Creating spaces for reflection, dialogue, and collective awareness through sound and attentive listening.
Deep Listening Circles are gently held, arts-based gatherings that invite communities to slow down, share stories, and listen deeply to one another.
“I was amazed at the series of workshops by Shumaila Hemani. In my 22 years of experience in the climate field, I have never had the opportunity to combine my background in film/photography/art with climate change. The work Shumaila is doing is incredibly innovative, and I think it touched a deep yearning among the participants to seek equity and justice in this world in which we are immersed.”
— Helen Corbett, CEO, All One Sky International
We collaborate with community organizations to design circles that respond to their specific contexts.
Deep Listening Circles are gently held, arts-based gatherings that invite communities to slow down, share stories, and listen deeply with one another.
Developed by Dr. Shumaila Hemani through her artist residencies at Trico Changemakers Studio (2022–2024) and Futures Forward (2023), the first series of circles was hosted online in 2023 and later in person at the CommunityWise Resource Centre in Calgary in 2024. These early gatherings explored questions of energy accessibility and social justice, bringing community members together to listen, reflect, and share lived experiences.
This year, The Deep Listening Path is opening these circles to community partners across Calgary and beyond. Organizations host circles to support systems thinking, dialogue, and creative reflection around complex social and environmental issues.
We are inviting partnerships with neighbourhood organizations, women’s organizations, migrant networks, arts and culture groups, seniors’ centres, shelters, and diverse grassroots collectives to co-create circles that honour each community’s realities—whether the focus is mental health, affordability, climate justice, housing, disability, migration, or other lived experiences shaped by intersections of ethnicity, class, and identity.
Bring a Deep Listening Circle to Your Organization
Organizations host Deep Listening Circles to support reflection, dialogue, and collective insight during times of change. Circles can be designed for:
• team retreats or staff gatherings
• community dialogues
• climate and social justice initiatives
• arts and cultural programming
• research or engagement projects
Each circle is designed collaboratively to respond to the needs of the host community. Gatherings can take place in community centres, arts spaces, classrooms, or outdoor environments with the goal to:
-Support thoughtful dialogue around complex social and environmental issues
-Strengthen trust and connection within teams or communities
-Create space for reflection and well-being in times of uncertainty
-Invite creative approaches to collective problem-solving
-Deepen listening across differences and lived experiences
Each gathering is gently held and shaped by the participants who are present. The goal is not to reach quick solutions, but to cultivate deeper understanding, empathy, and shared insight that will lead toward new possibilities in your organization.
If your organization is interested in hosting a Deep Listening Circle, you are warmly invited to reach out.
Who benefits from the deep listening circles?
Through Deep Listening Circles, we create spaces where members of diverse communities—newcomers, seniors, people with disabilities, single mothers, and others—can come together to share their lived experiences of social and environmental challenges such as energy affordability, mental health, and social inequities.
The circles aren’t just for those directly affected—they’re also for community leadership and stakeholders, including policymakers, community advocates, and industry leaders. By participating, they gain deeper insight into the lived experiences of those facing energy poverty and can work collaboratively to develop more inclusive, empathetic energy solutions.
“Shumaila is an excellent facilitator. She guides participants to tap into new ways of experiencing their surroundings through sound and listening, helping them come away with a new perspective.” Stefanie Drozda, Program Officer, Alberta Ecotrust,— Stefanie Drozda, Program Officer, Alberta Ecotrust,
The Story Behind Deep Listening Circles
Deep Listening Circles were developed through artist residencies at Trico Changemakers Studio (2022–2024) and the Futures Forward mentorship program (2023), where Dr. Hemani explored how sound, creative practice, and collective reflection can support communities navigating social change through a systems-change lens. Over time, a form emerged: intimate, gently held circles where changemakers and community members can slow down, be witnessed, and imagine new possibilities together.
Deep Listening in Times of Precarity
“In times of precarity, listening cannot be forced.
What becomes necessary instead is to allow listening to arrive.
To allow listening to arrive means creating conditions where listening can return naturally. It means stepping back from urgency, slowing down, and entering spaces where attention can soften. It can happen while sitting beside a river, spending time in nature, or simply pausing long enough to notice the sounds of the world again.“
Deep Listening Circles are designed to create these conditions—spaces where participants can slow down, reconnect with their surroundings, and allow listening to arrive.
— Dr. Shumaila Hemani, Forthcoming Book: Deep Listening in Times of Precarity
Bring a Deep Listening Circle to Your Organization
Deep Listening Circles can be hosted by community organizations, cultural institutions, educational spaces, and networks of changemakers who wish to create meaningful spaces for reflection, dialogue, and connection.
Each circle is designed collaboratively with the host organization to respond to its particular context and community. Together, we identify the themes and questions that matter most—whether related to climate and ecological change, community well-being, accessibility, migration, housing, or other social challenges.
A typical circle brings together 8–20 participants in a carefully facilitated space that includes guided listening practices, creative reflection, and dialogue. Circles can take place in community centres, arts spaces, classrooms, retreat settings, or outdoor environments.
Watch a Deep Listening Circle in Action
Deep Listening Circles cultivate empathy, trust, and collective imagination in times of ecological and social crisis. We are often asked: What would it feel like to participate in a Deep Listening Circle?
Each circle unfolds through a series of gentle practices that invite participants to slow down, listen deeply, and reflect together.
1. Arriving and Grounding
Participants begin by slowing down through a guided grounding practice that helps them become present to their bodies, breath, and surroundings. These practices create a shared sense of safety and openness, allowing participants to settle into the space and into attentive listening.
2. Listening to the World Around Us
Participants are invited to explore listening as an artistic practice by noticing sounds in their everyday lives
— the sounds of home, the city, nature, and technologies that shape our environments. These reflections help participants become aware of how sound shapes our experience of social and environmental realities.
3. Creative Reflection
Through simple arts-based activities such as sound recording, storytelling, and collaborative reflection, participants explore themes relevant to their communities
— such as climate change, housing, migration, accessibility, or care.
4. Dialogue and Shared Insight
The circle concludes with a facilitated conversation where participants share their reflections and experiences. These conversations often reveal hidden stories, emotional connections, and new ways of thinking about complex challenges.
Benefits of Hosting a Deep Listening Circle
Strengthening Trust and Connection
The circle format encourages participants to listen without interruption or judgment. This practice helps build trust, deepen relationships, and create a sense of shared presence within a group.
Supporting Meaningful Dialogue
Organizations often work with complex social issues such as climate change, affordability, migration, or accessibility. Deep Listening Circles create a safe space where participants can reflect on these realities and share lived experiences in ways that foster empathy and mutual understanding.
A structured, safe space for listening, reflection, and shared wisdom that builds safety and collective care.
Cultivating Creativity and Reflection
Through simple arts-based activities—such as listening exercises, storytelling, and sound exploration—participants engage their imagination and discover new ways of thinking about collective challenges.
Encouraging Inclusive Participation
The circle format ensures that every voice has space to be heard. This can be particularly valuable for organizations working with diverse communities where different perspectives and experiences need careful listening.
Participants report enhanced listening presence, clearer shared purpose, more inclusive decision making, and meaningful connections that sustain well-being.
Supporting Well-Being and Resilience
Participants often describe the circles as calming and restorative. Taking time to slow down and listen together can reduce stress, support emotional well-being, and strengthen community resilience.
Inspiring Collective Insight & Action
By listening deeply to one another and to the environments we inhabit, participants often leave the circle with new perspectives, renewed empathy, and ideas for collaborative action.
