RE-IMAGINING THE WORLD WITH SOUL

The practitioner's power to create and inspire

Programme for the 2nd European Psychosynthesis Summer School

At Riva del Sole, Castiglione della Pescaia
in Tuscany, Italy

18-22 September 2004

Re-Imagining the World with Soul

The practitioner's power to create and inspire

Changing our relationship with the world is both a psychological and political act. The ailments we perceive in the world are as much in ourselves. Through remembering our interdependence, we can experience the power of our individual actions to influence the whole. Psychosynthesis has long held the need to attend to both the individual problems in the consulting room and the global issues collectively facing us. A real caring for our individual soul also includes a caring for our planet and humanity as a whole. The values of practical action and consciousness-raising are brought together in soul-work; the creative engagement with what really matters.

The summer school will provide a nurturing space for psychotherapists who are often overwhelmed with what they are asked to hold for others. It will facilitate a bridging between inner and outer, psychological and environmental that assist healing the splits we create through our separateness. It will remind us as practitioners in the helping and therapeutic professions, that we have tools for soul-work that can contribute to the collective as well as the individual. The aim of the Summer School will be to create an empowering context and skilled practice to inspire a reconnection with the value and meaning of the psychotherapeutic vocation.

Summer School Programme :

Saturday 18 September
Arrival & check in at Riva de Sole: 14.00-17.00
Welcome and introductions to workshop leaders 17.00-18.30
Dinner 19.00-20.00
Opening plenary meeting: 20.15-22.00

Talk by Piero Ferrucci on The Soul of the World: Dangers and Promises of the Global Age.
Ritual gathering led by Molly Brown

Sunday 19 September
Am Training Seminars
Pm Elective Workshops

Talk by David Peat (Author & Physicist)

Monday 20 September
Am Training Seminars
Pm Elective Workshops
Free Evening

Tuesday 21 September
Am Training Seminars
Pm Elective Workshops
Free Evening / Party

Wednesday 22 September
Am Training Seminars
12 Final Plenary
14.00 Departure

Schedule for the Summer School :

Mornings 8am: Dream Matrix
Meditation

Mornings 9.30-12.30: Training Seminar
1. The Soul of the World
2. Healing Person and Planet
3. The Inspired Body
4. Listening to the World
5. The Cosmic Dance
6. Embracing the World

Afternoon Workshops 15.00-18.00
Sunday
- The Center & the Circle in Psychosynthesis
- Spiritual politics? Politics and business from a perspective of soul
- The Clown: a journey into the world of fantasy and imagination
- The Soul has its own time: for those working with severely ill people

Monday
- Ritual: an act of Soul
- Healing Trauma - coming back home
- Nature as an Archetype of Inspiration and Nurturance
- 21st Century Soul
- Dream Workshop

Tuesday
- The power of legend and myth to inspire us
- Shaping the future - constellations workshop
- Retelling the story
- Sounding the Global Soul
- Circle Dance

Training Seminars

The Soul of the World

Connecting to the World Soul is a way to achieve a new consciousness in relating to the world and to our individual soul as well. The World Soul is also a "connecting third" in human relationships that makes them soulful and meaningful. Only through the world we may truly love. Some of the main spiritual traditions (Kabbalah, Alchemy, Hermetism, Rosicrucians, Gnosticims, Theosophy, Anthroposophy, etc.) on one hand and depth psychology on the other all have emphasised the Soul of the World as the core of inner transformation.

Through our Psychosynthesis therapeutic practice we may integrate spiritual traditions and depth psychology, creating a bridge between inner and outer world as a living unity, as anima mundi. Working toward individuality is also working toward the World Soul as inseparable moments of the same process. This could be a creative path to re-imagine the world with soul.

Gianni Y. Dattilo is a registered psychotherapist, a SIPT trainer and supervisor, and vice president of EFPP. He was born in the USA but lives and practices in Rome. For several years he has been integrating, in seminars, workshops and individual sessions, Psychosynthesis with the kabbalistic tradition and other spiritual paths.

The Cosmic Dance - living and responding fully

Our body, feelings and mind are vehicles both for self-knowledge and expression. The challenge of integrating these vehicles in alignment with our deepest purpose is central both for individuals and at the collective level.
This highly experiential seminar will include bodywork and movement. The main theoretical context will be Assagioli´s psychological laws.

Fredrik Lundh is the Director of Psykosyntes Akademin in Stockholm. He has experience of working with multi cultural groups within WYSE (World Youth Service & Enterprise)
Rosie Manton is a Senior Trainer at Psykosyntes Akademin. She has an extensive background in Rudolf Laban´s work, Gabriele Roth´s 5 Rhythms and Stanislav Grof´s Integrating Holotropic Breathwork. She lives in Spain and runs workshops in a variety of European settings.

Healing Person and Planet

Healthy individuals contribute to and are sustained by healthy cultures; healthy cultures in turn support and are sustained by their interrelationships with the more-than-human world. Too often, psychotherapy treats individual problems as if they arose from personal pathology alone, rather than from our dysfunctional society-cut off as it mostly is from the larger web of life. Drawing upon psychosynthesis, ecopsychology, deep ecology, systems thinking, and Bohmian Dialogue, we will inquire together how we can help our clients understand both their problems and potentials within the wider context of culture and environment, and create more health for themselves and their communities. We will explore and practice ways of recognizing and healing the collective insanities of our world-and specifically apply psychosynthesis principles and practices to creating a Great Turning toward a healthy, sustainable culture.

Molly Young Brown, M.A. M.Div., is an internationally recognized teacher and writer in the fields of psychosynthesis and ecopsychology. Her books include the newly revised Unfolding Self: The Practice of Psychosynthesis (2004), Growing Whole: Self-Realization on an Endangered Planet (1993), and Coming Back to Life: Practices to Reconnect Our Lives, Our World (with Joanna Macy, 1998). She offers retreats, training programs, and consultation services in-person.

The Inspired Body: a seminar on inspiration

Without the presence of soul, our life becomes dry and our mind goes through endless closed circles. As practitioners in the helping and therapeutic professions, we experience various degrees of lack of inspiration, hidden depression or severe burnout. How then to re-connect with our vitality and inspiration? This seminar explores ways of inspiration as revealed through the body. Each of the three parts of this seminar will be dedicated to explore:
- The vital body in relation to different pathological structures (the schizoid, the hysteric, the obsessive neurotic, etc.).
- The archetypal body in relation to dreams and higher imagination (symbols)
- The inspired body: opening the body to creative and artistic inspiration.

Conceptual and practical tools are drawn from Assagioli and Jung's ideas as well as from clinical practice. Let us remind ourselves that our practice does express the richness of our soul and could be lived as a work of art.

Tan Nguyen, MBA Harvard, MPh. has been practicing as a psychotherapist for 30 years. As a pioneer in the field in France, he was granted one of the very first ECPs (European Certificate of Psychotherapy). He is presently director of Centre Source and vice-president of the FFdP (French Federation of Psychotherapy).
Chantal Quillart graduated from the psychosynthesis training in Paris in 1998. She has been also a senior assistant for 5 years and has her own practice in the South of France. Trained in clown-playing.

Listening to the World

While people often present as wanting solutions, they mostly need listening to and being understood. Perhaps this is true for the world? If the world needs listening to, how can we learn to listen?
As in human dialogue we cannot listen if we are full of agendas. We may consider ourselves part of the world but we behave and often think as if we were apart from it or that we humans are the world. Confronting the degree of our not-at-homeness, our unbalanced narcissistic disconnection, is a pre-requisite for learning to listen to what Rozak entitled the 'Voice of the Earth'.

Recognising and accepting our disconnection is already an engagement with the process of redemption and re-connection. We will draw on the experience of discomfort and alienation to open to the various sufferings of the world, to empathically attune ourselves to the collective issues and suffering within which we all operate. In doing so we may deconstruct many of our assumptions about our psychotherapy practice and begin to hear the collective voice of the earth through the individual symptoms of our clients. We will use imagination, dreams, synchronicity, our own pain and wonder as the means to re-inhabit the world in which we are often strangers.

Chris Robertson is the present president of the EFPP and the director of training at ReoVision. He is a UKCP registered psychotherapist and has been a Psychosynthesis trainer for thirty years working in several European countries. His book on Emotions and Needs has been recently published by OUP

Embracing the World

"A human being experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest…. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty." Albert Einstein

As therapists we train ourselves to be as open, sensitive and as deeply attuned to our clients and to ourselves as we possibly can. We learn to sit with, and to bear, profound levels of personal pain. However, at the same time, we receive an endless barrage of information and images about the escalating violence and desecration of what we, as human beings, are doing to each other and to our planet. In the face of this horror it can seem impossible to keep our hearts open to the wider world. How can our attuned sensitivities bear this? How can we possibly find a way to actively engage? Our reactions range from impotent fury to helpless despair.

In this workshop we will use ritual, meditation, voice and movement to explore our defences against our grief about the world and to find ways to express our sorrow, our anger, our hate, our despair, our passion, our love, our dreams and our longings - indeed, whatever is there. And thus find a way to embrace the world, both for the world's sake and for our own. For if we shut out the world's ugliness we also shut out the world's beauty. If we shut out the world's pain we shut out part of our souls.

Alone we become overwhelmed. Through sharing our grief, we can build a community to support each other's sorrows and longings for humankind and for the planet. We can inspire and empower each other's deeper commitment, aliveness and engagement. Instead of being raging fanatics or passive victims, sealed in our therapeutic isolation, we can join the world and learn to inhabit more fully the Warrior and the Healer archetypes.

Maggie Burlington and Joan Crawford are both UKCP registered Psychosynthesis psychotherapists, trained at the Psychosynthesis and Education Trust and ReoVision respectively. They both combine private practice with supervision, group facilitation and training.

Elective Workshops

Each morning: the Matrix will be open between 8am and 9am

Social Dreaming Matrix

This is a method of experiencing the collective unconscious by sharing and observing dreams. There is no other aim, goal, or thing to achieve. This approach to social well-being is older than the temple to Aesclepius at Epidauros in Greece, where the sick came to be healed through dreaming and sharing their dreams. It probably began in our ancient tree-living past. Today, it is used in analytical psychology for individual and group development.

We sit in a snowflake pattern, a fractal arrangement of chairs. This disrupts lines of sight, allowing intimacy, 'being alone in the presence of others'. It signifies this experience is not circular, neither group therapy, nor a therapy group. Anyone taking part in the conference is welcome to come to any or all of the Matrixes. Sessions begin and end with a bell, and the words 'The matrix is now open,' and 'The matrix is now closed'. They last an hour and a quarter, and begin and end on time. If you arrive late, do please take the nearest empty seat.

During the Matrix anyone may speak a dream of their own. It can be a dream from any time of your life, perhaps from the night before, perhaps a dream that has been precious for a long time. You may speak in your own language. If you do, please translate it into English, or ask someone else to do this for you before you start. It is respectful if after a dream there is a brief pause before another dream is spoken. It may or may not relate to the previous one. Please do not give personal details, any context to the dream, associations, interpretations or analysis, as they can disrupt the observation, rather like throwing stones into a pond whilst fishing. Similarly, let the dreams of others stand on their own - without giving associations, interpretations or analysis. Our anonymity maintains confidentiality.

Sunday 19 September 15.00-18.00

The Circle and the Center in Psychosynthesis Practice

Everything the Power of the World does is done in a circle. The sky is round, and I have heard that the earth is round like a ball, and so are all the stars. The wind, in its greatest power, whirls. Birds make their nests in circles, for theirs is the same religion as ours. The sun comes forth and goes down again in a circle. The moon does the same and both are round. Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were. The life of a (person) is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves. Black Elk

Circling and Centering are two metaphors of inner and outer processes towards Soul embodiment and realisation. Psychosynthesis practice cultivates a multicentered and circle-like approach from subpersonalities to rebuilding the personality around the Self, to larger interpersonal and social synthesis. In this workshop the group will be a ritualised way to call and embody Circle and Center as a journey of group consciousness, mirroring the world as Soul.

Massimo Rosselli, is a psychiatrist and psychotherapist, trained in psychosynthesis by Roberto Assagioli. He is the President of SIPT and Director and Trainer of the "Scuola di Psicoterapia Psicosintetica" in Italy

Spiritual politics? Politics & business from a perspective of soul

The fundament and goal of a politics from a soul perspective is the change of paradigm: in this new paradigm, it is consciousness that creates reality and not the other way round. You'll explore how your beliefs are co-creating and shaping the external social-political events and issues.

Dr. Dipl.Ing. Elena Franzini, psychosynthesis trainer in AEON, Basel and founder of Elena Franzini International Learning (http://www.elenafranzini.com/).

The Clown: a journey into the world of fantasy and imagination
The clown re-imagines the world with generosity and playfulness, manifesting a childlike soul. Let us follow his teaching so as to see the world through the clown eyes.

Chantal Quillart has trained in clown-playing and works at Centre Source.

The Soul has its own time

An experiential and skill-building seminar for those working with severely ill people - particularly from diagnosis to the death
The diagnosis of a severe illness brings people right to the edge of all their life experiences. A healthy inner psychical barrier - often misunderstood as denial or other defence mechanisms - helps them to live over the next weeks. They are then often treated with subtle abandonment by the health professionals. Therefore, the patients need for comfort, guiding and strengthening of their coping reactions is not answered, or responded to in the wrong way.
The interventions have to be timely. What is exactly right and supportive at one time can cause traumatisation in another. Too little intervention leaves the patient feeling despair and helplessness - while too much information overwhelms them.
We will be working with the three steps of guiding (Brode 1993, Weisman & Worden1976).

1) Being Held
2) Being Guided
3) Learning to Walk.

Running into a new life after that will be inevitable. Listening to souls pacing requires:
- Working with the time-lag between Hospital time, body-time, psyche-time and soul-time
- Making Soul-Contact
- Understanding soul purpose
- Seeing the guardian-angels work in so called negative coping answers

Kristina Brode did her PhD in the field of cancer and has worked since 1984 both in research and as a therapist. Her well evaluated, phase specific, semi-structured Systemical Cancer Care Programme is now used in several settings and Clinics. She is the founder and former Director of Circadian Institute near Cologne.

Monday 20 September 15.00-18.00

Ritual: an act of Soul

Reconnecting my soul to the world.
Recollect that the world is a soul.
Reconnecting my soul into the world soul.
One way to reconnect is rituals. Rituals are a very profound phenomenon with which we may have lost contact. It is a "holy" form to manifest a transition, a happening, an act. The ritual creates a bridge between soul and world - inner and outer. It is an art to create a ritual, an art to balance between the necessary openness to the purpose and meaning of the ritual and the necessary structure to evoke trust and safety. Symbolically we can see the image of the cross as a guide in creating rituals - the cross with 4 quarter, the contact between heaven and earth, vision and matter and between us human beings. From the centre of the cross we create the ritual, alone and together. The ritual is an act of the soul.

Nanne Hessel has more than 20 years searching and creating rituals in different contexts. It has been like a red thread whether it has been as a psychosynthesis therapist, as a leader, as a mother, as a friend or as a part of the larger whole. She is the director of the Psykosyntes Institutet in Gothenburg Sweden.

Healing Trauma - coming back home

Trauma is about broken connections - with the body/self, family, community, nature and spirit. With gentle guidance into the body's instinctive "felt sense" SE (Somatic Experiencing) helps people "renegotiate" and heal their traumas. The transformation process can allow them to achieve an increased sense of flow, deepen their sense of self and leads them to re-connect with the world.
Gabi Real, psychosynthesis trainer at AEON, Basel (Switzerland) counsellor, supervisor in private practice since 1991. Since two years I'm in training for Somatic experiencing (SE).

Nature as an Archetype of Inspiration and Nurturance
Nature teaches us to walk and live with elegance and beauty. Let us taste a piece of this teaching though working with the elements during this workshop.

Joel Niemann is a ECP registered psychotherapist and trainer at Centre Source

21st Century Soul

Evolving psychosynthesis in a changing world
Psychosynthesis models tend to stress the timeless, eternal nature of the self. Yet, the conditions of modern life under which we learn and practice psychosynthesis therapy and teaching have changed dramatically since Assagioli's time. The post-war boom has been and gone, and we are left with profound confusions and uncertainties about our individual and global futures in the coming century. Our models may well not be addressing the complex challenges to the contemporary psyche. In this workshop we will be asking the question: Do the nature, experience and qualities of psyche and soul remain static in the modern world? Drawing on sources that include sociology and politics, we will be exploring the changing nature of attachment, identity and consciousness. This will take us on a journey through pre-modern, modern, post-modern, liquid-modern and trans-modern perspectives. Out of our insights, we will be attempting to predict how psychosynthesis theory and practice might develop in the next generation.

Keith Silvester is Programme Director of the Psychosynthesis & Education Trust, London. Originally trained in community work and then at the Institute of Psychosynthesis, London, he is a therapist, supervisor, trainer and interpersonal skills consultant. Until recently, he was Head of the Student Counselling and Advisory Service at Central School of Speech and Drama, a leading training institution for the performance arts.

Dream Workshop

Both Freud and Jung described dreams as the Royal Road to the Unconscious. This workshop will explore different ways of reading the road map, asking what are the meanings and purposes of our dreams, and how to they help us take our place in society.

Dr Dale Mathers MRCPsych is a Member of the International Association of Analytical Psychology. He trained in psychiatry at St.George's Hospital, London and teaches Analytical Psychology in Britain and Europe. His recent book, An Introduction to Meaning and Purpose in Analytical Psychology, was published by Routledge in 2001.

Tuesday 21 September 15.00-18.00

The power of legend and myth to inspire us

Legend and myth are powerful, symbolic tales of the Soul's journey. They show us the way to reconnect with the deeper sense of purpose that is embedded in our life journey, and help us to reconnect with our Soul's yearning to become fully expressed - not only on the personal level, also in a broader context, the community, the world and the spiritual. The warning in many of the tales is the danger of denouncing the "call of the Soul or Spirit".
As therapists we can make use of the archetypal journeys, which are presented in mythology. We can help clients to see beyond their personal context, help them reconnect to the collective and inspire them to find their soul's journey. In this workshop we will work around a Native American myth, as an example of how myth can be used in therapeutic practice. We will use meditation, guided imagery and ritual.

Robert Bakker is head of Psychosynthese Studies and has been a psychosynthesis trainer/psychotherapist for 14 years. Working with mythology and stories has always had an important place in his life, not only in his psychosynthesis work but also in his former work in the theatre as director.

Shaping the future - a workshop introducing constellations

Constellations are a powerful and unique way of resolving issues of great weight in ways that point sensitively and simply to action. Over the last ten years it has been proven value in family systems therapy and more recently has been applied to organisational and social development. Constellations can be used to identify issues and influences that are usually "below the radar" of awareness yet which directly affect the health and well-being on a person, a group, an organisation and of our lives. Bert Hellinger called this influence "orders". By understanding the orders that governs the systems we are involved in, by focusing on what develops strength rather than weakness, constellations offers a lager framework of reference than can open fresh perspectives and possibilities.
Experience with leaders, managers, consultants, teachers, doctors and has shown the value of focusing on both personal/professional development issues in this systemic and still intimate way.

Ingrid Gunberg, member of the board of Psykosyntes Institutet in Göteborg, trained in Psyschosynthesis in Göteborg and in Constellation work by Albrecht Mahr and Jacob Staam.

Sounding the Global Soul

A voice workshop about re-claiming Inspiration
Sounding is much more than singing songs or a cathartic method…Sound is a carrier wave of consciousness and the voice is able to focus and project creative energy of intention. It offers us to take command and to ride the wave of being carried by deep abiding purpose.
Welcome to explore, reflect and celebrate!

Kerstin Elfving is a psychosynthesis therapist and trainer at Psykosyntes Akademin in Stockholm. She is also a consultant in creative communication and ceremonial performance.

Re-Telling the story

Therapy it is like re-writing a novel, which has been said too many times in the same way. So we help the patient to become aware of the story and to discover new complexities , hopefully changing the end.
In this workshop we will explore theoretically and technically this metaphore, both for therapy and supervision.

Andrea Bocconi is a psychologist and a writer. He trained in Psychosynthesis with Roberto Assagioli and Piero Ferrucci. Andrea teaches in Italy, Sweden and Holland. He has recently published a book on the Tarot.

Circle Dance

Circle dance encompasses dances from many cultures and times of history, based on the symbol of the circle. The circle becomes a microcosmic image of the cosmic space within which our planet turns. We all originate from this circle. The dance invites us to step rhythmically together, attuning in wordless understanding, peace healing and wonder of our planet and the beings who sail on her.

Lesley Brown has trained in Gestalt Psychotherapy, Integrative Psychosynthesis Psychotherapy and Group Therapy. She is a registered psychotherapist and supervisor with wide experience in training and coaching. She now combines teaching at ReoVision with a private practice working with individuals and couples.

Application

If this programme is not accompanied by application details, please contact an EFPP Training Institute in Europe:

AEON, Zentrum für Psychosynthese, Falknerstrasse 4, PF 103, CH - 4001, Basel, Switzerland. Tel: 061-262 32 00 email: schobel@aeon.ch
Centre Source, 16 Rue Lucien Sampaix, 75010 Paris, France. Tel.0033143491890 www.psychosynthese.com/ email: sourcepsy@numericable.fr
CIRCADIAN Institut für angewandte Psychosynthese Im Hilgersfeld 60, D-51427 Bergisch Gladbach Tel +49(0)2204-63595/Fax (0)220422092 email: Circadian@t-online.de
Eckhart House, Institute of Psychosynthesis and Transpersonal Theory, 19 Clyde Road, Dublin 4, Eire. Tel: 00.353.1.6684687 email:eckhart@eircom.net
Psykosyntes Akademin: Tengdahlsgatan 32, Se-116 47 Stockholm, Sweden. Tel: +46(0)86414700 email:info@psykosyntesakademin.se
Psychosynthesis and Education Trust 92/94 Tooley St, London SE1 2TH, U K. Tel: 44207-403 2100 email: enquiries@petrust.org.uk web:www.psychosynthesis.edu
Psykosyntes Institutet, Teknologgatan 3
411 32 Göteborg, Sweden tel: 031/779 78 68 fax: 031/779 78 69 info@psykosyntesinstitutet.se
Psychosynthese Studies, Hillegomstraat 45 hs,1058 LR Amsterdam, The Netherlands Tel: +31(0)203882722 e-mail: Post@psychosynthese-studies.nl web: http://www.psychosynthese-studies.nl/
ReVision 97 Brondesbury Road, London NW6 6RY, United Kingdom tel:442083578881 email: info@re-vision.co.uk web:www.re-vision.co.uk
Societa Italiana di Psicosintesi Terapeutica, Via San Domenico 14, I - 50133 Firenze, Italy. Tel:39-055-57.01.40 email: sipt@scuolapsicosintesi.com

The European Federation for Psychosynthesis Psychotherapy

Founded in 1997 the EFPP is a non-profit association registered in Firenze, Italy. EFPP operates as a federal body bringing together the autonomous Psychosynthesis Psychotherapy Centres and Institutes from different European countries including France, Germany, Italy, Ireland, Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. It works towards an agreement of common standards of training and code of ethics and represents Psychosynthesis Psychotherapy in European and international structures, such as the EAP (European Association for Psychotherapy). EFPP is a European Wide Accrediting Organisation and appoints representatives for supporting local organisations in awarding the ECP. (The European Certificate of Psychotherapy).

Summer School 2004

This is the second gathering of the professional psychosynthesis therapists in Europe. It is initiated by the EFPP in collaboration with SIPT and is an opportunity to meet colleagues and to participate together in a creative learning community.

Fees: EFPP members 280 euros Non-members 320 euros

Details of residential costs for Riva Del Sole (http://www.rivadelsole.it/) are in the application form.

http://www.psychosynthesis.net/