Progressing Through The Playshop

It is by design that The Playshop is simple, easy to understand, and easily practiced.

The four stages of competence are the internal conditions involved in learning a new skill. First, we don't know that we don't know, which we sometimes mask with denial. At this stage, we aren't sure if our skill set will be helped or hindered and so we tend to resist changing what we already believe.

The second stage is realizing that there is something to learn. Once we see value in an unknown skill, that resistance turns to interest and learning begins. In this stage we continue learning from others and absorb whatever we can.

The third stage is conscious competence. We understand the skill and can use it, while still giving attention to what we are doing. This is the practicing stage, where we learn from our results and notice how subtle shifts in our technique affect them.

The fourth stage is corporeal. After enough practice, we achieve an unconscious competence: we can use the skill without thinking. In colloquial terms, we "get it in our body."

Learning Gets Into the Body

For any new skill, we go through these four stages. For some skills, like guitar playing, it can take moments to pass through the first stage, but then years can be invested in stage two to understand music theory and tab lines, tuning, posture, playing chords, and more. We could then invest years in stage three, practicing daily to make playing guitar second nature to us. When the guitar feels like an extension of our body, that we can play it at will and without thought, then we are at stage four. The Playshop is designed to make this progression much quicker. Its video lessons total about 90 minutes, and students are expected to become comfortable with conscious use of the cascade by the end of the lessons, as they practice and test the exercise.

Stage Three: Practice

Students can notice changes in their outlook and sense of self as they practice and test the exercise during the lessons. These early experiences encourage continued practice. Secondary effects of feeling connected, including increased empathy, intuition, and self-esteem, may ebb and flow as the exercise becomes familiar. Daily practice over the following weeks establishes the habit and incorporates it into ordinary life. Integration then develops over approximately two to three months, at which point the cascade becomes effortless and runs in the background.

Stage Four: Unconscious Competence

Stage four begins when the cascade becomes effortless and runs in the background. The process continues without the same conscious attention required during stage three. Epiphanies and subtle expansions can continue over the following weeks or months as old emotional charges release and our sense of connection becomes more familiar.

Becoming unconsciously competent is not yet the same as completing the process. Students “graduate” when a stressful event passes by quickly, without effort or residual stress. Memories remain, but they no longer carry the same emotional charge of suffering.

Progressing Through The Playshop

The Playshop is the second class at The Your Body Never Lies College, after the free class, Shift Your Inner Dialogue, which teaches practical exercises that reduce negative mental commentary. The Playshop teaches the cascade through about 90 minutes of video lessons. Students are expected to become comfortable with conscious use of the exercise by the end of those lessons.

With an activity feed you may post to or scroll through, and access to the founder and other members through messaging, the campus aims to support Playshop participants’ journey to corporeal competence and connection.