Course Title: Getting to Know Our Mind Better
Instructor: Rachna Kejriwal, Engr '89
Brought to you by Odyssey
November 05, 2024 - December 10, 2024 (6 Sessions)
Tuesday, 6:00PM ET - 8:00PM ET
Virtual via Zoom
Course Description: Most of our known limitations come from our Mind. If we could understand our belief systems and release ourselves from the ones that don’t work for us, if we could understand how our Mind works and not pay attention to it when it’s repeatedly negative, if we could understand what to do with our emotions, or if we could stop the same defeating pattern in our relationships … what would life look like? Getting to know our Mind better, helps us understand better, and provides tools to empower ourselves to lead a more fulfilling life.
This is a workshop style course where participants will be expected to partner and build connections. Below is an outline of the six sessions in this course.
S1: How are our beliefs formed?
Beliefs are those ideas, we assumed to be true about ourselves early on. ‘I’m very messy. I should’ve been a boy. I’m not as smart as my sister.’ Many times we don’t even know where this belief comes from. Yet, they guide us in our daily behaviors and actions. They sit in our subconscious. But if we could dispel of these beliefs from our very root, then we could behave and act differently. We could be free of these beliefs. This module help explains how we form our beliefs and what we can do to dispel the ones that don’t empower us.
S2: Rules of the Mind 1
Our Mind is like a separate entity. It functions on its own. It keeps on saying things to itself. Unfortunately, most of the time, it may choose to say things that don’t help us. Interestingly, that’s the one thing that we can control and stop. We can stop the things we don’t want to say, and purposely guide ourselves to the things we want to say. By understanding The Rules of the Mind, we can take purposeful responsibility in changing our thoughts.
S3: Rules of the Mind 2
As we change our thoughts, we can our feelings, our behavior and our actions. As we understand how these are intertwined, we can make decisions and guide ourselves to the thoughts that work for us. And the thoughts that keep on disturbing us, we can try to understand what is the belief we’ve formed behind these thoughts.
S4: Our emotions: what to do with them?
We’ve been told, don’t get emotional. But what to do with them? We do have emotions. They’re very real and they’re trying to tell us something. Instead of pushing them away, we can understand what they are trying to tell us, how to feel them and how to manage them.
S5: Procrastination: what does it really mean?
Procrastination isn’t laziness. We want to do something, and when we’re just about to start, we start doing something else. We avoid the project we’re trying to do. Why? Understanding what our procrastination is really trying to tell us, we can deal with it and use it to help us move forward.
S6: Relationships: the mental dance we do
Any close relationship - parent-child, spouse-spouse, brother-sister, eventually gets stuck on a few issues. Each person eventually figures out what triggers the other. We say the same things again and again, and never resolve the issue. We do a dance with the same mental moves. How do we break this dance and resolve this mental act-react cycle?
Note:
The idea of this series is not just to learn but to experience. Each class is set with introduction of the concepts, then applying them with exercises with a fellow student partner. The learning becomes experiential. Everyone’s lives are busy. The idea is to have the initial experience during class and then understand how to look at our own Mind.
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Johns Hopkins Tuition Remission Policies
Johns Hopkins alumni, staff, faculty and their spouse or domestic partners are eligible for tuition remission for Odyssey lifelong learning courses. Select the correct ticket pricing during registration. If we cannot confirm your eligibility, you will be requested to pay the full registration price for the course. Eligibility details can be found here.
Withdrawals & Refunds:
If a course is canceled or closed, the registrant is notified immediately, and a full refund is processed automatically unless another course is requested. Registrants who wish to withdraw from an active course must complete the online Odyssey Refund Request Form. Attach any documentation to support your request (e.g., medical documentation, family crisis documentation, etc.).
100% refund- Prior to the start of the course.
50% refund- During the first week of the course.
No refunds will be given after the first week of each course unless in exceptional cases.
Please note, refunds apply only to the tuition portion of an Odyssey participant’s charges and are not applicable to any fees or gifts made to the Johns Hopkins Alumni Association. Registrants will be notified by email if a refund is approved within (5) business days.
