While any of us yet live...

[Proteus Communications]

Dear Doug, dear Judy.dear sparkling ones everywhere.

I love this, Doug:  "Conversation is how we awaken".  And the questions you
pose here are just the questions I ask myself over and over again.  

.	With whom are you able to converse about such important things?
Where do they congregate? Are they college people? Intellectuals Religious?
Manual laborers? Yes, yes 
Yes--all of them, everywhere, everyone to whom something matters
.	Where is the well of the sparkling today?  Right here, in this
conversation we are having.
.	Who are the people who are most enlivened by these conversations?
They are those to whom the question has been posed, the invitation extended
.	Where have you found them? Through my work, in my community, on this
list
.	How can I identify similar people in my community? Ask a question,
host those who come to answer it.  I'm starting to feel like a gopher, who
has just popped his head out of his hole and looks around and sees with some
surprise and gratification, that he is not alone, that there are other
gophers who have also popped their heads out and are looking around and
seeing each other.  Barbara Marx Hubbard talks about this phenomena in her
book Conscious Evolution.  (she uses the term "cultural creatives" or
"cocreatives" rather than gophers, but you'll get the gist)
.	What are the conditions for genuine dialogue which you have
identified?

In my work as a facilitator, trainer, consultant, coach I find I do have
many opportunities to engage with people about what matters most to them.  I
find that the kinds of training (leadership training and communications
skills, that sort of thing) I offer is giving way more and more to
constructing environments in which conversation can occur. That's in the
more formal settings.  Informally, in my community, I also find
opportunities for this deeper kind of conversation.  There is one magic key
and that is in the kinds of questions we pose to ourselves and one another.
It appears that the kinds of questions we ask set the tone, the context and
the quality of conversations we have.  Ultimately the kinds of questions we
ask ourselves create our future.  (I am reading a great book by Marilee
Adams called Change your questions, change your life.  She really gets that
the question is everything.  Everything.  Well,  99% of 'it', I think)
 

Here are some of the conditions I've found are necessary.  

Desire:  to be heard, to create something different, something new, to
connect, to engage. In other words, I can't make you want to be in
conversation with me, I can only extend the invitation, (and the form of
that invitation can be an irresistible question that you will want to
engage)
Safety:  enough trust between us, or in the environment, that our thoughts,
our selves will be honoured.  I love Judi's way of describing it:  "To draw
a line in the sand that says learning, caring, laughter, compassion,
precision, abundance and focus are what we practice here."
Recognition: of one another's gifts, and that what brings us together in
this conversation matters to us
Humility and vulnerability:  if I can bring these to our conversation, I
open up the possibility for all of us to speak from our hearts

William Isaacs says:  Dialogue requires that we be willing to suspend
memory, desire and assumptions, and exist, if only for a moment, for the
other person.

How about you?  What conditions have you found are necessary for generative
conversation??

With love,

Kathryn
-----Original Message-----
From: OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU] On Behalf Of Douglas D.
Germann, Sr.
Sent: Friday, July 22, 2005 10:14 AM
To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
Subject: While any of us yet live...

Judi, O sparkling one--

Want to ask you the same questions as I asked Kathryn--who were the people
who came to your Art of Hosting and Practice of Peace? How do we find them?
Where do they congregate? Are they college people? Intellectuals?
Religious? Manual laborers? Where is the well of the sparkling today?

                              :-Doug.
                              Who needs to be heard?

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