Two-Year Karuna Training
Objectives
* Learning basic mindfulness-awareness in the context of working with oneself and working with others.
* Recognizing aspects of intrinsic sanity in oneself and others as a starting point for healing.
* Learning to use Body-Speech-Mind practice as a tool in one’s own personal process and as a means to help others.
* Working with emotions in terms of confusion and sanity.
* Exploring elemental and emotional energies through Maitri-Space-Awareness Practice. This is a gateway to understanding
how confusion transforms into wisdom.
* Applying compassionate exchange when working with clients.
Overview of the Contents of Weekends and Deepening Weeks
The Training consists of:
> 2 Long Weekends from Thursday (dinner time) till Sunday (lunch time)
> 5 Weekends from Friday 7:30 p.m. till Sunday 5:00 p.m.
> 3 Deepening Weeks from Friday (dinner time) till next Friday (lunch time)
Note: In 2015 there will not be a Karuna Training. We probably start a new 2-year Karuna Training again in 2016.
- Long Weekend Establishing Trust in Inherent Sanity
The main focus is on the practice of meditation and working with mindfulness. Other themes with respect to content are suffering, impermanence, and egolessness. An introduction into Body-Speech-Mind Practice and Speaking the Microscopic Truth. Regional groups are formed and we learn to know our Karuna Community better.
Note: Regional Groups aim at working with some skills (Body-Speech-Mind Practice, and later, Compassionate Exchange) , and to studying literature together. De meetings of the regional groups will be planned by the participants themselves.
- Weekend Ego in Contemplative Psychology
We see how we create confusion in our lives and notice that suffering is also created because nothing in our world remains as it is now. We experience that we are more connected with each other than we might think. Ego evolves and is maintained as a means to control the changeability of existence. We explore the mechanisms underlying ego.
- Weekend Emotions as Path
By experiencing confusion as a part of our existence, we are able to see how emotions affect our lives. We see how emotions are structured and how they change. We learn to work with them with awareness.
- Weekend Creating Environments of Sanity
The outer as well as the inner environment have an obvious impact on us. Or as Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche put it: Whatever is in the room, that’s your mind. We explore various aspects of our environment and see how we can make our environment sane.
- Deepening Week Maitri and the Elemental Display of Energy
Introduction into the meditation practice of Maitri Space Awareness. This practice is possible because we work from our familiarity with mindfulness-awareness meditation. We work with the Five Elements and the Five Buddha Families and learn to experience them inside and outside ourselves.
- Weekend The Heart is a Powerful Healer
Through our meditation practice we are able to open ourselves to others. We open up to the signals that others give, either verbal or non-verbal, and experience that there is no fundamental difference between oneself and other. This the starting point for Compassionate Exchange.
- Deepening Week Exchange in the Five Families
Further exploration of the Five Buddha Families enhances the understanding of confusion and wisdom in the display of energies. In this way we enhance our ability to work with our emotions. We utilize this
understanding in Compassionate Exchange.
- Weekend Compassionate Exchange in Four Phases
Compassionate exchange is placed within the context of a four-phase procedure. This prepares participants for the project, a series of five sessions of compassionate exchange that every participant needs to do with someone outside the Karuna Community in order to graduate. Experiences
are shared in the regional groups. Every participant is entitled to one hour of supervision from a member of staff.
Note: The project consists of conducting five compassionate exchange meetings with somebody outside the Karuna group. How to do it will be discussed during the next weekend. The project will be supervised by the staff. Exchange of experiences will happen during regional group meetings.
- Weekend Defining the Project
In this weekend we prepare for our project in regional groups with the help of co-trainers.
- Deepening Week Brilliant Sanity Dawns
This deepening week is dedicated to the intensification of the Buddha Family energies. Through these experiences we are able to discover moments of brilliant sanity within ourselves and others. We see that we can trust brilliant sanity and this enriches our Compassionate Exchange.
We are also informed about the advanced training.
- Long Weekend Celebrating Brilliant Sanity
During this weekend all the participants give a presentation of their journey and in this way we end our training in a celebratory way.
Regional groups
Regional Groups meet in between weekends and deepening weeks in order to provide continuity.
