Trusted Circles Readiness Training
Tuesday, June 9th | 11:00 AM EDT | Location: Zoom
The members who get the most out of Trusted Circles aren't the ones with the most interesting stories or the best moderator. They're the ones who walk into their first meeting already knowing how to show up.
Circle Readiness is the required final step before placement into a Trusted Circle. In 60 minutes, you'll learn the foundations that make peer advisory actually work, practice the core skill that separates great Circle conversations from surface-level ones, and leave with a written commitment to your group.
This isn't an orientation. It's preparation.
Gestalt in Practice
Most high-achieving people default to advice-giving. It's efficient. It feels helpful. And in a Circle, it's the thing most likely to limit the depth of conversation. You'll learn the difference between sharing experience and offering advice, why that distinction matters, and practice applying it through real scenarios before your first session.
Your Written Commitment
Before you're placed, you'll write 2-4 sentences across four areas: how you'll protect your attendance, how you'll arrive prepared, what confidentiality means to you personally, and what your best self brings to the group. Specific enough that someone could hold you to it.
Important Notes
Attendance is required before placement into any Circle
Sessions are intentionally small to allow for real questions and conversation
Completing this training confirms readiness to begin the matching process
The Foundation: What a Circle Is and Isn't
A Trusted Circle is a confidential monthly gathering of 7-8 peers with a trained moderator. No hierarchy. No experts. No advice-giving. Understanding what it isn't, a networking group, a fix-it group, a therapy group, is just as important as understanding what it is.
The Four Cornerstones Everything in a Trusted Circle rests on four principles. You'll walk through each one in depth:
Confidentiality: No one. Nothing. Never. Your learning can leave the room. Their stories stay in the room. Forever.
Gestalt: Speak only from experience. This is the single practice that makes a Circle powerful, and the one most members have never encountered before.
Vulnerability: 95% of your life is the story you tell the world. Trusted Circles exists for the other 5%.
Personal Responsibility: Value is directly proportional to your level of participation. Your absence isn't neutral. It's a subtraction from someone else's experience.
What to Expect in Your First Six Months
Your first several meetings will feel awkward. That's not failure. That's how trust gets built. The members who say Trusted Circles changed their lives kept showing up while it was still awkward.
What Happens After
Once you complete the training, here's what follows:
Circle Assignment - You'll receive your placement within the next month
Moderator Welcome - Your moderator will reach out before your first meeting
5% Worksheet - A reflection exercise to complete before you arrive
First Meeting - Introductions, first 5% Reflections, and your Personal History: a 10-15 minute life story shared with your Circle