Come Back to Your Center Workshop

“Within you, there is a stillness and sanctuary to which you can retreat to any time and be yourself.” – Hermann Hesse

Starts the week of September 25th, 2023. In person option at Pilates Central Wellness on Tuesdays at 7pm. Register on this page and email me to let me know you will be coming.

Join me in practicing coming back to Center during this 6 week program to establish new patterns of inner balance, peaceful presence and grounded authenticity.

Do you feel disconnected from yourself? Or maybe you feel overwhelmed with life?  Being off-center can show up as feeling stressed, depressed mood, brain fog, fatigue, inability to make decisions, looping thought patterns, or easily flooded with emotions.

It is easy to become off-center these days.  Some of the ways that happens include:  news addiction, digital distractions, unhealthy habits, busy work lives, personal challenges and traumas. And yet, many of us are feeling a pull back to our Center. There is a longing to find that anchor within that doesn’t blow about in the winds of change and turmoil. This Center is naturally already present. It is what is most true about you. We just need to remove the blocks to it and encourage the daily turn towards it.

With practice, it is possible to begin to live more and more from this Center. From this Center, we can navigate life and all of its challenges and learn to thrive and not just survive. We can find safety, heal the body, rewire old mental and emotional patterns, heal from trauma and emotional wounds. From our Center, we can create the life we desire that is aligned with our Essence.

I will draw on elements from a variety of theories and disciplines for this course including: Polyvagal Theory, neuroscience, mindfulness and other meditation techniques, Yoga, QiGong, energy balancing,  Internal Family Systems, self-compassion, and Zen Theory of Change.

The format of this workshop is as follows:

• Two thirty minute videos will be uploaded to the course home page every week. Each video will have about 10 minutes of teaching content and 20 minutes of a practice that facilitates coming back to Center. You can view these on your own time.
• Live integration sessions week 3 and 6 with a 45-60 minute Zoom session for Q & A, discussion and a guided meditation.
• In person sessions available at Pilates Central Wellness in Evanston. Session will be at 7pm on Tuesdays and will be 50 minutes. Dates include: 9/26, 10/3, 10/17, 10/24, 11/7, 11/14.

Week 1: Exploring your Center

• Lesson 1:  What is our Center? Why is it so important?  Guided centering meditation.
• Lesson 2: The 3 Centers – body, mind and heart. Practice to balance the 3 centers.

Week 2:  What takes us off-center?

• Lesson 1: Identifying stressors and triggers. Practices include 3 different breath practices
• Lesson 2: Identifying personality parts that react to stress and turn towards unhealthy habits

Week 3: Finding your Center through feeling safe

• Lesson 1:  Introduction to your operating system – the autonomic nervous system. Somatic based practices to regulate the nervous system.
• Lesson 2:  The Vagus Nerve as key to finding inner stability. Practices to stimulate or turn on the vagus nerve.
• Live integration session on Zoom with Q & A, discussion and guided practice

Week 4:  Keeping your  Center while in relationship with others

• Lesson 1: The science and energy of connection. Practice bringing your energy and attention back to your center while with other people
• Lesson 2: Our nervous system state is contagious: How to stay in your center when others are off-center.

Week 5:  Coming home to your heart: learning to befriend ourselves

• Lesson 1: Befriend your emotions without getting swept away. Learn a process to feel emotions from your Center
• Lesson 2: Self-acceptance = self love = self-empowerment. Guided self-love meditation

Week 6:  Seven keys to coming back to center again and again

• Lesson 1: How to rewire our habits. Practice includes the power of  intention and creating a plan.
• Lesson 2: Zen Theory of Change: Using mindfulness and acceptance as key drivers of behavior change
• Live Integration session on Zoom: Q & A, discussion and guided practice