HEAL Support Group Agreements

1. We welcome everyone to our support groups (click here for our equity statement). 

2. We practice a kind, accepting awareness of our thoughts, feelings and sensations in the moment.

3. We are free to participate (or not) in any group meeting, sharing or activity by discerning what serves our highest and best healing. 

4. We consider that gifts (given or received) may appear in ways we cannot fully understand. Therefore, none of us is more important than any other: our greatest impact may be through simply being present.

5. We support ourselves and each other with kindness, compassion, understanding and open minds.

6. We listen non-judgmentally with our whole hearts, not just to others but to what arises inside as we listen.

7. We see the openness and vulnerability of the group as a gift, honoring privacy and confidentiality by not sharing what others share outside the group (we may share our own personal experience as it serves us).

8. We appreciate the healthy diversity of every member's situation and healing path. We refrain from projecting our own path onto others. In return, we only take from others what serves us.

9. We ask questions, understanding that others may or may not choose to respond.

10. We balance expressing with inquiry, being as interested in other’s experiences and perspectives as our own. We sometimes take more time, and allow the same for others.

11. We acknowledge that even if some group participants are in supportive professions (e.g., therapists, counselors) they are attending the group as a peer, not in a professional capacity.

12. We take risks, make mistakes, and then let go.

Feedback regarding these agreements is welcome: send to me or post in our online forum.