Acts of Kindness in Daily Life
The behavioural wing of compassion training: deliberately practising generosity, hospitality or kindness toward specific people — someone close, someone neutral, someone difficu…
Relating R4
Empathy and Compassion
Connecting to others, oneself, and nature with kindness, care, and love, guided by the intention to reduce suffering.
Tools for this skill (45)
Advice
Two minutes on something in your life you want to be different, then your partner asks the one question that changes everything: 'do you want advice?' Yes gets a minute of advic…
Anonymous Confessions
Everyone writes down something they have never told anyone, or rarely share; the slips go into a basket; each person draws one and reads it to the circle as if it were their own…
Body Love
Three minutes appreciating three parts of your own body aloud, one minute to set any boundaries — 'don't speak about my stomach, arms or breasts' — and then your partner appreci…
Building and maintaining psychological safety
To create an environment where team members feel safe to express themselves, take risks, and be vulnerable. Psychological safety is built through consistent behavior over time:…
Care Ethics Mapping
A 75-minute case exercise from the Uni Bern facilitator guide: for a real complex challenge, map on sticky notes who needs care and who gives it — deliberately including future…
Choose Your Own Adventure
One person shares what is on their heart for two minutes; the other two each name the thread that most has their attention — something said, or a way of being — and the speaker…
Climate Circles / Climate Cafés
Hosted talking circles where participants voluntarily share what the climate crisis stirs in them — fear, anger, guilt, hope — in a confidential, non-judgmental space with no fi…
Coaching with Compassion
An approach to coaching political leaders that starts from care rather than correction: build a learning agenda toward the client's ideal self, treat change as a learning proces…
Compassionate accountability
To address performance issues and concerns in ways that maintain care for the person while being honest about the problem. Compassion does not mean avoiding difficult conversati…
Council of All Beings
A communal ritual in which participants set aside their human identity, are "chosen" by another life-form, often make simple masks, and then sit in council speaking AS that bein…
Deep Listening
Listening past the words: in pairs or small groups, the listener holds complete, non-judgmental attention — without inner censorship, rehearsing a reply, or steering — staying o…
Despair Ritual
A communal ritual in which sorrows for the world are spoken archetypally — moving between small groups and the whole circle, voices joined and witnessed — building emotional sol…
Distillation
One person speaks for two minutes to something on their heart; a second reflects back exactly what they heard; the speaker clarifies; a third says what they took from the whole…
Emotional Manipulation
A two-player scene opens with a line designed to move the other character's emotional state — a compliment or an insult — and the second player accepts it and lets it land. The…
Empathy
Silent eye contact, then one person speaks for three minutes to something on their heart while the other only listens; the listener says back exactly what they heard, with as li…
Extending the circle of care
To cultivate the team's capacity to care about those beyond its immediate boundaries. Periodically extend empathic attention beyond the team: • Who is affected by our work that…
Feeling Scenes
The audience suggests feelings — sad, angry, in love — and in the coming scene every actor tries to hold that feeling as fully as they can. A variation gives each actor their ow…
Finding Your Story of Climate Justice
A writing exercise for connecting yourself to climate justice rather than holding it at arm's length: choose the Global South region and weather event you most relate to, write…
Frustration Station
Think of someone you struggle to be authentic with — the manual calls them 'the Jerk' and admits some people dislike that — and embody them while your partner tries to relate to…
Grief Walking
A structured way for a community to accompany loss or hard transition: people move between four stations — each holding a different mode of being with grief (solitude, witnessin…
Heard, Seen, Respected
In pairs, participants take turns telling a story about a time they were NOT heard, seen, or respected, while the partner listens without interrupting, fixing, or judging. A str…
I Love Myself!
On your turn, say one thing you love about yourself; if nothing comes, throw your hands up and declare you love everything about yourself. A game-shaped way into self-talk the m…
I've Felt That
Name three emotions you felt at one moment in your life, with no story attached; your partner sits with the combination and tells of a time they felt those same three. However s…
If I Were You…
Tell your partner about an experience — a time you felt scared or endangered, or something stuck in your mind — and let them question you greedily, because they will retell it t…
Inviting Non-Human Stakeholders
Role-play that adds the missing chairs: participants embody non-human stakeholders — animals, rivers, trees, future ecosystems — inside a real case or project discussion, speaki…
Love and Self-Love
Tell two people about someone you love, letting yourself feel it as you speak; hear what it did to them; then speak about why you love yourself with the same care and feeling, a…
Loving-Kindness / Compassion Meditation
The progressive compassion practice at the heart of most compassion trainings: settle into body and breath; direct kind, non-judging attention first to yourself (self-compassion…
Mirrored Feelings
In pairs facing each other, one person takes on a feeling and speaks gibberish so that the feeling comes through; the other answers in gibberish, mirroring the feeling as exactl…
Next…
Around the circle, each person tells the one on their left something they themselves would like to hear — 'you're not going to fall apart', 'your mother loves you', 'you don't h…
Noticing and responding to struggles
To ensure that when team members are struggling, the team notices and responds supportively. Create practices that help the team stay attuned to member wellbeing: • Check-ins th…
Open Sentences
Pairs sit face to face; one speaks, completing a sentence-stem read aloud by the facilitator ("When I see what's happening to the natural world, what breaks my heart is…"), whil…
Storytelling Reflection
In a group of four or five, one person stands and acts out a story or a prompt — your first time, a part of you that feels broken, who you were that has changed — with words and…
Terminator
Two pairs: one asks, one answers — except that the askers may only speak as 'we' ('We notice that you scratch your head whenever you're asked about your family. What's happening…
The Bartender
The audience is asked to name a personal problem. A scene then plays out to music in which somebody unburdens themselves about that problem to a bartender in a pub — sung, impro…
The Emotional Family
A family scene: the audience picks an activity they are doing together — barbecuing, playing cards, decorating the Christmas tree — and the actors establish the activity, the ch…
The Feeling Partner
Pairs look at each other with one named feeling — compassion, say — with no movement, arms at their sides, just looking. Then a new partner and a new feeling, then a third. Afte…
The Hitchhiker
Four chairs arranged as a car and four actors. One is a hitchhiker who brings a feeling into the car, and it infects the other passengers. After a while the driver gets out for…
The Kind Response
A seconds-scale daily micro-practice for Empathy and Compassion (VCoL collection): When you notice someone struggling, resist the urge to ignore it, judge them, or immediately j…
The Milling
The group walks silently through the room in shifting currents; at the facilitator's word, each person pauses face to face with whoever is near for a guided, wordless encounter…
The Self-Compassion Pause
A seconds-scale daily micro-practice for Empathy and Compassion (VCoL collection): When you notice self-criticism arising, pause. Ask: "What would I say to a good friend in this…
The Understanding Attempt
A seconds-scale daily micro-practice for Empathy and Compassion (VCoL collection): When you notice a negative reaction to someone, pause. Ask: "What might be going on for this p…
Tonglen Meditation
The Tibetan practice of exchange: breathing IN the suffering of another — or one's own, or the world's — as heavy, hot darkness, and breathing OUT relief, spaciousness, and well…
Truth Mandala
A ritual structure for honoring pain for the world. The circle is divided into quadrants holding symbolic objects — a stone (fear), dead leaves (sorrow), a stick (anger), an emp…
Watermelon
One partner may say only the word 'watermelon'; the other answers 'you seem…' with whatever they read in them, and the watermelons that follow are honest responses to being read…
Also develops it (50)
Active Listening
The foundational listening exercise in its many dressings: in pairs, one person speaks about something real while the listener gives full attention — no interrupting, no advisin…
Bacon
Angels, Recipients and Free Agents. The Angels work out what essential nutrient a Recipient is short of right now — the thing keeping them from their whole brilliance — and then…
Becoming the Water Body
A perspective-shift practice from the Ocean Ambassadors Compass: imagine being your local river, sea, or one of its animals or plants, and voice its needs and challenges in firs…
Building Psychological Safety
Sustainability work requires speaking uncomfortable truths, acknowledging uncertainty, and challenging unsustainable practices. None of this is possible without psychological sa…
Case Clinic
Structured peer-coaching for 5–8 people (~70 minutes): a case giver presents a current leadership challenge at their growing edge; after clarifying questions, the group holds th…
Change the Protagonist
Groups pick a story everyone knows and ask whose story it is as told. Then they retell it from a different character's point of view — the Three Billy Goats Gruff from the middl…
Changing Emotion
In threes or fours, each person takes a starting emotion and holds a conversation in which only the numbers one to ten may be spoken, so the feeling has to carry entirely in the…
Circling
A conversation about what is actually happening for you and between you, right now — sensations, emotions, relationship, 'vibes' — with curiosity about others' experience and no…
Climate Emotions Wheel
A color wheel of climate-related emotions (anger, fear, sadness, positivity and their finer shades) used as a check-in and vocabulary tool: participants locate and name what the…
Connectedness in decision-making
To ensure that awareness of connections informs actual decisions. When facing significant decisions, include explicit consideration of connections: • How does this decision affe…
Connection to Impact
Genuine care for affected communities and ecosystems drives more authentic sustainability efforts than compliance alone. This practice strengthens felt connection to those impac…
Core Exploration
In threes, an Explorer spends three minutes going after what matters most to a Speaker — feeling it, reflecting it, digging with 'why does X matter to you?', distilling and chec…
Creating genuinely inclusive engagement with external actors
To model inclusive practice in how the team reaches out and collaborates. When planning engagement with external actors, consider who is being included and who might be left out…
Creating norms that welcome vulnerability
To reduce pressure toward conformity and create space for authenticity. Cultivate norms that make it safe to be authentic: • The team leader regularly models vulnerability by ad…
Dedicated time for relationship-building
Relationships develop through interaction, and interaction requires time. For internal relationships: Informal gatherings provide low-pressure opportunities to know each other b…
Dialogue Interview
A prepared but generative one-to-one conversation (30–90 minutes) designed to open reflection rather than extract answers: the interviewer sets an inner container in silence bef…
Ducklings
One person goes about their business across a room, a building or a city block while the others follow, narrating aloud what they see and what they take it to mean: 'Mama finds…
Dyad Circling (Wedding Circle)
Two closely interdependent people — a couple, colleagues — circle each other on a tension between them while four to eight others sit around and attend only to the space between…
Emotion Sculpture
One person chooses an emotion they struggle with and sculpts their partner into it — shoulders, brows, posture — adjusting like a director until it is right, walks around it, an…
Emotions in Numbers
In threes or fours, each person picks an emotion and the group converses using only the numbers one to ten, so nothing but tone, pace and body carries the meaning. The audience…
Empathy Walk
Choose a person significantly different from you — across a boundary of politics, faith, class, life experience — invite them for a walk, and practice holding space across that…
Ensuring diverse perspectives shape decisions
Inclusion is not merely about participation but about influence. Diverse perspectives must actually shape decisions. Examine how decisions actually get made. Who has voice in si…
Exclusion
Four to six people play a scene in which one of them is left outside the group — not included in whatever the others are doing. The players have to sense who the group is exclud…
Greetings
Players mill about and greet whoever they meet, first plainly and then as a named relationship — a long-lost friend, someone you don't trust, an ex, someone with bad breath. Eac…
Hot seating
One person sits as their character and answers questions in role — first from the facilitator, then from the watching group. They enter the space as the character and leave as t…
Imitation Introduction
Two minutes each to discover your partner's superpower — what they are uniquely good at, and how it shows in the moment — and then, around the circle, introduce your partner as…
Inception ("What's that like?")
One person says what they are feeling right now; the other may only ask 'what's that like?' — or 'what's it like to feel sad and be smiling at the same time?' — for two to five…
Interrelational Meditation
Mindfulness extended into relationship: in pairs, participants alternate between eyes-closed contact with their own present experience and open-eyed, non-judgmental seeing of th…
Jeans Journey
A ten-minute guided meditation that starts in the body and ends in the world: after settling into the breath, attention moves to the felt contact between skin and clothing — scr…
Kabuki Circling
Every chair in the circle carries one facilitation role — Sensor, Reflector, Empath, Group Mother, Witness, Depth Charge, Romantic, Dissenter, Body Tracker, Stud Finder, Time Tr…
Making connections vivid and real
To move connectedness from abstraction to felt reality by creating direct contact with those the team is connected to. Periodically create experiences that make the team's conne…
Meeting check-ins
To help team members arrive mentally and emotionally at the meeting. Begin meetings with a brief check-in round. Each person shares briefly in response to a simple prompt: • 'Ho…
Mirror Sessions
In pairs facing each other, one person moves and the other mirrors the movement and the facial expression as closely as they can. A performance variation asks a pair to mirror i…
Noticing and naming team patterns in real-time
To develop the team's capacity to notice what is happening in the moment. Cultivate the habit of pausing to name what is happening: • 'I notice the energy dropped when we starte…
NVC Dialogue Practice
Practicing Marshall Rosenberg's core sequence on a real tension, in pairs or triads: state the observation without evaluation, name the feeling, connect it to the underlying nee…
Perspective contrast exercises
To sharpen awareness of how different perspectives frame the same issue. When facing a dilemma with different legitimate perspectives, assign small groups to deliberately adopt…
RAIN Meditation
A four-step mindfulness practice for meeting difficult emotion where it stands: Recognize what is happening, Allow it to be here, Investigate with gentle curiosity (in the body,…
Restorative Circles
A community process for conflict developed by Dominic Barter with residents of Rio's favelas: those who acted, those affected, and their community meet in facilitated circles —…
Restorative Dialogue
A repair practice for after classroom or team "hot moments": once a discussion has run too intense, the group returns to it deliberately — reflecting on what happened, exchangin…
Rooms Of The Heart
'If my heart had different rooms, the one I use the most is…' — one person describes a room in themselves, a playful room or a work room, and how it is to have the others in it…
Sensing Journey
Leaving the office to see the system from its edges: small groups visit places and people that matter in the system they work on — users, front lines, forgotten corners — with t…
Seventh Generation
A ritual dialogue across two hundred years: in a double circle, the inner ring speaks as people of the seventh generation hence, asking the outer ring — people of today — what i…
Simple Ethnography
Go where the users are: observers spend real time in the field — alone or in pairs — silently watching and recording what people actually do (not what they say they do), then de…
Simultaneous Speech
In pairs. One person invents a story or talks about a subject; the other tries to say exactly the same words at exactly the same time. Copying the timing means having to anticip…
Structured approach to repair
To provide a framework for repair conversations when harm has occurred. When addressing harm, a repair conversation typically moves through stages: 1. The harmed person describe…
Truths
In the full group, anyone may say to anyone: '(Person's name), when you ____ (identify a particular, unarguable moment or experience), I felt ___ (share an emotion).' Continue u…
Unconditional Forgiveness Practice
A guided reflective process for releasing a held grievance — not excusing the deed, not requiring reconciliation, but freeing the forgiver from carrying it: recalling the hurt a…
Whispered Belongings
Write down what you wish someone would say to make you feel loved and that you belong; show it to your partner, who reads it silently and meets your eyes. Then half the room sta…
Widening Circles
In groups of four, each person speaks about an issue they care about four times over: first as themselves, then from the perspective of a person who opposes their view — in firs…
Witnessed Movement
One partner moves however they want for five minutes with eyes closed; the other watches with full attention, trying to feel what it is to be them dancing — mimicking a little i…