The Wisdom of the Body
A 10-Week Online Companion Retreat to the Book
- Companion retreat to the book
- Online retreat
- Self-study, start anytime
- Move at your own pace, in your own place
- Lifetime access
Registration Fee: $175 USD
Would you be nourished by falling in love with your body rather than endlessly criticizing yourself and trying to get your body to fit into some preconceived mold?
Would you cherish having a safe container to journey through the sacred work of tending to our bodies in the most reverential ways?
What if you were supported in embracing the Incarnation as a profound truth about you? That the divine is deeply infused into your very physical being?
Program Description
Imagine journeying through a season committed to exploration, curiosity, tenderness, and delight. Imagine breathing deeply and feeling intimacy with an old and wise friend. Imagine, as Buddhist writer Reginald Ray says, to discover the last unexplored wilderness, which is the body.
Each week breaks open a different theme to help us make the descent into our body’s experience and receive its wisdom. Reflections are grounded in monastic wisdom and an invitation to allow contemplative practice to be a doorway of discovery. Through meditation, reflection, writing, visual art, and movement participants are given space to discover their own pathways within.
Each week is like a mini-retreat leading you into new ways of being in relationship to your body, ways that are more kind, loving, and abundantly compassionate to lead us toward a deep sense of peace and self-celebration. Each week lays out a banquet of possibilities for you to explore. You can choose which ones speak to you.
Whether your body is already an old friend and companion with whom you want to grow more intimate, or whether the whole idea of embodiment feels distant and foreign, or somewhere in between you are most welcome here. You are invited to bring your joys and sorrows, your delight and your grief.
This online retreat is open to all women (anyone who identifies in this way — femme, female, woman, etc)
What's Included
- Six days a week you receive an email with a link to the day’s content. The materials are in video and audio format which you can view and listen to at any time. The seventh day is a day for rest and integration.
- Weekly video and audio recordings of webinar sessions with Christine Valters Paintner to introduce the materials for the week's exploration and guide you through a meditation practice. These were offered live during the community version of the retreat.
- Weekly audio guidance for Creative Explorations from Christine
- Weekly videos from our fabulous guest teachers to offer bonus insights and practices beyond the book
- Video resources for practicing the yin pose of the week
- Weekly audio blessings and reflection questions from Christine
- Video interviews with our guest teachers Jamie Marich, Aisling Richmond, and Betsey Beckman
- Closed captioning and transcripts
- Lifetime access to all material in our private and easy-to-navigate retreat platform
The contemplative path is about deepening our capacity for intuitive connection to our body wisdom so we begin to hear our bodies’ voices.
“The contemplative path is about deepening our capacity for intuitive connection to our body wisdom so we begin to hear our bodies’ voices.” ~ Christine Valters Paintner
Weekly Themes
Week 1Viriditas: Claiming New Body Stories
Embracing St. Hildegard of Bingen as an ally, this week explores viriditas, stability, and learning to stay present with our whole body and self. Guest teacher: Aisling Richmond
Week 2 Breath: The Gateway to the Body
Embracing Sophia/Wisdom as an ally, this week explores statio or holy pause, softening, deep listening, and breath prayer. Guest teacher: Jamie Marich
Week 3Senses: Threshold and Sacrament Experience
Embracing the Woman from the Song of Songs as an ally, this week explores savouring, celebrating the senses, and slow ripening of awareness. Guest teacher: Betsey Beckman
Week 4Feelings and Desire: The Ocean of Emotion
Embracing Eve as an ally, this week explores radical hospitality and our relationship with desire — both its goodness and the resistance we experience. Guest teacher: Aisling Richmond
Week 5 Thoughts: The Inner Witness
Embracing Amma Syncletica as an ally, this week explores mindfulness, embracing and creating our own story, and encountering synchronicity through intuition. Guest teacher: Jamie Marich
Week 6Exile and Lament: The Vulnerability of the Body
Embracing Rachel as an ally, this week explores grief and lament, movement as prayer, and the body’s memory. Guest teacher: Jamie Marich
Week 7Holiness Made Flesh: The Incarnation and Embodied Life
Embracing the Woman who anointed Jesus as an ally, this week explores deep trust of the body, incarnation, and remembering our earthiness. Guest teacher: Betsey Beckman
Week 8Ecstasy and Reclaiming Joy: Expanding Threshold of Tolerance
Embracing Teresa of Avila as an ally, this week explores the call of ecstasy, communion with the divine, and dancing our deepest joy. Guest teacher: Aisling Richmond
Week 9Greening of the Body: The Earth as Matrix
Embracing St. Brigid of Kildare as an ally, this week explores participating in the life of creation, connecting with earth’s wisdom, and claiming our own wild call. Guest teacher: Betsey Beckman
Week 10Coming Home to Your Body: The Vocation of the Body
Embracing Mary, Mother of God as an ally, this week explores discerning where to say “no” and where to say “yes”, honoring the full spectrum of the embodied experience, and integrating the gifts and wisdom of this journey. Bonus practice from Christine Valters Paintner
Weekly Rhythm of Content
Six days a week you will receive an email with a link to that day’s content. The seventh day is a time for rest and integration. You have lifetime access to the material.
Day 1: Video and audio session with Christine (exploring the theme and practice for the week and leading you in the guided meditation)
Day 2: Embracing our ally for the journey (women saints and mystics) – audio guide from Christine
Day 3: Creative exploration – audio guide from Christine
Day 4: Guest teacher video (with Betsey, Jamie, or Aisling)
Day 5: Movement exploration through yin yoga and dance – audio guide from Christine
Day 6: Reflection questions and closing blessing
Day 7: Sabbath rest and time to integrate the week
Your Guides for the Journey
Christine Valters Paintner, OblSB, PhD, REACE
Christine is the director and online abbess of AbbeyoftheArts.com, a virtual monastery exploring contemplative practice, creative expression, and ways to nourish an earth-cherishing consciousness. She is a spiritual director, teacher, pilgrimage guide, and author of numerous books on spirituality and the arts. Her deepest belief is that the earth is the original monastery—a wisdom guide and mentor in living a soulful and vibrant life. Visit the “About Christine” page for more information.
Aisling Richmond, MA
Aisling Richmond is a Somatic Therapist and transformative guide who is deeply inspired by nature and the wisdom of the soul. Aisling is currently undertaking a PhD in Psychology and Transformative Leadership to work with cultural change. She shares a home with her partner in the rugged wildness of Donegal, North West Ireland. Aisling works as a therapist, supporting people to resolve trauma and life challenges through body-psyche-soul wisdom. She also mentors people in finding their deep soul purpose, and teaches a rich range of transformative programs online. Aisling is passionate about soul centred living, where nature and the feminine are deeply valued. Having worked collaboratively with many organisations including Amnesty International, Aisling has also been a guest lecturer with both Galway and Limerick Universities. AislingRichmond.com
Betsey Beckmann, MM
Betsey Beckman, MM is nationally acclaimed as a spirited dancer, storyteller, teacher of SpiritPlay and dancing Spiritual Director. With her extensive repertory of sacred storydances, she is regularly featured as artist/presenter at national conventions as well as local churches. She earned her Masters in Ministry degree from Seattle University, her certificate in Movement Therapy from the Institute for Transformational Movement, and is a certified InterPlay leader. As dancer, choreographer, author, mother, wife, teacher and spiritual director, she is passionate about living life fully and fostering creativity in all those with whom she shares life and ministry. Betsey’s publications include books (she is co-author ofAwakening the Creative Spirit: Bringing the Expressive Arts to Spiritual Direction), recordings (including producing the Abbey of the Arts CD collections), and The Dancing Word series of DVDs on embodied prayer, many of which companion the Abbey CDs. She offers the gift of playful improvisation whenever possible. TheDancingWord.com
Jamie Marich, Ph.D
Jamie Marich, Ph.D., LPCC-S, REAT, RMT (she/they) travels internationally speaking on topics related to EMDR therapy, trauma, addiction, expressive arts, LGBTQ issues, spirituality, yoga, and mindfulness while maintaining a private practice in her home base of Northeast Ohio. Jamie is also the developer of the Dancing Mindfulness expressive arts practice. Jamie is the author of several books including Dancing Mindfulness: A Creative Path to Healing and Transformation (2015, with foreword by Christine Valters Paintner) and Process Not Perfection: Expressive Arts Solutions for Trauma Recovery released in 2019, heavily influenced by the growth she has experienced through her study with Abbey of the Arts! Now primarily a North Atlantic Book author, she has recently released Trauma and the 12 Steps: An Inclusive Guide to Recovery (2020), Transforming Trauma with Jiu-Jitsu (2022), and Dissociation Made Simple: A Stigma-Free Guide to Embracing Your Dissociative Mind and Navigating Life (2023). Their newest book is You Lied to Me About God: A Memoir (2024). Jamie is currently a seminarian in the Chaplaincy Institute’s Interfaith Ordination program. JamieMarich.com
Praise for the Course
Registration
$175
Registration Fee
If you need a different payment plan or a scholarship to make this program accessible, please complete the scholarship request form.
Purchase the Companion Book
The book is not included in the registration fee. You may purchase the book at the links below or at your local book seller. Thank you for your support!
Terms and Conditions
Please consider your purchase carefully and review the many free materials we have on our website to make sure the program will be a good fit or get in touch with any questions.
We ask that you honor our work by not sharing the program materials with others who are not enrolled.
Please contact us for permission to quote in settings beyond the program
Some self-study retreats include video or audio recordings of sessions that were recorded in a live community offering of the retreat and may make reference to forums or other modes of sharing. Please disregard these as self-study retreats do not have these available.
Your registration implies consent to be added to our weekly email newsletter. You are free to unsubscribe or change frequency at any time. We never sell your personal information.
If you choose a payment plan and stop payment before fulfilling the commitment without contacting us to make other arrangements, your access to the program will be removed.