Workshop: Movement, Myth and Meaning

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Date:……………..28-29 July

Time:……………..Saturday 10am -5pm

……………………..Sunday 2:00pm – 5:30pm

Cost:………………$125

Registration:……online

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This course uses the language of mythology – symbols, archetypes, memory and emotions, and somatic awareness to explore the meaning of the feminine. It will be presented by Dr. Julie Teetsov. We talked with her about her background and the course.
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What is your background?

Originally, I am from Chicago and started my career working as a scientist in a laboratory and teaching astronomy and navigation. Then about five years ago I decided to move into coaching and teaching yoga. I became qualified as a Kripalu Yoga teacher and have done subsequent teacher training with Donna Farhi. My work combines yoga and movement with spiritual psychology.
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The Course

This is a new course created from my own experience in exploring the feminine. I find that people really learn well when it is related to the natural world. The natural world is always moving – the earth is moving, the solar system is moving, our bodies are always moving – right down to the smallest atom and so I find that people learn through movement. And that has definitely been my own experience as well.

So I thought that I would combine two of my loves – one of them is learning through movement and the other is mythology. So I have designed this course to use movement and the symbolic language of myth in relation to exploring the feminine – because this is a course for women. (I would love to design a course for men at some point!)

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What kind of movement is it? Yoga?

Some of the movement is inspired by yoga but also by my work with navel radiation. But it’s very much about finding the energy in the pelvis and moving that up through the heart chakra and up into the brain. It works with the chakras but not directly – in a much more organic way.
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Which archetypes will you focus on?

We will work through two of the major archetypes that are prevalent in the feminine journey. The first is the mother and the second is the lover – which is also known as the Aphrodite energy.

Both are intimately related but what I’ve found is that women sometimes identify with one more than the other, or sometimes with neither. So we explore the relationship with those archetypes.

I’m hoping that women will come out of the workshop with greater consciousness of the roles and archetypes they are expressing. This gives them the choice in how they express themselves.

It’s like when they go out on a date with a man that they are really attracted to, or spending a quiet night with their partner at home. They might choose  to be more feminine – or not – it depends what role they want to play in that particular encounter.

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How do you mix these different archetypes with movement?

I would just say come to the workshop!  It is not something that I can easily explain – it has to be experienced to be understood. But I can say that it is a lot of fun.

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Is the course focused more on practical experience or a theoretical awareness?

It will be about 50/50. Both are important and help make the experience complete.

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What are the benefits of this course?

I would say the main benefit is self-awareness. It gives a greater sense of inner authority. This whole workshop is really geared towards each of the participants listening to their inner authority – which makes me more of a guide than a teacher.

This awareness makes relationships more conscious and gives a much deeper level of understanding and intimacy. It reveals the dynamics of sexual polarity (masculine/feminine) in everyday life.

And another wonderful benefit of this work is the greater sense of connection with the cosmos – a connection with something beyond oneself.

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Is this therapy?

This work is very therapeutic, but it is not meant to be therapy. It is a day and a half long – so really it is an introduction to this work.

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