The Training Course Empathy Matters: Embodying Nonviolent Communication, took place in Poland on May 24 – June 2, 2022 and involved youth-workers from allover Europe. It was coordinated by the Polish organization Fundacja Artystyczna PERFORM.
The Project
The course offered space for learning and practicing Nonviolent Communication (NVC), as a powerful tool for understanding ourselves and others, building empathy and resolving conflicts.
The tools and methods combined verbal activities with a wide range of practical exercises inspired by Contact Improvisation technique so that participants fully embodied the whole learning experience.
Embodying could be simply defined as integrated with your body. This means that apart from intellectual inputs and practicing the language of NVC, the youth workers also moved a lot and learned how to connect with and express our needs and feelings in an authentic way. They learnt the basics of Contact Improvisation as a way to understand better themselves, to relate to others and to communicate nonverbally.
The Tool
This toolbox was developed at the end of the Training Course and summarizes the main results of the activity. It can be a source of inspiration for the youth workers and the organizations that want to go deeper in the topics of Non-violent communication and Contact Improvisation, developing projects with the organizations involved in this training course.
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Partners of the project
Fundacja Artystyczna PERFORM, Poland (coordinator)
Associazione Joint, Italy
Asociación Cultural Células Durmientes, Spain
Active Bulgarian Society (ABS), Bulgaria
NGO Youth Club Active, Estonia
Donum Animus, Latvia
Organization for Reconciliation (OR), France
Animepaf, Portugal
Friends of Children in Romania, Romania
