2019-20 Immersion
Advanced counseling, personal growth, and leadership training
Tools to heal body/mind/spirit/emotions
Community to practice and grow with
Integrity, boundaries, and respect paramount
10 weekends over 9 months starting Oct. 19th
Attend an upcoming Wisdom of the Body Introductory Playshop or Afternoon Workshop
See all upcoming events
What makes the Immersion different?
Real Energy
Learn to work with, and feel supported by energy that gets results, from energy healing pioneer and scientist Mike Sententia (Jill’s partner).
On-the-spot Connection Repair
Using real-life conflict within class, or with classmates as proxies for outside conflicts, we repair relationship ruptures with NVC-based mediation.
Restorative Touch
All the work on getting present, internally referenced, and connecting with the energy field supports the advanced skill of giving and receiving restorative touch. Learn more
Healing in Nature
We’ll tap into and deepen our relationship with the incredible healing power of nature.
Getting "Mesourced"
The English language hijacks our brains into thinking that reality exists locating reality externally, resulting in disconnect with ourselves and others. With NVC and other tools, we re-learn intimacy with our inner worlds, revealing a vast universe of power and choice. Learn more
Intimate Group Support
Your Immersion cohort becomes a group where you know and are known intimately, and whom you can call on for unconditionally loving support
One-on-one support
Your Immersion journey includes three individual counseling sessions with Jill, one at the beginning, one in the middle, and one at the end, so she can best support you during
the process.
Co-Counseling
Each week, the invitation is to use the skills you learn in the Immersion with your fellow students, giving and receiving support, honing your skills, and deepening your relationships.
Return to Presence
We learn how to get fully present and resourced to handle whatever life brings, and how to return to presence when we lose our way. Learn more
Honoring of diversity
The Immersion contains a component where we look at the impact and interrelationship of our different backgrounds. The discount structure also reflects a commitment to diversity.
Boundaries, Integrity,
and Respect
We’re doing vulnerable work here, and have created an appropriate container and set of processes to support that work. Learn more
Four-quadrant Healing
Because wounding happens to us in body, mind, spirit, and emotions, we work with all these dimensions:
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Physical–how much bodily contact or space does the client need?
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Mental–how do we interpret what we hear, and filter what we say for optimal clarity? We draw heavily on Nonviolent Communication and related schools of thought for ways to strip illusion from the English language, and get closer to the heart of things.
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Emotional–how do we show up when big feelings get expressed? Or when the client seems shut down? To the extent that we have fluency with our own range of feelings, to a similar extent will be able to hold those of others.
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Spiritual–metaphysical means “beyond the physical.” Many times what works most powerfully to move entrenched patterns is working outside most psychological traditions, such as with our human energy field, or our ancestral lineage.
Each element works with, reinforces, and help to integrate the others. We are whole humans who do not get wounded only one way, so our healing, too, needs to be multidimensional, and address all of us.
Real Energy
Jill took Energy Class with Lynda Caesara and then Lynda’s student, Norma Ramos-Ott for almost three years. During that time, she learned how to create a powerful energy field using the “twenty count.” Now she works with Mike Sententia, who is also her life partner. In this work, she calls in that same healing energy field, but now with specific adjustments, such as being able to request particular types of energy, such as “calm and safe.” Mike also visits class and gives free and informal talks after hours on energy, discounts on classes and services, and assists Jill with ongoing energy augmentation to her work. For those who are curious about/interested in this aspect, this part is especially fun and interesting, and not available anywhere else, except through Mike’s programs.
Healing in, with, and through Nature
The benefits of nature have been widely documented, and working with our inherent connection to nature helps us feel grounded, calm, safe, and present, all qualities that complement and support the work of the Immersion. Jill has authored a 52-card deck of “YourNature” cards with offerings to deepen one’s connection with nature, and tap into its incredible healing power. Jill uses nature as a vast resource in her own healing, and in that of her clients, particularly in the realm of healing from neglect. Plus, nature is always available, abundant, and free of charge. Students are strongly encouraged to use the invitations of the cards in their own lives.
Getting internally referenced
To reference internally, we orient to our own bodies for a sense of reality, and as a key factor in what to believe or do. We practice internal reference as a key component of Wisdom of the Body. Though simple in principle, many people struggle to get into the habit of referencing internally, because we’ve receive so much acculturation and language training to reference externally.
The more we can learn to reference our internal reality, the clearer we can get about how we feel and what we want. From there, we can more easily move out of states like depression, stuckness, and blame, into empowerment, deeper connection with others, and a life that reflects our deepest visions and desires. I have found that using and practicing the insights of NVC, based in the work of Marshall Rosenberg, helps tremendously in learning to reference internally. In particular, learning a vocabulary of feelings and needs helps retrain our externally-referenced habits to internal reference.
Pattern vs. Presence via the Five Personality Patterns
A key distinction we work with is pattern versus presence. We work with knowing how present we are, and how getting into pattern takes us out of presence. One extremely useful way to get a handle on our patterns is through learning about the five personality patterns. This potent body of work is not widely available, but is a cornerstone of the Immersion study. We learn it both in theory and through practice in finding ways to work with all the patterns, and to get out of pattern and into presence. Most people who have not been exposed to this work are surprised at how useful this body of work, and the Immersion’s approach to it is in their personal journey.
Boundaries, Integrity, and Respect
The personal boundaries of each student are of paramount importance. Part of the application process involves each student being asked about any history of difficulty in community, and also getting recommendations of others. This is for the safety and integrity of the class container. Jill has a policy about working within community, which you can see here.
Because she recognizes that a leadership position is also a position of power, and because she has seen multiple instances of how power can be abused, Jill is creating an accountability committee for herself, in case of any questions or concerns about her own behavior, or grievances about policies or processes. She will pay these committee members out of her own pocket. The names of those people will be made available to Immersion students.