Kleshas Intensive
Kleshas Intensive
A 5-month study group applying Yoga’s Ancient Wisdom to unwind nagging worries, anxieties, & old or stuck patterns to gain more Freedom and Ease.
Dear fellow seekers: I am so grateful for your curiosity and desire to learn. Not only does it fuel my creativity, but it keeps me going during the darkest of nights (and there have been more than a handful of those lately.) I know we can do this for each other!
I am so excited to be able to invite you to join an amazing group of 12 women as we dive into our work together in a whole new way!
You will uncover pathways to a life with:
Less feelings of being:
Lost spiraling down rabbit holes & spinning mind
Plagued by nagging anxiety & worries
Mired in conflicting thoughts
Weighed down by old stuck patterns & conditioning
More experiences of:
Ease moving through life, whatever it offers
Clarity & Calm in your thinking
Joy and wonder in life & relationships
Direction & focus for this next phase of your life
What Makes this Study Group Unique?
We will address these life challenges based on the 1000s of years of wisdom and insights from Yoga Masters about the human condition and the nature of the mind.
These Yoga Masters “discovered” the secrets which keep us from knowing our true essential selves as one with all creation, all Consciousness.
The Kleshas explain not only how we get entangled and stuck but define a step-by-step path to our liberation.
Sadly, this wisdom so far has only been available in dense, yoga-based texts that most people, even after 20 years of yoga, have never heard of!
Deborah Adele’s new book The Kleshas: Exploring the Elusiveness of Happiness translates and outlines these insights in a way thoughtful seekers (of any tradition) can learn and apply right now to move toward your own freedom and ease.
Using her book, and my experience working with this material over 20 years, this course, uniquely, offers a step by step unfolding of this timeless wisdom with demonstrations, exercise, reflections and supportive community dialogue to apply this to each of our daily lives.
We need to journey inward, beyond “info-spirituality” where we read a book, listen to podcasts, and nothing really changes. The world needs us to do our inner work! (Cynthia Bourgeault, from live talk)
Why a Study Group?
I have both been a participant in this sort of study group, and have lead many. I love being in, and leading, study groups like this because of the deeply supportive atmosphere and the daily discipline of reflection, experimentation, and transformation.
The study sessions are a good balance of readings and reflection time. Darcy offers ways to expand our thinking about the chapter or section we read. In a nonjudgmental setting, I enjoyed being able to integrate comments from others into the thinking I was doing on my own. - Cathy W -
What you will be Exploring
Modules 1-6: (in person for this series, likely via live zoom in future offerings)
How we capture ourselves in old patterns creating suffering for selves and others. Kleshas provide a map from sources of suffering to freedom.
We are born onto an “island,” into a culture, a set of rules, beliefs and expectations, that have become like the proverbial “water in the fishbowl” shaping our every thought and choices yet is incomplete and incorrect
Our definition of ourselves is given to us by what others say and expect of us and by how we see ourselves acting in the world.
Everything we experience comes through a filter of who I think I am, who I think I should be, how I think others should be and how I think the world should be,
We continually seek to feel good AND seek to avoid feeling bad. Happiness comes to depend on getting what you want AND not getting what you don’t want, which keeps us spinning and stuck.
See how the continuity of clinging tightly to likes/dislikes (including beliefs) brings staleness, rigidity, and narrowness to our thinking and being.
You will see how all that you do – whether “self-improvement”, meditation, yoga, tai chi – even New Year’s Resolutions – you do from within your kleshas, trying to “fix” yourself (or others).
Putting it all together through ritual and reflection
Dates for in-person sessions here: all 9:30-noon, Six Sundays
February 2,
February 23,
March 23,
April 13,
May 18,
June 15.
If you are unable to attend a given session, you may join us via Zoom, plus the primary teaching content will be recorded (without personal reflections of group members) and shared. You will still be able to participate in all the reflection questions and discussions online.
Between modules there will be 3-5 questions for reflection and experimentation. These questions will support your digestion of the material and deepen the ways you understand the role of the kleshas and how they subtly guide your daily life. I believe it’s essential to understand a problem at its root, see it in operation in life, in order to break free of their hold on us.
Based on the weekly reflection questions, you will be asked to share a short post of your experience each week. (max 300 words - short!) Each of us is then invited to read others’ posts, comment supportively, as we grow together. Participants always learn from the posts of their peers: so often we see ourselves in someone else’s post. This both helps us uncover blind spots and see the humanness in us all: as we feel love and compassion for others, we find it more easily for ourselves. (We will use a private FaceBook group for this. I can help anyone not familiar with FaceBook.)
What others have said about these study groups:
The structure of the class supported and sustained our efforts to delve deeply into each of the Yamas and Niyamas and to apply them to our lives. Class discussions led by Darcy further enhanced the experience as we learned from each others’ experiences. -Lise -
It came clear to me how I have been keeping myself in a box of old beliefs.
When I get moments of clarity I like myself and see a person who is enough. -Penny
There's a lot to explore here, but I don't feel shame or even regret (as I feared I would) ... just curiosity and compassion, and gratitude to have the tools now to begin to unravel some of this! - Elizabeth
What is My Investment for this Study Group?
Many of you have already indicated interest and are just awaiting details, so I expect this to fill quickly; there are a few spots left. This is likely to be the only in-person offering of this course.
Your investment is $497 and your time.
The payback is self-awareness, community, more freedom from nagging worries and anxieties, self-doubt, spinning mind and being mired in old stuck, repeating patterns.
Payment Options:
Check, cash or Zelle preferred.
Online Payment: I am in process of setting this up, for now reply and I will send you a paypal link. Please note I will add 3% to cover paypal/credit card fees.) If you need other payment options or timing, please let me know.
Questions? Unsure if this is for you?
Please reach out via email to schedule a free 15 minute consult.