Advanced Training

Once your group has had a few retreats together and built momentum in Forum meetings, consider the opportunities - together with challenges and risks - of diving deeper. You enjoy the bonds you’ve made and want them to continue and flourish. Yet, you have some concern around deepening those connections out of fear of actually losing them if the process of going deeper is too difficult or you don’t like what you see when you get there.

This training provides groups with the framework to build deeper connections safely and progressively. We believe that the key to connecting deeply is to create a solid, safe foundation and continue to nurture that safe place where members compassionately show up with their truth and vulnerability. We emphasize straightforward experiential exercises that can be learned in retreat, and then integrated into practice on your own for sustainability.

We use the spiral approach: we start with the basic stuff and build in the fine details later. Then, as group awareness builds, more and more details are introduced, while at the same time they are related to the basics which are reemphasized. It’s like a reverse pyramid. We move to a deeper level in the process.

The first part is getting present so every member can engage fully in the moment. No distractions. Next, exercises inspire the group to share moments of truth from the past so it becomes easier to show truth responses about what’s happening here and now. Then, the group gets more comfortable with being vulnerable and continues to unveil the hidden parts of themselves. The final step is where discovery happens. The Forum expands its capacity to deepen even further as members learn and grow by seeing blind spots in each other, helping each other to discover unknown patterns, traits or parts, and accepting and blessing each other while supporting each other in accountability and continued discovery.

Uncover typical Forum “Gate Closers” as they unknowingly creep up and stifle safety, and learn to embrace the “Gate Openers” as they provide increased capacity to connect deeper.

We believe in the simple beauty of Forum. The trick is to get to the simplicity on the other side of complexity. We guide the Forum through the difficult stages of complexity to arrive at simplicity on the other side.