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Restoring Hope

Restoring Hope

Practical Appreciative Inquiry based strategies to effectively resolve grief and resentment.

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What Readers Say

This book is a gold mine of practical methods to make things better. Ed Leidel, Episcopal Bishop and Congregational Coach serving North America.
 
Rob Voyle has produced the most comprehensive manual for dealing with the consequences of serious negative life events.
ANDy Austin, author, The Rainbow machine: Tales from a Neurolinguist's Journal.
 
This book is filled with things you can actually do to heal from grief and resentment. Whether you use this book on your own, as a member of a group, or to help others, you will find here a resource rich with hands-on and effective strategies for healing. Jim Finley, author, Merton's Palace of Nowhere.

Retreat Leader

Rob Voyle

The Rev. Dr. Rob Voyle is a leader in the development and use of appreciative inquiry in church and coaching settings.

Rob's Approach to Retreats

  • Helpful: Retreats must provide practical, sustainable solutions for today's challenges.
  • Humorous: Creativity and humor go together as people enjoy new insights.
  • Healing: We create opportunities for people to experience transformational insights that lead to new ways of living, working, and being in the world.

>>   See more on Rob's
        Helpful, Humorous, Healing
        approach to training.

The Appreciative Way

The Appreciative Way
Discover the essentials of the
Appreciative Way in this fast
read format book by
Rob and Kim Voyle.

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Discovering Peace
In a Rush Hour Culture

Are you tired of living resentfully in a rush hour culture?

  • Do you want to live compassionately in an angry world?
  • Do you want to find peace in the rush hour culture?
  • Do you want to find a more resourceful way of dealing
    with bullies in your life?
  • Is there someone you would like to forgive?

As an added bonus:

Bring your resentment and leave without it!

"Wow! 45 years of resentment its gone! Wow!"
comment by retreat participant as she set
herself free from her resentment.

Retreat Schedule: Discovering Peace in a Rush Hour Culture

No Discovering Peace in a Rush Hour Culture workshops are scheduled at this time.

Please see workshop schedule for a complete listing of all retreats and training programs.

In addition to these retreats we also provide practioner forgiveness training programs.

Compassion as the Path to Peace

In a "Rush Hour Culture" we often feel stressed and can easily end up in a state of resentment. In this state we resent everything and everyone, even ourselves and the life we live.

In this retreat you will discover how to live compassionately rather than resentfully.

By compassion we do not simply mean a tender hearted vulnerability or a mindless tolerance for rudeness and injurious behavior. We will expand the idea of compassion to include the following three faces of compassion.

  • Tenderness: An empathetic concern for someone in pain and a desire to alleviate it. This is what we often think about when we think of compassion. However, if this is the only form of compassion we have we will likely experience compassion fatigue.
  • Fierceness: A single minded pursuit of a just future as distinct from anger which is typically focused on a past hurt or injustice. Some examples of fierceness include "tough love" or the prophetic calling to care for the oppressed and disadvantaged in our society. It may also include creating and maintaining our own emotional boundaries toward those who would hurt us.
  • Mischievousness: In Buddhist circles this is known as crazy wisdom and includes the use of paradox, parable, playfulness, and teasing, that can easily be seen in the work of Jesus and other Spiritual Masters.

We will explore how to live and use these faces of compassion with ourselves and one another

Driving with compassion in the midst of rush hour
will not get you home any faster,
but it will get you home a whole lot happier.

As part of living compassionately we will also look at how you can move from resentment to a place of forgiveness so that we no longer carry the hurts of the past with us.

Resentment isn't what others have done to us.
Resentment is what we do to ourselves
in the darkness of what others have done to us.

Forgiveness is not Reconciliation!

One of the main reasons people don't forgive is that they confuse forgiveness with reconciliation.

Forgiveness: Is how you personally resolve what has happened in your past.

Basic Rule of Forgiveness: The primary beneficiary of your forgiveness is yourself. When others have hurt you in the past forgiveness means you get to put down the hurt and leave it behind, rather than carry it resentfully into your future.

Resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for your enemy to die. Nelson Mandela

Reconciliation: Is an agreement between two or more people on how they will live and work together in the future.

Basic Rule of Reconciliation: Never be reconciled to someone who does not share your values.

Jesus forgave the Romans and the Pharisees, but he was never reconciled to the mission of Rome or the mission of the Pharisees.

Forgiving and Forgetting is Very Unwise

Forgetting bad things is a real problem, because then we will have to repeat them to remember that they are painful.

Sometimes we need to forgive and remember rather than forgive and forget that some people are dangerous and shouldn't be trusted because they haven't demonstrated trustworthy behavior.

For More Information on Forgiveness

Most of this retreat is based on Rob Voyle's book Restoring Hope: Appreciative Strategies to Resolve Resentment and Grief. You can purchase it from The Appreciative Way Bookstore.

Rob has also written a brief description of the forgiveness process in his blog:
Teach Them to Forgive this Sunday and 9/11: Resentment, Forgiveness, and Reconciliation.

You can also listen to Rob teach on Resolving Painful Memories

Retreat Outline and Objectives

This retreat is provided in a one-day format. The specific times and schedule will be dependent on the hosting facility. Please check the schedule for location specific times.

This retreat is designed to lead you through a series of processes to enable you to set yourself free from resentment and live compassionately and peacefully with yourself and others.

Please Note: You Won't be Asked to Share your Story

You have been shamed once and there is no need to be shamed again, I do not need to know who or what you are resenting to set you free from your resentment. - Rob Voyle

You Will Not be asked to share or tell your story to anyone.

Your experience is private and you will work on it in the privacy of your own mind and heart.

In this retreat we will focus on:

  • "How" you resent, or the dynamics of resentment rather than the "who" and "what" or the content of your resentment.
  • "How" you forgive or the dynamics of forgiveness.

Retreat Content

  • Create basic internal resources such as the golden thread of life and unconditional love to create a stable foundation for forgiving others:
  • Use the three faces of compassion: tenderness, fierceness, and mischievousness as an agent of transformation in the world.
  • Discover how you uniquely organize and structure your internal experience of memories of past injuries, resentments, and states of forgiveness:
  • Resolve your internal objections and resistance to forgiving; - seeking and satisfying your objections to forgiving to ensure sustainable outcomes:
  • Restructure your internal experiences of resentment into internal experiences of forgiveness:
  • Create internal resources to enable you to remain grounded and engaged, rather than resentful or avoidant, in the presence of people who violate your values:
  • Discover the differences between guilt and shame and how to use the forgiveness strategies to achieve self-forgiveness:

What Participants Say

"Wow, 45 years of resentment is gone!"

"I can now feel compassion toward my boss rather than protect myself by being resentful

"I was able to be peacefully, rather than nauseous, around my ex-spouse at a family function"

If you would like to find the freedom of forgiveness register for one of our upcoming
Forgiveness Retreats.

Other Programs Related to Forgiveness

In addition to the one-day forgiveness retreat we also provide:

No Continuing Education Credit

This program is deliberately designed as a personal retreat in contrast to most of our training programs which provide professional continuing education for clergy coaches and therapists. Because it is a personal healing retreat, no continuing education credit is provided.

For Restoring Hope continuing education programs for coaches, clergy, and therapists please see: Restoring Hope Training.

Costs and Refund Policies

In general the one-day retreat will cost $75 per person.

Specific retreat prices may vary depending on the location hosts and sponsors.

Registration Refunds

Your registration is completely refundable, minus a 15% service fee, up to seven days before the start of the program. Thereafter the registration fee will be forfeited.

For more information please see our Cancellation Policies.

Accommodation

Day-long programs are typically at a sponsoring church or organization. No additional accommodation is provided.

Multi-day retreats are typically held at retreat centers and overnight accommodation is provided as well as meals between sessions. Commuter options are also typically available.

Because the locations differ accommodation costs will be specified of the specific retreat registration form.

Retreat Leader

Rob Voyle is an ordained Episcopal priest, psychologist, and executive coach. He is the Director of the Clergy Leadership Institute and is the author of: Restoring Hope: Appreciative Strategies to Resolve Grief and Resentment and Teach Your congregation How To Forgive. Rob has taught hundreds of people to forgive and find freedom and healing in the reality of unconditional love.

Here is what Episcopal priest Charles Fels said after he learned the forgiveness process:

"Rob Voyle is a great teacher and a gifted priest. His unique approach to forgiveness has been immediately beneficial to a number of people in my own parish. Rob's healing ministry really works!"

Registration for a Retreat

No Restoring Hope Retreats Are Currently Scheduled.

Email Rob Voyle if you would like to host a retreat for your constituents.

For a full listing of training programs please see: Training Schedule