​​Harvesting Pad 10: Heather Tischbein
​​Part of "DandDTrans," a community of inquiry and action regarding the role that dialogue and deliberation can play in addressing the mega-crises of our time
​​Image courtesy of www.NewStories.org
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​[Heather Tischbein]
​​[htischbein@wa-net.com]
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​​Please use the this space to share your thoughts now about Tom’s original question and what occurred for you over this past month of involvement: What do we, as members of the dialogue and deliberation community of practice, have to be and do to enable our most positive transformational impact in the face of emerging global crises which fundamentally challenge our business-as-usual habits and systems? 
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​​Use the queries below if they help but don’t feel bound to respond to them or be in any way limited by them. Tell the stories and give the details that will make your ideas and experiences come alive. 
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​​What you gained:  What new insights, challenges, ideas, inquiries, or actions came up for you from your participation this past month? What possibilities have opened up or further reinforced?  
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​​Just creating a placeholder here, for now.  I hope to have a little more time in a few days to say more.  One of the biggest insights for me was an epiphany...a question about...whether or not "trust" is a necessary system condition for effective collaboration.  During one conversation I realized that for me, if trust was a requirement for me to be able to collaborate with someone, that I would be seriously hindered in making a difference in community conversations and actions where I actually live...in what could be characterized as "Tea Party territory"...as that "faction" actually does control the local Republican party which controls the county commission and our state government representatives.  Our Congressperson is a conservative Republican whom the local party is censuring right now. Our federal  Senators and governor are Democrats and they hardly ever show up here.  So...new insights re trust and the need to feel "safe" in order to engage.
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​​A challenge I'm working with is how to converse with people whose belief systems and values are different to the point of being in conflict with my own.  As a conflict averse introvert, I have avoided conversations with those whom I knew I would disagree...believing it be true that I/we would likely never agree...on anything...so why bother?  I am now beginning to sense an answer to the "why bother?" question that is pointing in the direction of "because it matters".  I am recognizing that I have a choice to stay w/i my habituated and rationalized comfort zone of avoidance of Extremely Different Other OR to step into some Unknown Territory where trusting the vast protective goodness of Life is more important to me than trusting The Other...or even mySelf in some way...for that matter.  This is my trust challenge.  Life has arranged an experiment for me in this regard around local land use and economic development decisions being made in the public sector...decisions around a vision for (or not) developing a thriving, resilient local food system/economy. 
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​​ Part of my experiment is to work with acknowledging, honoring and inviting in the wisdom and help of the Invisible Realms.  Some people might call this practice "praying"...but I've been averse to praying my whole life, so I have to smile at the irony of finding mySelf "praying" when "I" wasn't looking.  I attended a talking circle on "ethics for a sustainable future" this week at Portland Community College Sylvania Campus that included among others two Native people, the chairperson of UNESCO, some college professors, and an activist or two.  I was surprised and deeply grateful that the two Native people both mentioned their practice of praying and singing to the spirit world...praying as a form of making a request and extending deep appreciation, and singing as a form of honoring and celebrating the relationships between the manifest (form) and invisible (non-form) realms.  Praying/singing...One Voice.
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​​ An aspect of my challenge of talking to The Other is the remembering of who "I" am and where "I" am.  "I" am a human Being on Planet Earth...hurtling through space in a spiraling vortex at a speed so fast "I" can't even feel it...most of the time just trying to remember to breathe a deep breath...and orient towards kindness.    "I" am Life on Earth...a direct, felt-sense, experience  of arising and falling away.  
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​​ “All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.” --Julian of Norwich.
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​​ “Everything will be okay in the end. If it's not okay, it's not the end.” --John Lennon
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​​ I really like reflecting on this notion of John Lennon's.  Is there an "end" in an eternal Universe, or Multiverse?  And if there is no "end"...then is there never an "okay"?  And was there ever a beginning?  Such is this challenge of engaging The Other, for me, and seeking an answer to "why bother"?  For now...I'm taking baby steps towards those whom I have at best been avoiding and at worst have been choosing to revile (mostly silently within mySelf) and to "write off".
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​​ And thanks to ​@Stephanie Jo Kent​ ,  I was reminded of the white privilege that allowed me...us...to gather together in this D&D Trans way.  ​+ Ben Roberts also spoke to this in his harvest hackpad.​  So, no need to belabor that here...other than to state my concurrence.
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​​What you experienced: How did you feel or change at different points in this process? Which processes did you participate in? Which were new to you? For processes you’ve experienced before, what was it like doing them online? What worked for you, and why? What didn’t? How might you use or change these processes on another occasion? What about the web tools used? Maestro? Hackpads? Zoom (if you experienced that)? Any others?
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​​What next: What are you doing, will do or might do as related at least in part to the question that brought us together and/or as a result of what we have done together? Who else would (might) you involve? 
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​Comments on Heather's Story

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​​One of the statements that stand out to me: "how to converse with people whose belief  systems and values are different to the point of being in conflict with  my own.  As a conflict averse introvert, I have avoided conversations  with those whom I knew I would disagree." In his harvest Tom Christensen pointed out the development of value systems as described in Spiral Dynamics. Looking at groups and individuals through this lens has helped me to understand more clearly how I can converse with people whose values are different from mine. ​+Harvesting Pad 8 Tom Christensen​
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​​​@Chris Smerald​ 2-7
​​I was also struck by the belief systems comment. It is a difficult and important issue. In a resilience focused dialogue several months back we reminded ourselves that avoiding us/them thinking is important. Many share similar values but weigh things differently. Also, really listening is a prerequisite to being listened to. 
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