Stimulating conversation. Good company. Comfortable surroundings. Sipping coffee and tea, munching snacks. When was the last time you did all these things together? Some persons would posit that we are hardwired to sit in conversation with each about meaningful issues! And indeed we can find immense satisfaction in participating in such interactions.

On July 16, The Conflict Center and Zinn Mediation Associates presented an evening of conversation on Immigration. The two organizations are both committed to peacebuilding. They collaborated to create an opportunity to practice civil conversation around difficult issues. Our cultures and communities do not always practice or even encourage conversation that moves thinking to a deeper level. We more often find ourselves in adversarial conversations.; conversations based on a win/lose outcome.

Circles of Conversations format has been used at The Conflict Center for the past seven or eight years. This time we changed the format to resemble more of a café styled setting; trying to recreate small table conversations with coffee and snacks and the opportunity to doodle and make notes on the table. Everyone was given a couple questions to get started; after 25 minutes, everyone rotated to a different table. There were different questions and the conversation continued with an entirely different group of people. We did this rotation of tables three times.

Moving folks around had persons talking to others they did not know. There was memory of previous conversations recorded on the paper and what each person carried from their previous conversation. The intention was to stimulate creative energy, hear many different views and experiences, and see if the conversation evolved to a deeper level of insight. As the evening progressed the reporting of new ideas gained in depth and critical thinking. The conversations were animated and positive with “ah-ha’s” happening for many.

Zinn Mediation and The Conflict Center believe that these types of conversation are necessary to deal with the issues confronting our society. They stimulate new ideas, out of the box thinking, and build connections between people. They promote the democratic ideal of bringing each voice to the table, to speak and be heard.

The evening was stimulating, interesting and challenging. We hope to have more occasions like this to discuss things that matter. We will let you know when, where, and what the conversation will be. Please join us next time.

For reference, read World Café, by Brown and Isaacs, or books by Margaret Wheatley.
Our website has the questions, summary of responses to the questions, and the notes written on the butcher paper at each table.