I’m a strong believer in engaging the whole person in conversation. Verbal discourse is only one dimension of a full conversation and we do a disservice to ourselves and our organization if we don’t engage the other dimensions of knowing that include, the physical, emotional, creative and spiritual. Systemic Constellation work is an amazingly powerful More…
On Being series on civil conversations
I think the radio show On Being with Krista Tibbet is the best show on the airwaves right now. This year she has been conducting a series of interviews around how can we have civil conversations with each other when we fundamentally disagree. Check it out…
What I’m reading: Honey Bee Democracy
Honeybee Democracy by Thomas Seeley is a fascinating account of how honeybee swarms make lilfe-or-death group decisions to move to a new location. When the hive swarms they’ve made the decision to leave their current location, but don’t yet know where they will be moving to. Scout bees are sent out to find possible locations for More…
Creating Healthy and Resilient Communities
As the hosting team prepares for the Art of Hosting – Vermont training that’s starting this Thursday, we’ve honed in on the theme of creating healthy and resilient communities. The group that’s gathering has begun to have email conversations around this topic which has prompted me to think deeply about the questions of what is More…
Think of it as a conversation
Over the course of the last several months, I’ve made an important decision about how I present my work and where I focus my attention. For more than 10 years I’ve been a Public Speaking Presence Coach through my company, formerly named RiverWays Enterprises. I love working with individual clients in private coaching sessions because our More…
Beginner’s Mind
I don’t know if I’m getting older and feeling my age, if my chronic injuries need special attention, or if part of me is just getting “lazy”, but lately, after 20 years of practicing yoga (with a 5 year stint as a teacher), I increasingly find myself drawn to beginner yoga classes. In these “easy” More…
Creative expression to help integrate complex information
Professional development business conferences are wonderful because you get so many opportunities to meet new people and listen to new ideas. But we can become saturated with new material very quickly and then it becomes difficult to absorb and integrate useful information. For this very reason, last year (2010) my friend, colleague and visual artist, Jay More…
Large group conversations
What if the answers to the problems we confront today lie not in bringing in outside experts to tell us what to do, but lie instead in the wisdom that’s already there within the community? How do we make space for the collective intelligence within the community to emerge? Through well-designed conversations that invite all More…
The first ingredient of rapport is full attention
I was listening to an interview today with Daniel Goleman, who, having previously introduced the concept of Emotional Intelligence, is now talking about Social Intelligence. His current work is looking at how the brain is wired to create connection. The sentence that drew me into the interview today was, “The first ingredient of rapport is More…
Returning to the familiar
Having just returned from a holiday visit with family, I’m well aware of how unsettling it can be to break out of the routines that are part of the normal patterns of our day-to-day life. To help manage these kinds of disruptions, my yoga teacher this morning reminded us of the benefits of returning to More…