events
Imagination in the Material World with Tom Cheetham and Kimberly Christensen
Every 4th Mondays
7:00-8:30pm NY time
Beginning
JANUARY 10, 2022
When the image is new, the world is new.
- Gaston Bachelard
Are you hungry for inspiration?
Do you want to feel more alive?
Join our community of lively souls every other week for 90 minutes to entertain, and be entertained by, IDEAS!
Each session will be focused by a (fairly) short text provided digitally to all, and we will travel wherever the spirits take us.
The first meeting will be devoted to the many meanings of creative imagination and how we might manifest it in the world.
Here is a text to contemplate for the first session:
The Thought of the Heart, by James Hillman Other themes and topics include writings from the works of a wide range of writers in the arts,humanities and sciences from cultures around the world.
Tom Cheetham, PhD is the author of five books on the imagination in psychology, religion and the arts, and one book of poems. Formerly Associate Professor of Biology and Environmental Studies at Wilson College, he has been teaching natural science and the humanities for 30 years. He is a Fellow of the Temenos Academy and teaches and lectures frequently in Europe and the US.
Kimberly Christensen, PhD is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in private practice in Portland. She completed clinical training in Berkeley, CA, while earning an MA in Counseling Psychology specializing in Jungian Psychotherapy. She has an MA in Cultural Anthropology from the California Institute of Integral Studies.
( Currently no workshops available )
PAST EVENTS
Becoming Capable of the World: The Practice of Imagination
We meet online twice a week for six weeks.
Thursdays: Lecture/Discussion
4:00pm-5:30pm PST
Mondays: Presentation/Discussion
4:00pm-6:00pm PST
If you stay in one place too long you’ll be taken over — either by your own fixating ideas or by those of others, either of which can immobilize and re-form you. To survive one must always be outrunning the destruction of the world.
- Leslie Scalapino
It's not enough to be alive. You have to live. Being is a verb, an activity. The most profound and deepest act of being we can engage in is imagining. It changes us from objects in a world of things, to subjects in a world of persons. Imagination is not in us—we are in Imagination. The organ of imagination is the heart, but its modes action are all the senses, all the emotions, all of the intellect. When the heart of imagination is active, everything is fluid, all things shimmer with just a bit of uncertainty. All our secret fundamentalisms dissolve into flesh and into breath. To learn the imagination we need to know how to pay attention to everything in our world: to flowers, dreams, people, clouds, emotions, the textures of stone, the tastes of spices, the colors in the eyes of animals. Join us for practice in becoming alive, of becoming capable of being in this magnificent world.
Tom Cheetham, PhD is the author of five books on the imagination in psychology, religion and the arts, and one book of poems. Formerly Associate Professor of Biology and Environmental Studies at Wilson College, he has been teaching natural science and the humanities for 30 years. He is a Fellow of the Temenos Academy and teaches and lectures frequently in Europe and the US.
Kimberly Christensen, PhD is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in private practice in Portland. She completed clinical training in Berkeley, CA, while earning an MA in Counseling Psychology specializing in Jungian Psychotherapy. She has an MA in Cultural Anthropology from the California Institute of Integral Studies.
COMMUNITY DREAMING
Let’s explore embodiment practices towards individuation.
In this dream group, we will explore:
Imagining and moving dream images in the body.
Group embodiment and moving dream images forward.
Exploring the connection between archetypal ritual in the group process and embodied dream images in the individual.
Once we get used to listening to our dreams, our whole body responds like a musical instrument.
-Marion Woodman
$50.00 per dream group
(twice a month, or every two weeks)
Groups occur,
Fall, winter, or spring
In a safe group container, it is possible to explore feelings and related somatic processes to gain access to greater wisdom and establish a relationship with the Imaginal. The overarching purpose is to open consciousness in the body that awakens the subtle body, to prepare the body to contain archetypal energies by practicing with dream images, and over time, eventually leading to the body as a temple for the embodied calling.
If you would like to explore a community dream group, the best way is to gather a group of 5 people and contact me. Another way is to reach out and after I hear from 5 people, I will start a community dream group for you.