Description
It is common for healthcare providers to frame the nature of the work we do in terms of
pathology, problems, and mental illness. Our tacit way of engaging our work is by first, and
often primarily, answering the questions, ???What is the problem and how do we solve it?? This
approach is not unhelpful insofar as it provides one way of interpreting the world as it is.
However, we can become overcommitted to this plausibility structure in such a way that we are
disabled from or, at the very least, limited in our ability to imagine a different way of
understanding the work we do with patients. This workshop invites us to consider the
additional question, ???What is the next, new, beautiful thing that you want to create?? This
query harnesses fundamental elements of interpersonal neurobiology, emphasizing the place
and role of beauty in drawing our attention, and then our imagination, toward that which we
long for ourselves and our world to become. We will explore the practical applications and
benefits of developing the practice of faithfully putting ourselves in the path of oncoming
beauty and witness the embodied, relational transformation that emerges as a result.
Presented by: Curt Thompson, M.D.
Learning Objectives
Participants will:
- Recognize the significance of the nature of the mind’s domain of narration
- Identify the place and role of beauty as a significant element in the healing process
- Provide practical applications of the experience of beauty as a way of emotional healing and
transformation
