For a Successful Dialogue Practice

Try the following:

~ Address the group as a whole. Avoid addressing your words to one or two persons.

~ Remember that it is most useful to listen, hear, and understand.

~ Avoid giving advice.

~ Remember that a speaker is probably doing her or his best to be honest.

~ Avoid interrupting another. Your group has a way of dealing with those who would damage your practice.

~ Keep expenses to a minimum. Everyone helps to take care of necessary expenses. Do your part.

~ Really listen to to what another is saying. Improved understanding is a major aim of your group.

~ Learn to listen well and gain greater listening skills.

~ Encourage everyone to speak at each opportunity. The words of each are gifts for us all.

~ Limiting each speaking time to 1 or 2 minutes. It's great to have time to speak more than once at a meeting.

~ Remember that focusing dialogue on personal experience is good practice.

~ In the beginning get 8 or 9 interested persons to commit to 4 or 5 consecutive meetings.

Practice perfects.

More to Come.

                                                                                rcs

  

What's to Like in an Organization?

 We know that organization increases our power enormously. We know that our organization informs and educates us well.

                    We are capable of forgetting the pleasures and satisfactions  of organization. I expect that the pleasures and satisfactions I am recalling just now will not be the same as yours. Still among mine you may find one or two of yours.

                    I have an interest in ad hoc organizations and and those of longer term.

Below are many of my personal likes in organizations. You may find some of your likes listed.

An organization which attracts me often has:

~ members who feel connected, involve, and respected.

~ the motive of helping me and others to thrive.

~ a clear understanding of costs and benefits.

~ members who promote widespread participation and responsibility.

~ members who embrace reality and who are willing to approach the truth.

~ members who value honesty and justice.

~ a mission I find valuable and pleasing.

~ plenty of talk in which all participate.

An organization which pleases me is one which:

~ Keeps me in the information loop.

~ most members feel well connected with leadership.

~ Makes very clear who pays how much and who gets what.

~ moves in the direction of democracy.

~ tends to be inclusive.

~ tends to safeguard that which I value.

~ includes those who study and promote actions good for me and others.

~ advocates and protects people and process important to me.

~ promotes dialogue which leads to appropriate action.

I find an organization congenial when it includes:

~ teaching the process of organizing.

~ the purpose of advocating and protecting me.

~ objectives very like my own.

~ intelligent, respectful, loving ladies. (Excuse my honesty, please.)

                I am very interested in hearing of your likes in organizations. I expect to post more about organization and organizing. Dialogue skills are organizational skills for all participants in society.

                Organizing can be a wonderful move toward governance.

                More as soon as I can.

                Thank you for reading. Make some time to do some exploration among the 50 posts here.

                                                                                                            RCS

Learning to Organize as We Organize to Learn

 Co-operation:

                There is a hope among us that we can effectively co-operate for our mutual well-being; that is to co-operate for the well-being of our health, education, economy, civic life, and more. We know about co-operation, but many of us seem to be out of practice. 

                In order to organize to get something going, or to keep it going, we need to co-operate pretty well. That takes talking, it takes communication, and it takes practice. To keep on the same track or on the same page, often takes an ongoing conversation or dialogue. Carrying on a dialogue conversation effectively takes some practice and a bit of learning. 

Practice:

                We could practice such dialogue as we teach each other active citizenship, self governance, and participatory democracy, if we would.

                Learning to practice the dialogue effectively can be an important first step. Learn to use the dialogue is a very useful in many collective activities. the practice of the dialogue makes us better co-operators and more effective doers. Use of the dialogue is a great aid to organizing and and more effective learning as we become more effective organizers.

Listening and Acton:

                Dialogue practice leads us to be more meaningful listeners and understanders. The dialogue is a way to think co-operatively, to act usefully, and effectively. It can be a way to beautiful action. It can move us beautiful action. It can move us to powerful and broadly meaningful action when we so will.

                You can explore our growing blogsites of dialogue and governance when you so will. You can check the list of associated blogs here whenever you care to. Find out more about dialogue skills and how to use them at the dialogue and the governance sites here.

                Thank you for reading.

                                                                                                        rcs

Dialogue Terms

 Here are a half a dozen terms I have used to write of our dialogues.

                I have written a few words about each to remind you about their meanings.

Assumptions:

                We have differing experiences and so differing opinions and assumptions.We have differing views because of who we are.
We often come to interpret our worlds differently from one another.
We develop conscious and unconscious ideas about the ways of the world which are difficult for others to understand until they know more of our experiences.

Defending:

                Without the abundance of shared cultural meanings good dialogue brings, it is unreasonable to expect a peaceful society. Defending our own or another's opinions keeps us from laying out our assumptions were we can all look at them and try to appreciate their meanings  and so keepings from productive and satisfying dialogue we want an need. It is shared deeper meanings we seek. Also defending our assumptions consumes the energy we could better use to achieve a clear understanding  of the assumption of another.

Go-under:

                Without good dialogue we are likely to miss opportunities and lose understanding s. We are likely to miss out on good positions, to go under and lose out as individuals, corporations, families, nations, churches, parties. The shared meaning we gain in good dialogue helps us  maintain, grow, and strengthen party, church, nation, family, corporation, and self.

Coherent:

                For many, an important benefit of dialogue practice is experiencing the power of collectively shared meaning. Most ordinary talk in in society may well be called incoherent. Our dialogue practice is designed to promote areas of  coherence in the vastness of misunderstanding. The meanings we share a cohesion of understanding.

Group: 

                For a truly effective dialogue of of sufficient variety of viewpoint A group of between 15 and 40 seems optimal. It is possible to do preparatory work with a dedicated, active organizing group of say nine may be adequate. A long lasting group with regular meetings is called for.

Thinking Together:

                Is a frequent result of a dialogue group and ought perhaps be a aim of your group. We learn to stay close to the same page and to carry each other's thoughts forward. Individuals sharing common meanings in a coherent way have power for peace and creativity. Thinking together coherently calls for dialogue sustained  long enough to to share a body of coherent meanings. 

You strengthen culture, create it, enjoy it, and pass it on.



                                                                                                        By Richard for you.

Dialogue Groups

 Dialogue  Practice Is  

      

It can look like a parlor game:               

 It is not about dice or pairs it is a lot about group communication. There is a bit to learn. It may seem like a parlour game and it is a little like that and there is some fun in it, but it can have a much bigger payoff. 

                Our dialogue talk is designed to create areas of coherence in the vastness of misunderstanding. Often a major benefit of our dialogue is to give us a better chance to experience the power of collectively shared meaning which we have created. Most ordinary talk in our society may be called incoherent. To learn to do our dialogue talk, takes ongoing practice. This practice we have called Dialogue for Peace, Magic Table Dialogue, and just The Dialogue. The Dialogue has rules which call for practice. The rules need not be rigid, but they do call for practice which is important. 

It can be a worthy effort:                

The Dialogue is aimed at learning to think together coherently. Thinking together coherently calls for sustained practice. An early practice may be called a listening practice, but calls for some use of your voice as well as of your ears and mind. Thinking together is both satisfying and a great power.  We believe that it is well worth the effort.

                This thinking together is a learning and growth process. It occurs on various levels of consciousness. It occurs in one, in mental talk to one's self, or even on unspoken levels. We could just say that a lot of learning goes on in dialogue practice.

                Make comments below. I respect suggestions and am grateful for them.
Suggestions about how the dialogue might be done online can benefit us.
You may place whatever you have to say in the "Comment" area below anonymously, with a pen name, or just your regular name.

                   Search this blog with one of the several avenues of search available in the side  columns. 

 

                                                                                                  

                                                                                                                      RCS

Dialogue Practice Actions

What it is: a first look 

                In our dialogue practice there is no agenda in the ordinary sense. Our purpose, in large part, is the practice. The practice is the honest and just sharing of meaning and development of coherence.  We practice certain methods and skills for thinking together.

                Our present purpose is to practice skills and learn rules of effective dialogue. We hope that others will come to see how this mere practice builds and supports our culture even as we listen and speak.

                This Dialogue For Peace, this Magic Table Dialogue, this dialogue is mostly leaderless. We can practice it and share its benefits without leaders.

Suggested first steps

                To begin your dialogue you will need to talk with others about the dialogue. You will begin, probably, by talking it over, discussing why you are doing it, what it means, and how you want to do it. 

                Explore this site.

                More to come.

                Thank you for reading!


                                                                                    by Richard Sheehan

Learn to Organize as you Organize to Learn

 Co-operation:

                There is a hope among many that we can effectively co-operate for our mutual well-being; co-operate for the well being of our health, education, economy, civic life, and more. We know about co-operation, but too many of are out of practice.

Organize:

                In order to organize for fair and practical results, we need to learn to co-operate better than usual. Better co-operation takes talk which includes better listening and hearing; it most often takes face to face communication. To get on a well understood same track or same page usually takes an ongoing conversation or dialogue. Carrying on a dialogue effective takes some practice. Such practice takes place in a dialogue group.

Practice:

                You can practice such dialogue as we teach each other the nature of the dialogue, as we teach one another, say, active citizenship, self governance, participatory democracy, appropriate mutual trust.

Learn:

                Learning to practice the dialogue effectively can be an important first step to more effective co-operation. Learning to to use the dialogue is a very useful early step in many collective activities and may be vital throughout those activities. The practice of the dialogue makes us more understanding co-operaters and more effective doers. 

Dialogue:  

                Use of the dialogue is a great aid to organizing to learn, as we become more effective organizers. The dialogue leads us to be more meaningful listeners and understanders. It is a democratic way to think together so as to be thoughtful and effective individuals of useful action. It is a democratic way to think together so as to be free, thoughtful, and effective people of good and useful action. Powerful, beautiful, broadly meaningful, and good action results when you so will.

Action:

~ Powerful co-operation results for those who practice learning to more truly understand one another.

~ Practicing democratic listening results in more powerful understanding.

~ We develop powerful understanding by practicing the dialogue and so coming to better use it.

~ The dialogue is simple, but it does take practice.

~ The practice is effective when it takes place in a dialogue group.

~ I dialogue group begins when two people find a third person to practice with them.

Check out these two sites;

~ Governance With RCS

and

~ Dialogue With RCS

                

                Thank you for reading; may it lead to reasoned action.

                                                                                                rcs

                                                                                                        

                

            

  

                

Group Dialogue Practice: hints for creating successful group practice

                                This whole blog is much about group dialogue practice and this is more on that same theme. Dialogue of this sort is often called social dialogue. Social dialogue has been called a pillar of social resiliance and cohesion. It makes our co-operation more powerfully effective. It may be that which makes human and humane co-operation possible. Using language is a marvel of humanity. By the time you have read a dozen of these little essays, you will have provided yourself the ability to recognize a successful dialogue group and know much of the reasons why it is successful.

Hints:

~In the very beginning it helps to have at least 6 or 7 interested persons committed to three or four consecutive meetings. This could be called your pilot group. Forty practicants is too many for most well working groups.

~ During practice one person addresses the group as a whole and avoids directing her words to only a few persons at a time.

~ The practice is mostly a listening practice with one person speaking and the rest listening. Even so, all intened to make sure that every one has an equal opportunity to speak.

~ Remember that the speaker is most likely doing his best to be honest and to make his words understood.

~ Avoid interrupting another. You will have your chance to speak and other times to listen. The dialogue continues so that there is more oppertunity to understand and to be understood. If a speaker is interrupted several listeners may be interrupted and so the effectiveness of the practice may be damaged.

~ Keep expenses to a minimum. Everyone helps take care of necessary expenses, Do your part as you are able to.

~ Listen well to that which the speaker is saying. Improved understanding is an aimof your group.

~ Practice listening wel and gain more powerful listening and understanding skills.

~ Encourage each and every one to use their opportunity to say something at each meeting. Their words and yours are gifts to each of us.

~ Usually limit speaking to one or two minutes. It is great to have time to speak more than once at a meeting.

~ Rememvber that focusing dialogue on the topic and on personal experience is good practice.

    

                          The hints offered here can be useful for keeping the practice pleasant and effective, but are far from all inclusive or comprehensive. There is much more offered in other posts on this blog. Consider beginning a practice group of your own, if you have not already done so.

                        Thank you for your visit and for reading.

                                                                                                        rcs

            

Social Dialogue

                    This social dialogue for dealing with work and worker related doings for mutual understanding and more specifically for collective bargaining is not specifically our type of dialogue, but it uses and benefits from many of the skills we develop. This video is a production of the European International Labor Organization.

                    Thank you for your visit. Please continue to explore this blog site.

                                                                                                      rcs

             

This Practice is old and it is New, It's Powerful Too

The Practice of  Dialogue 

          Dialogue including: A bit of a definition of our usefully different kind of dialogue. You may have heard or read information before. Read it again here and make sure that it is active in your memory. It is important that you do so. You will benefit.

              I write about a new kind of dialogue. It is mostly for groups of as small as 9 to groups of about 39. 

            Below are some descriptive notes about what is, and what it is not. See other posts on the benefits of this more productive and satisfying way to communicate. It can work wonders with your husband and has been successful in some very large groups.

Our dialogue practice is not a:

~ place to make a particular point prevail.

~ debate or even a discussion. 

~ time to attempt to make points.

~ game to win or lose.

 

This new dialogue practice is a way to:

~ meaning and understanding.

~ an activity which helps us to be us.

~ through the meaning of word.

~ an honest, supportive activity.   

~ greater awareness and enhanced consciousness.

~ hone your listening skills.

~ develop new speaking skills.

~ effective methods of communication. 

~ cultural preservation and creation.

~ make a healthy, effective society more probable.

~ meet interested people in an interesting environment.

~ put honest thoughts "on the table" where we can look at them and begin to find their meaning.

~ be heard.

~ find pleasure in speaking-up.

~ understanding among us and within us.

~ satisfying relationship.

~ exchange idea and opinion more safely. 

~ share experience.

~ more effective communication beyond the group.

~ practice a "second" language.

~ peace and good will.

~ to see our words as gifts.

According to Dr. David Bohm a similar dialogue practice is:

~ participating in a flow of meaning between us, through us, and among us.

~ an activity out of which emerges new and renewed understanding.

~ an activity which helps us to be an us.

            Could you find a way to practice a dialogue of this sort? Could you practice a dialogue more of this sort in your group?

            You can open a window below to make a comment, a suggestion, and ask a question. You might have to click on where where "no comment" is printed below.

            Thanks for reading. 

                                                                                RCS

Comments

                     We still have a working comments app present just below each essay and post. Try it, you may really like it! You can use your real name, a pen, a war name, a nickname. You may find that doing so can be more satisfying than posting your comment anonymously. Of course you can comment anonymously whenever you desire.

                My name is Richard, or more completely Richard Sheehan, but I most often sign my posts and comment responses, rcs. 

                                                                        rcs

                                                    

Space and Time for a Dialogue Practice Group

                    You can find space and time to let more meaning and understanding into your life. Dialogue practice can be a way to meaning, understanding, and more. You can find space and time to bring dialogue practice into your life. This blog deals with a kind of dialogue practice which you may find interesting and and more useful than you may imagine just now. This post deals with the nature of effective dialogue and its practice.

                    I have found that the practice works best face to face in a group. Such a dialogue practice group calls for a  designate space and time. The best space or place is often quiet and private. The best time is often a bit more than an hour at a time about once a week. The time a place is for the benefit of group members ought to satisfy them. Practice groups are best when open to a wide variety of participants. Groups are open, but the number of participants is best limited to less than 40 members. Also it is best when membership is 17 or more; however, successful groups have begun with fewer.

                    Group practice takes time a commitment. It be best done once a week for about an hour or two persession. This is best done forever, but few of us live that long. By using the hints and suggestions found here you can give your group a good chance for successful operation bringing powerful to skills to your members. With love, even a couple can benefit from the skills learned.

                    Again, time for your practice is important. A good goal to aim for might be to find a time good for 20 individuals to meet once a week for an hour and a half each session. A good aim might be to meet for 40 weeks each year.

                    Among the first steps an individual might take is to decide how she intends to show up for group practice. Another step is to actually show up. A great third step could be to arrange to attend complete practice meetings each week for the next couple of months.

                    As she continues her weekly practice sessions she may observe her dialogue companions becoming more effective listeners and more cogent speakers. She could see here companions speaking up, so as to be more successfully heard. She may also come to other members listening more attentively to a member speaking to the group. She might see her good friend in the group honestly express an opinion or describe and experience she has had. She will see fellow dialoguers developing and using new dialogue skills and and attitudes, before she herself becomes aware of her development.

                    With your help we can continue to review the benefits of our dialogue practice. I have read of independent groups practicing this kind of dialogue for a variety of reasons, including the belief that it maintains, strengthens, and creates culture! I have begun to mention a few of the benefits in this essay. Examples are that it can: bring more meaning and understanding to our lives, improve listening and speaking skills, underline the value of showing up, provide opportunity to observe a variety of speakers and listeners, give you the chance to be listened to, and we may discover more.

                    When your interest in this dialogue grows you can try to find a an active group near you. Or, if you know a couple of others who share your interest, you could form your own practice group. When you begin actual practice please feel free to report your experience by clicking on "comments" below. Also know that you are free to ask questions or to make comments whenever you wish.

                    Some simple doings have proven helpful. For example, it seems best to form a circle with chairs facing toward the center and so offering participants a good view of one another. In that circle one often begins to see that participants begin to look less and less to a designated authority and that they avoid building a hierarchy. In such a circle they experience getting to know in a way perhaps new to them.

                Participants in their own circle begin to want the words spoken there to be honest. They may even to see those words as gifts. The find that their words are listened to attentively and sometimes truly accepted as gifts. Participants share words and begin to find more meaning in that which is said. 

                Benefits of the dialogue are gained through practice. There are many ways to practice. Participants in the practice find that there rules(some correctly call them ways)which they learn, most of them are simple and important. They find that their are helpful suggestions available for making the practice more effective and more pleasant. Participants find that a significant number of those rules and suggestions are not completely new to them.

                Most practice is easy to do and easy to understand; even so, ongoing practice is important to making them yours. Some of the steps we take may seem very simple, but they lead to good effects and your group will benefit from them. It may not seem like a step, but an example is the practice of  appropriate respect and courtesy.

                Dialogue practice groups are usually open, but seldom public. Open means that nearly anyone can participate when their are chairs are available. When there are more than about forty individuals who want to participate it is best to consider starting a new group. (When you are interested in discussing this further you may use the comments section below). Seldom public, means that there are usually no observers; when practic begins doors are closed. A dialogue group is not a public forum. A public forum can be, among other things, a wonderful communication container. We can benefit from having and using public forums as we can from dialogue practice groups. However, our practice groups are for teaching our self a different and perhaps higher kind of  communication. 

                A dialogue practice group has ways, means, and aims different from those of public forums. Our ways include practice and democratic inclusion, our main means is our ongoing practice, our aims include bringing more meaning and understanding into our lives and achieving a better understanding of the assumptions and opinions of others. Participants are not interested in bringing others to their point of view. They are more interested in understanding the points of view of others. Some aim to better understand the power of thinking together. Nearly all find that they are listened to more closely than ever.

                You can explore this dialogue practice more by reading other posts on this blog and by communication with us by way of the "comments" app just below this posts. You may find that you can enjoy enhanced meaning and understanding in your life and at the same time engender a bit more peace in our world. You may also find yourself becoming a stronger and more effective individual as you develop and ability to think with another. 

                Thank you for reading.

                Bye for now.

                                                                                                   RCS