Connection to Nature and Self
Requirements
- A good internet connection
Description
Too often we remain stuck in old patterns of seeing, learning and acting. If you look honestly at our world, you find that it is someway out of balance in many fields. Not only the societies with their human communities are out of balance, even the seasons in nature are out of balance. Is there a way of restoring this balance? This course suggests that we need to go beneath the surface of what we usually see and know, and learn to see and feel in a different way. By encouraging deeper levels of learning and seeing, we create an awareness of the larger whole, leading to actions that can help to shape our evolution and our future. This course defines the capabilities that underlie our ability to see, sense, and realize new possibilities - in ourselves, in our learning communities, institutions and organizations, and in society itself.
Effective innovation (also in your learning community) requires the capacity to stay connected and grounded in your deepest source of inspiration and to be open to a larger will. If you are open, the larger environment will continually tell you what you need to learn and to do. This is a learning from the present, (and not a learning from the past) (and not a learning from where you want to go and what you want to teach and reach). This larger field, staying connected with this larger field, has been called by Christopher Bache “Sacred Mind”. Some people (like Thich Nhat Hahn, Joanna Macy, Bill Plotkin, Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee and many others) say the crisis of our times is not only an ecological and political crisis but it is a spiritual one.
The course suggests that the answers we seek cannot come from the limited consciousness which now rules the world but could grow from a deeper understanding born of the union of heart and head, helping us to see that all life is one, that each one of us participates in the life of a cosmic entity of immeasurable dimensions. Maybe this crisis is an attempt to awaken our soul.
The urgent need for this psychic balance, this deeper intelligence and wisdom, this wholeness, could help us to recover a perspective on life that has been increasingly lost until we have come to live without it — and without even noticing it has gone — recognizing the existence of nothing beyond the parameters of the human mind. It is a dangerous time because it involves transforming entrenched belief systems and archaic survival habits of behavior that are rooted in fear, as well as the greed and desire for power that are born of fear. But it is also an immense opportunity for evolutionary advance, if only we can understand what is happening and why.
For a rapidly increasing number of us, there is the possibility of choosing whether to follow in the tracks of the past, continuing to live our lives in servitude to the power principle and the institutions which embody it, however subtly expressed. Or to live and act from a different relationship with life and commit ourselves to the immense effort of consciousness we need to make to understand and serve its mystery.
This course is highly experiential, there are assignments to go (alone and/or with your learning group) and be in nature, to enjoy the peace, the beauty and the wonder you find in nature and deeply relax, even if it is an online course. It enhances your creative thinking, the metaphorical thinking, imagination and mindfulness.
At the end of your course you will have a certification of the acquired competences (transversal competences).
Awareness of self: Allow yourself to be in the “flow” of knowledge as it emerges. Wide your perceptions.
Take your time to learn from nature something about yourself and what you need to redesign your learning communities.
Enjoy the beauty, the peace and the wonder of nature. Enjoy and feel with your heart.
Make use of your creative thinking. Develop metaphorical thinking (create your own metaphors for your life). Use your imagination. Use your right brain.
Connectedness: explore connectedness. Create your community of practice. Use your heart as organ of perception.
Learn mindfulness from nature for yourself. Learn how to offer deep love and appreciation to nature for all you are experiencing.
This is an Erasmus+ course, an European project in adult education.
Project creators: Isoropia (Croatia), Rogers Foundation (Hungary) and Aura Sviluppo Sostenibile (Italy).
Who this course is for:
- Teachers
- Counsellors
- Nature professionals
- Coaches
- Trainers
- Anyone who works in the field of adult education
- All people who want to undertake a personal growth experience
Instructors
I'm a trainer and business/life coach, I attended the Holistic School in Integral Counseling. During last 8 years I integrated the systemic vision in my works, experiencing new ways to contact my self and each other. I'm systemic constellation facilitator. Very often my time is spent in classroom (business training, team building, co-creating courses...). I like to teach because is my best way to learn. My favorite place is everywhere I can express my self and my world in contact whit nature and authentically. I live between Bergamo and Reggio Calabria. Keep in touch! See my social links.
Virag - a real life-long learner - has a PhD in Social Communication and Linguistics. She has an MSc in IT management, an MA in Political Science, an MA in European Studies, and a post-secondary degree of Marketing Management, and has attended Training of Trainers Programme at Johns Hopkins University. She is a trained person-centred councellor, a psychodynamic dance and movement therapist, and also trained in Metamorphosis Folk Tale Therapy and in Symbolwork.
Virag has been an adult educator and trainer for 30 years, building up more than 20,000 contact hours in adult education. She has also worked as expert and researcher for educational issues in several national and international projects, becoming the leading professional of the Rogers Foundation for Person-Centred Education in Hungary. In 2017 she has co-authored of a national-level text book for VET teachers on pedagogy.
Goran Hudec is Full Professor with Tenure at University of Zagreb, Faculty of Textile Technology. Born in Zagreb he received Dipl. Ing. on Computer Sciences, Mr. Sc. on Electronic and Dr. Sc. on Electrotechnics degrees from Faculty of Electrical Engineering, University of Zagreb.
His professional career started at Brodarski Institute where worked on applied research and development of marine systems such as undersea acoustic communication devices. Skills in acoustics and in organization of in-situ measurements where applied to managing complex technological projects as TP-A59-02 “Acoustic Emission based protection of CPS Molve”. In the field is also patent on acoustic interior design HR PK20100404 B3.
At University he is author of two university textbooks and co-author of the third university textbook the author of over 80 scientific and professional papers. To enhance his teaching skills he took courses “Active learning and critical thinking in higher education” and the use of information technology with CARNets “Management and E-learning”.
His research on education methods started with “Textile Factory on the Internet” and “Referral center for the development of educational materials.” He led the IT project “Virtual Museum of design based on ethnic heritage” and took part in FP6 project 027607 mGBL “mobile Game-Based Learning”. He is national coordinator of a “Teaching creativity and engineering” Tecrino 538710- LLP-1-2013-1-CY-LEONARDO-LMP project.
His interest include writing SF short stories and is an active athlete. Expirience with a choice of learning methods could be applied to this project.
Divergent thinking are one of elements of building Resilience of People. Creativity will be important element in Connecting to Nature and Self.
I am Etelka Suhajda. I was born in 1974.
I worked as a pastor in the Hungarian Reformed Church for 26 years, I worked as a lead pastor for 16 years. Now I work as the executive of Rogers Foundation for Person-Centred Education.
I have a MA and a PhD on Theology, specialized in Ancient History and Linguistics. I taught Hebrew and Ancient History for 7 years. I graduated and teached in Gáspár Károli Reformed University. I was in Israel for scholarship for one year, and for another one in Belfast, UK.
I also have an MA on Jewish Studies and Assyriology. I graduated in Eötvös Loránd University.
I also have an MA on Mental Health Care and Pastoral Care. I graduated in Semmelweis University for Medical Studies.
I have a MIT online degree on Astrophysics. I did it for fun. I like studying.
I have been working as a mental health counsellor for almost 25 years. I have also been a group leader and a trainer on different mental health techniques. I worked with grief and loss in groups, but my main area of expertise are young people. I have worked with teenagers for 25 years. I have a youth group of nearly 30 members in a small, countryside town in Hungary.
I am married, and I have a son and a daughter, both teenaged as of now. I also have a cat and a dog.
I am currently studying bookkeeping for fun. Did I mention I really like studying? :-)