Youropean Quest

Level I - Change Process Guide (CPG)

Important: Start with module 1 for orienting, or as a taster without obligation and decide within two weeks after, whether to sign the indenture or not.

Module 1: Experiencing and practicing Nature-based Tools

In this module you will be introduced to the three major tools of Change Process Guides:

The “Four Shields of human nature”, a nature-based psychological model of human growth and health, “contemplative threshold work", a nature-based tool for a deeper self-understanding and “creating inviting and safe space”. Learn about the importance of attitude, ethics and authenticity, in order to effectively use these tools.

Consolidate the content you learned in the first part of this Module by practicing the tools in a diversity of assignments. Gain an in-depth theoretical and practical training in the art of mirroring, a respectful way to respond to the stories that participants bring back from assignments carried out in nature.

September 26—30, 2017 in the Eschwege Institut, with Holger Heiten & Gesa Heiten

Module 2: Monomyth and practicing the Art of mirroring

The monomyth based on the work of Joseph Campbell, is a tool describing the path followed by individuals and groups as they travel through the arc of the change process. Here we learn to see transition from the larger perspective of the monomyth and to recognize its patterns as they emerge. There will be opportunity for an assignment to deepen the experience as well as for practicing the art of mirroring.

to be planned in the Eschwege Institut, with Holger & Gesa Heiten

Module 3: The Way of Council

The ancient practice of sitting in a circle, speaking and listening from the heart, can enrich your relationships – at home, in school, in the workplace, in community. Council, a form of dialogue, is a gateway to deeper communication, intercultural understanding and the non-violent resolution of conflict – a place where destiny and the present moment meet. Listening is a core component of our understanding of the role of a mentor. Council, by developing our capacity for deep listening improves and expands our competence as mentors.

to be planned in Innsbruck/Austria, with Katrin Lüth and Holger Heiten

Module 4: The building blocks of Transition Process Coaching

A deeper understanding of archetypal patterns of coping with crisis in life transition phases and how they can be translated into a modern understanding of mentoring is critical for Change Process Guides. Here we learn to understand modern transition rituals more deeply and how to individually design small course formats with the help of the Monomyth and the Four Shields. We will experience advanced solo assignments in nature and continue further training with the contemplative threshold work and mirroring.

08, 2017 in the Eschwege Institut, with Holger & Gesa Heiten

to be planned in the Eschwege Institut, with Holger & Gesa Heiten

Practical Project

A practical project allows the design, planing, advertisement and implementation of a program of at least three days to demonstrate previous learnings and experiment more deeply with the process. This project may be completed with up to three fellow participants. Here we take the opportunity to face the praxis of Change Process Guides, under supervised circumstances and be prepared for the precious exchange of experiences with fellow participants during Module 7.

Projects will be developed and implemented in the time between Module 4 and Module 6.

Module 5: "Walk a Way" A model for Solos and short forms of rites of passage

The Walk a Way is the most popular format in the work of Change Process Guides with youth in the German speaking countries. Here in a 5 day outdoor experience you can track not only pathways in the outer landscape, but also those into the “terra incognita” of your soul. You will experience a full “Walk a Way” process yourself, having the opportunity to explore and discuss how to transfer your experience to other practical and customized formats of rites of passage.

to be planned in the Eschwege Institut, with Hendrik Hadlich & Gesa Heiten

Module 6: Psychological backgrounds and working with the shadow.

+ Feedback on the Practical Projects

Sometimes we repress or ignore parts of ourselves that we do not like or which cause us to feel uncomfortable. These “shadow” parts can be valuable resources for our personal development and our work or “tricky enemies” who make problems and undermine our success. Here we learn theoretically and through self experience about the unique benefits of facing, embracing and healing the (inner) shadow. By creating and facilitating safe ritualized frames, in which we ourselves and also our clients  are encouraged to face these shadows and to turn them into our allies metaphorically we will “drink a cup of tea with the devil”. Issues covered are psychological background, possible dangers, the do´s and don’ts in this work.

+ Feedback

In the second part of this module you will learn about does and don’ts in advertising, design and planning, through supervision in the praxis projects.
We will discuss ethics and sustainability. Here we reap the benefits of an amount of praxis experience that could sometimes take years to accumulate on our own.

to be planned (5 days) in the Eschwege Institut, with Holger & Gesa Heiten

Module 7: The Four Shields of Man and Woman

+ Certification and completion

Archetypes as described by C.G. Jung are powerful imbedded patterns of consciousness available to help us develop into the fullness of our feminine and masculine selves. In this module we learn how to ritually reframe strategies that have served their purpose but now are no longer useful or actually blocking our human potential. Challenge yourself with a rite of passage experience in nature, to mark the actual status quo of being a man or a woman.  Dealing with these themes is a necessary prerequisite for everybody who plans to work with other men or women in transition processes.

Certification and completion

This powerful rite of passage experience shall also mark the completion of the training. Therefore, we add an extra half day to the five days of the module, to enjoy a solemn completion and certification ceremony of the training to become a Change Process Guide.
Also Hendrik Hadlich and Katrin Lüth will attend the celebration, so that all trainers will be present for it.

to be planned in the Eschwege Institut, with Holger & Gesa Heiten, Dr. R. „Kunga“ Lacoste and Karina Falke

Accompanying face to face coaching

It doesn’t take much time to learn the tools of the Change Process and Vision Quest work, but it takes a long way to become a reliable tool for it yourself.

We emphasize in this training to practice and exercise and to face up to the own shadow aspects. If we want to serve the process of others, we have to learn, to get our own unsolved stuff out of its way. We have to learn recognizing projections (own and others) and to prevent, being overwhelmed by personal issues that might be triggered while guiding a group. At least we have to learn finding a professional way to cope with this. For people with a therapeutic training background this training asks for example to unlearn certain attitudes and perceptions.

A good tool needs to be sharpened and this we want to make sure in a twofold way:

1. The period specified for this training is necessary not only to learn practising the tools, but to give the appropriate time for the personal growth and to be infused with the mindset it takes, to be able to cope with the responsibility to guide others through change processes.
2. We ask every participant to take at least three sessions of an accompanying face to face coaching. For this you choose one of the trainers involved and stay with this personal mentor for the entire training. Appointments can be made ideally in the periods just before, during or just after one of the modules. A session will last one hour and will be charged with 80,00 € each.

Recommended attendance — Meredith Little Seminar

Meredith, co-founder of the School of Lost Borders, an outstanding teacher, comes each fall to teach in different fields of this work, at the Eschwege Institut. (5 days).

See the website of the Eschwege Institut for more details.

Level II - Vision Quest Guide

Here we extend the use of tools and understanding learned so far, into the complex and powerful format of the Vision Quest in the tradition of the School of Lost Borders and the Eschwege Institut.

At any time during or after your training you should participate in a Vision Quest offered by the Eschwege Institut followed by the completion of two apprenticeships.

In this module we learn new and specific Vision Quest tools, such as working with the confirmation sentence, screening, safety systems and incorporation. Past participation in a Vision Quest with the Eschwege Institut, will be accepted for this requirement.

Experience your own Vision Quest

Vision Quest - An ancient rite of passage for modern people

Vision Quest is to leave every possible distraction behind and become empty, to confirm a transition and to abandon for a while the distractions of your normal life. We will prepare you to go out alone, with a bare minimum of equipment and without food, into the heart of the wilderness, for four days and nights.

There you will live with yourself in wild solitude and surrender to the influences of the soul of nature, discovering it to be a true mirror of yourself.
The unimportant things will fall away and your emptiness invites the Vision of the work that must be done.

In your solitude, you wander through the precincts of death, where vision lies waiting. You drink from the springs of the deepest feeling and are filled with self-recognition. What is unimportant fades as the vision of the work that must be done becomes clearer.

Structure of the Vision Quest

Four days of preparation in Findhorn, staying in the Findhorn Hostel with bay view and close to the dune lands. We gather daily in the Earth lodge at the heart of the Findhorn Community.

Five days out in the wilderness of the Moray Firth. We will live in the woodlands at the beaches close to Findhorn Bay. The ocean as the most ancient landscape and the home of all living things will help to reconnect with the ancient home within you.

Four of these days will be your solo fast. The guides in the base camp will keep watch over your safety day and night.

Two days back in Findhorn, for integration of the vision into the life to which you return.

Next opportunity:

Vision Quest in Findhorn/Scotland July 29—August 09, 2017 (choice to attend in any other year, will be every summer approx. same time), with Holger & Gesa Heiten

Price: 840,00 € plus 245,00 € for accommodation and transport into the wilderness.

More information here: http://www.eschwege-institut.de/eng_calendar_events.html

Apprenticeships

(pre-requisite - completion of modules 1-7 and own Vision Quest experience)

As only 4 to 6 participants are taken in for an apprenticeship per Vision Quest group, a very close dialogue with the guides will be possible. Especially during the base camp time, when the Vision Quest participants are out for their solo, important questions can be discussed. There will also be opportunity for another short solo, for which the apprentices will prepare each other under supervision.

Two such apprenticeships are necessary, to fully learn, guiding others through this intensive process

Outdoor first aid training

Please complete a special outdoor first aid training of your own choice, during the period of your training with us. If you don´t know, where to apply for it, we can give references.

Completion

In your second and last apprenticeship you will be able to take on more responsibility, by working partly alongside with the guides. In the end of this Vision Quest, your completion of the training will be celebrated and you will symbolically step across the threshold between being a student and being a fellow colleague.