First of all, I wanted to express my appreciation at being able to share this learning opportunity with all of you.
Being involved in the Dialogue Makers? Network has been, literally, an experience that changed my life. I can say that with some authority. The experience so captivated me that I sold a business I had run for some 20 years and returned to school to learn more about dialogue.
I just wanted to amplify a few thoughts that were expressed at our seminar/dialogue.
The first is one I can?t emphasize enough: as a result of being part of this network, more and more I?m coming to see it?s all about listening. In one of the courses I took at the Wosk Centre for Dialogue, we learned about what are sometimes referred to as the ?core capacities of dialogue.? This list of capacities will vary from person to person, but here is my list, and let me emphasize that it is one that is morphing, remolding, transmogrifying all the time.
n Listening
n Suspending assumptions, judgments, and expectations
n Treating the other with respect and as an equal
n Empathy
n A spirit of inquiry, openness, and receptivity to diversity
n A spirit of advocacy
n Cognitive imaginations* (or what Jane calls ?quantum thinking?):
o an ability to deal with paradox
o an ability to resolve dualities to embrace nondualism
o an ability to think systemically, and to see wholes and parts
*A wonderful definition of imagination (from Kieren Egan?s work in the SFU faculty of education): a flexibility of the mind. And isn?t dialogue itself all about an embrace of imagination?
But at the heart of all of these is listening. It informs and shapes all of the others. I think it no accident that Jane, after so many years of work as an dialogue educator, should title her book ?Learning to Listen, Learning to Teach.? It?s all about listening. For me, the challenge of the rest of my life is a terrifyingly simple one: learning to listen. Not only with the ears, but with the eyes, and nose, and mouth, and fingers. Not only with all my senses, but with the rest of my body: my gut, the sweatiness of my palms, the tightness of my neck, the relaxed ease of all my muscles when I feel at home, welcomed, respected. And, of course, with the heart. Especially with the heart.
For me, it all comes down to listening, which is just another way of meaning awareness. Martin Buber?s work on dialogue is my philosophical and spiritual home, and my favorite line of his (from Between Man and Man) is this: ?The limits of the possibility of dialogue are the limits of awareness.?
Just a few words about suspending assumptions, the other capacity we talked about. Just when I think I?ve examined an assumption of mine pretty thoroughly?held it out before me, suspended before me for examination like an exquisite and intricate piece of jewelry (as one friend in our dialogue network so eloquently put it)?I find other assumptions peeking their heads around the corner: ?Hi, there! Bet ya didn?t know I was here.?
Oh.
One final thought. People expressed a desire to learn about building reflective communities. What I?ve learned from our experiences in the Dialogue Makers? Network are the following: it takes time (lots of time, and every minute is worth it), clarity of intentions, respect, a willingness to be vulnerable, and a willingness to persevere with the commitment to the ideals of dialogue, especially in the face of the struggles that dialogue embraces.
And listening. And one more thing . . . that I'll leave for another post, if anyone is interested (a post that will be much shorter than this one!)
For more information about the activities of the Wosk Centre for Dialogue, go here: http://www.sfu.ca/dialogue
Our written material mentioned the work of William Isaacs. His classic book on dialogue is called: ?Dialogue and the Art of Thinking Together.? Along with Jane?s work, this is one that is a ?must have.? Here's a great line from him: ?Dialogue is a conversation with a centre, not sides.?