Why Holistic Transformative Education is Essential Post-Pandemic

If there was any doubt that humanity and Mother Earth are one interconnected system, the pandemic should have erased that notion for good.

Never in the history of this planet (bold statement right?) has one event affected everyone physically, mentally, emotionally, and financially at the same time — and we are all aware that we are all going through this together!

One whole interconnected system.

Just like you and me. All of us are inextricably integrated as physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual beings.

In late November 2009 I sat in my doctor’s office nervously as I was about to hear the results of tests. After the words “it’s definitely cancer” came out of his mouth, do you think mine was just a physical reaction? Of course not. Every part of me was on high alert – mentally, emotionally, spiritually and of course physically.

Because each one of us — every single human and every other organism on this blue jewel of a planet — is a whole system.

Every day we interact, sometimes harmoniously, sometimes incoherently, with other whole systems.

We can’t separate one part from another. Of course, we do create separation all the time. We ignore the promptings of our heart or body and tell ourselves we’ll be fine. We spin uncontrollably in mental loops and assume this won’t impact our health.

The list goes on and on of ways we have been trained to separate ourselves instead of unite and integrate ourselves.
Thinking, Being, Feeling, and Seeing Holistically – The Graduate Institute.

Holistic thinking is not new to me but to find an institution of higher education on the East Coast that teaches precisely these ideas was thrilling when in November 2019 I learned of The Graduate Institute for Holistic Studies (TGI) for the first time.

Based in Connecticut, TGI was founded in 1999 to provide masters’ degrees and certificate programs in five areas of holistic studies. As I started learning more about the organization I was struck by how much potential there could be to develop these ideas more broadly for a world in crisis.

The Cohort Model

I discovered — through talking with dozens of enthusiastic alumni – that a core strength of TGI is its cohort-based learning model, where for one weekend per month for one or two years, you work together with others with your same interest, sharing, growing and learning holistic practices and principles together. As one whole system, with its unique individuated parts like you.