Self Compassion and Mindfulness in Today's World
a modular program for modern living
offered live online by Alfie Wishart
Every Sunday 10:00-11:30am USA Central Time
STARTS Sunday, April 16
Self compassion and mindfulness help us learn to be more caring toward ourselves, and stay grounded in the refuge of the present moment.
They help us bring loving kindness toward our inner being so we can bring that care and kindness to those around us. Through these practices, we can change our inner narrative and outlook on life from negative to positive. Both self-compassion and mindfulness help bring greater emotional balance, well-being and a sense of belonging.
The program
This is a modular series. It is based on and includes all the material of the 8-week Mindful Self Compassion (MSC) course with a greater emphasis on mindfulness.
Most importantly, there will be time in each session for participants to share their experiences with the exercises and to ask questions.
- There are over 20 weekly modules.
- Each module is 90 minutes in length.
- Audio recordings of the exercises for each session will be available to registrants.
- Register for the whole series, segments of the series, or one module at a time.
.
About the teacher
Alfie Wishart
Alfie is a therapist in Dallas, Texas, a licensed LPC (Licensed Professional Counselor), LCDC (Licensed Chemical Dependency Counselor) and a CRC (Certified Rehabilitation Counselor). He is a Certified Teacher in Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction and a Trained Teacher in Mindful Self-compassion through the UC San Diego medical school, a member of the International Mindfulness Teachers Association, and a long-time meditator. He is a founding teacher and board member of Dallas Center for Mindfulness and Compassion. Alfie believes that as the world in which we live becomes ever more stressful, our ability to maintain a healthy equilibrium becomes all the more urgent.
What to expect in each session
Modules 1 thru 7
Module 1. How does one learn compassion, and what is Self-Compassion?
In this module, we’ll discuss the series structure, what to expect and what your intention is. We’ll explore what mindfulness and compassion is and how they relate, and some thoughts on how to apply them to our daily lives. We will ask the questions: If we take away mindfulness - what do we have? If we take away compassion - what do we have?
Module 2. The Breath and Mindfulness
In this session we’ll focus on Mindfulness and the breath, the deeper implications, more of its benefits, what equanimity is and why it’s important. We’ll look at how mindfulness relates to compassion and how they work together. Safety and working with trauma will also be discussed.
Module 3. The Breath and Self Compassion
Here we’ll discuss the differences between a mindfulness body scan and a compassionate body scan.We’ll take a look at how each is useful in its own way, and how this can help us in our day-to-day activities.
Module 4. Body Scan with Mindfulness
The Body Scan exercises is well known, both as a mindfulness and a self compassion exercise. This time, we’ll be going further into equanimity, what the implications are for it as a life strategy, and what is its utility in our relationship with the body. It helps us build a more accepting relationship with our body.
Module 5. Body Scan: With Self Compassion
The Body Scan with Self Compassion is similar in form, but different in quality. We extend our awareness to the whole body, a little bit at at time, but we do it with gratitude, wonder, awe, appreciation, and caring. This is how we move from the wisdom of equanimity to engaging with compassion.
Module 6. Sympathy, Empathy, Loving Kindness and Compassion
Empathy is often used synonymously with compassion, but the two are very different. This module addresses the important differences between sympathy, empathy, loving kindness and compassion and what that means in terms of relationships.
Module 7. Loving Kindness for Ourselves
Loving kindness is like a loving mother, soothing us when buffeted about by the rough edges of the world. If we weren’t shown how to do this, as adults we tend to resort to food, sex, alcohol, travel, exercise, etc. to soothe ourselves. But, after indulging, we tend to feel empty. The loving kindness meditation/exercise is to expand our capacity for self soothing. We begin with ourselves.
Modules 8 thru 14
Module 8. Loving Kindness for a Loved On
As we learn to offer ourselves loving kindness, we often come to a point where we naturally want to extend loving kindness to others. As we grow in our ability to express loving kindness to ourselves, we grow in our ability to express loving kindness to others.
Module 9. Compassion for Oneself
For many, offering oneself compassion can be difficult at first. We may feel unworthy, that we’re letting ourselves off the hook, that we don’t deserve it, that it is selfish, etc. But, by offering ourselves compassion we can overcome our misgivings and allow ourselves to receive what we’ve needed all along.
Module 10. Self Compassionate Break, Gestures and Phrases
In this module we’ll learn the three universal acts of compassion and how to apply them to ourselves, especially intimate of difficult in daily life, sort of self compassion first-aid.
Module 11. Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
To build a better world, an understanding of diversity, equity and inclusion, in its deeper implications, is necessary and essential for building community. The practice of mindfulness and compassion is part of that process.
Module 12. Life on the Bell Curve
Forgiveness is one of the core skills of being human. The process of forgiveness requires compassion, or at least loving kindness, to start. We will be looking at what forgiveness is, what to expect in the process, the role of mindfulness and self compassion in the process, how to practice forgiveness, and why it is so important.
Module 13. True Self and False Self
The understanding of true self and false self has been central to the contemplative traditions for centuries and has been a topic of interest in psychology for about 80 years, though mostly in the background. Mindfulness and compassion help us distinguish between the two and recognize how they operate in our lives.
Module 14. Forgiveness of Self
The topic of resentment is prominent in the world’s spiritual traditions, emphasizing its importance. It is also one of the essential methods whereby we begin to erase the false self. The “self” we criticize is now who we really are. We can cease trying to determine if we are a good or bad person, and take a look at our behavior and learn from our missteps in life.
Modules 15 thru 21
Module 15. Forgiveness of Others
Without forgiveness, personal and spiritual progress would be permanently hindered. Forgiveness can give us the freedom and peace of mind we seek. The process is one of letting go, admitting we simply can’t will ourselves to forgive. Mindfulness sets the stage and compassion facilitates.
Module 16. Compassionate Letter to a Friend
This exercise helps us become more aware of two things: first, our ability to be compassionate toward others and, secondly, our ability to be compassionate toward ourselves. We find out that these abilities are two sides of the same coin. We can’t do either effectively without accomplishing the other.
Module 17. Loving Kindness fo Self, Other and Neutral Person
This is an exercise that takes us further into the process of loving kindness. As we get more grounded in our ability to experience loving kindness for ourselves, we begin to extend it to others.
Module 18. Loving Kindness for Self & All
In this module, we text the next steps in loving kindness, extending from people we care about or who are neutral, to those who have caused harm, or whom we just don’t like, learning to work through the challenges.
Module 19. Compassion for Self and Another
Moving from the practice of loving kindness to the broader field of compassion, we first practice compassion toward ourselves and a loved one. We get to encounter any resistance of misgivings we might have and work through them.
Module 20. Mindfulness and Compassion in Daily Life: Expanding the Pause
As we progress our life practice of mindfulness and compassion, we begin to expand the pause, the space between an event and our reaction. As we do so, we can expand that space of present moment awareness and equanimity to include our daily activities. Yes, it’s a challenge, but doable.
Module 21. Working with Difficult Emotions
One of the major challenges in life is handling how we respond when difficult emotions arise. We usually revert to old patterns, to how we’ve responded in the past. These times are the perfect opportunity to apply mindfulness––pausing, equanimity, and compassion––caring, forgiveness, for whole brain responding.
Modules 22 thru 27
Module 22. Working with Shame
Shame has come to the foreground and has been the subject of rigorous studies in many areas of life. The experience of shame, nonetheless, is very painful when we encounter it. Similar to process of working with difficult emotions, this module is oriented specifically to shame
Module 23. Falling Apart: Working with Trauma
The process of working with trauma wihtth mindfulness and compassion is the same as with working with difficult emotions, with one vital difference. Trauma is far more highly charged with emotion than other forms of difficult emotions. Mindfulness and Compassion can facilitate the resolution of trauma but usually, not without individual work with a skilled trauma therapist. Details will be discussed.
Module 24. Falling Apart: Working with Life Challenges
This human existence seems to go in cycles of good times, hard times and really hard times. There are times when everything we know how to do to manage our life seems to not work anymore, and people or circumstances we have relied upon suddenly aren’t there. Mindfulness and compassion can greatly facilitate the process of big life shifts.
Module 25. The Compassionate Friend
This exercise gives us an opportunity for tuning into our inner resources of wisdom and compassion. This is part of learning to shift our self understanding to include a wider understanding of and access to, our nature, our true self.
Module 26. Maintaining a Relationship with the True Self
This module will be a brief review of the exercises so far and how they can be applied in daily life. Discussion will include difficulties and misgivings, as well as successes in the practical application of what we’ve learned.
Module 27. Building Community: Finding Like Minded People
This is perhaps the most challenging of tasks… finding and connecting with like minded people, given that our social fabric worldwide has become highly segmented and polarized. The important of how we carry ourselves in the world will be discussed.
Registration
This online modular program is offered on a donation basis.
Click here if you wish to register and make a donation
Click here if you do not wish to make a donation at this time