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Capitulo Tres: El Intercambio de Escucha

core skills, education, parenting, Uncategorized | Active Listening, anxiety, authenticity, communicating with children, depression, education of feeling, Empathic Listening, Focused Listening, Focusing With Children, Gendlin's Focusing, Getting A Felt Sense, Getting In Touch, helping children with feelings, Inner Child healing, Intuitive Focusing, knowing your feelings, McMahon, personal growth, self-expression, Stapert, transparency

Learning Focusing, Listening, and Focusing Partnership Exchange

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By Kathy McGuire, March 6, 2008 1:33 pm

Chapter Three: Listening/Focusing Exchange

Click links for free downloads of word file of manual chapter

THE LISTENING/FOCUSING EXCHANGE

The basic, core model for interpersonal forms of Gendlin’s Focusing is the Focusing Partnership: the equal exchange of turns between peer counselors. One person uses Focusing to pay attention to the murky “intuitive feel,” the “felt sense” of an issue or problem needing solving. The other person responds with Empathic Listening, simply trying to “say back” or “reflect” the words of the Focuser, with emphasis upon the “feeling tone” and the murky, unclear Edge. The Listener might also give Focusing Invitations to help the Focuser go more deeply into the “felt sense” of the issue.

Then, after the designated time is up, the two share feedback about being the Focuser and being the Listener in that turn, then switch roles. The first Focuser now becomes the Listener, and the initial Listener becomes the Focuser, for an equal period of time.

THE FOCUSING PARTNERSHIP PROGRAM

Gendlin’s international Focusing Institute offers a Focusing Partnership program, a way in which people can form Focusing Partnerships for face-to-face or phone Focusing Partnership sessions world-wide. Those with no initial Listening/Focusing training can participate in two paid training sessions in numerous languages and by phone. Then they can join the Focusing Partnership pool. Click here to find all about the Focusing Partnership Program at The Focusing Institute website.

SELF-HELP MANUAL TEACHING FOCUSING PARTNERSHIP

I have taught Focusing Partnership, which I have called the Listening/Focusing Exchange for thirty years, since my own initial experience of Focusing Partnership in the original Changes Listening/Focusing Community in Chicago starting in 1968. My manual, Focusing In Community: How To Start A Listening/Focusing Support Group (Focusing En Comunidad: Como Empezar Un Grupo De Apoyo De Escucha Y Focusing) includes thorough instructions in how to do Focusing Partnerships and how to include them within a Focusing Group/Team/Community.

Download the complete Chapter Three: The Listening/Focusing Exchange (Capitulo Tres: El Intercambio de Escucha) from the manual to begin exploring these wonderful self-help tools. Use the links at the top of this blog.

Find links to free articles, personality tests, multi-media Self-Help training, Classes and workshops

Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director

The site of new insights and creative solutions is at the edge of what is already known. This edge, The Creative Edge, holds implicit within it all past and future knowing about the problem, more than could ever be put into words in a linear way

core skills, Intuitive Focusing, LISTENING, self-help skills, support groups | Empathic Listening, Experiential Focusing, Focusing Communities, Focusing Partnership, Gendlin, peer counseling, Rogers, Self-Help Groups

CREATIVITY: FINDING YOUR UNIQUE “TOUCHSTONE”

By Kathy McGuire, February 27, 2008 2:00 pm

See previous blog Creating At The Edge: Culture of Creativity for introduction.

INTUITIVE FOCUSING EXERCISE: THE “TOUCHSTONE MISSION”

So, let’s modify the “One Small Thing” Focusing Exercise a little and use the Intuitive Focusing skill to find the unique “Touchstone Mission” which engages and motivates each of us in our work and living. In groups, teams, or organizations, it is also possible to go further by sharing and nurturing these “Touchstone Missions” in each individual person, while meeting the over-all goals of an organization.

Finding A Talisman Object Symbolizing Your Work

Each individual will use Focusing to find words and images for their unique mission, in their individual work and/or within an organization, the unique contribution which would matter enough TO THEM as an individual to keep them motivated. Then, the individual will use Intuitive Focusing to come up with a symbol and an actual object which could stand as a personal Talisman for this Touchstone Mission, a reminder to return to this source for energy and inspiration.

The symbolic object could be kept on their desk or worn as a lapel button or jewelry, as a reminder to the individual to stay in touch with their Creative Edge and also a way of easily communicating to others this core motivating factor.

For example, for me, the symbol of my Touchstone Mission is a prism: conveying the idea to as many people as possible that finding the “new” comes from using Intuitive Focusing to allow ideas and solutions to arise from the “pause,” from intuitive, right-brain knowing. So, I could wear a prism as a reminder to myself and to others about what matters to me, what motivates me or keep one on my desk. A kaleidoscope serves as a similar talisman for me: a reminder that, through Intuitive Focusing, the entire Gestalt changes, and new ideas and action possibilities arise.

For another person, the motivating factor might be interconnections throughout the globe, and they might wear a globe as their symbol.

For an engineer, it might be perfectly elegant designs, and a symbol of this.

For a human resources person, it might be something about the perfect match between person and job, or low turn-over….whatever it is, a simple symbol of that motivating factor.

Sharing Your Talisman and Touchstone Mission With Others

If deciding to share this exercise with others in a group or team or organization, individuals could share about their symbol and talisman after the Focusing exercise, or a game could be devised throughout an organization, with people visiting colleagues, discovering the talisman object, and learning th Touchstone Mission of the others. A prize at the end for whoever learns the most talismans and missions! Or some such version as an icebreaker at an organizational gathering.

Focusing Instructions: “What is my unique Touchstone Mission, the motivation that can keep my work fresh and alive? What could be a symbol representing this to myself and to others?” 20 minutes

As a group or individually, sit down and get comfortable Click e-newsletter archive for complete Focusing Exercise

Download Dr. McGuire’s article Collaborative Edge Decision Making Method en espanol

Find links to free articles, personality tests, multi-media Self-Help training, Classes and workshops

Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director

Business, community building, core skills, Creativity, Intuitive Focusing | " grass roots organizing, "buy in, commitment, creative problem solving, Creativity, empowerment within organizations, innovation, Intuitive Focusing, Intuitive Problem Solving, motivation, organizational development, ownership

EMPOWERMENT ORGANIZATION : “One Small Thing” Examples — Corporate, Non-Profit, Grass Roots

By Kathy McGuire, February 19, 2008 5:03 pm

Kathy’s Experience: “One Small Thing” Focusing Exercise
(see Week One Empowerment Organization for Introduction)

    I did the “One Small Thing” Focusing Exercise included below on my own problem/goal: Getting Listening/Focusing Partnership skills incorporated into existing support groups, such as 12-Step, divorce/bereavement, cancer/other medical conditions, etc.

     Here’s what came up! Certainly a novel idea I had never thought of before. I’m not sure I will implement, need to talk with others, but here it is: “Offer a free copy of the Focusing In Community manual to audiences filled with support group facilitators (magazines, e-discussion groups, websites) as a PDF file to support group facilitators signing up for the e-newsletter and/or Creative Edge Practice e-group — or something like that — assume, once they have seen the manual, they will buy the supporting audio/visual materials — or, at least, the word will get out and some will try the skill-training out.

    I hope you try out the Exercise on a project important to you. Here are examples for a variety of corporate, non-profit, and grass-roots endeavors, all where “empowerment organization = motivating from the bottom up” was being sought (taken from Instant “Ahah!” #6 in Mini-Manual):

Example One: Achieving Corporate Buy-In

   At Old Navy (Business Week, June,19, 2006), Innovation Champion Ivy Ross, catching the MySpace-type lifestyle of today, used a Facebook-style CD in an effort to bind old and new employees into one new group. Every employee filmed three minutes of “something so personal it would take years to discover it.” Ross had new and old employees hungrily viewing the CD. They quickly became bonded into one, new group, “infused — with a close tightness essential for innovation.” Ross had found the “One Small Thing.”

Example Two: Revitalizing the PTO at a public school

     The PTO of a public school was languishing. A handful of parents were doing all the work. A new property tax bill dramatically cut funding to the public schools, wiping out PE teachers, art, music, librarians, nurses — The parents suddenly had to raise a whole lot of money from a population of middle to low income parents.

     The small group of committed parents started selling Grocery Store Gift Certificates. The PTO could purchase the “scrip” at a 5% discount, resell it to parents to use to buy groceries, and make a 5% profit on something parents had to buy anyway. Everyone had to buy groceries! They sold “scrip” in the front hallway before school and at school events and PTO meetings.

     Suddenly, everyone was buying “scrip” – grandparents, neighbors, as well as parents and teachers. People were coming into the school to purchase “scrip” and staying to paint walls or help with reading. The only people who were unhappy were parents who were on food stamps – they were furious that they couldn’t contribute!!!! The PTO had found the One Small Thing that allowed everyone to become involved.

     Now, parents had a “stake” in how the money would be spent. Attendance at PTO meetings grew to thirty, making decisions about how to distribute the funds, how to enlarge the “scrip” program. Teachers came to present proposals for funding.

     In the first year, the PTO raised $11,000 (at the 5% net profit, gross sales of $220,000!) to hire a part-time PE teacher who would teach the other teachers how to run PE classes. The “scrip” program spread to other public schools and, ten years later, a large banner in front of the town high school reads “Buy Grocery Scrip”.

     But, more importantly, the entire school was revitalized. The parents had to establish a “volunteer lounge” at the school to accommodate all the volunteers!

Hypothetical Example: Global Warming

     You are Al Gore. You want to get every day citizens involved in the issue of Global Warming. But most people feel apathetic: “Oh, there is nothing that one person can do — it is up to governments.”

     Well, maybe it is up to governments — but non-apathetic, engaged citizens are the ones to put pressure on governments. So, you are looking for that “one small thing.” “What is one small thing that masses of people would be willing to do and which would act as a first step toward full engagement?”

     Here’s a possibility: Purportedly, “idling” your car greatly increases the output of pollutants. Yet, everyone, without giving it a thought, “idles” at drive-up banks, fast food take-outs, school pick ups. What about a “Stop Idling! Stop Greenhouse Gases” campaign? With bumper stickers, flyers on car windows or handed out at drive-up locations — the double-entendre “Don’t idle and don’t be idle!” —

   If you can get people, all over the world, to “Stop Idling!”, you will have them engaged in thinking about global warming every day — and primed to engage in other actions which you initiate.

Empowerment Organization = Motivating From The Bottom Up

You want to find “One Small Thing” that every person in the community or organization can become involved in with minimal effort but maximum sense of satisfaction in contributing something to the larger mission. If the first step of involvement is too big, too difficult, then most people won’t be willing to do it.

So, you have to keep looking until you find something so small that everyone can do it, easily, willingly, yet so important that it will feel like a real contribution, a first step of commitment to the larger cause. Then, you can invite these involved, engaged people into further Collaborative Decision Making about the project.
If your “One Small Thing” project is not having the desired effect, then the step is too big, requires too much motivation or commitment. If that is the case, then you need to look for a smaller step until you find the one that works.

INTUITIVE FOCUSING ON “WHAT IS THE ONE SMALL THING—?”
Your Turn
So, let’s use the Intuitive Focusing skill to find the “one small thing” to engage and motivate your target audience, be it consumers, citizens, volunteers, or employees. Click here for the full Focusing Exercise

Find links to free articles, personality tests, multi-media Self-Help training, Classes and workshops

Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director

Business, community building, core skills, Creativity, Intuitive Focusing, self-help skills | " grass roots organizing, "buy in, commitment, creative problem solving, Creativity, empowerment within organizations, innovation, Intuitive Focusing, Intuitive Problem Solving, motivation, organizational development, ownership

COMPLETE FOCUSING EXERCISE: INTERPERSONAL SITUATION

By Kathy McGuire, February 17, 2008 5:55 pm

PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT

This is the beginning of a new four week cycle. For four weeks, we practice an actual exercise in three different categories: An Instant “Ahah!” to integrate into your every day life at work and at home, a Felt Sensing exercise to practice this step of Focusing, and a Complete Focusing Session. Actually doing the exercise which arrives in each e-newsletter insures that you can call upon these new skills when needed!
COMPLETE FOCUSING SESSION: SITTING WITH THE CREATIVE EDGE OF AN INTERPERSONAL SITUATION

Earlier this week you received Interpersonal Focusing : “This flower is beautiful To ME”, showing how owning our own reactions, instead of blaming them on the other, actually empowers us to begin to change interpersonal situations, and Interpersonal Felt Sensing Exercise, inviting you to find the bodily, “intuitive feel” of five unresolved interpersonal situations (that blog also contains links to downloads of Chapter Five: Interpersonal Focusing (Capitulo Cinco: El Proceso Interpersonal) from Dr. McGuire’s manual, Focusing In Community (Focusing en Comunidad).

In the Complete Focusing Session for each of the next four weeks, you will be invited to take one of these interpersonal situations and sense into, “sit with” it in a Focusing way, seeing what new information about yourself-in-this-situation can unfold.

Throughout the month, we will also explore methods for communicating and using Listening/Focusing turns with the actual other person as a way of resolving interpersonal conflict. The “felt sense” in each person in an interpersonal situation contains a Creative Edge which, when shared, can carry both problem solving and relationship forward.

But, in Complete Focusing, you are going more deeply into “owning” the personal dimension of the interaction for yourself, given the person that you are.

Focusing On A Specific Interpersonal Situation (20 minutes) Click the link to find the actual Complete Focusing exercise in our e-newsletter archive.

Find links to free articles, personality tests, multi-media Self-Help training, Classes and workshops

Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director

Business, community building, conflict resolution, core skills, Creativity, Intuitive Focusing, LISTENING, relationships, self-help skills | conflict resolution, Gendlin's Focusing, Getting A Felt Sense, harmonious relationships, Interpersonal Focusing, interpersonal problem solving, peace making

INTERPERSONAL FOCUSING: THE “INTUITIVE FEEL” OF CONFLICTS

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By Kathy McGuire, February 12, 2008 6:18 pm

Download complete instructions on using Intuitive Focusing and Focused Listening Turns to resolve interpersonal conflicts, turning conflict into creativity: Chapter Five: Interpersonal Focusing Capitulo Cinco El Proceso Interpersonal Order the complete Self-Help Package .

INTERPERSONAL FELT SENSING EXERCISE !!!!! (Read introductory philosophy “This flower is beautiful TO ME” )

Exercise: The “Felt Sense” of Various Interpersonal Situations

In the Complete Focusing exercise for these four weeks, we will do an Intuitive Focusing process with a variety of Interpersonal Situations, hoping to experience a “felt shift,” a true “paradigm shift” in our experiencing of ourselves and the Other in such situations.

But, for today, I’m asking you just to make a map, or a list, of unresolved Interpersonal Situations you are carrying and to try to find a bodily “felt sense,” the “intuitive feel” and a “handle” word or image which can help you go back to each of these Interpersonal Situations during later Complete Focusing Sessions. I’m suggesting that you take some notes for later reference, on The Specific Situation/Person, the “whole body feel” of being in that situation/with that person, and some words/images/gestures which capture “the feel of it all.”

Initially, we will work internally, using Felt Sensing and Complete Focusing to clarify the interpersonal dimension of situations for ourselves. As we proceed, we will also study and practice procedures for resolving such situations with the other person, if necessary. However, you will not be asked or forced to speak about any of your material to another person if you choose not to!!!! A lot of “resolution” can be done internally. Sharing Interpersonal Focusing with another is for the purpose of increased bonding and support for change. It is not required.

Felt Sense of Interpersonal Situations Exercise (at least 20 minutes) Find and practice the exercise, with five unresolved interpersonal situations at this e-newsletter archive link.

Find links to free articles, personality tests, multi-media Self-Help training, Classes and workshops

Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director

Business, collaboration, community building, conflict resolution, core skills, Creativity, Intuitive Focusing, relationships, self-help skills | conflict resolution, Gendlin's Focusing, Getting A Felt Sense, harmonious relationships, Interpersonal Focusing, interpersonal problem solving, peace making

INTERPERSONAL FOCUSING: THE CREATIVE EDGE OF CONFLICT

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By Kathy McGuire, February 11, 2008 5:15 pm

Honoring “Subjectivity”: “This flower is beautiful TO ME”

We tend to use pseudo- objectivity, pseudo-factualism, pseudo-logic to assert our view of the world over others, to “win” arguments: “Mine is the only, the right, the correct way of seeing. The way I see it is ‘the facts.'” This way of communicating either crushes The Other or makes them defensive. It does not encourage person-to-person communication and problem resolution.

Rollo May, a founder of the existentialist tradition in psychology and philosophy (May, R., Angel, E., and Ellenberger, H.F., Eds., Existence, p.63) states:

“Suzuki has remarked that in Eastern languages, such as Japanese, adjectives always include the implication of ‘for-me-ness.’ That is to say, ‘this flower is beautiful’ means ‘for me this flower is beautiful.'”

Self-Reflection Instead of Reaction: “Owning” Instead of “Blaming”

“You are a f_____b_____!” (to me)
“It’s not fair!” (from my point of view)
“You are hurting me!” (Something in me says “You are hurting me!”)
“I want to tear your eyes out!” (Something in me wants to tear your eyes out!)
“I am deeply offended by what you have done” (Being the kind of person I am, I am deeply offended by what you have done)

Just these little steps of self-ownership begin to locate our reactions to other people inside of ourselves, to turn them into “felt senses,” “intuitive feels” that we can work with in a Focusing way: “What is all of this TO ME?” “What is the feel of this interaction from the inside?” “How is it that this grabs me?” We can begin to become self-reflective rather than purely reactive, completely “controlled” by the other person and our situations.

Similarly , as a Focused Listener in an Interpersonal Focusing process, we can help the Focuser, the Speaker to “disidentify” from their projections upon The Other and to turn their attention, in an Intuitive Focusing way, toward the “feel of this interaction FOR ME,” the “felt sense” of how this situation is FOR ME.

The Focuser, the Speaker says “He did it on purpose. He is trying to control me!” The Listening Facilitator can reflect, “Something in you is saying, ‘He did it on purpose. He is trying to control me!’ Can you sense how that feels inside?” Or “Just say ‘Hello’ to that part of yourself.” Or “So the way you see it, he is doing it on purpose — Can you stop and sense into how that is for you?”

“Dis-identifying” From Our Reaction To The Other

Ann Weiser Cornell has eloquently defined the importance of “dis-identifying” ourselves from the many different “parts” or “aspects” of our felt-experiencing. In her model, as we stand in a neutral position of Presence, not identified with any of the warring inner “parties,” we are able to acknowledge, to say “Hello” to, to make space for each of these. And, as we do, we can become aware of the “intuitive feel,” the “bodily-felt sense,” The Creative Edge of deeper meaning called forth by each.

Similarly, we can use “dis-identification” in separating ourselves from our reactions to other people, finding the “felt sense” within ourselves of an interpersonal situation.

Self-Empowerment and Hope For Communication

This step from reactivity to self-reflection empowers us. Instead of being “hooked,” a puppet on the strings of our triggers, we regain the power to change our interpersonal situations: “What is this all about FOR ME?”

Does this mean other people can’t hurt you, can’t be doing something to hurt you or make you angry? No it does not. It is possible for people to hurt each other, for someone to act in such a way as to hurt or humiliate another person. However, even if this is somewhat the case, screaming with blame “You are_____! You did____!” is not going to reach the other person, allow you to communicate. Even if you are sure you are “in the right,” the best way to communicate with the other is from the position of “owning”: “Because of the kind of person I am, I saw you as trying to control me — I’d like to explore that feeling in me and share with you in that way.”

A favorite image: Two cats, their hackles up, caught on the brink of attack, each totally “hooked in” to reactivity toward the other. Instead of attacking, one lies down on its back, bares its throat to the other, a posture of peace-making. The other is then allowed to relax, and confrontation is avoided.

So, by beginning to look inside of ourselves for the wider “felt sensing,” the “intuitive feel” of our interactions with others, we become equipped with a tool that is not just self-empowering but has the capacity for peacemaking.

Throughout the month, we will explore a variety of methods for finding the “felt sense” in the midst of interpersonal situations and using it effectively, for self-empowering “felt shifts” as well as conflict-resolving communication.

Try out the first Interpersonal Focusing exercise: Felt Sense of Interpersonal Situations in our e-newsletter archive.

Find links to free articles, personality tests, multi-media Self-Help training, Classes and workshops

Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director

Business, community building, conflict resolution, core skills, Intuitive Focusing, relationships, self-help skills | conflict resolution, Gendlin's Focusing, Getting A Felt Sense, harmonious relationships, Interpersonal Focusing, interpersonal problem solving, peace making

COMPLETE FOCUSING SESSION: “HOW AM I TODAY?” WITH INNER NURTURING

Healing Your Aloneness: Finding Love and Wholeness Through Your Inner Child by Margaret Paul and Erika J. Chopich

By Kathy McGuire, February 4, 2008 1:07 pm

HEALING YOUR ALONENESS THROUGH INNER NURTURING

Caring Feeling Presence Inside

This four weeks, while practicing a Complete Focusing Session, we are learning about turning a Caring Feeling Presence, the Focusing Attitude of friendly, curious, non-judgmental, gentle attention to whatever arises inside. We practiced finding Inner Nurturers and Inner Woundedness (Week 1), Reestablishing Trust With Exiled, “Unpleasant” Inner Aspects (Week 2), Dealing With Critical Voices and Conflicts (Week 3), and now, Healing Your Aloneness Through Inner Nurturing (Week 4).

Developing Strong Images-With-Felt-Senses of Your “Inner Nurturer” Self

As I said in Week 4 Healing Your Aloneness e-newsletter above, almost everyone can find their own Inner Nurturing Self, the part of them that knows how to reach out to someone else who is scared or in pain or hurting or ashamed or embarassed….all the things our Inner Woundedness might be experiencing. The trick to practice is recognizing and turning this Inner Nurturing Awareness, this Caring Feeling Presence, toward whatever we find inside.Try the Complete Focusing Session below again, with special attention to the actual bodily-feel, the felt sense, that goes with turning caring inner attention toward whatever comes inside, as you would in embracing that abandoned child of the hospital steps and communicating, “You are totally OK. You are wanted in this world. You are deserving of loving attention. I will help to make you safe.”

COMPLETE FOCUSING SESSION: “HOW AM I TODAY?”

In Intuitive Focusing, first, you relax and find a felt sense, an “intuitive feel” that is before words and more than words. Then, you go back and forth between open-ended questions (“Why is this hard for me?”, “What’s the meaning for me?”, “How is this related to that other decision?”) and the “intuitive feel,” looking for words or images that exactly capture “the feel of the whole thing,” until you find a sense of resolution, of knowing the meaning.

At this moment of “Ahah!” you are experiencing a “felt shift,” a Paradigm shift. The kaleidoscope turns, and the whole situation is new. New ideas, emotions, and action steps suddenly become possible.

Be Gentle With Yourself

At all times, please remember the Focusing Attitude, the Caring Feeling Presence inside which we are also practicing these four weeks! Having a Caring Feeling attitude toward whatever arises inside is the best insurance for a wonderful quiet time with your own inner experiencing.

Try these long instructions only as long as you feel comfortable. Don’t be judgmental of yourself if nothing huge seems to be happening. It can take a long time to learn to recognize a felt sense, the “intuitive feel,” amidst all of the other things going on inside of your body (thoughts, images, muscular sensations, etc.).

If any tears arise during Intuitive Focusing, let them come. Be very gentle and curious with the place the tears come from, asking “What are these tears all about?”, “Why does this move me?”, “What’s the meaning of these tears?”

There are many different “protocols” for Complete Focusing Sessions.For this four weeks, we are practicing:

1. “How am I today?”-Allow 20-30 minutes (click the link to find the e-newsletter with full Focusing exercise)

BOOKS AIDING HEALING YOUR INNER ALONENESS, INNER CHILD

Homecoming: Reclaiming and Championing Your Inner Child (Paperback)by John Bradshaw

BioSpirituality: Focusing As a Way to Grow by Peter A. Campbell and Edwin M. McMahon

Download Dr. McGuire’s article Focusing Inner Child Work With Abused Clients

Find links to free articles, personality tests, multi-media Self-Help training, Classes and workshops

Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director

core skills, Intuitive Focusing, self-help skills | biospiritual focusing, caring feeling presence, Chopich, Creativity, Ed McMahon, Gendlin's Focusing, healing your aloneness, Inner Child healing, Intuitive Focusing, Margaret Paul, paradigm shifts, Pete Campbell, self-help

FOCUSING: HEALING YOUR ALONENESS THROUGH INNER NURTURING

By Kathy McGuire, February 1, 2008 6:26 pm

“I Can’t Fix Myself! It’s too late! My parents should have done it! I don’t have an Inner Nurturer!”

For this four weeks, we are working on perhaps the most essential aspect for successful Intuitive Focusing, creating a positive attitude, inside of yourself, for whatever might arise during a Focusing turn.This is The Focusing Attitude.

In Week One, I talked about turning a Caring Feeling Presence toward your inner experiencing, finding an Inner Nurturer and an Inner Woundedness.

In Week Two, I talked about establishing an inner, trusting relationship between “parts” of the Self that had perhaps been at war for years and didn’t really like each other.

In Week Three, I talked about dealing with the Inner Abuser, Inner Critics, and Inner Conflicts.

Now, we take on a common “Inner Child Focusing” problem. As Focused Listener or Focusing-Oriented Therapist, I might say, when a Focuser is sobbing with shame, emptiness, being unlovable, having a hole inside of themselves, “Can you find a way that your Inner Nurturer can comfort, can put her arms around that unloved part and let her know she is okay, she is loveable?”

And the Focuser might say, “I don’t have an Inner Nurturer!!!” or “I can’t fix that! It’s too late. It needed to happen when I was a child, come from my parents.” Or “I don’t have a lover or a spouse, someone who can hold me so I can feel better.”

Everyone Has An Inner Nurturer, and Healing Can Begin NOW

If this were true, then people really would be trapped. There would be no way they could heal their own aloneness, their own emptiness. However, this really isn’t true. Almost all of us (and those who really can’t need the help of an external Nurturing Therapist until they can incorporate this outer presence inside of themselves) can find a “part” of ourself that knows how to love someone else, knows how to be a friend, would know what to do if confronted by an actual sobbing child or wounded animal, for many of us, a part that is a wonderful counselor/therapist/guide for many other people!!!

And it is perfectly possible, once you find images for these nurturing parts of yourself and “sense into” the whole bodily-felt sense, the “intuitive feel” of how these parts of yourself offer Caring Feeling Presence to others, then you CAN turn this inner nurturing attention toward the wounded, empty, hurting parts of yourself and heal them NOW, hold them NOW, tell them NOW that they are perfectly loveable and acceptable and wanted and deserving.

And this is a most hopeful possibility, a way of healing your own inner aloneness, your own emptiness, your own “unworthiness” without a desperate and, usually unsuccesful, search for some “outer lover” to do this for you. Try The Caring Feeling Exercise Again With Special Attention To Believing That You Can Heal Your Own Inner Aloneness, To Finding Some Representation of Your Own Inner Nurturer

BOOKS AIDING HEALING YOUR INNER ALONENESS, INNER CHILD

When using exercises from any of these books, be sure to take the extra step of “sitting with” the “felt sense,” the “intuitive feel” that comes with images, and using Focusing to go deeper in a non-linear way. Going from image to image, in a linear way, is not the same as letting the “intuitive feel” of an image arise, and using Focusing to find the something new, the something “more than words” that can come from the “felt sense”: Healing Your Aloneness: Finding Love and Wholeness Through Your Inner Child by Margaret Paul and Erika J. Chopich Homecoming: Reclaiming and Championing Your Inner Child (Paperback)by John Bradshaw

BioSpirituality: Focusing As a Way to Grow by Peter A. Campbell and Edwin M. McMahon

Download Dr. McGuire’s article Focusing Inner Child Work With Abused Clients

Find links to free articles, personality tests, multi-media Self-Help training, Classes and workshops

Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director

core skills, Intuitive Focusing, self-help skills, spirituality | biospiritual focusing, caring feeling presence, Chopich, Creativity, Ed McMahon, Gendlin's Focusing, healing your aloneness, Inner Child healing, Intuitive Focusing, Margaret Paul, paradigm shifts, Pete Campbell, self-help

COORDINATED COLLABORATION: THE BEST OF HIERARCHICAL AND CONSENSUAL METHODS OF DECISION MAKING

By Kathy McGuire, January 31, 2008 6:02 pm

COLLABORATION WITHIN HIERARCHICAL SITUATIONS

Here is how I introduce these topics in my article explaining the Collaborative Edge Decision Making method (Metodo de Toma de Decisiones del Borde de Colaboracion ) and, particularly, the Coordinated Collaboration component for allowing collaborative decision making within time-limited and hierarchical settings:

“COMBINING HIERARCHY AND COLLABORATION

Hierarchical and collaborative models of decision making both have strengths and weaknesses. Hierarchical models can breed apathy and alienation, and the absenteeism, low productivity, and carelessness which can result. Collaborative models can lead to an inability to reach conclusions and to carry out effective action and can degenerate into power struggles over leadership. The Collaborative Edge Decision Making Method combines the benefits of both collaboration and hierarchy:

1. Benefits of Collaboration

Collaboration, where people work together as equal colleagues toward a common goal, has the following benefits compared to strict, hierarchical, top-down decision making:

(a) The equal hearing of every viewpoint and the contribution of each person’s unique expert knowledge can lead to win/win decisions which are more inclusive and creative;

(b) Egalitarian expression of disagreement can address weaknesses, producing decisions that are objectively higher in quality;

(c) When participants have a say in decisions affecting them, even when they do not get all of what they want, they experience greater “ownership” of decisions and become more willing and motivated to carry the decisions out;

(d) Working together toward a common goal also produces feelings of friendship and collegiality which lead to greater enjoyment in working together and greater commitment to the group and the organization itself.

2. Benefits of Hierarchy

In most business settings, clear, hierarchical lines of authority and responsibility insure that:

(a) Decisions can be made within prescribed time limits;

(b) Specialized expertise of individuals can be utilized effectively;

(c) An overview of the entire organization’s objectives and projects can be developed by executives, in communication with any advisory Boards and shareholders. This overview can be communicated to managers, who can organize the efforts of work groups toward accomplishing these over-all objectives.

(d) “The buck stops here.” Clear lines of responsibility, and the accompanying power and authority needed to take responsibility, are established.

3. Coordinated Collaboration Component

In pure consensual decision making, a decision is not made until everyone in the group feels able to go along with it. At the very least, dissenting group members have to be willing to say, “I’m not willing to participate in the project that way, but it’s okay with me if you three want to carry it out, “or, “I think there’s a better way to be found, but I’m willing to go along as long as we review the outcome in a month” or some such qualified assent.

If someone is not able to agree in any way, it is assumed that the decision is flawed, some piece of information needed for problem-solving is missing, or not yet articulated, and the group will benefit from spending more time sitting with the decision until an acceptable solution arises. Committees can be formed to gather more information, and group members can spend time individually or in pairs using Intuitive Focusing to look for innovative solutions.

However, in many situations within an organization, decisions have to be made on a timetable and passed along to other collaborative teams or up the hierarchy. Using the Coordinated Collaboration approach of the Collaborative Edge Decision Making method, a Coordinator or Project Manager can set time limits for Collaborative Decision Making and be empowered to make final decisions when the time limits are up and take these to other levels. Coordinated Collaboration allows the benefits of collaboration within the time limits and structured responsibility of hierarchical organization, capitalizing upon the best of both models.”

Actual Steps of Coordinated Collaboration Procedure

Read on to discover the actual steps of the Coordinated Collaboration procedure.

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Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director