Authentic Portland

Authentic Portland is an incubator, a laboratory and a catalyst for an emerging authentic culture. It is soil from which authentic communities have the potential to grow.

We are answering the question of how to embody authenticity, presence, truth and compassion in our day-to-day lives and relationships. 

We invite people of all races, nationalities, spiritual beliefs, sexual orientations, gender identities, social and economic statuses and political beliefs to join us in this exploration.

Some of our core values... 

- surrendering to present-moment experience 
- being fully alive, engaged, and grounded in the body
- following curiosity
- respecting ourselves and each other
- expressing from vulnerable transparency
- owning our experience
- seeing the innocence and good intentions in people, including ourselves
- connecting from the heart
- deepening our understanding of how we impact each other, and letting that matter
- treating relationship as an awareness practice
- deepening intimacy
- sharing togetherness in an attitude of play and not-knowing

We offer a variety of events:

- Games Nights: Come for some fun and potentially surprising insights. We interact with each other through various relational games for everyone to get a taste of what we are about. These games do not include board games, they may include gazing into someone's eyes, speaking your truth in the moment, or revealing through your body how you are feeling right now.

- Circling: This is a practice of non-judgmentally being with each other in a group conversation. We are looking at self and other in contact with the present moment from a place of curiosity. This tends to be more intimate and vulnerable, happens in smaller circles, and can include strong emotions. People often feel deeply seen and relational blind spots can be revealed through the process. We recommend attending a few of our Games Nights before circling. Please read through our event description before signing up, as this is not for everyone.

- Community events: Such as camping, potluck socials, informal gatherings - we hang out with the idea to include a similar level of authenticity in our interactions as we have practiced in our more structured events.

To learn more, visit our website Authenticportland.org.

To connect with others in the community, join our Authentic Portland Facebook group.

We have been inspired by and are loosely associated with Authentic World, The Circling Institute, Authentic Revolution and Circling Europe: we highly recommend their workshops.

If you need any questions answered before deciding to come, please reach out, we would love to hear from you! Thanks and looking forward to playing with you.