November 1, 2024 – September 7, 2025
A yearlong course of mythic study, somatic practice, storytelling, song, threshold exploration and nature immersion with The Emerald podcast’s Josh Schrei and special guests.
Welcome.
Mythologist, somatic instructor, and storyteller Josh Schrei of The Emerald podcast introduces The Mythic Body, a yearlong course for dedicated students who want to better understand the ecstatic, animate heart of myth and story, deepen their access to the imaginal core of human experience, explore foundational knowledge common to global ritual traditions, and enhance their practice in their own traditions.
Through mythic study, somatic practice, ritual repetition, nature immersion, threshold exploration, and shared story, participants will recalibrate and deepen their relationship with body, community, and cosmos. The course has deep relevance and deep applicability for bodyworkers, somatic instructors, therapists, depth psychologists, storytellers, public speakers, artists, writers, activists, policy makers, community builders, and all knowledge seekers.
Course Pillars
Mythos
The myths of the world aren’t abstract ideas. They are meant to stir a somatic experience of connection to the natural world and the larger cosmos. Ongoing study of the global mythic corpus will provide an anchor through which we can understand commonalities of ecstatic experience, build foundational access into deep somatic states, and understand how the human being is situated in this world of animate forces. Our study will focus on the myth as a key driver of human experience that is ritually enacted and somatically felt. We will discuss and invoke myths from around the world and explore specific ways to apply mythic understanding to our daily lives.
Nature Immersion
Participants will be invited to increase their time spent in the natural world and will explore the specifics of their relationship with nature and natural forces in new and dynamic ways. Moving from a destination-centric paradigm of nature immersion to a model of focus, animacy, deep knowledge, and vocal interaction, participants will grow their understanding of natural systems and reawaken the power of their relationship to place. Together we will explore methodologies of listening to land, re-enchanting land, and growing our relationship to land.
Ritual Repetition
Building on foundational knowledge, participants will structure a repetitive daily practice based within their own traditions, designed to connect them to a regular ritual rhythm. This repetitive practice will deepen over the length of the course and will be a key part of the course project work as participants expand their understanding of the key components of ritual, the somatics of ritual, and how simple ritual provides a foundation for daily life.
Invocation
99% of human tradition has been conducted through the medium of oral invocation. Honing our understanding of the dynamics of oral invocation has implication for all teachers, students, practitioners, writers, storytellers, and knowledge seekers. Through storytelling, listening, and vocalization practice, students will awaken and hone the human instrument as a vehicle for transmission in their own teaching and practice traditions.
Devotion
At the heart of this course is the understanding of the simultaneously tiny and grand place that the human being holds within the cosmos, a recognition that naturally generates awe and wonder. This devotion is the backbone for all of our study. Students will develop a program of regular ritualized wonder and offering around an object of devotion within their own traditions and explore how access to awe and wonder can be constructed on a regular basis.
Somatic Practice
Our journey into the mythic heart of human experience will be anchored with regular breath work and simple guided somatic meditative practice. Participants will also design their own somatic practice based on expanding access to threshold states and deepening access to foundational somatic energetics. Somatic practice will be accessible for all levels.
Threshold Exploration
Human beings once had ready access to deep states of seamless connection with the natural world and spent long periods of time in these flow states. Course participants will explore their own thresholds — what activities take them into the state of deep connection to nature and cosmos — and over the course of a year, will increase the time they spend in threshold states and cultivate simple exercises to access these states.
Learning Structure
This Course Includes:
• Regular live zoom sessions with Josh and with course facilitators. Recordings will be available for those who can’t attend live.
• Regular pre-recorded guided practice.
• Regular pre-recorded presentations.
• Regular pre-recorded mythic storytelling
• Ongoing questions and practice suggestions for students to explore on their own time.
• Discussion and reflection in smaller groups.
• Four projects within the course pillars
• Guest workshops and discussions to be announced. Previous guests have included Sophie Strand, Bayo
Akomolafe, Tom Hirons, Leah Song and Chloe Smith, and Peia Luzzi.
• Ritual practice, nature immersion practice, and threshold practice to be done on the student’s own time.
• Ongoing access to all course materials.
• In person immersion in Hawaii in March 2025 at no extra cost
The next round of
The Mythic Body
course will take place
November 2024 –
September 2025
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