Join Francis Weller for an evening of exploration as we wonder aloud, what facing the world with soul might look like in these tenuous, uncertain times.
Immersive Evening: Facing the World with Soul & Why It Matters
Thursday, March 21st 6:30-9:00 pm
Clubhouse SLC
850 E S Temple St, Salt Lake City, UT 84102
Opening Poet: Utah Poet Laureate, Lisa Bickmore (book signing after the talk)
Live Music: Jared Ray Gilmore
Visual Artist: Britta Baker
Circlesong by Carl Rabke
1.5 CEUs available for Utah Mental Health Professionals ($5 or free for Professional Members)
Schedule:
6:30-7:00 pm – Live Music & Art Mingle
7:00-8:30 pm – Immersive Talk with Francis Weller
8:30-9:00 pm – Community Social
Tickets: $25 ($15 for Members) – SOLD OUT
Generously supported by Carl Rabke & Erin Geesaman Rabke
Sponsored by Desert Morning Counseling
“In a dark time, the eye begins to see.” – Theodore Roethke
We are living in a time of radical change and uncertainty on this beautiful, beleaguered planet. It is a season of descent, of breakdowns, and collapse. We have entered what could be called the Long Dark, a necessary time when old calcified systems are breaking down and potentially composting into something life-sustaining.
How well we respond to these evolving circumstances will determine the shape of the coming decades.
James Hillman, the brilliant archetypal psychologist, wrote, “The world and the gods are dead or alive according to the condition of our souls.” In other words, the vitality of the animate, sensuous world and our encounter with the sacred depend on our souls being fully alive! What would a soulful response to these circumstances look like? What practices and perspectives can support us leaning into the world? How can we register, deep in our beings, the profound entanglement between the world “out there” and the world “in here,” recognizing that the widening symptoms of collapse are also being felt and experienced in our bodies and souls?
How do we keep our souls alive?
We will touch upon ways to cultivate a robust interior life rooted in imagination, creativity, fertile stories, ritual, self-compassion, and the vital necessity of friendship and living community. Join us for an evening of exploration as we wonder aloud, what facing the world with soul might look like in these tenuous, uncertain times.
About Francis Weller:
Francis Weller is a psychotherapist, writer, and soul activist. He is a master of synthesizing diverse streams of thought from psychology, anthropology, mythology, alchemy, indigenous cultures and poetic traditions. Author of the bestselling, The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief, and In the Absence of the Ordinary: Essays in a Time of Uncertainty, he has introduced the healing work of ritual to thousands of people. He is the Founder/Director of WisdomBridge, an organization that offers educational programs that seek to integrate the wisdom from traditional cultures with the insights and knowledge gathered from western poetic and spiritual traditions.
Francis received two Master’s Degrees from John F. Kennedy University in Clinical Psychology and Transpersonal Psychology. His work was featured in The Sun magazine, The Utne Reader and most recently he was a guest on “All There Is” with Anderson Cooper. He is completing his third book, Facing the World with Soul and Why It Matters.
About our opening poet, Utah poet laureate Lisa Bickmore:
Lisa Bickmore is the author of three books of poems. The second, flicker (2016), won the 2014 Antivenom Prize (Elixir Press). She won the 2015 Ballymaloe International Poetry Prize for the poem ‘Eidolon,’ which appears in her third collection, Ephemerist (Red Mountain Press). She is the founder/publisher of the new independent nonprofit Lightscatter Press (lightscatterpress.org). In July 2022, she was named the Poet Laureate for the state of Utah, and in 2023 was awarded a fellowship from the Academy of American Poets for poets laureate.
About our musician, Jared Ray Gilmore:
Jared is a classically trained pianist gone rogue. He has been creating music for 25 years as a music producer and audio engineer and has a handful of albums on all streaming platforms under the name “Jared Ray”. Jared is also a prolific content creator and a Jungian Depth Coach. He’s very excited to share his love of piano with our community! Follow Jared on Instagram.
About our visual artist, Britta Baker:
“Invest in the living world” pretty much sums up Brittas’ entire outlook on life – how we create inside, for and from it. They are a color-obsessed experimental artist, painting mostly with bleach and CMYK printer ink, but will never be found without a sketchbook and clutch of homemade fude pens in hand, ready to play cartographer to the strange geography of being.
Thank you to our sponsor, Desert Morning Counseling. Additional support thanks to Sandi Cameron-Greene.
