Pema Chodron, a well known Buddhist teacher, is one of my favourite teachers on facilitation practice. She has enhanced my understanding of dealing with tricky situations and scary places with practices, advice and stories which are beautifully rendered.
In this article, “The Answer to Anger and Agression is Patience” she writes about her own struggle to cultivate a practice of patience as the antidote to anger and aggression:
Patience has a quality of enormous honesty in it, but it also has a quality of not escalating things, allowing a lot of space for the other person to speak, for the other person to express themselves, while you don’t react, even though inside you are reacting. You let the words go and just be there.
This suggests the fearlessness that goes with patience. If you practice the kind of patience that leads to the de-escalation of aggression and the cessation of suffering, you will be cultivating enormous courage. You will really get to know anger and how it breeds violent words and actions. You will see the whole thing without acting it out. When you practice patience, you’re not repressing anger, you’re just sitting there with it–going cold turkey with the aggression. As a result, you really get to know the energy of anger and you also get to know where it leads, even without going there. You’ve expressed your anger so many times, you know where it will lead. The desire to say something mean, to gossip or slander, to complain–to just somehow get rid of that aggression–is like a tidal wave. But you realize that such actions don’t get rid of the aggression; they escalate it. So instead you’re patient, patient with yourself.
In situations where groups are in conflict, it is pointless to pretend that there isn’t anger and aggression in the room. The presence of this anger and aggression calls for this radical honesty and trust in what is real, and it means being very grounded as you approach what is there and give it your attention. There are few things scarier for a facilitator than leading a group towards the honest appreciation of the true anger and emotions in the room. If you are unable to stand in the fire, exhibiting patience to be there fully yourself, you will not be able to invite others to join you there. The shakier you are, the more afraid everyone else will be.
The challenge is to remain of service to a group of people for whom an honest relationship with what is real is important. Remaining of service means being able to address the anger and aggression honestly, without judging it, which only adds to it. If you think anger is wrong, you won’t be able to be a peacemaker. If you think anger is true, you can go there.
This is a fundamental skill needed in the world right now, on all levels. Think about how you deal with confrontations in your work environment, in your family or in your community. Do you shy away from the anger, or do you let it overwhelm you and do you take a position?
Imagine you were called to facilitate a ceasefire in the Israel – Lebanon conflict. Could you do that? Who do you know in the world that has the capacity to do this? If the answer is no one, what do you think it would take for you to become that person? Trust me, if you are that person, the world needs you right now.
Cultivating patience cultivates peacemaking.
Thanks to my blogless life partner Caitlin Frost for the link.
[tags]pema chodron, patience, peacemaking, peace[/tags]
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I’m preparing to teach at an Art of Hosting gathering in Nova Scotia in a few weeks and as part of the conversations on design, we have been talking a little about what is required in order to confidently step into chaotic and unknown spaces.
This morning, my friend and other co-host Toke Paludan Moeller sent a short poem from an Aikido master that sums it up nicely:
When you step up,
claim the mat as your own.
Everybody you encounter
and everything that happens
is there by your invitation
and your invitation alone,
even the unexpected ones.Your job is to respond with
grace and compassion.
You can’t hide and you can’t fake it;
we will all see.Let the skills you have learned
and the wisdom of this art
flow through you
and all will be well.
[tags] aikido, art of hosting[/tags]
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From whiskey river today:
The Artist’s Duty
So it is the duty of the artist to discourage all traces of shame
To extend all boundaries
To fog them in right over the plate
To kill only what is ridiculous
To establish problem
To ignore solutions
To listen to no one
To omit nothing
To contradict everything
To generate the free brain
To bear no cross
To take part in no crucifixion
To tinkle a warning when mankind strays
To explode upon all parties
To wound deeper than the soldier
To heal this poor obstinate monkey once and for all
To verify the irrational
To exaggerate all things
To inhibit everyone
To lubricate each proportion
To experience only experienceTo set a flame in the high air
To exclaim at the commonplace alone
To cause the unseen eyes to openTo admire only the absurd
To be concerned with every profession save his own
To raise a fortuitous stink on the boulevards of truth and beauty
To desire an electrifiable intercourse with a female alligator
To lift the flesh above the suffering
To forgive the beautiful its disconsolate deceitTo flash his vengeful badge at every abyss
To HAPPEN
It is the artist’s duty to be alive
To drag people into glittering occupationsTo blush perpetually in gaping innocence
To drift happily through the ruined race-intelligence
To burrow beneath the subconscious
To defend the unreal at the cost of his reason
To obey each outrageous impulse
To commit his company to all enchantments.
— Kenneth Patchen
The best facilitators, the best consultants and the best and truest helpers are like that too.
[tags]kenneth patchen[/tags]
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I have just finished posting a collection of 21 stories of Open Space events I have facilitated over the past 6 years. Most of these stories are about community-based events in Aboriginal communities here in Canada, but I believe they have lessons about the practice of Open Space that are more widely applicable in different settings and for unconferences too.
I hope you may find the collection useful.
[tags]unconference[/tags]
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Finn Voldtofte and friends are convening an interesting looking gathering in Denmark at the end of October called “Moving the Edge.”
This gathering is intended to support the emergence of a field of collective intelligence, where the practices, insights, principles, etc., of collective intelligence can be evolved.
In addition we intend to create space for engaging the field of collective intelligence for deepening inquiries into core questions within specific areas. We envision that the following areas will attract the interest of many participants:
– The possible roles of business as seen from an evolutionary perspective
– Our planetary home
– Practices for integrated lifeWhat themes will actually be engaged depends on the experiences and insights brought present by the participants.
If you feel called by this invitation, then you are invited.
The gathering will start Sunday, Oct. 22 with an informal reception at 20.00 and ends Thursday, Oct. 26 after lunch. The venue is Fuglsøcentret near Aarhus, Denmark.
In support of this intriguing gathering, Finn has posted some articles about process that are lovely, including one on “inquiring from the middle,” a practice he is especially passionate about.
[tags]moving the edge, finn voldtofte[/tags]