A Transformational Three-Month Program Restoring Death to its Sacred Place
The Conscious Dying Institute (CDI) is continuing to work with medical practitioners, caretakers, mental health professionals, and family and community members to restore death back to its sacred place in the Circle of Life. Its next offering in Minnesota is a three-month, on-and-off site course involving transformational life-renewing content and healing modality training.
Death is the one process in life all are guaranteed, yet very few talk about, let alone, prepare people for it. CDI is working to change this in order to support individuals, families and communities in not only facilitating individuals to die well, but living their most complete and joyful lives. Death is constantly woven into one’s life — whether this takes form in daily decisions, life transitions or physical deaths. CDI’s three-month, end-of-life doula program prepares students to work with death in their own lives, as well as the lives of their family, friends, patients and clients.
“Death gives us the opportunity to clarify, create closure and envision a future we want to live into,” says Brad Smith. “As a healthy 30-year-old, this training has not only supported me in having the emotional and intellectual tools to navigate transition and support family members and clients at the end of life, it has brought clarity and affirmation to my own life, allowing me to fully take advantage of this opportunity to be alive and step into myself.”
CDI is offering a three-month training and certification program called Sacred Passage: End-of-Life Doula. This program includes online study, completion of practicum within their community, and two transformational in-person retreats in St. Paul. Phase 1 includes pre-course reading material and reflection questions, bringing experienced laypeople and providers deeper into their relationship with death, expanding their minds and hearts to consider death’s place within life. The first three-day retreat in St. Paul drops all the information into participants’ bodies through experiential exercises with group and personal processes aiming to expand participants’ bandwidth to work with intense emotions.
After Phase 1, students are paired with a program peer to work through the Best Three Months© Coaching framework, and then they are asked to facilitate this process with two community members. The second five-day retreat is a five-domain healing modality training, leading students on a healing journey through spiritual, emotional, physical, legacy and after-death care for self and others. At the end of the certification program, participants can expect to be well prepared to facilitate the dying process for individuals, support their peers in transitional times, and be transformed personally to live their life fully.
“The End of Life Doula program took me beyond the physical dying process and into the emotional, spiritual, practical and mental domains,” said CDI facilitator Trish Rux. “While I have worked with dying patients for years, this training supported me in working with patients more holistically and compassionately. Ultimately this work is life-affirming for both the practitioner and the patient.”
The Sacred Passage: End-of-Life Doula Certificate training begins March 2020 and runs through June 2020 and offers 66 CNEs for nurses. Interested individuals can learn more at www.consciousdyinginstitute.com/events/march-2020-minneapolis-mn-sacred-passage-end-of-life-doula-certificate or by emailing program advisor Kamala Snow at [email protected] or call 303.440.8018. The three-month certificate training typically costs $3,145 for those who register early. Scholarships and payment plans are available.
