Welcoming message from our founder:
Kalli Holmes Sorensen

Updated September 2007

Welcome! It occurs to me that if you are reading this, perhaps we are already meeting on common ground.  We both have a heart-felt desire to provide our children with a positive, supportive environment for learning.  A system that offers a more balanced and holistic approach that includes mind, body and soul awareness, as well as academic, intellectual offerings, thus assisting students to truly thrive. What we want as parents for our children is based on our personal values and individual belief systems. Our choices and decisions start here. A child’s education often reflects a parents hopes, dreams and goals for their child.

For myself and my husband, Rev. Christian Sorensen, this was the starting point for the Seaside Wisdom For Life School (SWLS). At the time we begun actual conception for the school in fall of 2004, our son Trevor was five and starting kindergarten in the following fall of 2005. We recognized that other than what parents offer in the home environment, a child’s school has the strongest influence on their growth and expansion. We wanted a learning environment not only in alignment with our values but one that honors his Inner Wisdom and encourages spiritual character development a long side emotional and intellectual awareness. We wanted a more heart-centered, life-enriching approach. Dr. Tobin Hart, psychologist and author of From Information to Transformation: Education for the Evolution of Consciousness addresses this well, "Education is more than a transmission of facts and skills. To truly educate is to draw forth the qualities of heart and intellect that make for excellence in both human development and academic achievement. We cannot truly learn unless we make space for the inner life in which reflection, imagination and intuition are cultivated." In our search for such a place that embraces this philosophy, we found few alternative options in the North County of San Diego area.

In October 2004 I had the pleasure of attending ChildSpirit, a children’s spirituality and educational conference attended by hundreds of parents, educators and researchers. In doing so, I had the opportunity to attend a presentation introducing a well-established, but relatively unknown, educational system with more than thirty five years experience in teaching universal values and encouraging conscious awareness. This alternative, or holistic system of education is called "Education for Life," the roots which are based on Yoganada’s teachings.We found this to be very much in alignment withour own New Thought philosophies and guiding principles taught here at Seaside Center for Spiritual Living (SCSL) based on the teachings of Ernest Holmes. This offers us a wonderful balance of both Eastern and Western practices which embraces the unity of all religions and their common purpose in helping people experience joy, love and peace, qualities more important than ever before in the culture and times we live in. I was thrilled to find a pre-existing educational model which respects diversity and the development of autonomy and interdependence. We soon formed a strategic alliance with the Education For Life Foundation.  This was to become the model, system or approach for teaching expanded awareness and higher consciousness at Seaside Wisdom For Life School incorporating Universal Truth found in Religious Science principles and all New Thought philosophies.

Seaside Wisdom For LifeSchool’s affiliation with our sponsor, the Seaside Center for Spiritual Living (SCSL) community, brings a supportive network in many ways to the school that a small independent school would not have. There are many resources to draw from within a larger community. The association with SCSL and our larger international community, United Centers for Spiritual Living (UCSL) gives the school a spiritual energy that it might not otherwise have. Not all the families in the school will choose to be involved with the center, some will come from other various spiritual traditions and cultures, enabling a diverse community within the classroom. One can be involved with our community or not, there is really no distinction made about it.

SCSL is also one of only three campuses in the country for the Homes Institute for ministerial education providing an accredited master degree in consciousness studies. We are well established as an educational campus offering a wide assortment of spiritually supportive classes for adults through our new SeasideLifeAcademy. As an educational destination, we recognize the need to bring a higher awareness to our youth which now takes place on the same campus.  We, and many others over the last decade, have shared and held the vision of a spiritually based, non-profit, private school on our grounds. We are one of the first Centers within UCSL to accomplish this, although we see more to come soon.

Many people today recognize that a fundamental change in education is urgently needed for the overall welfare of our children and our evolution. SWLS is now answering this call for change and embracing a more "Transformational Learning" approach to education. We are starting by establishing mutually respectful relationships between children, parents and teachers. This is a system in which the teachers relate as partners with students in a program designed to promote cooperation instead of competition. Where parents and teachers participate as a unified whole to form the foundation for SWLS. Personally, it is very exciting for me to be introducing such a great life-enriching system of education to the San Diego area for the first time. Going into our third year now, we are on track to grow a grade level each year, expanding to eventually include K-6  or above.

So it is with intention for the highest good for all our children that we invite you to come explore. Ask yourself what your core values for your family are and what type of an educational environment your child would best thrive in. Then take a look at what is offered here at Wisdom For Life School and listen to your heart for the answer. For there in lies the answers we seek for our children.

As a united, unified community we can expand the consciousness of many more children. May your path lead you to discover the optimum place of learning for your child.  Honoring the importance of your decision, we invite you to contact us so that we may support you. Please let us know if you have further questions, considerations or comments. We thank you for considering the SWFLS in your search.