The wisdom of body-mind = the future

Embodied Education

Dan and I are delighted to be presenting about Embodied Education in Glastonbury in May and then in Oxford in September.

Glastonbury: 
A day workshop Dan & I are co-facilitating in Glastonbury on Mon 27th May.

Further details & to book https://goddesstempleteachings.co.uk/radicallyembodying/embodied-education/

Join Kay and Dan Aldred to learn about their @girlgodbooks book Embodied Education: Creating Safe Space for Learning, Facilitating and Sharing, and vision for a new educational paradigm based on wellbeing, co-regulation, and creativity, which advocates for body-first, relational and embodiment approaches in organisations and communities.

Explore practical strategies for the creation of organisations and spaces which are trauma-informed and neurodivergent, sensory, and nervous system friendly, and which celebrate and encourage individuality, divergence, and innovation, alongside exploration, discovery, and imagination.

Suitable for anyone connected to schools, universities, youth work, teaching, home-schooling, unschooling, health and social care services, charities, social justice, parenting, holistic health and therapeutic settings, religious, and spiritual spaces.

Oxford:
Creative Bridges 2024 Embodied Consciousness, Psyche & Soul Research & Practice @eurotas.world & @aleftrust

Super excited to be offering a presentation as part of the Transformative Education Track of this conference in Oxford in September.

Further details & to book
https://eurotas2024.com/

Final reminder about this year's @the_pdaspace summit 26th - 28th April at which Dan & I are presenting on the importance of self regulation for educators, spaceholders & facilitators.

Join the summit here https://www.thepdaspace.com/summit-2024

Knowledge & decisions derived solely on rational, logic & 'disembodied' thought

without any conscious reflection - #metcognition

or, input from emotional intelligence - #intuition

or, reference to body wisdom - feeling, sensation & #instinct ...

is at best #base & #basic

and, at worst is sociopathic, psychopathic & dangerous

and, therefore, a real threat to humane, humanitarian, humanity.

The rational logic of disembodied minds (created & groomed by our colonial #educationsystem #schools #academia #universities) got us into this mess.

Return to the wisdom of the body-mind

Wakey wakey all bodies. Your wisdom (your pain, fatigue & rageful objections and/or your resistance, pleasure seeking & desire) is needed right now!

All bodies - I / we - need you to feel, emote, sensate.

All bodies - your feeling, sensation & emotional intelligence is the glue to re-membering the wholeness of the body of our common humane, humanitarian, humanity.

All #bodies - #wakeup & #liberate

Systems groom us in disembodiment & cause soul loss.

The sterile hospital of our birth, the school & university where we are educated & then our workplace - they're predominantly survival energy (fight/flight) driven & spiritless environments, where our bodies are 'disciplined', 'coerced' & 'measured' & we are told what to think & do, plus how to behave, speak, act.

Soon the stress of our culture, the media & the overarching body phobic, fear based attitudes of mainstream religion mean we collapse into freeze & fawn, spiritless, terrified, & now numb to the screaming objections of our bodies.

We exist zombified, no longer connected to soul - our wordless, creative, life essence - which is only able to express through our bodies - movement, emotions, imagination, sensations & so we are lifeless.

Soulless, lifeless & spiritless bodies are controllable, codependent & do bidding of the groomer.

And that is why our spiritual needs & embodied human needs are inextricably linked. There's no separation.

I've spent the past 12 months (un) learning & I've barely scratched the surface.

I visited @ashmoleanmuseum in Oxford last May & marvelled at the treasures of antiquity from cultures all over the globe but the ache in my heart & discomfort in my gut were strong. Instinctively & intuitively it felt wrong.

I wondered : How did these objects get here? Why are they here? When did they arrive?

To decolonialise requires consciousness, awareness appraisal & reflection. It requires effort & commitment. It requires an assessment of privilege & processing layers of shame, disgust, horror. It requires repair.

To decolonialise requires going beyond standardised white, colonial, imperial 'his'story & this means seeking marginalised sources, texts, voices. It requires trusting instinct & intuition - the twinges of ick. It requires being unpopular, being labelled wrong & going against the status quo. It requires change.

And I've barely scratched the surface & it's a pandora's box. And, it's not pretty. It's a continual unravelling.

Education, academia, Church, contemporary spirituality & the wellness industry have all reinforced the colonial agenda & have all been areas of society I've invested in trust, time & energy wise.

As @sofiaakel writes ..

"When many of us reflect on our journeys through compulsory, further and higher education, we don’t often recognise the knowledge we gain as inherently political. But it is impossible to divorce our worldview – including our political and moral values – from the subject matter we’re taught.

If we don’t challenge the colonial roots of our education, we are ultimately breathing life into an ideological framework borne out of an empire steeped in blood.

The task then, is for each of us to consciously and intently work to decolonise both our own minds and the institutions that uphold this.

There are revolutionary futures that we can imagine for ourselves through alternative ways of understanding the world that do not start, end and seek validation from darkness."

Revolutionising systems, structures & institutions in society is a spiritual imperative.

Our current education system here in the UK & anywhere else where the system has colonial & industrial roots is harming & traumatising children & young adults - physically, emotionally, intellectually AND spiritually.

It's causing 'soul loss' - a disconnect from their bodies, lifeforce spirit & creative soul.

We need to embody education - reanimate learning - teaching interconnectedness of mind, body, soul, spirit,

And, teach the interdependence & interbeing of individuals & the earth & community.

The future = #embodiededucation #embodimentspirituality

Final reminder & spaces left for this two day workshop I'm co-facilitating with Dr Lynne Sedgmore, CBE, in Glastonbury on Sat 25th & Sun 26th May.

*** Full details & to book https://goddesstempleteachings.co.uk/radicallyembodying/ ***

Understand and practice what it means to be a fully embodied sacred woman, priestess and leader, in the world today – with all its challenges and complexity.

Explore how this can be done effectively and sustainably, with integrity, living from our authentic wholeness, power and neurodiversity.

When we can fully embody our life purpose, authenticity, spiritual practices, and devotion to Goddess, we can truly express, and accept, all the different parts of ourselves.

*** We can then engage profoundly and effectively with community, social justice and ecological activism, as well as within our daily lives ***

Embodiment Spirituality

SST : So, I presented at the #SST24 @sst_theology two concepts:

1️⃣ Tangible Divinity #tangibledivinity
2️⃣ No Words Theology #nowordstheology

These are lived experience, embodiment theologies, rooted in #embodimentspirituality & resolution of #trauma in what I call our Divine Nervous System #divinenervoussystem

Theology meets #embodiededucation & the #polyvagaltheory & becomes a no words study of locating the divine #inandthrough the body within our #fleshyknowing

Thanking all the scholars, teachers, mentors (some mentioned below) whose work this is built on & the women who contributed shares to my @girlgodbooks book Making Love with the Divine: Sacred, Ecstatic & Er0tic Experiences

Audre Lorde, Lisa Isherwood, Elizabeth Stuart, Marcella Althaus-Reid, @drpeteralevine Dr Stephen Porges @polyvagalinstitute @irenelyon @gabormatemd @blackliturgies

What did I learn from presenting at a highly prestigious academic conference?

I spoke last week @sst_theology #SST24 conference about the concept of NO WORDS THEOLOGY.

Studying the divinity & spirituality of lived experience : a theology forged within & from embodiment.

I realise now that this is a paradox. Because:

* Academia & theology are dissociative disciplines - separated from & 'othering' of the body & emotions (which they pathologise, infantilise & dismiss).

* Lived experience is not considered valid or 'evidence'.
* Theology is about theory not the reality of the embodied experience of divinity.
* Theology (in the UK at least) is primarily the gate keeper & endorser of the Church & its hierarchy, doctrine & dogma.
* Neither academia nor theology value innovation, creativity or exploration.
* Neither academia or theology are self reflective or emotionally intelligent, & neither can speak to or understand (or are interested in learning about) the body - it's intelligence, wisdom & depth.

* Academia & theology are closed, insular, systems & echo chambers, which are inherently colonial, imperial, patriarchal, ableist, elitist, exclusionary, mind dominant & body phobic.

* Academia & theology are stuck in the dark ages & dying systems, like many others in society. They lack consciousness & awareness, & seem so archaic to me now.

Embodiment Spirituality - so what is next?

Radical (returning to the roots) rethinking & reinstating women as spiritual leaders. There's a template.

Edited extract from my MA essay Recovering Mary Magdalene written in 2005

"when we look at the scriptures in the light of the first century understanding of women, we see a radical new movement. 

A title recovered and given to Mary Magdalene is that of apostle to the apostles. 

In the early centuries of Christianity, Christians made pilgrimages to Magdala to venerate Mary Magdalene and to experience the resurrection as she did: living an erotic, spirit filled, life. 

Jesus encouraged gender equality in discipleship and spiritual leadership.

Malone writes, “Bernard of Clairvaux in the twelfth century as well as many other writers both before and since have called Mary Magdalene the apostle to the apostles”

I hope you enjoyed this newsletter.

Best wishes, Kay x
 ​