This 12-week (2 hours per week) training journey is designed to give practitioners in restorative practices, transformative justice, conflict resolution, and mediation a method and community for addressing power in conflict processes.
With practical tools, embodied practices, collaborative model-making, skill-building, consciousness-raising, and connected experiences, we create a container for each of us to bring our whole selves to this collaborative learning environment.
Pre-Requisites for this Program:
- Right Use of Power™ Basics Course (Find out more here)
- Have training, certification or experience as a conflict resolution, mediation, restorative justice or transformative justice practitioner.
Program Schedule
All sessions are 10am - 12pm MST
February 21, 2025
Introduction & Connection
This first session is an introduction to the course where we will get to know one another and review the guidelines and agreements. You will have the opportunity to ask questions and understand the curriculum journey for the 12 weeks ahead.
February 28, 2025
Awareness Principles & Practices
Beginning with a foundation in mindfulness and compassion is the essential ground for building power-and-equity consciousness for communication and conflict. We will review some core mindfulness concepts and develop a practice for bringing awareness into restorative approaches to conflict.
March 7, 2025
Systemic Power Lenses & Cycle
In this session, we will expand our view of power by beginning with systemic power. The Right Use of Power™ models Four Systemic Lenses and we will learn about how systems get created and perpetuated through the Systemic Power Cycle. This systemic view is critical for understanding and navigating the other types of power.
March 14, 2025
Status Power & Identity Mapping
Following the systemic view we will dive deep into status power and how it differs from our identities. You will have the opportunity to reflect on your own identities and the impacts of status power.
March 28, 2025
The Dynamics of Shame & Power
Shame, especially in the United States, is a prevalent experience when harm or conflict has occurred. Right Use of Power™ has developed a model for understanding the interplay of shame and power and how to navigate that dynamic to move us into right relationship.
April 4, 2025
Power-Conscious Relationship Building
Ongoing relationship building is a key aspect of being in right relationship. In this session we will primarily focus on the Phases of Power-Consciousness which is a model to guide us in understanding some of the places we get stuck in relationship. We have outlined specific strategies that help us to identify what is needed in each phase for continuing our movement toward right relationship with ourselves and others.
April 11, 2025
Accountability in Relationship
Responsibility and accountability are key aspects of restorative and transformative justice and are critical for generative conflict. In this session, we will explore the differences between responsibility and accountability and how we show up in each according to the Phases of Power Consciousness, the power differentials present in the relationship and the structures in which the harm or conflict occurs.
April 25, 2025
Power-Conscious Communication
Clear communication, feedback, boundaries, and consent--paired with awareness, compassion, and courage--are the foundation to power-conscious communication. In this session, you will be introduced to the anatomy of communication, its critical components, and obstacles to effective experiences. You will also have the opportunity to practice giving and receiving power-conscious communication.
May 2, 2025
Power-Consciousness in Generative Conflict
Conflict, when viewed through a power-conscious lens, is an opportunity to invest in relationship. This session gives you a way to practice difficult conversations so that you can experience conflict as generative in your relationships and in your restorative practices. We will introduce restorative practices specific to conflict, as well as share additional models and tools as approaches for navigating conflict.
May 9, 2025
Power-Conscious Approach to Harm
Building on the previous session, we will engage with power-conscious approaches to harm and repair. We will take the time to define words that often get conflated in conflict like hurt, discomfort, harm, and abuse. You will expand upon your understanding about restorative and transformative models and practices, including tools for working through interpersonal difficulty and harm.
May 16, 2025
Power-Conscious Practices in Action
While learning theories and having tools is helpful, knowing how to put them into practice is where we really get the value of this learning experience. Here we will workshop ways you can bring these models and skills into your own practice.
May 23, 2025
Sustaining a Power-Conscious Practice
What happens with your power-conscious momentum once the program concludes? This session is perhaps the most important session of the challenge because it creates a bridge between where we’ve been together, and where we are going. Here we get to explore what responsibility really means, and craft our commitment for developing power consciousness within restorative and transformative practices. We get to challenge and encourage each other, form accountability partnerships, and create commitments for moving forward.
Restorative Practices are often displayed in a pyramid to show that proactive, relationship-building practices are the foundation of any healthy relationship or community.
Inevitably, as humans, we will have different needs, beliefs and expectations that will create conflict between us. With a strong foundation through relationship building, it becomes easier to engage in regular communication (giving and receiving feedback, impact statements) which should be the bulk of energy and effort toward relationship tending.
As conflict arises, we tend to those differences as immediately as possible through restorative conversations. This is required for the basic maintenance of relationships. When we fail to provide this maintenance, relationships may fall into deeper conflict, where harm to self and others can result. When this happens, we use one of the many reparative restorative processes developed in restorative justice, which helps us come back into right relationship with one another by identifying harms and creating agreements for repair.
With Restorative Integration, we realize that a greater foundation is necessary for building relationships and community. We understand that we cannot build true community (welcoming diverse social locations and points of view) without an understanding of social power dynamics from an anti-oppression lens. This social justice foundation is critical for the success of restorative practices as, without an understanding of social power dynamics, we will only perpetuate systems of oppression and continue to cause harm while we are trying to mitigate or address harm.
Supporting the social justice framework, we understand the necessity of mindfulness. Without mindfulness, it would be easy to engage in restorative practices in a way that may limit others' participation, not differentiate between intention and impact, or become a guised manifestation of a traditional approach to "justice" that may ultimately inhibit rather than promote equity.
And, finally, the ultimate ground for this work is compassion. Compassion is the necessary vehicle that carries mindful awareness into restorative practices. Without compassion for self and others, we can easily become trapped in shame or locked in a battle of us vs. them or good vs. bad. When conflict inevitably arises and we become aware of the frequency with which intention and impact do not match, we have the opportunity to allow the ground of compassion to support our work toward building a community of belonging. This creates the potential for a conflict-positive culture. Wherever there are two or more human beings gathered, difference and conflict exist whether it is expressed, suppressed or twisted into conformity. We understand that difference and conflict are natural and necessary parts of the human experience so we seek to be courageous, competent, capable, and committed in our approach to working with both.
In the simplest terms, conflict has the potential to either promote productivity or to stifle it; to increase oppression or champion equity; to alienate others, or to deepen relationships. The difference in outcome lies in the approach to conflict. When conflict is ignored or avoided or when there is a reactive approach to differences in relationship, harm, disengagement, and disempowerment are likely to follow. However, if there is a willingness to be uncomfortable, to engage and welcome difference, and the skills to engage in conflict in healthy ways, the results are tremendous. Increased trust, engagement, collaboration, and equity often result from conflict-positive environments.
Investment
Please note: It costs nothing to apply. We ask for payment (at the rate you choose) once you have been accepted into the program.
This price is for those who are from countries whose currency value is significantly lower than the USD AND/OR those who frequently struggle to meet basic needs or are facing temporary financial crisis.
This price is for those who are from countries whose currency value is similar to the USD AND/OR those who are mostly able to meet basic needs and have some discretionary income.
This price is for those whose are from countries whose currency value is higher than the USD AND/OR can comfortably meet their basic needs and have significant discretionary income.
In our Power-Conscious Restorative Integration Program, participants will:
Ready to Deepen Your Power-Consciousness?
We are so excited to co-create this community with you!