Knowing the Conscious Man

We are designed as part of nature to encounter life with amazement and wonder. And yet, our predominant transactional consumer culture trades this for a fiction i.e. that your happiness and ‘worth’ is found through productivity, material gain, technological advancement and social status.  The fiction leaves most men with a profound lack of fulfillment, chronic disconnection and loneliness and a continuous search for meaning.

Men can go for days, weeks, months or years without encountering their own wild beauty, rarely sharing an authentic, deeply intimate moment with themselves and those they are closest to. The good news is that embedded in our psyche by nature, is the potential for a bigger, more sensuous, more imaginative, more intimate and vital life. As Bill Plotkin posits, ‘it’s time to take another look at ourselves’.  The Knowing the Conscious Man Intensive invites participants to looks more deeply at themselves using nature as a mirror of their inner landscape.

It is about offering courageous men a deep sense of possibility – an alternative, soul infused, more meaningful and conscious way of embracing and walking your individual path. The workshop asks a lot of you – if you are drawn to register, prepare to be significantly stretched on the path toward psychological wholeness. Using nature as a mirror, you will be supported to explore the deeper questions about your life – questions that have no right to be ignored. The workshop will take you as deep as you are willing to go – it is being held at ‘Raven’s Nest‘ in Venus Bay south east of Melbourne. This is a camping-only experience and some previous personal growth experience is expected of applicants.

Overview:

During the workshop you will:

♦ Encounter Bill Plotkin‘s Nature Based Map of the Human Psyche as a core navigational tool. (The ‘Wild Mind Map’ is a holistic model to reclaim and embody the many facets of our innate human wholeness granted to us by nature yet suppressed by our experience of the prevailing ‘ego-centric’ culture).

♦ Access the four windows of knowing

♦ Experience deep somatic ritual and altered states of perception

♦ Cultivate an intimate conversation with your internal world and the natural world around us

♦ Experience significant solo time in nature using nature as the mirror of your psyche

♦ Proximate into a deeper relationship with the wounded and/or protector parts of yourself.

♦ See your physical body as a manifestation of your inner ‘story’

♦ Experience pathways for releasing suppressed emotion including grief and shame

♦ Meditation, deep imagination and dreams

♦ Time in Council and lots, lots more!!

Workshop Date:
Nov 21-24, 2024
16 in stock

Note: This intensive is for men who are willing to:

ask deeper questions of themselves

  reach outside of their ‘comfort zone’

open up to possibility

 It is recommended that you have previously completed other personal growth programs. This could include the Melbourne Men’s Group Awakening the Conscious Man Intensive and/or other developmental experiences – we will review your registration.

Logistics:

♦ This is a 3 night residential intensive in Venus Bay (170 kilometres South East of Melbourne). It is a fully catered, camping-only workshop for up to 16 people. You will need to bring a tent and camping gear.

Date:  5PM (3PM Arrival & Setup) Thursday Nov 21- 2PM Sunday Nov 24, 2024

Venue: Raven’s Nest retreat centre – Venus Bay

Investment: your time and $895 – a $450 deposit will hold your place.

Guarantee: What you put into this workshop is directly related to what you take out! The intensive will stretch you…in a good way!

Your Facilitators

David Mallard is a uniquely experienced trainer, coach, mentor, guide, adviser and consultant. He has been deeply involved in men’s development work for 25 years and co-founded Melbourne Men’s Group Inc. in 1998 with Dr. Roger Hilton. David is trained in Breathwork, accredited in the DiSC personality profile, holds a Cert. IV in Training & Assessment and has Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees.  He is currently a student in the professional ‘Wild Mind Training Program‘ with the Animas Valley Institute of Colorado. David has extensive senior executive leadership experience in corporate Australia working closely with CEO’s and Boards – in parallel he has facilitated, coached and guided hundreds of men’s group meetings, workshops and seminars. David is also a council member of Soulcraft ANZ Inc.

Chris Caldwell is a counselling psychologist, supervisor, teacher and group facilitator with over forty years’ experience in the field of healing and personal development.  Chris has explored and trained in diverse fields during his practitioner career including the body mind model of Wilhelm Reich, formal meditation and yoga trainings in Australia and India, extensive practice in dreamwork and depth psychology as initiated by Carl Jung and extended into the transpersonal work of Stanislav Grof. Amongst other things, Chris currently teaches transpersonal counselling at the IKON Institute of Australia.