Transformative Learning

Awakening Beauty – a 2 wk course on Beauty in Art, Mondays 19th and 26th June 2023, 10am-12pm UK time with Mary Attwood
Awakening Beauty A two week course on Beauty in Art With Mary Attwood Monday 19th June & Monday 26th June 10am – 12pm UK time via Zoom £40 “Beauty can be consoling, disturbing, sacred, profane; it can be exhilarating, appealing, inspiring,...
Seeing the World Anew: The Emergence of Landscape in Art With Mary Attwood Three week Summer course Mondays 8th, 15th and 22nd August 2022, 10am- 1pm UK time
Gainsborough, Constable, Turner Three week Summer course With Mary Attwood Mondays 8th, 15th & 22nd August 2022 10am – 1pm, via Zoom On looking at them, we find tears in our eyesand know not what brings them.John...

iRewild in Motion – Reconnect to the Natural World – 6 week course starting 2nd February 2022 – 7pm-8pm (UK time) – via Zoom – £44 full course with certification
An exciting collaboration between the Centre for Myth, Cosmology and the Sacred and iRewild. This course aims to support and improve your health and wellbeing in deep connection with nature, while at the same time increasing your love for learning about nature as you freely walk, explore, and reconnect with the natural world.

From Allegory to Anagoge: the question of symbolic perception in a literal world by Angela Voss
This paper discusses the relevance of the ‘four levels of interpretation’ of medieval theology – literal, allegorical, moral, anagogical – to the teaching of astrology at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. In an educational system increasingly bound to positivist assumptions a way is required to lead students to a deeper perception, and experience, of the symbolic.

Myth, Cosmology and the Sacred: Transformative Learning as a Bridge between Worlds by Angela Voss
Rice University religious studies professor Jeffrey Kripal has defined the humanities as ‘consciousness studying consciousness in the reflecting mirror of culture’ (2014: 368), and indeed he sees the role of intellectuals as a ‘collective prophet’ (2017: 302) who can potentially see behind the veil of our separatist, egoistic illusions and wake up an awareness of our common humanity. This paper focusses on how Kripal’s vision informs the Masters programme in Myth, Cosmology and the Sacred at Canterbury Christ Church University, for in our view, values of sustainability are intrinsically connected to understanding what it means to be a human being making meaning in the world. The MA subscribes to Kripal’s call for a broader perspective which goes beyond the ‘exterior’ world of empirical and historical information to reflect on the question of human cognition and experience—that is, on our own nature as interpreters of culture and creators of myth. The MA programme is situated within a transformative learning context, and here the programme director explains its rationale and ethos. Examples of pedagogical methods are described and student feedback included. With reference to key authors, the foundations of the programme in holistic and integrative models of knowing are discussed, together with the importance of calling on esoteric and wisdom traditions for hermeneutic frameworks. Such frameworks combine mythopoetic and spiritual insight with critical and reflexive understanding, and thus bridge the subject-object split of the Western Enlightenment which still dominates our intellectual discourse. Finally the programme is linked to sustainability values, and positioned in the context of a new vision of integrative learning for our times which fosters connections between humans, earth and cosmos.

Introduction to Goethean Enquiry – DOWNLOAD with Louise Livingstone – £15 for full recording and handouts
In this seminar we will learn more about Goethe and his imaginal method of enquiry, exploring why his method is so important for the world we are living in today.

How can Study unite the Symbolic and the Literal? – Simon Wilson
Today I’d like to talk about studying and what studying may bring about. To be more specific, I’d like to talk about a crucial meaning of the word study, a meaning which most of us are probably unfamiliar with and which indeed the whole Western world is unfamiliar with and has been for the past 300 years or so. It designates a whole understanding of what study involves and what study can bring about in students and it has fallen by the wayside, where it still lies forgotten, neglected and concealed under the detritus of 3 centuries. But if we clear away the undergrowth and remove the rubbish, we may find that it still shines as if new with a light that may illuminate the world and ourselves. It may even bring about a transformation in our knowledge, both of the world and of ourselves.

The Art of Seeing – Plotinus and the Soul with Mary Attwood – Thursday 27th October 2022 – via Zoom – 7pm-8pm UK time – £ 10
The Art of Seeing Plotinus and the Soul with Mary Attwood Thursday 27th October 2022 - 7:00pm-8:00pm (UK time) via Zoom £10 "We must close our eyes and invoke a new manner of seeing, a wakefulness that is the birthright of us all, though few put it to use....
Gallery visit – Seeing the World Anew: the emergence of landscape in Art – with Mary Attwood – Saturday 3rd December 2022
Seeing the World Anew: the emergence of landscape in Art at the National Gallery, London With Mary Attwood Saturday 3rd December 2022, 10:00am - 2:00pm “The eye must not rest on the appearances of nature itself, or on the surface qualities of the work of art, but see...
The Call of Sophia with Dr Simon Wilson Tuesday 21st February 2023 – 6.30-8pm UK time via Zoom £10
The Call of Sophia with Dr Simon Wilson Tuesday 21st February 2023 6.30-8.00pm (UK time) via Zoom £10 This presentation will look at Sophia, or Woman Wisdom, who calls to each of us personally, to desire her and devote ourselves to her. She was present in...

Ravens Speech with Andreas Kornevall – Sunday 26th February 2023 – 3:00pm-5:00pm UK Time – Via Zoom – £15
This workshop is for those with an interest in witchcraft, runes, alchemy, symbolism, Norse culture and Paganism. Andreas will guide us through the magical talismans of the ancient world – what can we learn from them, how can we read them? Also an introduction to the thousand-year history of the runes will be presented. Storytelling and myth will be essential components in our explorations; we will learn basic storytelling techniques and discover the initiatory patterns that exist in fairy tales.

The Remarkable Evolution of Myth, Cosmology, and the Sacred in Human Culture with Professor Richard Tarnas – Tuesday 21st March 2023 – 6.30-8pm UK time via Zoom £10
The Remarkable Evolution of Myth, Cosmology, and the Sacred in Human Culture with Professor Richard Tarnas Tuesday 21st March 2023 6.30-8pm UK time via Zoom £10 In this evening’s illustrated lecture, Richard Tarnas will offer a brief overview of the ways...
Annunciation in Art – the call and response – 2 week course Mondays 27th March & 3rd April 2023, 10am- 12.30pm UK time via Zoom – with Mary Attwood
Annunciation in Art - the call and response with Mary Attwood Two week course Mondays 27th March & 3rd April 2023 10am- 12.30 pm UK time via Zoom £45 with Mary Attwood 7-8pm UK ti “There is some kiss we want with our whole lives The touch of spirit on...

Gaia Gatherings – Monthly Earth Healing Circle – Last Tuesday of Each Month – 7.30pm-9pm UK Time – Online Via Zoom – with Dr Louise Livingstone and Jay Livingstone – £11 Per Session
Gaia Gatherings - Monthly Earth Healing Circle with Dr Louise Livingstone & Jay Livingstone Last Tuesday of the month (scroll down for dates)7:30pm - 9pm UK time via Zoom £11 per sessionA monthly online group, to share, reflect and send healing from our hearts to...

The Art of Seeing- the Passion of Christ – Thursday 27th April 2023, 7-8pm UK time with Mary Attwood £10
The Art of Seeing monthly sessions held on a Thursday evening 7-8pm UK time via Zoom with Mary Attwood The Art of Seeing - overview We know how to read a book and get lost in the world of the imagination, and we allow ourselves to be moved emotionally and...

Deep Time – A Contemplative Journey with Dr Louise Livingstone – via Zoom – 4 week course – Wednesdays 5th, 12th, 19th, 26th June 2024 – 7pm-9pm UK time – £80
Dr Louise Livingstone is co-founder of the Centre for Myth, Cosmology and the Sacred, and Director of the Heart Sense Research Institute. You can view her bio here For more information and to book, visit:...

Conversations with Gaia with Dr Louise Livingstone & Jay Livingstone via Zoom – 6 week course – Wednesdays – Starting October 2023 – 6.30pm-9pm UK Time– £120
This course is inspired by the theme of Robin Wall Kimmerer’s wonderful book Braiding Sweetgrass (2013) that encourages us, through indigenous teachings, to see the world as a gift. Innate within the energy of gift lies relationships, and the notion of reciprocity. In turn, at the heart of relationship and reciprocity lies openness, love, understanding, give and take, and, conversation.

Heart Sense Private Mentoring Sessions via Zoom – Dr Louise Livingstone – Running Throughout The Year
One-to-One Support/Mentoring/Readings. Private sessions with Louise Livingstone, PhD (MSc, BA, PGDipCEIG, VTCT, AAMET EFT, INLPTA). Reconnect with your heart and align to the inherent wisdom that lies within, learn to understand how your heart speaks to you and guides you through life, and gain confidence and trust in your heart for personal transformation; particularly important in these rapidly changing and challenging times. “Committing to journey back to our own heart is one of the most courageous and important steps that any of us can take in our world today” – Louise Livingstone.
Each session is one hour online via Zoom. All sessions are recorded. You will receive the audio recording via WeTransfer after the session has taken place.

Meeting the World Through the Heart with Louise Livingstone – 25 July 2021 – 3pm-5pm (UK time) – via Zoom – £15
As Iain McGilchrist states in his book The Master and His Emissary, “The model we choose to understand something determines what we find….Our first leap determines where we land” (2012, p.97). Expanding our enquiry deeper into the imaginal realms, in this session we continue to take the imagination seriously and move into our heart space; known through various discourses as an organ of imaginal perception.

Summer School 2021
We are excited to announce that the Centre for Myth, Cosmology and the Sacred is celebrating its first birthday! Over the past twelve months, via our online lectures, seminars and talks, we have had the pleasure of connecting with large numbers of you over Zoom; meeting old friends and making new ones. Each day (from Monday to Thursday), we will be releasing an online lecture for you to watch/listen to. On Friday 30th, we will be hosting an on-line, celebratory coffee morning via Zoom at 11am (BST), where Angela, Mary and Louise will be available for informal chat.

Calling and the Inner Imaginarium – Sharon Blackie talk with Q&A – £10 – DOWNLOAD
Sharon’s talk took place on 23rd February 2021. This package contains the full recording of both Sharon’s talk and the Q&A afterwards. In this talk, Sharon explores the idea that each soul has a unique way of being, a unique purpose, which is essential not only to its own growth, but to the world’s own becoming.

Transforming the heart: from biological pump to producer of knowledge, with Louise Livingstone – £5
20 minute downloadable lecture. This lecture presents the idea that the heart is far more important and complex than our dominant way of generating knowledge about the world makes possible

Research Lecture – The heart speaks: reimagining the heart for contemporary times, with Louise Livingstone £10
60 minute downloadable lecture. In this lecture, Louise introduces her PhD research that makes a case for heart knowing as a vitally important human capability which has, over the course of many hundreds of years, been divorced from, and rendered subservient to, knowledge about the world as generated through the brain.

Docere, Delectare, Movere, Soul-Learning, Reflexivity and the Third Classroom by Angela Voss
‘It is as if we can study everything about religion, except what makes it fiercely religious’ observes Rice University religious studies professor Jeffrey Kripal. Well, what does make religion fiercely religious? Should this highly-charged, sensual, devotional, or emotive impulse indeed find a place in academic studies?

A Methodology of the Imagination by Angela Voss
In his work on Sufi mystics, Henry Corbin uses the term mundus imaginalis to designate the psychic space in which the “super-sensible”reality of dreams, theophanies and spiritual beings are manifested, in a visionary sense, to the individual. T

Taking the lead from nature: why creativity matters in research – with Angela Voss – £5
This lecture was originally given at Christ Church Canterbury University in 2017 as the opening of a research day on creativity in research. In it Angela discusses combining the two ways of knowing – the objective and the intuitive

Moments of Awakening: Religious Myth and Reflexivity – Angela Voss
In this contribution to Daniela Boccassini’s wonderful journal, I talk about my ‘moments of awakening’ through music, and also the author Fred Gettings’ similar experiences in the Basilica of San Miniato al Monte in Florence.