The Pace e Bene community believes that a lifestyle of violence – and of violence reduction - operates on three levels within each of us. Our human tendency sometimes is to focus on one or two of these areas and neglect the third. We can think of our goal as making a sturdy 3-legged table which is Nonviolence - all three of the legs must be strong. To help us with this, during this program we will continually revisit our practice in each of these levels:
Personal: how do we treat/communicate with ourselves? Thoughts, food, exercise, rest, emotions, spirit, detachment - what are the spiritual disciplines that lead us toward more freedom in action rather than feeding our neuroses or desire for recognition? What are the characteristics of spirituality that supports the hyperactive American culture? What characteristics feed reclusive and separating tendencies? What habits do we want to cultivate? To avoid?
Each weekend we gather, we will spend some time experiencing a “spiritual practice” that you might like to incorporate into your own lifestyle, or not. These spiritual practices also function as group openings and closings ~ to nurture the Spirit of Nonviolence among the gathered community. The practices also help us grow in dexterity when dealing with our emotional landscape – anger, attachment, complacency, denial, despair, detachment fear, gratitude, internal resistance, joy, etc.
Interpersonal: how do we treat/communicate with others? From the perspective of Engage, the CARA process (Centering, Articulating, Receiving and Agreement) is the cornerstone of interpersonal communication. Each weekend we will practice this process and add new tools to expand our ability not only to communicate nonviolently with others, but also to use our communication to weaken the domination system and strengthen the “beloved community.” We will explore using CARA as the basis for cultivating an attitude of non-judgment as well as the basis for confronting oppressive behaviors or language in others.
Social-Structural: we comprise communities, institutions and nation-states which often operate in unjust or oppressive ways. How are we about the work of identifying these processes and transforming these social structures? What are the stages of social transformation and how do we move from one stage to the next? What roles are helpful, or not helpful, in sustaining nonviolent social change? Are we aware of the ways we’re inadvertently re-creating the domination system within the groups we belong to? Do we know how to use the power, status and position we DO have, for radical inclusion and transformation?
