Connected Life connecting to your unlived life The unlived life refers to the undeveloped gifts and the The Soulcentric Development Wheel (SDW), developed by Bill Plotkin and presented in Nature and the Human Soul, charts a course of psychospiritual development based in the wisdom of nature and nature-based people across time. The focus of the program is on incorporating the wisdom of nature and soul into our lives, providing a basis for a strong psychospiritual practice that can bring more purpose, meaning, depth, and joy into our lives. The basic structure of the program is built upon the Soulcentric Developmental Wheel. In addition, we will draw on the teachings of Carl Jung, Stephen Gallegos, James Hollis, David Whyte, among others. Connected Life was developed 5 years ago to provide participants with a personal path into the SDW, providing instruction, guidance, individually designed tasks, and suggested soulcraft practices. The course has been taught for five years in Durango, Colorado and offered three times nationally through our friends at Animas Valley Institute. Animas continues to offer an in-person experiential program for the SDW (www.animas.org). In this online version of Connected Life, we use the power of the internet to offer an 8 week online course that gives you an opportunity for a personal, experiential exploration through the SDW while deepening your experience through the support of guides and an online community. This includes individual soul tasks, readings, group forums, online chats and one-on-one Q & A's with the instructors, essays, poems, and more. Our time together will be devoted to the practices that help us: 1) Address undone work from the early stages of life and strengthen our relationship with the gifts from these stages-- gifts that may have been long buried. This work supports and transforms our daily lives, strengthening us for the work of our current stage of development. 2) Address the tasks of our current stage of development, including looking at how we can serve the Earth and our communities in ways that are more aligned with the path of our individual psyches and our current stage of development. Participants will be expected to participate in group forums and to complete individual soul tasks, the required reading, and personal writing to share with the course guides. You can expect the course to require a minimum of 4-6 hours a week to complete all that is offered through this course. Instructors will monitor all emails – both in the forums and in personal emails based on individual assignments -- on a regular basis, replying multpile times throughout the week. To enroll in this course or for more information about the instructors or the program, email either instructor below. The course begins January 15, 2010 Costs: $375 Enrollment limit: 8 Donna Medeiros donnam@durango.net
Jim Marsden at jamarsden747@gmail.com
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Animas Valley Institute The primary goal and method of all Animas Valley Institute programs is the encounter with soul. Founded in 1980 by psychologist and wilderness guide Bill Plotkin, Ph.D., the Institute is one of North America's longest-standing organizations offering contemporary wilderness rites. AVI programs are quite different than those offered by most other wildemess organizations, rites of passage guides, and colleges and universities. What we offer is not primarily rites of passage, wilderness-based psychotherapy or even ecotherapy. Our work is nature-based soul-initiation, whose central goal is the descent to soul for the purpose of maturing or deepening the ego, rather than healing it. Our programs are not designed to help people fix or solve problems in their current lives. Our goal is to help people transform their lives in such a way that they live and love more from their depths -- as opposed to merely being better adjusted or happier living in the surface world in which our contemporary culture specializes. Another way to say this is that our work is not primarily personal or interpersonal, although it includes some of both of those, but rather transpersonal -- in the sense of deepening into our connection with soul. Visit Animas at www.animas.org or call and talk to Elizabeth, the program manager at 970-259-0585 |
unexplored challenges and tasks of our individual psyches. Connected Life was created to provide guidance in exploring these undeveloped parts of our lives-- through the support of community, guides, and the Soulcentric Developmental Wheel.
Donna Medeiros has been an educator for over 30 years. For the past 12 years, she has been a student of wilderness, dreams, psychospiritual development, and the mystery of life. Since first beginning these studies, bringing the riches of the underworld to our lives and our culture has been at the heart of Donna’s personal practice and passionate inquiry . She has worked with Animas Valley Institute for 10 years in a variety of roles. Five years ago, she developed Connected Life, a program of psychospiritual development that she teaches to individuals and small groups. 
Jim is a guide for the Animas Valley Institute and leads Animas guests throughout the year. He has a passion for the wilderness and co-leads other outings that help deepen our understanding of ourselves and our relationship with our natural world. In addition to his guiding responsibilities, he is a management consultant with over 20 years of experience, mostly with Hewlett Packard, specializing in organizational development and innovation. Jim is also a faculty member of the Presencing Institute, 
“With Nature and the Human Soul, Bill Plotkin once again works miracles. This vital book provides a road map to help us remember how to be human — which means how to be a human being in relationship to the natural world, to our home. We owe Bill Plotkin a deep debt of gratitude for this important work.” — Derrick Jensen, author of A Language Older Than Words and As the World BurnsYou are not logged in. (Login)
