Most of the time that I ran EIs my focus was on facilitating people having direct experiences. Either the day after a long Intensive or late on the last evening, I would organise a couple of integration dyads. People would use the dyad:
Tell me something you have experienced on this Intensive
Thank You
Tell me how you can make use of this in your life
Thank You
I also used to organise Holistic Yoga for people who wanted to try out a daily practice. This is a good vehicle for introducing people to a wide range of regular growth practices and I recommend it for that purpose. But I was not overly concerned with how people put their experiences to use. This has changed for me.
Now I am more interested in helping people to lead lives that are more in tune with the Divine, with their own true nature, than in simply facilitating experiences. This is not in tune with the strength and purpose of EIs. As described by Lawrence Noyes (The Enlightenment Intensive), an EI is an awakening process – it demonstrates to people that the Absolute exists and that they can experience it. The EI does not have anything to offer for the much longer and more difficult process of bringing such experiences into one’s life. But this is where my energy has shifted toward.
I have introduced a specific period, between one and two days, after the end of the Intensive for structured integration work. The schedule and dyads used are explained in more detail in Appendix 4. Here I want to explain something about the aim of the design described there.
First the Intensive itself is continued right up to the end of a full day of dyads. The participants go to bed and are told that the Intensive rules will continue the next day. First thing the next morning I deliver the “Closing Talk” of the Intensive and immediately follow it with an Introduction to Integration talk. This ensures that the participants remain in silence, in the open state achieved during the EI and in a contemplative state. And their first task in the integration process is to silently review what they have learned or experienced. They do this with reference to a journal that they have kept during the EI.
In the Closing Talk of the EI I emphasise the following points
- it is they, the participants, who have made the Intensive whatever it was; that I am honoured to have served them and that they have all made progress. I thank them and, if appropriate, the EI staff.
- experiences can, and often do, occur after the end of the Intensive. If this should happen to them they should communicate it to someone who will simply receive what they say. If an experience occurs during the integration work they are free to use any of the dyads to communicate what has happened
- having a direct experience does not make someone a better person; and not having an experience does not make one worse – nor a failure. Inevitably I have appealed to their ego to commit to the process – and to the ego not “succeeding” feels like failure. But you cannot fail at something you cannot make happen.
- In order to retain any of the benefits of what you have discovered and experienced you will need a daily practice. You have been in a wilful process and the benefits will be lost over time – that is inevitable and not a failure on your part. Wilful changes are not sustainable without regular practice.
In then opening talk on Integration work I make the following points:
- The whole point of participating in something like an EI is to improve the way that you live so that it is more in harmony with the way things are, so that you are more fulfilled and cause less injury. But this requires effort over and above the Intensive itself.
- Whether you have had a direct experience or not you will have discovered, or been reminded about, things about yourself or life or others. These insights need to be integrated as much as experiences themselves.
- At the beginning of the Intensive they did one dyad that addressed what they wanted from the EI and what they wanted to change in their lives. They should now return to those issues in the light of what they have learned and experienced.
- Making changes in one’s life requires clearly identifying what it is you want to change, identifying the obstacles to change, the help you require and have access to, and designing a scheme to make the change in small steps, preferably reversibly.
Following these talks the participants have a period of silent contemplation and review that lasts about 45 minutes. Then they have a schedule that has a dyad followed by a meal or break of some sort for additional reflection. By about half way through the day the schedule includes a group in which people share where they have got to. At that point the rules of the Intensive are relaxed and participants can start to talk to each other outside the dyads. Having a process of relinquishing the safety of the Intensive in a series of steps is far better than the previous pattern of ending and moving immediately to socialising. It also ensures that the integration work is done seriously and with the level of openness and honesty generated within the EI.
I am still in the process of developing the integration work, but I am satisfied that the principles outlined above are correct and that the type of schedule used in 2006 provides the basis for continuing this activity.
When I have finished a long Intensive I always like to have interviews with the participants to say goodbye in a formal sense. However I also always find this very tiring. Even ten minutes each with 20 people takes over three hours. In 2006 the dyads were used as a time when participants could opt to have a 20 minute interview (there was an odd number of participants). This worked well and meant I could monitor the dyads and complete most of the interviews.
It is usual to allow people to stay on for a day or so after the end of a two week – remember to include this in your budgeting. Then finally they have all gone. At that point I usually start to feel all the stuff that I have been putting aside. I feel exhausted, deflated, fucked up, unappreciated and the very last thing I want to do is to put my attention on anyone else. What I actually feel like is having a harem of beautiful young maidens to come and massage and bathe me. I want others to give to me rather than for me to have to give to others. I am saying all this not to display my own neuroses but to warn you about what it might be like for you at the end. I think it is inevitable that after giving out so intensely for a long period that one wants to reverse the flow – and if you can organise this in a straightforward fashion then do so.
I organised reunions after all the early two week Intensives. However I found them a bit of a strain, and only a few people could ever make it, so I have ceased doing that. However I do contrive to stay in contact with people. That is easier now with the use of e-mail. I think it is important to hear from everyone. Generally the people I do not hear from are those in trouble and they usually only need simple advice to get out of it – so I am fairly insistent until I hear from everyone. Well this is the basics of what I have learned. If you are planning to run a long Intensive and want to ask me anything about it feel free to contact me; I will always do my best to assist. Long Intensives have transformed my life in unbelievable ways and I feel honoured to have shared the process with so many others.
A Master's Path 