Nurturing the Fields of Change

February – December 2023

New Programme

Welcome to Nurturing the Fields of Change!

Feeling inspired? You might also enjoy the recording of the launch session and Q&A, held on 7th December 2022!

This programme and emerging community of practice are for all who are interested in social change and cultural transformation, fostering a more just, equitable, and sustainable world. Join us for the first cycle of a journey into the living dynamics and experiential heart of holistic change facilitation. Responding to the turmoil and imbalances of our time, the programme opens an opportunity to come together and explore how we can synergise our energies and nurture joint inquiries into the big questions that confront us, such as:

  • How can we nurture holistic system change in the world? 
  • How can we open to nature and collective wisdom? 
  • How are mind, heart, body and spirit engaged in our work?
  • How do we inspire coherent action for transformational outcomes? 
  • How do we experience and approach the challenges we encounter? 


Inquiries into these questions require not only a theoretical appreciation of the holistic, interconnected nature of our world, but a deep and ongoing commitment to engage experientially with our individual and collective interior conditions. Experienced holistic change facilitators, transpersonal coaches and mentors will accompany us on this individual and collective journey.

“Many of us have begun to appreciate that purely external, technical solutions are insufficient in addressing the multifaceted problems of our time, because they are bypassing the inner dimensions of the crises we have been experiencing. There is a growing recognition that our global challenges are rooted in dysfunctional mental states and social dynamics, and that we need to engage in inner work to evolve our capacities and skills in addressing world-wide insecurities and volatilities” (Nurturing the Fields of Change report, p.12). 

Welcome to the Fields of Change

Dear all,

We are delighted to invite you to join this emerging community and programme, co-created by members of Alef Trust’s Conscious Community Initiative, and to share the story that has brought us together to this present moment. Imagine that we are all seated around a campfire, feeling the warm glow and dance of flickering flames, beneath a starry sky that stretches into the mystery of the vast unseen cosmos. Let us breathe together a moment as we lean closer towards the fire and listen to the wind whispering in the surrounding trees.

Community has always been at the heart of Alef Trust, a not-for-profit global learning provider active in higher education, research and community development since 2012. Alef Trust delivers Master’s and PhD programmes in consciousness studies, spirituality and transpersonal psychology which are validated by UK universities. Our work is about cultivating balanced ways of being, as well as activating the potential of rigorous whole-person learning and inquiry for the betterment of human habits, cultures, and systems. The programmes and courses offered continue to evolve in response to the intensifying complexities and urgent needs for sustainable and ethical human development. 

In early 2020 we received funding to launch the Conscious Community Initiative, which supported a growing community of holistic facilitators associated with Alef Trust who contribute to individual and collective transformation around the world through their diverse professions and communities of practice. Initial approaches and findings from 2020-2022 are presented in our report Nurturing the Fields of Change. These include the significance of working skilfully with intention and attention whilst cultivating curiosity, open awareness and self-care. We found that holistic change agency thrives through collaboration and supportive community.  Community building and connection are at the core of enabling sustainable and lasting change. Peer communities help us in our practices and enable us to engage with the unknown in more courageous and resourceful ways. With the support and encouragement of our peers, we feel accompanied, seen and validated in our work; and we grow in our relational capacities and in our ability to hold multiple perspectives. 

And so, Nurturing the Fields of Change was born, and will be launched in February 2023 as a community and programme that responds to the needs of our day, co-creating resources and relational structures that help strengthen our individual and collective change agency and that empower us to prepare the soil and sow seeds for change, wherever we are based in the world. We are grateful to have received further funding which has enabled us to develop its infrastructure and significantly subsidise programme costs this year.  

If you decide to join this community, your experiences and insights will contribute to the collective tapestry that we intend to weave between us.  We look forward to sharing the journey. 

The Alef Team

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Nurturing the Fields of Change is a living programme and oasis of practice for effective change agents in today’s world. It will be held entirely online and is hosted on Sutra, an online community platform which shares the values and ethos of Alef Trust. 

The programme will unfold over a year-long cycle from February to December 2023. It features a structure of nested circles, with the outer circle being accessible to the largest number of people. This outer circle includes a monthly programme of topical presentations and dialogues, which will grow into an evolving library of digital resources to which you will have ongoing access. The inner circles focus on accompaniment in smaller groups, resourcing you more substantially with facilitated reflective meetings, case clinics, one-to-one coaching, and theoretical and experiential content explored in greater depth. 

What we are offering here is not a conventional training programme. Whilst we will be exploring many ideas, theories, models, and practices in this programme, when it comes to the big questions of our time, no one map or model reflects the complexity of the challenges and uncertainties we are navigating. What we intend to do together may be best described as collaborative sense-making, relational deepening, and playful remembering, releasing into the present moment, making space for emergence, and honouring the sacred by following the promptings of the deeper sources that animate and enliven us. 

Essentially, we are seeking to co-create an inquiry community with you. This means that we are not assuming that we, the facilitators of this programme, hold all the answers. Instead, we pledge to create safe spaces for deep attunement, so that we can together honour the edges of our knowledge and live the questions that call to us. 

“We do not think ourselves into new ways of living, we live ourselves into new ways of thinking.”
(Rohr, 1999)

Our multi-disciplinary and international team of practitioners and researchers look forward to this shared learning journey. Together we are co-creating the community that will resource and support us as we work on holistic change around the globe. 

Dr. Jessica Bockler is an applied transdisciplinary artist and transpersonal psychologist specialising in embodied approaches to accessing creativity and imagination. She is a co-founding director of Alef Trust, and teaches across a range of courses in integral psychology, creativity & transformation, research design, and applied transformative psychology, bringing spiritual perspectives to activism and social change. Jessica’s research interests converge on the intersection between inner work and holistic approaches to social change. She believes that working with the deeper streams of consciousness, tapping collective unconscious domains, is critical to enabling human beings to come into a more holistic and wholesome relationship with nature and earth. Jessica is on the academic advisory board of the Inner Development Goals initiative, and contributes to the UN’s Conscious Food Systems Alliance. She is also an active member in the global research network of the Presencing Institute.

Luka Bönisch is a writer, artist, transpersonal coach, and graduate of the Transpersonal Coaching Psychology Professional Certificate with Alef Trust. After many years of studying various schools of spirituality, philosophy, and psychology, and extensive inner exploration, he finds joy in assisting others on their individual journeys. You can find out more about his work on his website www.mindfulled.com

 

Lorraine Clewer is a transpersonally oriented therapist, activist and researcher based in Mexico City. She offers integral therapeutic accompaniment to individuals and groups wishing to heal, grow and transform from trauma, conflict and distress. She draws upon extensive training in psychodynamic psychotherapy, dance and body oriented psychotherapy, and trauma informed yoga therapy, as well as decades of experience accompanying social justice movements around the world, to tailor approaches that honour people’s struggles, and create space in which transformational processes can unfold. In addition to her professional qualifications, she holds an MSc in Consciousness, Spirituality and Transpersonal Psychology, and an MPhil in Development Studies.      

Jevon Dangeli is a transpersonal coach and co-founder of the Live Foundation – a non-profit whose mission is to create opportunities for positive change by providing free education and empowering resources to those who contribute their time and energy to humanitarian aid or environmental sustainability. He established the Open Awareness for Change Initiative in February 2020. The initiative involves providing groups with a practical system whereby they can harness their collective consciousness and combined creativity with the aim to address health or safety concerns, social problems, or environmental issues in their community or globally. As a project mentor on Alef Trust’s Conscious Community Initiative, his core intention is to support the project’s overarching aim – to build a global community of holistic change-makers who nurture individual and systemic transformation.

Jules De Vitto has a BSc in Psychology, MA in Education and MSc in Transpersonal Psychology, Consciousness and Spirituality. She is an accredited and certified Transpersonal Coach, Authentic-Self-Empowerment Facilitator, as well as an experienced teacher and educator. She is the founder of Highly Sensitive Humans – an online community that offers courses, coaching, articles and a podcast for Highly Sensitive People. She helps those who identify with the traits of high sensitivity to navigate emotional overwhelm, step into their authentic power and align with their true purpose in life. She is a published author who wrote Resilience: Navigating Loss in a Time of Crisis which provides practical resources to cultivate greater resilience and find greater meaning and purpose through times of crisis. She has published her research in the peer-reviewed journal Consciousness, Spirituality & Transpersonal Psychology.

Dr. Kendra Diaz-Ford is a transpersonal psychologist, Ayurvedic Wellness Coach and yoga teacher.  She earned her PhD in Transpersonal Psychology from Sofia University (formerly the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology) with specializations in Education and Research, Spiritual Guidance and Women’s Spirituality, and has taught in the field of transpersonal psychology for 10 years. She serves as Academic Programme Leader for the Alef Trust. Her practice and research focuses on women’s psychospiritual development, Ayurvedic rituals, practices and ways of daily living, integrative theory and the intersections of transpersonal psychology with spiritualized feminism.

Dr. Simon Divecha has two decades of experience leading and co-leading initiatives for beneficial change. This is particularly around connecting our lives, work sectors—businesses, universities, NGOs—and the dynamics between our inner and outer worlds. Practically, he particularly works both with individuals and catalysing large coalitions of (often unlikely) partners to see and enable alternative futures. This has included advocacy programs for international NGOs (such as Greenpeace), changing international law and, in facilitating sustainable models for businesses. In tandem with that he co-hosts and/or curates transformational programs. Simon’s fascination with the paradoxes inherent in this work catalysed interest in holistic approaches and a PhD. He is the co-creator of (be) Benevolution, faculty for Pacific Integral, an Associate Editor of the Action Research Journal.

Dr. Hennie Geldenhuys is a medical doctor, clinical researcher, academic, transpersonal coach and trainer, and a curious human. He has a passion for integrating his experience in the healing arts with the applied transpersonal perspective to coaching and psychology. Hennie specializes in mind-body-spirit integration, integrative health and wellness, applied ethics, and mindfulness-based balanced living. He teaches on the Integrative Medicine and Transpersonal Coaching Psychology courses at Alef Trust. He lives in the Western Cape, South Africa, nestled amongst the mountains, with his family, cats and dogs.

 

Francesca Hector is coordinator of the Conscious Community Initiative and Alef Trust community. She has an MSc in Consciousness, Spirituality, and Transpersonal Psychology and MA (Hons) in English Literature and Italian. As editor of the Alef Field digital magazine and editorial assistant of Alef Trust’s peer reviewed research journal she supports the infrastructures and processes that allow the vital work of members within the Alef community to ripple out into the wider world.  She has a background in holistic transformation and kundalini yoga, and is interested in developing participatory and holistic approaches to personal and social transformation, through multidisciplinary research and embodied living experience. 

Ayesha Iftikhar is a clinical psychologist and integrative psychotherapist based in Lahore, Pakistan. She has trained counselling students and facilitated process groups, as well as contributed to and presented research on social narratives on intolerance, otherization and advocacy. Her focus now includes bringing the transpersonal perspective and creative process to change work, especially with other mental health workers, teachers, activists and those who serve the wider community.

 

Tabitha Jayne is the Founding Director of Earthself, a Community Interest Company that works with teams and organisations, people and communities to put Earth at the heart of business. A Transpersonal coaching psychologist and Professional Certified Coach (PCC) with the International Coach Federation (ICF), Tabitha has coached leaders and teams from social enterprises, start-ups, small businesses, corporate and non-profit organisations. She has also trained 100+ coaches in how to coach with nature and Earth through her signature EarthConnected Coaching approach. Tabitha is currently Interim CEO of Net Zero Nation, which focuses on mobilising SMEs on their Net Zero journey.

Victor Jivanescu is a peak experience integration coach, a teacher of integrative practice and facilitator of transformative events. He is a former strategy consultant with a keen interest and published research in psychedelic transformation and integration. He initially studied philosophy at Oxford University and more recently he graduated with a MSc degree from Alef Trust, focusing on consciousness studies and transpersonal psychology. Victor’s psychedelic integration journey led him towards earning certifications in hatha yoga, as well as participating in meditation retreats and engaging in a sustained personal practice of breathwork techniques. His commitment to making consciousness studies and integrative practice more widespread determined him to co-found an NGO dedicated to this mission in Romania in 2017.

Sean Khaya Andrew is brought into his work through the potential of dialogue and unearthing ways of organizing that support connection, learning, and action. His practice focuses on designing, hosting, and facilitating transformative conflict, action-inquiry, nature-based culture regeneration and collaborative governance processes that are in service of people working on their most complex insidious questions. Through a relationship and principles-based approach, he’s continuously exploring different perspectives and possibilities that guide us into deepening and expanding our individual and collective worldviews, creating questions that incite imaginative feasible action and together deciding what our next most graceful step might be as a present expression and seed for the future world we yearn to work, play and live into.

Dan McTiernan
Dan works with clients to facilitate growth, connection and healing at the fertile edge between transpersonal psychology, embodied meditation and permaculture. His unique background in deep ecology literacy and permaculture practice combined with training as a certified transpersonal psychology coach and embodied meditation teacher allows for a truly holistic framework of inner and outer process work. His focus is to help clients recognise their felt sense of aliveness and in doing so to recognise their true nature as a deeply grounded presence and their connectedness with all of Life as life itself. He is co-founder of www.earthbound.fi

Christine Miskelly
After retiring from a career teaching psychology in schools Christine studied Consciousness and Transpersonal Psychology with the Alef Trust.  More recently she has qualified as a Transpersonal Coach and has a private practice with a particular interest in the challenges of later life. She is also actively involved with her local hospice being on the chaplaincy team and also supporting the bereaved. Her great joy is playing the piano and singing in a number of choirs. 

 

Dr. Lila Moore is a transdisciplinary artist and theorist with expertise in the fields of technoetics, screen-dance, film, fine art, mysticism, contemporary spirituality, Jungian, feminist and cultural theories, and movement-based therapies. She holds a PhD in Dance on Screen (Middlesex University), MA in film (Central Saint Martins), Posdoc in Technoetics and Cybernetics (Planetary Collegium) and her writings were published in academic journals. She is a lecturer and dissertation supervisor for the Alef Trust and recipient of the Outstanding Lecturer Award (Department of Mysticism and Spirituality, Zefat Academic College). Moore’s films and artworks are archived by SIGGRAPH and Archive of Digital Art. 

Hazel Mutch is an integrative psychotherapist, artist, and creative facilitator based in Lancashire, UK. She is an artist/facilitator for the arts on prescription program, Creative Alternatives; an applied strand of the Alef Trust. She specialises in the uses of poetry, story, and images for contact with body, mind, and soul, and facilitates creative sessions in nature. Hazel is trained in Internal Family Systems, which is a deeply compassionate psychospiritual approach. It informs her therapy and facilitation and provides a model for wholehearted communication.

 

Nargis Raza has lived and worked in Dubai since 1975. She started her transpersonal journey at the age of sixteen when a near death experience opened her perception to a larger consciousness. She is a graduate of the MSc programme in Consciousness and Transpersonal Psychology at Liverpool John Moore’s University, UK, and has also studied at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology (now Sofia University), in California, USA. Her early interests in mindfulness and meditation have expanded through the years to include group work in areas such as freeing the feminine spirit and body & mind harmony.

 

Paula Staunton is a dancer, educator, activist and events organiser. She is a director of the Earth Moves Cooperative. Her roles include creative direction, volunteer coordination and workshop facilitation. She is also instrumental in growing plants in the community growing spaces and sharing/learning permaculture information/practice. Paula has an MSc in Consciousness, Spirituality and Transpersonal Psychology from Alef Trust and Middlesex University and a BA in Psychology and Women’s Studies from Liverpool John Moore’s University. She has taught psychology and related subjects for Liverpool and Wirral adult learning and other community/adult education organisations since 1999. Her work has been published in various journals. Paula has run a dance business since 1998. As ‘Ishtar’ she has presented dance in therapeutic, entertainment, educational, team-building and digital contexts.

Adi Vickers is a holistic educator. She co-founded Asana, an international language school, in 1993, and has been teaching, teacher training, and designing curricula for the past 32 years in Ireland, Italy, Spain, Laos and India. She is passionate about transformative, whole-person, arts and nature based learning for young people from all over the world. She is currently in the process of opening up the school to teenagers in the local community who are floundering in mainstream education and in need of a more holistic approach to learning. Although she enjoys being part of the Asana and local Cahersiveen community, she feels that the time has come to share her Asana experience with mainstream educators in Ireland, Europe and the wider world. She is currently doing a PhD in applied transpersonal psychology in order to document and evaluate, in a rigorous, evidence based way, the impact of a type of education informed by transpersonal and integral perspectives. 

Through this evolving programme and community we aim to nurture between us the fields for paradigm change, honouring our deeper nature and embeddedness in the world, and galvanising our action potential by developing conscious, integrative, full-spectrum responses to our perceived predicaments and visions.

We approach holistic change facilitation with the awareness that our deepest inner nature is embedded in nature at large. Therefore, the core content of this programme is built around transpersonal, depth-psychological and ecological principles. Throughout our time together, we will attune to natural patterns and rhythms and listen to our intuitive, emotional, somatic, and vital intelligences and what they invite us to do or undo…

Immersion in the natural cycles and seasons of holistic change

  • Autumn: Attune and plan.  We commence our journey in the autumn, engaging in integrative planning and self-inquiry, preparing the soil. We will attune to our contexts and consider the structures and containers that may be most conducive for coherent processes to unfold. We will explore the individual and collective realities of the terrain in which we are working. From here, we will cultivate integrative practice, attending to the multidimensionality of ourselves and of our work. We will access and work with our deep imagination and explore nature design principles for project planning. We will explore the ethics of holistic approaches to change facilitation and consider what we need for our community and sense of connection, so we can feel safe and supported in our co-created online spaces.
  • Winter: Pause and incubate. Winter prompts us to go inward and listen deeply to our multiple intelligences, honouring their voices and developmental impulses. We will sense into the challenges and obstacles that are present, within and beyond us. We will listen deeply to the underlying narratives of separation and individualism that are rooted in our Western culture and contemporary consciousness. And we will enter a shared dreaming process, noticing the new archetypal stories that want to emerge through us, honouring our interbeing and the sacred sources that shape our lives. Intuitions may gestate and more subtle information may come to the fore. As our awareness deepens, we calibrate our pacing, and continue to build feedback loops into practice planning and delivery. We will open to the healing field of self-regulation that is inherent in nature. And we will practise deep relating, to help us grow as a conscious community. 
  • Spring: Notice what grows.  In the spring of our shared journey, we will immerse ourselves in diverse aspects of change facilitation. We will consider what is needed for holistic change facilitation to be most meaningful and valuable in any given context, considering systems sensing and conscious stake-holder engagement alongside facilitator capacities and practice ethics.
    We will explore holistic change as a multidimensional evolutionary expression of our deeper human potential and participation in local and global ecosystems. We will consider both the flourishing and challenges encountered through projects and approaches from around the world. We will refine our approaches to participatory engagement with all stakeholders, meeting people on their terms, appreciating their perspectives and understanding their ways of being and doing.
  • Summer: Appreciate what is flowering. Harvest & celebrate. The summer brings our journey to its culmination. We will celebrate its fruits and reflect on what has not taken root and grown. We will explore transpersonal and participatory approaches to research, considering the ethics and conundrums that evaluation presents us with, in a world that is overly identified with reductive measurement and quantification. Together, we will apply the art of visionary storytelling that can help inspire new ways of being and doing. We will explore metaphors, poetry and the arts as vehicles for sharing visions, and we’ll examine how to understand and relate to audiences from all walks of life. Lastly, we will calibrate our intentions and start to prepare the soil for the next cycle.
  • emerges through Earth-based wisdom, and is rooted in integral and transpersonal frameworks;
  • combines interactive presentations and dialogues with opportunities for personal reflection and integrative development;
  • engages in inner work to evolve our capacities and skills for outer action;
  • embraces a whole-person and whole-systems approach to human development and societal transformation;
  • offers personal accompaniment and coaching alongside theoretical and practical training;
  • supports networking and transdisciplinary practitioner dialogues;
  • honours the different backgrounds and experiences, different paths and stages on the path of all participants. 
  • You are interested in the principles and practices of holistic change facilitation. 
  • You want to explore psycho-spiritual development in service of outer (systemic and social) change. 
  • You may be a practitioner, researcher, writer, teacher, or activist with experience in fields relating to change facilitation, such as education and coaching, health and wellbeing, sustainability, peace-building and humanitarian efforts, international development, and/or systems change. 
  • You may or may not already have experience in inner development and integral or spiritual practice. 
  • You want to participate in leading edge and intimate dialogues in a safe and respectful container.
  • In summary, the programme is open to all who feel called to contribute to collective transformation and paradigm change. You will be able to apply the programme offers and arising insights to any field of work. 

Which circle do you feel most called to join?

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Participate in topical presentations, join conversations, and feel inspired by different perspectives and ideas. We will be holding 10 interactive sessions, exploring the principles and practice of holistic change facilitation with Jessica Bockler, Francesca Hector and project leaders from the previous cycles of Alef Trust’s Conscious Community initiative

All sessions 14:00-15:30 UK time (GMT: Feb-Mar & Nov-Dec /BST: Apr-Oct)  

6th Feb What is holistic system change and how is it nurtured?

6th Mar Holistic change and its seasonal cycles
With Paula Staunton: Transforming land, transforming people

3rd Apr Engaging with deeper sources and listen to emergence 

1st May Archetypal work and social change
With Ayesha Iftikhar: Journey to the self: Taking care of the care-takers 

5th Jun How are mind, heart, body and spirit engaged in our work?
With Adi Vickers: Integrative practice for the heart-centred teacher

3rd Jul Structural and relational considerations

4th Sep How do we experience and approach the challenges we encounter?
With Lorraine Clewer: Yoga therapy with labour rights activists

2nd Oct Activating leverage points for change
With Tabitha Jayne: Developing an Earth-connected facilitation process

6th Nov How do we inspire coherent action for transformational outcomes?

4th Dec Community meeting, feedback, reflections

Registration fee: voluntary donation (fully subsidised)

Join a reflective circle, cultivate connections and resonances

Access to the Widening Perspectives circle, plus:

  • Programme of 10 “fireside conversations” hosted by Jessica Bockler, with people deeply immersed in exploring the growing edges of change facilitation. 

13th Feb, 17:00-19:00 GMT.  David Nicol – Subtle Activism: Creating the energetic foundations of the emerging era

8th Mar, 16:00-18:00 GMT.  Patricia A. Wilson and Paméla Overeynder – Engaging community:
Stories and practices for awareness-based change 

14th Apr, 16:00-18:00 BST. Daniel Schimmelpfennig – Creative chaos lab

20th Jun, 15:00-17:00 BST. Dave Pendle – Imagination, spirituality and social change

5th July, 15:00-17:00 BST. Karen Liebenguth & Alister Scott – Ethical facilitation & leadership

19th Sept, 14:00-16:00 BST. Eva Pomeroy – The social field: Exploring the quality of our collective being

19th Oct, 15:00-17:00 BST. (tbc) Anton Baaré – Human insecurities & conflict resolution

15th Nov 16:00-18:00 GMT. Cassandra Vieten – Gamechangers for changemakers

13th Dec 16:00-18:00 GMT. Cassandra Vieten – What kind of changemaker are you?  

(Session details and facilitator bios below.)

  • 10 Facilitated reflective circles: With a maximum of 15 people, groups will meet monthly, from February to December, enabling more intimate continued reflections on the issues and perspectives explored in our programme of monthly webinars and fireside conversations. 
  • General discussion forum, serving ongoing peer dialogue.

Reflective circles schedule 2023:
First Monday of the month: 6 Feb, 6 March, 3 April, 1 May, 5 June, 3 July, 4 Sep, 2 Oct, 6 Nov,  4 Dec 15:30-17:00 UK time

Registration + fees: £250 (low income), £350 (moderate) £450 (high) per year (partially subsidised)

____________________________________________

Tier 2: Session details & Facilitator bios:

13 February, 17:00-19:00 GMT
David Nicol: Subtle Activism: Creating the Energetic Foundations of the Emerging Era

At a time of such extreme polarization and bewildering change, how can we participate in the healing of our world without feeding the cycle of reactivity? Subtle activism explores the creative application of spiritual practices like meditation, prayer, and ritual for social and planetary transformation. It invites us to imagine new forms of spiritual expression that straddle the private and public spheres as a way to offer a more profound holding for the complex wounds that are rising to the surface as we transition to a new era. In particular, it seeks to nurture the rising potential of our collective spiritual intelligence to meet the challenges of our times with wisdom and courage.

David T. Nicol, PhD, is the co-founder (with his wife Kate Naga) of EarthRising (http://earthrising.one), an emerging global community dedicated to seeding the new Earth through harnessing the power of coherent group consciousness for personal and planetary healing. He is the author of Subtle Activism: The Inner Dimension of Social and Planetary Transformation (SUNY Press), the first comprehensive study of the idea that focused collective meditation can contribute powerfully and measurably to social change. He is the director and co-founder of the Gaiafield Project, and co-founder of BeThePeace and WiseUSA, initiatives that have united tens of thousands of people worldwide for large-scale meditations dedicated to social change. David has taught on Subtle Activism at the California Institute of Integral Studies and The Shift Network.  He is also a professional astrologer (https://www.earthrising.one/) and writes a regular column on Substack called Geistic Musing. David, an Australian by birth, now lives in North California with his wife Kate and dog Peaches. 

8 March, 16:00-18:00 GMT
Patricia A. Wilson and Paméla Overeynder
Engaging Community: Stories and Practices for Awareness-Based Change 

Patricia shares practitioner stories, especially from the Global South, illustrating the inner and outer practice of awareness-based whole-systems change. Paméla interweaves experiential practices to attune to that pulsing systemic wholeness. They conclude with key patterns of generative practice and offer a personal credo for the participatory change agent.

Patricia A. Wilson, professor emerita from the University of Texas in Community and Regional Planning, holds a BA from Stanford and a Ph.D. from Cornell.  Her interests evolved over four decades from economic development and inequality to community engagement and the phenomenology of practice.  Her action research in community-based change processes has included Latin America, South Africa, India, and Hispanic neighborhoods in the U.S.  Her latest book, The Art of Community Engagement:  Practitioner Stories from Across the Globe (Routledge), won the 2020 Hamilton Book Award for best textbook.  Dr. Wilson currently serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Awareness-Based Systems Change.

Paméla Overeynder is a biodynamic craniosacral therapist with 30 years in the healing field facilitating human transformation. She received lay ordination in the Order of Interbeing in 1996 from Zen Buddhist Master Thich Nhat Hanh and co-founded Plum Blossom Sangha, a mindfulness community in Austin, Texas.  Paméla is currently an ordained minister in the Inayatiyya Sufi Order International and the center leader of the Inayatiyya Sufi community in Austin.  For many years she has taught meditation classes, led chanting circles, and guided meditations.  She offers core teachings in the esoteric school, serves as a guide and spiritual mentor, and facilitates individual and group spiritual retreats. 

14 April, 16:00-18:00 BST
Daniel Schimmelpfennig: Creative Chaos Lab

A Creative Chaos Lab is where “choice” is left to chance. “Chance” is not the absence of selection but rather the intrusion of a different order of selection. Meanwhile, “chaos” is not the absence of order but rather highly complex information. We are thus seriously gaming with an epistemological therapy to think in possibilities and potentialities. In other words, we explore what anticipation for futures and anticipation for emergence imply and how we can approximate what synthesis and paradox could mean. We investigate strange synchronicities together and ask ourselves what contains secret truths that are downright dangerous for the mind, so we can no longer remain in prior fiction.

Daniel Schimmelpfennig has a background in Psychiatry, has studied International Business & Management in Amsterdam and Moscow, Futures Studies in Finland, and Space Studies at the International Space University in Strasbourg, France. His work is situated in the multitemporal context of urgency, necessity, and emergency.

20 June, 15:00-17:00 BST
Dave Pendle: Imagination, Spirituality and Social Change

Holistic facilitation emphasizes the integration and importance of the first person perspective, as central to the transformation process in all its dimensions. This necessitates a keen sense of the multi-perspectival aspects of the Self and the heart with its twin impulses towards Being and Becoming. Critical to the future facilitation of Social Change is an undimmed sense of possibility and potential, a deep trust in the life process, combined with a keen attunement to the emerging future, plus a nascent sense of unprecedented and unimaginable possibility. Aspiring practitioners thus develop the capacities and become open to cultivate, the conditions whereby the full health, vitality and thrivability of the systems where they are situated becomes more likely.

Dave Pendle spent 30 years in the UK non-profit sector enabling socially excluded young adults and youths make strides on their journey towards independence. In parallel, for eighteen of those years, he undertook an immense amount of spiritual exploration, including more than 10,000 hours of mindfulness, spiritual enquiry and meditation practice. Currently resident in the Netherlands, he has now founded a business Generative You designing offerings in order to Upgrade the Nature of Leadership. He is currently running an innovative collective enquiry series titled Phenomenal Conversations and a series of Generative Leadership Masterclasses.

5 July, 15:00-17:00 BST 
Karen Liebenguth & Alister Scott: Ethical Facilitation & Leadership

How do we know that we lead and facilitate ethically? We believe that ethics are a practice. It’s about knowing our deepest values that guide our actions of thinking, communicating and behaving. In this session we’ll explore what ethical leadership means, how we can practice it, model it and bring it into our work with groups.

Karen Liebenguth is a leadership coach and mindfulness trainer. She works with clients in natural settings creating time and space to reflect on their purpose and values, their inner life (feelings, fixed beliefs, biases, impulses), actions, mind-set and attitude towards themselves and others. In 2020 she co-founded Parcival – an ethical leadership programme.

Alister Scott is a leadership advisor and systemic coach. He is the co-Founder of the Compassion Practices Collective and a co-Director of the Global Rewilding Alliance. He is also the co-author of the acclaimed Little Book of Making Big Change Happen. Alister has supported the leadership of nearly 20 founders and their successors in extraordinary organisations.

19 September, 14:00-16:00 BST 
Eva Pomeroy: Social Fields: Exploring the Quality of Our Collective Being

We can think of the social field as the space between us. The quality of that space has a tremendous impact on our lived experience and we also possess significant agency to shape it. In this session, we engage in contemplative exercises and dialogue to connect with our knowing of the social field.

Eva Pomeroy is Research Lead at the Presencing Institute and Affiliate Faculty in the Department of Applied Human Sciences, Concordia University, Canada. Eva is Co-Founder and Managing Editor of the Journal of Awareness-Based Systems Change. Her work focuses on the social field as a key leverage point for transformative change.

 19 October, 15:00-17:00 GMT (tbc) 
Anton Baaré: Human Insecurities & Conflict Resolution

 15 November, 16:00-18:00 GMT
Cassandra Vieten: Gamechangers for Changemakers

As a changemaker you might be engaging in strategies that are counterproductive to what you are trying to achieve. Learn what social, cognitive and neuroscience tells us about what does and doesn’t work to win hearts and minds.

13 December, 16:00-18:00 GMT
Cassandra Vieten: What Kind of Changemaker Are You?

We each have our strengths and challenges when it comes to our work as changemakers. Explore what your innate strengths are, how to emphasize them, and how to develop presence, purpose and power in your communications and actions.

Cassandra Vieten is Director of the Center for Mindfulness, and Director of Research at the Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination, both at the University of California, San Diego. She is also a Senior Advisor at the John W. Brick Foundation, Director of Research and and a Senior Fellow at the Institute of Noetic Sciences, where she served as President from 2013-2019. Her research has focused on spirituality and health, transformative experiences and practices, the development of mindfulness-based interventions for emotional well-being, development of media technologies to inspire awe, and social, cognitive and neuroscience of effective changemaking. She received her Ph.D. in clinical psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies, and completed her research training in behavioral genetics at UC San Francisco. She has authored three books, published numerous articles in scientific journals, and is an internationally recognized keynote speaker and workshop leader.

 

Join the imaginal core: Develop your capacity for holistic change facilitation through personal integrative practice and in-depth accompaniment in a 4-module holistic change facilitation course

  • Access to the Widening Perspectives and Deepening Reflections circles, plus:
  • Integrative Practice quest: Establish and evolve a personalised integrative practice programme throughout the year, taking care of your emotional, relational, spiritual, intellectual, and vital intelligences and needs. Deepen your multidimensional awareness and somatic processing via a range of creative, embodied, relational, and spiritual practices. We will support your Integrative Practice through:
    • An introductory module: Featuring guidance on integrative planning and practice through readings and audio-visual resources, and 2 webinars (recorded), exploring the principles of integrative practice.
    • 10 facilitated meetings of your Integrative Practice circle: With a maximum of 15 people, groups will meet monthly, from February to December, to attend to the nurturing of integrative capacities. Your circle will be managed by one of our Integral Practice mentors. 
    • A facilitated Integrative Practice forum: Here you can share your initial practice pledges, receive feedback, and periodically check in and report on your practice as the year unfolds. The forum will be managed by one of our Integral Practice mentors.
    • 5 one-to-one coaching sessions with an Alef Trust qualified transpersonal coach, who will support you to develop a more expansive and interconnected sense of self and help you to access the necessary resources that may aid the attainment of your fullest potential and performance.
  • Seasons of Holistic Change: A 4-module experiential course, exploring the cyclical dimensions of holistic change facilitation. 

Module 1: Autumn – Integrative Practice

Our Integrative Practice quest is the first module of the training course. The cultivation of inner skills and capacities is  inextricably related to how we can be of service in the world and model and embody the very change we want to see around us. Moreover, an integrative perspective helps us honour all dimensions of our being and our work – the inner and outer, the individual and the collective. Therefore, we place integrative practice at the heart of the holistic change facilitation quest. This module features guidance on integrative planning and practice through readings and audio-visual resources, several webinars (recorded) that will explore the principles of integrative practice, a year-long facilitated integrative practice circle, a written forum, and 5 one-to-one coaching sessions – as detailed above.

Module 2: Winter – Deep imagination

Dreaming while awake, this module explores imaginal and embodied practices for envisioning and enacting change. Our practices will be rooted in principles emerging from quantum physics, social field theory, transpersonal theory, and quantum social science, inviting us to explore concepts of self and self-agency. We will sense into the daily narratives that inform our actions and ways of being, and what archetypal stories are calling for our fuller attention and enactment. This module includes reading resources, guided activities, a facilitated forum and several sessions blending theory and praxis, exploring the value of imaginal play in holistic change facilitation.

Module 3: Spring – Participatory facilitation

This module will consider essential attitudes and capacities that enable holistic change facilitation in any given context. We will explore systems sensing and conscious stake-holder engagement alongside practice ethics. The module includes reading resources, guided activities, a facilitated forum and several webinars. This module also includes case clinics. Case clinics are held to address work and practice related issues experienced by the members of the programme. You will be invited to register your interest in bringing a case at various times of the programme.

Module 4: Summer – Visionary storytelling & evaluating holistic change

The summer module explores how we share our work with the wider world, finding common ground through shared values and igniting new visions for holistic praxis. Together, we will apply the art of visionary storytelling that can help inspire new ways of being and doing. We will also consider how holistic change can be evaluated, drawing on transpersonal and participatory approaches to research. We will explore how to navigate narratives of commissioners and funding bodies that are overly identified with reductive measurement and quantification. Lastly, we will calibrate our intentions and start to prepare the soil for the next cycle of our work. The module includes reading resources, guided activities, a facilitated forum and several webinars. This module also includes further case clinics. Case clinics are held to address work and practice related issues experienced by the members of the programme. You will be invited to register your interest in bringing a case at various times of the programme.

All webinar and case clinic dates to be announced.

Celebratory gathering of the programme community: December 2023.

All live taught webinars & practice sessions featured on the 4-module course will be recorded and the recordings will be made available to registered participants.

Schedule 2023

Reflective circles:
First Monday of the month: 6 Feb, 6 March, 3 April, 1 May, 5 June, 3 July, 4 Sep, 2 Oct, 6 Nov, 15:30-17:00 UK time

Monthly Integrative Practice circle meeting:
Last Monday of the month: 27 Feb, 27 March, 24 April, 29 May, 26 June, 24 July, 25 Sept, 30 Oct, 27 Nov, 17:00-18:30 UK time

Seasons of Holistic Change: A 4-module experiential course. Webinars:
Module 1: Wednesdays, 8 Feb, 22 Feb, 15 March, 17:00-18:30 UK time
Module 2: Wednesdays, 29 March, 12 April, 26 April, 10 May, 24 May, 17:00-18:30 UK time
Module 3:  Wednesdays, 14 & 28 June, 12 & 26 July, 13 & (27 Sept), 17:00-18:30 UK time
Module 4: Wednesdays, (27 Sept), 11 Oct, 25 Oct, 8 Nov, 22 Nov, 6 Dec, 17:00-18:30 UK time

Registration fee: £2,000 (low income); £2500 (medium income); £3,000 (high income). (All fee levels are partially subsidised.) Partial scholarships are available for those experiencing financial hardship. 

Certification: Participants who fulfil the participation requirements will receive a Certificate of Participation in Holistic Change Facilitation from Alef Trust.

 

Find out more

Tier 1

Tier 2

Tier 3

Application

If you are interested in joining Nurturing the Fields of Change you’ll find registration and further information here. Places are limited, so do send your application as soon as possible! 

We will be happy to respond to any further questions through our general enquiry form. 

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