Pre-reading
Read this once before Friday. It sets the ground for the weekend so we can start deep instead of warming up.
Why we're gathering
Most of the time we see each other in the middle of things. This weekend is for stepping out of the middle and asking what matters to us, how we got here, and what we want to carry forward.
The weekend moves in six phases. We connect on Friday night and relax on Saturday morning. On Saturday afternoon we enter ceremony together, where we descend, ascend, and integrate in a closing circle. On Sunday morning we finish our integration and close at 2 pm. Then we get out into nature to ground. Most of us travel home Sunday afternoon, and everyone is welcome to stay until Monday.
How we'll be together
Most of our time together is spent in circle. We sit together, and a talking piece passes from hand to hand. Whoever holds it speaks. Everyone else listens. The circle asks four things of us:
- Speak from the heart. Say what is true for you right now.
- Listen from the heart. Give the speaker your full attention, without planning your reply.
- Be brief. Say what matters and leave room for others.
- Be spontaneous. Let what you say come in the moment, without rehearsing.
The agreements below are proposed. We'll confirm them as a group on Friday night.
- Confidentiality. What's shared here stays here. What we learn can leave with us.
- Listen without fixing. When someone speaks, we listen. We offer our own experience only when asked.
- Speak from your own life. Say "I" and talk about what you know firsthand.
- The right to pass. Anyone can pass on any question, any time, with no explanation.
- Phones away in sessions. Check them on breaks.
- Build your own container. Respect the time and space someone else may need.
- Take care of yourself. Step out, rest, or eat when you need to.
- Start and end on time. It's how we respect each other's attention.
The values you hold for their own sake
Some values we hold because they get us something: respect, safety, success. Others we hold because they are simply who we are. We'd keep them if no one noticed and nothing came of it. Those are the ones we're after this weekend.
They often show up early. Watch a child absorbed in play and you'll see curiosity, freedom, or making things in its purest form. Many of us still carry those same qualities, sometimes buried under what we learned we were supposed to want.
A few ways to recognize them:
- When you're living one, you feel most like yourself.
- When one is violated, you react more strongly than the moment seems to call for.
- You can trace it back to a time before anyone taught it to you.
If it helps to have words to start from, here are eleven qualities that many people recognize as their deepest nature. Use your own words if they fit better.
- StrengthAliveness, capacity, "I can."
- WorthKnowing you matter, without having to earn it.
- WillSteadiness and inner support. Something to stand on.
- CompassionWarmth that knows pain from the inside.
- JoyLightness, delight, and curiosity.
- PeaceStillness that goes all the way down.
- LoveCloseness and the sweetness of connection.
- RealnessBeing a real person, beyond any role.
- Being yourselfA simple sense of "I am," with nothing to prove.
- SpaciousnessOpenness, room to breathe, freedom.
- ClaritySeeing and knowing without strain.