More about the Symposium Context and the Day…

The world we’re living in demands more of us than ever before. The crises we face – ecological, social, psychological – are too complex and interconnected for surface-level responses. As coaches and practitioners, we’re being called to develop new capacities: to stay present to overwhelm without fragmenting, to hold complexity without retreating into over-simplification and to meet collapse with something more than despair or denial.

Psychosynthesis offers frameworks and practices for this work: from the essential core of Self, through emotional and psychological integration, to our fundamental interconnection with each other and the world.

Join us for a day of collective exploration into what it means to work at depth – and why this matters now.

Agenda

Time	Activity	Person
09:00	Arrivals
09:15	Welcome: Opening & Context setting	Aubyn Howard & Bonny Tydeman
09:30	Keynote: Facilitating Depth through Psychosynthesis	Kenneth Sørensen
10:30	Break
11:00	Breakout 1 – No Man is an Island: An Entangled Experience of Self	Theo Dijkman
	Breakout 1 – The Story of Your Life: Stages of Crisis and Awakening	Anne Welsh
12:30	Lunch
13:30	Breakout 2 – It’s a Wild World: Making Sense in Confusing Times	Keith Silvester
	Breakout 2 – A Depth Perspective on Leadership Development	Aubyn Howard
15:00	Break
15:30	Lightning Talk: What Psychedelic Experience Reveals About Developmental Capacity	Sonal Kadchha
16:00	Lightning Talk: Depth in the Age of Algorithms: Staying in Right Relationship with AI	Nyla Khan
16:30	Lightning Talk: Ground & Rise Tarot: A Bridge for Coaching at Depth	Sam Starr
17:00	Closing Plenary	Aubyn Howard & Bonny Tydeman
17:30	End

Keynote Session

Morning Keynote – Kenneth Sørensen
Facilitating Depth through Psychosynthesis

Working with Psychosynthesis as a coaching or counselling paradigm gives access to multiple levels of depth, which can be engaged according to the client’s needs, capacity, and life situation. Psychosynthesis both includes and transcends mainstream psychological modalities, while adding perspectives that are distinctive—most notably in its understanding of essential identity.

In this opening keynote, Kenneth will outline how the process and practise of synthesis enables us to work at multiple levels with our clients, and help them to strengthen their centre – so they can meet future challenges with clarity, responsibility, and creative freedom.

Workshop Breakout Sessions will include:

Theo Dijkman – No Man is an Island: an entangled experience of self
Exploring Phenomenological depth

From Indra’s Net of ancient Buddhist philosophy to the poem of John Donne in the 15^th century, and the spider’s web of relationships of 21^st century post-feminist thinkers, all have considered life to be an interconnected experience of the human and material world. Assagioli suggested that “neither biologically nor psychologically are we a “closed system”. Our physical body is not isolated from the surrounding life.”

The egg diagram shows this permeability of our psyche and the exchange of information between the unconscious and conscious, between the internal and external world in all its manifestations. From this perspective our sense of self is a continually changing experience of entangled relationships with others and the material world around us. Through sensory interaction with the world and each other, we’ll explore how being together shapes individual and collective experience. This is depth as felt relationship, as the lived reality of interbeing – discovering that our sense of self is a continually changing experience of entangled relationships.

Anne Welsh – The Story of Your Life: Stages of Crisis and Awakening
Exploring Existential depth

This workshop will invite participants to reflect on the trajectory of their becoming, listening to how crisis and awakening have shaped their identity. Using Assagioli’s stages of awakening as a framework, you will explore the existential terrain of your life, and how you have established a sense of meaning, purpose and identity through change and challenge. 

Keith Silvester – It’s a Wild World: Making Sense in Confusing Times
Exploring Intellectual depth

In our current zeitgeist there seems to be a consensus that we live in a complex, polarised world: wars that do not get resolved, seemingly irreversible climate change, the impact of technology and social media and, with ‘fake news’ and not knowing who or what to believe. This may be surprising given how much ‘consciousness’ there is. Certainly in western societies we have had decades of therapy and personal development approaches to draw on.  So how come “the world is getting worse” (to quote James Hillman and Michael Ventura from 30 years ago)?  In this workshop we will explore how our contemporary world can be understood through an interpretation of Assagioli’s egg-shaped model of the psyche and its application to organisational and collective social change.

Aubyn Howard – A Depth Perspective on Leadership Development
Exploring Integrative depth

The gap between the crises we face and the leadership capacities needed to meet them continues to grow. Aubyn brings together three approaches that have been “strangers to each other” – horizontal, vertical and inner development – through a psychosynthesis lens. How do we work with leaders to develop the depth capacities this moment demands? This workshop explores depth through integration and synthesis – bringing inner healing into relationship with systemic awareness, personal growth with collective transformation, whilst staying embodied and grounded in the natural world. Participants will experience new ways of working with leadership development and take away practical models and tools, continuing an inquiry that began with dialogues between Roberto Assagioli, Abraham Maslow and Clare Graves in the 1960s.

**This year we want to make space to hear more voices of our community. If you’d like to present your work, and how you’re taking psychosynthesis out into the world, please get in touch with Bonny.

Lightning Talks

Psychological Flexibility & Transformation at Depth: What Psychedelic Experience Reveals About Developmental Capacity, Sonal Kadchha

In an era that often equates intensity with transformation, this talk examines what altered states of consciousness, induced by psychedelics, reveal about the psychological structure required for real and enduring change. Drawing on Psychosynthesis, we explore how psychological flexibility, discernment, and the development of the observing self determine whether depth stabilises into growth or dissolves into fragmentation. This talk invites a rethinking of transformation itself, not as breakthrough, but as integration sustained over time.

Depth in the Age of Algorithms: Staying in Right Relationship with AI, Nyla Khan

AI is already in our clients’ hands, and many are turning to it for reflection, meaning-making and guidance, often without an ethical container.Rather than rejecting or romanticising this shift, Nyla Khan explores what happens when a psychosynthesis practitioner steps into experimentation with care. Drawing on psychosynthesis, contemporary AI ethics and lived testing, Nyla asks: how do we engage technology without outsourcing Will or discernment?

Sam Starr – Ground & Rise Tarot: A Bridge for Coaching at Depth, Sam Starr

A brief introduction to Ground & Rise® Tarot as a method that connects symbolic enquiry with psychological awareness of our complex inner landscape. We’ll also work with the cards in small groups to discover insights around coaching at depth.

The Facilitators

Anne Welsh

Anne has worked in the field of personal and professional development for over 30 years.  Initially she trained in psychology and practiced as a psychotherapist.  Alongside this practice she was operations director of a psychological training and development institute, training people in coaching, psychotherapy and counselling.  In the last 10 years, she has specialised in executive coaching and worked with clients across the globe.  Since 2010 Anne has been training and supervising employees at GlaxoSmithKline in Job-Plus Coaching. She is also currently training in-house coaches for the House of Commons in the UK. Anne is an APECS Accredited Master Executive Coach, EMCC Senior Practitioner and a EMCC EISA coach supervisor.

Aubyn Howard

Aubyn is the co-founder (with Paul Elliott) of Psychosynthesis Coaching Limited. He holds an MA in Psychosynthesis Psychology with the London Institute of Psychosynthesis and an MSc in Change Agent Skills and Strategies with the HPRG at Surrey University. He draws upon more than 30 years’ experience as an organisational consultant, facilitator, educator and coach, supporting transformational change and leadership development with leaders of all sizes of organisation, across many different sectors and national cultures. For the last 10 years his focus has been the growth and development of Psychosynthesis Coaching and its’ EMCC accredited training programmes for individual and team coaches and supervisors. APECS Accredited Master Executive Coach, EMCC Senior Practitioner and EMCC EISA Psychosynthesis Coaching Supervisor. Author of Psychosynthesis Leadership Coaching: a Psychology of Being for a Time of Crisis (2020).

Bonny Tydeman

Bonny is a soulful leadership coach, psychospiritual guide and spoken word artist. In her coaching work with individuals and groups, she focuses on the cultivation of authentic expression as a pathway to finding meaning and belonging. Her background in the creative industries – where she was a creative producer, art director and cultural curator – informs her rich and imaginative approach to self-enquiry and initiation. She is passionate about the transformational power of creativity; the synthesis of spiritual exploration with psychological understanding; and the meeting place of personal and social transformation. Bonny has hundreds of hours of experience helping people to navigate change and challenge and is professionally supervised and accredited (at Senior Practitioner level) by the EMCC. She has trained in embodied coaching supervision and is on the faculty at the Psychosynthesis Coaching Academy, where she has acted as course tutor and co-facilitator. As a spoken word artist, she explores deep existential terrain with boldness and humour. Her debut spoken word album – Welcome the Dark – is now available on Spotify.

Theo Dijkman

Theo Dijkman has worked as a psychotherapist and clinical supervisor working in private practice for over 30 years. He has been UKCP registered since 2002, has completed a Foundation in Group Analysis and for 10 years was a senior faculty member of the Institute of Psychosynthesis in London where he delivered seminars on their MA programme. Since 2019 he has focused on his clinical practice as well as his writing. His articles for the professional psychotherapy and counselling community have appeared in international psychosynthesis publications. He has presented his papers to psychotherapy forums and at international conferences. Prior to his psychotherapy training he held senior management positions in mental health services in Scotland. 

Keith Silvester

Keith Silvester is a psychotherapist, trainer, supervisor and coach, qualified at the Institute of Psychosynthesis in 1990 where he later did his coaching training.  He was Director of Programmes of the Psychosynthesis Trust from 2003-2010 where he still now teaches and supervises. From 2009-2017 he was also Chair of Training Standards of the Humanistic and Integrative College of UKCP.  Since 2018 he has been President of the European Federation for Psychosynthesis Psychotherapy.  From 1993-2003 he was Head of the Counselling and Advisory Service of the Central School of Speech and Drama in London. A graduate of the University of Cambridge, he has an MSc in Training from Leicester University. He is a qualified community worker and Alexander Technique practitioner.

Kenneth Sørensen 

Kenneth has a Master’s Degree in Psychosynthesis from the University of East London. He is a psychotherapist and astrologer, and the author of six books, including The Soul of Psychosynthesis (2016), Integral Meditation (2017) and The Seven Types (2019). He is a former director of training at the Norwegian Institute of Psychosynthesis. Kenneth’s website www.kennethsorensen.dk offers more than 100 articles in English on the topics of psychosynthesis and the Seven Types. He is the CEO of www.jivayou.com, which offers online identity profiles based on Roberto Assagioli’s theory of the seven psychological types.

Lightning Talks

Sonal Kadchha is a London-based Psychosynthesis therapist. and researcher specialising in integration after intensity and depth-oriented transformation. Her work focuses on psychological flexibility, discernment, and the developmental capacities that allow profound experiences to stabilise into lasting growth. She teaches internationally on Psychosynthesis, psychedelic integration, and the distinction between transient states and enduring structural change.

Nyla Khan is a Psychosynthesis Coach and facilitator working across relational depth and values-led leadership. With nearly two decades of experience in entrepreneurial and leadership environments, Nyla integrates psychosynthesis, systems thinking and embodied practice into her work. Her recent exploration into ethical AI integration reflects her commitment to ensuring technology serves depth rather than dilutes it.

Sam Starr is a psychosynthesis psychologist,  EMCC-accredited leadership coach and advanced Tarot practitioner. She is the founder of Ground & Rise® Tarot, a practice that bridges spirituality and psychology through symbol, parts work and intentionally framed closed questions that keep agency with the querent. Her work invites a lived, embodied experience of psychosynthesis in real time.