SLCEC -- Workshops
2009 Calendar of Events and Workshops
SLCEC trainings are meant to enrich and build leadership capacity and to foster healthy vibrant communities in the Salt Lake Valley and beyond. These workshops support growth and change in our friends, team members, our communities and ourselves by offering methods for facilitating open dialog, community engagement and transformation.
January 22, 2009
Community Transformation: An Introduction to the Integral Approach
7:00 pm - 9:30 pm, Wasatch Retreat & Conference Center (75 S 200 E, SLC)
John Kesler
February 7, 2009
Sustainability Summit Stewards Group
2:00 - 5:30 pm, SLC Main Library, Room L-1
February 19, 2009
Conversational Leadership Workshop: The World Cafe -- Creating a Culture of Connection
7:00 pm - 9:30 pm, Wasatch Retreat & Conference Center (75 S, 200 E, SLC)
Kathy Lung, Tenneson Woolf
February 28, 2009
Creating Community Through Virtue Meditations
1:00 - 4:30 pm, Wasatch Retreat & Conference Center (75 S, 200 E, SLC)
John Kesler
March 19, 2009
Five Levels of Civil Conversation: How to Increase the Quality of Group Decision-making and Dispute Resolution
7:00 pm - 9:30 pm, Wasatch Retreat & Conference Center
John Kesler
Call to Civility and Community
An initiative in Utah through the Salt Lake Center for Engaging Community. An invitation from Executive Director, John Kesler, as well as the text that has been broadly endorsed in the state. What I appreciate in this is the dedication it takes to create a document and invite support for it. Where I have most interest is now in the "how" of this happening. Bringing the guidelines to life in real-time practice and conversation.
Dear supporters of the Civility and Community Initiative,
If you were not able to make it to the Dialogue on Democracy gathering a couple of weeks ago, we were able to announce endorsement of the statement by the executive and judicial leadership of the State as well as the Utah State Bar and the Salt Lake Interfaith Roundtable.
We are hoping to obtain a joint resolution of support from the Utah State Legislature when the Legislature convenes in January, and in the mean time will be going after endorsement by the editorial boards of the major media in
The goal is then to pursue a handful of demonstration projects during 2009, and find ways to make a real impact after that. Future convening includes monthly meetings.
Download one-page document here.
Storycatching
Christina Baldwin wrote a book called StoryCatcher. It is a delightful read reflecting so much of the depth of her life. It is a delightful invitation to notice the power -- learning, relationships, pathway to action -- that can show up in listening to and mining our stories.
Three days ago I met with fellow board members from the Salt Lake Center for Engaging Community. Eight of us gathered. We told stories. At one level it was an invitation to checkin -- say a bit of what is alive for you. This board is not a traditional board. It is more of an incubator kind of group. We share our work. We develop our friendships. We ask for help from each other. Our checkin was half of the meeting.
It was in our storytelling that I found a deep, rich harvest, again. What could so easily be dismissed as "long checkin" was for me heart of the work. I listened. I mapped. And from that listening, tagged some of the core themes. For us working with engagement in community, there was much learning there. Much about our current noticings and practices of building thriving community. A bit of this is below.

Values
- there was Jim from the Integrated Health Network sharing his work with soldiers returning from duty, integrating with their families. He spoke of the power of healing that is internal, helping to mirror this to the soldiers. He also spoke with a few tears welling of how the marines are so hungry for this kind of help.
- there was Ben from the Hemingway Foundation telling a story of this challenged economy and how it is shifting employment for many people. "We are the authors of our lives." And he continued to speak of his desire to work in the natural cycles of life, as happens in nature.
- there was Jane building on Ben, sharing her commitment to living in balance on the earth. She shared some of her awakening and strong sense that many are awakening and remembering.
Invitation
- Jim again speaking of his reaching out to soldiers. He speaks it with such heart. Reaching out is a simple principle.
- there was Martha, a long-time educator and leader of the Three Rs program describing how there is less divisiveness in the state now. The simple invitation to have coffee together between people of different religious affiliations.
- similarly, there was Randy of the Foundation for Intereligious Diplomacy sharing research he read on the impact of having dinner together. The invitation to just focus with each other for a bit of time in the day to support well-being.
- there was John of the CEC sharing some of his excitement in a Call to Civic Discourse in Utah, sharing the core practice of good citizenship -- talking to each other.
Practice
- I am very much paying attention to simple steps of daily practice. Not grand designs. Just simple daily practices and calling myself and others to such attention.
Projects
- John spoke further of demonstration projects for 2009, working with the legislature and community groups
Vision
- there was Sonya, a cofounder of a local charter school reflecting on her enrollment. I could see and feel as she spoke the love that she feels for the kids and families that are part of her school. She asked, "what will be like in our next 10 years?"
- and Randy speaking further about relationships between ethics, intelligence, and distance.
Choice
- Jane speaking further on the choice of how to seed community, exploring arts programs.
Resourcesfullness
- Sonya reflecting further on her school. "We do the best we could with the money we have."
- John's invitation to media groups and state legislaters in civic discourse
Values, Invitation, Practice, Projects, Vision, Choice, Resourcefullness -- for me, all rich principles of healthy community, noticed in telling stories, embedded in heartful honesty. Not brainstorming. Just showing up, telling stories, mining.
Coalition for Civic, Character and Service Learning
November 8, 2008
A couple of weeks ago I watched my colleague and friend John Kesler honored for a lifetime of commitment to community engagement. He was awarded the Civic, Character and Service Award at the 5th annual Dialogue on Democracy event in
I love John’s fierce commitment to engagement. I’ve seen it many times in our shared work through the
One of those anchors is translocal learning communities, communities of place that act locally while connecting regionally and learning globally. The SLCEC is a budding example. Our local action includes “Creating a Culture of Connection” in which we are supporting dialogues on creating welcome. This work includes local school districts, neighborhood community councils, university students, and community immigrants. I don’t know to what level this initiative will become a translocal learning community, but I love the starting points that we are at and how this is inspiring many.
Another anchor is the cross-fertilizing among people of similar interest and imagination. One example of this through our center is a recent Sustainability Summit. At this half-day event, 85 people from various organizations in the
I appreciate John for his steady focus on the community – the tending to the whole – while at the same time supporting the action of the individual. It is a leadership that is so needed, and one of the qualities that many see in John. I am grateful to learn with him about keeping my eyes and heart open to the global, while at the same time, keeping my feet firmly committed in the local.
John spoke it well and with deep passion as he announced a statewide call for improved civic discourse in
Circle and Ceremony Workshop
A couple of days ago, I cohosted a workshop on circle and ceremony with Ramona Sierra of Sierra Earthworks Foundation, and John Kesler with whom I co-direct the Salt Lake Center for Engaging Community. We had 3.5 hours to work with. Thirty-five people signed up and participated at a beautiful location, the Chase Peterson Building, on the University of Utah campus.
We offered brief introduction on purpose. In this case, the workshop was designed to help people learn and practice circle and ceremony as methods of engaging community, of building deeper connections, or enspirited community.
We had intended a simple check-in circle for people to share a bit on who they are and a bit of why they chose to come to the workshop. However, as we were about to begin that circle, I realized I felt it served better to combine that circle with what was to be the next, which was to speak to the need that any of us were seeing in the world (community, work, family, nation) that requires us to practice the different kind of leadership, the hosting.
The circle began with Ramona selecting a talking piece, a beautiful beaded and feathered stick. I had set some time boundaries, one minute per person. This circle went deep quite quickly, yet stayed in the time framing. The words and energy that were shared were very beautiful. People shared their desire to learn, to connect, to reach out, to be in an authentic space, to slow down. Some shared stories from their respective lives and causes: a refugee community, a woman’s recovery center, a city diversity program, a character education program, documentary arts films, children, hospice work. We were a beautifully diverse group coming to sense in each other ourselves and the beauty of connection.
We took a break after this round, and upon returning asked a simple question, a time-out kind of question. What just happened here? I loved what people spoke, some of which is below.
- Hope and possibility became visible.
- There was a safe place for emotion.
- People were listening with their whole being – this was the invitation spoken by my colleague Ramona to begin – what are the other ways that we can listen with each other?
- The circle creates flow.
- In a minute we were able to say enough about what was important to us and create a container to stand shoulder to shoulder.
- The energy shifted when our stories got more personal.
I suppose it is true that we planned on these kind of things. But we did not design explicity for this. It was not a workshop on creating safe places. Though we touched some of this, I feel we just set conditions and held the space for this to be possible. The way that people entered and participated is what created the stronger impressions for people. And this led them to offer a few gems in checkout -- "you've expanded my life; I take you with me."
This experience of circle reaffirms what I know and have experienced from other circles:
- people want to witness each other and want to be witnessed. And even more significantly, it can happen at a surprisingly deep level in a surprisingly short period of time.
- people want the experience of being open hearted or maybe full-hearted in community. We don’t necessarily start speaking it that way, but the form, the circle, activates and reminds us of this experience.
- circle creates the quality of listening that enables us to build. It creates relationship with each other, a chance to hear a bit of story. I shared with them what has become one of my favorite lines on story -- "the shortest distance between two people is a story."
There were many gems that were shared in this circle. These are gems that I carry with me now, even if just for a season. They are bits that are embodied in the turquoise bead that each of us received thanks to Ramona.
And there was simple humor – the transparency of one participant sharing that she didn’t know anyone in the room and actually brought a book to read in case she got bored. We all laughed, relating, and yet knowing the very clear experience of not hiding in a circle. The form gently requires us to show up, which sadly, is often avoidable or not possible in many forms of meeting.
Gratitude for the simple power of a circle. It is the form, the invitation, the energy that builds that helps people feel both friendship and deep learning and that then inspires ideas to use in our respective areas of work and life. Gratitude to Ramona and John, and to the participants that support a process that very easy to feel for a long time.
Design
1:15 Welcome
CEC – John Kesler
1:20 Context, Workshop Shape, and Circle Introduction
Ramona, Tenneson
1:45 Circle
Ramona, Tenneson
Who are you?
Why did you choose to come to this workshop today?
What is the need that you see in your world that requires us to meet and lead differently?
2:30 Break
2:45 Noticings From the Circle
Ramona, Tenneson
3:15 Ceremony Introduction
Ramona
3:30 Ceremony / Circle – Gift of Turquoise Bead
Ramona
What do you take with you from this workshop?
4:25 Close & Thanks
John, Ramona, Tenneson
Center for Engaging Community
John Kesler is my patner in work with the Center for Engaging Community. He is a man of great vision. He attracts incredible people around him. He is very humble. And a great catalyzer of efforts. Together we co-direct the Center.
Last week, John and I were checking-in. Projects. Imaginations. Plans. A central point of our efforts is an initiative called Culture of Connection. We launched this effort in many ways with a large community event last spring. Today it lives in many people, committees, and community relations.
I wanted to name this initiative because last week John and I had one of those moments where we revisited purpose and a few agreements. We weren't trying to per se; but it became clear that in our phone conversation, that is what was happening. These all spoke to me...
- Bring capacity of conversation
- When we find competence and passion, help to catalyze the self-organizationt that manifests flourishing community.
- We can look through multiple lenses.
- Be a trusted neutral convenor, not an advocate.
- Grassroots community engagement.
This also spoke to me, three anchors. We support flourishing community by...
- Convening, training, connecting, practicing in conversation.
- Supporting technology that connects, both in content and social community (this a project that we are just starting to imagine)
- Grounding our work in specific domains -- currently feeling the biggest need in a bipartisan legislative dialogue project, and, and exploration into supporting and integrating immigrant and refugee communities in the Salt Lake Valley.