Interest Group Information
Interest Groups are small groups in which you can enrich your experience of the Plenaries either through discussing the material or by allowing different and creative processes to give you space to absorb the subject matter of the Plenaries.
Parsing the Plenary - Riley Robinson
Let’s talk about what has come up for us during Marcelle’s plenaries. Please bring your insights. Let’s gather around our own “fireplace” as listening companions. Marcelle’s four sessions are titled:
Perhaps each of us can sit quietly with these before the conference to consider what these might mean to us now from our own experience. Do questions come up that we want to bring to the conference and the interest group?
Riley Robinson is a longtime Quaker WFCRP attender who, thanks in part to this conference, keeps finding out that he’s not the same as he used to be.
Let’s Talk About Dreams - Gary Soulsman
For centuries, Friends have recognized that Spirit can speak to us through many voices—including our dreams. Dreams do more than reveal our unconscious; they can be a royal road to a deeper appreciation of our connection to God and to each other. In this safe and confidential small group, we will practice worship-sharing style listening by using the easy-to-learn “If it were my dream” process. As always, the focus is on safety, confidentiality and connection. All are welcome, even if you are new to dream sharing.
Gary Soulsman brings decades of service to spiritual exploration in Wilmington, Delaware and beyond. He is Co-Clerk of the Friends Conference on Religion & Psychology and has spent many years guiding others through the wisdom of dreams. Since concluding his 35-year career as a Delaware journalist, where he extensively covered the beat of faith and spirit, Gary has devoted his time to leading adult education programs focused on the evidence of consciousness's survival beyond death.
Fairy Tales: The Inner Light and Inner Dark - Lorraine Kreahling
NOTE: This is last year’s description, more to follow. Jungians have long been fascinated with fairy tales because they mirror the individuation process that is at the heart of Jungian analytic theory and practice. In simplest terms, Jungian individuation is an ongoing journey of self-discovery which involves bringing matters that are pressing on us from our unconscious—in the forms of dreams, neuroses (and compulsions) and projections—into the Light of consciousness to be integrated and made a part of who we are.
The archetype of the fairy tale is similar to the mythic hero’s journey—but with less detail. This leaves more open space for children and the child within us to fill it with material from our imagination. Fairy tales have held on through time, because like dreams, they can light up a hidden part of ourselves.
In this group we will use the skeleton of a fairy tale to exercise and exorcise parts of us that may be hidden. We will give space to the heroic qualities Jung believed each of us has. That like the hero’s journey, our fairy tale will begin at home and end there gives us safe boundaries to do both serious and playful exploration of the unconscious. We can bring back a little of that Refiner’s Fire to not only brighten our daily lives and daily bread—but to see the treasure inherent in the Dark and our Shadow.
You will need a notebook, black pen, and some form of adding color—e.g., markers, watercolors, colored pencils, etc. I recommend an attractive notebook for this project that suggests that what’s inside is valuable (like Jung’s Red Book). You will also need a willing suspension of disbelief.
Lorraine Kreahling is a writer and illustrator who wrote her graduate thesis on Jung and fairy tales and became a convinced Quaker in young adulthood. She has been a regular contributor to The New York Times, and has published on topics as diverse as geothermal technology and yoga, to metabolism and interior design. She was a long-time board member and also former clerk of the Friends Conference on Religion and Psychology.
Yoga - Mary Kearns
On Your Own - not joining an Interest Group - use the time as you wish, with friends or alone.