Soul Work—A Conscious Container is a facilitated group experience that uses a carefully curated combination of group dialog practices, meditative and contemplative exercises, archetypal astrology, breathwork, and 1-1 coaching to create a safe, supportive community.

Over the course of 10 weeks, you will be given tools for deepening communication and establishing meaningful bonds of mutual support and kinship. Within the safety of this unfolding community, each person’s unique path towards self-knowing and wholeness will be understood and validated, first and foremost, on its own terms.

In the act of coming together to honour the reality and importance of each person’s subjective experience, we will also begin to see how each of our lives is reflected within a broader philosophical context, and supported by a rich and benevolent pantheon of higher spiritual powers or cosmological forces.

Whatever your strengths and weaknesses, struggles, gifts, burdens and abilities, Soul Work provides an opportunity to join a community of open minded, open hearted seekers on a journey towards remembrance of the soul’s true nature and a greater, healthier, fuller engagement with life’s challenging realities and its most awe-inspiring mysteries.

What this looks and feels like will be different for each person, and the Soul-Work container is designed to celebrate this fact, while also providing a structure that brings us closer together, even as we each walk our own unique paths towards wholeness.

This course has been created to serve you in many different ways, helping you to:

  • Access, feel, process and honour your emotions more fully.

  • Get helpful insights into your psychological patterns of thought and behaviour.

  • Stay present to your bodily sensations with equanimity and acceptence.

  • Co-create relationships based on authenticity, generosity, and compassion.

  • Stimulate your curiosity and imagination and empower you to explore your creativity.

  • Provide an open-ended cosmological framework which affords a sense of belonging to the World.

The container consists of:

  • 5 carefully facilitated group sharing circles (2hr) that will include transformative dialog practices, journalling exercises, and guided meditative and contemplative practice led by Barbara Carter

  • 8 evocative presentations (with Q+A) covering each of the planetary archetypes within the context of the ongoing inner and interpersonal work that is being facilitated in the sharing circles.

  • 5 one-to-one sessions with me, spread throughout the duration of the container.

  • 5 or more independent peer-coaching calls with your assigned small group.

  • 1 transformative breathwork session with integration circle, led by Jonathan Schecter.

Course Format

Group Sharing Circles

These sessions will be the foundation of the course, and will take place every two weeks. They will be carefully structured so that every person has the chance to speak and be heard, both in the group as a whole, and in breakout sessions. Every participant will be assigned a small group of 3-4 people which will stay the same throughout the course.

Mindfulness exercises led by Barbara Carter will help us to get grounded in our bodies and regulate our nervous systems, to improve the quality of our presence on the calls, but also to teach techniques and practices that can be used for the same purposes in daily life.

These calls are designed to make it feel safe and productive for each participant to deeply reflect on their process and to share about it. Quiet periods of prompted journalling will provide time for private introspection, before returning to share what comes up, and hear about other’s experience.

One-To-One Sessions

Every participant will have two 1 hour long calls with me, one before the course and one after. In addition, each participant will have three 45 minute calls with me, spread throughout the course itself.

The calls can be used for whatever purposes are needed for each individual. Some might take the form of astrological readings, while others might be more like counselling or coaching. The before and after sessions will likely be used to prepare for the course and reflect/integrate respectively, while the shorter calls that take place during the course itself can be used for whatever is most of service. They will be opportunities for participants to:

  • Get extra support and guidance

  • Reflect more deeply on their process

  • Understand their birth chart or transits better

  • Ask any questions they have about the course

  • Privately raise any concerns they have regarding their process or the conduct or needs of others in the group

Presentations

The group sharing sessions will alternate with presentation sessions. Each of these sessions will consist of two 30-minute presentations, followed by a 30 minute Q+A. The presentation schedule has been designed to give participants a deep, emotional, embodied understanding of the planetary archetypes, by presenting art, music, poetry, quotations, and explanations at the time in the course when their lessons are most relevant and helpful.

The learning that is on offer here is not meant to be abstract or intellectual. This is not a certification course or a training in archetypal astrology. The lessons that are on offer here are invaluable to anybody who has (or hopes to have) an astrological practice, but the focus will always be on your inner connection, your relational capacities, your embodied experience—your soul work.

Peer Coaching Calls

In addition to connecting in breakout rooms during the group sharing sessions, the small groups of 3-4 people which are assigned at the start of the course will also meet independently for bi-weekly (or as often as you like) calls.

These will provide opportunities to give and receive support, strengthen bonds of kinship and community, and reflect on one another’s process in a less structured (but still intentional) way. Sometimes, prompts or topics will be provided for exploration in these calls, but mostly, their form and content will be allowed to develop organically.

Transformative Breathwork

There will be an opportunity to participate in an hour-long session of deep, fast and intense breathing, which can elicit powerful psychedelic effects. Although the best way to provide this service is in person, I am confident that the support that the container will afford will be more than sufficient to guarantee a safe and meaningful experience for all who choose to participate.

The session will be led by Jonathan Schecter, a highly experienced Neurodynamic Breathwork practitioner and psychedelic integration coach. In addition to a sharing circle directly following the session, there will be multiple opportunities to explore any material that surfaces in the following group sharing calls, 1-1 sessions and peer coaching calls.*2

Jonathan S, Barbara and I will all be present on the call, and every breather will have the option to bring in a sitter to be physically present with them during the session, if they so choose. This kind of breathwork can be a powerful catalyst of emotional catharsis and a source of great psychological and spiritual insight. While nobody will be expected to participate, it is highly recommended. It is extremely safe, and will be facilitated with the utmost care.

The Practical Stuff

When

The next cohort of the course will begin in late January/early February, 2025.

A full schedule with calendar links will be sent to you upon signing up.

Where

This is an online course, and all circles, sessions and presentations will take place on Zoom. You will need a computer or device that can run the Zoom software.

For the group sharing calls, you will need to be in a quiet, private space, in order to ensure a conducive and safe environment for you and others to fully participate. Because of the sensitive nature of these calls, they will not be recorded.

While the presentations and Q+A sessions will be recorded, you are encouraged to participate live, as every call will help us to develop the bonds of kinship and mutual support which are the foundation of all our other work together.

Who Is This For?

Soul Work is for you if you want to:

  • access, experience, and work with your emotions more profoundly, and with more support;

  • examine and get insight into your patterns of thought and behaviour, and work to make meaningful, positive changes;

  • improve your capacity for authentic, open-hearted communication and work with others with the same goals;

  • benefit from a community of like-minded seekers and form relationships based on a mutual commitment to soul work;

  • learn contemplative practices and breathwork techniques that will help you to navigate life’s challenges;

  • do the work of making space for, unearthing and integrating unconscious and transpersonal material, and supporting others in that endeavour;

  • understand your place in the cosmos through the lens of archetypal astrology

Soul Work might not be for you if:

  • you cannot commit to attending the live calls

  • you just want to learn about astrology / do not want to participate in therapeutic group activities

Your Facilitators

  • Jonathan Waller

  • Barbara Carter

  • Jonathan Schecter

Pricing

Places on the course will be offered on a sliding scale. A certain number of places will be offered at the lower price, and every person that signs up to pay the higher amount will open up another place for somebody else to pay less. There is no difference in offering between the different tiers, so just take some time to consider which option is most appropriate for your circumstances.

Standard: £500 (approx US$640)

Subsidised: £350 (approx US$450)

Benefactor: £650 (approx US$830)

If you would like to participate, register your interest by email by filling out the form below. If you have any questions about Soul Work which need addressing, please also ask here.

If you are strongly called to participate, but cannot afford even the subsidised price, please reach out and let me know, as there may be opportunities to attend the course for less or for free, under some circumstances.

Payments are to be made via PayPal, and a minimum deposit of £100 will be required to secure your place. All further details will be provided via email.

If it helps, payment plans can be negotiated on a case by case basis to help spread the cost over multiple instalments.