The Mary Ward Centre

The time immediately after we have received initiations when we are integrating the energies within ourselves is a good time to allow the energies to act as mirrors and to reflect back to us unresolved issues from our past and issues in our current lives. Although the energies can give us emotional and mental healing support, sometimes it is helpful for initiates to have access to some personal skills development training as well so that they have enough basic tools to get through day to day life.

This is also relevant to people who have sought healing because they have difficult situations in their lives. Although healing sessions can help, sometimes the learning of additional personal development skills means that they can deal more effectively with what life throws at them and not be on the back foot all the time.

The Information Centre on this website holds details of personal skills development workshops run by various external training organisations which might be helpful for people learning the energies and also for those people who have had the need to seek healing support. This page given details of workshops run by The Mary Ward Centre in Central London. These are intended to be simple practical workshops to help people handle life situations better and are of short duration – maybe one day or maybe a few hours in the evening every week for a few weeks. The Mary Ward Centre is a charity so the prices of workshops are very reasonable and not expensive. Price concessions may be available to some people who cannot afford the workshops.

The Centre was established with funding given by the novelist Mary Ward who was born during the reign of Queen Victoria. The Centre’s website advises that Mary’s wish was to support the provision of cultural and educational opportunities to those who had no access to them due to circumstances of birth. She helped to establish the first college for women at Oxford University, Somerville College, and the first school for physically handicapped children in England. Today, the Centre has charitable status and operates as an Adult Education College offering a wide range of educational and training opportunities.

The Mary Ward Centre is located in Central London in the West End. The address and website are as follows:

Mary Ward Centre

42 Queen Square

LONDON

WC1N 3AQ

http://www.marywardcentre.ac.uk

I give details below of some of the personal skills development workshops offered by the Mary Ward Centre. This is not a complete list of courses offered by the Centre but is intended to give an indication of the range of workshops offered which readers might find most useful. To find out about these and other courses, please go to the Mary Ward Centre website, and then click through on Courses, Personal Development, Course List.

If anybody might be interested in attending some of these workshops, could they please note that the workshops are run on an interactive group basis and that maximum advantage is achieved when everybody is open with their issues within the group and can work with their fellow classmates to resolve them. This might seem very daunting to some people. However, if you can push yourself through the openness barrier, it can be quite liberating to share your issues with other people and also to realise that they have the same issues in their lives.

Please note that these courses are designed for people who need to develop their own skills. They are not designed for people to learn to teach similar workshops and therefore have no qualification accreditation within the English education sector.

Assertiveness Skills

Assertiveness relates to the ability to present one’s views and opinions and to engage with other people in a way that is not aggressive or emotional but does deal with issues that might be very sensitive or difficult. Assertiveness Skills training is suitable for those people either who find it difficult to put their views across to others and find it easier to ‘stay within their shells and silent’ or for those at the other end of the spectrum who find it difficult to stay calm when engaging with other people on problem matters. This series of two workshops will give techniques to help deal with other people more effectively.

Developing New and Existing Friendships

Relationships with other people which have reasonable balance in terms of giving to and receiving from each other can enrich our lives and help us to grow together as people if we know how to nurture the relationships. Sometimes, though, we have people in our lives with whom we do not have such a positive relationship but we do not know how to move the relationship forward. We do not get taught relationship skills in the State education system despite the fact that most things we do in life are undertaken in relationship with other people. This series of two workshops aims to bridge that gap by way of introducing some simple concepts about how to develop friendships. This could be helpful for people who feel alone with few friends and are stressed out because of that.

Feel The Fear

This series of workshops is intended to get participants to acknowledge their fears about aspects of their lives and to introduce them to techniques to deal with that fear. By the end of the workshops, participants should have awareness of how to move through their various fear barriers and to deal with the change in their lives that results.

The Inner Child

This series of workshops explores the concept of the Inner Child and encourages participants to connect with the Inner Child in them. This helps to understand what emotional wounds are being carried forward and to process emotional baggage. The potential of the Inner Child can be unlocked and innate creativity released. These workshops approach self-healing from a different angle to my teaching and might also be useful for healers wishing to learn some additional approaches to emotional healing.

Facing Our Masks

The series of workshops will be helpful for people who do not like the external world to see the real them and who create a persona or mask behind which they keep their real selves hidden from external view. Wearing masks can mean that we live a false life and can limit our potential. These workshops explore the reasons for choosing this way to interact with the external world and explore how the masks may be taken off so that the real person may be transformed and seen by all.

Enjoy Your Voice

Some people do not know how to use their voice well when communicating with others. They can hardly be heard because there is little projection in the voice. Sometimes people develop low self esteem because they feel embarrassed about the way that they speak. This series of workshops looks at reasons why people may not be using their voice well and teaches people to be able to use their voice as a tool to express emotion and feeling and their personality when talking to others. It includes role play of using our voices in different communication situations.

Selling yourself or your message

If we are going to work as healers, there is often the need to be able to present what we do or to sell ourselves. Not everybody feels comfortable with that. Sometimes people come to me for healing who get themselves stressed out because they have difficult selling themselves or putting themselves forwards at critical times in their lives such as interviews, promotions, dealing with the boss at work, etc.. This series of workshops looks at what we need to do to develop and to present the message so that what we need to express is clearly received and understood by the recipients.

Date of posting : 30^th June 2007