Friday, January 21st – Sunday, January 23rd 2022 (via Zoom)
Thursday, June 23rd – Sunday, June 26th 2022 (South Salem, NY)
These two independent learning retreats, open to all CIL graduates, will explore themes crucial to both our personal evolution and our participation in the collective. Several centuries ago we lost empathy for not only other, different human beings, but also for the non-human world. Now our climate is changing too fast for many species to survive and threatening our human population with mass migration and homelessness.
How are we each called to live in and find our way to praise this mutilated world? How do we regain empathy for ourselves, each other and our battered world? Our planet is at a crossroad, what Joanna Macy calls “The Great Unravelling”. How do we honor our deep hope for what she also calls “The Great Turning”?
During these times, perhaps more than ever, we need community. Many ancient trees live in community. We now know that tree roots breathe with one another, sharing water and nutrients. We want to do the same with and for one another in our CIL community.
May the ancient trees be our teachers. We too need one another, need to take care of one another in a circle where we bring our hopes and dreams and nightmares. Where we sit together to hear and understand one another with compassion. To be with one another with presence, with honesty, deeply hearing one another, hearing the sacred longings waiting to be alive and to thrive. To find out next steps, both inner and outer.
Our January 21st – 23rd 2022 gathering will be on Zoom, allowing people further afield to participate and keeping us all safe through the winter. We will meet for 4 hours each day with an additional half-hour break. We will set the time once we know who will be participating. Cost will be $250.
We are visualizing that we will all feel safe enough to gather in person in New York for our June 2022 learning circle. Trusting that to happen we will meet for three hours the evening of Thursday, June 23rd, then from 10:00am -5:30pm on Friday, June 24th and Saturday, June 25th and 10:00am -1:00pm on Sunday, June 26th, in Alexis’s home in South Salem. Cost will be $750 including the three lunches.
We hope you feel called to participate in one or both of these gatherings. Any questions or concerns, please email either one of us. alexisajohnsonphd@gmail.com jschmruach@aol.com
We are using the following as resources if you want to dive into the material ahead of our times together:
Robin Kimmerer: Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
Thich Nhat Hanh: Being Peace & Interbeing
Daniel Siegel: Mindsight, A New Science of Personal Transformation
Joanna Macy: A Wild Love of the World
Administrative Details: To reserve your place, please mail a check made out to “The Center for Intentional Living”. The Zoom retreat should be paid in full in the amount of $250 upon registering. The June 2022 session deposit is $200. Payments should be mailed to:
Kelly Skarupa, 25 North Broadway, Tarrytown, NY 10591 (Please make sure the check is made out to The Center for Intentional Living.)
May you be well and safe.
Alexis and Judith