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In Person Day Workshop: Active Hope + Insight Meditation
10 places available
When we look at what is happening in the world around us, it can be easy to fall into despondency and cynicism. We may feel there is simply too much to face, and wonder what any one individual can really do. It is in times like these that we need more than ever to turn towards each other in community and practice, to explore what can lead us to greater hope and understanding.
This one-day workshop brings together two interwoven approaches, Active Hope and insight meditation. Active Hope, developed by Joanna Macy through her work as a teacher, scholar, and activist, offers a way of meeting the world with honesty, courage, and hope. Through exploratory group practices, connection, and the framework known as the spiral ( gratitude, honouring our pain, seeing with new eyes, and going forth) it helps us turn towards both the beauty of life and the suffering we witness around us. In doing so, it opens the possibility of responding not from overwhelm or despair, but from a deeper sense of purpose and care.
Alongside this, insight meditation offers an ancient practice of investigating the heart and mind through meditation. It invites a deeper understanding of who we are and how we belong in the world. At its heart, it is a way of seeing beyond limiting self-narratives and conditioning, and of coming to a place that is both compassionate and courageous. It supports an experiential understanding of our interconnection and non-separateness with all life, so that this understanding may be expressed in the world through joyful, compassionate, and caring action.
Together, these two approaches offer a way of resourcing ourselves inwardly so that we may meet the world more fully and respond with greater clarity, steadiness, and hope.
We will gather in the Deep Heart Space in Portrunny Bay, County Roscommon, for this unique opportunity to explore these practices together.
Booking Deposit 20 euro
Meet the instructor
Paul McNamee
Paul is a psychology lecturer, insight meditation and mindfulness teacher. He has an MSc in Mindfulness Based Wellbeing and professional qualifications in adult education. He is a certified MBSR instructor and trained through the MMTCP programme with Tara Brach and Jack Kornfield. A former retreat centre manager, he was closely involved in woodland and ecological projects. He has completed an apprenticeship in the Active Hope programme and is particularly interested in how contemplative practice can deepen our capacity to respond to ecological and social challenges with clarity, courage and compassion.
Patrick Jones - Course author
Anna Swisher
Anna Swisher is an Active Hope/Work That Reconnects facilitator and mentor, with a background in psychology, movement, nature-based learning, communications, and community development. She is the founder and lead facilitator of Project Mobilise. She works with young people and adults, facilitating workshops and designing training for organisations, universities and community groups around Ireland.
