Professional Enrichment Program Curriculum

YEAR I:  
HOW THE BEGINNING ROOTS THE JOURNEY

     At the moment of conception, two dances begin. One dance is between each of us and our primary caregivers. This first dependent, wordless experience shapes the patterns for all future relationships. The second dance is between us and the Mystery of our own destiny. Simultaneously, we must consciously embrace the complex and often wounded ground of our pre-personal and personal past, and be open to the transpersonal unfolding of our unique inner calling.

     Our first year focus will include:

• Your own issues in the three primary modes of being: pre-
  personal, personal and transpersonal.
• A deeply personal understanding of Object-relations and
  secure and insecure attachment as part of early childhood development.
• How certain aspects of development unfold from inherited
  deep structures (crawling before walking, babbling before
  talking) and how other aspects move in spirals to be re-
  visited through crises until transformed.
• How the body-mind tells the stories of the layers of our lives.
• How a spiritual practice can create a containing environment
  in which to fall apart and come back together.

YEAR II THE WORLD OF TRAUMA:
RESTORING THE BODY-MIND-SOUL CONNECTION

     Trauma can be very subtle and cumulative (strain trauma) or very sudden and shattering (shock trauma). Chronic misattunements between infant and caregiver strain the child?s sense of realness and rhythm of self and agency. Physical and sexual abuse, catastrophic illness, and disasters of nature and war are shock traumas which disorganize both our personal and collective environments.

     In trauma, aspects of the self split off, freeze up, and are locked away into safe-keeping. Working with trauma is nothing less than restoring the body-mind-soul to its wholeness.

     Our focus will include:

• The neuro-biology of early traumatic attachment.
• How Presence is rooted in limbic attunement and affective resonance.
• How trauma affects development of hope and shame.
• The unique life altering effects of early sexual abuse.
• Understanding addictive and psychosomatic attempts to cope with the overwhelming effects of trauma.
• How traumatic memory disrupts ongoing identity, brain chemistry and basic physiological functioning.
• Creating transitional/transformative space allowing the soul to re-emerge, to unfreeze and reclaim the vitality and trust of spirit.
• Techniques of deep listening, meditation, imagery, dream work and mind-body centering.
  

YEAR III THE SELF, THE SELF, AND THE COLLECTIVE

     In our last year together, having deepened as a community, we will explore how we each balance the autonomy of self, family and connection to community. We will also look at the transitions that mark the phases of our lives as we approach the termination of our learning community.
     How do you hold the Mystery of your transpersonal self and bring its guidance to ongoing pre-personal and personal work? How do you unfold awe, gratitude and the sense of the sacred on all three levels?
     To mark your graduation, you will create a project illuminating your integration of CIL learnings and your personal path.

     Our focus will include:

• The conscious practice of forgiveness and compassion.
• The father inside and outside.
• The energetic dynamics of the family system including genograms, family sculpting, siblings, long absent and sacrificial members, and ancestors.
• Finding creative balance for the tensions between the I, the Thou and the collective.
• Integrating the shadow and the golden shadow.
• Creating rituals of passage for life transitions including conscious aging and dying.
• The individuation process in which the egoic self comes to be guided by the timeless Self.