Course Information:
Dates: June 23rd, 2015- July 28th, 2015
Location: St. Joseph’s Spirituality and Education Centre Kincumber South
8 Humphreys Road
Kincumber, NSW 2251
Australia
Venue is wheelchair accessible
Cost: $4,500 USD for a single room (price includes training, meals and lodging)
To Apply: There are few spaces available. Please request a detailed application by emailing retreats@sbinstitute.com and mention CEBTT 2015 in the subject of the email.
Program Background:
Cultivating Emotional Balance (CEB) is 42-hour psycho-educational program developed by Paul Ekman, PhD and B. Alan Wallace, PhD at the urging of the Dalai Lama to address destructive emotions in society. The aim of CEB is to teach participants skills that facilitate greater emotional regulation and focused attention. Participants learn to identify the physiology and facial expression of emotion, develop attention skills, resilience and mindfulness, as well as cultivate meaningful aspirations. A primary goal of CEB is for participants to gain greater flexibility and choice in cognitive and emotional processing. CEB is an evidenced-based curriculum that draws from empirical psychological research on emotion, coupled with contemplative practices rooted in Buddhist traditions. Kemeny et al., (2011) found significant effects of
CEB on mindfulness, decreased negative emotions and increased prosocial responses among other important indicators. The empirical paper can be found here: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22148989
In this training program, participants will learn about the seven universal facial expressions of human emotion, various meditation techniques, as well as skills for teaching the CEB course to others. The emphasis is on continuing to develop a solid foundation of practice and content knowledge to train individuals to embody emotional balance and mindful awareness in the CEB courses that they may teach in the future.
About the presenter(s)
Dr. Paul Ekman is an American psychologist who is a pioneer in the study of emotions and their relation to facial expressions, has created an ‘atlas of emotions’ with more than ten thousand facial expressions, and has gained a reputation as “the best human lie detector in the world”.
Dr Eve Ekman is Paul Ekman’s daughter. She is a researcher in social welfare at the University of California, Berkeley. Ekman’s work shows that clinical empathy, instead of emotional distancing, can help alleviate job burnout and energize caregivers to act with compassion.
Dr B. Alan Wallace, an American author, translator, teacher, researcher, interpreter, and Buddhist practitioner interested in the intersections of consciousness studies and scientific disciplines such as psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and physics. He endeavors to chart relationships and commonalities between Eastern and Western scientific, philosophical, and contemplative modes of inquiry.
More Course Information:
The complete course is five weeks, two weeks of emotional skills training (led by Eve Ekman, PhD) and three weeks of contemplative practice (led by Alan Wallace, PhD).
• Emotional Skills Training: Training to recognize the universal facial expressions of emotion, physiological profiles of emotions, triggers and scripts.
• Contemplative Training: Practice various forms of meditation, shamatha (focused-attention), vipassana (insight) and the four-immeasurables (loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity).
Learning format
• Morning and afternoon sessions. Weekends/Saturdays off.
• Didactic and experiential components as well as a “teach-back” portion to practice communicating the material.
• Noble silence during the contemplative training portion.
• Certificate of completion.