Indian Institute of Psychodrama and (both based in Chennai, India) present "Exploring Stories through
Drama: A Course on
Storytelling Therapy and Psychodrama" An 11-Session Certificate Course
(via Zoom), Wed 13th Jan, to Wed 17th Feb 2021. ___ Course Schedule 11 Sessions, 5pm-8pm India time. Wednesdays and Fridays. 1) Wed 13th Jan, 2) Fri 15th Jan., ------ 3) Wed 20th Jan, 4) Fri 22nd Jan, ------ 5) Wed 27th Jan, 6) Fri 29th Jan, ------ 7) Wed 3rd Feb, 8) Fri 5th Feb, ------ 9) Wed 10th Feb, 10) Fri 12th Feb, ------ 11) Wed 17th Feb. ___ Course participants would
learn ways to use story and drama in
trainings that they might lead regarding Improvisational
Drama, Creative Writing,
Life Coaching, Healing, and/or Psychological Counselling. ___ Course Story-processes and Stories 1) Remembering Personal-experience
Stories. Including one's Life Story (the Mother of All Stories),
and dreams. 2) Remembering Associative
Stories (Echo Stories). For example: Does one relate to a particular character in
a fairytale, epic, movie, literature, history, etc? 3) Modifying (Re-framing, Adding to, etc) any of the
above-mentioned stories. 4) Composing Imaginary
Creative Stories that may be Metaphorical, and may be Transforming
and/or Healing. One might start by seeking to bring to mind metaphors for
aspects of one's personal experiences.
Notes on Healing Stories are here. ___ Course Overview Course participants would learn ways to use story
and drama in trainings they might lead regarding Improvisational Drama,
Creative Writing, Life Coaching, Healing, and/or Psychological Counselling. Dr Eric would assist participants to consider
various kinds of stories (including those related to personal experiences,
dreams, fantasies, fairytales, epics, history, literature, TV shows, and
movies), and Ms Magdalene would assist participants to explore their stories
through Psychodrama. Story and Drama
would be used for exploring one's identity, transforming, and healing. Aims and Objectives of the course
include enabling participants to -- 1) Further explore and discover oneself (one's
identity), in part by
exploring one's individual unconscious and the collective unconscious. 2) Further find one's "voice" and
the audiences one would like to address. 3) Further understand the conflicting,
contesting messages internal and external to oneself. 4) Further understand where one stands in
relation to these conflicting, contesting messages. 5) Further settle upon compromises between
conflicting, contesting messages, if this might be possible. 6) Further consciously construct and/or
confirm who one is. It may be therapeutic to one to explore and
share some of these matters. Matters that are meaningful to one, might also
be meaningful to members of the general public. What issues are "in the
air"? There are personal issues and social
issues. If personal issues are
experienced by many people, they are also social issues. It may be therapeutic to society to explore
and share some of these matters. This is also a course in creativity --
specifically, creativity as applied to story composition. Stories may be composed and shared via
various mediums (in addition to thinking), including drawing, writing, and
telling. For the sake of experiencing different
perspectives, participants may at times be invited to -- 1) Shift telling of personal-experience
stories from 1st-person ("I did this...") to 3rd-person
("She/He/They did this ...), and 2) Shift telling of stories about characters
external to oneself from 3rd-person ("She/He/They did this ...) to
1st-person ("I did this..."). To
Elaborate: What internal debates have occurred within
one, and have been settled? What internal debates are still occurring
within one? What are you really good at doing? What do you really enjoy doing? Do you feel you have a mission in life? Do you want to have a mission in life? Who and what do you want to become? In what ways might you like to affect the
world? Is there something you would like to say? Is there something you would like to say -- to
and/or about people (including oneself) who are living in particular
circumstances and places today? Who are you? Where do you stand? Where are you positioned (sociologically)? Who and what do you stand with? Who and what do you stand against? What groups are you in? What "Communities of Choice" have
you joined? What are some choices people today need to face? Challenges?
Opportunities? Dangers? What are some stories of your self, family,
community (including gender, sexual orientation, age-group,
etc), profession, caste (if any), religion (if any), language
group, state, and nation? This course is an opportunity to bring one's
thoughts and feelings out into the open and share them -- possibly for the
sakes of giving and receiving support and inspiration, and helping to build
community. One starting point in this discussion is the
thought of Eugene O'Neill (USA playwright, 1888-1953). He felt a major theme of modern life is
"alienation". (This
condition could be re-framed as the need and freedom to make "choices".) Eugene O'Neill wrote (to paraphrase): A primary condition of most humans living in modern
times is alienation -- alienation from nature due to one's isolated
consciousness, unable to find belonging in any social group or
environment. This has resulted in part
from work that is industrialised or otherwise non-fulfilling and
non-meaningful. Whether in a traditional society or in an
authoritarian modern society, each of us is trained to be merely a cog in a
massive machine -- a sort of automaton with no hope of liberation from the
role given to us. Isn't there more to
the human experience? How can we
escape the machine and become true individuals? The grim futility of modern human existence is
to be cursed by alienation from self, society, and the
source-of-all-life. Life is made
bearable only by illusions of connectedness. ___ Course Eligibility This course is open to any adult who has an
interest in psychology and the arts.
The course would be a good introduction to Psychodrama. ___ Course Co-leaders Ms Magdalene Jeyarathnam, https://centerforcounselling.org/magdalene-jeyarathnam TED Talk on "Psychodrama". Dr Eric Miller, https://centerforcounselling.org/dr-eric-miller Talk on "Using Storytelling to Improve Mental Health" (10 minutes). Talk on "Storytelling
for Lawyers and Law Students" (8 minutes). Links to Dr Eric's writings on Storytelling
Therapy are here. ___ Registration, etc The Course poster is here. The Course fee for peoople who are not college
students and who would be paying in rupess, is Rs 10,000. One could register for the Course here. If you are a college student and/or if you
would be paying in another currency -- please inquire. ___ Contact info Indian Institute of Psychodrama, info@indianinstituteofpsychodrama.org (India mobile) 98847 00135 World Storytelling Institute info@storytellinginstitute.org (India mobile) 98403 94282 To WSI homepage |