Wrestling with Power

A Practice in Radical Belonging

December 4-6, 2026

Richmond Hill, Richmond, Virginia

“Belonging” holds together two fundamental aspects of life, according to John O’Donohue: the longing of our Being and the being of our Longing.

 There is within me a longing for relationship that holds – holds steady, holds plenty, and holds me. In the Wisdom’s Constraint program in July, Terry Chapman and Jim Burns put beautiful care in naming Relational Stamina - the capacity to remain in connection when everything in us wants to manage, withdraw, or resolve.

 “Everything belongs” is a beautiful sentiment that is difficult to practice when disrupted. More often than not, it’s my attachment to my own identity or story that disrupts.

 Radical Belonging is the commitment to be in relationship and stay in relationship when disrupted. It is the recognition that those disruptions are an invitation to look inward, with the goal of understanding what parts of my own story or identity are getting in my way of seeing or understanding the story of another; being and staying in relationship.

 The world reminds us at every term how different, how separate, and how at odds we are with one another.

 This invitation is to retreat together to Richmond Hill to explore and celebrate the root of our shared belonging. We’ll be wrestling with our stories of, and about,  power.  With  curiosity, we’ll seek the parts of our own stories that keep us from being in relationship with others.

 Please join the men of Illuman’s East Coast Collaborative December 4-6.