If so, then the Awakening the Heart workshop is for you.
The Heart is the locus of feelings and our relation to spirit. We will work on both levels. The Awakening the Heart workshop draws on Western psychotherapeutic traditions such as gestalt, bioenergetics, and focusing, as well as on Eastern traditions such as meditation, witnessing, and visualization. Added to these are gospel, folk, and chanting musical traditions.
Based in their work with Kindred Spirits at Rowe, Spring Hill, and The Second Chance Family, Neil and Rodney have synthesized music, singing, intense feelings work, play, meditation, dyadic exercises, and silence -- a seamless mesh of exhilarating energy.
The workshop will end on Father's Day: there will be a special ritual in which we can deal honestly with our experiences with our own fathers and honor fatherhood. Whatever your relation to fathering and fatherhood, the ritual will allow an open space where all of us can have our own experience. The people assisting Rodney and Neil know and love this work, so each participant can expect some one-on-one attention.
Neil Friedman brings his 25 years' experience providing psychotherapy, his humor, and his storytelling ability, as well as a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Harvard University. Neil has taught at Brandeis, SUNY-StonyBrook, and Lesley. He has written eight books, the most recent being Focusing: Selected Essays 1974-1999. For seventeen years, he was on the staff of Spring Hill Conference Center, which put on The Opening the Heart workshop, and for three years he was the co-director. He is a Certifying Co-ordinator in the Boston area for the Focusing Institute and offers individual and couples counseling. Neil and Rodney have worked together for over 20 years and complement each other's abilities. Together, they create a safe, supportive, and exhilarating workshop atmosphere that has to be experienced to be believed. Rodney Mashia is a singer, songwriter, flautist, and computer software consultant. He has been a senior musician and staff member of the Opening the Heart workshop at Spring Hill. Rodney was a soloist with the choral group On Wings of Song and has a tape "Stand in the Light." He has been a staff member and a co-director of the Kindred Spirits camp at Rowe. Drawing upon the gospel tradition and his own autobiographical songs, Rodney's music is infectious, heart-warming, and irresistible.