Navajo people call human beings “five-fingered” people. This refers to the way that Navajos relate their clan connections using the fingers of their hands. The thumb is “shay”, myself. And each one is imprinted with a unique spiral pattern. This spiral pattern is said to emerge when a child has spirit blown into it be the ye’i – the ancestors, who also produce the spiral of hair on the top of each person’s head. The spiral gives life. From there, each person can recite their clan heritage through the remaining four fingers, their father and mother, their father’s mother and …
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Last wekk I was working with some good friends – Kyra Mason, Thomas Ufer, Ruth Lyall, Jennifer Charlesworth and Nanette Taylor. Together we designed and delivered a one day workshop on what we called “Chaordic Leadership in Changing Times.” The focus of the workshop was collaborative leadership practice and we were asking questions about collaborating around a movement in the child and family services sector in British Columbia. Collaborative leadership practice has a couple of key capacities. First is the ability to be in and hold space for conversations that matter. The second is the practice of developing and holding …
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If you would like a flavour of what happens at workshops on the Art of Hosting, here are some links to give you a sense of things. Audio from the Art of Hosting workshop in southern Indiana last fall. These files were made by Jeneal King, one of the participants who took an active role in harvesting the event. Lots to listen to here. Best I think to download and listen off line. Update: No longer up as of August 12, 2008. Ravi Tangri in Nova Scotia has been making a number of videos about Art of Hosting teachings …
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Dave Pollard sees skillful conversation as a key to the kinds of communities he is trying to create. In this post he revisits his ideas about personal practices for being a good conversationalist. These are great: Tell the other person something you’re passionate about, and why. Tell them passionately. Tell them something they should know that they don’t, preferably as a story, and make it clear why it’s important. Tell them about a possibility you’ve imagined. A real possibility, not just an ideal, a wish or a dream. Tell them a different way of thinking about something, one …
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Those of you interested in exploring the Art of Hosting, our pattern language for working with conversational leadership in living systems, might consider joining Teresa Posakony, Tenneson Woolf, Christina Baldwin, Ann Linnea and I at teh Whidbey Institute near Seattle in the New Year. Invitation and information is here. You presence is desired!