Lectures
Newly published are at the top. Use the Filters to find topics of interest.
Living earth : Living climate
In this lecture Dennis uses the two polar principles of form and function to illustrate ways to imagine the Earth as a living being in contrast to seeing Earth as simply a resource. The elements (earth, water, air, fire) and their dynamics give birth to the four life forces (cold, wet, hot, dry). Reciprocations between…
The Alchemy of Holy Week
In the yearly cycle the events of Holy Week can be the source of profound meditations on the relationship between pain and suffering on one hand and joy and gratitude on the other. Using indications from the work of Emil Bock on the daily events of Holy Week as a foundation, this weekend workshop will be composed of meditative pictures from alchemical sources of the planetary forces that serve as backdrop for the Christ drama. The focus of the work will be to explore alchemical imagery that is in harmony with the Easter celebration of the victory of life over death.
Gems and Plants for Healing Chronic Illness – Greenwood Gathering
This two-day workshop brought together those who are actively engaged in growing medicinal plants to share space with persons who are actively involved in the healing arts and in education. Presentations on greenwood selection and fermentation as well as demonstrations of selection, equipment and techniques for ultra-fine semi-precious gem grinding and filtering were given. The presentations focused on best practices.
Reading the Secret Script of Life
The political, social, environmental, and economic issues of the present time are rooted in polarities engendered by abstract, cause-and-effect thinking. The perception of the flow of life as strings of abstractions results in a mass mind that is locked into endless cycles of unsolvable polarities.
This workshop with Dennis Klocek will explore the roots of abstraction and then move towards morphological exercises that form the basis for the capacity to “read” the esoteric script.
Developing Living Picture Thinking: Sensation, Perception, Intention
Explore the phenomenological approach to science and develop practices for seeing into the open secret.
SOUL Course Series Four: Soul Initiation
Part 10 – Soul and Death; Part 11 – Soul and Freedom – The path of sacrifice, Jumping mouse; Part 12 – Soul and Initiation – Overcoming despair, Hiawatha
Perceiving the Spirit of the Natural World
Perceiving the Spirit in the Natural World – Frey Vineyard Jan 2014 Contemporary science, with its focus on the gathering of abstract data as a means for the perception of natural phenomena, tends to promote the view that nature is simply a resource to be exploited. Earlier civilizations tended to see the phenomena of nature…
Plant and Soil: Salt and Oil
This workshop explores an alchemical method for understanding plant nutrition. The intimate relationships between soils and plant physiology when seen alchemically allow the grower to adjust the use of soil amendments to better advantage. The alchemical mandalas of the mineral cross of carbon, potassium, silica and phosphorus will be highlighted in the context of the four great groups of the plant cross. We will look at the physiology of legumes, biennials, grasses and medicinal plants in the context of their preferred soil requirements.
Transformation of Substance
Using the four elements theory, Dennis explores the alchemical relationships between natural forces and human consciousness. He takes us on a journey using the language of alchemy into the smallest interactions in the mineral world and then through the elements out into the cosmos, sharing imaginative exercises and practices for personal work to improve your perception of these forces. With this new vision, the true meaning of “turning lead into gold” becomes clear.
SOUL Course Series Three: Soul and the World
Part 7 – Soul and Color; Part 8 – Soul and Suffering: The Flaming Door; and Part 9 – Soul and Ceremony
SOUL Course Series Two: Soul Storytelling
Part 4 – Soul and Myth; Part 5 – Soul and symbol; and Part 6 – Soul and Karma
SOUL Course Series One: Social Soul Tools
Part 1 – Soul and Spirit; Part 2 – Soul to Soul; and Part 3 – Soul and Senses
Neurology and Education
Dennis surveys the history of the study human consciousness and compares older concepts with contemporary neurological discoveries regarding learning difficulties and limbic structures in the brain.
Alchemical Dew, Pathogens and Immune Response – Video Series
This three-part webinar will address the relationship between human beings and plant families and link them to methods for making remedies for the immune system.
Spiritual Physiology: The Heart
To build the world in the I, to behold the I in the world, is breathing of the soul. To sense the universal all in feeling of one’s inner self is wisdom’s pulse. To trace the paths of the Spirit in one’s own aims of life is inner speech of Truth. So let the Soul’s…
Workshop on Fairy Tales
The workshop started with a puppet show of the “Queen Bee” Fairy Tale. After that, the lecture begins. This is the way that the deepest mysteries of the mystery schools were taught. The idea of the puppet is that as we make puppets move, so God makes us move. But what is the purpose of…
Fairy Tales for Kindergarten Teachers
To continue our discussion of fairy tales, today we’ll work with the theme of the gemut as a kind of central motif in the problem of initiation. This theme centers on the relationship between day-waking consciousness and dreaming consciousness. There is a threshold between these two states of consciousness that is permeable and fluctuating, but…
Lung, Liver, and Dew
Learn about the alchemical concept of “dew” and how that may be understood as the becoming of our organs of perception.
Transforming Fantasy into Imagination
The role of mystery schools in the modern era and engaging in self-transformation in a modern way.
The Alchemical Wedding
Course of study for the Alchemical Marriage.
Inner Work for Contemporary Humans – Audio Lecture
This course on Inner Work techniques is designed to help gain access to the life of the soul through imaginative exercises and esoteric games.
Technology: Belly of the Beast – Audio Lecture
Learn to see technology through the perception of will forces and unlock it’s hidden dimensions.
Adventures on the Symbolic Plane of Consciousness
As had been employed by mystery pupils of the past, modern explorers of the wisdom of self-transformation use symbolic imagery for enhancing their meditative practice. A specific practice which Rudolf Steiner called entering the astral body. Starting with the mandala as an archetype of consciousness, each session will use the methodology of breathing an image to enter into its symbolic content. Small workgroups will address the inner responses to these symbols using suggested protocols.
Developing a Weather Eye
Expand your vision to include the the life process of planet earth. Join Dennis as he teaches how to develop your own weather eye, using cloud observations, simple physics, and old weather sayings.
Learn how to read weather maps, so you are not reliant on the fickle weather reports, which so often seem to disappoint.
Balancing Sensation and Digestion – Video Series
This three-part series by Dennis Klocek explores the relationship between good digestion and the blood’s ability to interact with cellular metabolism from the point of view of temperamental patterns in the life organs, the digestive organs and the qualitative influence of the daily sense activity on overall health.
Biodynamic Alchemy and Spagyrics
This workshop will focus on the alchemical principle of spagyric substance that is at the core of Biodynamic preparation methods. The term spagyric was coined by the great alchemist Paracelsus to describe procedures for taking apart a substance at one level of existence and reinvesting it into itself it at a higher, more energetic, level of existence.
The resulting spagyric substance transcends its natural order energetically. Seen in this way, putting cow manure in a cow horn is alchemically spagyric.
Medicinal Plants – Alchemical Analogs – September 2018
These presentations develop the creation of analogs as the basis for science into actual harvest and processing protocols based on plant time body gestures.
Medicinal Plants – Distillation – July 2018
These presentations go into the particulars of high quality fermenting and the construction and use of the proper laboratory equipment for small scale extraction.
The Healing Power of Symbols
This workshop with Dennis Klocek explores some of the foundational principles that allow us to choose and employ symbols to relieve stress and promote healing.
Traditional Medicine – Video Series
In a three-part series Dennis Klocek presents alchemical methods that unite substance and symbol in the pursuit of healing.
Truth, Lies and Illness – Video Series
This presentation by Dennis Klocek traces how lies impede the ability of the nervous system to achieve balance and suggests some remedial practices to guard against the failure of immune response that is a biological symptom of a “post-truth” epidemic of world wide lying.
Sacred Earth
These four lectures were given at a Biodynamically inspired agricultural festival in the fall of 2019 in San Miguel de Allende in Mexico. The intent was to link the mineral, plant, animal and medicinal properties found in the high desert area of San Miguel.
Chronic Pain & Esoteric Initiation
Chronic pain evolves from body issues to soul issues of fear, anxiety and depression. Rudolf Steiner’s famous phrase that wisdom is crystallized pain points at a way to understand this widespread issue. We will explore the esoteric principles in the search for wisdom out of chronic pain.
Transforming Inherited Beliefs: Family Values – Audio Lecture Set
This course addresses the common issue of how to transform beliefs and values that were part of the family of origin influences in childhood.
Impulse Control – An emotional epidemic
The course addresses the issue of impulse control in contemporary life.
Sacred Agriculture Keynote Speech at 2012 Biodynamics Conference
This keynote address given in Madison Wisconsin at the National Biodynamic Conference began with an explanation of how numinous experience of the transcendent dimension of nature is transformed into an experience of the sacredness of nature through understanding. The idea was enlarged into a description of the difference between the ancient hunter religion and the…
Parenting as Initiation
This lecture was given to parents and faculty of the Sacramento Waldorf School in 2012. The topic addresses the original state of consciousness of human beings where the divine consciousness and the personality are mixed in the young child. Then it is necessary for these two outlooks to separate in order for freedom of the…
Colors of the Human Soul Course
This course represents the fruits of a life long study of the healing forces present in color by Dennis Klocek. The intent is to build a bridge between the laws of color represented in the sciences and the potentials for color therapy in psychology.
Esoteric Fundamentals of Education
This course addresses the learning issues that arise from compromised sense perception. The role of imagination in promoting what is known as theory of mind is traced from the neurological roots of perception to the development of an inner work practice based on conscious formation of an inner organ of spiritual perception.
Honoring the Dead
When people close to us pass away the profound sense of loss is often a cause for feelings of helplessness and despair. In ancient times rituals were devised to help those left behind to understand that the so called dead are in reality still available for relationships with the living.
These four lectures paint a broad picture of some of the subtle patterns of consciousness that Rudolf Steiner has presented as the basis for a new relationship to departed souls.
Core Principles of Biodynamics
This course is a survey of the esoteric principles that are the foundation of the Biodynamic practices. Starting with the geological features of pre-cambrian times the ascent of organisms is sketched as a depiction of what Rudolf Steiner has called the world / mineral / plant.
Healing Meditations
At times it is necessary for those on a path of self development to engage in protecting themselves from the negative intents coming from other persons. This process is delicate but if handled consciously it can be healing for both the person who we are struggling with and for ourselves.
The Nine Subtle Bodies – Full Course
This course covers the subtle bodies of he human being according to the teachings of Rudolph Steiner. The sixteen presentations are accompanied by exercises designed to evoke the consciousness of the particular body that is being presented in the lecture part of the session.
Dealing with Addiction Workshop
Addiction is a topic of interest to just about everyone. Lecture topics include: the neuroanatomy of addiction, five homeopathic constitutional remedies as pictures of the addictive persona, the role of risk/reward strategies in the esoteric life, broader cosmic issues arising from the fall of man, and the esoteric relationships between temptation, suffering and compassion.
Mystery Wisdom Introduction
These presentations form a short course on the fundamental language that composes what Rudolf Steiner called mystery wisdom. Mystery wisdom is the teachings of the perennial philosophy presented in a context that addresses the soul issue present for human beings who are searching in vain for eternal teachings in the present technical world view. The…
Esoteric Physiology Course
The lecture themes will trace the path of the blood from the marrow of the limb bones through the various life organs and ultimately into the head. The evolution of the organs and systems will be presented from the point of view of both physiology and the symbolic or alchemical perspective.
To Every Season Turn, Turn
The rising tide of life forces in Spring is linked in a unique way to lunar rhythms around the time of the equinox. This workshop addresses the critical patterns of early spring, highlighting optimum times for working with plants. It completes the work with the planting calendar through studying the elemental patterns of the moon during harvest season.
Scientific Research, Spiritual Research
A three-part lecture covering the experimental method of science, lunar declination rhythms, atmospheric tides, eclipse influences on climate, plant antennas, and morphological analogs.
Macro and Micro – The Action of the Etheric Forces in Nature
These lectures trace the activities of warmth, light, and rhythm in the life forms of the natural world. The intent is to form a picture of “the etheric” which is both an important and difficult concept. Moving from an historical look at the idea of the ethers into some of the contributing streams in Rudolf Steiner’s thinking such as the fourth dimension, the nature of warmth and the infinitely distant, and then finally to the current scientific research that supports the idea of the etheric realm.
Human Phantom Workshop
The human phantom is a concept given by Rudolf Steiner to describe the body of life forces that was the original plan for the sense activities of the human being before the fall created the complications of illness and death. Esoteric students in the Rosicrucian tradition strive to recreate the phantom again in their soul life by working with exercises to transform the daily life in the sense world. The practice of transformation can be called sacred sleeping. This workshop addresses the issue of the fall of humanity from paradise, its implications for human life and the techniques of sacred sleep.
Rosicrucian Meditation Course
The course on Rosicrucian Meditation techniques was given in the Boston area in the summer of 2009 at the Rudolf Steiner Institute. It was designed to help gain access to the life of the soul through imaginative exercises and esoteric games.
Creativity in Teaching
These three lectures are on the theme of how to avoid burnout when dealing with the demands of students, colleagues and parents. For the educational task of dealing with students the use of imagination in forming pictures of the destiny of the students will be addressed. For working with parents the use of imaginative perception in structuring productive conversations by asking questions will be the focus of a lecture. For working with colleagues the imaginative perception of placing issues into sleep will be addressed in the last lecture.
Principles of the Biodynamic Preparations
These lectures address the polarities of major plant nutrients, the role of the aster family of plants in the Biodynamic preparations, preparation of chamomile and other substances, and the relationship between valerian, amethyst and the activity of the planet Saturn in the context of plant organs.
The Human in Nature: child, spouse or steward
The subject of this lecture was the changing relationship between human beings and the natural world from Neolithic times until the present age of global environmental awareness. Topics include, something has changed in humans, Zen, Shinto, the oracle and the agent, Paleolithic, Neolithic, bronze age evidence of polarities between technology and religion, is an arrowhead…
Myth of Me Workshop
This series focuses on the use of myth as a tool for exploring the myth of “me”.
Topics include masks and personality, health and illness, active listening, archetypes as images of the physical body, salt as thinking, creating exponential consciousness, knowledge versus knowing cosmology and the chakras, spiritual protective practices and establishing imaginal consciousness.
Sacred Agriculture
The Agriculture Course of Rudolf Steiner provides a direction that can contribute to a renewal of the sense of the sacred when engaged with the daily work on the land. The key is to be able to transform the concepts in the book into living imaginations that are developed through inner exercises. Through practice, the inner eye of the heart opens to the more subtle forces moving through the spirit of the place in which we work.
The Great Passage
This 7-lecture series covers the four subtle bodies, a survey of dream states, the eternal and temporal aspects of the self, the great paradox of physical existence, expectation and power in pursuit of spiritual experience, healing anxiety, understanding sickness, the role of moods in spiritual research, gesture and mood motif as an approach to conversation with the departed, the heart and the eternal feminine, and foresight and gratitude as healing forces for anxiety.
On Mentoring
A 3-part series covering the use of the alchemical mandala of earth, water, air and fire as a foundation for building problem solving and communication skills, the use of myth as a symbolic language of interpersonal relationships, the stages of imagination, inspiration and intuition as social skills, techniques for working images into sleep as an aid to creative problems solving, dialogue techniques of forming statements as questions, the healing effect of biography, and the alchemy of soul transformation by enhanced capacity to listen to your heart.
Black Madonna Lecture
Tracing the concept of the Madonna from Gnostic sources as the basis for self transformational meditative practices into the mystery schools of today. Explore the esoteric practices that lead from the ancient Sophianic consciousness to the two aspects of the Black Madonna that make her a spiritual being who leads humans from the past into the future. From the Black Madonna to the task of the modern mysteries represented by the being Anthroposophia.
Agricultural Alchemy
These lectures address the principles founded by the alchemists that can serve as the basis for a new way of looking at the forces of nature. The mandala of the four elements, the processes of salt, mercury and sulfur and the principles of transformation of the elements are the dynamic backdrop for four lectures on the nature and interaction of minerals, plants and animals as they are encountered in agricultural work on farms and in gardens.