Session 1: Introduction and Overview
Describes the stages of psychological development that lead up to the material presented in the course. Defines deliberate living and uses examples to illustrate it. Presents a diagrammatic overview of the course.
Session 2: Cultivating Awareness of Conduct
Explains the importance of awareness of one's conduct. Describes how awareness can be lacking due to multitasking, the mind's chattering, automatically responding to circumstances and experiencing emotional pain. Shows how the practice of mindfulness can be used to regain it.
Session 3: Evaluating the Consequences of Conduct
Identifies the most pertinent subset of experience for the purpose of evaluation. Stresses the importance of being able to perform the evaluation as the need arises instead of relying on fixed answers. Lists the leading questions with which to evaluate the chosen subset of experience. Explains how to deal with conflicting results of evaluation. Warns about the danger of rationalisation.
Session 4: Purposefully Adopting Beliefs
Examines the purpose of beliefs. Identifies different kinds of beliefs, how they are adopted, what effect they have on one's worldview, and how to purposefully change them. Presents a diagrammatic overview of the interaction between beliefs and behaviour.
Session 5: Tying Knowledge to Circumstances
Identifies the potential inherent in circumstances. Shows how to identify and pursue more desirable circumstances. Explains the working of empathy. Describes the role that the mindset plays in trying to fulfil the potential available in the present circumstances.
Session 6: Mastering Failure
Identifies different types and causes of failure. Suggests ways in which its emotional ravages might be overcome, and even prevented from taking place.
Session 7: Summoning the Courage
Explores the psychological challenges that one is likely to encounter when attempting to live deliberately - loss of group identity, upheavals in one's worldview, the frustration of living in a dysfunctional society and the dangers of not living by societal rules.
Session 8: Choosing a Life Direction
Asks the attendees to decide which aspects of their lives they are going to take responsibility for and how much responsibility they are going to accept. Asks the attendees to decide on their life direction. Stresses the importance of formulating an internal standard for living.
Session 9: The Decision-making Process
Places all of the material covered thus far on the traditional timeline (past, present and future) to show how it comes together to guide the process for making decisions. Presents a diagrammatic overview of the process.
Session 10: Reaching beyond Personal Experience
Describes how lessons learned from personal experience can be extended to new situations by relying on spiritual teachings, observation, imagination and inspiration. Distinguishes between consequences that are under one's control and consequences that require other people's cooperation to produce.
Session 11: Deliberate Living Highlights
Highlights the main benefits of deliberate living - not getting hurt, release of judgement and conscious evolution. Explains how deliberate living can be used to derive values and goals, transcend rules and regulations and dispense with the concept of morality.
Session 12: Where to from here?
Clarifies misconceptions about deliberate living that may have arisen during the course. Describes the stage of psychological development associated with deliberate living and briefly sketches the subsequent ones. Places deliberate living in the larger life context and suggests how to continue its pursuit now that the course is over. Gathers feedback on the course and answers any remaining questions.