Retreat Overview

Guided meditation will be the main focus of the program. There will be ample opportunity to ask questions and share whatever you feel comfortable with. There will be no pressure to do so; passive participation is perfectly fine.

Details about modalities

Having emotionally corrective experiences forms the core of Ideal Parent Figure Protocol and the experiential techniques in Schema Therapy.

Preliminary research into IPF and extensive research into Schema Therapy indicate that both are more effective than standard talk therapy for people with grave psychological disorders like disorganized attachment, personality disorders, treatment resistant depression and anxiety, and substance abuse issues.

To this point, schema therapy was developed by Jeffrey Young in response to seeing how traditional Beckian Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) was ineffective for patients with more serious disturbances like personality disorders.

Similarly, IPF has been shown to be effective with very serious conditions like Borderline Personality Disorder, and Dissociative Identity Disorder etc.

Said differently, the techniques and frame works used in this retreat are very effective even for difficult psychological disturbances.

Retreat Structures: Schemas, Psycho-Education and Guided Meditations

Schemas

We will do psycho-education and reparative meditations on each the following schemas:¹

• Emotional Deprivation
• Social Isolation
• Mistrust
• Abandonment and Instability
• Defectiveness and Shame
• Dependence and Incompetence

Psycho-Education

We will start with a brief lecture on attachment theory, attachment repair, Ideal Parent Figure Protocol (IPF), and Schema Therapy. Then, before each Schema oriented meditation guidance, we will do a brief psycho-education on that particular schema drawing both from Jeffrey Young’s Schema Theory and Attachment Theory.

Guided Meditations

Guided meditation will be the primary means for working through the schemas. We will be taking an attachment theory based re-parenting approach in the guided meditation. These meditations will give us corrective emotional experiences. These will help us remap the ‘internal working model of attachment’.

We will apply each of these meditations to each the six schemas listed above:

• Ideal Parent Figure Protocol (IPF). Here we have imagined ideal parents re-parent us around the schema in question. This gives us the corrective emotional experience we need to heal.
• Tong Len, a Tibetan Buddhist compassion meditation. This will help us cultivate compassion generally and also particularly around the schema in question. Moreover, by considering how others suffer with the same schemas we will see how we are not alone in our difficulties. This helps to normalize the painful experience of the schemas. Moreover, compassion around our shared difficulties further builds solidarity and a sense connection with others.
• Positive Opposite meditation will open up our imagination to see how we can move past our schema “life traps” and open up to the positive opposite of our schemas. Thereby we see new and better possibilities for our lives. That helps us actually change the behaviors towards the positive;
• Mentalization exercises. Mentalization, also known as meta-cognition is the ability to reflect on your own and others’ mental states. This helps us understand the motivations that drive behavior. Weak mentalization abilities are correlated with poorer functioning in life, and psychological disorders like personality disorders, depression, anxiety disorders, and substance abuse disorder. Strong mentalization is a hallmark of robust mental health. Understanding your own and others mental states helps to develop confidence in making sense out of the world and your experience of it. All the guided meditations will be peppered with instructions that encourage looking back at one’s own mind state and the mind states of others. This will improve our mentalization abilities.

Walking Meditation

Brief walking meditation instruction will be offered. Most hours will consist of a 20 minute walking meditation session and a 40 minute seated guided meditation session. The walking meditation sessions will serve to help integrate the previous guided meditation session. Alternatively this 20 minute session can be used to journal or to take a break.

Miscellaneous

There will be a lot of time for Q&A and spot coaching

We will be doing deep work on this retreat. For that reason please feel free to take a break at any point.

We will end the retreat with a guided meditation on the development of the positive mental states of health pride, generosity, serenity, and joy.

Feel free to forward this sign up page to anyone you know who would be interested and would benefit from participating.