Contemplative Design Upcoming Workshops

70 years ago psychologist Abraham Maslow presented his ground-breaking theory of human motivation. He defined first-order human needs as a hierarchy of physiological, safety, belonging and esteem and higher-order human needs as self-actualization and self-transcendence.

At Contemplative Designer we believe that we as designers and architects are falling short of designing our built environments to fulfill both the first-order and higher-order human needs.

This is why as designers we need to train in Contemplative Design.

Contemplative Design is the synergy of the inner technologies of contemplation and its timeless wisdom with the outer technologies of design and its timeless ingenuity to bring about a built world where each and every built space is mediator of human flourishing, not just well-being.

When we tap into the vast potential of contemplative design we begin to transform not just “how” we design and “what” we design but also profoundly shape “who” we can become as designers.

We have developed a novel framework for a contemplative design process synergizing our Founder Sarika Bajoria’s real-world experience of practicing architecture and teaching contemplative practice with research in the science of human flourishing, neuroaesthetics and psychology.

Creating Space for Creativity: Building Resilience

01 CONTEMPLATIVE DESIGN

WEDNESDAY APRIL 3, 2024. 6:00-7:30 PM ET (virtual workshop)

As designers and architects how do we cut the puppet strings keeping us in reactive design process, constantly responding to design challenges reflexively?

This learning journey blends diverse experiential contemplative practices, interactive breakouts and practical tools for immediate application for your design process to help you:

  • Build creative agency by building your inner sanctuary for creativity to transform auto-pilot reactions to design challenges into resources for creativity.

  • Heighten resources of empathic imagination, intuition and multisensory awareness as your design superpower

  • Direct the trajectory of your design process with authentic confidence through controlling your momentary design minds.

02 Expanding Perspectives: Enabling Conscious Collaboration

CHALLENGES

  • Your designers and teams… long for authentic connection with teammates, clients and end-users and a cohesive culture.

  • Fear judgment, fierce competition and isolation.

  • You want more diverse and inclusive perspectives in your projects and teams.

TAKEAWAYS

  • Foster conscious collaboration with clients, colleagues, and the design process by deploying the first contact method of listening where wonder and empathy break habits of conditioned thinking and implicit bias.

  • Engender socially and ecologically conscious projects through viewing every project participant with new expanded perspectives of wisdom and compassion.

SELECT TOOLS & PRACTICES

  • Practice deep listening with a beginner’s mind in every interaction with clients and colleagues.

  • Expand compassion to Nature by identifying your “sustainability superpower”.

  • Give and take in “Wonder and Empathy Circles” to bring collective wisdom to a design challenge.

03 Embracing Form follows Intention: Supercharging Momentum

CHALLENGES

  • Your designers and leaders…know what they do and how they do it but not their design “why”.

  • Core values are misaligned with your organization’s mission and culture leading to stalled momentum.

  • Lack a clear vision of the impact they want to make on the built environment during your career.

TAKEAWAYS

  • Deepen self-knowledge through designing an embodied mental and emotional blueprint of your future designer self, aligned with your design values and your organization’s mission as the northstar to staying on course.

  • Deploy the design momentum equation to ensure that your highest intentions for the built environment is put into constant action over the course of long complex projects.

SELECT TOOLS & PRACTICES

  • Conduct reflective self-inquiry into your core design values to crystallize design intention.

  • Meet your “future designer self” in a future project and design as your mental and emotional blueprint.

  • Supercharge momentum by taking on the role of a variable of the design momentum equation.

04 Becoming an Instrument of Design : Embodying the Future Now

CHALLENGES

  • Your designers, leaders and teams… lack meaning and purpose in their daily design practice and low engagement.

  • Your teams are not aligned with your larger values and mission. You have higher turnover rates.

  • Limited bandwidth is hindering adopting cutting-edge insights from allied fields of design.

TAKEAWAYS

  • Embody self-transcendent design intention by bringing your future potential as Eco-designers to create “spaces of flourishing” into the present through iterating and becoming an Instrument of Design.

  • Explore how insights from neuroaesthetics on the shared universal human psychological and neurological responses to built environments can help dissolve artificial boundaries of siloed design thinking.

SELECT TOOLS & PRACTICES

  • Design with understanding of the neurobiological universality of human experience of spaces.

  • Design in the persona of an Eco-designer who sees the web of interdependence amongst all design participants.

  • Realize the “Future is Now” and iterate as an intentional instrument of design to bring the emerging future of “spaces of flourishing” into the now.

The exceptional benefits of our unique methods

In addition to the survey results here, designers also reported that our methods helped them forge deeper connections with their colleagues, embrace authenticity and vulnerability, and find greater meaning in their projects through contemplative design practice.

  • I am confident in my ability to be creative on demand.

  • I am able to fruitfully engage with difficult clients and colleagues.

  • I have clarity of vision of the future designer I want to become.

  • My design life is aligned with my intentions for the built world.

Authentically transforming our built environment one designer’s mind at a time.

  • “Contemplative Designer has helped me find a way to bring back the joy of designing ...

    through methods to create beautiful and meaningful spaces. Challenges like burn-out, fierce competition can be overwhelming !

    Madeline Amhurst, Project Designer and Job Captain, Gensler New York

  • "This is a groundbreaking process essential for all designers and innovators."

    “The tools and practices were incredibly powerful to move through mental blocks, limitations and deepen my creative potential.”

    Vellachi Ganesan, Senior Lighting Designer, Associate Principal, Spectrum Engineers Adjunct Faculty, University of Utah

  • “Sarika has the rare ability to communicate profound insights in simple and clear language.

    All participants were impressed by Sarika’s comprehensive approach in her theoretical grounding, practical and skillful means.

    Dennis Winters, OALA, ASLA Principal, Landscape Architect Tales of the Earth

  • “I realized how self-reflective practices can help me become a better designer and teammate.”

    “I don’t have much experience with contemplative practices so it was very interesting to engage my mind in a way that directly connected the practice to the design profession.

    Eric Salitsky, Designer, ESKW Architects