.png)
a moment to fly up...
mentoring 2024-2025
Photo of Mokichi Okada
Such a life we are given. When I gaze at this man's face I imagine slow knowledge, a life with space and time, led along by his ever-evolving inner and outer life.
His life had many disruptions. As a young art student he developed an eye disease which prevented him from following the path he desired. He researched and adopted a vegetarian diet, curing himself. Later in life this experience led him to explore methods of organic farming.
He took over his father's antique business, but the post-World War I recession of 1920 and the devastating Tokyo earthquake of 1923 caused his business irrevocable damage, which was followed by the loss of his wife and children.
He sought answers to the adversities in his life and turned to religion.
His values of truth, virtue, and beauty he believed were intrinsic to a human being's real happiness and capacity in life. He perceived that ill health, poverty and conflict prevented others from flourishing.
I tell this story becasue it helps me to talk about movement in a life. His is not a random life, difficult things occur, but each time he seeks to follow a thread, a way of evolving himself and his part in the world around him.
We live in a world where we are always at risk of getting lost in the possibility of too much. We move through our lives with so much haste and overfill, that we lose the orbit that has a gravitational pull for us. Listeneing to gravitational pull grows us to discern.
My experience is that this pull can come from both adversity and falling in love. It is as if the world conspires, or our own inner being says' this way'. And then you want to do what you love, finding ways of learning and doing.
We are at heart creative. A regular practice emerges, then meditation, and writing, etc, and these things slowly bring a rhythm, a pulse into the life.
Our minds are very noisy, it is the ground we stand on, so we do not notice so much, it is just the way things are. And then through steady yoga practice a re-wiring occurs and a re-weaving, so that we notice that we think differently. There is more space, more time. The body and the breath weave the emotional life into one, and then there, at the end of the exhalation in the silence is the life of the spirit, a mystery, a fragrance. 'God' .
It is an extraordinary journey which never ends. It gives such a quality to our lives, a simpler uncluttered mind, living closer to ourselves, others and our world.
It takes a while to hear deeper. We can deceive ourselves with stories. It takes time to hear what pains and fears drive us, they move so quickly into place, to take over, pushing everything else aside. Until one day we can see they are just a guest, a pushy frightened quest, who needs to be welcomed too. Then these guests no longer need to dominate all decisions. Learning the truth is freeing. Speaking it is even better.
The community becomes a 'Sangha', a spiritual home, a place that nourishes and protects. A place you can be yourself and share your journey.
This is the focus of Mentoring Program. Learning to linger, living deeper, in need of less. Shaping the values that give interior strength and a stability - to walk into the unknown.
Understand - through the stillness,
Act - out of stillness,
Prevail - in the stillness.
(Dag Hammarkskold- On the Art of Ethical Leadership)
The program is not only about assessments- but in living a life in yoga. To become a teacher or upgrade is just a part of the process.
In late September 2024 there is the opportunity to join a yoga/cultural exploration in Japan. This is not included in the program.
2024 - 25: Mentoring Program
A moment to fly up?
This white rabbit is from Lewis Caroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Rabbit is always in a hurry, pushed and pressed by societal needs, anxious and wound up, looking at their clock all the time. Are they late? Who or what is driving this constant motion?
Rabbit wants to do everything but there comes the moment when Rabbit will be stopped or woken up, decide to pay attention and inhabit themself. Most humans are living an automatic life, with no inner freedom, plenty of external freedom, but joy is elusive. Mostly they're running on empty, tired and sometimes overwhelmed. Could rabbit learn how to linger, to start the work that is necessary to begin living life in a conscious way?
A yoga life offers that moment. A discipline, a focus, a way of working with the body and mind that begins to create a capacity to relinquish and to see what is endlessly harming our hearts and minds,
Will this rabbit decide to live their one amazing life or be lead blindly along ?
Overview of the year
The program is built around two, week-long retreats:
The first in March 2024 and the second in March 2025.
Linking these weeks of retreat are:
5 x 4 hour Sunday meetings on the first Sunday of the month: 2 pm to 6 pm, and;
10 x 1.5 hour Friday evenings 4-5.30 pm Breath and relaxation.
These Fridays provide a steady place to link together the group.
Dates
-
2nd February Friday Meeting and orientation
-
1st Retreat: March 10th -16th 2024 (Sunday to Saturday) in Reflections, Nambucca Heads. This six-day retreat is a core component that starts the year.
-
7th April Sunday
-
12th April Friday 4-5.30 pm
-
4th May Sunday
-
10th May Friday
-
7th June Friday
-
5th July Friday
-
7th July Sunday
-
2nd August Friday
-
6th October Sunday
-
12th October Friday
-
2nd November Sunday
-
9th November Friday
-
6th December Friday
-
7th February 2025 Friday
-
2nd Retreat: March 9th - 15th 2025 in Nambucca Heads
Fees
Total cost $3,288 for the entire program.
Acceptance letters will go out on 8th January.
Payment is due 7 days after receipt of acceptance letter - 15th January.
Full payment: $3088. This is the preferred payment, attracting a $200 discount.
Please contact me if you would like to pay the full amount.
Or
$1000 deposit to be paid by Monday 15th January, then
$88 per fortnight starting 15th March 2024 and ending end of February 2025.
The cost includes access to the library of recorded classes.
Other classes
I encourage all who are doing the Mentoring Program to attend classes or monthly intensives
whatever keeps you in contact.
Some interesting articles
You may find these interviews useful in the context of thinking about the course.
-
Donna Hollman: "An interview with Donna Holleman"
-
ABC Radio interview: "Why Indy Johar doesn't want you to 'escape' to New Zealand"
Mentoring 2024 - $1000 Deposit
1,000$Deposit for the Mentoring Program 2024Valid for 2 months- • Sunday & Friday Classes
- • 2x March Mentoring Retreats (2024 + 2025)
- Full access to video library for the year
Mentoring 2024 - Payment Plan
88$Every 2 weeksFortnightly payment plan for Mentoring 2024. Payment plan is not valid until $1000 deposit is paid.Valid for 52 weeks- • Sunday & Friday Classes
- • 2x March Mentoring Retreats (2024 + 2025)
- Full access to video library for the year