Dialogue Circles
Remembering Village Council:
Joining in Heartfelt Dialogue During Transitional Times
INTRODUCTION:
We live in unprecedented times. There is a tremendous need for heart-based community dialogue. It seems imperative that we move from a comfort-based, energy-consumptive lifestyle, out of connection with each other and the rest of the community of life, into relationship-based, low-energy, locally interdependent community.
Often, when people awaken to the world situation, their first impulse is to try to join or start an intentional community of some kind. We need to come together, they’ll say, if we want to have any chance of facing into peak oil and climate change. It’s too big for us to deal with alone.
But as the past decades of community experimentation have too often shown us, we who were born into the captivity of Empire are ill prepared for cooperative, interdependent community life. Having gone deep into the cave of hyper-individualism, having had our egos squashed and twisted and, in turn, over-inflated, by hierarchy, violence, and insanity, few of us manage to acquire the skills, the perspective, and the maturity, that allows us to mix it up with competence and grace in a close-knit group of our fellow humans. Intimacy, honesty, and vulnerability, at the levels called for, seem out of reach and terrifying. Having been deeply wounded by empire, we find that sharing power, decision-making, work, and money with grace and aplomb is almost impossible to pull off.
After decades of combined experience in intentional community and working with group dynamics, Sally and Tim have developed a workshop experience to help people as they approach the awesome task of coming together into cooperative, interdependent groups. These are three-day gatherings, with training components that draw from their own wisdom and experience, along with the wisdom of David Bohm’s dialogue work, Scott Peck’s community building work, and Marshall Rosenberg’s Non-Violent Communication practice. Small groups of aware souls gather in, to sit together in circle, to learn to identify and suspend assumptions, to listen deeply, to find their true voices and, thereby, to tap into the deeper layers of wisdom that are available. The circle becomes a strong container, to hold the work required to peel back ego structures and to learn how to approach, and sit with, conflict in a way that actually benefits the community, rather than threatens it. It’s a space in which we can show up as ourselves, without hiding, and assemble, from the various viewpoints present, a larger wisdom than any of us can access alone.
DESCRIPTION:
Heartfelt dialogue is the practice of moving from discussion, based in the paradigm of domination and control, to dialogue, based on the paradigm of relationship and connection. During the workshop we notice in ourselves the operations of mind and ego that keep us stuck and we learn to shift, moment by moment, into open-heartedness, connection, relationship, and greater wisdom.
We will face into the current global challenges of resource shortages, climate chaos, mass extinction, population overshoot, and economic meltdown as a starting point for conversations that embody dialogue and the principles of non-violent communication. Within a strong container, based on our commitment to identify and suspend assumptions and core beliefs, we will learn to engage across gender, generation, and differing backgrounds. Through this process we seek a wider and deeper collective view than is normally available to us as isolated individuals or groups. With grace, we then find the deep wisdom of true council and the joy of heartfelt connection.
THE PROCESS:
We sit together in a circle. The facilitators offer short pieces of information about the development of dialogue and group cohesiveness. Some simple tools, such as a talking stick, may be used from time to time as a means for bringing greater awareness to our interaction. In addition, as a group, we will create simple, earth-based ceremony to acknowledge the possibility and invoke presence and wisdom from other realms of consciousness in non-human life, our ancestors, and/or in our own genetic coding. As the weekend proceeds, the responsibility for direction and leadership will naturally move away from the identified facilitators and into the deep wisdom that develops in the group and as may be expressed by any of the participants.
OBJECTIVES:
1) To recognize in the realm of personal human interaction the operation of conditioned responses that come from the paradigm of domination and control.
2) To identify, express and accept the full range of human feelings arising from our current global predicament.
3) To identify and suspend core beliefs and assumptions that prevent open and graceful dialogue and creative community interaction.
4) To notice the richness and wisdom of dreams as gifts to the community.
5) To honor the wisdom of women and men, elders and emerging adults in their varied perspectives, gifts and understanding.
6) To notice, mark, and reflect upon the development of safety and openness in group interaction and to develop the ability to facilitate that development.
7) To learn to speak with courage, honesty, impeccability and non-violence in order to discover, through ever deepening dialogue, both individual and group wisdom, meaning, and purpose.
REQUIREMENTS:
Everyone who attends the workshop agrees to view the documentary What A Way To Go: Life at the End of Empire prior to attending the workshop, and they agree that they are not in basic disagreement with the analysis of our current planetary crisis regarding climate change, resource depletion, species extinction and population overshoot. In that way, we come together “on the same page” with the information. How we are to be in the face of the information is then what the dialogue can address.
Because of the challenging nature of the work it is required that all participants begin the process together at the beginning and agree to attend all sessions. This is because we learn together as a group, over the course of the weekend, to enter into true dialogue, which allows us to tap into a greater wisdom. When individuals arrive late, or miss sessions, the work, both for the individual and for the group, may be impeded or disrupted.
This work is challenging to one’s ego and cultural conditioning and is likely to trigger one’s triggers. It requires a high degree of maturity and a developed skill for self-reflection OR a high willingness to learn. It is not for everybody. People commit to looking inside themselves at their own reactions, and to be prepared to take full responsibility for those reactions, rather than focus outside of themselves for others to blame. Anyone who is currently experiencing high personal stress, who is engaged in intensive psychotherapy, or who has doubts about the wisdom of engaging at this time in such a rigorous self-reflective process, should contact the facilitators prior to registration to discuss the wisdom of their participation.
FACILITATOR/MENTOR BIOS
Sally Erickson is producer of the documentary, What A Way To Go: Life at the End of Empire, a psychotherapist of 25 years in private practice, community builder, writer and artist, and mother of two grown offspring. Sally brings 15 years of community building experience, keen insight, kindness, strength and integrity as an initiated elder, guardian of the circle, and courageous truth-seeker.
Tim Bennett is director/writer of the documentary What A Way To Go: Life at the End of Empire, a community builder, artist, and father of three grown offspring. He is a consummate observer of process, an impeccable truth-teller and taboo-buster, and a champion of vulnerable and transparent communication. Tim also brings 15 years of community-building experience, Landmark Education seminar work, insight, quiet strength, and courage.