The Spaceholder’s Compass:
Tools for Transformative Leadership
How can I evolve my facilitation compass to better host group processes?
The Valley, Portugal, August 12-23.2025
Hi!
Welcome to The Spaceholder’s Compass, a 5-day immersive training, crafted for facilitators, leaders, retreat hosts, and community managers seeking to deepen their capacity to facilitate group spaces.
How can we facilitate transparently, in service of the collective purpose? What unconscious patterns shape my presence as a facilitator or leader?
This training invites you to evolve your facilitation compass by developing both inner and outer tools that support presence and clarity in guiding transformative spaces.
This training aims to give you a place of orientation and hands on experience with many methodologies on what approaches can be helpful, and how you can practically and concretely integrate it in the way you hold spaces, design experiences and transformational group processes.
Through experiential learning, dialogue, and co-creative spaces, you'll gain practical methods and fresh insights to develop your leadership and capacity to host participatory group processes.
There is space for everything. We will have fun, cry, eat, feel, and just be in it.
The Program
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Arrival, lunch + afternoon session:
A space to get to know each other, explore what hopes and dreams you are holding, co-creating the learning container together. We will map who is in the room, connect, play and share intentions for our journey. Tickling our minds and how we see the world, we will offer living system frameworks like the ecocycle and the Cynefin framework.
You may encounter:
* EcoCycle Model
* Cynefin Framework (https://cynefin.io/wiki/Cynefin_Framework)
* Chaordic path (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UY-ka17m7tI)
* Social group mapping practices: who is in the room?
* The Art of Hosting (www.artofhosting.org)
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What are essential basic aspects of holding groups and offering conditions for any meeting, gathering or event? What do we already know and what are some best practices to be inspired by? This day is about co-creating clarity around what makes facilitation effective
Holding space together means understanding and being able to name and hold different elements: Holding Time, Flow, Content, Harvest, Purpose.
You may encounter:
* Flow Game (www.flowgame.net)
* Circle Practice (https://www.thecircleway.net)
* Powerful Questions Practice https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EqxIjMwGyw
* The Art of Hosting (www.artofhosting.org)
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Facilitation means dealing with difficult situations: Explore challenging situations and learn basics on how to deal with tension and conflict in group environments. How do I know that I’m triggered, while I'm hosting? Work on real life scenarios, learn practical ways of keeping yourself centred and effective strategies that help to contribute to safety and trust.
One of our main goals is always the emergence of the new, staying open and flexible to what IS - and not to what we imagined or planned.
You may encounter:
* Nonviolent Communication (NVC) (www.cnvc.org)
* Strong Teams Talk About Elephants (www.strongteamstalkaboutelephants.eu)
* Sociocracy 3.0 and consent decision making (www.sociocracy30.org)
* Deep Listening & Reflective Practices (www.presencing.org)
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What mindset and practice can help me to design and host effective group processes? Learn underlying principles and design aspects of healthy generative processes and retreats, Experience different practices that can help you deepen your ability to be grounded.
What unconscious patterns shape my presence as a facilitator or leader? We will also bring awareness and compassion to the spicy edges, shadows and power dynamics of our role as guides of group spaces.
You may encounter:
* 8 Breaths Design Model https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGwzuCUMX3I
* Four-Fold Practice https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLb8cbAKcXQ&t=2544s&ab_channel=ArtofHosting
* The Art of Hosting (www.artofhosting.org)
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Bring home what you are learning and develop concrete future steps with the support of all of us in the room. There will be plenty of space to co-create solutions for some of your challenges. This is also a possibility to co-shape new ideas for retreats and offerings as they emerge. Closing Circle & Ceremony.
You may encounter:
* Open Space Technology (Open Space World)
* Pro-action café (https://www.sessionlab.com/methods/pro-action-cafe)
Meet the Team
Between us, we’ve hosted circles, designed programs, responded to conflict, and learned by doing. This team holds a shared commitment to growing leadership that is real, responsive, and rooted.
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Group facilitator and participation specialist. Maya designs and hosts participatory processes that center dialogue, co-creation, and collective intelligence. She’s been facilitating since 2011 across activist movements, community spaces, and international trainings.
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International process facilitator and participatory leadership trainer. Mira brings over 17 years of experience guiding groups through collaborative decision-making, systems change, and co-creation. She integrates practices like Nonviolent Communication, Sociocracy 3.0, and Art of Hosting to foster inclusive, purpose-driven group processes.
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Community facilitator and participatory artist. Sharon weaves storytelling, ritual, and social practice into group spaces that foster connection, reflection, and shared leadership. He’s guided gatherings across festivals, activist movements, and intentional communities.
Our venue
The Valley is a community-rooted space nestled in the forested hills of central Portugal. Designed to host group processes with care and simplicity, it offers open-air domes, shared living spaces, forest paths, and handcrafted structures built by the people who live and gather there. It’s a place where meals are shared, ideas are exchanged, and connections grow naturally. The Valley holds space not just for workshops, but for belonging.
We’re currently gathering a small group of participants for the first edition of The Spaceholder’s Compass. If this program speaks to you, we’d love to hear from you. Fill out the short form below to tell us a bit about yourself, your experience with facilitation, and what you’re looking for in this journey. We’ll get back to you soon with more details.