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Ilana Rubenfeld

The Rubenfeld Synergy Training Program

Mastery in Mind Body work requires genuine synthesis. Training with Ilana Rubenfeld will teach you to use your whole being to predictably guide clients to sing their own song more fully.

The Method integrates elements of the great body/mind teachers: F. M. Alexander and Moshe Feldenkrais, together with the Gestalt theory and practice of Fritz and Laura Perls and hypnotherapy of Milton Erickson. Integration, integrity, intimacy, spirituality and community are keystones of the Rubenfeld Synergy Method®.

As we enter the 21st century, with ever more complex breakdowns side by side with massive quantities of information, it becomes clearer that human beings must be treated as whole entities. As practitioners, we must be able to help our clients access their whole selves.

Yet integration is still a scarce phenomenon in therapy and in health care. Many practitioners do excellent work with body or with emotions. Few can do both. Even fewer know how to synthesize the two. As a practitioner of the Rubenfeld Synergy Method® you will be able to reach this profound level of integration—both for your clients and for yourself.

This program offers you the most powerful, most complete advanced body/mind training available. You'll study and practice the contributions of others in such a way that you naturally synthesize what you learn with your entire wealth of experience.

The joy you'll witness as an RSM practitioner is worth every minute of the lifetime of learning you invested to become one.


How does the method work?

RSM guides people to return home to themselves.

Emotions and memories stored in our beings often result in energy blocks, tensions, and imbalances. The Rubenfeld Synergy Method® uses many avenues, including verbal expression, movement, breathing patterns, body posture, kinesthetic awareness, imagination, sound, and caring touch, to access these reservoirs of feeling.

Together, synergist and client make room for emerging feelings, integrating them with present experience. It's a psychophysical journey whose touchstones are acceptance, caring, trust, humor, and growth—and whose goals are wholeness, harmony, empowerment, and freedom.

Nor does all the integration occur in the client: in the process you naturally learn to balance analytical and scientific approaches with intuition, metaphor and sensitivity. "Beginner's mind" will renew your past work and training, so your practice will be fresh for your clients and refreshing for you.


What are the themes, tools, and techniques?

USE OF TOUCH

During the training, we'll devote much time to learning the use of touch and other non-verbal interventions in an educational and therapeutic context. Learning where to touch is not the most difficult aspect; learning how and when to touch requires practice, diagnostic skill, intuition, and a present sense of where the client is in his or her healing process.

We'll explore how intention affects touch, and how touch can be a dialogue with the unconscious, providing new gateways to emotional awareness and release. As direct contact with the neuromuscular system, touch offers immediate feedback about your client's state of body/mind. You'll learn how to use yourself—your whole being—as a subtle instrument for this kind of inquiry and intervention.

USE OF PSYCHOPHYSICAL MODALITIES

The F.M. Alexander Technique and the Feldenkrais Methods each deal with posture in a dynamic relationship to gravity. You'll learn aspects of both of these extremely important body/mind approaches as means of using the whole Self. As Moshe Feldenkrais once said: "Movement is life, and life without movement is unthinkable."

Principal themes include: kinesthetic awareness—the use of words and images—how conscious control affects movement and how movement changes thinking—the re-education of the neuromuscular system—the vital importance of breathing while thinking and moving—and how movement in inner and outer spaces affects our intellectual and emotional capacities.

USE OF GESTALT THERAPY

Gestalt theory and practice will refine and deepen your awareness and skills—your ability to enter the moment more fully as you yourself become more present, you will be better able to lead the client toward his or her own moment.

Major themes include: heightened awareness—contact boundaries—working with the impasse—unfinished business—the concepts of foreground and background integrating polarities—dreamwork—co-creating experiments to intensify issues presented by the client—and appropriate use of timing in verbal and non-verbal interventions.

USE OF ERICKSONIAN HYPNOTHERAPY

Touch and movement can also create genuine hypnotic state and they can expand the possibilities for dialogue with the unconscious mind. You'll learn how to "read" the client's coding patterns, and how to teach them to reach themselves. Clients are delighted with the freedom and grace they gain thereby.

ADDITIONAL THEMES OF THE TRAINING

Meditation—group process—self-nourishment—functional anatomy and physiology—the healing power of humor—music and dance—uses of ritual—the three brains: limbic, reptilian and neo-cortex—developing intuitional capacities—establishing verbal and non-verbal rapport—energy systems—developing observational skills—listening to process as well as to content.

"There are no mistakes."
—Ilana Rubenfeld—

What is the form of the training?

CURRICULUM AND COMMUNITY

You'll approach the various modalities in the context of each client's healing journey, receiving and observing the interventions of your colleagues and learning how to maintain your own energetic balance while healing others. The curriculum includes lectures, demonstrations, experiments, movement sequences, practice and supervision, with theory continually interwoven.

The Rubenfeld Synergy Method® is taught as an organic whole, in the here and now. A community, your peers as well as model clients, assistants and faculty is the heart of the training program. Ilana has designed the program to be presented, received and shared within this community.

Far more than a group of individuals, the training community is an active culture for learning and growth. Its contribution to you will be lifelong: you'll benefit spiritually, emotionally, physically, intellectually and aesthetically. You'll find friends, colleagues, and teachers—and laughter, tears and inspiration.

GROUP SIZE AND FACULTY

We teach integration as an art. Therefore, the size of the group will be limited. Ilana and her staff will personally conduct each training, so there will always be high quality supervision and personal attention. This fosters rapid individualized learning within a supportive environment.


What about instruction and supervision?

SUPERVISION

Supervision takes several forms. Through an ongoing exchange of roles and a shifting among levels of focus and intensity, you'll learn-and begin to generate trust, flexibility and a profoundly non-authoritarian attitude toward others.

As the Training progresses, feedback from faculty and peers increases in sophistication, creative insight and emotional depth. Throughout, your uniqueness will be respected and actively supported.

PERSONAL AND SMALL GROUP SUPERVISION

You will be personally supervised by a staff member, who will serve as your advisor and share ongoing issues and feedback. You'll also have numerous opportunities to work with other members of the training staff. In addition, trainees meet regularly in small groups to review and practice the material presented in lectures and demonstrations.

TRIADIC PRACTICE

In groups of three, trainees interchange the roles of synergist, client, and observer. This enables you to observe, to give and receive high quality constructive feedback and to experience Rubenfeld Synergy as would a client exploring your own personal themes and learning first-hand how this approach generates personal growth.

GROUP PROCESS

Experimental sessions and creative feedback from the entire group provide a unique, emotionally rich common ground for you to develop a unifying sense of perspective, direction and purpose as a synergist—all leading to the growth of your personal approach to the practice of this work.

MODEL CLIENTS

During the second and third years of the Training, we invite "model clients" from outside the program to participate in sessions where trainees gain additional, supervised practice. You'll also derive the unusual benefit of direct feedback from the model clients, an advantage seldom available in private practice or training programs.

VIDEOTAPING

An additional instrument for supervision, this technology allows us to "stop time" in order to analyze subtleties that might otherwise be lost in the rapid progress of the training sessions.


Will I need to take private sessions?

Yes. You are required to have twenty (20) private Rubenfeld Synergy sessions
each year. You may begin these private sessions just prior to the start of
Module I. A special trainee rate of $60 (U.S.) per session will be
negotiated by the training with your synergist. The training will help you locate a Certified Rubenfeld Synergist in your home area. At least six of the twenty sessions will take place during the training modules with members of the staff. These sessions are not part of your tuition.


How do trainees become certified?

Along with the entire training community, you will creatively evaluate your personal and professional growth each year. Trainees keep intensive personal journals, read texts and design their own projects for certification. The training is a professional commitment; if you miss work for any reason, you will be required to make it up. Trainees may become Certified to practice the Rubenfeld Synergy Method® upon successful completion of the training, contingent upon the approval of Ilana Rubenfeld and the faculty. Certification qualifies you to practice the Rubenfeld Synergy Method® one-on-one and to join the Rubenfeld Synergy Associations which maintain a directory of practicing synergists throughout the world.


Where and when will the Trainings take place?

The Rubenfeld Synergy Training is a four-year professional certification program that meets three (3) times per year. Each of these three modules is seven days. In addition there are 3 weekend regional meetings.

The RST XVI Training Program will take place on the East Coast at The Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, NY, in the Spring & Fall. The winter module will be in Philadelphia,PA.

Regionals

In addition to three 7-day training modules, there are three (3) Regional Group Meetings (Regionals) per year which take place in between each module.

Trainees in the same general geographic location will meet with faculty and staff to practice, review and deepen their skills. These regionals take place on the weekend and provide 10 hours of small group learning. There is a lab fee of $600 for these three meetings. This fee may be subject to change after the first year and is not included in the basic tuition.


Who is eligible?

No specific training in Gestalt therapy or body/mind approaches is required for acceptance into the Training program. However, such a background would be useful and would afford a deeper appreciation of the integrative nature of the Rubenfeld Synergy Method®. Primary success factors among our trainees have proven to be abilities to focus attention and to remain open to new ways of learning. Previous training groups have included psychotherapists, educators, nurses, musicians, massage and physical therapists, architects, actors, physicians, business executives, social workers and many others of varying ages and backgrounds. The diversity of their experiences has enhanced the synergy of the learning process.


How do I apply for admission?

THE FOLLOWING CONDITlONS ARE REQUIRED FOR ACCEPTANCE INTO THE RUBENFELD SYNERGY METHOD® TRAINING PROGRAM

  1. A written application, with two letters from references.
  2. A non-refundable application fee of $50.00 (U.S.).

To apply, complete and submit the application form [PDF format], or contact Ilana Rubenfeld at 877-RSM-2468 prompt 3 or 215-659-1495 or by email RubenfeldSynergy@comcast.net.


What is the tuition?

The tuition for the three (3) modules is $3950 (U.S.) per year. A deposit of $600 (U.S.) is required upon acceptance. This reserves your place in the program. The balance of $3350 (U.S.) is due no later than 6 weeks (45 days) before you begin the program. The Rubenfeld Synergy® Center accepts payments by personal check, money order, MasterCard and Visa. We cannot accept any foreign currency.

The basic tuition of $3950 (U.S.) per year does not include: Room & Board; Travel; Private Sessions; nor the 3 Regional meetings.

REFUND POLICY

If you withdraw your application 30 days or less before the training begins, you will receive a refund of your tuition minus the $500.00 deposit. Once the program begins, the tuition (less the $500 deposit) are refundable on a daily prorated basis until the end of Module 1. After this time, there are absolutely no refunds. Please contact the center for more details and any changes in policy. Please read the tuition and refund information carefully before sending in your application and deposit.


Are there training opportunities after graduation?

Certified graduates may apply to the Post Graduate Training Program which teaches Synergists advanced skills and trains them to become part of the teaching staff. There are also continuing education seminars offered each year.

Can I use training for graduate school credit?

Several graduate schools accept participation in the Rubenfeld Synergy training program for credit toward a master's or doctoral degree.

"As in Zen, you're not allowed to paint a single branch before you become that branch. A person who has this ability is real and genuine... Ilana has this ability, and as she has this ability, she quickly gets into different roles, very quickly grows and comes to final integration — some would call it 'becoming one's true self becoming authentic'!"

Fritz Perls, Ph.D., M.D.
Founder of Gestalt Therapy

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