Heron
June 2006
Back in May, I was sitting on our deck with Konstantin from
Russia having a cup of coffee and looking at the beautiful
view of the river at the end of our field. As I
watched a blue heron flew in to land in the middle of the
river. I was admiring it and feeling so lucky to live
where this is possible, while also having a little pang at
the thought of giving it up when we move into town.
Later that evening sitting on the deck of a lovely
organic café with Solihin and our girls, having a Mother’s
day dinner together, I was recounting the story of the
heron in the morning, and as I was speaking a blue heron
flew right over us, and Rebecca said “ see you can have
herons even in the city!” I told a friend who looked
up the totem meaning of the heron, which feels exactly what
I need at the moment: able to maintain balance, have
a secure inner foundation, but not fixed, and a clarity of
understanding. A nice Mother’s day gift from nature.
The other evening at the end of
a long a day in the office, I decided to take my kayak out
on the river. It was warm and beautiful and just
across from our beach was a heron standing in the shallows
of the river with the light reflecting off the water
shimmering against his feathers. He took off and flew
further down the river, where I passed him a few moments
later. He flew again and throughout my whole trip he
accompanied me, or led the way, just ahead of me.
I felt so grateful for living on a river, being able to
have these experiences with those who share the land with
us and also ready to let go, knowing that these experiences
are available to us if we take the time to connect with our
environment; we are graced with a profound relationship
with it.
Alicia
“Morocco is like
a tree nourished by roots deep in the soil of
Africa, which breathes
through foliage rustling to the winds of
Europe.”
King Hassan 11 of
Morocco
Living the Life Forces in Marrakech
January 6 -13, 2007
We are very excited
to be returning to Marrakech after nine years to offer a
Living the Life Forces workshop. We will be staying
in a beautiful traditional riyad or palace in the old
walled city very close to where we stayed before.
This time there is room for everyone to stay together in
one place and it will be our base to explore the
fascinating city of Marrakech and the surrounding
area. We can see the Atlas mountains from the roof
terrace, and hear the sounds of life in the medina drift up
towards us.
The purpose of the Living the Life Forces workshop is
to take an inner and outer journey, in that while we are
exploring our outer surroundings we will be integrating
that with our inner experience and seeing what arises for
us in the context of the life forces by inhabiting a
completely different place from that which we are used to.
We will gather for part of each day to workshop and
then wander the narrow winding streets of the old medina,
explore the labyrinthine bazaar, visit the Djemaa el Fna,
the main square with its attendant snake charmers, street
performers, storytellers and food vendors. We will
visit palaces and mosques inlaid with exquisite tiles and
carved Arabic script from the Qu’ran (the holy book of
Islam), tiled open courtyards with rose petal strewn
fountains, walled gardens and pools, bargain for beautiful
woven rugs while drinking mint tea, experience the local
hammam, hear the call to prayer five times a day, absorb
the exotic flavor of the old city and eat fresh and
delicious food.
The cost of the workshop is $1795, which includes
seven nights accommodation (double occupancy), breakfasts
and dinners, inclusive transport and workshop
journal.
Registration:
$100 non-refundable
deposit required to hold your space.
$1100 due October 1, $595 due November 1.
Register by phone 800 304 4464 (inside USA) or 503 723 7900
Alicia@adhumanitas.com
“As we
approached Marrakech, the earth turned salmon pink,
deepening as it reached the walls of the town, with its
belt of majestic palm trees and the haughty Koutoubbia
Tower facing the snow-capped Atlas mountains. A city of
splendor. The city of the oasis, the capital of the
desert, spread out like a coral necklace offering at the
feet of the Atlas, the door of the
Sahara…”
Nina Epton, A
Journey Under The Crescent Moon.
Once you have
registered you will receive a comprehensive packet of
information to help you prepare for the trip.
Required reading Being Human: Exploring the forces that
shape us and awaken an inner life, by Solihin and Alicia
Thom and Alexandra ter Horst available from
www.beinghumanbook.com or by calling 800 304 4464.
Human-centered education
We were invited to present at the Third Annual Edinburgh
Festival of Middle Eastern Spirituality and Peace again
this last February. The theme for this year was
education and we offered a workshop on Human Centered
Education: Exploring the role of parents and teachers in
supporting the inner development of a child. It was
particularly special for us as we had Faustina Ramos-Coca
leading the workshop with us. She is the founder,
teacher and principal of an school in Austria inspired by
the Montessori and Life Forces models. Over the years
she has taken our workshops and really applied the
principles of the Life Forces to her school with great
effect. She really enhanced the presentation as
she shared how she uses those models in her school, and we
elaborated on the life forces, involving the participants
to experience for themselves how these forces can be
recognized and how they affect us.
When we were in Vienna in June,
Faustina invited Solihin and I to come and speak to the
parents at her school one evening. The room was
packed with interested and involved parents and we had a
great evening, followed by dinner at a local restaurant
with many of the teachers from the school. Faustina
is so committed to the integration of the life forces model
into the school, that she has asked us to facilitate an
annual Being Human workshop for the teachers and interested
parents.
Alicia
Dear Alicia and
Solihin,
I've been quite busy lately, trying to arrange more space
for the school since next school year there will be 70
students and we really need more room...
Well, I had some great life-forces experiences with my
students last month, I'd like to share with you:
First I worked with my group, 12 students age 12 to
15. We've done quite a lot with the forces and qualities
before, but the following exercise was new to them. I
explained the forces and qualities again, showed them a
picture, I drew, and then they lined up in groups of 4
students in each group. One represented the material, the
other the vegetable, the other the animal and one the human
life force. They talked about how it felt, and then they
articulated in such a precise way how it felt when the
forces were out of order. It was amazing for me, how easy
it was for the children to relate to the symbols, how easy
it was for them to explain, what and how they felt.
I also did this exercise, when a "human person" (the forces
in order) meets an "animal person" (the animal force is
dominant). The animal felt inferior, wanted to run away,
the human felt that she couldn't really get in contact with
the other person. Throughout the exercise we always related
to situations in our daily life in school. The students
liked the exercise so much that we experienced with the
forces the next day, too. Then I did the same exercise with
students age 9 to 12, using real symbols to explain.
We had great ahas right in the beginning. There were 2
children who wanted to represent the animal force. Instead
of talking, as they are used to doing, we surrendered.
After that - without any discussion - everyone found
his/her place! This even happened a second time, when we
did a new constellation. The exercise really went well with
this group, too. We had two students watching and they also
could see and feel, when it was right , when the
forces were in order and when they were not.
But I found one big difference to the other group. When the
nine-year-olds represented the human force, they felt
insecure, even though the forces were in order and the rest
of the forces felt fine. I then included reflectiveness, it
was better,but it was good for them only when all the
qualities came into the picture. I think this is because of
their developing stage. They just start to become
reflective.
During daily life in school we often can observe the
animal force. The kids sometimes act like a "herd of
buffaloes" instead of acting according to their authentic
needs. Not only us teachers observe that, also the students
and we talk about it then, and there is some
change....eventually.
With love,
Faustina
A walk towards a re-wedding
In June Solihin and I were both in Vienna as we had been
invited to facilitate the re-wedding ceremony of Andi and
Alexander. Andi has done many workshops with us over
the years and shared with us that although they have been
married for fifteen years and have three beautiful
children, they never had a spiritual wedding. They
had been feeling the importance of that as they looked
forward in their life together, so began to create a very
personal process and ceremony to fulfill this need.
We all met on a Thursday morning at the side of the road in
the beautiful countryside of Austria a couple of hours
outside Vienna. There were eighteen of us starting
the walk including many of Andi and Xandi‘s friends, and
over the three days that we walked we became a group of
thirty, as people joined in when they could. They
wanted the venture to be like a personal workshop for
themselves and to make it open enough that their friends
could participate to the degree that they felt
comfortable. Before we started walking we began by
talking about pilgrimage (we were going to walk part of an
old pilgrimage route, called Mariazell) and how a
pilgrimage is a journey of intention and purpose, and that
all of us were there to support and witness Andi and Xandi
in their journey, but we also asked that everyone become
quiet and ask for themselves, what is the purpose for this
journey and what intention should they make. We did a
life forces process with Andi and Xandi to have them choose
people to represent the different forces within them and
then position them according to how they were in
relationship to each other.
Over the three days we walked 65 kilometers, or 40 miles,
on roads, pathways, up hill and down dale, through farms
and villages, surrounded by forests and mountains.
The first night we all slept in a hay loft, which the
farmer rents out to groups who are walking the trail.
After a breakfast of coffee and wonderful Austrian rolls
and jam we were off again. I really started to see
how great a metaphor walking is for almost anything in our
lives, and also looked at it in the context of our own
marriage. We spent time each day walking and talking
with Andi and Xandi, alone, with each other, and with
others on the walk. The second day we walked for nine
and a half hours for thirty kilometers. Later that
evening, in attempting to get up from my chair at the
dinner table, I suddenly realized how stiff I was!
That night we slept in an enormous room filled with about
forty bunkbeds!
The last day it rained for the five hours that we walked,
but as we came out of the woods we were greeted by a
magical sight of a valley ringed by mountains and in the
middle of the village the dome and spire of the Mariazell
basilica, we had arrived!
We went to our very comfortable hotel with hot showers and
changed for the wedding ceremony itself, which was to be in
a lovely tiny little stone chapel right across the street
from the hotel, very simple. Firstly, everyone went
in and lit candles and then as everyone else waited, Andi
entered, escorted by me, her dear friend Gabi and the woman
who had been the witness at their original wedding.
They very much wanted both Solihin and I do the ceremony
together, to have both masculine and feminine aspects and
it was lovely to do it that way. We spoke of how
everyone had walked alongside Andi and Xandi during their
life so far and during this walk, and asked if they would
pledge to continue to walk alongside them in their
marriage, they all shouted yes! Solihin did the Call
to Prayer and we then asked them to make a commitment
to each other from each level of the forces, their material
or ancestry, their feelings, their animal or instinct and
their human. Gabi played some music she had commissioned to
be composed for them, their children and old friends spoke
and by the end of the ceremony everyone was in tears!
Everyone’s hearts were so open and we had all shared so
much during the three days that we could all experience the
gift in this experience.
Later we all had a wonderful dinner and danced together,
and at midnight the lights were turned out and they carried
out a cake with candles and sang me happy birthday, as it
was my birthday the next day!
Thank you Andi and Xandi for inviting us to be participate
and to all your friends and family who joined in making it
the rich experience that it was for all of us.
Alicia
Myths and Archetypes
Stony
Creek, CT July 2006
Myths &
Archetypes was a life changing process. I was shown
that what I was truly longing for all these years was not
an external journey but an inner one. Now I have
entered into myself, I can finally rest and grow and live
onward towards a journey that God has wanted me to follow.
David Rosas, LMT
The workshop
has taking me on a journey of what I need to clarify and
acknowledge for myself. It was a wonderful weekend. I
am going to cherish what I recovered from my journey, make
it part of my map, that I was not aware of. Latifat
Balogun, NYC
The workshop was so
moving and I continue to be humbled by the depth of this
work. Each person was totally present to the person
whose constellation was in process. It truly
demonstrated that we are one - we became one with that
person's "story". The depth and complexity of
humanity was illustrated with the diversity of each
experience. I am "still processing" and have been
moved to stillness. It is taking time to integrate
back into "my life "- -whatever that is!? I continue
to notice how easily we can see the "sliver in our
neighbor's eye” and not the plank in our own! Janet Geeza,
PA
We are pleased to
announce that we will offer a further workshop in the new
year:
Myths and Archetypes
Portland, OR, February 9-11,
2007
LEARN about the
odysseys and personal mythologies that shape our
lives. Access and utilize or alter these archetypal
elements within ourselves and our patients and
clients.
We use the model of
the Life Forces to help mirror and understand the various
elements within us that alter, disorganize or mask our
capacity to understand our own resources and our personal
journey through life. This workshop offers a deep,
powerful, and intimate look at your own life journey.
We utilize [in a rather modest way] kinesiology [muscle
testing] combined with mudras [sign language] to help
direct and keep the process on track, and through group
constellation work we enlarge and elaborate your own
personal state, mythology or inner needs. Through the
process, and also whilst faciliating other's processes you
will find new purpose, revive dormant resources, and let go
of old mythologies that no longer serve you.
Myths and Archetypes is designed for everyone and is
particularly useful for health practitioners of all kinds.
•
Explore myths, archetypes, and odysseys as components and
models for life
• Identify the myth in which you are engaged
• Use constellations to mirror, articulate, and enact
internal resources
• Illuminate your personal hierarchy, journey, archetypes,
and worth
• Find a new odyssey to better support your life’s journey
• Clarify your life’s purpose, direction, and value
• Adapt this protocol to work with individual patients and
clients
Life coaching
Last year, as I approached my fiftieth birthday I began a
process of re-evaluating everything in my life; did it
still work for me? Was it lacking something? Was it
time to let go? Etc. This included our home,
relationship, work and more. One of the decisions
that came was to sell our home and move into a smaller
house with a much smaller garden, as I realized that I was
spending more time than I wanted to on caring for where we
lived. I have spent the last thirty years making
homes and gardens and tending to them and our family, and
felt that it was now time for me to give more to caring
for, and developing, other areas of myself.
I had also been exploring different avenues relating
to my work, looking at going back to school and other
options, but nothing resonated. During this time I
kept surrendering and asking for guidance. One night
during my spiritual practice of deep surrender I suddenly
received the words “life coaching,” which surprised me as
it wasn’t something I had ever considered, although I knew
people who were coaches, I really didn’t know much about
it. I decided to just sit with it for a few days and
see how it felt, and I started to recognize how this really
would be a fitting direction for me to take. I began
exploring different training programs and found one that
was in-person, which was very important to me, and also
that I really resonated with the philosophy of co-active
coaching. (The Coaches Training Institute (CTI)
www.thecoaches.com) This is the idea that the client
contains all the answers they need and that through the
relationship that is created between the client and coach
they are able to access those answers, and find meaning and
clarity about their life and the choices they make.
I began the training in January and completed it in May;
traveling to the Bay Area once a month, and in early July
began the very rigorous certification program, which will
end in December. I am building a coaching practice
and have some great clients that I am working with on a
regular basis. I love this work, feel energized and
inspired by my clients and what arises from the sessions,
as well as having my own coach, which is a requirement for
certification. That has really helped me to see the
value of this work from the client’s point of view; how
wonderful to have a regular time set aside to explore the
issues that are most important to me at that moment, and
have the full support and witnessing of my coach in that
process.
This work fits very well with the understanding of the life
forces and once I have attained certification I will be
able to develop the integration of the two models. I
am excited about this work and the possibilities that exist
with it, and what I can bring to Ad Humanitas through the
work, and to the coaching community from us.
I will keep you posted on developments!
Alicia