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What we’re about

Want to be HAPPY? Learn what makes you THRIVE!

Yup, like anything else, happiness (and thriving) are skills that can be learned. And it can be SAFE and FUN!

Join our community of authentic, like-hearted, playful, compassionate, responsible souls who are exploring, experimenting, discovering, and practicing what makes us thrive ... through connecting with our bodies and other "right-brain" ways of expressing ourselves*.*

We call the things that make us thrive "Life-Needs."

Think of "Life-Needs" as pathways to thriving ... and happiness!

![img](https://secure.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/4/1/b/f/600_453436831.jpeg)


We do what we do because we think it'll help us survive or thrive. (Even if it's all unconscious.) Because ultimately it's all about thriving and being happy -- right?
We're each on our own journey of discovering what makes us thrive (what makes us happy).

And because PLAY, BEING SEEN, and BELONGING are core Life-Needs for all of us, it's much more satisfying to do this exploring together.

ADVENTURES in THRIVING is focused on experiential, workshop-style offerings that give us room to be actively engaged in our own process of exploration and discovery, and to authentically share what we discover with each other.

(Please also check out our other group at www.meetup.com/portland-nvc and www.meetup.com/amazing-dating-romance/for more authentic, community-based exploration of WAYS TO GET TO THRIVING.)

Come "dip your toe in" and see if you like it!

Warmly, 
Vika and the Thriving Life Community
www.thriving-life.org

P.S. We incorporate wisdom from many disciplines, sources, and practices, including Compassionate Communication (NVC), brain science, mindfulness, Tai Chi, Qi Gong, mind mapping, Laughter Yoga, Attachment Theory, quantum mechanics/The Law of Attraction, positive psychology, somatic empathy, somatic expression, and many others. 

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OUR CORE VALUES & PRACTICES, that help us honor and support everyone’s thriving:

* COMPASSION: Understanding that everyone – including you and we – are just trying to thrive (be happy), even when we act without awareness or skill, or out of pain that’s too much for us to hold

* DIGNITY & RESPECT FOR OURSELVES & EACH OTHER, and acknowledging both our shared humanity and our healthy separateness

* AUTHENTICITY/TRANSPARENCY: being real human beings with each other; acknowledging our shared humanity

* LIVING IN ALIGNMENT WITH OUR VALUES

* ACCEPTING RESPONSIBILITY FOR OUR OWN WELL-BEING, including acknowledging that we are the author of our own lives and experience, and setting boundaries that support our thriving

* DEEPENING OUR CAPACITY TO BE PRESENT AND AVAILABLE RIGHT NOW,
including learning how to notice and experience our present-moment body sensations, feelings, thoughts, and impulses ... without having to numb, avoid, change, or fix them, AND without getting overwhelmed or flooded

* LIVING FROM WHAT'S MOST ALIVE IN US

* CREATING, MODIFYING, & DISSOLVING AGREEMENTS IN WAYS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO EVERYONE'S THRIVING

Come explore, play, and create with us!