Alchemical Alignment training will only be online for now.
Foundation and Deepening: seven 3-day Modules.
Taught by Tele Darden and Ladan Nabet, LAc (see bios below).
Spring Foundation M1-3 (April, May, June) FULL
Fall Foundation (Sept, Oct, Nov) Early rate deadline July 8.
Module 1: Sept 8-10; 10am-4pm Eastern (7am-1pm Pacific, 4pm-10pm CET)
Module 2: Oct 13-15; 10am-4pm
Module 3: Nov 10-12; 10am-4pm
Advanced Modules (Dec - March)
Module 4: Dec 8-10, 2022; 10am-4pm Eastern (7am-1pm Pacific, 4pm-10pm CET)
Module 5: Jan 19-21, 2023; 10am-4pm
Module 6: Feb 23-25, 2023; 10am-4pm
Module 7: Mar 23-25, 2023; 10am-4pm
M4-7 include Integration Circles, and membership in our Maintain Alignment international online
community gathering space.
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Apply here if you are a practitioner ready to join us.
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Alchemical Alignment is a heart- and soul-based experiential bodywork training with a
solid amount of information to fill your mind. Learn principles and practices for
interactive, virtual and hands-on, non-verbal and verbal health, fight, flight, freeze and
double bind work.
Classes include "The Alignment Sequence™," a mindful embodiment ritual movement
meditation, as well as guided seated meditations, experiential exercises for dyads
and triads, and more.
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Curriculum at first:
Experiential somatic meditation.
Alignment Sequence™ movement.
Creating safe conditions for trauma resolution work.
Principles and practices of Biodynamic Craniosacral.
Aligning self before working with other.
Range of Regulation details: slow, medium and fast health.
Intro to practitioner archetype embodiment. Role clarity.
Alchemical talk skills: trauma-related language intro.
Aligning touch skills: the whole, stabilization and extremities, the first steps.
Right Distance. Shift to client interoception and neuroception being primary.
Intro to tracking the whole being, and alignment with Blueprint of Health.
Toroidal fields and polyrhythmic Tides.
Boundary repair intro.
Thorough introduction to Body Security System and Polyvagal Dynamics.
7 Realms of the Body Security System.
5 Heights of Interpersonal Danger, 5 Depths of Freeze.
Working with waves of information.
Intro to double binds.
Intro to standing, seated and table work.
Followed by:
Experiential somatic meditation.
Alignment Sequence™ movement.
Review of past modules.
The alchemy of containment and microchallenge.
Diving deeper into Polyvagal and Autonomic Security System understanding and tracking.
Awareness and utilization of the social nervous system and secure attachment.
Safely inquiring into and meeting imprints: microfight, microflight, freeze, shame and grief.
Hyper and hypo threat response, and its completion.
Unmet developmental needs, and meeting them.
The yin shadow of fight and flight.
Accessing core work using extremities.
Local and global symptom dynamics.
Safety valve work at joints, diaphragms.
Continued standing, seated and table work.
Aikido principles for shadow work and client symptoms.
Threshold dynamics, sequencing. Time repair.
Verbal skills: advanced communication overview.
Tools for activation.
Building capacity for more powerful therapeutic work.
Even deeper stability, transformation: central channel work.
Boundary/space/location repair continued (post-injury, accident, surgery, etc).
Orienting rehab.
More nuanced attention, verbal, and touch trauma resolution skills.
Client education.
Trauma categories.
Organ, viscera healing.
Working with foreign objects in the body.
Integration.
Optional Modules 8-14 deepen into details of Death and Birth, see below.
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Course costs:
$7250 total, Modules 1-7.
Includes $500 non-refundable registration fee.
Early rate $6000: discount for early payment in full: $1250 off,
paid by two months before the first Module.
Commitment to all seven Modules required for lowest tuition rates.
If there is space, M1-3 applications will also be considered.
See application for all payment options, dates, and breakdown of costs.
Cost includes class, and between-Module group Integration Circles (M 3-7).
(Individual supervision, if you choose that instead, is not included in tuition.)
The training is recommended for practitioners with a practice, who have done a fair amount of personal work, have developed some resilience, and are ready for a deeper somatic exploration.
Homework required: regular meditation, movement, readings, peer exchanges, receiving professional sessions, giving practice sessions, and Integration Circles or supervision. Alignment Sequence download included.
Participation eligibility, and advancing to the next Modules, to be determined by instructors.
Number of spots limited, small groups.
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15 Bodywork CEU's per Module (NCBTMB), ONLY for Modules taught by Brigit.
Brigit Viksnins is approved by the National Certification Board for Therapeutic Massage & Bodywork (NCBTMB) as a Continuing Education Approved Provider.
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Withdrawal/cancellation policy:
Brigit Viksnins and Alchemical Alignment, LLC reserve the right to cancel or postpone any program. In such a case, tuition credit is transferred to future classes. We also reserve the right to ask any student to leave, or wait for the next round, for any reason.
In case of student cancellation:
This policy encourages you to commit to coming. Tuition is fully transferable to another round of training up to 6 weeks prior to the start of the class, and changing to another group, the $500.00 registration fee will be charged. Within 6 weeks of class, tuition is non-refundable or transferable except in cases of dangerous weather, unexpected illness, birth work, or emergency.
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Scholarships:
We love variety. The idea of people from various backgrounds, languages, cultures and communities getting this healing message, and translating it into what will serve their community feels fulfilling to us. Because of this, a limited number of scholarships of 25-75% off for all levels are available for individuals coming from and working directly with historically marginalized communities, please include an explanation in your application if you are interested in being considered.
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Retaking:
Part of the Alchemical Alignment culture includes retaking, as often as you would like. This is a win-win situation, where your skill reaches new breadth and depth, receiving the information again and again. In addition, the newcomers benefit from your level of practice. There is always something new to learn or with which to experiment, for practitioners at all levels. This model is based on Aikido classes and seminars, where all ranks of students train together. The cost is currently $3300 for M1-7 ($3000 one month early), with preference given to those retaking a whole round, M1-7. If there is space for you to come to less than M1-7, the cost is $475 per Module.
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Course Teachers and Assistants:
There have been several bodyworkers and psychotherapists with decades of experience and extensive education participating as teachers and assistants. They are recommended for professional sessions and supervision as well. Their practices may be full, in person only, or also/only virtual, please inquire directly.
M1-7 Teachers:
Tele Darden (she/her) is a bodyworker, teacher and coach
who guides visionary healers as they become more empowered
and embodied forces for change in the world. In practice since
2007, she offers her wide range of skills and experience in
somatic and intuitive healing to create deep and nourishing
containers of transformation for her clients, both in the US and
internationally. Tele lives with her husband, teenager and pets,
including Pickle the ball python on traditional Susquehannock,
Nentego (Nanticoke) & Piscataway lands in Maryland.
Ladan Nabet L.Ac., Dipl. Ac. is a bodyworker, acupuncturist
and teacher. Her healing work harmonizes your body’s innate
life force to ease chronic pain, navigate complex illness, and
transform legacies of trauma held in the body. Her precise and
subtle awareness is honed by her training in Traditional East
Asian Medicine, Sports Medicine Acupuncture, trauma resolution
bodywork, pre/perinatal development, ancestral healing, theater
and dance. She finds balance communing with the beautiful
land around her home in Maryland.
Current Course Assistants:
Gisele Silva LMT, BCST (PA)
Kimberly Clark OTR/L (ME)
Liz Hartshorn LMT, RCST®, SEP (NYC)
Claire Turner RCST® (OR)
Past Assistants:
Rob Sherrod NCTMB (Silver Spring MD)
Wayne Sickels RCST®, NCTMB, MTS, MDIV (VA)
Glenda Enagonio LMT, RCST®, SEP (MD)
Carol Syvret Austin LMT, RCST® (VA)
Sille Borstad SEP, RCST®, NCTMB (DC)
Sandra Washburn LMT, RCST® (MA)
Becky Carroll PhD, SEP (MA)
Connie Ridgway LICSW, LMT
Kate White MA, SEP, RCST®, NCTMB (VA)
Cynthia Wilcox PhD (CO)
Click here for Course Feedback from participants.
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Optional Advanced Modules with Brigit Viksnins after completion of M1-7,
$1645 each (Death/M8-11 and/or Birth/M12-14), $1545 early, or $3000 early for both.
Deepening into Death, M8-11 (altogether 12 days, challenge vs trauma, intro to somatic imprints left by death of others and near-death in self), Nov 3-5, Nov 17-19, Dec 1-3, Jan 12-14 (2023).
and Birth, M12-14 (altogether 9 days, intro to somatic blueprint and imprints, pre-conception to post-birth). Mar 30-Apr 1, Apr 20-22, May 4-6 (2023).
All 9:20 am - 3:45 pm Eastern.
Deeper relational somatic security system detail work.
Retaking M8-14 half price, early rate $1500.
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M8-14 Teacher:
Brigit Viksnins MAT, SEP, RCST®, BCTMB, LMT
Brigit (she/they) is an advanced bodyworker, and the creator
of the training program Alchemical Alignment. She is also a
Somatic Experiencing Practitioner, Biodynamic Craniosacral
Therapist, and Board Certified Massage Therapist. She has
undergrad and graduate degrees from Georgetown University.
Brigit has had a successful private bodywork practice
in the Washington, DC/Piscataway/Nacotchtank area since 1996.
She is a life-partner, stepmother, mother and grandmother as well.
Brigit is a first-generation Latvian American, from a lineage rich with healers, midwives, authors and teachers. Her parents and all childhood community adults had fled their homeland, and had been refugee immigrant children under bombs and in Displaced Person's camps in WWII, on their way to the USA. She regularly travels to post-Soviet Latvia to relate to the land, eat traditional foods, steep in the wisdom of her ancestors, and also share her skills.
She created a full body movement meditation -- latest video recorded in the forest in Latvia -- called The Alignment Sequence™, based on movements from Aikido, Qi Gong, and bodywork stretching. It is helpful for people who want to move beyond old patterns into their Original and Potential Blueprints, and cultivate self-regulation,
resilience, presence and power.
Brigit taught Massage Therapy at PMTI in the 90's, is a few hours away from being an association-approved Biodynamic Craniosacral (BCST) teacher (well, tbh, it has been a decade and hasn't reached the top of the to-do list yet), has assisted Somatic Experiencing (SE) trainings, and Body Into Being.
Since 2013, her commitment has been to Alchemical Alignment: Bodywork for Trauma Resolution and Embodiment of Spirit (see course feedback here). Starting in April 2022, Tele Darden and Ladan Nabet started teaching the 16th foundational Alchemical Alignment program, and Brigit will continue to teach the Death and Birth Modules.
Highly recommended: schedule with the practitioners listed above. To reach Brigit's very limited private practice calendar, schedule here if you are a practitioner interested in the program: 1 session, 3 sessions. For non-practitioners, not interested in the program, schedule here: 1 session, 3 sessions.
Brigit values continuing education highly, and not only teaches, but also participates regularly in short or in-depth training programs as a student or an assistant. Recently those include programs by Ray Castellino and Anna Chitty (Body Into Being: PPN/BCST/SE/Polarity), Katherine Ukleja (post-grad BCST), Kain and Terrell (TST), Barral and Crobier (Neuromeningeal 1-5 and Visceral Osteopathic), Boxhall (BCST), Upledger (CST), Barnes (MFR), Wanveer (Glia), Degranges (PPN/BCST/SE), Taussig (Distance Osteopathic Skills), Bosbach Largent (Family Constellations foundation training), as well as regular ASD morning class Aikido training starting in 1991. Here is a list of some classes that have influenced her worldview.