News

2nd September 2011
Read this account of her experience at the 2011 NVC European Summer Festival  by Therese Bentley - CLICK HERE to download the PDF file.


19 Oct 2010
News from the NVC Rainbow mill Summer Camp, Norfolk. 24th-30th August 2010.

"Out beyond ideas of wrong-doing and right-doing, there is a field.
I’ll meet you there!" Rumi.

Out beyond Wroxham, the capital of the Norfolk broads is a small town Stalham and a mile and a half west by north is Des’s Mill at East Ruston. In the "field", with around seventy other people, I pitched my tent. I thought I was going to spend that week in a very structured, organised way living out on the land trying to get my soul free. I certainly freed up my soul greatly, although this happened in a more timeless organic free-range way! The days usually began with a morning gathering in the big marquee. Workshops were offered throughout the week and, among many others, included NVC ‘dance floors’, with Des; exploring NVC through ‘Five rhythms’ with Michael Gabriel; exploring intimate relationships with Daren Dewitt; Embodied Peacemaking and many games for children and young people (of all ages!) with Mark (‘Fluffy’) Walsh; Being with grief and Loss with Hugo Roele (who came all the way from Holland). Fringe activities included ‘theatre sports’, dancing, singing, clay sculpting and tin-flower making.
Evening activities consisted of Dj’ing of variable abilities, a film showing, birthday celebrations and a final night camp celebratory "No Need for Talent" show were also arranged.
Empathy groups were offered - meeting at agreed times daily - and there was ‘free- range organic’ time after lunch and late afternoon group ‘Celebration and Mourning’ time in the big marquee. ‘Angel’ volunteers were requested daily for things such as empathy, child minding, rubbish collection and bathroom cleaning.
My ongoing celebration of the camp is of my empathy group and how my appreciation of the power of empathy has enriched my life and my partner’s life since. Also the healing power of humour! Oh yes, and the effect of environment!

"Sell your cleverness, purchase bewilderment!" Rumi.

I marvel at the power of gathering as a community of people from diverse walks of life leaving our roles behind and simply serving the aim of non-violent communication, identifying our needs and those of others and meeting and greeting those needs with empathy.
I found workshops that were just what I needed, casual conversations that were just what we needed, quotes and sayings on the walls in the barn, all meeting needs for challenge, learning and fun. I experienced very little fear, a lot of ease, and cart loads of joy and heartfelt warmth. Priceless!
My only financial transactions throughout the camp were paying Penny (more than a penny!) for the week and purchasing the Native American flute I began learning to play at Cliff’s workshop.
Going in to Stalham to get the money to pay for this I realised I had lived without money for a week and this had been replaced richly by trading in needs.
This possibly reads as idyllic. The reality was anything but! The weather was changeable: lots of rain, gale force winds, thunder and lightning; some very cold but crystal clear nights and just enough sunshine to dry us out and cheer us up. There were also problems with plumbing and electrics! For me these were beautiful elements of the camp and enabled us all to contribute to one another’s needs or give up pride and say "help I’m stuck in the mud!" - And we got Rainbows!"
There was some mourning as the Giant giraffe and jackal banners (that Des had lovingly commissioned) attached to the mill only held out for a few days.
Other priceless elements were the presence of small children, the teenage tribe (of werewolves!), the dogs, cats, chickens and roosters! This was really living naturally!
The camp finale in the Rainbow barn (a space that met needs for shelter, refreshment, fun, companionship, expression, contribution and many more!) felt full of love as I laughed, cried mourned and celebrated as we, the rainbow camp, entertained ourselves colourfully and richly at the "No Need for Talent Show" and then beautifully after the closing meeting on Monday morning.
I left with my inner poet re-energised* and engaged and my inner musician budding!

How could anyone see this as anything other than beautiful?
John Rankine
*see John’s camp poem under the tab ‘NVC Creativity’ on this website


5 Oct 2010

NVC Trainer Certification Process Reopens in the UK!

At last, the news many people around the NVC world have been waiting for! After some years of the certification process being closed for new certification candidates, registration for new NVC Trainer candidates has been reopened in most countries including the UK on 15 September 2010. The two UK assessors are Gina Lawrie and Vicky Pierce.

The CNVC team say:

“We have been working hard for the last several years to create all that is necessary to open registration: to expand the CNVC assessor team (triple in size) to serve a global community, to update all the policies and procedures leading up to CNVC certification, and to develop all the necessary documents, office infrastructure, and to incorporate it all into a new website design.

“Regional groups of assessors are designing new and varied assessment procedures, which will accommodate diverse cultures and the individual styles of the assessor groups. The two-fold goal is flexibility of the assessment process AND clear and consistent outcomes for demonstrated competencies of knowing NVC, teaching NVC, and most importantly, living NVC.”

To read the full letter or for more information go to the CNVC website http://www.cnvc.org/training/certification.html

If you are interested in becoming a certified NVC Trainer in the UK you can download the certification information from the CNVC website and contact Gina or Vicky for more information (go to the site members page of this website for their contact details).

30 July 2010
Report from the NVC European Summer Festival 2010

I’ve just returned to England from the Festival, held this year on the west coast of France, north of Bordeaux.

There were about 120 of us at the Festival, from all over Europe – about 40 French people, and others from Belgium, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, Austria, and the UK, as well as from England via Thailand, and from New Zealand.

The site was right beside the sea and a lovely beach, the weather was glorious, the food delicious, while the site staff were warm and friendly and looked after us very well indeed.

I was in heaven! Conversations with so many fascinating people, with all sorts of experiences of NVC (CNV in French!), while catching up with old friends from previous Festivals, and making lots of new ones. And getting some good practice with my French.

For those of you unfamiliar with these Festivals, let me tell you a little bit about them.

The official language always seems to be English, whatever the country; which is nice for us UK natives; even though we do have such a good reputation for speaking many other languages!

The structure of the days is much the same at every Festival. There is space for 4 workshops (one and a half hours each) every day – early morning, morning, afternoon and evening. There are also 2 meetings each day of the whole group, in the morning and evening. The morning one focuses on admin stuff, and then people offering workshops that day give a brief intro – we can then all choose which workshops we’d like to go to that day.

The whole-group meeting in the evening is then for mourning and celebrating whatever we’ve done/not done that day.

It’s important to let you know that workshops can be offered by anyone at the Festival, and can be on pretty well anything you fancy. I’ve been to a session by one brave soul, attending his very first Festival, who really felt lost in the big group and didn’t know what to say – so he ran a session on this! And it was just fascinating, and intensive!

I also offered a workshop - one that was a big, revealing experience for me in Sweden last year - given by Tine, a Zen coach from Denmark; on those two little words, "yes" and "no".

Eight women came to the session; mainly French, and we had a deep and intensive session!

Please note that there is no charge for any of these workshops
There are always families and children at the Festivals, and activities are organised for the children, again usually on a day-by-day basis by whoever feels inspired to do it.

Generally it’s a very relaxed environment, where we each choose to spend the time as we wish, anything from an intense one-to-one empathy session to an afternoon on the beach and conversations with friends.

This was my fourth Festival, and I’ve had a fabulous time at every single one – lovely people, new friends all over Europe, deep conversations, powerful learning, and a lots and lots of fun!

The Festival next year will be in the UK; and I came back from France early to go to an Open Day at a potential venue I heard about while abroad.

It's very unusual, and perfect for us, I feel. But, it's organised by an environmental education charity, and they are choosy about who they have on site! So we're stuck for a few weeks while waiting for them to decide whether they can fit us in next summer (they have a very short season); which is frustrating; I thought we'd be 'all systems go' after the Open Day.

We're also negotiating with a couple of other sites; and I much prefer to wait for this latest one.

And don't worry; I'll let the whole world know just as soon as we have a site and the dates!

See you all next summer at the Festival, somewhere in the UK.

John Evans


17 May 2010
Update on certification re-opening: CNVC are still dealing with some details so anticipate one month further delay to re-opening for registration.

19 April 2010
Certification process to re-open after a long wait
CNVC have announced that there are only a few more loose ends to tie up and it is their intention to re-open the certification process in countries where there are assessors ready by 1 June 2010. This includes UK where Vicky Peirce and Gina Lawrie are assessors. There will be a new process of application for registration for the certification process. It will all be announced and updated on the CNVC website. People who are already registered will be hearing from CNVC with an invitation to say whether they still want to go ahead with certification.