3.21.26 | Guest Presenter: Dr. Polly Young-Eisendrath | Workshop: Can You Stay Mindful When Emotionally Triggered?

This workshop introduces the Skill of Real Dialogue as a mindfulness practice for remaining present and open during emotional activation. Staying alert and responsive during emotional conflicts or disagreements requires special mindfulness skills—the ability to concentrate and remain open while being activated. This skill is essential for clinical work, organizational life, and intimate relationships. Participants will learn about human emotions, emotional entanglements, and how to track their own subjectivity in real time so that difficult conversations can be engaged without dehumanizing oneself or others.

Learning Objectives (6 CEs Pending Approval)
At the conclusion of this workshop, participants will be able to:

1. Apply the mindfulness practice of the “Snow Globe” of seeing, hearing, and feeling to their own subjectivity.
2. Identify and apply the three core skills of Real Dialogue: speaking for oneself, listening mindfully, and remaining curious.
3. Recognize the internal and interpersonal dynamics that characterize a “difficult conversation.”
4. Describe how emotional activation and emotional entanglements arise in interpersonal exchanges.
5. Practice tracking internal experience in real time while remaining engaged with another person.
6. Apply Real Dialogue skills to clinical, organizational, and relational contexts.
7. Demonstrate strategies for staying ethically grounded and non-dehumanizing during emotionally charged interactions.

(* A midday break will be provided for lunch excursions. Those interested in being included in a group reservation at the Stovall House, please email kelly@realdialogue.org.)

Polly Young-Eisendrath, PhD is a Jungian analyst, developmental psychologist, author, and internationally recognized teacher whose work bridges depth psychology, mindfulness practice, and the psychology of adult development. She is the founder and Executive Director of the Center for Real Dialogue™ a nonprofit dedicated to cultivating psychological maturity, ethical wisdom, and humanizing dialogue across differences.

She has taught and lectured widely on Jungian psychology, trauma, relational development, and the cultivation of wisdom in both clinical and public settings. She is the editor of The Cambridge Companion to Jung and the author of several influential books exploring women’s psychology, conflict, love, loss, and spiritual maturation. Her work is especially valued for its clarity, compassion, and grounded integration of psychological insight with lived experience.

A longtime mindfulness practitioner and teacher, Dr. Young-Eisendrath draws on Buddhist psychology alongside Jungian and developmental frameworks to explore how individuals and communities can meet suffering, complexity, and difference without dehumanization. Through her writing, teaching, and public programs, she invites audiences into a deeper engagement with inner life, ethical responsibility, and the possibility of mature love and dialogue in challenging times.