Connect with your Surroundings

SLOW DOWN. CONNECT. MEET YOUR NEIGHBOURS.

A week of meditation, authentic connection and practical communication tools in our community garden.

English / German translation 🌿 No experience needed. 🌿 Free / donation-based 🌿 Come to one event or join the whole week.

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Meditations in the Garden

Slow down from human doing to human being.
Together we practice grounding and giving space to whatever is alive in us—without fixing, solving or improving.

Mon 22 June, 17:00
Wed 24 June, 14:00
Fri 26 June, 9:00

30 minutes each

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SATURDAY 27 JUNE

11:00 – 13:00: Meeting beyond Judgement
Why do conversations with partners, parents, neighbours—or even ourselves—sometimes become so difficult? Nonviolent Communication offers us a framework to understand where conflict is coming from and a practical method to resolve any conflict through meeting each other beyond judgement.

You'll learn:

• empathic listening
• expressing yourself honestly
• understanding the needs underneath judgements
• practical tools for more connection in your conflicts & daily life

50% practice / 50% theory

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13:00 – 14:30: Potluck Neighbourhood Lunch

Bring something to share, meet the people living next to you & connect with your surroundings through picknick outside.

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14:30 – 17:00: Connecting Authentically with your Neighbours (& loved ones)

A playful and practical workshop for creating deeper human connection. Expect real conversations, simple exercises and a welcoming atmosphere.

Together we practice:

• listening and being heard
• staying connected during dialogue (the origin of conflict)
• checking assumptions instead of believing them
• meeting each other beyond first impressions
• being welcomed & held in our vulnerability

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Our intention

We want to help create a neighbourhood where people feel more connected—to themselves, to each other, and to the place they live. And we love our wild community gardens with the birds singing in the trees. And we believe our gardens can be more than green spaces. They can become places of belonging. This week is an invitation to slow down, connect, and create a little more community right where we live.

Everyone is welcome.

Whether you meditate every day or have never tried anything like this before. Whether you're curious about personal growth or simply interested in meeting your neighbours.

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Practical Information

Location: Inside Garden between Rudolf-Reusch-Strasse, Kubornstrasse and Kunzeweg

Cost: All Events are for free / donation based

You can join each event individually (also the three parts on Saturday).

No prior knowledge required.

To bring:

• Blankets/pillows to sit on the ground
• Comfy clothes for the meditation (and maybe an extra jumper in case it gets cold).
• You just as you are

Contact: martinapescenvc@gmail.com

Who we are

• Martina Pesce

My mission is to contribute to a world where everyone can be heard and seen, by others and themselves.
I came in contact with Nonviolent Communication (NVC) through a relationship where I started to grasp the beauty of this tool. After 3 years of self-study and occasional practice, I was touched by how this communication allowed me to connect with my mum in conflict, so strongly that I felt love for her for the first time in 20 years.
Unsatisfied with the lack of mental health support in the neuroscience research field, I decided to switch careers and dive deep into NVC. I trained as a mediator, counsellor and trainer at the Connecting2life school (Yoram Mosenzon). It was a two-year-long process of embodying the tool and then learning how to transmit it so that it could sink in the body. For a year I've been holding my workshops, courses and 1:1 practice.
My approach is based on practice and embodiment. I found NVC very revolutionary and with that respect, I like to let sink in our system a few bits of info at the time, rather than an overwhelming waterfall of theory.

• Matthias Flury

To be honest with you, I’m incredibly hesitant to write this short biography about myself. Part of the resistance comes from a fear of not being enough - it’s an insecurity that often comes alive since for many years of my life my need for connection wasn’t met, no matter what I tried. Out of this experience I’m shy to show and present myself, even to an unknown reader, to not go through the pain of rejection again. Another source for this hesitation is that I’ve got an idea of how I need to present myself here as a facilitator. “I need to sell myself well and in a way that will make you trust me and curious to learn from me”. And I’m worried that I’ll try to perform as something I’m not in order to achieve that. Underneath the pressure of trying to be perfect I’m certain I’ll lose something incredibly important. I’ll lose connection to myself and with that any hope of actually contributing value to you.
That’s why I’ll start this introduction of myself like this. I’m looking forward to meeting you and exploring together how we can give space to our feelings and unknown desires. How we can hold space and lovingly meet each other exactly where we are in our authentic selves. This is the place where relationships gain intimacy and depth, where love grows and where life begins to make sense.
Just in case you actually want to know about my background: I started learning about NVC in 2019, took my first lessons with Empathie Stadt Zurich in 2020, and completed my education in 2023 with a course about teaching and embodying NVC by CNVC-Trainer Yoram Mosenzon. I regularly support NVC-teachers as an assistant in their courses and regularly teach myself since 2025. If you have any questions you can reach me at matthias.flury@mail.ch.

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