The NVC Year Training is an annual in-depth training in Nonviolent Communication (NVC) that aims to help you learn, live and share the consciousness and skills of Nonviolent Communication. It provides five residential modules of three days each (total of 15 days of training). The modules are distributed from October 2026 to June 2027 and interspersed with online meetings to support practice.
The 15 days count as training credits recognized by the Center for Nonviolent Communication (CNVC), useful for those who wish to continue toward certification.
Our theme is drawn from the Centre for Nonviolent Communication (CNVC’s) Certification Preparation Packet, which provides a complete journey from initial encounters with Nonviolent Communication to advanced NVC mediation and facilitation skills:
- Knowing: learn and clarify the concepts of Nonviolent Communication.
- Living: Embody the compassionate consciousness of NVC in your daily life, including spirituality and social change.
- Sharing: Get support to share Nonviolent Communication skills with others at home, at work and in workshops settings.
Have you struggled to apply the principles of NVC in your daily life?
Once you’ve learned some NVC, you really want to apply it in your life to improve your relationships and build community. The question is, how? How do you get the learning and healing you need? How do you develop your communication skills?
Year Training learning objectives
- Learn, live and share the consciousness and skills of Nonviolent Communication.
- Find opportunities for healing past pain.
- Learn a process you can use to support others.
- Develop your communication skills to improve relationships at home, work and in the community.
- Get ideas and support to create the kind of world you want to live in.
- Benefit from the support of fellow-participants in an on-going NVC community.
The benefits of a year-long training
- The five modules give a sense of structure and progression.
- The format offers greater depth than one-off workshops.
- We become a community of people living and learning NVC.
- The community offers mutual support.
Learning and living together
As well as learning the principles of NVC, we will also be exploring how to live as a temporary community during our time together. This will include working together with our host, Paul Craig, on community tasks such as cooking, washing up and cleaning. We will also be exploring how we make decisions and address conflict as a community. We invite you to bring your courage and self-responsibility, bearing in mind that coming together as a community can be challenging, and conflicts may arise. It is in these situations that we are most likely to grow in our capacity to build community.
Trainers
All modules are led by CNVC-certified trainers Shantigarbha and Gesine Schrader. Between them they have spent decades learning, living and sharing NVC. More about the Trainers. More about them.
Dates for your diary
- Online Taster Session: Sunday 6 September, 10.00am – 12.00pm. Book this Taster.
- Module One: Knowing NVC (1–4 October 2026)
- Module Two: Living NVC (3–6 December 2026).
- Module Three: Healing past pain (11–14 February 2027)
- Module Four: Transforming conflict (15–18 April 2027).
- Module Five: Sharing NVC (10–13 June 2027).
All modules start with a meal at 6.30pm on the Thursday and finish at 4.15 pm on the Sunday.
Online taster sessions and interview
We will be going on an intense year-long journey, and we want to get a sense beforehand of how it will be to travel together. We invite you to attend our online taster session on Sunday 6 September, 10am – 12pm. The fee for attending a taster session will be £25.00, deductible from your organisational fee when you apply for the Year Training.
When we receive your application form, we will invite you to a short online interview, so that you can ask us questions, and we can get a sense if you’ll thrive on the way.
About the Training: What is Nonviolent Communication (NVC)?
NVC was developed by Marshall Rosenberg over a period of forty years as a response to one simple yet powerful question: why do some people continue to act compassionately, even in deeply challenging situations? NVC is now being used by a worldwide network of trainers and practitioners in fields such as education, parenting, mediation, conflict resolution, psychotherapy, and social change. Further introduction to NVC.
I have been on two of Gesine and Shantigarbha’s Year Trainings, which met many, many needs. They were both fantastic experiences which I highly recommend.
Kate Aldous, 21-22 and 22-23 participant.
General Information
- Participants will be invited to form Empathy Home Groups that will meet daily during the modules and be encouraged to meet face-to-face or by online between modules.
- Introductory reconnecting session at the start of each module.
- Concluding session at the end of each module including next steps.
- A morning session ‘Remembering’ our collective purpose and planning the day.
- An evening session ‘Harvesting’ the day’s learning.
- Open Space in the evening for fun and games, including singing and dancing!
- Community calls in between modules to foster community and for ongoing support.
Who is this training for?
This Year Training is open to you if you have done an NVC Level One training or equivalent 2-day Foundation Training with a CNVC-certified trainer.