Free Talk: Sept. 7: Awaken From Your Mind. Learn More || 7-Week Program to Follow. Learn More
Are You Looking to Experience More Fulfillment in Your Relationships?
Do you love the depth of fulfillment you experience when alone with Presence (a.k.a. Spirit/God/Source) but find it difficult to experience this when you're with people who are talking?
Do you ever feel like you have to choose between staying connected to your essence OR having relationships with people?
Do you find yourself overriding conversations (speaking louder/faster), staying quiet while your life force shrinks or leaving feeling disappointed and isolated?
Would you like to relate from your essential self, free from social conditioning and codependent survival-based strategies?
Would you like to experience the same quality of presence and flow you know in solitude while being with others?
You don't have to choose between deep fulfillment and relationships. There is a way.
No authentic relating experience necessary. Come as you are.
DISCOVER ESSENCE IN RELATIONSHIP
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Experience the unique potency of being witnessed in your essential nature
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Share in what arises naturally from presence rather than personality, thought activity and stories
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Be nourished by the fresh aliveness that emerges when essence meets essence
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Be seen and recognized for who you are beyond thought patterns and conditioning
TRANSFORM YOUR RELATING PATTERNS
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Release unconscious social conditioning and survival-based strategies
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Shift from codependent caretaking, performing or people-pleasing to authentic expression
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Develop new ways of being present that honor both your deepest self and others
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Rewire your social nervous system for deeper ongoing ease and connection
ENJOY DEEP FULFILLMENT WITH OTHERS
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Experience communion and flow vs. reporting and disconnection
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Enjoy the aliveness of others without losing yourself
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Discover a new fulfillment with others that equals what you’ve known in solitude
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Live with the freedom to be fully authentic in any relationship
All are Welcome
Embodying the Freedom to Live From Your Essence
So You Can Thrive More In:
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Your Relationships
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Group Gatherings
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Professional Collaborations
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Community Connections
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Embodied Awakening
“When I know that I can be silent, won’t be interrupted, won’t talk too long, and I don’t have to take care of anyone, it feels like layers of social conditioning fall away and only Essence remains.”
— Robear
A Space for Everyone
Whether you're just exploring conscious connection, have been practicing authentic relating for years or have touched profound spiritual realization, Essence Relating offers something uniquely valuable for deepening liberation and authenticity in relationship. Even those who have experienced a significant awakening of consciousness often discover that intimate connection is where their realization is most challenged—and refined.
Experience what's possible when you relate from embodied Presence rather than social conditioning. Discover how the 5Alive process creates a supportive container while providing a refreshing way to be with people that honors both speaking and silence.
Taste the difference between sharing authentically from your personality—about your thoughts, feelings or through storytelling—to giving Presence a chance to share—from essence to essence—and see what arises naturally within the relational field.
What is Essence Relating?
Most social interactions play out from personality to personality through reporting what we could call "mind activity"—sharing our thoughts in the form of stories, beliefs and opinions. In contrast, Essence Relating invites something deeper: relating authentically from Essence to Essence, where we rest grounded in our own fulfillment rather than trying to get it from the connection, which can be ironically counterproductive. From this foundation of inner fulfillment, we can be naturally fed by the connection without grasping for it.
Far more than an authentic relating practice—Essence Relating follows a specific three-tier approach that leverages powerful elements from the Embodied Presence Process, Somatic Experiencing and the traditional Native American talking-stick practice. These carefully sequenced practices support us in shifting from the habitual reporting of mind activity into the aliveness of sharing—both through silence and speaking—from our essential nature.
"There is a difference between trying to be present and actually being present. Robear's work is all about the latter."
— Kimberly Jonas (Reiki Master and Founder of BodyMantra)
Why I Recommend Essence Relating Meetings to My Students
For Present and Past Students of the Live Awake Program, Essence Relating (ER) provides a supportive container where you can practice your embodied awareness and conscious self-care skills while relating with people. As ER facilitates relating from essence to essence rather than personality to personality, it also supports you in deepening and embodying awakened awareness in ways that solo practice cannot.
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Authentic Awakening Includes Relationship: True awakening isn't something that just happens when life is easy or while you're meditating, and then gets lost when you interact with people. ER helps you integrate the richness of equanimity and awareness you feel in solitude into the field of relationship. When this happens you experience how relationship itself becomes a potent and rewarding crucible for deepening and embodying more awakened insight on many levels.
For Bridging the Potency of Solitude with Connection: Rather than having to choose between the fulfillment you know when you're alone with Presence and being with people, through practicing ER you can discover how to bridge the potency of your solitude with connecting to the people that are important to you. This addresses one of the most common challenges I see—people who can access deep presence alone but lose it the moment they're with others, especially family...on the holidays!
"I don't think I have ever felt this at peace in a circle of people."
— Danae Yume Shanti (Spiritual mentor and community music inspirer)
What's Different About Essence Relating?
Essence Relating is Simultaneously a Presence Practice and a Relating Practice. With aspects of the Embodied Presence Process as the foundation, ER creates something entirely different from either traditional therapy-style sharing or even authentic relating practices.
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Transforms Codependent Behavior into Interdependent Relating: Because the format supports people to drop into their own fulfillment before relating, and move into connecting at a pace where they don't lose "themselves," Essence Relating has been shown to be effective for transforming codependent behavior patterns into more interdependent essence-to-essence relating habits. This gradual transformation of your relational nervous system through practicing a new way of being with others is far more effective than simply trying to stop old habits.
Safety to Go Deep: 5Alive is the name for the five-minute container we use to support going beneath our conditioned ways of relating. With 5Alive, you can know that you:
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Won't be interrupted
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Don't have to take care of anyone else
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Can be silent if you choose
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Can take your time
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Won't take up too much space
"Essence Relating provided a space where I could explore the myriad of my socialized beliefs and messaging... After a few sessions, I experienced how I could remain present with myself while interacting with others. Eventually, I experienced myself as one member of a group in Presence, and there I found Humanity."
— Eve B.
Community Transformation
The Power of Collective Witnessing: When essence-to-essence relating unfolds in the presence of others committed to authentic connection, insights deepen. Through witnessing others' breakthroughs, you may discover blind spots in your relational patterns or recognize unconscious social conditioning that you also share. By being witnessed by others, the realizations and shifts you experience can enter into the "conscious muscle memory" of your relational nervous system, not just your individual awareness. The collective field creates a unique container where individual transformation becomes medicine for the whole group.
Ongoing Support for Everyday Integration: Because there is a learnable formula for Essence Relating, it's not just something you can do or access during the meetings. This means that, once you attend enough meetings to get the hang of the basics, you can experience extending the benefits into your life beyond the meetings. In addition, the embodied awareness muscles that are developed in this safe, supportive space can carry over into your experiences in the wider world where you may not feel so supported.
"Essence Relating is a very powerful and helpful way to connect authentically with others and support each other. I see it as a potent gift we can use to contribute positively to the evolution of our species and emerging collective consciousness."
— Greg "Saddiq" Cortopassi (Catalyst for personal, group and organizational transformation)
Direct Experience is Worth More Than a Thousand Explanations
Join us and experience for yourself the difference between the reporting of "mind activity" that characterizes so many conversations, and what emerges when relating moves from Essence to Essence. Discover how much deeper and more satisfying relating becomes when you move beyond all the mental chatter into the aliveness of present-moment Essence.
What to Expect​
Enter like you would a sanctuary. If you need to speak, please do so softly, slowly and sparingly.
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5:45: Arrival - Door opens at 5:30 and closes at 6:00 to support the integrity of the space.
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6:00: Welcome and Orientation
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Essence Relating process instruction and guidelines
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Short guided Embodying Presence Process to facilitate dropping in together
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Essence Relating warm-up to begin bridging connection
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5Alive demonstration for modeling our container
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6:15: Essence (45 minutes)
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Essence Relating practice by participants—focusing on your own experience
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Dropping deep into your felt-sense awareness
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Sharing your present moment experience, beyond stories, social conditioning and limited, unconscious survival-based relating strategies. Finding out what happens when you give Presence a chance.
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7:00: Relating (45 minutes)​
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Witnessing and relating Essence to Essence together
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Inquiring deeper into the group relational field
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Exploring what feels natural and alive with curiosity
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7:45: Closing
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Sharing impact
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Announcements, if any
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8:00: Departure
Community Care Reminder
If you are feeling at all sick, please refrain from joining us until you are healthy again. Thank you.
Meeting Details
Time: 2nd and 4th Thursdays, 6 - 8pm
Cost: $15 - $25 Suggested Donation. Pay at the door. Cash or Venmo. No one will be turned away for lack of funds. Pay what you can while honoring the value you receive. Your support helps us provide this offering to the community.
Location: Robear's Home in South Boulder Address provided with RSVP
RSVP to Reserve Your Spot. Please contact us by 4:00pm on the day of the meeting to save your spot.
Join Us for This Unique Experience
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Learn the simple but profound three-tier process
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Discover a new way of being in relationship that honors yourself and others
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Connect with like-intentioned people
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Leave with practical tools for transforming your relationships
"I look forward to doing it again to see what the next session brings.” — Scott G. Taylor
Feeling Called to Go Deep One-on-One or with Someone Important to You?
If you're feeling called to explore embodied awakening more deeply, want to practice ER one-on-one with Robear or a partner rather than come to a meeting, Private Awakening Guidance Sessions offer personalized support for your unique journey. Through one-on-one mentoring with LAM's practical direct experience body-centered approach, you can deepen your capacity to embody presence both in solitude and in relationship. Couples and private group sessions for communities and collaborators are also available and particularly potent. Schedule a complimentary 20-minute Consultation.