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Stories: Exercises: |
Current Bay Area Workshops for the Public
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To see the schedule of events, click on the Calendar.
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| Scroll down to read descriptions of all standard workshops |
Sharon Ellison, originator of the Powerful, Non-Defensive Communication (PNDC) process, offers regular workshops in the San Francisco/Oakland Bay Area. She also offers workshops nationwide.
If you are not able to take a workshop in the Bay Area, Sharon’s book will show you how to eliminate defensiveness in yourself and disarm it in others—so you can communicate with clarity, power and compassion. The book is also available on CD, read by Sharon, so you can hear and practice the non-defensive tone.
In addition, other consultants in the PNDC Consortium of Trainers offer
workshops. This calendar includes PNDC workshops offered by Mady
Shumofsky.
Vicki Dello Joio offers classes and workshops in Chi Kung and the Way of Joy. Working with this foundational martial art, Vicki guides people in creating an internal, non-defensive state of being. For information, see: www.wayofjoy.com
PNDC Level I: Basic Workshop
PNDC Level II: Intermediate Workshop
Changing Blueprints - Changing Reality
A meeting of Two Paths to Empowerment: Chi Kung and PNDC
Living Non-Defensively, Living in Your Power
An evening of role - plays
A community conversation
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Current practice sessions are listed on the Calendar. |
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For workshops with Sharon, please go to Sharon's Calendar to the specific
class you want to sign up for and email us or call the office at (510)
655-8086 to register. You can pay your deposit with a credit card over
the phone with MasterCard, Visa or American Express. You can send deposit
checks to Ellison Communication Consultants, 4100-10 Redwood Road, #316,
Oakland CA 94619. Please indicate either in the memo section on your check
or in a short note the event(s) for which you are registering.
If you are not signed up for our E-zine (internet newsletter with tips on non-defensive communication) and would like to be, visit PNDC Ezine Sign-Up Page
Sliding scales are always available: If you can pay the standard fee for any workshop, practice session or tele-class, we appreciate it. However, we are also dedicated to making this work available to people regardless of ability to pay. If the standard fee doesn't work for you, you can always select whatever amount will work for you. Materials, such as books and tapes, can also be purchased on a sliding scale.
CEUs are available for MFTs and LCSWs for the PNDC workshops with Sharon.
The basic Powerful Non-Defensive Communication workshop provides information on how our traditional communication model has been based on the "rules of war" and thus causes people to get defensive easily and engage in needless power struggle. We will examine the six typical defensive modes people use daily. We will discuss how common ways of asking questions, making statements, and giving predictions actually create and accelerate conflict and cause us to become controlling and manipulative, even when we have good intentions. We will then discuss the principles of non-defensive communication and practice eight formats for listening and speaking with far greater power, even when others do not "cooperate." This new way of listening and speaking can not only can increase our self-esteem, confidence, and clarity; it is also often disarming and prompts others to be increasingly respectful and reciprocal.
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After what you learned in the basic workshop about making a transition from a "war model" for communication to a non-defensive model, you can focus on strengthening your skills. In the Level II workshop series, we spend one whole weekend on each form of non-defensive communication. You can move from "How do I figure out what question to ask?," to "Let's see, which question should I ask first?" You can get so familiar with the steps in the non-defensive statement, that it becomes more automatic and old habits of withdrawal or argument begin to disappear. And you can eliminate inhibitions about setting effective boundaries at home and at work. I have found this series to be exceptionally rewarding. Each of the three sessions will be approximately six weeks apart. Pre-requisite: Basic Workshop.
Questions - Weekend One: Learn dozens of kinds of questions so they become easier to access as an alternative to the immediate defensive response. They offer a means to deepening your understanding and enhancing creative thinking. Instead of struggling to find a single question to ask in response to what someone says to you, imagine being able to draw from a wealth of possible questions in any situation! You can learn to use the disarming power of the question to stimulate others to respond with openness and sincerity.
Statements - Weekend Two: Become so familiar with the four parts of the non-defensive statement that they are deeply internalized and an automatic framework for speaking with clarity and power without being judgmental — whether you are stating your own opinion or giving feedback to someone else.
Predictions - Weekend Three: People seldom use predictions to create boundaries in day-to-day personal and professional relationships. Predictions are often seen as just the kind of limit setting a parent does with a child. Work through any barriers in making predictions that are firm, but gentle, so others gain increasing respect for you.
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Learn to understand how we create a kind of "blueprint" or map of reality for each experience we have in life - love, success, exercise, respect, freedom, even rain. In this workshop I show how we create these blueprints at an early age, and demonstrate how they can give form to long term, self-defeating patterns in our lives that have no - win choices built into them. Each person will have opportunity to work on a significant childhood blueprint, which influences her/his life. This workshop can help you understand and change yourself at a core level, thus achieving greater fulfillment. Basic PNDC not required.
The material that forms the basis for this workshop is from my forthcoming
book.
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The focus will be two-fold. First, it will be on using Chi Kung, a Taoist
system of gentle movement, which embodies powerful, non-defensive energy.
Vicki will guide participants in increasing their wei chi, or protective
energy, which comes from being energetically open, expansive and assertive.
It is the ability to exude so much radiant energy or chi that nothing
negative can penetrate it. The Chi Kung practice will occur outdoors if
weather permits. The second focus will be on strengthening our ability
to speak with the non-defensive power of being fully authentic. The goal
is to simultaneously enhance our non-defensive energy fields and non-defensive
verbal skills.
Become more open, spontaneous, intimate, confident and powerful as a way of being - in your relationships, your life work, and your spiritual journey. Spend a weekend exploring how to integrate your inner voice and creative expression with the power of non-defensive communication. You will have opportunity to (1) focus deeply on the prompting of you inner voice (through meditation, journaling, art, music and movement), (2) strengthen your ability to show vulnerability as an essential part of being spontaneously open, fully alive, and present in the moment, and (3) speak with confidence and authority, interacting in a natural, genuine way that enhances your integrity and ease. In this retreat we'll share, stretch into new comfort zones, and have fun!
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An evening of Role-Playing: Due to the popularity of this evening of role-plays, Vicki Dello Joio and I will be offering it twice each term. During this evening, I take one example after another that audience members bring and role-play, comparing and contrasting defensive and non-defensive ways to respond. We debrief each role - play and I answer audience questions. It is always different — fun, moving, intense — PNDC in action.
A Community Pot Luck and Conversation: Sharon
hosts an evening where people can gather to talk. The last session focused
specifically on the "War on Terrorism." The focus is always
on how we can approach community issues from a non-defensive posture.
As became so apparent during the last "conversation," while
we may want peaceful solutions to local and global community issues, it
is still often hard to deal with our own frustrations without getting
defensive when there is conflict among individuals and groups with conflicting
perspectives. Learning how to integrate non-defensive attitudes when issues
are heated is a vital aspect of learning to create peace, starting with
ourselves.
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Once a month Sharon offers a three-hour practice session on a week-night from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. These sessions can help you develop and deepen non-defensive habits of communication. Practice sessions include discussion, role-playing, and other forms of practice. Each term has a particular focus for the practice sessions. For example, one theme has been "Shifting How we Use Power," and in that series, the topics included, "Responding to Other People's Defensiveness," "Shifting from Judgment to Wisdom," and "How do You Use Your Authority." Other topics have been, "How to respond to Criticism Non-Defensively," "Showing Vulnerability as a Source of Power," "Eliminating Our Own Victim Mentality," and "Non-Defensive Internal Dialogue."
The cost of an individual practice session is $60. A sliding scale is always available.
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