Guy writes: Creativity: is the ability to respond to complex and unprecedented predicaments with the whole depth and breadth of one's resources and experience. This experiential reservoir of wisdom is vastly greater and subtler than our conscious knowledge, deliberately accessed. As Michael Polanyi said, 'We know much more than we know we know'. And the way this 'More' speaks to us is through the varied voices of Intuition: insight, imagination and humour; inklings, hunches and bodily feelings. To be creative, we have to learn to hear and heed these voices, and the way to tune our inner eyes and ears is through Meditation: Shorn of their historical and religious packaging, forms of meditation such as the Buddhist practice of 'mindfulness' offer powerful tools for the cultivation of practical, creative intelligence. In this seminar, we shall explore first-hand some of these methods for gaining access to the 'intelligent unconscious', and discuss the revitalised understandings of creativity and intuition that are engorging from the new sciences of brain and mind. And we shall see how wisdom and creativity go hand-in-hand with playfulness and fun.

More Information About Frenchman's Cove

Guy Claxton is the best-selling author of more than a dozen books about the mind from both scientific and spiritual perspectives, a professor of education at the University of Bristol, and a long-standing (or rather -sitting) student of Buddhist meditation. He was for eight years a follower of the controversial Indian sage Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh (Osho), and was a member of the founding faculties of Schumacher College and of Sharpham College for Buddhist Studies and Contemporary Inquiry, both in South Devon. His teaching style has earned him a reputation for erudition and eloquence, empathy and warmth, and a great sense of fun and mischief. Guy Claxton has a double first from Cambridge, and a doctorate from Oxford.

Breakfast will be eaten at the main building from 8.30 and we will hold our main session with Guy Claxton from 10.00 to 12.30 each day. We will then repair to the beach for lunch provided by Mrs Lawrence and have the afternoon free. Informal discussion periods will be arranged between 5.00 and 6.00 before preparing to go out for dinner. There is a good choice of restaurants, some within walking distance. We will arrange appropriate transport in the evening, partly with our hired van.