Embodied approaches to Life and to Therapy

In a few months I reach my 80th birthday, and for me this marks a new and (I hope and intend) a productive phase in my life. 

Some wise person said:

"Live as if you would die tomorrow, 

and study as if you would live a hundred years."

If spared, having sampled semi-retirement, I plan to return my focus to my  work for the next five years, and then at 85, turm more towards reflection, contemplation and reminiscence.  

 For some years now it has been my wish and stated intention to reach the age of 93 "practising Tai Ji and wondering about the future."  (At 63 I calculated that this was about 10,000 days away- a big but finite number. Now I am past the halfway mark .)

However: "Man proposes, God disposes."

I feel that my work is to pass on some what I have learned, and am still learning;

• about an embodied way of living; 
• about the unavoidable clash of opposites and their power to generate new, unimagined, creative possibilities; 
• about authenticity, authority and integrity; mutuality, respect, dependence, independence and interdependence; 
• about Self-directed learning and about collaboration; 
• and about the Socratic dictum that "wisdom consists in knowing that one does not know..."

It is a while since I retired as a Supervisor, and even longer since I was in practice as a Somatic Trauma Therapist, or Body Psychotherapist.  I shall not be returning to that kind of regular and relatively intense personal commitment.  I have been enjoying having more space and freedom in my life.

Instead I plan to build a practice offering support and encouragement - mostly in the form of Mentoring and/or Coaching - to people already set on some personal path of helping, creating, exploring.  Using Jungian terminology I want to work with people already engaged in a process of Individuation. The phrase that came to me was: Healers, Creators, and Seekers.   I am thinking of people who have made and want to make a contribution, and at the same time pursue their own personal Growth.

In practice this means:

• creating a Coaching and Mentoring offer for a limited number of people individually on in groups
• developing the Self-Directed Learning (SDL) Model that has informed past workshops with an emphasis on on Radical Self-Acceptance and Transformation (New Forest 2015, Lesbos 2017) probably in covid times as an online offering, with the possibility of additional coaching
• promoting Self-Esteem, and beyond that  (mutual) Human Esteem, as a foundation for Peacemaking (so sorely needed just now) through work based on the book Able & Equal; a gentle path to peace by Denton L Roberts.
• continuing to encourage people to experience how Embodiment, Awareness and Aliveness enrich their lives through the Radix Workshop programme (at least through 2019), and by supporting the Radix Institute Training Initiative.
• creating a programme for the Self-Care of Helping Professionals, from Burnout Recovery to professional fulfilment
• working as a Trustee in the Champernowne Trust on behalf of a Jungian perspective that acknowledges the depth of the Psyche, the power of imagination and creativity, and the scope ( and constraints) of human possibility.

Michael Gavin