Reframe Conflict as a Stepping Stone, Not a Roadblock to Your Goals

Uncover the secrets to using healthy tension to propel you toward success in the next installment of our training series.

In Turning Conflict into Creativity, you will learn the psychological dynamics of groups in relationship to tension and conflict.

Change, transformation, and our evolution depend on the tension between what is and what will be, between our current state and our future state, and between reality and our hopes for what could be.

Tension carries the potential to ignite powerful and enduring change within individuals, groups and organizations.

This second program in the Open Circle Training series presents ways to work with this tension, both in your life and at work. 

Through it, you can foster generativity, overcome interpersonal challenges, and transform stagnant relationships into fertile ground for creative growth.

By the end of this training, you will be able to:

  • Exercise self-awareness of intrapersonal and interpersonal patterns that contribute to unhealthy relationship dynamics.
  • Identify and assess the root cause of tension and struggle within yourself, in groups, and in your organization.
  • Transform conflict in yourself, in groups, and within others.
  • Understand group or organizational dynamics that cause or exacerbate emotional tension.
  • Navigate difficult situations that arise within the workplace with confidence.
  • Assess and communicate blind spots along with areas of avoidance for positive transformation.


This 16-hour in-person training will be hosted by More Than Fitness on its parklands in Delaware. More Than Fitness is a 501(c)(3) organization founded in 2018 to address mental health issues in young people through mindfulness and fitness.

Training Dates: 

June 7th: 7pm

June 8th: 9:30am - 5pm

June 9th: 9:30am - 2pm

If you need any guidance on travel arrangements and accommodation, please contact us [email protected]

Important note! 

Introduction to the Listening Circle, the first workshop in this series, is a prerequisite for this second workshop.

If you have not attended a Listening Circle Training with Open Circle, you can do this prerequisite on demand. Please register here. 

For questions regarding prerequisite requirements, reach out to Miriam Jones ([email protected]).

This Training Is for Professionals Who Want To...

  • Integrate various perspectives and feedback to drive impactful change in the workplace and their communities.

  • Break free from conventional thinking patterns and listen beyond the confines of preconceived notions and limiting assumptions.

  • Empower their teams with the tools and insights to adapt, innovate, and thrive within an ever-evolving landscape.

Course Curriculum

    1. Welcome and Guide Map for your Journey

    2. Participant agreement

    3. Preparation exercise

    4. Resource list: books, podcasts, articles and websites

    1. Video Lesson: Premise of Turning Conflict into Creativity - introduction video

    2. Five Premises of Turning Conflict into Creativity

    3. Reflection Exercise

    1. Video Lesson: Your relationship with Tension

    2. Slides to accompany video: Your relationship with Tension

    3. Window of Tolerance Worksheet

    4. Experiment

    5. Moving from Center - an interview with Wendy Palmer

    6. Leadership Embodiment by Wendy Palmer

    7. Experiment

    1. Video Lesson: Tension as a Gateway

    2. Slides to accompany video lesson: Tension as a gateway

    3. Reflection exercise

    4. Optional Resource: Overturning our Immunity to Change - an interview with Deborah Helsing

    5. Optional Resource: Developmental and Technical Tensions in Organizations- a video from Beyond Listening

    1. Video Lesson: Tension and the Human Condition

    2. Slides to accompany video: Tension and the Human Condition

    3. Experiment

    4. Optional Resource: Tension as the Human Condition in Organizations - a video from Beyond Listening

    1. Video Lesson: Courting Opposites

    2. Slides to accompany video: Courting Opposites

    3. Experiment

    4. Experiment resource: Personal Mandorla Worksheet

About this course

  • 16 Hours of Guided In-Person Training and 1:1 Coaching
  • 6 Exciting Online Modules for Pre & Post Training
  • Invaluable Tools and Skills for Immediate Application Within Your Organization

Secure Your Spot for Turning Conflict into Creativity!

Enroll Now

What Do People Say About Turning Conflict into Creativity?

“As a leadership consultant and master coach with over 30 years of experience, working all over the world and facilitating groups, teams, and circles, I had some trepidation about going into this unknown training as a participant. Would the workshop challenge me? Would it hone my understanding of power relations in facilitation? Would I learn something about myself? Would I develop new and useful skills? Would it embody a truly experiential, dialogical, improvisational and exploratory ethos? Would I find the workshop leaders mature, stimulating and inspiring? The answer to each of these questions was a resounding 'YES!'”

Sara 'Zora' Boas, MCC, MA, RDMP, Founding Director, Boas Partners

“I would recommend Open Circle Foundations training because one can learn a creative way of providing a space with care to enter a dialogue that connects participants/trainers in personal ways of finding human commonalities that form conscious ways of challenging beliefs”

Carolynne Abdullah, Racial Equity and Inclusion Consultant

“Excellent pioneering work. The Listening Circle Practice has transformed how I work as a leader and facilitator. Rather than standing in front and leading, this Practice has allowed me to sit with people in Circle, and walk with others as we share our stories and discover together the possibilities beyond what we could imagine on our own.”

Brett Robin Wood, Founder, Creative Wisdom

“The highly skilled team members at Open Circle have a range of listening and facilitation skills that span from formal to informal, inviting to challenging, easy to highly advanced. They are clearly on a mission to humanize the workplace.”

Don Lubach, UC Santa Barbara Ombudsman

Meet Your Instructors

Miriam Jones

Open Circle Co-Founder and COO

Miriam is an experienced entrepreneur and thought leader in the area of transformational education, cultural change, and leadership. She has founded and led several successful organizations, from not-for-profits to corporations and co-operatives. After developing an interest in business, culture and education, Miriam began designing and delivering leadership programs and cultural change efforts for organizations across the globe. In search of new perspectives for her organizational work amid rapid global change, Miriam turned her focus to learning forms influenced by indigenous nature-based cultures and societies including circle listening and healing practices, circle governance, rite of passage, and nature-based rituals. Embracing these, she gained an ecological understanding of human systems. Drawing inspiration from nature's systems, she now guides leaders and organizations beyond office walls, helping them discover answers within their organizational frameworks.

Adam Rumack

Open Circle Co-Founder and CEO

Adam brings a wealth of experience in driving organizational and individual transformation across diverse sectors, including corporations, large-scale non-profits, and the education and criminal justice systems. His profound passion for the outdoors serves as a catalyst, offering insights into the interconnectedness of humanity and the wild, shaping his approach to human-driven systems. In his pursuit of knowledge, Adam has delved into various disciplines, studying under spiritual and religious mentors and exploring the intricacies of economics, human behavior, and performance sciences. A practitioner of holistic stewardship, Adam applies his insights on his land in Coastal Oregon, USA, where he also oversees a nature-based preschool. His multifaceted background uniquely positions him to bridge the realms of organizational transformation, ecological mindfulness, and holistic education.

Gala Narezo

Facilitator

Gala Narezo is a facilitator, educator, activist and mindfulness instructor who is committed to mindful change-making. In her groups she uses storytelling, mindfulness, art and circle practice as guiding principles. She has collaborated with a variety of amazing partners on transformational education through awareness campaigns, public art, curricula and transformational media. She has degrees from Yale University and Art Center College of Design. She recently completed an M.A. in Art Education at City College of New York CUNY. She has done extensive training and practice in circle based facilitation running weekly groups online and live retreats in the USA and Mexico.

Included in Your Registration Fee

  • 6 hours of online training prior to in-person training, complete with videos, exercises, checklists, and resources

  • 16 hours of guided in-person training and 1:1 coaching at More Than Fitness in Wilmington, Delaware

  • $50 off your next training when you enroll within 30 days of completing this course.

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