I Love Conflict... Transformation ❤️

More on Omni-partiality, lightly paraphrased from Duncan Autrey: >> When things get sticky, people find third-party authorities who can regulate the chaos by applying power. Or they focus on strategies like compromise and negotiation. These approaches ask us to give up power or push us to care less. What if the solution was to care more? What if we chose to respond to life's puzzles by seeking solutions that were best for everyone involved and for the system as a whole? This approach is called Omnipartiality. << From the brilliant article at: https://lnkd.in/dQfexCbp #omnipartiality #mediation #conflictisagift

From a conversation I just had with a colleague: "I literally feel so peaceful every morning and every night, not because of the absence of conflict in my life, but because I trust I have the ability to handle it". She then continued: "And that ability comes from Ken Cloke's teachings." Two things I love about that quote: 1) It shows the incredible personal and relational benefits available through digging into conflict, and 2) It is an incredible example of giving appreciation that is not based on judgment ("X is brilliant") but rather on the impact someone has had on your life. For more on that type of #gratitude, check out this video with Uncle Marshall (#NVC): https://lnkd.in/gm4RR8sn

From Ken Cloke's Mediating Dangerously (2001), on shifting from neutrality to omni-partiality. "I suggested we shift our thinking from being neutral to being omni-partial, first, because there is no such thing as genuine neutrality when it comes to conflict; second, because the language of neutrality creates an expectation that fairness means suppressing our past experiences and insights. Real fairness comes from using the past to gain an open, honest, humble perspective on the present. Worse, neutral language is bland, consistent, predictable, and homogenous, and used to control what cannot be controlled…. Yet because neutrality implies objectivity and distance from the source of the conflict, it cannot countenance empathy, or give the mediator room to acknowledge or experience grief, compassion, love, anger, fear, or hope. Neutrality can paralyze emotional honesty, intimate communication, vulnerability, and self-criticism. It can undermine shared responsibility, prevention, creative problem-solving, and organizational learning. It can ignore the larger systems in which conflict occurs. It can fail to comprehend spirit, forgiveness, transformation, or healing, which are essential in mediation. As a result, it can become a straitjacket, a check on our ability to unlock the sources of conflict." (I found the quote while writing my own summary of omni-partiality: https://lnkd.in/gQ4WU9yd)

From my dear friend and mentor, Shilpa Jain (author, educator, and mediator!): "I think that one of the crux places of my work is how to shift from separation into connection. If I was going to summarize all my activism, I think that's what it's been about. Where do we learn this sense of separation? How does that even first enter? What do we do to shift into reconnection, into wholeness, into love, and at every level? Then it becomes less important what issue I’m working on, whether it's economy or ecology or education or justice. All of it—the query and the work—is constantly around this invitation: how do we shift from separation into connection?" (https://lnkd.in/gFsb_Ykz)

#Peacemaker Dan Terry's philosophy of international development and cooperation, which inspired 30 years of his work in #Afghanistan: "How do we #mediate and mentor? Not to win hearts and minds of others to better control them, but rather to effectively squander our own hearts enfranchising and investing in them." - from the short ode to Dan Terry's life by his friend Jonathan Larson, "Making Friends Among the Taliban".

"Hostage-taking is just another form of hospitality" - Dan Terry. Here's an anecdote to help explain the quote: In the course of his community health work, Dan traveled often in the northern backcountry of the storied ruins of Balkh. As sometimes happens in such unsettled times, Dan was captured by a crafty local commander who thought he could spot a windfall when he saw one. Held hostage in the commander's base, Dan assured his captor that there were no riches within reach of any of his friends or family and that threats to his personal health or safety in hopes of ransom would be fruitless. As the hours passed, the commander observed that Dan was neither anxious nor resentful. They ate together and drank tea as conversation and camaraderie flowered. In time, it dawned on the captor that a strange friendship had sprung up between him and this oddly warm hostage. Persuaded that any demand for ransom would prove in vain and recognizing in Dan a noble friend, the commander called for a sheep to be slaughtered. A kebab meal sealed the bonds of affection between them. And with that, the commander set him free." (from Jonathan Larson's "Making Friends Among the Taliban")

Desmond Tutu on #forgiveness and #altruism: "To forgive is not just to be altruistic. It is the best form of self-interest... However, when I talk of forgiveness I mean the belief that you can come out the other side a better person. A better person than the one being consumed by anger and hatred. Remaining in that state locks you in a state of victimhood, making you almost dependent on the perpetrator. If you can find it in yourself to forgive then you are no longer chained to the perpetrator. You can move on, and you can even help the perpetrator to become a better person too." ( found in Scilla Elworthy's The Business Plan for Peace )

Trevor Noah on using his early language skills to transcend difference, prejudice, and violence: * It became a tool that served me my whole life. One day as a young man I was walking down the street, and a group of Zulu guys was walking behind me, closing in on me, and I could hear them talking to one another about how they were going to mug me. "Asibambe le autie yomlungu. Phuma ngapha mina ngizoqhamuka ngemuva kwakhe." "Let's get this white guy. You go to his left, and I'll come up behind him." I didn't know what to do. I couldn't run, so I just spun around real quick and said, "Kodwa bafwethu yingani singavele sibambe umuntu inkunzi? Asen- zeni. Mina ngikulindele." "Yo, guys, why don't we just mug someone together? I'm ready. Let's do it." They looked shocked for a moment, and then they started laughing. "Oh, sorry, dude. We thought you were something else." * (from Born a Crime) He didn't look like them, but speaking like them destroyed their ability to see him as separate from themselves... #inspiration

On truth vs. storytelling. "Once we shift our attention from assessing the truth or falsity of the story, we can recognize that it was designed to communicate the storyteller's subjective interpretation, emotional response, mental confusion, fear of vulnerability, and desire for assistance in understanding what happened. Recognizing these elements in conflict stories makes it possible to transform the story and invent new ones that end in resolution, forgiveness, and reconciliation." (Crossroads of Conflict, Ken Cloke) In order to listen with this goal in mind, Ken recommends: 1. Open and enlarge the story Listen with an open heart. Grok what the storyteller really needs and how they were affected by the conflict. Ask questions rooted in curiosity to get the extent of the storyteller's version. 2. Destabilize the story Every story is a pattern created out of a subset of facts. There are other facts and other patterns with the same facts. The point is to ask questions that make this reality clear, to "loosen the grip" of the Singular Conflict Story on the Storyteller's mind. 3. Recontextualize the story Once the storyteller is aware of the meaning of the story -- the impact of their own story upon themselves, as well as the possibility of telling other stories from the same dataset, they may no longer be attached to that story. The goal is to meet the need the story was telling through the listening so they can let go of the story. 4. Support the storyteller in creating another story What story can they tell that would have a lasting positive impact on their life? That would utilize their personal power and responsibility? That could lead to a plan of action on their part?

Ken Cloke on how every dispute you complain about is actually a fairy tale: "Conflict stories are also fairy tales, in which the storyteller becomes a princess (victim) describing the actions of a dragon (perpetrator) to someone they hope will become their prince (rescuer). In the fairy tale: 1. the princess is primarily responsible for expressing feelings and being emotionally vulnerable, 2. the prince is responsible for coming up with solutions, and 3. the dragon is responsible for directing attention toward problems that might otherwise be unnoticed. In order to elicit sympathy and support from the listener, the storyteller must be seen as powerless in the face of evil. The action of every conflict story is therefore to trade power for sympathy." (The Crossroads of Conflict) If "knowing is half the battle" then just reading that passage should hopefully change every conflict story I ever tell. ;) Emerging from the fairy tale (which Ken calls "mediation") means: 1. Offering empathy and power to everyone 2. Showing each person how they play all three roles. 3. Refusing to become a rescuer 4. Asking the princess to accept responsibility for part of the problem 5. Helping the dragon become more open and vulnerable 6. Encouraging everyone to participate in solving the problem. (For a more detailed discussion of the narrative structure of conflict stories, see Kenneth Cloke and Joan Goldsmith, Resolving Personal and Organizational Conflicts: Stories of Transformation and Forgiveness)