Billion Worlds Lab

PART ONE: Introductions

After establishing some basic shared principles and norms, the first portion of The Climate Circle begins. This part takes up about half of the event. We begin seated in a circle with a variety of “natural” objects placed at the center of the group. The primary facilitator shares the prompt:

“To introduce yourself, select one of the objects that helps you connect with a personal experience, memory, or set of feelings that relate to your experiences with climate emergency. Tell us what you’ve chosen and take us through your thought process. Tell us some stories; try to focus on how these memories and ideas make you feel.”  

This prompt, or your modified version of it, can be printed out on cards as a visual reference for participants. To help clarify what we’re inviting participants to share, have the secondary facilitator be prepared to go first.  Being vulnerable can feel intimidating, so modeling for the group with the first introduction really helps set the scene. 

We recommend that this secondary facilitator offer some thoughts that include snippets of personal history interwoven with present concerns about the climate crisis and how this feels. Don’t over prepare! It’s helpful to show that it’s ok to ramble a bit, to search for your meaning and connections, and to not have everything already figured out. You want your first introduction to feel somewhat raw, so that others feel comfortable following suit.

If you already have a relationship with another attendee, you might consider sharing the prompt with them ahead of time and asking them to be prepared to jump in early on, in case no one chooses to follow the first introduction. 

The introductions should not proceed in a pre-defined order (don’t just “go around the circle”). Instead, after someone takes their turn, they should return the object to the middle of the room, and the facilitator will then invite someone else to step forward: 

“Thank you for taking your turn, does anyone else feel drawn to take their turn and share?”

This continues until all participants—including the primary facilitator, who will go last—have taken their turn introducing themselves. Once everyone has gone, we turn to part two. 

PART TWO: Open discussion

After everyone has taken their turns, the lead facilitator closes out the introduction section and moves on to open discussion. The facilitator may say something like, “We’ve appreciated your stories, we now want to give you all a chance to share any feelings or thoughts that arose as you listened to others share.” The open discussion is meant to give those in the circle a chance to talk about what came up in the introductions including running themes, emotions, etc. 

Remind those in the circle of the aforementioned norms to allow everyone to share (step-up, step back, allow silence, take turns, etc.). This is also a good time to remind people that their thoughts don’t have to be fully formed–this is a space for processing, not for concrete conclusions and problem solving–rambling is okay. 

You might see if anyone in the circle has picked up on specific themes or common emotions. If not, one of the facilitators can jump in to express what common themes/emotions they heard or wrote down during the introductions. As the open discussion progresses, people may jump in one after the other in fairly quick succession; if needed, feel free to occasionally slow things down with a break of silence. Asking everyone to take 10-30 seconds of silence will allow those who need time to think through their thoughts to be able to better engage with the conversation. At the end of the silence, the facilitators should invite those in who haven’t had a chance to speak. Some people may feel excited to share a lot, if this happens, thank them for sharing but remind them to give space for others. 

When there is about 15-20 minutes left in the event, the facilitators should wrap up this discussion and transition to the closing and debrief.

PART THREE: Closing

Facilitators will acknowledge the closing and provide an opportunity for any last minute additions to the discussion. Then explain that the final portion of the event is a space to assess our shared experience. To transition, facilitators can provide a summary of themes, thoughts, and emotions that they identified throughout, and invite participants to do the same. And then most importantly, ask everyone to turn to a reflection on the climate circle process itself. 

“Now that we’ve shared this experience, maybe we can all offer some feedback about how this experience felt, and ways that we might change things going forward?”

The closing is a space where the climate circle can adapt and grow through group reflection on how the experience felt and what could be done differently. This part of the practice is meant to be “metacognitive” where participants start to think about the climate circle itself as a process that they have collectively experienced, and that may have elicited its own emotional responses and feelings. This is also a chance to allow participants an opportunity to take ownership of the space, and to demonstrate this, write down suggestions and reflections that people make during this time.

The closing also serves as an invitation for participants to consider becoming collaborators and part of the Climate Circle as a community building process. Facilitators should be open about how the experience was for them. Demystify the role of facilitator, making it clear that there are no experts and that it is an imperfect practice and a skill/role that is continuously building and morphing in/as a collective. 

Gauge participants’ interest in a higher level of engagement, to attend again, to take on the role of facilitator/ co-facilitator, or helping in the planning of future events. It’s okay if this is a one-off event, but there is opportunity to make this a recurring event with a new set of facilitators and participants. Consider using contact info for prior attendees to advertise future events, and invite them to share the work of making climate circles carry on. 

Lastly, invite participants to help clean up. The climate circle does not end here and can serve as a catalyst for connection outside of the circle.