Most styles of meditation used in clinical settings and practice encourage non-attachment to images, feelings, thoughts and desires.

Imaginative Contemplation, a lesser-known meditative or contemplative practice, encourages participation in sacred narratives, metaphors, symbols, and images in ways that often promote powerful psychological and spiritual differentiation and integration.

Presenter Martha A. Robbins, Th.D., will describe and explore various ways of engaging in imaginative contemplation and interactive guided imagery and discuss their spiritual and clinical benefits and potential risks. will describe and explore various ways of engaging in imaginative contemplation and interactive guided imagery and discuss their spiritual and clinical benefits and potential risks.

Objectives:

At the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

1. Describe various forms and practices of imaginative contemplation within a spiritual tradition

2. Participate experientially in at least two forms of imaginative contemplation and one form of guided imagery in order to distinguish their similarities and differences

3. Examine and discuss the use of interactive guided imagery in a clinical case study

4. Explore spiritual and clinical benefits as well as potential risks in the use of imaginative contemplation, guided imagery, and interactive guided imagery within therapeutic settings and as complementary to therapy

About the Speaker

Martha A. Robbins is the founder and director of Pneuma Institute LLC, an ecumenical organization that offers formation, enrichment, and training programs in spiritual direction and spiritual leadership and the Joan Marshall Associate Professor Emerita of Pastoral Care at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. A graduate of Maryville University (B.A.), St. Louis University (M.A.), and Harvard University (Th.D.), she is also a licensed clinical psychologist, spiritual director, and retreat leader.

Dr. Robbins has lectured and given workshops and retreats in Israel, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Ghana, France, and Canada as well as the United States. As a licensed psychologist, Robbins has worked in a number of counseling settings including The Cambridge Hospital at Harvard Medical School and the Family Centre in Lower Hutt, New Zealand.

Co-sponsored by:

St. Joseph Spirituality Center

Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic, UPMC

School of Social Work, University of Pittsburgh