EXCPLORING HUMAN DEVELOPEMENT
BILL PALMER AND TERESA HADLAND IN NOVEMBER 2025

14 – 16 November 2025 in Wageningen

MASTERCLASS: “EXCPLORING HUMAN DEVELOPEMENT”

Being a therapist, whether with the body or the mind requires certain skills which are traditionally the capacities of the ‘elders’ in society. For instance:  mentoring, active listening, non-judgement and holding-space. Although all of these sound like verbal communication skills, they are also expressed and felt by the WAY in which you touch someone and move their body so flow equally within both bodywork and talking.

These abilities can also be developed when you are younger. The key is to realise that they are not rules that you follow but come naturally from your work on yourself. For instance, if there are parts of yourself that you haven’t integrated then you will inevitably be triggered by people who express similar features. If you have faced and embraced your own demons then clients can sense that and feel safe to be themselves so you naturally hold a secure space for them.

In this workshop we will focus on developing these capacities through the way you do bodywork and also through processes by which you explore yourself. The workshop continues the journey through Human Development started in November 2024. However, it is accessible to anyone and we will review the stages of life we explored in the previous workshop.

Each stage expresses the flowering of one of the deep energy functions of East Asian medicine and by working to activate these functions you can find a way to integrate the challenge of that stage of life. Movement Shiatsu contains particular processes and bodywork techniques for stimulating these ‘developmental energy functions’ and Inner Qigong provides ways to practise and strengthen them on your own.

In this workshop we will focus on developing the following:

  • Becoming aware of  core patterns through somatic exploration, voicework, drama processes and movement.
  • Working with emotional issues through movement and touch
  • Using techniques from Movement Shiatsu and Inner Qigong to resolve traumas which block natural development.
  • Reviewing the Six Forms of Touch which show how different aspects of therapeutic dynamics can be conveyed through the WAY in which you touch and move a person.

FOR WHOM?

You’re warmly welcome—no matter your age or level of experience as a therapist! Although this course is a follow-up to the “Stages of Life” course in November 2024, it is not necessary to have attended that one. No other previous workshops with Bill and Teresa are required either—just some experience with shiatsu or another form of hands-on bodywork, and an interest in inner development.

ACCREDITATIONS

Accreditation will be requested from KTNO (among others NVST) and ZHONG (category 1 and/or 3). LVNT and SVN automatically recognize our training courses.

THE TEACHERS

BILL PALMER

Bill Palmer was one of the pioneers of oriental bodywork and Qigong in Europe in the 1970s. He saw that the basis of the oriental approach was to “facilitate the communication within”.

He began to investigate how people could access suppressed parts of their personality through their bodies and through movement. He worked for ten years with teachers in the voice work tradition of Alfred Wolfson and Roy Hart. He studied Qigong, Chinese Herbal Medicine, Developmental Movement Therapy and Drama Therapy and founded the School for Experiential Education. Within this school the emphasis is on learning through exploration and improvisation.

Bill is the initiator of the shiatsu style “Movement Shiatsu”. He teaches Movement Shiatsu around the world. He is also regularly involved in music improvisations, which he sees mainly as a way to let go of the dominant mind in order to be able to be together in a spontaneous way.

My central belief is that we, as individuals, are not wise enough to know what is best for another person. Therefore, I do not try to understand what to do by diagnosis and theory. Instead, I focus on helping people to feel into themselves through their body sensations and their natural life process. My work is now more like education than therapy.
– Bill Palmer 

TERESA HADLAND

Teresa Hadland has studied Shiatsu since 1980 in the East-West Centre in Edinburgh and London, the Iokai Centre in Japan and for many years with Sonia Moriceau in the UK.

For 11 years she taught on the BA in Complementary and Holistic Therapies at Derby University and is now Senior Tutor at the School for Experiential Education. Since 2000 she has coordinated the assessment of teachers for the Shiatsu Society.

She now runs two busy practices in the UK and, with Bill Palmer,  co-teaches courses in Inner Qigong and Movement Shiatsu worldwide. Her special interest is in how emotional issues can be resolved through working with the body.

PRAKTICAL INFORMATION

Date: 14, 15 and 16 of November 2025

Location: KenKon
Nieuwe Kanaal 11, Wageningen
Times: 10 to 17 o’clock

Investment  incl. daily lunch (vegetarian): €395,-,
€95,- upon registration, the remainder before the start.

(For people familiar with our school: this training really is in Wageningen! And not in our current working space in Nijmegen.)

SIGN IN

Are you in? You can sign in with the button below. You pay the registration fee €95,- when signing in. For the rest you will receive an invoice later.

(NB: If you ar from an other country than The Netherlands, you better send me an e-mail, so I can sign you in manually. Mail me: jaana@handsontao.nl )

Sign in for the Bill Palmer weekend in November 2025

ARTICLE

Read the article  “The Six Forms Of Touch”, that Bill wrote. You find more articles at https://seed.org/article-archive/