Come Alive
In The Courage Room™
The Creativity Collective
Love Your Body. Soothe Your Brain. Find Your Voice.
Do you long to…
soothe your scattered, overwhelmed nervous system-body-brain?
find and strengthen your personal courage?
deepen your creativity and healing through writing and creative visualization?
create and maintain a non-denominational spiritual practice?
learn to use mindfulness in a down-to-earth, relational way, not in total solitude?
connect to your authentic voice, body and emotions in both playful and serious ways?
and explore all of these with a like-minded, curious and respectful community?
In The Courage Room Collective, we do all of the above, and so much more.
Come Alive in The Courage Room™
Find Creative Energy
Using the gentle resource of the breath, full-body awareness and simple movements, we tap into creative energy and relational awareness.
Discover Your Voice
Through the weekly All Write, I invite members to tap into their creative energy in clear and simple ways. We write into authentic voice and experience, tapping into the spiritual, the relational, and hidden places that the conscious mind may overlook or shy away from.
Explore your Patters of Behaviour
We use creative visualization, meditation, and expressive writing to work with our patterns of behaviour and thought.
Calm Your Nervous System
We engage the brain through simple, proven neuroscientific practices that help to calm and centre our overloaded nervous systems.
Strengthen Creativity and Spirituality
We cultivate an appreciation and respect for creativity and spirituality, however we define them.
Practice Empathy
We actively cultivate empathy for our selves and for others through presence and (optional) one-on-one group engagement.
This work helps us to open up space for new habits and behaviours.
Who It’s For
Creative people of all kinds: amateurs, professionals, artists, business people
“Non-creative” people who want to become (more) creative. Yes you can!
Writers in need of inspiration and encouragement to begin or to continue a significant project
People interested in self-healing through expressive writing, movement, and proven brain-care (neuroscientific) practices
Artists who are no long connecting with their muse because she got an iPhone and is obsessed with TikTok. Artists who want to find a new muse.
Journal-keepers. Secret scribblers. Anyone who can hold a pen or tap on a keyboard. Sketchers. Visual artists.
People seeking to come more fully alive by developing a daily creative/spiritual practice.
A Collective for the Body, brain and voice
I invite you to envision your own body as your first and finest room: the original Courage Room™. It contains the miracle of who you are.
Come (more fully) alive in your own courage room. Soothe your brain. Nurture your energy.
The most useful, necessary and beautiful way to do this work is in community.
Please join us.
The Courage Room™ Collective is available now.
Membership is $27 US/month-- $34 Can/month. To join, please contact me.
Payment can be made by Paypal or E-transfer in Canada.
We embrace the playful child who’s still in there (somewhere, even if she’s pissed off and hiding).
We open the doors and the windows to air the place out.
What does it mean to “come alive” in this world?
How do we ‘come alive’ in a fast-paced, info-packed culture when getting through an easy day can be exhausting?
The changes and challenges in the last month (let alone the last year) have left many people reeling, anxious and fearful.
For ourselves, for our communities, for our earth, the need to build our courage and nurture our creative energy is greater than ever.
In The Courage Room™, creative energy itself equals aliveness.
Most of us had tons of creative energy as kids.
That’s what play is: aliveness in spontaneous motion. Freedom and ease in the body, and good sleep at night.
And we still have it—it hasn’t disappeared. We use our creative energy every time we solve a problem, bake some cookies, or learn something new. Whether we’re artists or business owners, students or tradespeople, creative intelligence is how we get things done. It’s part of survival.
But we all forget, sometimes, to take care of and to nourish those inner resources. Life is busy. We develop coping habits that do not serve us, built on defenses and hurts that we’ve accrued over many years.
And we also live in a culture that doesn’t teach us to honour and protect aliveness—the creative sources that power this whole planet—think, Forests, Oceans, Rivers. On the one hand, our culture takes the labour of creativity for granted, and pays lip service to creative and gifted people on Oscar Night and at other glitzy awards’ ceremonies. On the one hand, the very systems we live inside are damaging, even deadening to the mind, the spirit, the body, and this earth.
In The Courage Room™, we acknowledge that creative work and play give us life and infuse our days with meaning and energy.
What You’ll Learn
The Courage Room™, members of the collective will
open the door to empathy for self and others. Then write and move through this opening.
open the windows to the light and to the shadow in our lives (the raw material of courage). Then write and move through the shadows.
cultivate and commit to quiet and periods of non-stimulation (so your nervous system can calm, regulate, and recharge)
engage in small but significant daily actions to give up the old habits that no longer serve us
build new habits, behaviours, and a clear creative-spiritual focus. Then write into and through this process.
learn about the ways new habits and actions help us to change our brains
gently work with limiting beliefs, fear, shame, and past-present wounds
learn brain-care (neuroscience-based) techniques for witnessing and soothing those hurts. Then write about and explore this process.
How It Works
The Short Explanation
Weekly Meetings
Every week, we meet on Zoom, come alive, and write together. Each time, we come together for one hour. There is no requirement whatsoever to attend the live sessions. The talking part and related resources will be posted in The Courage Room™ Seminars site, under Login on the main navigation bar.)
Weekly meeting time is Thursday at 12 pm Canadian EST.
A Growing and Evolving Collective
The Courage Room™ is its own creative experiment. I’m still inviting founding members. Ideally people will commit to the community for at least three months, but in practice you can depart whenever you’d like.
I encourage TCR™ members to let me know what works and what doesn’t so that we can build this community together.
The Full-On Explanation
First TWO meetings of the month are Creative Visualizations followed by All Write.
The first half of each meeting: Guided Creative Visualization/ meditation.
The second half: All Write, our group write for 30-40 minutes. I provide a prompt, but members may write whatever they need to.
The writers in the group may use this writing time to gather inspiration and focus on their own writing projects.
Third meeting of the month Energy Alive
the focus will be connecting with the breath, gently moving the body with Qi Gong or simplified yoga poses, or focusing on a brain-soothing neuroscientific practice to calm the nervous system.
The second half: All Write, our group write.
Fourth meeting of the month, we meet for the Come Alive Cafe.
We open with a short meditation (always, people, always The Breath), then we have a cuppa (whatever suits your time zone).
I’ll answer 2-3 questions that community members will have sent to me the preceding week/weekend OR members will be invited to chat and share experiences. If the group is large, we’ll move into break-out rooms.
BONUS
Exclusive Interviews
Every couple of months, I’ll invite a wonderful writer, artist, therapist, musician, and other creative soul into The Courage Room for an interview, or to take questions from the community.
Resource Recommendations
I’ll talk in the Café about my favourite spiritual, neuroscience/trauma-informed books. And delectable novels, of course. (Depending on the needs and wants of the Collective, I may start a book club. We’ll see…)
Active Online Community
I run a very active group on Facebook—The Courage Room™ with Karen Connelly—and members of the collective are invited to keep in touch with each other and get to know each other there. In time, depending upon the needs of the group, I may begin a private FB Group or find another venue to use as an online forum.
The Courage Words
February: The Courage Room (The Body)
March: Brain-Care
April: Spirit
May: Shadow
June: Voice (Communication and Truth)
July: Movement
August: Heart (Love and Relationships)
September: Come Alive (Power)
October: Sweetness (Sensuality and Sexuality)
November: Earth (Groundedness)
December: Rest
January: Beginning
The courage room™ Collective is available now
Membership is $27 US/month-- $34 Can/month. To join, please contact me.
Payment can be made by Paypal or E-transfer in Canada.
Disclaimer
The Courage Room™ and any other programs, seminars and master-classes organized by Karen Connelly in The Courage Room™ are not to be misconstrued as therapy or therapeutic advice.
The Courage Room™ programs, memberships, and seminars, including blog posts and other information on this website, are for education and informational purposes only. They are not intended to replace, override, or question any individual healthcare or therapeutic service you currently use, have used in the past, or may use in the future.
Participants’ individual therapeutic needs will not be discussed, assessed, or evaluated in The Courage Room™ programs or writings. The Courage Room™ participants are encouraged to seek appropriate healthcare practitioners in whatever area they see fit and to take full responsibility for their health and well-being.
Similarly, Karen Connelly’s writings on this website are not intended to be used as formal therapeutic advice or diagnostic tools. She will not be held accountable or liable for decisions you make or consequences you experience directly or indirectly from the writings and information offered on this website or in any of her educational services in The Courage Room™.