Odysseys with Wholeness

Nicola Mary Christensen-Johnson

Into the Woods

An Online Workshop - The Mysticism of Inditing

Saturday 18 February 2023

February Intermission

Stephen Sondheim 1987 musical Into the Woods weaves together several fairy tales from the Grimm Brothers. Different well-known characters, such as Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel, Cinderella and others, enter the woods to share their stories. The scenery is one of a very populated wood with all sorts of colourful people popping in and out to hold otherworldly conversations. The crossover of their tales invites us to explore the consequences of their desires and what their quest – or in my terms their odyssey with wholeness – reveals to them. The hustle and bustle of the crowdy woods are beautifully captured in Sondheim’s lyrics and music with a fast tempo, more allegretto vivace than andante cantabile, and cascades of words which, at times, can be difficult to follow.

Enchanted woods are familiar archetypes for evoking the bewildering things we can expect to encounter when we walk into the unknown and unfamiliar territories. Like most soul explorers, my regular walks into the woods are solitary expeditions. I occasionally come across some breath-taking and astonishing things, like a white stag, but more often my trips into the woods are precious moments of deep silence and stillness where I can feel myself in new ways and learn to listen, ever deeper, to my inner voice and bespoke guidance.

In this workshop I invite you to join me on a walk into the woods for an experience of quietness and tranquillity.  Through different texts and musical pieces opening up our inditing hearts, we will befriend solitude and loneliness so that we may discover what it truly means to inhabit and dwell in aloneness. This, in time, beckons us to entertain an intimate relationship with ourselves and to connect with our higher self, which I call our sovereign selfhood, the source of our inner guidance.

Practical Information

The Into the Woods Online Workshop takes place on Saturday 18 February 2023 at

  • 8.00 – 10.00 Pacific
  • 11.00 – 13.00 Eastern
  • 16.00 – 18.00 UK & Ireland
  • 17.00 – 19.00 Central Europe

 

Cost: 500,00 kr.

67 € – £ 60 – 74 US$ – 98 CAD$

To sign up, go to the Webshop and select the date of 18 February 2023. You can sign up until 12.00 (CET) on the day of the workshop. After payment you will receive a confirmation email with the Zoom link to access the workshop.

My Heart Is Inditing

 

The purpose of the workshop is threefold:

  1. Uncover the art form which enables us to bring the exquisite invisible into a precious and cherished visible form.
  2. Develop our capacities for voicing the truths that dwell in our heart.
  3. Initiate an experience of inhabiting and dwelling in the imaginal realm so as to unleash the powerful creativity populating our heart-centre.

 

The workshop is designed to explore a place visited on our odyssey with wholeness. During the gathering, we bathe in sounds and resonances, ingest words and lyrics, play with colours and shades, juggle with shapes and forms, and tease out textures and grains. These playful games tantalise our senses, arouse our sensory faculties and, through an exquisite blend of words and music, entice us to a virtuosity of wordsmithing and chanting.

Basking in the imaginal realm draws forth our deepest feelings and crystalises our most precious thoughts so that our hearts may indite something of matter in whatever art form feels true to us.