Ursula Funke-Kaiser 

Masterclass: Grief, Joy and the Return to your Authentic Self. Dates: 22-25 May 2025 with SE-Advanced  Trainer Ursula Funke-Kaiser.

Content: In this course we will explore our personal relationship with grief. Which losses happened in my life, what did I learn about how to grief them – or not to grief? And what did this mean for the further course of my life? And even “smaller” losses, that
were not seen or accepted as such by the people around me can become firmly stuck in the soul. So to identify those different issues or portals of grief will be helpful for our exploration. In looking into this, dealing with experiences of loss and grief with all our SE-tools, we will find ways to go deeper in what is unresolved in ourselves and how to let go of patterns, obstacles for further development and living joyfully. And in doing this in the context of a course for SE practitioners and students we will as well strengthen our abilities to work with grief in our clients and support them on their way to their authentic self beyond.

When we learn how to be able to be open for emotional pain and sorrow and let us grief what is lost, we can find the well in our soul from where inner strength, muchlarger resilience and joy of living can evolve.

Peter Levine here refers to the I Ging The Chinese Book of Change Sign 48, The Fountain or Well. This sign reminds us, that it is not enough to change superficially, but to take care of the deepest foundation of life that is inexhaustible.

Doing this in a way that creates a safe ground first, makes it possible to visit the places of pain and sorrow. There we experience the emotional charge and raw power that has the potential to pull us away from the way we have to go, to free our authentic self and be alive. By caring for the basic SE-principles like titration, pendulation, SIBAM, coupling dynamics and joining, the immense pain, that is hidden in grief und our concealed sorrow, can be touched slowly and with awareness. And by moving through it, we can open up for joy again and we can reunite with our Authentic Self.

In a way this multilayered inner process challenges us with a transformation of our personal identity. Trauma we experienced and the hidden within energies of grief, sorrow and heartache make us to how we see ourself. To change this belief (“That’s the way I am”) and find a new identity in which joy, wellbeing and benevolence become central, needs inner and outer guidance, like in every journey through the deep night of the soul.

Grief: The 7 Portals

In Peter Levine`s teachings there are 7 gates:
1 – Loss of someone or also something you dared to love
2 – The places that haven’t felt love and should have so – often connected to immobilizing shame and selfblame –

early attachement woundings and developmental stress
3 - What we expected but did not get – which is often difficult to distinguish from 2
4 – Ancestral grief
5 - The sorrows of the world
6 – Pervasive disconnection, lack of social cohesion
7 – Existential grief – illusion of separateness, a spiritual form of grief, a yearning for a sense of belonging and unity.

Very often those portals are interconnected and one experience of grief can trigger other ones. Naturally during those four days we will not be able to look deeply into every one of those gates, but we name them and we hope you will get an idea of how it might show in you and your clients.

For practical information and registering: Grief, Joy and the Return to your Authentic Self