The Courage & Renewal approach is premised on the notion that every person has access to an inner source of truth, named in various wisdom traditions as identity, true self, heart, spirit, or soul. This inner teacher is a source of guidance and strength that helps us find our way through life’s complexities and challenges. Gatherings informed by the Courage & Renewal approach give people a chance to listen to this source, learn from it, and discover its imperatives for their work and their lives.
This approach is distinguished by principles and practices intended to create a process of shared exploration—in retreats, programs and other settings—where people can find trustworthy space to nurture deep integrity and relational trust on which our lives depend. These principles and practices are grounded in CCR’s core values which spell out the foundational beliefs and intended purposes for our work with individuals, groups and organizations.
This offering is open to anyone with an interest in the Courage & Renewal approach and serves as a prerequisite for the Courage & Renewal Practicum and the Courage & Renewal Facilitator Preparation Program. Applications for the next available Courage & Renewal Practicum will be available to those who are interested upon completion of the Foundations Program.
Program Structure & Content
The Foundations program consists of five 2-hour online sessions. Over the course of that time, you’ll join other purpose seekers, world changers, and institutional transformers to explore the foundations of the Courage & Renewal approach through short presentations, opportunities for individual reflection, small group sharing, and large group conversations.
- Session 1: Listening To and Honoring the Inner Teacher
In the first session, we’ll give welcome, speak to what you can expect from this program, and focus most intently on recognizing the reality of our own inner teacher and reflecting on what helps us listen to and honor its guidance.
- Session 2: The Power of Community and Moving Towards Personal and Societal Wholeness
In the second session, we’ll define the Courage & Renewal form of community, identifying the ways in which this particular way of seeing community can help us listen to our inner teacher and create trustworthy space for our souls to show up. We’ll also explore how seeking clarified self-knowledge within a trustworthy community helps move us towards personal and societal wholeness.
- Session 3: Exploring the Courage & Renewal Touchstones for Creating Trustworthy Space
In session three, we’ll dive deeper into how we create trustworthy space with the help of the Courage & Renewal Touchstones. Facilitators of Courage & Renewal programs use these Touchstones to define clear boundaries in a Circle of Trust retreat, the kinds of boundaries that create trustworthy space for the soul.
- Session 4: The Principles and Practices of the Courage & Renewal Approach
In session four, we’ll examine the principles and practices of our approach. The principles and practices offer us ways of perceiving the world and ways of being with ourselves and others that help us sustain our journey towards an undivided life and transform our relationships, workplaces, and communities.
- Session 5: Bringing the Foundations to Life
In our final session, we’ll spend time reflecting on what we’ve learned together throughout the past few weeks and how we imagine bringing the foundations of this approach more deeply into our lives, whether personally or professionally.
The Center for Courage & Renewal and its facilitators do not discriminate on the basis of race, creed, color, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender expression, age, height, weight, physical or mental ability, veteran status, military obligations, and marital status.