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Steve Torma speaking about Compassion Camp

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Transcript from Video:

Steve: Hi folks! This is Steve Torma from Asheville, North Carolina and Earthaven Ecovillage.

Terrie: I’m Terrie LeWine and I’m from Philadelphia and I’m at Earthaven Ecovillage.

Steve: So, here we are today, spring equinox. We’re sitting here with our lovely flowers here at Earthaven. We are dreaming about Compassion Camp this summer, hoping that you all might want to come and join us. This is our third year, and we’re planning to have a wonderful time together.

Terrie: I love Compassion Camp because it brings people together from western North Carolina and beyond. It’s really a dream of people gathering in a way that they can share intimately, get to know each other, and learn a few skills along the way.
What are some of the things that are highlights for you, Steve?

Steve: Well, non-violent communication, which you and I both care so deeply about, it’s a core part of what we do at Compassion Camp. But, there’s many other things. Many other issues, related to how to create more peace, and justice in the world, and loving relationships, and inner peace. We also have a lot of fun.  We try to create a safe container where people’s needs to be taken care of are really respected.  And we do singing, and we do creative movement things.
What about walking around here? What do you think?

Terrie: What people have said (we often do tours of Earthaven, people sleep here in tents and inside indoors) you really get a sense of the life that is happening here at Earthaven. A sense of being connected to the earth and why that’s important too. So Compassion Camp, while it really is steeped in non-violent communication, it’s really morphed into all things compassion. What are ways we can care for each other? And care about each other?  And develop sustainable relationships, that feel really good? So one of the ways that has happened is through connecting with the people of the land here.

Steve: I really think of compassion as the medicine for our time. Learning how to just push out further, and further who we can care for, and care about not only the humans, but the beyond the human worlds. At Earthaven, if you’ve never been here before, there’s some really beautiful parts of nature that you can have access to, streams, trails, trees. So if this sounds interesting to you, we’d love to have you join us.

Terrie: One of the things that we’ve done, and we’ve grown into over all the years, is how we do leadership. It started out that we would have a few of these classes, NVC classes and things that are prepared by people who already teach.

It’s also an opportunity if you have something or some skill either that you want to ask for to kind of be immersed in a group, or that you really want to practice your own leadership skills or co-leading skills. So, we have open source (what we call our version of open source) technology, where in the beginning is when we decide what’s going to happen here. It’s designed and it’s decided by everybody who is here together. So it isn’t decided by us. That’s something that’s really important to me and it makes for a really interesting well-rounded group of topics that we can explore together.

Steve: To create a teaching – learning community. People who come together to share their talents with each other. So that we collectively become more connected, more intelligent, more skilled, more compassionate.  So, look forward to having you join us. Thank you, folks.

Terrie: Oh, a couple other things that you might want to know: One is that your kids are welcome here. We have a robust program for young people. And one of the things that people report is the food here is so good.  A lot of the food is off the land, it’s grown off the land. Most of it is cooked by people here on the land. So it’s a nice place to come to get a good meal as well.

Steve: Thank you folks, thanks for watching this. see you soon!

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Transcript from video:

Laura:
Hi, I’m Laura. I just want to speak about my experience at compassion camp 2019 because I’m definitely going back to 2020!

It far exceeded all my expectations. It was amazing; learning, food, we did dancing, and singing, we had a fire at night.
Singing around the fire, I made so many great friends.

It was at Earthaven ecovillage, which was amazing. That’s just like this little hidden gem in the mountains, you would never know was there.

It was just an amazing experience and I’m still savoring it to this day.

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Transcript from video:

Alan: I’m Alan Muskat and I’ve been to the first two Compassion Camps.
I can’t wait for the next because I haven’t experienced anything like it-  besides going to the actual international NVC training when, for days at a time, I felt completely accepted and I couldn’t do anything wrong. I can’t say we’re quite there with this one but we’re building it each time. I know that I could ask any question or say anything and have time to talk about it with folks on our own or in groups. Even the food was great. The location is beautiful and I make friends. Real friends that I can have throughout the rest of the year because everyone is local or nearby.

Thanks!

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(Transcript from video)

Steve:

Hey, folks..I really want to invite you to join us for compassion camp this summer, July 15 through 18  2021 at Earthaven Ecovillage.

If you haven’t heard of compassion camp before this is our third time doing it and it has some features to it that i just absolutely love.

One of the main features is that we gather as a teaching-learning community, where we invite what we want to share with each other and what we want to ask of each other. We invite this into what’s called open space technology process, where we learn. We become a learning teaching community.

The topics a lot of it is NVC based, but we also have a lot of other topics related to compassion social justice and the whole range of what it means to create a compassionate culture. There’s also a strong emphasis on community building and relational connection.

We have singing and movement, dance, story telling, a variety of different ways that we connect and celebrate and build community together and enjoying nature. Earthaven has so much beauty with all these other beings that we’re sharing here; the trees, the water, the crawling animals. There’s so much gorgeous trails and woods that it’s such a balm for the soul.

So for all of those reasons and many more… great local food especially that’s another great one.. really encourage you to come and join us this year at compassion camp 2021. Hope to see you there!

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Over 100 people passionate about living and promoting compassionate consciousness gathered in August to learn, play, and celebrate together. It was a wonderful weekend full of life… smiles, tears, dancing, deep connections, new friendships, and wonderment filled the village. If you weren’t able to come this year, mark your calendar for next year: July 16-19, 2020. Visit the School of Integrated Living’s website for more information.

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Steve Torma laughs when he remembers his first exposure to nonviolent communication (NVC), the system of compassionate human relations developed by psychologist Marshall Rosenberg. As a fresh-faced 25-year-old at the Hippocrates Health Institute in Florida, he attended exactly one afternoon in-service program about the practice. “I thought that I knew what NVC was after that introduction!” he recalls.

But it wasn’t until 2007 that Steve truly began to understand the transformative potential of NVC. After an eight-week intensive course by one of Compassion Camp’s facilitators, Jerry Donoghue, he saw that the practice went far beyond a way of talking with others. “It’s a postmodern understanding of what all religions basically talk about at their core, which is the Golden Rule: Love thy neighbor as thyself,” Steve says. “For me, NVC has become a spiritual path.”

Since that revelation, Steve has founded The REAL Center and 10,000 Love Letters, two projects for spreading the word of NVC, and has instructed nearly 600 people in the practice. He brings that mission to Earthaven in partnership with School of Integrated Living (SOIL) through Compassion Camp, taking place August 15-18. Read Steve’s interview on the School of Integrated Living website, where he shares more about the camp, the power of NVC, and its value to sustainability advocates.

Compassion Camp is a four-day event for adults and children where we create a community of people who learn, play, and celebrate together, empowered to send each other back into the world to spread these seeds of justice and love. Our time together is designed to foster community among the growing number of people who are passionate about living and promoting compassionate consciousness. Be inspired, empowered, and connected.

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