A Nine-Day Program: August 4-12, 2016

Teaching mindfulness meditation and mindfulness based interventions (MBIs) in health care and society is a mind-body discipline joining experiential understanding, practice competencies, and conceptual knowledge the pedagogy integrating contemplative wisdom with evidence-based psychological and scientific inquiry.

For those who facilitate or wish to facilitate mindfulness meditations and MBIs within healthcare, mental health, education, business, leadership and organizational settings, The Science of Healing and Mindfulness:

• Offers experiential learning, coaching and collective inquiry in the practice and facilitation of mindfulness meditations, compassion practices, and mindfulness based interventions (MBIs) in daily life.
• Provides clarity as to the origins, meanings, and practice of mindfulness meditation within Buddhism.
• Explores the presence of meditative practices within the world’s religious and indigenous traditions and provides a framework for the delivery of MBIs for culturally and spiritually diverse participants.
• Delivers current, relevant and evidence based information regarding the integration of mindfulness meditation, psychological theory and practice, and neuroscience (understanding the mind-body response to regular meditation practice).
• Supports practitioners’ discernment regarding various mainstream MBIs, teaching qualifications, and the wise and ethical application of mindfulness interventions for varying populations.

Dates: Thursday, August 4 to Friday, August 12, 2016
Instructors: Lila O’Farrell and Guest Nitartha Institute Faculty
Attendance: In class
Course Code: HEA 300
Residential Location:  University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
Program Registration: Click here to register online before May 29, 2016. Online website registration closes on May 29. To register after May 29, please email our Registrar David Palmer at dpalmer@nitarthainstitute.org and he will assist you with registration via email/phone. Email/phone registration deadline: June 30, 2016.

Readings:

Recommended: Emotional Rescue: How to Work with Your Emotions to Transform Hurt and Confusion into Energy That Empowers You by Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche. (Tarcher Perigee, 2016). A leading example of how the healing power of mindfulness can transform emotional suffering.
Required: A compilation of readings and a CD of all meditations offered within the course.

Both will be available for purchase at the Nalanda Store: http://nalandastore.com.

Class Topics:

• Mindfulness within the Buddhist tradition
• Engaging Mindfulness in Health Care and Society
• Mindfulness, Awareness, Insight and Compassion
• Promises and Pitfalls of Mindfulness Based Interventions
• Integrative Practice: Multicultural and Interfaith Dimensions of Mindfulness
• Comparative Case Study: Buddhist Psychology & Psychological Theory
• Mindfulness Practice and Collective Inquiry

The syllabus includes a balance of didactic teaching, collective inquiry, and the practice and facilitation of mindfulness meditation.

About the Facilitator:

Lila O’Farrell, MA (Couns. Psychology), MDiv (Interfaith Theology) is a specialist therapist and principal mindfulness educator in Primary Health Care in Auckland, New Zealand. Lila attended a 7 day training for health care professionals with Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn in 2003. Since then she has facilitated Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) in health care, educational, corporate, community and retreat settings.

Lila is one of the first professionals to introduce mindfulness courses for both adults and children, within primary health care. She offers mindfulness courses to a culturally and socioeconomically diverse populations experiencing a variety of medical and psychosocial concerns, and to medical staff seeking knowledge about mindfulness, and stress reduction. Lila trains and supervises colleagues to teach mindfulness, and meets internationals standards as a mindfulness teacher and trainer.

As a student of Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche, Lila nurtures a mindful life informed by Buddhist study and meditation practice. As a former interfaith hospice chaplain, tertiary educator and therapist, Lila’s work is informed by powerful teachings about life’s meaning received from hospice clientele, years of facilitating the successful recognition and repair of emotional habitual patterns, and continual witnessing of the ways in which mindfulness meditation transforms lives. She is the co-director of Mindful Life Consulting Ltd.

For more information about Nitartha Institute’s Summer 2016 Science of Healing Programs Click Here.