Date/Time:

Sunday, July 28, 2019 - Wednesday, July 31, 2019 

Location:

Wasatch Retreat & Conference Center

Salt Lake City, UT 

Prices/Tuition:

Early Bird (prior to 5/28/19): $750
Regular (after 5/28/19): $850
Deposit: $175.00

Register Today

Contact: 

Stacy Jenkins
(801) 696-1169
[email protected]

The Embryo in US, Man as Embryo

Instructor: Jaap van der Wal

Organizational Host: Guild for Structural Integration

Credits:  28

Course Description:

In the human embryonic development, we are dealing with what could be mentioned as 'still functioning in forms'. By this is meant that the gestures of growth and development that the human embryo is performing could be interpreted and understood as human behavior. And as a kind a pre-exercising of what later will appear as physiological and psychological functions.“The body developed out of us, not we from it” (Rumi)The human body gets its shape and form during the embryonic development in a continuous process of change and metamorphosis. Using the phenomenological approach, it is possible to understand those gestures as human behavior. During the early phases of human existence, the processes that accompany the (at least conceivable) act of incarnation may be “read” from the biological facts. Those gestures also are a kind of echo or recapitulation of the gestures of development of man as a species. In this way biography and biology meet. The embryonic existence is not merely a passed phase of human life, the embryo still exists in us: also in our unconscious physical existence and body we act as beings of soul and body.The human embryo seems to be a kind of continuous empathetic equilibrium between 'introvert antipathy' and extravert sympathy' in relation to its context and environment. This polarity seems to be active in various dimensions and directions a.o. between head and extremities and between cranial (head) versus caudal (pelvis), while in the trunk and the vertebral column (the so-called Middle) the typically human quality of going upright and balancing seems to be preserved.The aim of this course is to make the attendants aware of the great processes and forces of becoming that work in the human body as the necessary conditions for being a human individuality. Not only with the intellect but also by the heart: phenomenology is the approach of experiencing and participation instead of pure thinking and observation. Prior knowledge of embryology is not required. The lectures and discussions will be alternated with practical exercises like form drawing and bodily motions (‘eurhythmy’ and ‘anatomy dancing’). For graduates and students in Structural Integration, but also for Osteopaths, Craniosacral therapists, Bodyworkers, Trauma therapists and for other interested people from the domain of therapy and/or (complimentary) medicine.Visit Jaap van der Wal's website to learn more.

Instructor Bio: 

Jaap van der Wal  Ph.D. is a medical doctor and until his retirement in 2012 he worked as associate professor in Anatomy and Embryology at the University of Maastricht, Holland. After his medical education in 1973 he became specialized in the functional anatomy of the locomotor apparatus with eventual emphasis on the architecture of connective tissue and fascia and its role in proprioception. Gradually he developed as teacher in Philosophy of Science and in Medical Anthropology. “My passion however was and still is human embryology. The human body is a process, developing and functioning in time. The embryo moves and behaves in forms. It is in this area that I encountered the Goethean phenomenological approach. I apply the method of dynamic morphology to understand what we actually are doing as human beings when we are embryo. With respect, I can find in the embryo cautious answers to questions as to the meaning of human existence." After his retirement, he has fully devoted his energy to Embryo in Motion, a worldwide project on teaching Embryosophy. He now teaches his ‘Embryosophy’ in Europe and USA in institutes for Craniosacral-therapy, Osteopathy, Polarity Therapy but also Prenatal Psychology and Trauma therapy and so on.