Susan Wildin, MD, CPC invites you to Dialogues for Social Change.

In these difficult times when everyone seems to be taking sides, I want to support people working together to separate our perceptions and judgments from our deepest longings. I believe if we act from these longings, change can happen more effectively and without alienating others. To create this connection to longing and a space of mutual connection and understanding between people across barriers of belief and judgment, I use a process I call Dialogues for Social Change which is based on the work of Marshall Rosenberg, PhD and Jim and Jori Manske.

I will be sharing this process and basics of Nonviolent Communication online in 3 two-hour, weekly workshops.

Recover Compassionately is a three-part, non-sequential series of online training, offering individuals struggling with thinking and behaviors that disconnect them from life-affirming choices, a way of living authentically with oneself, and compassionately with others.

Loving Ourselves with Warmth and Curiosity is one part of the three-part Recover Compassionately series that includes four 2-hour online classes, a 20-minute individual coaching session, and an online forum for group discussions — focused on nurturing ourselves.

Facilitated by Mark Friedman, CNVC Certification Candidate

Learn by doing.

We can think of no better way to learn the elements of connecting communication and get them into your bones at the same time than to pick a “live” conflict and role-play with someone how you might navigate to a solution that met the needs of all.

We use Nine Skills for Conflict Resolution based on work of CNVC certified trainers, Jim and Jori Manske.

If you are interested in this 3-hour workshop for any level of NVC folks, contact Bren or Susan.

When we have 8 or more interested, we’ll create a class.

Do you long to be truly heard? Do you long to hone your skills of listening in a meaningful way to others? Now imagine how having this skill could prevent miscommunication, deepen personal relationships, communicate across differences, and foster a more compassionate future for all of us.

Hard-wired into our brains is the capacity for empathic understanding and yet most of us have not been trained to listen well.

Empathic listening builds connection, honesty, trust and may stem the growing epidemic of loneliness. Find 3 or 4 other people and we’ll form a LISTENING CIRCLE to grow your skills and have fun at the same time.

These can be in-person Listening Circles or electronic gatherings on Zoom. They can be around a set topic or ask each person to talk about “whatever” is on their heart.

Click here for a camera-ready flyer about Listening Circles.

Contact Bren at bbhardt@gmail.com for more information.

Create an opportunity to enjoy a 2 to 3-hour interactive workshop and learn to use the skills and precepts of Compassionate Communication to foster trust, kindness, learning, and cooperation. When we prioritize connection and empathy, we meet the needs of both children and parents.

Would you like your children to:

• Contribute and listen to what you value?
• Form life-long bonds with you?
• Learn how to attend to their needs?
• Respect your needs for rest and self-care?

WHAT PEOPLE SAY ABOUT BREN:

“Bren’s dynamic and empowering workshop taught me profound skills for peaceful parenting with respect tenderness and love”. Laura Licato, PhD, mother of two.

WHAT PEOPLE SAY ABOUT THIS SKILL:

“Compassionate Communication gives people a way of listening to so others feel not just heard but understood.”—Dr. Thomas Gordon, author of Parent Effectiveness Training

Contact Bren Hardt to arrange a presentation anywhere.

For an informational flyer, click here

Want to embody Peace, Compassion, & Wisdom in your words and actions?

Want to join an online learning community for 12 weekly 90-minute calls to explore life using a powerful resource: The Ongo Book: Everyday Nonviolence?

Woven into this soul-engaging and practical resource book are daily practices of Mindfulness, Nonviolent Communication, and more. Each participant holds the intention to do 5 solo practices per week (scripted in the book) and to telephone another pre-selected & rotating participant to do the scripted buddy exercise for that week.

For a peek inside the guide: www.zenvc.org/ongobook/

Email Susan@wildins.net if interested. As soon as we have 12 participants, we will convene a session. A small fee will be requested + each person will purchase the book.

Join us as we explore the spectrum of facilitation from open space to teaching.
This workshop will be made up of 3 two-hour sessions with practice in the main group, dyads, and triads.In session one, we will concentrate on tracking and the different hats a facilitator can choose to wear.
The second and third sessions will be more practice and opportunity for participants to facilitate with feedback from their peers.

The suggested donation is $30 per session; all persons welcome regardless of donation.
Meetings held via Zoom video.

For more information, email Karen Starz

This virtual course will teach you ways to maneuver through challenging conversations and connect with others in an authentic way. Bring ease to your holiday season by learning new concepts and skills in order to be heard and hear others- despite past wounds, misunderstandings, or political divides.

Contact Karen Starz at starz.organizer@gmail.com

Play some fun and invigorating games to connect you with compassion, empathy and self-empathy while learning and practicing ahimsa, or nonviolence. Play in an atmosphere of natural giving and receiving.

Based on the work of Marshall Rosenberg, Ph.D. and author of “Nonviolent Communication, A Language of Life.”

There is no experience necessary.

Contact Karen Starz at starz.organizer@gmail.com or info@houstonnvc.org

According to author Dr. Bruce Perry “Empathy underlies virtually everything that makes society work—like trust, altruism, collaboration, love, charity”— and we have the ability to increase our empathic skills for ourselves and others.

Join us for empathy building games and exercises. Come have fun while practicing the art of connection and supercharge your relationships with empathy.

You will learn skills to re-frame your communication in a way that creates connection and peace. Facilitated in an interactive, fun learning environment, we will practice these transformational processes – self-connection, empathy for others, and expressing ourselves with a balance of authenticity and care.

For more information, email Houston NVC

This group practice is designed for people of all ages, to play through strategies of practical and enjoyable games that create and strengthen connections.

For more information, email Houston NVC

A three part exploration of Compassionate Communication:

• Overview of Compassionate Communication
• Self-compassion: the first step to healing
• Communicating Compassion in family relationships

Contact Susan Wildin at susan@wildins.net, or info@houstonnvc.org

A training to explore Compassionate Communication. It will focus on how participants can share their practice of compassionate communication in their own lives, schools, communities, workplaces, groups and among people.

For more information, email Houston NVC

Let’s explore what “power” means to all of us. Is it possible to share power with others without giving up on what is precious to us as individuals?

Topics may include:

• Understanding personal power and systemic power;
• Engaging in dialogue for shared understanding;
• Entering agreements with care and curiosity;
• Making effective collaborative decisions;
• Cultivating practices for transforming conflict and restoring relationship;
• Creating sustainable, effective and life-serving systems and processes and much more

For more information, email Houston NVC

An interactive workshop on Community, Power and Privilege.

CEUs are provided for this course for Mental Health Workers and Family and Marriage Counselors.

For more information, email Houston NVC

In today’s climate of polarization – in politics, world views, families – would you like to connect through your differences?  Even in the most divisive energy, people can be heard, valued, and seen, and still connect.  If you would like to know more about empathy, come join us for this life-changing workshop.

Contact Karen Starz at starz.organizer@gmail.com or info@houstonnvc.org

Learn the steps to self-empathy in order to manage your reactions with care, and strive for connection in challenging situations. This two hour virtual course will include dyad and triad work as well as larger group work. Bring a situation or experience that is mildly stimulating to you, and we will pick one or two to work with.

For more information, contact Karen Starz

Learn about the process of creating Restorative Circles and using Restorative Systems, while practicing using NVC, to resolve conflicts. Everyone will bring an example of a conflict in their lives, and we will choose one or two to role play in a Semi-Simulated Restorative Circle format.

Please contact Tina Michel at tina.michel8@gmail.com or info@houstonnvc.org

This International Intensive Training (IIT) is a 9-day, Nonviolent Communication “immersion experience.” Offered as a residential workshop, and led by a team of experienced CNVC certified trainers. The purpose of this IIT training is to offer people the opportunity to live the process of Nonviolent Communication in community with others over an extended period of time, in order to develop a deep understanding of Nonviolent Communication through skills and consciousness.

Please contact CNVC at https://www.cnvc.org/training/iit

We are constantly giving and receiving feedback, whether consciously or not. This course teaches you how to do it in a way that inspires collaboration. What you will gain:

• skills or resourcing yourself before, during and after feedback sessions
• a new way to “review” employees
• improved connection and productivity
• the ability to pause
• ability to make doable requests
• connecting through power differences

The workshop will be 50% skills + knowledge and 50% practice. Once completed, you will have access to an online donation-based practice group that meets weekly.

Facilitated by Karen Starz, CNVC Certified Trainer (karenstarz.com)

Where: Zoom

You are invited to the continuation of the workshop series, Living Peace, an Experience in
Connection to Others and to Yourself. The workshops are conducted by Susan Wildin, MD,
Certified Professional Coach, and are based on the work of Marshall Rosenberg on Nonviolent
Communication. Each workshop stands alone so anyone can participate.

Susan requests $20 per session to support her work and any amount would be appreciated.
Preregistration is required, so I can send the meeting URL and handouts.

You can ask questions or register by contacting Susan at susan@wildins.net.

In times of uncertainty, repetitive thoughts and judgments can lead us to opinions of right and wrong and some strong feelings one way or another. We might be left feeling disconnected from others. What we really could be disconnected from, however, are our longings, desires, hopes, and dreams.

In my experience, Nonviolent Communication (NVC) doesn’t ask me to ignore, squash, or judge my judgment. The process of NVC gives me a playful and fun avenue in which to entertain my evaluations, judgments, and opinions – it is called jackal language. These jackals, when engaged, connect us to what is important to us and to the people who stimulate our judgments.

I invite you to bring your Jackals to my next series: a Jackal Dance where everyone is invited. There is no need for a permission slip, to be self-conscious about your hemlines, or to leave your contempt at home. I will create an atmosphere, with your help, of trust and companionship. I hope you will take the ability with you to dance with your jackals and have compassion for your judgments.

No level of NVC is necessary.

Where: Zoom

To express interest in scheduling this workshop with a group, email Karen Starz

Join Susan Wildin MD, CPC for Heart Centered Parenting. Heart Centered Parenting is for
parents of children of all ages (even adult children), grandparents, educators and anyone else
who has contact with children. Using principals of Nonviolent Communication, we will explore
connecting with children in our lives in ways that are nourishing to everyone. The sessions are
designed to build on one another, and you can come in at any time. The format will be 1 hour of
topical teaching and practice and one hour of role play with real life issues in each session.

Susan is a retired developmental behavioral pediatrician and a transformational life coach with
12 years of experience in Nonviolent Communication.

Do you think of money as a need? Want to be a part of a collective experiment on money? Do you have some belief systems getting you down, or some thoughts about money that bring up anxiety and fear?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, this workshop is for you. With facilitation by Karen Starz, CNVC Certified Trainer, we will explore a new paradigm of giving and receiving, within the context of a nonviolent consciousness.

The aim is to honor all the energy we expend while dancing out the door with joy. This is a 5-week course and the more people who come, the more we will have to work within our collective energy pile.

To express interest in scheduling this workshop with a group, email Karen Starz

Join Susan Wildin MD, CPC, for an opportunity to practice Nonviolent Communication at home in community with others, exploring the curriculum in The Ongo Book: Everyday Nonviolence – Daily practices in Mindfulness, Nonviolent Communication and More, for individuals, couples, and groups by Catherine Cadden and Jesse Wiens.

The program consists of group sessions weekly, led in turn by each group participant using the scripts in the book, weekly empathy buddy sessions (buddies change monthly), and daily solo practices.

Susan requests $20 per participant for the entire 12-week session to support her time and work in organizing and doing the tech work, as well as the cost of the Zoom program. She is open to dialogue if this amount is a problem for anyone. You will also need to purchase The Ongo Book.

For more information.

Susan Wildin MD, CPC invites you to Relating to Your Adult “Children”

Do you see the oxymoron in the title? We will explore this and more in three 2-hour online workshop sessions in which we will mourn the loss of childhood, celebrate the growth of the adult, find purpose for ourselves, and creatively transform our relationships with our offspring. We will also practice dialogues around real life issues or concerns.

Join me, Bren Hardt, for an interactive course in the art of empathy, a true Superpower & the “glue” of our entire society.

                 ** First class is complimentary for everyone.**

So many of us and so many of our neighbors are trying to cope with multiple stressors… even trauma.    Trauma is unaccompanied overwhelm, so listening with our full hearts can heal that because our neural pathways are wired to have “accompaniment”.  Then we can thrive, not just survive.

OUR CURRICULUM

• Increase clarity of what empathy is and is not
• Enhance your skills for empathic connection  
• Explore “touching the dream” in empathy
• Find out what prevents you from listening with empathy and learn ways to access choice in moments when you are triggered
• Explore different styles of empathy to fit a variety of situations
• Explore natural expressions of empathy
• Learn the benefits of empathy to brain and body

  Whole-Hearted-Communication.com;  bbhardt@gmail.com

NVC and The Religious Experience:
The Alignment of Needs Consciousness and Spirituality

The founder and author of Nonviolent Communication, the late Marshall Rosenberg, was deeply interested in the common thread found in the world’s great religions and wisdom traditions. Drawing from them, Rosenberg was able to language their essential beliefs, values, and character traits as universal needs: the heart of Nonviolent Communication. Despite this, the topic of religion- albeit messy- and its potentiality within the framework and paradigm of NVC remains largely unexplored in circles of learning and teaching of Nonviolent Communication.

HoustonNVC invites you to explore the intersection of religion with Nonviolent Communication in this first-of-its-kind course offered online this fall. The course will be led by two seasoned Facilitators/Trainers who have spent much of their adult lives in search of beauty and meaning and perhaps surprisingly, have therefore aligned their unique religious beliefs with the practice and spirit of Nonviolent Communication.

We ask that participants have some level of NVC in the form of having read Marshall’s book, having taken one of our Fundamentals of NVC workshops, or another equivalent. Please email us if you have any questions regarding this request.

Karen Starz MA, MAEC, and CNVC Certified Trainer

Karen is a consultant, coach, speaker, and facilitator. The connection with Marshall Rosenberg’s work and NVC came naturally and peaked further, ongoing exploration into the foundations of NVC. Her background spans many areas, from interpersonal relationships, to businesses, schools, and non-profit organizations. Other services she provides include mediation, conflict resolution, and curriculum writing. Her approach to NVC is based on embodying the whole of nonviolent consciousness to create an automatic, empathic, somatic response and awareness. Karen aims to bring social change through learning, and is particularly interested in the spiritual connection that NVC fosters.

See more at www.karenstarz.com

Jamil Popatia, CNVC Certification Candidate

Jamil struggled to find his purpose, identity and a sense of belonging while growing up in Western Canada with immigrant parents. Jamil now considers these struggles as opportunities to build resilience in an unpeaceful environment. It wasn’t until his 30s that he discovered what dignity, purpose and meaning would be for him. His response to his environment was to explore ways of nonviolently addressing interpersonal conflict. As a counselor, mediator and trainer his passion is balancing empathy with authenticity in all interactions. Jamil considers this use of nonviolent communication to be dignified dialogue in that it is true to compassion and connection. Jamil is particularly interested in the intersection of faith, spirituality and NVC as seen through the lenses of the religions of the world.

See more at www.DignifiedDialogue.ca

We welcome all religions and belief systems: faith-based or otherwise. Please come with curiosity and a willingness to explore the intersection of needs-based consciousness and spirituality.

The Skills of Facilitated Conversation: Mediation the Nonviolent Communication Way

Are you ready for a new way of mediating? Are you longing for solutions to come easily? Do you find it exhausting dredging up the same details over and over?

“All it takes is a lot of patience, the willingness to establish a human connection, the intention to follow NVC principles until you reach a resolution, and trust that the process will work.” -Marshall Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life

For six sessions, we will explore mediation in community from the perspective of a Nonviolent Communication consciousness. Guiding us through this journey are two CNVC Certified Trainers, Karen Starz and Michael Dillo, who have a passion to connect people in a human way so that they can enjoy contributing to each other’s wellbeing.

In this process, when connection is valued rather than details, solutions tend to come easily. Learn how to connect using observations, feelings, needs, and (doable) requests. Walk away with the confidence that connection is always available and accessible with patience.

This is not your typical legal mediation style. Come with an open mind and a willingness to share and practice. We will be using real-life experiences as role-play. Tools will be offered in presentations from Karen, Michael & video-clips from Marshall B. Rosenberg. Participants will be able to practice individually in smaller groups in break out rooms.

Karen Starz MA, MAEC, and CNVC Certified Trainer

Karen is a consultant, coach, speaker, and facilitator. The connection with Marshall Rosenberg’s work and NVC came naturally and peaked further, ongoing exploration into the foundations of NVC. Her background spans many areas, from interpersonal relationships, to businesses, schools, and non-profit organizations. Other services she provides include mediation, conflict resolution, and curriculum writing. Her approach to NVC is based on embodying the whole of nonviolent consciousness to create an automatic, empathic, somatic response and awareness. Karen aims to bring social change through learning, and is particularly interested in the spiritual connection that NVC fosters. One way she embodies this aim by contributing as President of Houston NVC.

See more at www.karenstarz.com

Michael Dillo, Assessor and CNVC Certified Trainer

Michael in his “first” life was a professor for civil engineering. In his PhD thesis he specialized in underground constructions and tunneling in rock, what paved his way from his home country Germany to Switzerland in the early 1990’s. As much as he enjoyed living in this beautiful country, he started to feel increasingly dissatisfied with his job as an engineer and was disheartened dealing with technical questions all day. He struggled with with fear of change and a lot of messages like: I “have” to pay for my family, I “have” to finance my house, my insurances, my car, the vacation…

In 1997 he was inspired to attend a workshop with Marshall B. Rosenberg to find some answers to his questions and fears. During the first three day-seminar, he received some fundamental life-changing answers. However, it took him quite a while to understand the difference between intellectually understanding NVC and internalizing it. For many years he began to connect with feelings and needs as he had never done in life before – he began to empathize with himself and others.

In 2002 trust in himself had grown so much that he was able to quit his engineering profession without feelings of fear or guilt. Again and again, he was fascinated by and grateful for the experience that things, people, inspiration, and even money come “by chance“. He has been a CNVC Certified Trainer since 2004 and started to work worldwide. In 2013 he was asked to join the CNVC Assessors Team of the German-speaking part of Switzerland and the CALF Team in the USA. He is passionate about supporting certification candidates on their path to deeply integrating NVC while heading for certification.

See more at www.frei-raeume.ch