Where Do I Start?

January 2023: under construction, will be updated soon!

Many people approach learning NVC through taking a Study Series like our eight-week Empowered Communication class. During these series, participants form a learning community with ties that sometimes last far longer than the class itself. Through interactive learning, role-plays, experiential exercises, and practice at home, you’ll learn, in a systematic, step-by-step way, how to align your life, choices, and relationships with your deepest needs and dreams. If, like many others, you discover that you want to continue with this path, you might then want to join one of the follow-up series, More Empowered Communication, to deepen your integration of the principles and practices as you move along your personal or professional journey.

In addition to these bread and butter series that are available year round, we also offer some other Study Series on specific topics. Those provide an opportunity to sink more deeply into one aspect of learning NVC for a while without making an extensive commitment of your energy and resources.

For ongoing learning, you might want to attend one of our Practice Groups. Practice groups generally have no set curriculum. Instead, you can bring specific issues and challenges from your life and receive empathic support and coaching on how to respond in a way that combines authenticity and care for all. Practice groups often operate on a drop-in basis, although sometimes they are set up for a fixed period and you would be asked to commit for the duration (usually six or eight weeks).

We also offer weekend, one-day, or half-day workshops on a variety of topics. Most of our workshops don’t require any prior knowledge of NVC. These are stand alone events that you are welcome to attend based on your interest in the specific topic or connection with a particular trainer.

Whenever you are ready for a more intensive immersion, you might want to consider attending one of our Retreats. Some of them are offered on a regular basis, and others may be offered on a one-time basis. NVC retreats are an amazing opportunity to immerse yourself in a different way of living, to form community with others who are also deeply committed, and to go away for a few days to a setting that can nourish your spirit while you are stretching to do the work of transforming your habits and integrating new skills.

• Once a year, usually in February, we offer the Living Peace retreat which attracts people year after year to a unique experience that combines individual attention and group learning at multiple levels of experience.
• Once a year in the summer, the Diversity Project offers the Nonviolent Leadership for Social Justice retreat with a focus on race, class, and ethnicity in North America.
• Miki Kashtan and the Nonviolent Global Liberation Online Community offer week-long retreats in different parts of the US and the world, with a focus on co-creating personal and collective capacity.  The retreats are designed to create the conditions that would allow participants to take a next step in their understanding, capacity for interdependent living, practice, service, and contribution to support the possibility of a nonviolent global liberation.

All of these retreats are open to you at whatever level of NVC experience you are.

If you are ready to take NVC learning to the next step, your path will likely take you through a yearlong program. Our current staple program is the BayNVC Immersion Program, designed for people who want to make NVC second nature through participating in many days of learning throughout the year. Other yearlong programs are also offered from time to time. Participants in our yearlong programs often say that they have been life changing events.

If you want to learn from the comfort of your own home, you can join thousands of others who are learning NVC by participating in teleclasses. Many of the teleclasses that our trainers offer are operated by the NVC Academy, and these tend to be presented as short series or longer courses. We also offer some teleclasses on our own, many by Miki Kashtan on specific topics of interest.

If learning on your own or with your family or friends is your favorite way, you can sign up for Private Sessions, where one of our trainers will offer empathy and coaching which are custom tailored for your own pace and goals.

Is your company, organization or community group looking for ways to work together better and make decisions that everyone buys into? We can support you with a range of organizational services based on the tools of Nonviolent Communication.