Upcoming Seminars

Please select the blue "View & Purchase" button below next to the event you wish to attend.

Course Information

Friendly and Fearless: Combining Kindness and Assertiveness in Important Relationships

- With Daniel Ellenberg, Ph.D. and Rick Hanson, Ph.D.

In important relationships at home and at work, we need to respect the needs of others while also sticking up for our own. But easier said than done. In this experiential, practical workshop for helping professionals, we’ll use positive neuroplasticity to teach participants how to grow these lasting inner resources: staying calm when others get heated, honoring our own feelings and wants, and skills for communicating about charged topics and repairing relationships. Building on the work of Kristin Neff and others, we’ll explore interpersonal courage, compassionate strength, and the intersection of love and power.

This workshop will include internal experiential practices, didactic lectures, role play, paired activities, movement, and writing. Throughout, the focus will be on how to teach these tools to others and use them oneself.

This workshop offers 6 CE hours.

There is no conflict of interest or commercial support for this program.
 

Presenter

Rick Hanson, Ph.D. and Daniel Ellenberg, Ph.D.

Rick Hanson, Ph.D., is a neuropsychologist, acclaimed teacher, and author of the new book Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm, and Confidence (Random House, October 2013; in 4 languages). His prior books include Just One Thing: Developing a Buddha Brain One Simple Practice at a Time (New Harbinger; in 12 languages), Mother Nurture: A Mother’s Guide to Health in Body, Mind, and Intimate Relationships (Penguin), and the best-selling Buddha’s Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, and Wisdom (New Harbinger; in 24 languages).

Daniel Ellenberg, PhD is a leadership coach, organizational trainer, group facilitator, public speaker, and licensed therapist. He is the founder/director of Strength With Heart® men’s groups and workshops, co-founder and president of Relationships That Work®, and a principal of Rewire Leadership Institute®. He is co-author of Lovers for Life: Creating Lasting Passion, Trust, and True Partnership, and a contributor to The Communication Path and Mastering the Art of Success, Volume 8. He leads workshops on developing resilience, having effective difficult conversations, and helping men develop greater self-esteem, self-compassion, and effectiveness in relationships—both professional and personal. His facilitation always involves a focus on creating and sustaining a healthy group or organizational culture. He helps people realize that their greatest assets lay in their own curiosity, authenticity, and willingness to embrace change.

 

Target Audience:

Psychologists, Psychiatrists, Social Workers, MFTs, Counselors, Substance Abuse Counselors, Occupational Therapists, Nurses - All Levels

 

Course Objectives:

  1. Describe the two stages of experience-dependent neuroplasticity

  2. Describe two research-based ways to heighten the internalization of beneficial experiences as durable changes of neural structure or function

  3. Name two elements of the brain’s threat-defense system

  4. Summarize the two branches of the vagus nerve complex

  5. Name two psychological techniques for increasing the sense of calm strength while in an interpersonal conflict

  6. Distinguish between threat- and thrive-oriented interpersonal responses

  7. Describe three key elements of nonviolent communication

  8. Describe the two levels of forgiveness presented by the teachers: disentangled, and a full pardon

  9. Name one way that autonomy promotes intimacy, and one way that intimacy promotes autonomy

 

Agenda

9:00 - 10:30am  

 Course Overview
Challenges in integrating autonomy and intimacy
Need for psychological resources
Two stages of experience-dependent neuroplasticity
How to maximize learning from beneficial experiences
Growing calm strength
10:30 – 10:45am  

Break

10:45 - 12:15pm  

The brain’s threat-defense system
Vagus nerve complex; connections between calming and engagement
Distinguishing between threat- and thrive-oriented responses
Our normal needs; ways to accept and validate one’s own
Principles of nonviolent communication
12:15 – 1:45pm  

Lunch

1:45 - 3:15pm  

 Unilateral virtue; wise speech
The power of vulnerable requests
Staying focused on core values and aims
Ways to stay centered while others are angry or demanding

3:15 – 3:30pm  

Break

3:30 – 5:00pm  

Expanding the circle of “us” to include more of “them”
Two levels of forgiveness
Forgiving oneself
Concrete plans for the days ahead