Written by Niek | 10 May 2011

the workshops I attended

My intention at this 2011 CCI USA meeting was, not to be bothered by making notes of what happened and who did what, when. The result is, that I needed much more time to figure out what I did at this CCI meeting! And the final conclusion is, that I was right to trust to be open for a process that unfolded itself!
That started with attending Jenny’s imaginal dialogue workshop on Wednesday afternoon. Possibly the foregoing meeting of several support groups together  – preferable of six persons each – to make your personal statement – contributed to my personal effect of this afternoon workshop.
The  workshop of Jenny started with the statement, that what we experience is all about ourselves and the invitation to accept that ‘there is an intelligence’ (or an awareness) that is bigger than you, by reaching into a deeper level.

‘Be open for whatever you encounters’ is the message because ‘we lost our connection with the imaginal’.
As I understand the workshop, we were invited to pair up, inviting our partner for our session (equal time for each of us) to make notes, describing our personal area of work and, while closing our eyes, breath as it flows, slowly in and out. ‘When you feel relaxed in your inner landscape’ wrote Jenny in a handout,’start with the five elements: 1) ask an imaginal figure who can help you with this work, to meet you in the imaginal realm. Second: ask this figure if it has a message for you.  And you may ask direct questions. Than ask (3) if it needs anything from you and (4) if anything more needs to happen right now. (5) Thank the imaginal figure and find a way to say goodbye that feels right. (6) identify a direction that will help you to remind you of this imaginal work including validations’.

Conscious Community International

Thursday morning  Fred and Chris organized a Community Committee question workshop about the future of CCI co-counselling in general, in the USA, in Connecticut, its message, the way of teaching, how to grow etc. Soon afterwards the different personal views were reported to the about 20 participants of this workshop. The answers are multilateral, personal and for me the most important topic seems to be, in my words, that ‘we need to create a dream of how and what our future may be with, and how without, the CCI approach’.  And when we have that goal, we ‘need’ to find our way to bring that into reality! So for instance: ‘what are we doing when the Chinese discover the CCI co-counselling way?’ The workshop was energizing because we started to be on that way! And it was in this workshop that we discovered that CCI not only means: Co-Counselling International, or Co-Creating International, but also ‘Conscious Community International’.
Thursday afternoon Siglind facilitated her ‘Liberate to peace’ workshop about the book she recently wrote together with Johannes Risse, ‘that shows possibilities to learn handling emotions and needs in a way that they are changeable and that peace inside a person and with others, is possible even under hard or nearly impossible conditions’. See also CCI USA 2011 (5) ‘an emotional connection’ in this newsletter, published April 25th .
Friday morning I facilitated my from Wednesday afternoon postponed workshop about ‘create your own Universe’ on request.  Some 15 people attended this workshop. This is a renewed edition of my first workshop in 1983 in the Netherlands. It is about creating and stationing people around you/(me) on a piece of paper. They are alive or only in your thoughts. Where they are stationed on that paper represents how near – or how far away, they are now for you.  Pair up and share what you draw. Than look again at the result on the paper and ask yourself what quality they all might have in common. Use the CCI approach. Share the outcome with the whole group. I found out that the closest to me had in common that they accepted me just for whom I am.
Friday afternoon was the item the usual business meeting of the CCI-USA organization, facilitated by Fred. This implies the question, if we do not need far more a business meeting ‘European style’, namely the ‘business’ of the participants of this international meeting, and not so much the business of only the organization of CCI-USA. On request of the Israelian representative, we all ‘enthusiastically welcomed Dror’ after its declaration to belong to CCI.  Dror, Israel’s CCI community organizes in autumn 2013 a CCI meeting and so was the meeting also informed about CCI developments in Germany, Hungary, the UK, the USA and the Netherlands. CCI New Zealand (Aotearoa) organizes in January 2012 an international CCI meeting. Saturday morning I attended the workshop ‘age, what does that mean to you?’ from Janice. She shared with us her vision and finding out ourselves was in silence by yourself. The result we shared.

emotions and science

The workshop ‘co-counselling, emotions  -and science?’ was the last one I attended, facilitated by Rose and Richard with their revised Power Point presentation. On the back site of Richard’s t-shirt was readable: ‘ and mistrust it!’ He said that the overcrowded attendance, looked for him like a research group! He mentioned that 40 years ago very little was known about ‘emotions’. After something like a revolution, this has changed now.  So he mentioned Tom Sargent as one of the thinkers of co-counselling in the USA, as he mentioned also several times the contributions of Tom Sheff. So both facilitators stated ‘that we are very emotional creatures’, that we are not ‘failed computers’, and that ‘minds are no longer merely brains that happen to be in bodies’. No, we are intelligent because we are emotional!

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