Reflecting on the last seven years of Compassionate Inquiry as a distinct entity, I recall the many times that Gabor or I have remarked that CI “seems to have a life of its own”. Its evolution has been more like the natural growth of an organism than a pre-planned, carefully executed business venture.
Today, before sitting down to write this article, I was scheduled to simultaneously appear as a guest in two live Zoom calls at 11am – one hosted by Soraya Romao-Inglis to let the Portuguese-speaking community know about the Compassionate Inquiry Short Course and the Compassionate Inquiry Circles, which have both been translated into Portuguese; and the other hosted by Irina Ungureanu to inform the public about the upcoming 10-week Compassionate Inquiry Suicide Attention Program beginning on March 8. I take responsibility for the lapse that only one of these meetings was noted in my calendar, and the invitation to the other came minutes before the start time. Fortunately, I was able to drop into one meeting and then the other to welcome the attendees, and it all worked out.
As I was listening to Soraya and Irina address the participants on Zoom in two separate groups, I experienced immense warmth, appreciation, fulfillment and gratitude in my heart for all that has been accomplished within our Compassionate Inquiry community. The passion, diligence and contributions of many people, including Soraya and Irina, have spurred the growth of additional arms of our CI Organism.
I am reminded of an octopus, which has a central brain between its eyes that acts as an ‘executive director’ and additional brains in each of its eight arms which can: act independently to search under rocks for food; explore textures or terrain; gather tools such as coconut shells, rocks and broken glass for protection and shelter; and taste and feel the environment through receptors in over 200 sensitive suction cups in each arm – approximately 2000 suckers in total. Autonomous arms can ‘do their own thing’ or work seamlessly together during coordinated activities such as swimming, attacking prey, or constructing a home. Arms exchange information with each other through neural connections. If one arm is severed, it can still move, and react to stimuli in its environment for up to an hour or more. Luckily for the octopus, it can completely regenerate a severed arm over the span of a few months.
Gabor and I may be the central brain of the CI Organism, but there are at least eight other directors and teams acting as satellite brains in our octopus arms, working independently yet in a synchronized and coordinated fashion with each of the other arms. It is mind-blowing to me that we can use shared Google drive folders, translation teams, branding guidelines, structural templates and workflows to duplicate an arm in a new language relatively quickly, all things considered. It is this shared neural network among humans, using the digital world as our communication tool (rather than coconut shells, rocks and clams), that has allowed Compassionate Inquiry to expand so remarkably in a few short years. Had we attempted to plan it, such a feat would have seemed impossible in 2018 when CI was hatched. Fortunately, we had no plan. We started something and it grew.
Along the way, talented people showed up who had passion, vision and dedication. Our country coordinators, Sanjog Sotomayor (Spanish), Cristina Bara (Romanian), Soraya Romao-Inglis (Portuguese), Manjeet Adi Egervari (Hungarian), Steve Borloz (French) stepped up to initiate translations of our programs in these languages, and committed to assembling and managing teams to deliver the programs.
The creators of the Compassionate Inquiry Suicide Attention Training, Irina Ungureanu and Camilla Monroe, facilitated the first pilot program in 2022, and have taught it twice annually since then, supporting hundreds of people in knowing how to respond to individuals in despair.
Hannah Idarius and Laura Latina, the inspired developers of The Portal, a Compassionate Inquiry training for conception, pregnancy, birth and the postpartum period, approached me in 2023 and launched The Portal training in 2024 – another miraculous birth within CI, this time supporting professionals who work with women before, during and after pregnancy, along with their newborns. They are creating a more caring environment for humans as they enter this world.
Our dedicated Admin Team, Tech Team, Marketing Team, Translation Team, Transcription Team, Facilitation Team, Intern and Volunteer Team, Mentoring Team, Certification Team, Circle Leaders, CI Educators, DEI Team and CI Focus Groups are additional arms of our expanding octopus family. To each of the members of these teams, I offer my heartfelt gratitude, admiration and appreciation for executing the tasks at hand in a skillful, collaborative and coordinated fashion, and for keeping our CI Organism vibrant, adventurous, curious, explorative, connected, playful, inclusive and healthy. Together we’ve constructed a welcoming home for many to inhabit.
Since our first year-long Compassionate Inquiry Professional Training in January 2019, our fabulous CI Facilitators have trained over 4000 participants in over 80 countries. We have educated another 6000 individuals in trauma-informed care in our 25-hour Compassionate Inquiry Self-Study Short Course and Short Course with Facilitation. Our skilled and compassionate CI Circle Leaders have supported more than 1000 individuals in processing and healing their traumas through the 10-week Compassionate Inquiry Circles. Currently, more than 260 individuals have completed the 6-month Mentorship Program, passed a certification review, and are now certified Compassionate Inquiry Practitioners working with clients around the globe. Many of these practitioners and course participants were overjoyed to come together in person to connect during our CI Conference in Bucharest, Romania in September 2024.
On February 22 we will host our third Compassionate Inquiry Experience on Zoom, introducing another 1000 people to this brilliant therapeutic approach. In June this year we will celebrate our first Summer Solstice Retreat in Owen Sound, Ontario (my home town), hosted by our CI Facilitators, for participants and graduates of the Professional Training as well as our team members. This will be a time to play, explore and connect.
Our vision to bring compassion, respect, acceptance, insight, healing, freedom and connection to humanity through an international community of skillful Compassionate Inquiry practitioners is in flow. We extend our multiple arms to you to join us in creating a kinder world through compassion + inquiry – first given to oneself and then offered to others.
