The Desert - Somatic Compass of Resiliance

What is it about? 

The desert, vast and quiet, evokes the personal moments of emptiness, pause, and stillness that often precede transformation. Within its silence lies both challenge and potential: the absence of familiar paths becomes an invitation to rediscover resilience, creativity, and connection.

By weaving symbolic, embodied, and creative approaches together, this training empowers youth workers and facilitators to become skilled companions in life’s transitional spaces. Those they support will gain resilience, inner resources, and creative ways of meaning-making.​​

​This project explores the Desert, a Somatic Compass as a guiding force for navigating life’s storms with compassion rooted in the body. Just like the pendulum movement, which swings between extremes before finding balance, our bodies and emotions continuously shift in response to life’s challenges. By cultivating awareness of these natural rhythms, participants will learn to return to a state of centred resilience.

Main questions for this training: 

• What are the 7+ senses, and how do they shape our perception?
• How do sensations influence our relational field and capacity for connection?
• How can we use our senses to cultivate a felt sense of belonging within nature?
• What practices can help us expand our awareness and listen more deeply to ourselves and the world?
• How does an ecosomatic approach help us shift from individual presence to relational presence?

Methodology:

Somatics  - Ecopsychology - Movement

Through the combined lenses of ecopsychology, somatic practices, and movement, this training explores how the “inner desert” can be embodied, felt, and understood.

• Somatic practices: Somatic practices focus on increasing awareness of bodily sensations, movements, and patterns to enhance overall well-being and self-awareness. This work emphasizes the body's internal physical perception and experience.
   
• Ecopsychology: explores the relationship between human beings and the natural world through ecological and psychological principles. It seeks to understand and address the psychological underpinnings of environmental issues, proposing that the health of the planet is intrinsically linked to human mental health. It emphasizes the importance of reconnecting with nature to foster emotional well-being and a sense of ecological responsibility.​
• Dance  Improvisation is a spontaneous and intuitive practice where movement emerge in the moment, without a predetermined structure. It allows mover to explore their physicality, emotions, and creativity while responding to various stimuli such as rhythm, breath, sound, and space.

For who? 

The intention of this project is to support ourselves in developing practical, somatic and relational skills for supporting individuals who are going through challenging/ transition moments. 

The course welcomes participants from diverse professional and personal backgrounds (youth workers, educators, facilitators, mental health workers, artists, dancers) who are curious about using ecopsychology, somatics, and movement as methods for personal and social growth in the topic of luminal - transition spaces. 

We aim to have 28 participants from Slovenia, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Slovakia and Romania.

Participants must be over 18 years old and have a communicative level in English so that they can participate fully in the program.

Participants must be over 18 years old and have a communicative level in English so that they can participate fully in the program.

​This training course is funded through the Erasmus+ Programme, travel costs up to a specific maximum allowed amount will be fully reimbursed.

Slovenia: 28 EUR (56 EUR for Green Travel*)
Italy: 211 EUR  (285 EUR for GT*) 
Germany, Spain, Slovakia, Romania, France: 309 EUR  (417 EUR for GT) 

Last drop of information: 

• Applications deadline: 21th of September at 12pm
• Selection results: 28th of September
• Arrival day: 14th of November by 7pm
• Start of the program: 21th of November 9:30am
• Departure day: 22th of November by noon

For More Information, visit this page: 

www.moave.si/thedesert

Application form link: https://forms.gle/o8Fyw5bxweb9AGL2A