The Eagles
Jake
Eagle was a businessman, organizational consultant, international trainer
of Neuro-Linguistic Programming, and is now a licensed psychotherapist.
"Since I was very young, I've been
interested in how people step fully into their unique place in life. As
a business leader, and in my first several years as a therapist, I tried
to direct people to step into their potential. Today, I have more faith
in people--in part, because of the Percept model, which I see as a process
that encourages self-initiated growth. Living and teaching Percept has changed
my conception of personal growth and therapy. I now place less emphasis
on trying to change the parts of ourselves we don't like and more emphasis
on acceptance and integration." Jake
EagleHannah Eagle was a body worker for thirteen years, an artist, a student of meditation, and is now a practicing homeopath. "As a body worker, I observed that as we age, in our efforts to hold on to some "safe" known self, we progressively become more and more inflexible in body and mind. During my first Percept training, I discovered a more playful, spontaneous, and flexible part of myself. I discovered a more creative way of being in the world and found the courage to live outside of my limited "safe" identity. I found a new sense of being alive in my life. I also discovered I want to share this way of being with others." Hannah Eagle
In 1998, we, Jake and Hannah Eagle, had the good fortune to meet John and Joyce Weir, an elderly couple that had been in the therapeutic community for about as many years as we had been alive. John and Joyce, at 85 when we met, had been working together for 50 years. They had developed an orientation to living that would forever change our lives-and the way in which we would work with clients. The Weirs named this orientation, Percept. Since 1998 we have stayed very engaged with the Weirs. We attended their final residential program shortly after meeting them, and have enjoyed a personal relationship with them ever since. The Weirs are a model of health - as individuals, as a couple, as parents, and as professionals. It is a bit hard to sort out how much of their health and clarity and ease comes with age, and how much is the result of the Percept orientation. We have known other elderly people, and the Weirs stand out as unique in the way they flow through life. They are constantly curious. They are unencumbered by drama. They don't repeat stories exhaustively or even talk much about the past. They don't plan for the future any more than is necessary. When they encounter differences with each other, they listen, they speak, they acknowledge and they sometimes say, "Nice to know you," and then they move on, but with no apparent aftertaste.
The Weirs
John
has a strong academic background, having taught at UC Poly Tech. We detect
the influences of Freud, Jung, and Rogers in John's work and theories, but
John claims to have been strongly influenced by the "holy trinity"
of Gestalt psychology: Koffka, Kluger, and Koehler. "The
best part of living in Percept for me is the freedom from striving to please
others. I have a reduction of concerns, less obligations, no struggling
or striving. There is peace, quiet, and harmony. I take things as they are.
Everything has its own life. Mine is uncluttered and autonomous. Nothing
is important now. I don't bother with novels or movies -- I have no desire
to be involved in reconstructions or imitations of life -- I'm too fascinated
with my own experience." John WeirJoyce, with her background in expressive dance, yoga, dance therapy, group therapy, and the fine arts, brings a balance and softness to the Weirs work that results in a feeling of wholeness-which is what their work is all about. "Day and night there's a dream going on. We're paying attention during the day to what's going on between us and the jobs that we have to do in the living process, but underneath there is that constant flow of dream, like a river that bubbles up once in awhile. I'm wanting us to pay more attention to that part of us, those constant messages from an unknown part of us." Joyce Weir