What is the "skills content" of Beyond the Edge? What can I hope to learn?
Participants come away with improved abilities to tap hidden sources of personal knowledge, break out of old patterns of thinking and behaving, and create meaningful change in their lives and the world. Because each person’s experience of this process is unique, there is no way to exactly quantify or define how these skills will be applied — that is specific to the person’s temperament and talents, values and goals, particular life story, and immediate situation.
How can I afford to take this time away?
Beyond the Edge is intentional time away from the daily patterns and crises in the lives we all lead. The four-day length creates an opportunity for profound personal renewal. The exercises and format of Beyond the Edge encourage deep reflection on challenges in the context of remembering what is most important in this life. The time enables participants to slow down to find the real solutions to their problems — the very solutions that may have been blotted out through focus on the intensity of daily living. As one of our participants replied to this question, "How can I NOT afford to?"
I am not in a formal leadership job and I don’t always see myself as a leader. Is this experience for me or only for people, such as managers and executives, in formal leadership roles?
Our definition of leader is anyone who desires to use personal potentials to make a conscious and positive contribution to the world. Participants include a wide range of people and professions from all types and level of organizations, occupying both formal and informal leadership roles. We do not limit this definition. Community change agents, clergy, artists, social advocates, and anyone simply with an interest in living their most positive potentials are welcomed and supported by the Beyond the Edge experience. BTE is designed to awaken and release the instincts for leadership contribution that we all possess.
How does Beyond the Edge support leadership for positive social, institutional, and organizational change?
Beyond the Edge is designed to foster the growth and development of the inner self as an instrument of change in the world. The experience is not about passive interior exploration nor a lesson in "pulling oneself up by one’s own bootstraps." To the contrary, the process and values that stand behind Beyond the Edge can help people gain deeper contact with the actual conditions they face and the meaning of their role in helping make positive social change. Participants explore and develop better ways to stay grounded, whole, healthy, and energized as they move forward with the important causes that inspire their work.
I am having trouble articulating a specific concern or question I might bring to Beyond the Edge. Should I come?
Most people come to Beyond the Edge with some sense of ambiguity about how best to express an area of interest and challenge. One of the benefits of the experience often has been taking the time to more fully and consciously clarify where the edge of learning really is. This in itself can help liberate an "itch to grow" in a special way and begin to awaken answers. You will get specific coaching assistance from the facilitators (and often from other participants) to help you frame and focus your work at the event.
Some of the issues I need to address are difficult for me. How much disclosure will be required?
There is no coercion or informal group pressure to disclose more than you wish. Everyone is asked, as a ground rule of the event, to help create an environment that respects the right of each participant to decide how much to share and to work on what is most important to him or her, depending on that person’s situation and nature. Tension related to disclosure gives way quickly, usually within the first morning, as people realize that the experience is accepting and affirming, their unique situation will be honored, and others are also there in a spirit of voluntary exploration. And, people leave Beyond the Edge knowing that each other’s sharing remains wholly within the group.
I’m not sure the issues I want to address are really appropriate for Beyond the Edge.
Beyond the Edge is designed to embrace a very wide spectrum of professional and personal issues. Participants have addressed topics as varied as making decisions about life and career direction, creating better personal boundaries, leading in bureaucracy, staying grounded in conflict, increasing personal creativity, fostering self-trust, recovering from job termination, dealing with high levels of public exposure in decisions, and many other topics. We do know that some of the challenges people face can be personally painful and emotional. Beyond the Edge is not a therapeutic process. While it has often held value for helping participants work with difficult issues such as marital stress, physical health, family dysfunction, and substance abuse, sometimes the nature of the situation may be better addressed by a different kind of learning than Beyond the Edge offers. Please contact one of the facilitators and share any pertinent issues you are wondering about. If you are currently working with a counselor or therapist, we encourage you to talk with that person as an important data-point in your decision to attend.
I am interested in an event for my entire leadership team.
Beyond the Edge is a group setting that is focused on individual development. It is not team building, resolution of group conflict, or group goal setting. Participants form highly supportive, collaborative relationships with one another but do so from a totally voluntary, personal standpoint. In some cases, multiple members of the same leadership team have voluntarily attended BTE together and have found this a particularly effective way to develop their understanding and regard for one another, carrying forward far beyond the event. Please contact a facilitator to discuss your specific situation.
I am concerned about the cost of this seminar.
Beyond the Edge is not just reasonable in price, but an exceptional value when compared to other leadership seminars and learning events. The price includes high-quality accommodations in a particularly beautiful setting, great meals, and all workshop fees and materials. The facilitator-to-participant ratio is designed to be very low (one to four at maximum) so that each person receives substantial support and personal assistance. This is an investment with potential rewards over many years.
Are there price options or scholarships available?
We do recognize that our location and cost make this workshop difficult to attend for some leaders. Unfortunately, because the workshop operates on a very low financial margin, we are not able to offer any price reductions, scholarships, or opportunities to provide assistance to the event in lieu of payment. However, circumstances can vary from one Beyond the Edge event to the next and we would very much like to know of your interest. Please contact a facilitator to discuss your situation.
Please note that we do take credit cards as a payment option for Beyond the Edge.
What does Beyond the Edge have that I cannot find in other workshops or learning events?
Our vision is that of an informal, structured convening of people who come in good faith — a sincere effort by those who want to learn inwardly and who bring an open heart and mind to the personal leadership questions most important to them as individuals. Beyond the Edge is a heartfelt, very real effort to reclaim what is good and what is best in people — in you — including your capacity to face your contributions to the problems you want to solve and your capacity to use your own wisdom to address these challenges. BTE brings deep, genuine care for each person who attends, who wants to find a way out of what troubles them and a way into what has been possible only in dreams. Ultimately, our vision of success relies on the mysteries of the human spirit itself — and the beauty, silence, timelessness, and community found in a particular place and time.