Many scholars, cultures, and spiritual leaders attribute the outwardly disparate challenges of our time to the seemingly ubiquitous and unconscious logic of separation. This paradigmatic logic or belief can permeate the ideas about who we are and how we should live and thus manifests in the actions and behaviours we take in life, whether at home, work, or in our communities.
This belief can also manifest dissections within us as individuals. Outwardly, our professional lives might be distinct and different from our personal beliefs. We may act with our heads, when our hearts and intuition may be telling us otherwise. These dissections are reinforced by societal structures. Many scholars have critiqued how the academe values only the mental intellect, and disregards or subjugates the deep intuitive wisdom within. Some transformative learning scholars refer to this deep intuitive wisdom as a soul knowing, or a spirit knowing. To transcend this paradigmatic logic of separation, this workshop will attempt to be an experience of reconnecting with our individual parts. To begin, we will be getting out of our heads and back into our hearts. Through dialogue together, we will attempt an experience of reconnecting heart, soul, spirit, and physical bodies with the head. We will explore how judgments and conditions may influence the way you feel and how to clear these barriers, blockages, and undesirable feelings. Once in our hearts, we can connect with, and become more accepting of, our intuitive abilities. The workshop will offer a safe space to be vulnerable and authentic, both necessary for this self-work.
We agree with the many contributors at this conference who recognise that inner transformation is a necessary precursor or corollary for outer transformation, and the dialogue we are offering is one thread to this diverse tapestry.