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No yearning for an afterlife,
no looking beyond,
no belittling of death,
but only longing for what belongs to us
and serving earth, lest we remain unused.
Ranier Maria Rilke
Date:
Apr 27th, 2013 - May 1st, 2013
Instructors:
Meredith Little and Educo staff
Web Address:
Educo Africa
Contact:
contact@educo.org.za Seminar house Oatlands: http://www.oatlands.co.za/, near Cape Town, South Africa
Telling one’s own story is an ancient art. Nowadays, we have forgotten how to listen and how to tell. Yet the very survival of our species depends on our ability to communicate with each other in such ways as to be mutually enriched by the telling and the listening. If we cannot tell with expression, our life is mute. If we cannot listen like a mirror, we cannot reflect back the wholeness of body, soul, mind and spirit of the teller. The best stories are about human-nature: that is, the human of us which is, after all, nature, nature that has always been the body, psyche, mind and spirit of the human species.
One of the best ways to create a story, if not the best, is to put people in contact with nature in the raw. What comes forth in the story is the stuff of self-transformation. Even as we “myth” ourselves into experience, so we express ourselves into existence. Our stories about our natural selves, and our means of expressing them, lead us to courage, determination, commitment, hope, wisdom, and the will to survive, to transcend the difficulty, to go beyond ourselves. Those of us who work with people must know how to listen and respond to the stories our people tell, so that we can help them create a life that is deeper, richer, and of greater benefit to our community and the earth.
Mornings will be taken up with meetings, afternoons with solitary excursions into the surrounding land that evoke the four shields of human-nature. Trainees forgo companionship, food, and shelter during these times. In the evenings we will tell, listen to, and practice mirroring stories that empower. The objectives of the seminar are to experience human-nature deeply; to elicit personal “mythos” through the expression of the story; to acquire knowledge and experience of how to listen and respond to the four personas of human nature (“mirror”); and to utilize a powerful incorporation tool of self and group empowerment through a Council setting.
