention will be given to dreams–both waking and sleeping–and to noticing what Carl Jung refers to as synchronicities, endeavoring to develop capacities for noticing, listening, seeing, sensing, and, most of all, trusting–developing what Robert Sardello, in his latest, beautiful book, calls “heartfulness.”
Practicing with the Twelve Senses
This contemplative course is for anyone interested in developing an embodied, soul life that is receptive to the spiritual worlds. In a profound—yet simple and straightforward—way we will explore the twelve senses as brought to us by Dr. Albert Soesman, a family physician who lived and worked in the Hague, Holland until retiring in 1983. Dr. Soesman has written a marvelous little book entitled Our Twelve Senses: Wellsprings of the Soul that will serve as our guide. The book offers a lively way of both understanding and experiencing not merely the usual five senses, but twelve human senses of touch, life, self-movement, balance, smell, taste, vision, temperature, hearing, language, the conceptual, and the ego senses.
Contemplative Living with Earth
The Contemplative Living with Earth course itself is a work in contemplation and action as it represents the life-long work of Robert Sardello and Cheryl Sanders-Sardello, co-founders of the School of Spiritual Psychology. Having developed the material in these four modules over many years, the intent of this course is to orient the inner life of participants toward being open and receptive to the spiritual worlds, while at the same time becoming able to be within spiritual-soul awareness in daily living. It is possible, through these four modules, in conjunction with engaging in the practices described, and participating fully in the course, to re-orient life to be able to live within ongoing heart awareness, and within a living sense of the holiness of embodiment, right here, right now, in our home, the Spiritual Earth.
The Power of Soul: Living with the Twelve Virtues
This course focuses on Robert Sardello’s marvelous book,The Power of Soul: Living the Twelve Virtues, and the extraordinary work that unfolds when we actively and creatively engage with the Twelve Virtues of Soul: devotion, balance, faithfulness, selflessness, compassion, courtesy, equanimity, patience, truth, courage, discernment, and love. Classes will be held one afternoon or evening per month over the course of 13 months. The first class will be an introduction to Spiritual Psychology followed by a brief orientation to the Twelve Virtues and how to work with them. We will subsequently focus on the twelve soul virtues and their attendant spiritual practices, one virtue per month.
Dream-Centered Living Certification
This course is designed to introduce dedicated practitioners to the Art and Practice of Dream-Centered Living. With expert supervision in a safe, contained environment, practitioners develop a genuine feel for the radical receptivity required for working with dreams in this very unique and intimate way. Certification takes place over the course of a calendar year, one weekend day per month, from 9am to 5pm. At the end of the year, practitioners will have spent 90 supervised hours and another 45 hours practicing without supervision, for a total of 135 hours.
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