Cultivating Mental Balance (CMB)
“You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.” — John Kabat Zinn
The Cultivating Mental Balance (CMB) Program is a one-year long program where science, mindfulness practice and coaching are combined to support the participants to develop their attentional and cognitive skills, together with discovering their driving power and emotional intelligence. This program will have a life-long impact at personal and professional level.
The program is combining the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn from Massachusetts University, Cultivating Emotional Balance (CEB) Program developed by Paul and Eve Ekman and Alan Wallace, Mindful Self-Compassion Program developed by Kristin Neff, and Co-Active coaching. It comprises 90 hours of group training and 8 hours of personal coaching, over 12 months. It takes place in person or online live.
“The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping the old ones, which ramify… into every corner of our minds.” — John Maynard Keynes
Through the Cultivating Mental Balance (CMB) Program you will EXPERIENCE:
- Clarity to recognize the difference between the challenges and the real stressors, the difference between constructive and destructive emotions, the hedonic and genuine happiness, and the yin and yang compassion.
- Focus on what you choose and what really matters to you.
- Presence of your course colleagues and your mindfulness coach, as well as yourself.
- Structure to work with these new discoveries and integrate them in your daily life – personally and professionally.
- Support, love and care through the entire period to feel safe and understood, to experiment and try out different behaviours and mindset, to get through the tough times and celebrate success.
- Belonging to a likeminded group of people who are here to transform and at the same time to support you through your own transformation.
- Courage to be yourself – authentic, curious, powerful, sensitive, determined, vulnerable, inspiring.
- Calm and peace through the meditation practice and mindful movement.
- Transformation through your increased awareness, self-compassion, behavioural change and action taking.
- Accountability – with so much on your plate every day, you will be hold accountable for what you are committing to, for what is really important to you and for not slipping back into old behaviour patterns.
“If you love someone, the greatest gift you can give them is your presence.” — Thich Nhat Hanh
Module 1 – Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) – 8 weeks (21h)
The first module of the Cultivating Mental Balance (CMB) Program will FOCUS on:
- The definition of mindfulness and its integration in daily life
- Increasing self-awareness and presence
- Identifying habitual patterns and behaviors and learn how to make sustainable change
- Increasing mind-body connection
- Recognizing and managing stress and stress reactivity
- Moving from reactivity into responsivity
- Perceptions and making choices
- Emotions & habitual patterns
- Working with difficult moments and strengthening resilience
- Mindful listening and speaking
- Cultivating silence, curiosity, beginners mind, non-judgement, acceptance & letting go
Practices
- Meditation, mindful movement, mindful eating
- Self-reflection
- Group dialogue and exercises
- Weekly home assignments
Practicalities
- 21h group training (6 weeks x 2.5h/week, 2 weeks x 3h/week – week 1 and week 8)
- Dates: weekly on Thursdays:
- Opening Session – Oct 1, 6.00-9.00pm CET (3 hours)
- Sessions 2-7 – Oct 8, Oct 15, Oct 22, Oct 29, Nov 5, Nov 12, 6.00-8.30pm CET (2,5 hours each)
- Closing Session – Nov 19, 6.00-9.00pm CET (3 hours)
- [check your local time here (Copenhagen time zone)]
- Place: online live via Zoom
“In my view the most important meaning of mindfulness is recollection. In other words, mindfulness is the ability to gather oneself mentally and thereby recall one’s core values and motivation… It suggests bringing presence of mind into everyday activities.” — H. H. Dalai Lama
Module 2 – Cultivating Emotional Balance – 16 weeks (40h)
The second module of the Cultivating Mental Balance (CMB) Program will FOCUS on:
- Strengthening self-awareness and presence
- Cultivating genuine vs hedonic happiness
- Conative, Attentional, Cognitive and Emotional Balance
- Focus and attention training
- Exploring emotions from a constructive and destructive perspective
- Working with the Big 7 Universal Emotions: anger, fear, sadness, happiness, disgust, surprise, contempt
- Emotion regulation
- Working with Emotional Episode Timeline
- Emotions vs moods, traits, disorders
- Reaction vs response
- RAIN practice
- Working with hot triggers
- Loving-kindness, compassion, empathetic joy, equanimity
- Mindfulness of the body, mind, feelings and phenomena
- Mindful listening and speaking
Practices
- Meditation and mindful movement
- Self-reflection
- Group dialogue and exercises
- Weekly home assignments
Practicalities
- 40h group training (16 weeks x 2.5h/week)
- Dates: weekly on Thursdays:
- Sessions 1-16 – Nov 26, Dec 3, Dec 10, Dec 17, Jan 7, Jan 14, Jan 21, Jan 28, Feb 4, Feb 11, Feb 18, Feb 25, Mar 4, Mar 11, Mar 18, Mar 25, 6.00-8.30pm CET (2,5 hours each)
- [check your local time here (Copenhagen time zone)]
- Place: online live via Zoom
“I believe that the very purpose of our life is to seek happiness. Whether one believes in religion or not, whether one believes in this religion or that religion, we all are seeking something better in life. So, I think, the very motion of our life is towards happiness.” — H. H. Dalai Lama
Module 3 – Mindfulness Based Self-Compassion – 8 weeks (29h)
The third module of the Cultivating Mental Balance (CMB) Program will FOCUS on:
- The definition of compassion and self-compassion and its integration in daily life
- Deepening mindfulness, loving-kindness and compassion – create your own practice
- Self-criticism, shame, disconnection, forgiveness, motivation, safety, equanimity
- Core values and purpose
- Listening and speaking with compassion
- Meeting difficult emotions with compassion
- Working with challenging relationships
- Meeting unmet needs
- Cultivating happiness, gratitude, appreciation and self-appreciation
Practices
- Meditation & mindful movement
- Self-reflection
- Group dialogue and exercises
- Weekly home assignments
Practicalities
- 21h group training (6 weeks x 2.5h/week, 2 weeks x 3h/week – week 1 and week 8)
- 8h guided silent Mindfulness and Self-Compassion retreat (on a Saturday)
- Dates & time: to be determined [check your local time here]
- Place: online live via Zoom
“Compassion for others begins with kindness to ourselves.” — Pema Chodron
After completing the Cultivating Mental Balance (CMB) Program you can EXPECT to:
- Understand the patterns of your mind and learn how to change behavioral patterns
- Understand the mind-body connection and the signals your body is sending to you, being able to act timely in stressful or unpleasant situations
- Recognize and face your emotions, work with them and break the destructive patterns
- Increase focus, performance, creativity and innovation
- Increase adaptability to change, flexibility and resilience
- Increase self and social awareness, empathy and compassion
- Increase your ability to make wise decisions according to your values
- Develop strategies to respond wisely to emotions and challenges
- Develop inner and outer trust, strengthen relationships and reduce conflicts
- Reduce stress, stress related illnesses, anxiety and burnout
- Transform your life from inside out and reach your full potential
- One-year long access to training, coaching, and materials that will support you in integrating the learning and the new habits in your daily life to make life-long changes
- Life-long access to a supportive and like-minded community
“Stand still like a mountain, flow like a river.” — Lao Tzu
Bonuses:
- Life-time access to the tools and materials used in the program
- Life-time access to the guided meditations
- The possibility to listen to the recording of a missed session
- The possibility to take the course from wherever you are in the world
- A buddy to support you and keep you accountable through the journey
- Life-time access to our “Cultivating Mental Balance” community
- 10% discount to any next program you register
- 10% discount if you’re a student, unemployed, or retired
- 10% discount if you bring a friend/colleague
“If one is cruel to himself, how can we expect him to be compassionate to others?” — Hasdai Ibn Shaprut
Who is your Mindfulness Teacher and Coach?
Carmen Manea is a courageous, curious and determined coach and mindfulness teacher. She is a certified Co-Active Institute & International Coach Federation leadership coach, a Cultivating Emotional Balance & Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction teacher and has 15+ years business experience in companies as Coca-Cola and LEGO Group.
She is specialized in the areas of mindfulness, stress reduction, emotional balance, emotional intelligence, resilience, self-compassion, presence, self-awareness, authentic leadership, women in leadership, diversity & inclusion, impostor syndrome & inner critic. Since 2015 she has been teaching and coaching people from more than 30 countries, on four continents, with very different personal and professional backgrounds.
Carmen’s strengths are courage and curiosity, active listening and communication, empathy, the ability to create safe and trusting relationships, multicultural understanding, loving-kindness, compassion, determination and resilience.
She is sensitive yet strong, loves nature, and is genuinely interested in people and cultures. She can be very active (running marathons, hiking in the mountains, diving and practicing yoga) and very still (meditating, reading, making jigsaw puzzles and reflecting).
“The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.” — Carl Rogers
What previous participants say about working with Carmen:
I would warmly recommend Carmen’s courses to anyone who wants to cultivate awareness, balance and take responsibility for their emotions and personal growth and development – whether it is in the personal life or professional life.
Some important lessons for me was that Carmen taught me to recognize the automatic storylines in my head and deal with emotions in a more reflected way; When a feeling arises you always have the opportunity to stop and choose how/if you want to react to it. The classes with Carmen always left me with more calmness, clarity and with several important personal realizations. Carmen created a safe space for us in the class, and also she managed to create a sense of community between the participants, in which I think we all felt deeply connected as human beings, realizing that we all to some degree deal with the same emotions. This was deeply touching to experience.
Carmen is a wonderful and good teacher who has the ability to convey emotionally hard subject matter in a good and constructive way.
Carmen is a gifted teacher and using incremental approach, guided us on our individual journey to a more mindful way of living. Through experiential learning, every weekly session allowed me to better understand mindfulness and the tangible benefits the practice can bring me. After every session, and particularly after the all-day retreat, I felt a wonderful inner peace and better able to cope with change and uncertainty. I warmly recommend Carmen’s course to you!
Carmen is a kind, warm and insightful teacher with a big knowledge and experience in the field of mindfulness.
Carmen was the person who helped me getting through a rickety bridge just by “holding the tip of my finger”. She is always there with the right questions to direct you in a gentle way. Makes you think and helps you throughout this personal journey. Her calming voice in meditations and during yoga practices made me relaxed, calm and feel safe. I have done mindfulness courses before but they weren’t successful without the personal touch. Carmen was the person who was by my side on the journey, teaching me how to be non-judgemental, how to break my bad habits, how to stay calm and how to transform. Thank you!
The best way to let go and enjoy! My work as a psychologist has always made me curious about different methods which allow the person to better understand themselves, their thoughts and behaviors and learning to be in the present, not future or past, so when I heard about Carmen’s program I was very eager to participate. After attending six or more sessions, I can really say that mindfulness has a lot of benefits (stress reduction, focus, less emotional reactivity, more cognitive flexibility), and helped me both personally and professionally. Carmen offered great guidance in my first steps in this new practice. She would always explain every step of the way, she adapted the steps so they would be a really good fit for everyone involved and basically she was there for us as human beings. After every session, I was feeling very relaxed, always had a good night sleep and a lot of energy for my future actions. Personally and professionally I would recommend everyone an experience like this.
Carmen er meget rolig og møder folk hvor der de er, med stor åbenhed og uden at dømme. For mig åbnede hun døren til nye perspektiver på mig selv og mine omgivelser.
Jeg har deltaget i tre kurser med Carmen – Meditation & mindfulness, Cultivating Emotional Balance, og Self-Compassion. Alle tre kurser har givet mig et sundt og varmt syn på mig selv, mine følelser og det har lært mig at forstå min omverden på en åben og medfølende måde.
Jeg vil varmt anbefale denne kurser til dig, der har brug for at gå på rejse med dig selv og sammen med andre eller dig, der blot er nysgerrig på, hvordan du finder en indre ro, som du kan tage med dig videre – der er ikke noget krav om, hvad du skal kunne, du skal blot være åben og du kan bruge øvelserne lige præcis som de passer ind i dit liv og din verden. Der er ingen løftede øjenbryn, og du bliver mødt med varme, smil og en åbenhed, som er svær at lade ligge, når kurset er færdig.
Jeg har lært mig selv utroligt godt at kende gennem de tre kurser. Blandt andet gør jeg brug af Emotionel Episode Timeline, som er et fantastisk redskab i hverdagen og til at forstå følelser – uden at skulle underkende dem. Jeg har lært at acceptere tingenes tilstand og lade følelserne være til stede, både de gode og de mindre gode. Compassion-øvelsen var fantastisk fordi det skaber udsyn, medfølelse og forståelse. Til sidst vil jeg også nævne Wise Breaks, som gør mig bedre i stand til at klare vanskelige situationer både ude og hjemme.
Mindfulness har bragt meget glæde ind i mit liv, og jeg vil varmt anbefale og ønske for alle at de prøver kurserne.
If you are looking to manage your stress levels or to cultivate some peace, Carmen is the perfect Mindfulness Trainer for you! I loved attending her classes and always felt positive and calm after the sessions.
The Mindfulness and Meditation Course was very beneficial in helping me gain awareness of life patterns, develop a greater connection to the present moment as well as provide mindfulness practices to use outside of class. Carmen is a very caring, supportive and compassionate leader. Her style is a wonderful representation of positive leadership. I highly recommend working with Carmen to gain the benefits of being more mindful in daily life.
“A human being is a part of a whole, called by us “universe”, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest…a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our talk must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.” — Albert Einstein
The Cultivating Mental Balance (CMB) Program tailored for you:
Basic Program
EUR1999
- 36 live online group calls (36×150 minutes)
- 8 individual coaching sessions (8×50 minutes)
- 1 weekend online retreat (8 hours)
- Lifetime access to the Cultivating Mental Balance closed community group
- Life-time access to the tools and materials used in the program
- Life-time access to the guided meditations taught
- Tangible and long-lasting results
- 10% discount to any next program you register
- 10% discount if you’re a student, unemployed, or retired
- 10% discount if you bring a friend/colleague
- Possibility to pay in 2 instalments
In-depth Program
EUR2199
- 36 live online group calls (36×150 minutes)
- 8 individual coaching sessions (8×50 minutes)
- 1 weekend online retreat (8 hours)
- Lifetime access to the Cultivating Mental Balance closed community group
- Life-time access to the tools and materials used in the program
- Life-time access to the guided meditations taught
- Tangible and long-lasting results
- 10% discount to any next program you register
- 10% discount if you’re a student, unemployed, or retired
- 10% discount if you bring a friend/colleague
- Possibility to pay in 2 instalments
Premium Program
EUR2999
- 36 live online group calls (36×150 minutes)
- 8 individual coaching sessions (8×50 minutes)
- 1 weekend online retreat (8 hours)
- Lifetime access to the Cultivating Mental Balance closed community group
- Life-time access to the tools and materials used in the program
- Life-time access to the guided meditations taught
- Tangible and long-lasting results
- 10% discount to any next program you register
- 10% discount if you’re a student, unemployed, or retired
- 10% discount if you bring a friend/colleague
- Possibility to pay in 2 instalments
“The capacity to learn is a gift; the ability to learn is a skill; the willingness to learn is a choice” — Brian Herbert
General practicalities
- Course duration: 98h over 1 year
- Date & Time: See the details in the individual modules
- Place: online live, via Zoom
- Group size: max 20 participants
- Early Bird: Sign up and pay latest one month before the course starts and get a reduced price
- Registration: Sign up and pay latest one week before the course starts
- Companies & Organizations: Different pricing may apply. Contact Carmen for a quote.
- Teacher & Coach: Carmen Manea, certified CTI & ICF coach, CEB & MBSR teacher
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” — Marianne Williamson
Sign up now and start transforming your life!
The registration for this cohort (starting on 01 Oct 2020) is closed.
If you’re interested in being notified when the next course is scheduled, please fill in below form.
“If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. We need not wait to see what others do.” — Mahatma Gandhi
