Dear CIHS Community, Happy August! Every month I find myself reflecting on the same two sentiments when I sit down to address the community. The first is always, "Wow! What a busy month. I cannot believe it is [insert here] already!" We all know that the prevalent thought is that time is moving faster. I think this may be truer here at CIHS than anywhere else because the months simply fly by us at warp speed. The second idea that always seems to be at the forefront of my mind is what I remind our students of all the time: it is challenging to be at the forefront of education and the practice of the innovative healing arts. I hope all of you are up to the challenge of stretching the paradigm. This month was especially busy because of the preparations that went into the 4th annual conference, Subtle Energy Science: Art & Practice of Consciousness and Healing, held the weekend of July 20-22. In total, we had 99 participants here at CIHS. The vision for this year's conference was a trial one. It was a vision to be inclusive of the entire subtle energy sciences community, including dyed-in-the-wool scientists and physicists, to medical professionals, to psychological professionals, to medical and healing arts practitioners. The intent was to broaden the focus from the idea that yes, we can prove that energy exists and we can heal from the manipulation of it (or remain stuck in patterns, as the case may be). In addition to presenting cutting-edge research about this field, we wanted to explore the question, what do people who work with energy do, anyway? Why is this significant? How does it shift and change individuals, communities, society, and even perhaps have a global impact? Some presentations answered these questions, and for some people, other presentations perhaps had them walking away with more questions than they had going into the presentation. In the spirit of academic dialogue, we created and opened up a forum of exploration into the research and specific practice of energy and the healing arts. We want to graciously thank all of our presenters which included the following: Dr. Bill Tiller; Dr. Claude Swanson (who teaches Life Force quarterly at CIHS which is open to all CIHS community members); Dr. Beverly Rubik; Tiffany Barsotti, M. Th. and Rev. Tom Kelly, owner and founder of Soul of Yoga in Encinitas; Dr. Rick Jelusich (CIHS faculty and master healer/spiritual thinker/author); Dr. Thornton Streeter; Lane Lowry, MA; Dr. Michelle Dexter (CIHS core faculty & psychologist); Dr. Misha Goussev (CIHS alum and core faculty); Randy Eady, M.Ed. , NCC (CIHS student and medical professional); Mr. William Murphy (CIHS student and scientist); Dr. Mary Clark (CIHS core faculty, Director of Pranic Healing San Diego, co-owner of Psy Tek medical research laboratory, and psychologist in private practice); Dr. Alan Blum, D. Chiropract.; Dr. Russ Fuller (CIHS core faculty & psychologist in private practice); and Beth Green, MA, founder of the Stream and author. Additionally, we want to thank our more than 60 attendees who are CIHS community members and/or students. Having the event on campus with everyone sharing in the spirit of academic inquiry and experience makes it a very special time for CIHS administration and faculty. Thank you for sharing your time, energy, friendship, and feedback with us. As I mentioned, it is not always easy to branch out of one's comfort zone and try new ideas and concepts. It is easy to immediately dismiss something as "not for us," or as something you may balk at instinctively. Instead of simply shutting-down because of a reaction toward something that may seem "off" or "distasteful" to you, I encourage you, in the spirit of academic inquiry, to search the response. As part of a community of iconoclasts who work off a non-dual model, every model, paradigm, thought, and speaker has merit. If we are steeped in the non-dual and non-traditional ways of exploring science, spirituality, medicine, and healing, then we can embrace every model as worthy and with its own merits, existing on a continuum of "works for me" or "does not work for me," rather than dichotomies that do not fit the new world view of good/bad, right/wrong, and smart/stupid, to name just a few. As always, CIHS is dedicated to remaining at the forefront of education and the pursuit of inquiry into these pioneering fields, while also maintaining academic and research integrity. Sometimes straddling the world of academia with a field that is not always linear (or predictable!) is challenging for us, educators, too! Next year, the focus for the annual conference will again shift into a narrower concept toward the pursuit of knowledge within the marriage of science and spirituality. We have taken all of your insights and feedback to heart, and we will be working all year toward providing an even stronger experience for 2013. We will be decidedly more focused in our presentation niche, and we already have a promising line up of medical doctors, scientists, and researchers on the forefront of the interstices between science and spirituality. If you were not able to join us this year, there is always next year. The 5th annual conference will occur July 19-21, 2013. It is a wonderful way to experience our community at its liveliest - literally and figuratively. Furthermore, I am always asking our students, are you up for the challenge of pursuing an education on the forefront of research and subtle energy sciences? With this in mind, we are announcing the preliminary Fall quarter schedule. The fully detailed one, including registration information, will be released in the September newsletter. (Registration week for Fall quarter is September 10-14 and the Fall quarter officially beings September 24). We are continuing to offer courses that are at the frontier of psychology, integral health, comparative religion and philosophy, and subtle energy studies. For our licensure track psychology students, we will be offering Psychopharmacology (taught by Dr. Russ Fuller), of course, taught from a prospective that veers off the traditional medical model that sees psychopharm as an elite intervention. Subtle Energy Psychology, Theories and Applications II (taught by Dr. Michelle Dexter) is the second course in her 3 series module. A student can elect to take all 3 of Dr. Dexter's course series, or he/she can just take one or two depending on his/her interests. Human Development and its Archetypes is a multidisciplinary class that is relevant and highly recommended (although not required) for all psychology students (integral and clinical), integral health students, and comparative religion and philosophy. Dr. Roger Cavnaugh, core CIHS faculty and clinical psychologist, has designed this course to span across these disciplines as a mode of inquiry into where these fields converge and diverge. Human Biofield: Scientific and Philosophic Concepts will be taught on campus by Dr. Thomas Brophy (if you are not local, we will Skype you in if you want to take the class). This course is appropriate as an elective for any student but is a core class for Integral Health and Subtle Energy Sciences (Life Physics) students who desire their focus be subtle energy studies/sciences. Lastly, a CIHS core requirement for all doctorate students, Advanced Qualitative Research Methods, taught by Dr. Sharon Mijares, (CIHS core faculty, clinical psychologist, and author) for all Psychology students, Integral Health students, and Comparative Religion and Philosophy students from a cross-disciplinary perspective. Dr. Mijares is a master author on phenomenological inquiry and these subjects. We are excited about the Fall course offerings' ability to push the limits of what you think you know while also creating a foundation for academic inquiry and the discipline of advanced study. If you are interested in pursuing a graduate degree at CIHS in one of our innovative programs (we have BA completion, too), there is still some time to submit your materials for review before the Fall quarter begins. If you have any questions about how CIHS can support you in developing a stronger foundation and career, please feel free to contact me. I am always more than happy to meet with you to discuss how CIHS can support your goals either as a student or as an active community member. Happy August!
Sincerely, Hope Umansky, PhD Hope_Umansky@cihs.edu |
