Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy

MBCT applies traditional forms of mindfulness meditation, but more importantly can be self administered (with instruction/support) and integrated into the client/person’s life. It is also highly suited to group work. Therapies that clients can administer themselves are important because they can continue to be effective, independently of the therapist, with issues that were not a problem at the time of the MBCT programme.

• Experiential Introduction
• Teacher Development - Part 1
• Teacher Development - Part 2

Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy: Experiential Introduction

Trainer: Patrizia Collard PhD

Training Dates: 6-7th Nov + 4-5th Dec 2010
4 day course run over 2 weekends
Fee: £480
Location: 11 mins from London Bridge
Accommodation available at the same venue for £30/night (Only 2 rooms)

This four day course teaches you mindfulness interventions (meditations, every-day mindfulness and mindful movement) and will introduce you to ways of identifying and dealing with difficult physical sensations, feelings and moods commonly associated with stress, anxiety, pain and depression. The experience of working in a group can enhance one's own learning as we observe how fellow human beings grow and change.

This course is also appropriate for those who just want to experience MBCT for their own wellbeing.

Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy has been developed with the aim of reducing relapse and recurrence for those who are vulnerable to episodes of depression. This empowering way of working has also gained empirical validation. It is needed because the risk of relapse and recurrence in those who have been depressed is very high, and the amount of triggering required for each subsequent episode becomes lower each time depression recurs.

Jon-Kabat-Zinn's book, Full Catastrophe Living (1990; New York: Delacorte) describes many of the methods used in the MBCT programme and is an excellent introduction to clinical applications of mindfulness meditation training, also applicable to chronic pain, anxiety, and stress-related physical illness.

 

Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy: Teacher Development - Part 1

Trainer: Patrizia Collard PhD

Training Dates: 10-14th September 2010
5 day course run Friday midday-Tuesday afternoon.
Fee: £620 
Location: 11mins form London Bridge.
Accommodation available at the same venue for £30/night (Only 3 rooms)

The second part of this training is taken one year after completing Part-1.
Dates: TBC

This five day intensive training module will facilitate the deepening of your personal mindfulness practice. The main focus will be on developing sound teaching skills in MBCT and skills in inquiry and dialoque. The course will be interacticve and experiential to a large extent. You will need to demonstrate teaching skills in small groups and discuss your journals with one-another.

This training is in line with established MBCT trainer training standards and will require you to do meditational homework. However, there is currently no official accreditation or qualification existant for MBCT, even though the academic institutions have established particular standards (to which we adhere).

Participants will need to have proof of the following essential attendance criteria:

• Having attended an eight week course in MBCT.
• Having professional training and experience in the context within which you plan to teach/integrate mindfulness.
• Having a real commitment to engage in this style of learning (non fixing, letting things evolve, suspending habitual ways of thinking, engaging into a process of ‘being’ and ‘unfolding’, working from the heart and with compassion).
• Experience of daily mindfulness practice over at least one year. Sufficient depth of personal experience of mindfulness practice to begin the development of competency in teaching. (Having practiced with co-horts or friends the various aspects of teaching required for delivering the eight week course).
• In depth personal experience of the three main practices taught in mindfulness-based approaches (body scan, sitting practice and mindful movement practice).
• Having attended at least one week - silent retreat and a few one or two day retreats where mindfulness or insight meditation were experienced.
• Having read ‘Full Catastrophe Living’ and ‘Mindfulness based cognitive therapy for depression.
  
• You are required to submit a brief journal (2000 words maximum) a month prior to the starting date of this course. The journal should include a summary of your regular practice (including difficulties that came up and how you dealt with them). Then journal must be printed and posted to 45 Lowther Hill, London SE23 1PZ (not e-mail). It should contain dates and experiences of retreats, some information on regular practice and insight into 'strengths and weaknesses' of own practice. It does not have to be a daily log. It can also contain some feedback on the two main texts that need to be read prior to the course.

Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy: Teacher Development - Part 2

Trainer: Patrizia Collard PhD

Training Dates: TBA
An intensive experiential 5 day training workshop offering space for nourishment, inspiration, exploration and learning
Fee: £680 
Location: 11mins form London Bridge.
Accommodation available at the same venue for £30/night (Only 3 rooms)

Who can attend?

This further teaching development process is intended for professionals who have:

1. Previously attended a mindfulness-based Teacher Training Part 1
2. Experience of teaching at least three 8-week mindfulness-based programmes (or equivalent).
3. Have participated in guided silent retreats
   

How will we learn?

We hope to offer an environment in which participants can engage in a deepening exploration of their own experience of being human, of investigating the way they hold this and of mindfulness as a way of being in the world. The interface of all of this with the experience of teaching mindfulness-based approaches will underpin the process of the course. There will be a focus on refining and further developing our teaching skills in relation to particularities (such as use of language, group facilitation skills and programme development) and developing and embodying a spacious open awareness and exploring the deeper intentions that move us to do this work. We practice in small and larger groups and learn through our individual and collective experience. Participants will have opportunities to lead practices and investigate personal and co-participant’s experiences of these. Detailed instructor and peer feedback will be offered to support the learning.

Training for Mindfulness-Based Teachers

This programme is designed to respond to the growing need for practicing mindfulness-based teachers to take their development and learning process deeper. Participants on this programme will have previously participated in a mindfulness-based Teacher Development Retreat or equivalent and will have current experience of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction and/or Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy.

Participants will therefore have moved beyond the first explorations of the form and shape of mindfulness-based programmes and curricula, and will developmentally be at the point of exploring ways to

• Refine existing skills
• Further develop understanding of the teaching and its underpinning themes drawn from the different worlds of science and dharma
• Inquire into the ‘person of the teacher’ – the way in which each of us relates to ourselves, the individuals, the group and the teaching process itself.

The teaching team and the participant group will therefore be engaged in a process which offers the potential for a rich collective and individual development process.

A key overall intention is to support participants in developing the ability and confidence to teach from the immediacy of their own experience. This tends to grow out of a depth of experience of the practice, the teaching process and the form of the programme. Developmentally, many teachers experience that their confidence of knowing what is needed, develops to the point that they can let go of holding the teaching in a certain way and relate to the process from a wider, more spacious and spontaneous place.

The programme will offer an integration of interactive training and development processes within the context of periods of silent formal and informal meditation practice.

The intention is to facilitate learning within the following areas through these processes:

• Cultivating the ability to embody mindfulness
• Developing awareness of relational process between teacher and participants
• Strengthening teaching skills
• Developing awareness and confidence to appropriately support participants to turn towards difficulty
• Enhancing group process skills as they relate to mindfulness-based teaching
• Developing awareness of the ethical processes in action during mindfulness-based teaching

Other information

Participants must commit to the entire training.

Please note that we give a certificate of attendance which details the nature of the course and the hours involved. This does not though constitute an authorisation to teach mindfulness-based approaches. The development and interest in the potential of mindfulness within a range of settings is rapidly growing and training processes are therefore becoming more structured. However, within the UK there are currently no formal qualifications/certification processes which regulate competency in teaching mindfulness-based approaches. This requires those of us working in this developing field to inquire deeply into our own practice, our integrity, our intentions and the boundaries of our skills, competencies and understandings.

(The course structure and definition has been adopted from Bangor- Centre for Mindfulness Research and Practice)

MBCT Trainer:

Dr. Patrizia C. Collard PhD, BABCP accredited, UKCP reg., MISMA, MAC Patrizia is an experienced MBCT and MBSR trainer and is a Senior Lecturer for Integrative Psychotherapy and Counselling (University of East London). Patrizia was also resident in Hong Kong and China for 9 years where she studied Taoism, Buddhism, Energy work, Meditation and Yoga. Patrizia also has research interests in Autism and Mindfulness.