Last minute preparations are underway. I’m looking at the pile of props, costumes and workbooks and wondering how I’ll squeeze everything and a wheelchair into the car, even though we have done this so many times before and in much smaller vehicles. Wondering what I’ve forgotten… there is bound to be something… even though I have everything from safety pins and string to gilded plant pots.

On the surface it all looks like panic stations, yet, beyond that is a pool of perfect calm. I know that no matter what we have forgotten, or how things appear to be going… it will be fine. It is a matter of trust…and of experience.

There have been lost and misplaced items, things that should have been to hand at crucial moments but were, inexplicably, not. There was the year when a last minute epidemic hit the group and two of our Companions stepped up to the mark and shared nine roles between them. Wardrobe disasters, technical glitches, on the hoof rewrites… you name it, we’ve had it, and for the most part, no one even notices.

Although we do put a lot of care into staging these workshops, that is as close to theatrical as they get. The dramatic element is not about playing a part, as you would in amateur dramatics. There are no lines to learn, there is no audience to please, no need to be anything other than yourself.

We take a story, drawn from myth, imagination, or even stranger sources, and play it out symbolically. The story always addresses some of the spiritual and psychological principles behind the human journey and, through such rituals, we seek not only to gain a deeper understanding of ourselves and our place in the world, but to set in motion the wheels of change.

This year, the story is inspired by the ancient Epic of Gilgamesh, a story that was old when the pyramids were raised. Over the weekend of the event and afterwards, we will share the story and open the doors of the temple a little to give a glimpse of what we do. We will also be asking you to join us in a meditation. ‘Raising awareness’ can have more than one meaning…

Continue reading at The Silent Eye.