Integral Education: The CIIS Blog

Fall Brown Bag Series Kicks Off with a Performance from Turquoise

We're kicking off our Fall Brown Bag Series with a performance from the Turquoise a capella ensemble on Tuesday, October 9, from noon-1 pm in the 4th floor staff lounge of the CIIS Main Building.

Turquoise is an a cappella group composed of women and gendervariant individuals from within the CIIS community. Since the founding of the group a year ago, it has quickly become a favorite at the Institute, making a sensation at the CIIS commencement in 2012. "We offer music in service of helping others to feel, to heal, and to awaken to the presence of beauty. The songs in our repertoire tell stories from many cultures, and we strive to hold these narratives with responsibility, respect, and care."

The Brown Bag Series features artistic work by CIIS faculty, staff, students, and alums, and is sponsored by the President’s Office and the Department of Writing, Consciousness, and Creative Inquiry. The series continues on Tuesday, Nov. 6, with MFA program alums Karina Jacinda Small and Lois Smith.

Expressive Arts Therapy Program Strengthens Partnership with Glide

By KASEY VARGA, alumni and marketing coordinator for the Expressive Arts Therapy Program

In 2010 the Expressive Arts Therapy program at CIIS initiated a partnership with Glide Memorial Church, which describes itself as "a radically inclusive, just, and loving community mobilized to alleviate 
suffering and to break the cycles of 
poverty and marginalization."

This partnership was founded on the principles of reciprocal learning, client empowerment, social justice, and the building of long-term sustainable relationships. This fall we are beginning our third year of work with the Family, Youth, and Childcare Center in the Tenderloin neighborhood of San Francisco. More than 20 students and alumni have been involved with facilitating arts-based staff retreats, running pre-practicum EXA groups for children grades 3-5, acting as aesthetic witnesses, counseling teens, running a dance group for moms, and completing practicum hours, among other things. We are now about to deepen our work with Glide by partnering with Glide Women’s Center, where one of our treasured alums, Khara Scott Bey, currently works.

To help fund our partnership, EXA and Glide will co-host “An Evening of Social Revelry, Silent Auction, and Performances” on Saturday, Sept. 29, in Namaste Hall in the CIIS Main Building. We strongly encourage the CIIS community to attend. This will be a great opportunity to socialize and network with some great people, as well as bid on a wide variety of items (from artwork to healing sessions to a weekend in Napa!). You'll also witness some truly special performances from our alumni and the children of Glide’s Family, Youth, and Childcare Center. 

Glide recently published a short feature detailing the EXA-Glide parternship >>

Integral Dreaming: A Holistic Approach to Dreams

By FARIBA BOGZARAN, PhD, East-West Psychology alum, and DANIEL DESLAURIERS, professor in the Transformative Studies PhD program

We are often asked how we came to the idea of writing Integral Dreaming. The book is our collaborative attempt to reveal the complexity and multidimensionality of dreams. Having been part of the dream studies movement since the early 1980s, we realized early on that dreams are a phenomenon too complex to be narrowed down to one discipline or a single author’s theoretical stance. We set ourselves the task of integrating the rigor of science with the wholeness of the multidimensional being.

The concept of Integral Dreaming evolved out of twenty-five years of dialogue, co-teaching and research. We met at the inaugural conference of the International Association for the Study of Dreams (IASD) in 1984 in San Francisco.  At the time, we both were graduate students living in Canada, Fariba studying psychology, researching consciousness and dreams at the University of Regina, and Daniel a doctoral student at Université de Montreal, working on a project marrying cognitive psychology, artificial intelligence and dreams. We were both also practicing artists: Fariba trained in the visual and multimedia arts and Daniel in music and dance.  Every year we met at the IASD conference and attended each other’s presentations. It became apparent early on that each of us, in our unique ways, understood the value of dreaming not only from the perspective of the “hard sciences”, but also from depth psychology and creativity. Before naming it, our approach was already integral.

The intellectual and artistic common ground we shared brought us together as colleagues. At IASD conferences, we participated in dream theater presentations that merged science, archetypal exploration and cross-cultural music and dance (Santa Cruz, 1988 and London, 1989).

At the 1985 IASD conference, Fariba met psycho-physiologist and lucid dream researcher Stephen LaBerge who introduced her to CIIS. Fariba joined his lucid dream team at Stanford Sleep Laboratory. Transferring her courses from the University of Regina to CIIS, she received her MA and PhD in East-West Psychology. Her research explored transpersonal experiences in lucid dreaming. Trained in somatic psychology, art and shamanic studies, she developed Dream Creations as a set of integrative and creative methods to explore dreams. She was appointed as faculty member at JFK University where she founded the Dream Studies program in 1996. Simultaneously, she continued her career as an artist, exploring the connection between arts and consciousness.

Making a Film About the Evolution of Human Consciousness

By ALAN BAISS, Integral Counseling Psychology alum and filmmaker. Learn more about Alan and his films at Integral Inspirations.

Alan has been running an online fundraising campaign for his new film, Conscious, at Indiegogo. If you would like to support his campaign, you have until May 28.

Imagine creating movies that highlight the deep philosophies taught at CIIS in collaboration with a group of alumni who are passionate and dedicated to the vision. We are doing just that, and it’s a dream come true.

"Conscious," our current production, asks about the profound meaning of our moment in time as well as humanity’s great potential to participate with Nature in the next turn in the evolution of consciousness.

Filmmaker Alan Baiss

We are making films under the banner of Integral Inspirations; maybe you have seen "Integral Consciousness," our film about Haridas Chaudhuri, the history of CIIS, and the Integral Yoga of Sri Aurobindo. Maybe you have heard of the film "Conversations with Bina," which we had the great honor of making after Bina Chaudhuri passed away. "Conscious" is our third and undoubtedly most ambitious project.

Creating a quality film on a shoestring is a journey loaded with challenges, but when that film is spiritual in its basis, the production takes on elements of a spiritual practice.  Over and over we are being challenged to let go of desired outcomes and to exercise faith in the grace that is present in the production. Imagine flying to India and filming magnificent interviews, only to make the difficult decision of putting most of the interviews in abeyance because of an unanticipated and unrelated situation that arose after filming, and then feeling challenged to trust that somehow this is taking the film in a better direction.

How about our current funding campaign? We are barely over 10 percent of what we need and hoped for. Maybe the invitation is to trust that something greater is arising from our efforts. It could be that the support of the amazing individuals we have connected with as a result of our reaching out will provide vaster riches for the film than achieving our funding goal could; maybe, but of course it would also be nice to reach our goal. Somehow the film "Conscious" insists that we practice the yoga as an integral part of our participation in the production.

We have been interviewing Jerry Schwartz and Pravir Malik for "Conscious." These are two men who are greatly respected in the world of economics and whose philosophy about money grows out of Integral Yoga. Can I present their wisdom on a potential alternative relationship with money in the film with integrity while retaining my familiar values?

"Conscious" is inviting me to act congruently with the film, to have faith in a consciousness far greater than my small "I," and to release what resources I have into service for the realisation of a deeper aspiration, in this case, to make a film with the potential to participate in the evolution of human consciousness.

I graduated from the Integral Counseling Psychology program at CIIS and had a good 12 years in private practice; I really loved this work. Then, after the deaths of my parents, a close friend, and narrowly escaping from a house fire, I realised I did not want to look back on my life and wonder what might have been possible for me if I had taken a chance. I soon closed my practice and returned to San Francisco, and it was here that a series of synchronicities landed me in the unlikely role of producer of films featuring Integral Yoga. I came into this knowing nothing about filmmaking or about Integral Yoga, but thankfully, I have been deeply honored to have been joined on this journey by talented and respected individuals, many of whom, much to my delight, are CIIS alumni.

Please have a look at our campaign and watch some of our videos. If you like what we are aspiring to achieve, please send the film your gift and see what we have for you to show our appreciation. We would also love to hear from you.

Checking In at the New CIIS Student Gallery

By MONICA MODY, writer and first-year PhD student in the East-West Psychology program. Monica assists at events and in the office at the Department of Writing, Consciousness, and Creative Inquiry.

The current exhibition of visual work and poetry displayed at the all-new CIIS Student Gallery is inspired by the question, “What is uniquely human?” The exhibition presents work by both students and alumni of CIIS, who inquire into the thematic question using a range of artistic practices.

The theme for the exhibition holds particular relevance for the CIIS community, engaged as it is in transformative practices that redefine what it is to be human and what it is to be in community—as humans—with other humans and non-humans.

“The CIIS community is grounded in the transformation of consciousness, healing, and deep emotional engagement: the show offers a mirror through which the university can see its preoccupations reflected back at itself,” says Jenelle Campion, who co-curated the exhibition with Daunielle Rasmussen. Campion and Rasmussen are both in their second year of MFA programs at the Department of Writing, Consciousness, and Creative Inquiry.

The show features works in mixed media, acrylic, and oil; pencil portraits; photographs; and poems. Together, these artworks are acute explorations of suffering and compassion, the emotion of happiness, religious and spiritual conflicts, what it means to be transgressive, the witnessing self, alter-selves, and relationships—including to plant forms and animal forms.

“The entries radiate with the heart the artists put in their work,” says Campion, adding that the curators were gratified by the student-body’s response to the call for submissions and the conviction in art-making it demonstrates. By inviting art that was not made only inside the MFA enclosure, their curatorial process turned the show into an investigation into why we make art and a call to widen our conception of art communities. “We wanted to challenge the image of the artist sitting in the dark hovel of art-making,” stresses Campion.

Discover Bali

By Richard Buggs, Dean of Alumni and Director of Travel Programs

Are you looking to getaway this summer to a breathtakingly beautiful South Pacific island that also provides an immersion into the arts? Look no further than the CIIS Travel Program, which is hosting a tour to Bali.

The Arts and Spirituality of Bali tour is a unique opportunity that combines deep relaxation with an exploration of Bali’s most important religious and artistic traditions. Wake up early and stroll through verdant rice paddies; snorkel in startlingly clear, warm water, with miles of coral reefs and schools of technicolor fish to gaze upon; put on your finest batik sarong for the full moon festival at goddess Saraswati’s temple; and learn the ancient art of shadow puppetry.

While Bali has shares many commonalities with other Asian cultures, it’s set apart by its Bali-Hindu religion (a blend of Hinduism, Animism, and Buddhism). According to Balinese Hindu tradition, the arts are seen as powerful bridges, connecting the sekala (tangible world) and niskala (intangible world of spirit). In this way, Balinese Hindu tradition invokes transformation on an individual and collective level through its arts, rituals, and festivals.

Our Bali tour will be based in the city of Ubud, considered the center of Bali’s artistic life. Participants will study a wide range of artistic practices, from Balinese gamelan music to dance, batik and woodcarving. We will take a 3-day tour of the island and visit various religious sites, including the most sacred Mother temple, Besaki Temple.

Join us this summer from July 20 through August 7. For more information, please send an e-mail to rbuggs@ciis.edu.