The Three Roles of HUM
How do we work together? During each workshop, there are three “hats” that help define our roles. Participants rotate hats weekly to explore different parts of ourselves, develop empathy, and cultivate balanced heart, mind, and body.
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The Heartkeeper creates and maintains a safe, grounded space for the group. This role embodies the devotional aspect of HUM—caring attention and service to collective flourishing. The Heartkeeper tracks group affective energy, notices who's leaning in or pulling back, and intervenes when someone needs support. They ensure everyone feels seen and heard, creating the emotional foundation that makes vulnerable exploration possible. This is the heart of the practice—without psychological safety, meaningful discovery cannot happen.
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The Understander guides the inquiry and extracts patterns from group experience. This role embodies the knowledge-seeking aspect of HUM—systematic investigation of how minds actually work. The Understander poses precise questions, listens for commonalities across participants' experiences, and synthesizes what's discovered into clear, testable patterns. They document insights using structured schemas, ensuring that subjective experience becomes shareable knowledge. The Understander makes the invisible visible, transforming implicit knowing into explicit understanding.
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The Motivator brings embodiment and action to the inquiry. This role ensures HUM doesn't stay purely cerebral—it grounds insights in physical experience and real-world application. The Motivator uses embodiment exercises (movement, gesture, physical experiments) to test and deepen understanding. They design micro-interventions that participants can take into daily life, creating the feedback loop between insight and action. The Motivator asks: "How do we know this is true? Let's try it and see." They transform knowledge into experiential wisdom and practical change.
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As the Heartkeeper, my primary responsibility is to hold space for emotional safety and authentic expression. I watch over the conversation like a guardian, ensuring that everyone feels seen, heard, and valued. When tensions arise or someone seems hesitant to share, I gently create an opening for vulnerability. I remind us to pause, breathe, and reconnect with our hearts. My role isn't to fix or solve—it's to create the conditions where genuine understanding can emerge. Think of me as the emotional anchor that keeps us grounded in compassion and presence.
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I'm the Understander, and my focus is on clarity, curiosity, and deeper comprehension. While the Heartkeeper holds emotional space, I hold intellectual space—asking questions that help us dig beneath surface assumptions and explore what's really being said. I listen not just to words, but to the patterns, contradictions, and unexplored territories in our thinking. My questions might sound simple—'What do you mean by that?' or 'Can you say more?'—but they're designed to open doors to insights we might otherwise miss. I help us all become more precise and truthful in our understanding, moving beyond easy answers to genuine discovery.
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As the Motivator—sometimes called the Mover—I bridge the gap between insight and action. My job is to track where our understanding leads and help translate it into tangible next steps. I ask: 'So what does this mean for how we live?' and 'What would it look like to apply this insight?' I'm not rushing anyone or imposing my agenda—rather, I'm making sure our beautiful realizations don't just evaporate into abstraction. I help the group identify concrete ways to embody what we've learned, whether that's a small shift in perspective, a new habit, or a courageous conversation. I keep us grounded in the practical implications of our understanding.
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One of the most powerful aspects of HUM is that everyone rotates through all three roles over time. You might be the Heartkeeper in one session, the Understander in another, and the Motivator in a third. This rotation is intentional—it helps you develop the full spectrum of human intelligence. By experiencing each role, you learn to hold emotional space, ask penetrating questions, and bridge theory with practice. You discover your natural strengths while stretching into new capacities. The goal isn't to master one role, but to integrate all three into how you show up in the world.