I have been immersed in workshops this weekend. I ran my full-day Fail Is Not A Four Letter Word on Saturday and then threw myself into the experience of Katie Rose‘s Singing The Song That We Are on Sunday. Both were gloriously full with eager participants, despite the snow and distance they had to travel.
Many of us have been to workshops which engaged only our brains. We’ve sat with paper and pen, talked through relatively superficial questions, and left without knowing each others’ names. When I go to a workshop, I want to be taken on a journey. I want to go from somewhere to somewhere and I want to trust the workshop facilitator to be my guide. I want them to have a map, but not grip on to it too firmly. Katie did this beautifully. There was a flow from one exercise to the next and my whole body was involved through sound, movement, words, drama and more. She stood back and allowed us to explore and then stepped in with her exquisite intuition to nudge us towards new places to look. I left the day with so much serenity, humming contentedly to myself all the way home.
When I go on these journeys, I also want to feel like others are there with me – that’s we’re seeing each other and being seen. I am always blown away by how my fear-of-failure-busting gang connects and supports each other. This group shared hugs and tears, acknowledgements and whoops of celebration. They’ve all swapped emails and are already continuing their conversations. In fact, a couple of them have suggested that they have a six month reunion – and this is a group who spent just six hours with each other.
It is a precious honour to be trusted to guide people through a learning journey and this weekend I’ve been reminded of how equally wonderful it is to find someone, such as Katie, who can do that for me. It’s a true skill to create a space safe enough for a group of strangers to explore an issue such as fear of failure, resistance, self-doubt, and insecurities. After my workshop, one of the more apprehensive participants said to me: “It was amazing how quickly and easily I could open up to people I didn’t know. I realised that we were all in the same boat so no-one was judging anyone else”. If as a workshop facilitator you can set up the expectation of openness and model vulnerability, something sacred is created. It’s a container which allows people to let go and go deep. They can cry and sing and shout – as they did this weekend! – and actually move through a block, rather than merely thinking about it.
The World Needs Your Passion, So…
1) What kind of journey do you already take others on? Fear to freedom? Stress to calm? Overwhelm to simplicity? Unfitness to health? What do you do naturally, just because of who you are? – and are there ways in which you could package this and actually offer that journey as a 1-1 or group process?
2) What journey are you ready for? Where do you want to go from and to? Who can be your guide?
3) Check out Katie’s website, The Rose Window, for her full moon chanting, workshops & upcoming second album launch.
© Corrina Gordon-Barnes, 2009
** There’s no blog next week so here’s a challenge… If YOU were writing this blog, what would you write about? Where are you noticing yourself doing – or wanting to do – things differently? How could your experiences help others in finding new pathways? **
** Fail workshop coming to London…. June 2009, date and venue tbc. Book early to avoid disappointment**