June 2010 Mandala Intensive

A wonderful group of women gathered in Plum Blossom Studio in Decatur, Georgia for this year's Entering the Circle: Five Day Mandala Intensive. We created many mandalas, talked about the history, psychology, forms, and colors in mandalas. We shared laughter and tears as we delved into mysteries of the circle and shared our lives for days of self-discovery through creativity. Here is our group portrait.

Huichol Beadwork Mandalas

I was in Mexico in May, and visiting the Wednesday market in Ajijic I saw some beautiful mandalas crafted by indigenous Huichol people using beads, hollowed out gourds, and wooden planks.

Moving Water Mandala

The bamboo drip fountain in my garden creates a pattern of sound and image.

Finding My Standpoint

A Mandala of Finding My Standpoint: standing still, balancing in place, tracing around my feet, painting in and around my footprints. A way of knowing my being within a particular place and time. Try it yourself sometime.

Turning of the Seasons: a Mandala

As Spring blossoms out of Winter, I am reminded that the year with its turning seasons is a mandala. It is a cycle that repeats again and again, each time with endless variations. This mandala, embraced as a model of how life unfolds, is beautifully expressed in a quote shared with us by Starr, a participant at our recent Part III Mandala Intensive.

There are times to cultivate and create, when you nurture your world and give birth to new ideas and ventures. There are times of flourishing and abundance, when life feels in full bloom, energized and expanding. And there are times of fruition, when things come to an end. They have reached their climax and must be harvested before they begin to fade. And finally of course, there are times that are cold, and cutting and empty, times when the spring of new beginnings seems like a distant dream. Those rhythms in life are natural events. They weave into one another as day follows night, bringing, not messages of hope and fear, but messages of how things are.

Chogyam Trungpa

Mandala Intensive, March 2010

A week long mandala intensive concluded the Mandala Certificate Program for a group of five women from the US and Italy. The retreat, "Integrating the Circle," offered lectures, case study presentations, and experiences creating mandalas. Each participant also reported on her independent study project, another element in the Certificate Program. Projects included conducting mandala groups and workshops with mentorship, producing a mandala coloring book/calendar and mandala greeting cards, and developing an interfaith curriculum for introducing mandalas at spiritual retreats. Another project was the development of a website with authoritative mandala information for an international audience http://www.mandalaweb.info/.

The week was a rich gathering that deepened personal connections as well as affirming a shared belief in the healing, centering, grounding, soothing, and spiritual growing that is possible through creating mandalas.

Soothing and Centering

Susanne and Maureen Shelton presented on healing music and mandalas at a conference entitled, "The Agony of Caring: Professionalism and Moral Distress in Healthcare," sponsored by Emory University Center for Ethics, Atlanta, Georgia. Maureen taught two of her original songs (hear more at http://www.mandalacd.com/), and Susanne explained the neurological underpinnings of human responses to the circle before guiding participants in creating their own mandalas. Our points: self-care of caregivers is an ethical obligation, and creative activities are easy, effective, and enjoyable self-care.