A stump in a forest hosts life in a living system Photo by alastairb * NOTE: I changed the title of this post to better reflect the both/and nature of this conversation, rather than the unhelpful either/or way I originally wrote it. At the Art of Hosting last weekend, it finally came to me – the simple description of the different between facilitation and hosting as I understand it. So here are a few simple metaphors and a more detailed meditation. At the simplest level, you can think of a party. A facilitator is like a party planner, or …
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One of the patterns emerging from our work in the Art of Hosting, is the practice of developing and supporting a core team that can collectively hold the bigger work that is being done. At the moment I am working consciously with the core team pattern at VIATT, with the WK Kellogg Foundation Food and Society Conference, with the Quinault Indian Nation on a tribal strategic plan and with smaller conferences and gatherings, including one next week – a conference exploring collaboration in the child welfare and family services practice field. On that one we have been working with …
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Just back from an amazing Art of Hosting in rural Pennsylvania. Found this in my email box upon my return, send to me by my friend Toke: Not just any talk is conversation Not any talk raises consciousness good conversation has an edge It opens your eyes to something It quickens your ears And good conversation reverberates It keeps on talking in your mind later in the day; The next day, you find yourself still conversing with what was said The reverberation afterward is the very raising of consciousness Your mind and heart have been moved Your are at …
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I’m happy to announce that this coming June 22-28 I will be teaching with my dear friends Toke Moeller and Monica Nissen at the Shambhala Institute for Authentic Leadership in Nova Scotia. We will be teaching a module called “The Art of Hosting and Harvesting: From Strategic Conversation to Wise Action to Systemic Change.” We would be delighted if you would consider joining us and the other great teachers who are assembled for the 2008 programme.
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Photo by Khalid Almasoud A note on some very interesting recent psychiatric research that shows that decision-making has much to do with finding an inner equilibrium: Martin Paulus, M.D., professor in UCSD’s Department of Psychiatry, has compiled a body of growing evidence that human decision-making is inextricably linked to an individuals’ need to maintain a homeostatic balance. “This is a state of dynamic equilibrium, much like controlling body temperature,” said Paulus. “How humans select a particular course of action may be in response to raising or lowering that ‘set point’ back to their individual comfort zone. In people with psychiatric …