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Relational Mindfulness: Bringing Mindfulness to the Beautiful and Messy Realm of Human Relationship

Live Online Course

With Deborah Eden Tull

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Introduction & Modules

The greatest challenge for human beings is how to stay present in the beautiful, dynamic, and messy field of human relating.

Relational Mindfulness offers 9 Buddhist teachings for bringing presence, clear-seeing, and compassion to how we relate – whether we are at work, with family, on a date, in conflict, or engaging with world issues and politics.

Relational Mindfulness is a practice for erasing the myth of separation and remembering the intrinsic interconnection that is who we really are.

The quality of every relationship we will ever have stems from the quality of our relationship with ourselves.

  • What if our greatest strength is our shared sensitivity and vulnerability?
  • What if meditation is simply a pathway for erasing the illusion of separation?
  • What if a subtle shift in our attention informs our ability to live in partnership with one another, the natural world, and all forms of life?
  • What if personal awareness practice is the most important skill for impacting change in our world?

These restorative and heart-opening practices can be integrated into every moment of life.

About the Course

This online course is based on Eden’s newest book, Relational Mindfulness: A Handbook for Deepening Our Connection with Ourselves, Each Other, and The Planet (Wisdom Publications – May 2018).

You are welcome to participate in this course solo or with a partner, friend, colleague, or spouse.

There will be mindful inquiry and relational practices offered in-between each session. If you participate in this course alone, we will offer you the opportunity to practice with a partner online.

Whilst the encouragement is to work with a partner, you can also inquire using a journal.

In addition to the recorded sessions, each week you will meet with Eden virtually for a group Q & A session to go deeper and look more personally into how these teachings apply to your life.

Module 1 – The Foundation for Connection: Moving From “I” Consciousness to “We” Consciousness

Intimate relating begins with the self. It is a toxic fantasy to believe that we can be intimate with others when we have not learned (or are afraid) to be intimate with ourselves.
—Gerry Greenswald

People struggle at times with how to bring meditation off the cushion and into relationship. Meditators can find it challenging to maintain the peace they find on silent retreat in everyday life and social life. In this module, you will be introduced to the 9 principles for Relational Mindfulness. These principles will then be explored in-depth throughout the course, helping us to erase the myth of separation and gain a new understanding of relating as a path for awakening.

The 9 principles are:

  • Intention
  • The Sacred Pause
  • Deep Listening
  • Inquiry and Clear Seeing
  • Turning Towards, Rather Than Away
  • Transparency
  • Taking Responsibility
  • Not Taking Personally
  • Compassionate Action

Eden will help you to bring more awareness to the myth of separation as it operates in your life. She will help you make the shift from “I” consciousness to “We” consciousness, to learn to trust true nature as a guide in how we relate.

Module 2 – Going Deeper

The act of deep listening is an act of love. Listening to life as it unfolds moment by moment with our full presence is the essence of meditation. In Module 2, you will be guided through the first four principles of Relational Mindfulness:

  • Intention
  • The Sacred Pause
  • Deep Listening
  • Inquiry and Clear Seeing

We will explore the following questions:

  1. How does the bubble of separate self keep us from being available for the level of connection we crave? Why is ego so afraid of intimacy?
  2. How can we allow connectedness to become unconditional rather than conditional?
  3. How do we resist intimate connection through projection and judgment and how can we release these habits?
  4. How can we deepen our receptivity and capacity as listeners?
  5. How can we listen beyond the words/surface to what is underneath, in order to be a more compassionate presence?
  6. How can we remember the inherent goodness of all beings, and access genuine compassion, even when there is conflict or challenge in the relational field?

Every part of us that feels pain needs to know that it is not alone. Each aspect of our being that suffers needs to know that there is someone to listen. This module will include a guided practice for finding self-compassion in the relational field as well as formal Relational Mindfulness practices to bring to daily life.

Module 3 – Our Strength is our Sensitivity

The best people I know are inadequate and unashamed. We have to learn to live with our own frailties.
—Stanley Kunitz

In Module 3, we will explore the principles of:

  • Turning towards rather than away
  • Not taking personally
  • Transparency

Part of maturing spiritually is learning to step beyond the myth of separation to operate in service to the whole.

In this module, we will learn practices for releasing fear, self-consciousness, and other obstacles to the already open heart.

We will bring awareness to the ways we guard, protect, defend, and mask ourselves so that we can experience greater freedom in everyday life. We will learn how to take the risk and choose the courage of transparency in order to express ourselves more freely and from interconnected awareness. These practices help us to more fully express the love that is who we are.

Module 4 – Truth Telling and the Larger Impact of Relational Mindfulness to Affect Social Change

Truth-telling is like oxygen: it enlivens us. Without it we grow confused and numb. It is also a homecoming, bringing us back to powerful connection and basic authority.
—Joanna Macy

In this module, we will explore the final 2 principles for Relational Mindfulness:

  • Taking Responsibility
  • Compassionate Action

We will explore more deeply the ways that personal change and the ability to bring about social change are inextricably linked. We will explore the myth of separation as a root cause of so many of the isms we face today. We will take a deeper dive into transparency and truth-telling as vital practices, personally and collectively. We will acknowledge the degree to which “how we treat ourselves and how we treat our world are one and the same.”

Some of the questions we will look at are:

  1. How can we commit to sharing and celebrating our authentic self more in everyday life?
  2. How can we release the habit of “othering’ people, ourselves, and the natural world?
  3. How can we remember We consciousness in every situation and conflict?
  4. How can we hold ourselves accountable to continually going deeper in our embodiment of Relational Mindfulness in order to end the trance of separation?

Eden has found that Relational Mindfulness is a much needed complement to traditional dharma teachings and practices.

It has introduced her to a unique interpersonal dimension of awareness that has its own path from confusion to insight.

At the same time, it is nothing other than the mind recognizing its own compassionate and empty essence.

On original page there were testimonial quotes here.

Eden is well acquainted with this space and the practices that unfold it. Her gifts in this regard will bring tremendous benefit to anyone willing to look into the mirror of relationship. Lama Karma

I would highly recommend this workshop to anyone desiring greater connection with themselves and others. It is deeply transformative! Cindy, M.Ed. in Curriculum and Instruction

Live Online Course Details

4 Recorded Modules

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Shared Learning Experience

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4 Live Sessions

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30 Day Refund Guarantee

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About Deborah Eden Tull

Deborah Eden Tull is a Zen meditation and mindfulness teacher, public speaker, author, activist, and sustainability educator.

She trained for seven years as a Buddhist monk at a silent Zen monastery in Northern California, and has been traveling to, living in, or teaching about conscious, sustainable communities internationally for the last 25 years.

Eden has worked with a wide range of audiences, from dharma students and people wanting to cultivate more compassion in their life, to concerned citizens and activists, to parents, to schools and corporations, and to special populations such as inner city youth and people who are incarcerated.

Eden has a special gift in facilitating mindful inquiry and relational mindfulness and is passionate about helping people to remember the depth of interconnection that is available in every moment and every interaction.

She is passionate about the personal, interpersonal, and transpersonal impact of mindfulness.

Her teaching style emphasizes deep listening, transparency, inquiry, compassion, and an unwavering commitment to compassion.