The SoulCare Course

Every class in The SoulCare Course is 90 minutes and has four components: an in-depth presentation from Joan; a small group exercise or inquiry; a large group discussion; and a guided imagery or meditation practice. You’ll also have a place to post online, interact with other course participants and gain further guidance from Joan between sessions.

Week One:
Entering the Temple of the Soul (April 4th)

Research in spirituality and health has identified meaning and faith as central to wellbeing, prevention and recovery from illness and surgery. In this session we will explore the nature of spirituality, enter the temple of the soul through inquiry and practice, and begin our exploration of the two intersecting worlds of chronos or clock time and kairos or eternal time. In this first session together, you will:

Explore your personal experience of the soul

Discover exactly what helps you connect to your spiritual center

Receive guidance for deepening your spiritual practice, or discover how to undertake a new spiritual practice

Uncover any blocks you have to connecting to your soul

For the seven weeks of the course, your invitation is to commit to a practice of your choice so that we can explore the nature of the soul together, in a real and present exchange both in weekly sessions and online between our meeting times. Holding ourselves and each other accountable for moving into the kairos realm together will ensure that the course not only feeds our minds, but also reaches into the depths of the soul beyond words and concepts.

Week Two:
Listening Deeply to the Body-Mind Conversation (April 11th)

In this session we will explore the pathways through which your emotions and beliefs become embodied – from neuro-hormones to immune function; from stress to the release of pro-inflammatory cytokines that can predispose you to illness; and from adrenal fatigue to burnout and depression. We’ll deeply explore this circle to understand how illness and stress can guide you back to your soul. You will:

Discover how spiritual principles help you to become “stress hardy”

Learn how your thinking predisposes you to health and illness

Recognize and overcome “New Age Guilt” and simplistic thinking in the mind-body realm

Discover how illness acts as a metaphor for our lives (or not)

Learn to use stress and burnout as course corrections

Week Three:
Restoring the Soul of Childhood (April 20th)

Twenty years of research has shown beyond any shadow of a doubt that time does not heal childhood wounds. It only conceals them. There is a dose-response relationship between the number of adverse childhood experiences (neglect; emotional, physical or sexual abuse; a missing, addicted, depressed, incarcerated or mentally ill parent; violence toward the mother) and physical health for the remainder of the lifespan. Learn to:

Truly heal any childhood wounds

Create rituals (which operate in the realm of the soul, the imagination and the amygdala) and create healing of a different order than talk therapy (which operates at the level of the hippocampus)

Discover when spiritual practices can help heal childhood wounds and when they act as “bypasses” and block effective healing

Embody the archetype of the wounded healer

Access psycho-spiritual healing resources for you as an individual and for your clients (if you’re a healthcare professional)

Week Four:
Forgiveness and Healing (April 25th)

One of the most active areas of research in integrative medicine is in the link between forgiveness and health. An interesting research tidbit: 94% of people believe that forgiveness is a good thing for their health and peace of mind. But only 48% have tried it.

The conditioned self is averse to self-reflection and change, yet is always pushing us to improve and judging the parts of ourselves that are not yet developed. It encourages self-hatred rather than compassion. The soul is ruthless in pointing out our conditioning, yet as loving as the Great Mother who encourages the still sleeping parts of us to wake up and shine. In this session, you will:

Realize the power of forgiveness and its direct correlation to your health and wellbeing

Discover what you gain (and lose) by holding on to grudges

Understand the misconceptions of forgiveness that prevent people from experiencing it (and how it differs from reconciliation)

Learn soul practice that open the door to forgiveness of self and others

Week Five:
Navigating Change with Resilience (May 2nd)

The universe comes into being now, and now, and now again, freshly creating in every moment. Change is the only constant we can depend on. The way we approach unwanted change leads to stress or despair on the one hand, or to transformation, soul growth and service on the other. Change begins with the death of what was and culminates in the dawning of something new. The intermediate or liminal stage is “the place between no longer and not yet.” This is the most fertile, but also the most challenging, part of the process. Navigating this change is an essential skill for living in these times of global shift. Moving through liminality with grace, and without allowing the fear of the conditioned self to move to premature closure, requires a set of soul competencies in the area of resilience. In this session, you will:

Learn to get comfortable with the unknown

Discern between allies, mentors and “enemies” (those who drain your energy and collude with the conditioned self to create fear)

Practice the power of mindfulness and gain the capacity to still your mind and calm your body

Develop your curious self and learn to listen to your intuition

Become a resilient, soulful shelter and support to others

Week Six:
Entering the Imaginal Realm (May 9th)

The conscious mind is like the tip of an iceberg. The soul lives in the unconscious realm where imagery, rather than words, is the mode of expression. Fantasy, imagination and dreams convey a lot of information about physical and emotional healing, the meaning of symptoms, undiagnosed illness and the means to recovery. In this session, you will:

Discover the link between fantasy and healing

Explore your dreams and see them as “letters from the Divine”

Understand how your waking dreams and imagination convey information about your health and wellbeing

Learn to awaken in and from your dreams

Week Seven:
Your Soul’s Compass: The Art of Spiritual Guidance (May 16th)

As human beings we are masters in the fine art of self-deception. Discerning the flow of guidance from ego reactivity is an important – and often neglected – healing art. Is that strong hunch I have about my health or another issue a true unfolding of the inner guide/physician or something else? When you tune into your guidance and learn to trust it as part of your daily life, you will be directed on how to evolve and free yourself from the repetition of karma to experience the dharma of life. In this session, Joan will draw from her book, Your Soul’s Compass: What is Spiritual Guidance, in which she and her husband Gordon Dveirin interviewed close to 30 male and female spiritual leaders – Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Sufis, Quakers, Hindus, shamans and intuitives. You will:

Explore the four-part cycle of guidance: alignment with Source, discernment, action and retrospection

Learn to embody energy as guidance

Discern the difference between synchronicities, knowings and red herrings

Learn the art of the SoulCircle (experienced in small groups)

Realize the joy of being and having an “anam cara” or soul friend