The Center for Systems Awareness is offering this advanced toolkit for those who have completed the year-long Certification Program for Compassionate Systems Master Practitioners. This program is designed for those who are engaged in leading Compassionate Systems workshops or systems change processes on the ground, and who would like to learn how to more intentionally and consistently cultivate generative social fields in their work and life in general.

In 2021-22, we prototyped a “Holding Space” program with a group of 10 master practitioners. Integrating their feedback, we iterated and offered a second cohort in 2022-23. Based on both cohorts positive experiences and encouraging feedback, we aspire to offer this program annually to meet the needs of our growing population of master practitioners who are passionate about the work of creating conditions for generative social fields.

The How to Hold Space program is particularly relevant for master practitioners who aspire to teach the Compassionate Systems Framework to others, for those who are in positions of decision-making authority in complex change processes and for those who want to stabilize and deepen their contemplative systems awareness practice. From our perspective, these are some of the most essential and fundamental practices we can share.

To lead the Compassionate Systems Framework well, whether through a workshop or more indirectly through process work, we believe it is essential to have an inner anchor of emotional grounding and an intentional awareness of the quality of the social field that is present in any given situation. These are skillsets that are often implicit to masterful facilitators. Through this advanced program, we will explore what personalized, embodied facilitation looks and feels like, and in the process make more explicit what it means to hold space for people and processes. This particular orientation is what we call “systems awareness”, and it is grounded in contemplative cultivation as a necessary bridge to become clearer about one’s inner landscape in order to be able to be with others as “legitimate others”, practicing neutral present awareness with more consistency.