What is the Connection Practice?
Introduction to the Connection Practice
Welcome to the Connection Practice, where empathy meets insight in an innovative, scientifically-proven approach to lifelong social-emotional growth. In today’s fast-paced world, it’s easy to feel disconnected from our inner selves and from each other. The rush of life often brings loneliness, stress and conflict, leading many to destructive coping mechanisms like addiction and antisocial behaviors.
The Connection Practice offers a powerful antidote to disconnection for those who are ready to learn and apply it. Created by Rita Marie Johnson, this scientifically-grounded skill provides a simple framework for navigating internal conflicts and interpersonal challenges. By integrating empathy (using the language of feelings and needs) and insight (gaining clarity through heart-brain coherence), the Connection Practice guides a transformative journey to resolution. It swiftly turns turmoil into creative solutions, fostering emotional safety and personal resilience.
The Connection Practice serves people of all ages, genders, and walks of life. It spans various domains, such as education, business, wellness practices and personal growth. Imagine equipping yourself with a skill that enhances your emotional intelligence and empowers you to respond masterfully to life’s complexities. This skill enables you to navigate adversity with clarity and grace, leveraging your empathy and best intelligence.
Process Overview - Visual Tools and Supportive Technology
Connection Practice Boards help you learn the process quickly and begin transforming negative feelings into creative solutions. These Boards, available in magnetic or digital form, guide you through a challenge. You identify feelings and needs and display them visually. Then you follow the steps to gaining an insight and choosing an inspired action. This tool brings immediate confidence and builds self-trust as issues are quickly resolved with “know how” and positive outcomes.
In addition, pairing the Connection Practice with cutting-edge technology such as the Inner Balance App or emWave provides real-time biofeedback on heart-brain coherence. This integration ensures your learning is grounded in science, resulting in consistent emotional regulation and stress reduction.
Connection Practice Coaches and Trainers gratefully acknowledge the HeartMath® Institute and Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication for inspiring the Connection Practice.
Benefits
- Find release from worry, anger, anxiety and depression, leading to a more peaceful, joyful existence.
- Connect with your feelings and needs rather than suppressing them or expressing them in ways that are hurtful to yourself and others.
- Resolve conflicts with ease and positivity, fostering stronger, more harmonious relationships in all areas of your life.
- Achieve your highest brain function and tap your intuition so you make the best possible choices.
Widespread Impact
These far-reaching benefits apply to all areas of life:
- For Personal Development: Enhance your personal growth, sharpen your communication skills, and create a more harmonious life with greater self-awareness and meaningful connections with others. Learn more »
- For the Workplace: Create an emotionally-safe work environment, improve team effectiveness and enhance overall productivity. Learn more »
- For Schools: Create a safe, social-emotional culture that empowers learning, strengthens student-teacher relationships, and provides students with the inner life skills they need for future success. Learn more »
- For Families: Enhance communication, resolve conflicts peacefully and create a nurturing atmosphere that deepens familial bonds. Learn more »
- For Spiritual Communities of all Faiths: Promote empathy, authenticity and unity within your spiritual community, enriching the collective experience of connection. Learn more »
The Connection Practice has been called “the profound made practical.” By learning and embracing it, you achieve more positive outcomes each day in much less time. You also become a more positive influence whenever and wherever you interact with others. Discover how this skill brings more clarity, peace and fulfillment to your life.
Scientific Basis
Scientific research underscores how emotional memories stored in the amygdala can trigger rapid, intense reactions, including stress, fear or aggression. These reactions occur faster than our conscious thought processes, influencing our responses in challenging situations. When left unchecked, these negative feelings can damage our health and potentially escalate to violence.
The Connection Practice offers a transformative approach to addressing these automatic reactions. By calming the responses of the amygdala, the Practice helps individuals break free from destructive emotional patterns. Moreover, it goes beyond mere emotional regulation – it activates the brain’s best intelligence. This integration of empathy and insight not only enhances emotional resilience, but it also facilitates constructive decision-making. Learn more about
the science behind the Connection Practice.
Ready to transform your life with the Connection Practice?
Participate
Connection Circle
Join our small group Connection Circles to experience the power of the Connection Practice. Experience emotional safety and resolve an issue through empathy and insight without advice, opinions, judgments or strategies from others.
Learn
Live Courses
Start with the Inner Wellness for Success Course, our core offering, to experience the Connection Practice firsthand. This course is your gateway to greater well-being.
Find Support
Work With a Coach
Work one-on-one with a certified Connection Practice Coach to learn this self-empowering skill. Experience the transformative power of individualized support, tailored to your needs, and unlock your potential for deeper connections and personal growth.
Certification
Get Certified
Learn the Connection Practice through the Inner Wellness for Success and Emotionally-Safe Relationships courses. Then learn how to pass it on to others by taking the Coach Certification Course. This training track paves the way for a rewarding career and generates profound personal growth.
Join a Connection Practice Retreat and Tour of Beautiful Costa Rica
Our Vision and Mission: empathy + insight = connection
Vision: We envision a world where people discover positive solutions to challenges, connect peacefully with each other and celebrate life.
For a summary of how the vision has unfolded, read Rita Marie Johnson Named 1 of 10 Most Promising Women in Healthcare and Wellness in 2024.
Mission: We teach people the Connection Practice, a synergistic combination of empathy and insight, so they can live confidently, resolve challenges quickly, and enrich their relationships.