Small groups are the beating heart of the Realisation Festival. When designing the festival, thinking about how we might help people un-imagine and re-learn, we wanted to create spaces for listening, reflecting and discussing. The talks and workshops provide varied and stimulating content, there is plenty of unscheduled time for reflection, it is the daily small group meeting that creates the chance to integrate, discuss and play with the ideas that germinate during the festival.
Over the four group meetings, deep bonds are built between the 8-10 group members. The groups are designed as a safe space where people can explore and push their thinking, or simply share how they are experience the festival. The groups are given enquiry questions each day of the festival, to reflect the arc of the experience. Everyone participates and the group facilitators are there to guide the group to positive and constructive conversations whilst encouraging people to be open and brave in sharing their thoughts.
The groups are also a place where you find out what arose in workshops or talks that you were not able to attend. They enrich and broaden your experience of the festival, and crate a daily steadfast checking in point. They are a place where you feel the diversity of the people at Realisation, and as the days pass you also begin to see the common thread that holds this collective of individuals together, a shared sense of how can we help?
When we receive feedback from the festival each year the small groups are highlighted as a place where people find real benefit, kinship and thought development. We look forward to welcoming you to your group in June.
Festival founder Ed Haddon, and Lucy Taylor of Make Work Play