Your social media and your restorative justice elevator speeches should vary.

Lets start with social medai:
You can connect Facebook and Twitter, so your tweets are your Facebook.  I did that for awhile, but felt I had two purposes for each.  Facebook, is me, it had to be I got deactivated last fall, for acting too much like a business.  I wish I did better with the [...]

Volunteer gratitude, a community member responds to the “we were bored” explanation.

You can’t do Restorative Justice without community members.  I believe they bring in collective wisdom.  I train our volunteers on aspects of Restorative Justice, and request they show up with their best selves.
I focus on Restorative Justice Accountability as being:

acknowledging you caused harm
understanding that harm from anothers point of view
recognizing where you had choices
take steps [...]

Blogging keeps me grounded, it forces me to practice what I preach.

Chatting with a friend, who is active on Facebook.  She said when you post what you are doing for the day, it helps you keep accountable to doing it.  I related to that, and experienced it recently, one degree deeper.  I’ve been challenged to live by a blog post I authored.
The last post, before this [...]

We are as strong as our weakest relationships.

Consider for a moment your most conflicted relationship.  Who are you at conflict with right now? Today, at this moment.  The person maybe part of your inner circle of connections, your child, spouse, friend or coworker.  Maybe you have a more distant relationship that is in conflict, a boss, an ex-wife, an old boyfriend.
Conflict is [...]

Speaking about Restorative Justice, what one thing, is most important.

I’m struggling with what to say at tonights first fundraiser.  I know that I will have a demonstration towards the end.  I plan to make the ‘mic’ the talking piece, and have a few testimonials from the crowd.  I have a few people aware that the spontaneous opportunity will be presented.  I do believe I [...]

Restorative Justice for Victims and increased victim participation.

A few recent events pulled this post together.
1.) At the IIRP Conference, I teased the Prosecuter in attendance, asking him if he was lost.  It was just a little sarcasm about the different philosophies sometimes held by ‘prosecution’ and ‘restorative justice’.  I then shared with him how I appreciated prosecutors that took initiative in using [...]

Using Talking Circles to promote social justice.

 
At UWRF Restorative Justice is being used to address Social Justice issues.  Specifically talking circles, to promote discussion and inspire action.  The four phases of the Circle will work well for this.
Our final phase of Circle is ‘Taking Action’ and action promotes social justice.
This began back when I connected with campus activities and student services staff [...]

It never hurts to treat yourself restoratively. Restorative Justice requires introspection.

I recently cleaned out my nightstand drawer.  I thought the mix of items were really interesting, can I explain a few.
-The Mini Bottle of Sky vodka, upper right corner.  Demonstrates my protective parenting skills.  I found the vodka outside of our apartment building, right by the door.  Just laying in the grass, unopened.  It’s mine now. 
-The handcreams, [...]

Restorative Justice allows us to speak with wisdom and real-ness.

One of the phrases I typically say in trainings:  “Nothing new under the sun”.  My point is two-fold.  First Restorative Justice isn’t all that orginal,  its more of the orginal kindness people needed to survive.  It’s as old as the sun itself.  I believe Restorative Justice reconnects us to the past way of relating.
I make [...]

Developing belonging as a life skill and a restorative justice skill.

Lets put value on ‘belonging’.
Look at all the books on LOVE.  The efforts at PEACE.  Not to minimize the importance of either of these but what if we learned to make people feel like they BELONG.
What about embracing our own selves, and our own place in our community.
How do we nuture our own belonging.  How [...]