Upcoming
Courses and Trainings
Obituary as Art: A Legacy Workshop
What if an obituary wasn't just an announcement — but a work of art? Over five Tuesday evenings, we'll gather to write, reflect, and create. Through whatever form calls to you — writing, poetry, collage, song, or visual art — you'll leave with a finished piece that captures something true and beautiful about who you are and the life you have lived.
Book Club 2: Everything was Beautiful and nothing hurt
Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt by Ben Reeves
This tender, imaginative novel is narrated by Travis, an embodiment of Death who quietly accompanies people through their final moments. When he forms an unexpected bond with a midwife and her young daughter, his carefully maintained distance from human life begins to unravel. Through compassion, loss, love, and ordinary moments of beauty, the novel invites readers to contemplate mortality, what it means to accompany the dying, and how an awareness of death can deepen our appreciation of being alive. It is especially fitting for conversations about conscious dying, presence, and the sacredness of life’s final threshold.
CDI Meet & Greet Session: October
Meet the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation: An Online Community Meet and Greet
We warmly invite you to join the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation for a live online meet-and-greet and community conversation.
This gathering is an opportunity to learn more about who we are, what we offer, and the vision guiding our work. Whether you are considering one of our programs, exploring end-of-life education, seeking meaningful ways to serve your community, or simply curious about our work, you are welcome.
Cohort 2: Sacred Passage Doula Intensive
Sacred Passage Doula Intensive
Where ancient wisdom meets the sacred work of our time.
This training is for healers, caregivers, hospice workers, and those with no formal background at all. It is for those who hold a bone-depth knowledge that this is their work. If death has found you, if you have sat at the bedside and felt something vast and sacred move through you, you may already be a doula at heart. This intensive will give you the language, the skills, and the community to answer that calling.
Join Us: @ The 11th Annual Death Faire in Pittsboro, NC
Join us @ The 11th Annual Death Faire in Pittsboro, NC
Facing Death, Finding Life: A Meditation on Impermanence
Facilitated by Christina L. Vair
Inspired by the work of poet, author, and educator Stephen Levine, this guided meditation invites participants to gently explore impermanence and mortality. Through mindful reflection, we will create space to soften fear, deepen acceptance, and awaken to the preciousness of the present moment—discovering how facing death can help us live more fully and consciously.
CDI Meet & Greet Session: November
Meet the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation: An Online Community Meet and Greet
We warmly invite you to join the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation for a live online meet-and-greet and community conversation.
This gathering is an opportunity to learn more about who we are, what we offer, and the vision guiding our work. Whether you are considering one of our programs, exploring end-of-life education, seeking meaningful ways to serve your community, or simply curious about our work, you are welcome.
Join Us: @ Science and Soul Conference in Nashville, TN
Join us @ The Science and Soul: Advancing Health Care Through Caritas Practice
Facilitated Session by Christina L. Vair
The 2026 Caritas Community Conference invites nurses and Watson Caring Science practitioners from around the world to gather in shared purpose and presence. Science and Soul honors the integration of evidence-based nursing and the sacred work of human caring. Together, we will explore innovative scholarship, experiential Caritas practice, and global perspectives that advance transpersonal caring in contemporary healthcare. Through dialogue, reflection, and community, we deepen our commitment to whole-person healing and to sustaining the heart of nursing in our time.
CDI Meet & Greet Session: December
Meet the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation: An Online Community Meet and Greet
We warmly invite you to join the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation for a live online meet-and-greet and community conversation.
This gathering is an opportunity to learn more about who we are, what we offer, and the vision guiding our work. Whether you are considering one of our programs, exploring end-of-life education, seeking meaningful ways to serve your community, or simply curious about our work, you are welcome.
Book Club 3: The Path Everywhere: Unlocking the Jewels Hidden Within You
The Path is Everywhere is an intimate, provocative journey into the inner landscape of consciousness, the body, and the heart, weaving together the wisdom-streams of contemplative spirituality, relational psychotherapy, and the poetic imagination. It emerged from dialogues I had with colleagues, clients, and participants on retreat, as we opened together into the mysteries of an embodied psychological inquiry and spiritual exploration.
CDI Meet & Greet Session: Jan 2027
Meet the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation: An Online Community Meet and Greet
We warmly invite you to join the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation for a live online meet-and-greet and community conversation.
This gathering is an opportunity to learn more about who we are, what we offer, and the vision guiding our work. Whether you are considering one of our programs, exploring end-of-life education, seeking meaningful ways to serve your community, or simply curious about our work, you are welcome.
CDI Meet & Greet Session: Feb 2027
Meet the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation: An Online Community Meet and Greet
We warmly invite you to join the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation for a live online meet-and-greet and community conversation.
This gathering is an opportunity to learn more about who we are, what we offer, and the vision guiding our work. Whether you are considering one of our programs, exploring end-of-life education, seeking meaningful ways to serve your community, or simply curious about our work, you are welcome.
Cohort 3: Sacred Passage Doula Intensive
Sacred Passage Doula Intensive
Where ancient wisdom meets the sacred work of our time.
This training is for healers, caregivers, hospice workers, and those with no formal background at all. It is for those who hold a bone-depth knowledge that this is their work. If death has found you, if you have sat at the bedside and felt something vast and sacred move through you, you may already be a doula at heart. This intensive will give you the language, the skills, and the community to answer that calling.
CDI Meet & Greet Session: Mar 2027
Meet the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation: An Online Community Meet and Greet
We warmly invite you to join the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation for a live online meet-and-greet and community conversation.
This gathering is an opportunity to learn more about who we are, what we offer, and the vision guiding our work. Whether you are considering one of our programs, exploring end-of-life education, seeking meaningful ways to serve your community, or simply curious about our work, you are welcome.
CDI Meet & Greet Session: Apr 2027
Meet the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation: An Online Community Meet and Greet
We warmly invite you to join the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation for a live online meet-and-greet and community conversation.
This gathering is an opportunity to learn more about who we are, what we offer, and the vision guiding our work. Whether you are considering one of our programs, exploring end-of-life education, seeking meaningful ways to serve your community, or simply curious about our work, you are welcome.
CDI Meet & Greet Session: May 2027
Meet the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation: An Online Community Meet and Greet
We warmly invite you to join the Conscious Dying Institute Foundation for a live online meet-and-greet and community conversation.
This gathering is an opportunity to learn more about who we are, what we offer, and the vision guiding our work. Whether you are considering one of our programs, exploring end-of-life education, seeking meaningful ways to serve your community, or simply curious about our work, you are welcome.
Cohort 4: Sacred Passage Doula Intensive
Sacred Passage Doula Intensive
Where ancient wisdom meets the sacred work of our time.
This training is for healers, caregivers, hospice workers, and those with no formal background at all. It is for those who hold a bone-depth knowledge that this is their work. If death has found you, if you have sat at the bedside and felt something vast and sacred move through you, you may already be a doula at heart. This intensive will give you the language, the skills, and the community to answer that calling.
Cohort 5: Sacred Passage Doula Intensive
Sacred Passage Doula Intensive
Where ancient wisdom meets the sacred work of our time.
This training is for healers, caregivers, hospice workers, and those with no formal background at all. It is for those who hold a bone-depth knowledge that this is their work. If death has found you, if you have sat at the bedside and felt something vast and sacred move through you, you may already be a doula at heart. This intensive will give you the language, the skills, and the community to answer that calling.
Event Full
Sacred Passage Doula Intensive
Where ancient wisdom meets the sacred work of our time.
This training is for healers, caregivers, hospice workers, and those with no formal background at all. It is for those who hold a bone-depth knowledge that this is their work. If death has found you, if you have sat at the bedside and felt something vast and sacred move through you, you may already be a doula at heart. This intensive will give you the language, the skills, and the community to answer that calling.
What You Will Learn/The Container
You will be held in a lineage of care that honors death not as failure, but as completion. Over five months, you will receive:
Training in the practical and sacred arts of end-of-life support
Tools for vigil holding, death planning, and grief tending
Embodied practices to resource yourself for this tender work
A community of fellow threshold keepers walking beside you
Investment: $3000
Space in this intensive is intentionally limited to honor the depth of the work. To be trained in the art of sacred passage is to receive a lifetime of service to offer others. This investment covers the full five month container - both intensives, all monthly teachings, and the ongoing support of your community and teachers. We are committed to accessibility; please reach out if you need a payment plan or wish to discuss options.
In-Person Gatherings:
3-Day Intensive: May 22-24, 2026
4-Day Intensive: October 9-12, 2026
The Journey:
Between gatherings, you'll engage in monthly practices and teachings that weave preparation, presence, and personal transformation into your becoming.
This training is for those who feel the call to serve at life's most profound threshold—to be a compassionate guide and sacred witness as souls complete their earthly journey.
Breathwork for Grief and Sorrow
Free
Join us for a sacred space to be with grief, sorrow, and the depths of our human experience. Through intentional breathwork, we invite the possibility of allowing—not to push away what we feel, but to move through it, to let it breathe, to honor it.
In community, we create a container where these emotions can be witnessed and held. Whether you're navigating loss, processing sorrow, or simply needing to release what you've been carrying, you are welcome here.
Hosted by two experienced breathwork facilitators who will gently guide you through this powerful practice.
No experience necessary. Come as you are.
Breathwork for Grief and Sorrow
Free
Join us for a sacred space to be with grief, sorrow, and the depths of our human experience. Through intentional breathwork, we invite the possibility of allowing—not to push away what we feel, but to move through it, to let it breathe, to honor it.
In community, we create a container where these emotions can be witnessed and held. Whether you're navigating loss, processing sorrow, or simply needing to release what you've been carrying, you are welcome here.
Hosted by two experienced breathwork facilitators who will gently guide you through this powerful practice.
No experience necessary. Come as you are.
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Title 1
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Title 2
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Event 3
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Event 2
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Event 1
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Event One
It all begins with an idea. Maybe you want to launch a business. Maybe you want to turn a hobby into something more. Or maybe you have a creative project to share with the world. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.
Upcoming Experiences
Sunday, June 21, 2026 | 90 Minutes | Virtual
Hosted by the Conscious Dying Institute | Facilitated by Kelly Cummings, Certified Sacred Breathwork Facilitator (400 hrs)
Today the sun stands still.
In many traditions, the solstice is not only a celebration of light — it is a moment of reckoning. A pause. An invitation to ask what we are willing to witness in ourselves at the height of our own aliveness.
At the Conscious Dying Institute, we return often to the image of earth as witness — the steady, unshakeable ground beneath us that has held every joy, every grief, every turning. On the solstice, we breathe into that ground. We let the breath carry us into the places we have been too busy, or too afraid, to visit.
This is a ceremony. Come as you are.
What to Expect
A 90-minute guided conscious connected breathwork journey with opening meditation, intentional music, and space for integration. No prior breathwork experience is needed — only your willingness to arrive.
What to Bring
• A comfortable place to lie down
• A blanket
• An eye covering
• A journal and pen for integration
• Water nearby
Investment: $45 | Sliding scale honored — reach out if pricing is a barrier.
Questions? Contact Kelly at kelly@consciousdyinginstitute.com
A Zoom link will be sent upon registration.
Tuesday, September 22, 2026 | 90 Minutes | Virtual
Hosted by the Conscious Dying Institute | Facilitated by Kelly Cummings, Certified Sacred Breathwork Facilitator (400 hrs)
Day and night are equal today. The trees already know what we are still learning — that letting go is not a failure. It is the most natural thing a living thing can do.
At the heart of the Conscious Dying Institute's work is a simple, radical trust: that the earth has always been our witness. That the ground beneath us has held every death, every birth, every season of our lives without flinching. In the practice of earth as witness, we press ourselves — through breath, through intention, through presence — back into contact with that holding.
On the Autumnal Equinox, we breathe together. Into what is complete. Into what is composting. Into the spacious, honest grace of the in-between.
What to Expect
A 90-minute guided conscious connected breathwork journey with opening meditation, intentional music, and space for integration. No prior breathwork experience is needed — only your willingness to arrive.
What to Bring
• A comfortable place to lie down
• A blanket
• An eye covering
• A journal and pen for integration
• Water nearby
Investment: $45 | Sliding scale honored — reach out if pricing is a barrier.
Questions? Contact Kelly at kelly@consciousdyinginstitute.com
A Zoom link will be sent upon registration.
Monday, December 21, 2026 | 90 Minutes | Virtual
Hosted by the Conscious Dying Institute | Facilitated by Kelly Cummings, Certified Sacred Breathwork Facilitator (400 hrs)
Today is the shortest day. And it is also, quietly, the beginning of the return.
Even at the earth's deepest stillness — even in the season most associated with endings — the light begins again. Not with fanfare. With one small, almost imperceptible increment of brightness. The earth turns. She always turns.
This is at the heart of everything we hold at the Conscious Dying Institute: the understanding that endings and beginnings are not opposites, but partners. That earth as witness means trusting the ground to hold us through both — the dying and the being reborn.
On the Winter Solstice, we breathe the year to its close. We grieve what we must. We rest in what remains. And we let the breath carry us, gently, toward whatever is beginning.
What to Expect
A 90-minute guided conscious connected breathwork journey with opening meditation, intentional music, and space for integration. No prior breathwork experience is needed — only your willingness to arrive.
What to Bring
• A comfortable place to lie down
• A blanket
• An eye covering
• A journal and pen for integration
• Water nearby
Investment: $45 | Sliding scale honored — reach out if pricing is a barrier.
Questions? Contact Kelly at kelly@consciousdyinginstitute.com
A Zoom link will be sent upon registration.