Council and SRM: Upayas for the Socially Engaged Buddhist Chaplain
Thesis Completed As Part Of The Upaya Buddhist Chaplaincy Training Program
Jared Seide
Sixth Cohort
March 2013 – March 2015 COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 2
Contents
Abstract 3
Personal Background and Acknowledgements 4
Methodology 8
Literature Review 10
Preface 13
I. Defining Terms: Socially Engaged Buddhist Chaplaincy and the Three Tenets 14
II. Council, Grounded in the Four-Fold Task and a Practice of the Three Tenets 16
III. Laurie Leitch’s Work with SRM in Communities Experiencing High-Stress and 20 Trauma; Methodology and Practice Grounded in Buddhist View
IV. Practices of Council and SRM as powerful upayas in systems-focused work of 23 the SEB Chaplain
V. Working with Council in California Prisons – What is the Opportunity, What are 24 the Challenges for the SEB Chaplain?
VI. Working with Council in Rwanda; Post-Conflict Reconciliation and Healing from 31 the Perspective of the SEB Chaplain
VII. Combining Council and SRM in Prison/Re-Entry Settings – Similarities, 40 Contrasts and Blending the Two Modalities to Address Unique Needs of Suffering in These Systemic Contexts
VIII. The Bellagio Center Conference: Emerging Ideas, Challenges, Opportunities 43 and Working with Key Stakeholders
IX. Findings and Recommendations for Further Application of Methodologies in 46 California, Rwanda and Beyond; Approaching Systemic Suffering from the Perspective of the SEB Chaplain
Appendix I: Letters from Prisoners 52
Appendix II: Program Overview Handouts 65
References 72 COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 3
Abstract
The Socially Engaged Buddhist (SEB) Chaplain is tasked with awakening to the suffering of all beings and with being with what arises, listening for how to serve and what can be done. The
SEB Chaplain vows to transform the suffering of individuals, systems and environments and seeks skillful means (upayas) with which to accomplish this. In a time of unprecedented systemic challenges to economies, ecosystems, socio-political structures, suffering is deep and widespread. How is it possible to provide effective interventions to individuals and systems that are predicated on the unique needs of each, rather than the preconceived notions of what we think ought to work? How do we acknowledge that the wholesome and sustainable solution comes from listening to the unique characteristics of the situation, rather than inflicting an external theory of what we think should be done to fix things? How can the SEB Chaplain come alongside the suffering and bear witness… allowing for, rather than imposing, a response?
This thesis will present the practice of Council and the Social Resilience Model as powerful methodologies to employ in being with and transforming suffering. Council provides a generative space for practice and healing and SRM offers a tool for grounding in and maintaining the resilience necessary for embodying a path toward easing suffering. In tandem, these upayas represent a powerful and flexible program offering that impacts providers, clients and systems. This thesis explores the application of these methodologies in providing rehabilitation and reintegration programs for prisoners incarcerated in the corrections systems in
California and Rwanda and preparing to return to their home communities. These are populations, and systems, in great need of support and resources. The potential for expansion and growth of reentry programs like this is huge and the methodologies explored in this thesis may be a valuable asset to the work of SEB Chaplains in these, as well as many other, arenas. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 4
Personal Background and Acknowledgements
Throughout my life, I have been captivated by storytelling. I became a semi-professional child actor in the aftermath of the teen movie “Fame” and studied acting in New York and
London, at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, finally graduating from Brown University with a concentration in Theatre Arts. My path into directing and producing films led me to
Hollywood, where I soon found that the commoditization of the story could be a path to a lucrative career, though, it turned out for me, a deeply unsatisfying one. As a parent, some years into a Hollywood career, I was introduced to an innovative program, coordinated by The Ojai
Foundation, that was unfolding at the incendiary multi-cultural public school that my daughter was attending. This program introduced the practice of Council, as a storytelling modality, to the students and to the greater school community. What I observed was no less than a transformation of the campus – which was, at that time, rife with racial tension, dissatisfaction and dissent -- into an empathic, cohesive community of stakeholders. That community became engaged and unified. I credit the school-wide Council program with shifting and bolstering the sense of social connectedness and cohesion through the simple act of sharing our stories. The
Council program’s impact on my daughter, Sophie, was similarly transformative, on an individual level: I believe it enabled her to find her voice.
Witnessing and participating in that process changed my life. I became a student of the
Council process and began to devote more of my time and energy to the work that The Ojai
Foundation was fostering. I studied the practice intensely and was mentored by the Executive
Director of The Ojai Foundation, Jack Zimmerman, eventually becoming a practitioner and then a trainer, at a time when Council programs were expanding rapidly in Southern California schools. I eventually found myself training teachers, coordinating school-based Council COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 5
programs and was honored to be part of a core group of nine Council trainers selected to shape the expansion of The Ojai Foundation’s core organization, so that it could support the now burgeoning programs and nurture the expanding body of Council trainers working in the field.
Our initiative within The Ojai Foundation became known as the Center for Council Practice. As the program’s popularity grew and the necessity of interfacing with a variety of systems beyond schools became apparent (government, corrections, veterans affairs, corporations, health care…), the need emerged for an outward-facing organization that could respond to and collaborate with these systems so as to introduce the transformative potential of Council. In late 2013, the Board of The Ojai Foundation agreed to “spin off” our initiative and the independent Center for
Council was launched.
As Director of Center for Council, I have been responsible for generating, supporting and developing Council trainings and programs locally, and throughout the world, in prisons, hospitals, community and environmental groups, social-profit organizations, social service agencies, businesses and other venues. I have been profoundly inspired to practice and lead Council groups with, by now, thousands of participants. By sitting with each other in quiet and contemplative sharing, Council participants report that they feel "more heard" by peers, co-workers, families and friends, and they discover a greater sense of community and empathy for those around them, as well as an increased sense of self-esteem and empowerment. They report that they find their voice, discover what truly matters, and take a stand for themselves, their values and their dreams. I have found Council to be a strikingly effective tool for developing and strengthening connectedness through storytelling -- and it offers experiences that are engaging, empathic and dramatic – experiences I’d hoped to find working with theatre and film! COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 6
It is deeply gratifying to work in a field in which sharing one’s stories can be so healing and bonding, as I first observed at my daughter’s elementary school. It feels nourishing and critically relevant to the culture in which we live. In so many ways, we are reminded that we are living in a time of unprecedented transitions. On the political front, the rapid ascents of China and
India, the Arab Spring, “Occupy Wall Street” and other upheavals are examples of historic cultural and demographic shifts. Populations are aging, employment opportunities stretched, ecosystems and water resources challenged – and extraordinary innovations in technology have created a tremendously dynamic and complex cultural landscape to navigate. As I bear witness to these unprecedented transitions, in Joanna Macy’s words “a great turning” (Macy 1998), I sense the need to let go of so much that has been familiar and to help foster the emergence of ways that support new realities… socially, politically, ecologically. In a time of major transition in economic, political, environmental and social systems, it feels to me that new practices are needed to increase individual and group interconnection.
I practice Council in my life, in my family and relationships -- as well as “officially” as a trainer, presenter and organizational leader and I am so deeply grateful to the many teachers, mentors and collaborators who have supported me along this path; the elders and teachers of The
Ojai Foundation (Jack Zimmerman, Gigi Coyle, Leon Berg, Marlow Hotchkiss) have been great allies, as have been the powerful and incisive Council trainers and facilitators and the many current- and future-wise-elders I’ve sat with in Council in schools, prisons, assisted living facilities and in nature. My job is a full-time commitment to supporting, developing and sustaining Council trainings, programs and collaborations on behalf of Center for Council; my personal commitment is to serve the emergence and recognition of our collective stories and to help us recognize and celebrate our profound interconnectedness in all ways, for all beings. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 7
I have learned a great deal about leadership as this project has unfolded. As I am asked to explain the methodology of Council, in increasingly diverse groups, I have recognized a great deal about the deeper contours of listening and being with the emergence. The practice of
Council itself teaches its practitioners, as one cultivates ever-greater ability to drop one’s fixed, preconceived ideas and listen for what will serve. For this work to be in integrity, programs must come in response to a longing and a desire, rather than be an external intervention, designed, planned and imposed before bearing witness to those who will be its subjects.
The critical learning here for me has been to stand in the emergence, to be with not knowing and to hold space, to sustain the container (just as one maintains one’s posture in zazen) while inviting and allying with other voices and perspectives. There is no fixed position to hold in Council and the process of building these ever-more-complex programs has called for the cultivation of a practice of deep and grounded ballast and receptive and curious openness
(“strong back, soft front”). As I grow in the practice and the organization, and its programs emerge through me and my colleagues, I am so very grateful for the deep nourishment of my Zen practice and all the many Bodhisattvas, seen and unseen, who support me in it.
I have been a member of the Zen Center of Los Angeles since 1995; I have had the great honor to study with, and receive precepts from, Roshi Wendy Egyoku Nakao. I have been nourished by a deep affiliation with the Zen Peacemakers Order and am inspired and humbled to be invited by Bernie Glassman to support many of ZPO’s Bearing Witness Retreats. My engagement with the Chaplaincy program at Upaya Zen Center has been profound and transformative and I am deeply grateful to Roshi Joan Halifax and the faculty and staff of Upaya for their extraordinary teachings, compassionate service and support.
COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 8
Methodology
I had come to the Upaya Chaplaincy program with a job I love and work that I find deeply satisfying. In reflecting on my personal path and my attraction to the practice of Council,
I have come to appreciate my own deep need to be seen and to find myself in the stories and the hearts of others. I have come to sense that the experience of interconnectedness that I had consistently found in Council, and that has led me to take on this work as my career, is a profound personal need that is unfolding in me and defining a sense of meaning in my life. In addition to the nourishing practice of zazen, the emergent field that is created in the practice of
Council provides the ground for my experience of interconnectedness, it is the place where I experience and embody community, oneness, deep peace. The growth and expansion of the work of Council has become a personal mission and I have been grappling with how best to support a wholesome and sustainable expansion.
The preparation of this thesis has been an extraordinary process for me, one that has echoed my personal spiritual journey through the Upaya Chaplaincy program, these last two years. As I have deepened my “inner chaplaincy,” I find my relationship with the practice of
Council deepening as well. And, in exploring the application of Council programs in arenas that are rife with suffering, on both an individual- and a systems-level, one is aware of the great need for self-regulation skills and a protocol that supports carriers and facilitators of Council practice, as they steward a container in which to be with difficult and sometimes painful stories. One is unprepared for what emerges stepping into a Council circle after visiting the Childrens’ Barracks at Auschwitz-Birkenau, or the horrific remains of the massacre at the church at Ntarama, just outside Kigali. Even the dehumanizing realities of prison life in California, on a day-to-day basis, are often quite challenging to face. As I have found my way into the Bearing Witness COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 9
work of the Zen Peacemakers, I am drawn to bring Council to these horrific experiences and, at the same time, I have felt concerned that there is not enough support in place for navigating the dysregulation often experienced by Council facilitators and leaders as they bring forth this work.
In May of 2014, I arranged to meet up with Laurie Leitch, subsequent to a brief chat we’d had following a presentation she had made to the chaplaincy cohorts at Upaya. We had coffee and scones in a New York café one morning and realized that we’d both been longing for a way to integrate each other’s work: Laurie had felt the need to bring the practice of forming a safe space for sharing into her work with communities implementing SRM and I had been sitting with concerns about the need for deeper self-regulation skills for Council facilitators. The integration of the skills of SRM was a missing link to the ability to scale the work of Council and support its carriers, as opportunities unfold and the Center for Council expands. In addition, we both found we had a passion for working with prisoners facing reentry – as well as an attraction to Rwanda, where we’d both had separate, deeply affecting experiences working with post-trauma programs.
We agreed to explore building a collaboration – and we pursued an application to the Rockefeller
Foundation for a Bellagio Center Conference, which, in a few weeks, was approved. This thesis has grown out of our collaboration and the activities and opportunities that have emerged.
While my personal journey with Council began many years ago, this thesis focuses on work I’ve done with the Bearing Witness Retreats, the expansion of Council programs in prisons and reentry settings in California and Rwanda and the integration of SRM into Center for
Council’s programs. As I bear witness to the unfolding work, my devotion to the practice continues to deepen and my chaplaincy has, I hope, ripened. I continue to learn so much about this practice and my hope is that the present thesis offers some insight into ways these upayas may serve. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 10
Literature Review
I have been profoundly moved by the deep teachings in Zen Buddhist practice and philosophy offered by my teacher, Roshi Wendy Egyoku Nakao, at the Zen Center of Los
Angeles, as well as by Roshi Joan Halifax, and the other teachers associated with Upaya Zen
Center, including Roshi Bernie Glassman, Sensei Alan Senauke, Acharya Fleet Maull, Stephen
Batchelor and many others. These teachers have all been so effective at making complex ideas accessible, and making the practice relevant; recordings of the many hours of these teachings are mostly available through the ZCLA and Upaya websites.
The insights of Roshi Bernie Glassman, presented in his Instructions to the Cook…
(Glassman, 1997), as well as the many conversations and teachings I have been privy to, have elucidated the practice of the Three Tenets of the Zen Peacemakers and the widespread application of this view in the work of Socially Engaged Buddhism. I have similarly found
Stephen Batchelor’s teaching and books, in particular, Buddhism Without Beliefs (1997) and
Confessions of a Buddhist Atheist (2010), quite helpful in applying Buddhist teachings and philosophy to practice in everyday life, “off the cushion.”
The Upaya Chaplaincy program has introduced me to some fascinating work on systems theory and collective wisdom, starting with Fritjof Capra’s seminal The Web of Life (1997) and continuing through the work of the MIT-based group led by Peter Senge. I have been inspired by Senge’s writings, in particular The Fifth Discipline (2006) and Presence (2008), the latter written with Otto Scharmer, Joseph Jawarski and Betty Sue Flowers. Scharmer and Katrin
Kauufer’s book Leading from the Emerging Future (2009) was an exciting application of
“Theory U” and other ideas about complex adaptive systems, as applied to organizational environments, as was The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly (2009), COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 11
by Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erikson, John Ott and Tom Callanan. Senge, Scharmer and others have worked extensively on research and application of systems dynamics and creative processes in organizational culture and I have found their work integrating these concepts for non-profits and institutions to be inspiring and quite helpful.
As new interventions are tested and assessed in a variety of systems, social scientists have attempted to develop tools and metrics for determining what works. The prison and corrections system has been studied at great length, as various theories about prisoner rehabilitation and post-incarceration reintegration have been developed and tested. In the field of criminogenic research, certain factors have been determined to be important indicators for success and have consequently framed program development; the noted Pennsylvania Parole
Study, for example, identified five dynamic criminogenic factors that provide a lens for understanding positive change in rehabilitative interventions. Professor Edward J. Latessa has provided some important analysis of these indicators, which has framed discussion around assessing outcomes for Center for Council’s prison-based programming (Latessa, 2005).
Over the last three decades, The Ojai Foundation has provided something of a laboratory for the exploration of a variety of wisdom traditions and practices and their utility in stewarding community deepening and development and how best to foster these practices to serve society and the planet in a time of manifold challenges and transitions. The practice of Council was the principle methodology studied and codified during The Ojai Foundation’s formative years and has led to the individuation of Center for Council as an independent organization whose mission is “to train practitioners of council and to create and support council-based programs that foster collective wisdom, greater resilience and a deeper sense of community” (Center for Council,
2014). The definitive work codifying this practice, as developed at The Ojai Foundation, is The COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 12
Way of Council (2006), written by Jack Zimmerman and Gigi Coyle.
At The Ojai Foundation and elsewhere, the use of ritual and ceremony as tools for social engagement has been researched with great depth and breadth. There has been much interest in the use of ritual, as groups and individuals explore how to foster community and cohesion in a time of systemic challenges and transitions. Among the many visionaries who have taught about ceremonial practices at The Ojai Foundation, Joanna Macy has had particular impact and her writings (1983, 1988, 1998) provide much fodder for exploring meaningful use of ritual in service of healing society and the environment. Of the many important anthropological works on rites and ceremony, Caroline Humphrey and James Laidlaw’s The Archetypal Actions of
Ritual (1994) provides rich analysis of the use of ritual as a tool to set apart a special time and space; emerging from their analysis of Jains in Western India, Humphrey and Laidlaw provide insight into the “ritual commitment” that creates an opportunity to make meaning from enactment of a communal process. I have found it useful to explore ways in which Council ritualizes community wellness practices and I am grateful to have been led to many valuable writings on ritual, ceremony and process that were consulted for this thesis and provided deep background, in particular: Sedonia Cahill’s The Ceremonial Circle (1992), Bill Plotkin’s Nature and the Human Soul… (2007), Christina Baldwin’s Calling the Circle…, Steven Foster and
Meredith Little’s The Roaring of the Sacred River…, Al Chungliang Huang and Jerry Lynch’s
Mentoring, The Tao of Giving and Receiving Wisdom, Kay Pranis and Mark Wedge’s
Peacemaking Circles: From Crime to Community and Rupert Ross’s Return to the Teachings.
All the aforementioned texts are recommended for useful grounding in ways in which ritual processes can serve modern communities and systems in the service of deepening resilience and easing suffering. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 13
Preface
Center for Council’s “Introduction to Council” Trainings Workshops often start with a reading of the following poem, by Mirabai Bush (1992):
We need to listen fully.
It’s the basis of all compassionate action.
We need to listen not only to the voice of the person who is hurting,
but to her bare feet,
the baby wrapped in her shawl,
and the stars in the cold night.
Such full listening helps us hear who is calling and what we can do in
response.
When we listen for the truth of the moment,
we know better what to do and what not to do,
when to act and when not to act.
We hear we are all here together,
and we are all we’ve got.
COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 14
I. Defining Terms: Socially Engaged Buddhist Chaplaincy and the Three Tenets
In Instructions to the Cook: A Zen Master’s Lessons in Living a Life that Matters (1997),
Roshi Bernard Glassman urges the practitioner to “start by doing nothing.”
And so it begins.
Beginning with the initial pause, the “empty” space, is to ground our work in the practice of waking up and becoming alive to all that is present and emerging in the world around us.
Without such a pause, one is in fact beginning at a deficit, with so much perspective being obscured by clutter, noise, distraction, “beliefs.” This observance of the pause is a practical and necessary precondition to any worthwhile intervention in suffering, be that between individuals, in community or on a systems level. Rather than starting with “a plan,” this somewhat counterintuitive suspension of judgment (or “not-knowing”) precedes wholesome and responsive intervention and is a key innovation of Socially Engaged Buddhism (SEB) and the work of the
SEB Chaplain. This approach addresses the fundamental issue: how can one be an effective vessel of support and assistance, how to minister to suffering, without leading with an agenda or imposing an external strategy?
The Three Tenets of the Zen Peacemaker Order are “Not-knowing, thereby giving up fixed ideas about ourselves and the universe, bearing witness to the joy and suffering of the world and loving actions towards ourselves and others.” (Zen Peacemakers, 2014) These tenets arise from the Three Pure Precepts (do not do evil, do good, do good for others), which are part of the Sixteen Bodhisattva Precepts. “Do not do evil” may be seen as the cessation of positionality and fixed thought and, in practice, letting go of what we think we know. When we listen completely to what is manifesting and open to all that is, we get out of the way and we COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 15
become more intimate with the situation at hand, often we may become an ally, we find that we
“do good.” The action that arises from these two steps is necessarily aligned with love and care; when we choose not to turn away, but we allow ourselves to care and act, we manifest compassionate action, we “do good for others.” “When we practice the Three Tenets,” writes
Roshi Wendy Egyoku Nakao, in the ZCLA Precepts & Jukai Study Workbook, “our capacity to remain present in suffering enlarges… the recognition grows that we are needed and we are indispensible to others” (2012, p. 13).
The SEB Chaplain vows to transform suffering of individuals, social systems and environments, utilizing the Three Tenets, with skillful means (upayas). Buddhist practice is the ground for the SEB Chaplain as he/she seeks to come alongside patients and clients facing exigent circumstances and engaging issues of meaning and value in their lives. From this ground, effective upayas may emerge, supporting a field of “no fear.” Buddhist view holds that one of the greatest gifts one can give is “the gift of no fear” (abhayadana); yet as motivated and directed as the SEB Chaplain may be, offering fearlessness is only possible if that ground has been first established for the Chaplain himself or herself. And practice is the essential building block for the SEB Chaplain. Practice makes it possible to maintain great passion, devotion and efficacy, while embodying non-attachment and non-preferential mind. As Bernie Glassman suggests, the work of the SEB Chaplain, like that of the “Zen Cook,” connects two important strands: charity and efficacy; being nourished and nourishing; not knowing and compassionate action (Glassman, 2014). Glassman reminds us that doing good in the world must be grounded in rigorous practice (zazen), clarity of vision (unattached to ideas and knowing) and generosity of heart (including everything in our field). It involves both inner practice and decisive, rigorous and sustained social engagement. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 16
How then to engage practices that are both grounding for us as individual practitioners, called to the “supreme meal,” vowing to end suffering, and to the clients, allies, communities and organizations we are called to serve? What activities, rituals, models, processes can both deepen our inner ballast and strengthen our efficacy in the world? How do we become facile and resourced, practicing self-care and healthy sustainability, as well as openness and service to the needs and longings of a world mired in suffering? What are the tools? Where are the ways?
How can we serve?
II. Council, Grounded in the Four-Fold Task and a Practice of the Three Tenets
For the SEB Chaplain, on a very basic level, the work is: 1) to embrace what one encounters upon walking into a patient’s room, or client’s community, and to come to terms with everything that is there; 2) to let go of the projections and inner activations that inevitably come up as one is faced with all that is there; 3) to notice and be with the letting go of one’s own reactivity; and 4) to always practice attention, presence and stability so that one does not become disembodied, distracted, shut down or unconscious, but, rather, is alive and engaged. Embrace.
Let go. Notice. Practice.
British scholar Stephen Batchelor’s perspective on the embodiment of Buddhism, through his take on the Four Noble Truths (what he calls “the Four-Fold Task”), involves living our lives in an awakened fashion, creating culture though our presence and arriving at meaning through our own practices, choices and behavior (Batchelor, 2014). Batchelor asks us to look at the comprehension of suffering, the letting go of what arises from suffering, the beholding of that letting go and the cultivation of a path. This emphasis suggests the utility of a practice like The COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 17
Way of Council, which invites participants to practice presence, attention, letting go of judgments and bearing witness to that which is said and that which comes up for participants.
Council may be thought of, then, as a way in which the SEB Chaplain may engage his or her practice, both on a personal level and as an offering to those who may be served by the work.
Council is an invitation to practice presence together. It is a response to the deep need of individuals to be seen and acknowledged and the ability of the group, the team, the tribe, the community to be that body that reflects, confirms, celebrates and mirrors what is alive in us and emerging through us. By creating and practicing Council, individuals can access a collective wisdom that is available through a deep listening and can receive support and even guidance in moving forward with what wants to be. Council can be a practice that activates the experience of letting go, noticing and moving with what emerges. With training and study, a Council practitioner can become skilled and resourced in the integration and application of this process in a wide variety of settings and contexts, including in one-on-one experiences, group encounters, organizational planning and system design.
This thesis focuses on the way in which Council has served as a foundation for a new program to ease the suffering of inmates, while detained in prisons in both California and
Rwanda, and as they reenter civil society, as well as the suffering of those communities to which they are returning in both regions. Though these settings are worlds apart, they have been brought together in this project - and in this thesis - as they represent striking similarities and common themes, challenges and teachings. The mixing of these contrasting programs points to both the broad applicability of these practices and tools in varying contexts and to some important cautions to keep in mind, as future work unfolds. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 18
In teaching and practicing Council, much time is spent by the Council trainer in reviewing the simple components that create the “container”: the circle of participants, the physical and metaphoric center and its content, the inward threshold and the activity that marks the beginning and the sacralizing of the process, the intentions that participants work with while
“in Council,” and the outward threshold that enables us to mark the end of the activity and move back into our “regular life.” These elements are encountered, first, as newcomers are introduced to Council, and then perceived and practiced. By enacting the evocation, creation and celebration of the Council circle, participants pass through a liminal process that sets apart the experience and invites a stepping away from the familiar, “known” world into a space that is felt to be more intentional, more receptive, more sacred.
The threshold, defined by the circle and marked by the invocation at the beginning of the
Council, requires the setting down of what we know, so as to enter the “not knowing” place. In this newly invoked sacred space we experience a deep listening, or bearing witness. The talking piece, when taken up, invites its holder to speak spontaneously and heartfully, expressing what arises in that moment, as a result of the moments that have just preceded it, rather than delivering a rehearsed presentation, planned in advance. The agreement to bear witness deeply and heartfully to the person empowered to speak enables participants to set aside their analysis and judgments and perceive what is alive and present, sparking new responses that may arise. The process, when practiced in this way, recapitulates the Three Tenets of the Zen Peacemakers (not knowing, bearing witness, compassionate action that arises) and provides an opportunity for the embodiment of SEB practice.
Of course, all Councils do not flow in this way and often the intentions introduced and invited are lost or neglected. Fear and attachment are sometimes present and “speaking and COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 19
listening from the heart” can degenerate into an analytical, defensive, directive, ruminative experience. When this is recognized and named, it is possible to return to the true intentionality and rigorous practice. Council becomes a constant invitation to embrace, let go, notice, practice.
It can contain sustained practice and continue to provide opportunities for compassionate action to arise. Examples abound of unexpected acts of healing and generosity that were a direct result of a group stepping into a strong “not knowing” space and listening deeply. In one example, a participant listened deeply to stories from a distant country he’d never visited and was moved so deeply that he surprised himself by making a deep and personal apology for his ignorance and lack of engagement and offered a personal and heartfelt expression of gratitude and love. In another example, a participant was profoundly moved by a story from someone who had been an adversary and, later, credited that gift of that wisdom as causing a surprising shift in his own family and the healing of a deep wound. In both cases, the actions that had arisen came as a result of the letting go of the analytical and proscribed frames and lenses through which we usually listen to others and the allowing of a deep empathy; in both instances, actions were taken that were quite surprising and meaningful. Examples of compassionate acts, large and small, that arise in Council are plentiful and may be said to be the fruits that are born of the practice of letting go and listening deeply.
Council may be practiced by an ongoing, intentional group, one that might emerge within the staff of an organization, or the clients of a community center, or as an “Inmate Leisure Time
Activity Group” (or ILTAG) at a maximum-security prison. Or it might be encountered as an offering made to a spontaneous group, one of relatives gathered for a memorial, or visitors to memorial site, or creatures present in nature. Council can be offered to a willing group of children or a Board of Trustees. And Council may occur within a range of consciousness and COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 20
familiarity, as an individual may silently invoke Council amidst a check-out line of agitated holiday shoppers, or a ring of silent oak trees. All that is needed is a grounding in the practice and a facility with the protocols and precepts of the work; this grounding may come in handy in unexpected ways. It may manifest with a circle in a hospital room, involving participants there in body and/or only in spirit. It may manifest in a staff meeting, with an invitation for all to speak their name and something they are grateful for. Or it may manifest as a divorcing couple attempts to bring a “third presence” into their circle, representing their fading relationship, to sit with and listen to for guidance. When trained in this practice and these tenets, the SEB Chaplain carries the capacity to offer a powerful upaya to individuals who are suffering.
III. Laurie Leitch’s Work with SRM in Communities Experiencing High-Stress and
Trauma; Methodology and Practice Grounded in Buddhist View
The Social Resilience Model (SRM) is a practical, easily learned method that is culturally-sensitive and can be taught peer-to-peer; it has been used in many countries that have experiences catastrophic trauma, including Rwanda, where SRM skills were introduced in the
Kigali Prison, in 2008. The skills target the nervous system and learning, through focused attention, providing individuals with tools for their own self-control and healing. On the website of their organization, Threshold GlobalWorks, Drs. Laurie Leitch and Loree Sutton define social resilience as “The timely capacity of individuals and groups – family, community, country, and enterprise – to be more generative during times of stability and to adapt, reorganize, and grow in response to disruption” (Thershold GlobalWorks, 2014). Leitch and Sutton developed this
“collective, skills-based approach to improving individual and group well-being and resilience,” COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 21
utilizing neuroscience concepts as “organizing architecture” (Leitch, 2012.)
SRM was developed to capitalize on the natural capacity of humans for resilience, which
Sutton describes “the ability to bounce back from tough stuff and to even grow stronger as a result.” “Thankfully,” Sutton continues, “advances in science and technology harnessed to the burgeoning field of neuroscience have now laid the foundation supporting our understanding of the biological basis for resilience and our responses to threat, loss and fear… Restoring balance through the use of simple neurobiological skills…yields an essential foundation for self- regulation upon which optimal functioning within one’s resiliency zone depends” (Leitch,
2012).
SRM attempts to foster an understanding of and skillset for working with this neurobiological process, tools for navigating and fostering individual and communal health. It is a wellness practice that is applicable to recovery from trauma and, to some degree, to flourishing during times of low-stress. SRM represents a way to support optimal health through empowering stabilization skills, as well as the easing of suffering and potential re-traumatizing for individuals and communities facing conflict and distress. The dissemination of these skills, then, represents a way to serve individuals and communities by increasing the capacity for self- care. SRM is a model that supports a critical competence that is essential for practicing in relationship and for wholesome and generative group work, particularly in groups in which trauma is or has been present.
For the SEB Chaplain, SRM offers a powerful tool for being with the discomfort that may occur in individuals and groups as they unearth and reflect on stories from their past and listen to the stories of the lived experiences of their peers. Emotions and stirrings emerge as one encounters emotionally charged memories, which may trigger a series of psychological and COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 22
physiological responses that limit our ability to stay with these memories. When traumatic memories are touched, the nervous system experiences dispositive symptoms and literally embodies suffering. In being with that suffering, the SEB Chaplain who invokes and applies
SRM has an opportunity to “comprehend suffering,” in the words of Stephen Batchelor, and to respond, rather than to react, to suffering (Batchelor, 2014). Batchelor goes on to say that when we move toward this non-reactive responding “we are more apt to live with care and, thus, to cherish and protect our world” (2014).
As a SEB Chaplain, the possibility of coming alongside a patient, client or colleague who is suffering is predicated on one’s ability to remain resilient and responsive and to embrace what one encounters when one walks into a patient’s room, or a client’s community, or a colleague’s office and come to terms with everything that is there. In this role, the SEB Chaplain must let go of what inevitably comes up and notice, and be with, one’s own reactivity. This can be quite a challenge and SRM provides a clear and powerful set of tools that can be utilized as we notice, embrace and comprehend trauma and suffering, taking care and giving care. As one learns and practices the skills of SRM (essentially, tracking sensations, grounding, resourcing, intensifying our resources, shifting and staying) one develops a capacity to be with all that comes without dysregulating.
Leitch has developed and delivered SRM (as well as other trauma-informed models) in a variety of programs around the world in which populations have experienced severe trauma and suffering due to natural disasters, violence and strife. SRM takes a somatic and sensory approach with the intention of decreasing nervous system dysregulation and mitigating the resulting physical and psychological illnesses, such as immune system disorders, depression, anxiety, and cognitive impairment. SRM provides a process for viewing and COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 23
engaging the body “as an ally in healing rather than an enemy.” Leitch has found that “The human nervous system reacts in the same way in its response to threat and fear regardless of culture, country, or ethnic group. The meaning that symptoms of dysregulation and distress might have can vary widely across cultures, but the symptoms themselves are the same” (2012).
Her work with SRM for affected populations has led her away from a clinical focus to more of a public health perspective, offering a model for achieving “a renewed inner sense of balance, well-being and self-management, even when one has faced unimaginable losses….” (2012). The goal of SRM, then, is to equip individuals and communities with tools for self-regulation, so as to enhance functioning at the cognitive, emotional, physical, behavioral and spiritual levels of experience. The set of skills contained within SRM are useful upayas for the SEB Chaplain in the comprehension and letting go of suffering. Introducing and sustaining the practice of these skills with patients and clients, and developing appropriate containers for integrating this work at the community-level, are critical challenges.
IV. Practices of Council and SRM as powerful upayas in systems-focused work of
the SEB Chaplain
Peter Senge, Otto Scharmer, Joe Jaworski and others working at MIT have explored systems dynamics, organizational change and the creative processes for decades in the search for an effective response to the needs of a culture caught in ever-increasing complexity and ever- deepening suffering. Their work has led to the formation of The Presencing Institute and what they refer to as “Theory U,” which posits: “The quality of results produced by any system depend upon he quality of awareness from which people in the system operate” (Scharmer, COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 24
2009). Their work, then, has been focused on advancing understanding of how processes can be enacted by a group so as to increase awareness. Interventions can be designed, they suggest, to take a group to a deeper presence with the conditions it is facing, be those conditions personal health issues, environmental challenges, organizational discord and societal fractures. In their explorations, the practice of “not knowing” and “bearing witness” are foundational and create a grounding from which a container may emerge that will provide a space for the emergence of greater self-reflection, increased cohesion and deeper interconnection. But how is it that effective intervention grows from this open, contemplative ground?
The practice of Council enacts and provides a container for such a deepening of group awareness. It is a codified methodology that brings about a more attuned field. Such an emergent field is supple, responsive and sensitized to the individuals within it. It exemplifies that quality of resilience that allows for easier recovery from trauma in times of stress and greater generativity and flourishing in times of harmony. And it is that essential resilience, experienced by a group, that the Social Resilience Model supports and deepens through its series of skills and practices. Group experiences that are the foundation of the Way of Council and individual process that occurs through SRM are embodied practices, congruent upayas for fostering resilience. Council, at its most effective, is a “resilience zone” for groups, as SRM provides a pathway to such a state for individuals.
V. Working with Council in California Prisons – What is the Opportunity, What
are the Challenges for the SEB Chaplain?
For over fifteen years, Center for Council (formerly an initiative within The Ojai COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 25
Foundation) has been introducing Council practice into California’s prisons. Council programs have resulted in tangible and meaningful shifts in behavior, including deeper collaboration between ethnic groups, inmates taking steps to be accountable for their behavior and seeking forgiveness and improved regulation of impulsive and reactive communication styles, leading to reduced incidents of violence, according to prison officials. These results have been quite striking and, while programs have yet to be scaled widely, Council programs are gaining increased attention and support from the California Department of Corrections and
Rehabilitation. While over 95% of California’s prisoners will be eligible at some point for release, the lack of successful rehabilitation programs brings many back. The state has historically high rates of recidivism, which has contributed greatly to the overcrowded conditions, leading to the recent US Supreme Court ruling on California’s obligation to depopulate the prisons and to the realignment strategy now unfolding.
By bringing Council programs into both the prisons and the communities to which prisoners are more and more rapidly returning, Center for Council is seeking to build positive cultures both inside and outside of prisons, and is supporting successful reentry and re- integration of formerly incarcerated individuals into their communities. Utilizing the practice of
Council, participants are learning and practicing new skills that support healthy and productive perspectives and behaviors that are critical to balanced, effective and sustainable reentries. As
Council programs grow, new skills and practices are impacting post-release behavior in formerly incarcerated men and women and their tendency to engage in actions that lead to recidivism.
Council is poised to have a meaningful impact on the corrections system both inside and outside of prison. Recent grant funding will lead to substantial scaling of these programs in 2015-16. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 26
Council’s positive impact on prison populations is consistent with recent criminological academic research. According to the Pennsylvania Parole Study (Latessa, 2009), there are five dynamic criminogenic factors: anti-social attitudes, anti-social friends, lack of empathy, impulsive behavior and substance abuse; the most effective rehabilitative programs target at least four of the five. In "What Are Criminogenic Needs And Why Are They Important," noted
Professor of Criminology, Edward J. Latessa, writes: "programs that target at least four criminogenic needs can reduce recidivism by 30 percent.” (Latessa, 2009).
Council-based programs directly address the first four of the cited criminogenic factors in the following ways:
1) anti-social attitudes: Council naturally fosters connection and cooperation. The
practice of Council removes any perception of hierarchy, encourages openness
without judgment, and dissolves previously held perceptions of others. By
entering into shared agreements around the intentions of Council, the individual
becomes part of a greater whole and the group process reinforces pro-social,
non-delinquent norms.
2) anti-social friends: One of the greatest barriers to successful rehabilitation is
continued association with other individuals with anti-social tendencies.
Council offers a mutually supportive environment, engendering community
and strengthening bonds between individuals and among the larger group. The
process attracts individuals seeking to confirm a common set of values and
mutual respect. Having an alternative to previous, potentially criminal or
destructive associations is key to increasing the possibility of successful
reentry. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 27
3) lack of empathy: Forming a circle dramatically changes the dynamics of a
group; it puts us all – literally – on the same level. Sharing our own
experiences and hearing the stories of others reminds us that for all of our
differences -- of race, education, socioeconomic background, family dynamics
–- we share many commonalities. Stories shared in Council that articulate
experiences of loss, hope, love, hardship, triumph and resilience are universal
and resonant and engender compassionate responses, dissolving barriers to
cooperation and community.
4) impulsive behavior: In Council, everyone in the circle has an opportunity to
speak, but only when empowered by receiving the talking piece, which is
passed in a prescribed pattern. At its core, Council is a practice of deep
listening and shared opportunity to express what is alive and true for each
participant. Consciously monitoring one’s thoughts and responses, while
respectfully honoring the intentions of Council (taking turns speaking and
being heard) helps instill a new way of relating to others and reinforces new
patterns of focusing emotions and expressing oneself in an authentic and
contained way.
Since 2005, Council programs have been developed in several CDCR institutions, including California Correctional Institution (CCI), Los Angeles County (LAC), Richard
J. Donovan Correctional Facility (RJD) and Correctional Training Facility (CTF). In 2012, in partnership with Warden Randolph Grounds, Center for Council initiated an inmate-training program at Salinas Valley State Prison (SVSP), which has trained a cohort of inmates of different races and ethnicities (mostly "Lifers") to lead inmate-groups on the prison yard. In COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 28
addition to planning and leading these programs, Center for Council collaborates with other service providers, utilizing a Council-based platform to integrate evidence-based modalities such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Mindfulness Based Emotional Intelligence (MBEI) and trauma informed care into comprehensive rehabilitative strategies. Council may be thought of as a platform or a meta-program, one that supports all other essential program modalities: from therapy to art to athletics to literacy to vocational education.
Many of the underlying skills that form the basis of the Social Resilience Model are embedded in Council practice and are compatible both in the training of inmate-trainers to manage their own reactivity – and also in the group awareness, as Council containers are created and assessed by participants for their safety and sustainability. As a group works with Council, particularly one in as highly stressful a setting as a prison yard, it needs a process and framework for self-regulation; Council offers a container and a practice for engaging this work, while SRM provides important facility and understanding of the process of dysregulation and how to respond as a group to this dispositive state. The neuroscience and clinical evolution of the SRM methodology provides important undergirding for working with Council in these settings, in particular in evolving training protocols for facilitators. Council and SRM complement one another in the evolution of practice groups, supporting practical skills for working with regulating arousal and facility with the process and building a “safe container” for engaging this work.
The philosophy that underlies these prison Council programs is that real transformation occurs at the individual level, the family level, the institutional level, the community level and the societal level. Working with Council builds the confidence, education, and advocacy skills of program participants and creates a vehicle for participants’ self-expression and self-advocacy, COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 29
so that their engagement with the wider world helps to change prevailing beliefs. Council allows for a “deep dive” in treating trauma. Such trauma treatment means first comprehending the reality of participants’ traumatization and of the trauma suffered by the community, perhaps for generations (perceiving and embracing the experience of suffering). The intent is not to blame others for discriminatory misbehaviors or absolve our participants of responsibility for their actions. Rather, the intent is to reduce and eventually remove the tendency to blame. This is done by tracing back the origins of trauma to the beginnings of our society, or even the beginnings of humankind, utilizing the theory of complex traumatization and engaging a deep and nuanced inquiry into the interconnecting stories and relationships that underlie suffering.
Again we see that Council provides an opportunity for comprehending, beholding and letting go of suffering and for cultivating an ongoing communal practice and facility for working with suffering.
Cumulatively, these approaches are held as effective in treating the whole person and transforming that person from outcast to essential contributor. A key component of what is taught in these prison Council programs is the ability to navigate the emergent, beginning with one's own emotions and one’s ability to self-regulate. In relation to external occurrences, the emphasis in these programs is on promoting choice. What comes up may be perceived as fair and appropriate and legitimate, or not; when unfair, inappropriate, or illegitimate perceptions arise, the training provides skills to transform the situation within and through the regulation of one's own emotions and consequently to affect and transform the situation on the outside through modeling appropriate behavior and co-creating more positive, equal material realities.
Rather than “correcting” criminals, the curriculum of these programs supports traumatized individuals in acquiring new skills and understandings and changing their lives. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 30
Council enables a group to “go deep” in mitigating trauma, recognizing the reality of the individual’s traumatization, and of trauma suffered by those around them. Council, when combined with practical self-regulation skills that can be used on a daily basis seek to treat the whole person, helps transform individuals from “outcast” to “essential contributor.” At the institutional level, then, this change in emphasis means that support personnel are not charged with correcting inmates, but rather critical partners in supporting and learning with them. This transformative process continues as “alumni” of prison-based Council programs are released and integrated into Center for Council’s community-based Council programs, in the areas to which they parole, supporting a continuum of care and the next steps in successful and balanced reintegration into society.
The Council practice becomes the ground for the emergent work of rehumanizing that is critical to recovering from the psychological and psychosocial effects of incarceration. The combination of trauma-informed techniques and models (like SRM) and the deep and rigorous practice of attentive listening (so as to promote empathy) and authentic expression (so as to encourage inclusive engagement) serve to deepen communities and promote unity, harmony and integration. Amidst the myriad skills and competencies that emerge from this practice is the increased ability to embody stability and self-regulation. The tools of SRM, when integrated into the study and practice of Council, provide critical resources for stepping into the next chapter of the formerly incarcerated individual’s life and reintegrating into civil society.
In addition to the impact that Council is having in programs in which inmates are invited to create practice groups, the introduction of this practice in highly visible prison settings has led to initial experiments with Council-based programs for correctional officers, supported through the Employee Wellness program of CDCR’s Human Resources Department. Currently, Center COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 31
for Council, in partnership with Fleet Maull and the Center for Mindfulness in Corrections, is negotiating to establish an ongoing Council-based wellness and resiliency program for prison guards that “supports staff morale, protects staff health and safety, and promotes positive correctional outcomes.” This program is designed to shift the culture amongst prison guards from stress, burnout, denial, untreated trauma exposure - and the resulting emotional problems, health risks and the high cost of ill-health - to a staff culture of healthy self-management and self-care, emotionally and socially intelligent communication, effective stress and conflict management, and overall staff wellness and safety. The expected outcomes involve a measureable reduction in staff burnout, improved staff morale and improved correctional outcomes achieved by healthier, more resilient, and more emotionally and socially intelligent and skillful corrections staff. Departmental interest stems from a desire to prevent and/or reduce suicide, PTSD-related incidents, and trauma/stress caused family discord, domestic violence, substance abuse, etc., for staff and to reduce costs for chronic stress or burnout related staff absences, lost-time injuries, staff turnover and related health care costs.
While the focus is different for staff, Council programs address the systemic dehumanizing that impacts all who interact with the correctional system, whether they wear officers’ uniforms, management’s suits or prisoners’ garb. This intervention has the potential to impact the entire system.
VI. Working with Council in Rwanda; Post-Conflict Reconciliation and Healing
from the Perspective of the SEB Chaplain
In January of 2013, at the invitation of Bernie Glassman, Center for Council offered an COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 32
initial five-day Council training workshop in Kigali to a group of Rwandan peace-workers committed to healing their country. The lead NGO, Memos, had assembled a group of fourteen participants culled from 10 local NGOs. These fourteen were to work as leaders of small
Council groups in the upcoming Bearing Witness Retreat, offered as part of Rwanda’s commemoration of what is locally referred to as “The Genocide Against the Tutsis,” which took place in 1994.
The Rwanda government had been very active in promoting this commemoration, launching a variety of initiatives labeled with slogans like “Rwanda Proud” and “Never Again.”
Rwandans are deeply engaged in a healing process that impacts the entire population, including the generation born in the post-trauma period and very much touched by it. Rwandan NGOs are profoundly aware of the challenges of reintegrating the perpetrators of genocide, many of whom have served twenty-year sentences and are approaching the end of their punishment, ready to return to the communities in which the crimes were committed. Many communities are already addressing this reintegration issue, as “perpetrators” and “victims” have already returned to co- habitating in neighborhoods, as well as workplaces, and communities are struggling to find deep healing. It may be, in fact, that the focus on these labels has both helped frame the current commemoration preparations and reactivated an “us”/”them” sensitivity amongst Rwandans.
The modality of Council integrated into this Bearing Witness project offered an invitation to go beyond attachment to knowing who is who, beyond what one thinks about another member of the circle, and how it might be to set aside all we believe we know to be truly present with the emerging moment.
The NGOs invited to participate in the retreat were eager to have their staff trained in innovative tools and modalities for peacework and Council represented an intriguing new COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 33
technology. The participants were enrolled, eager to learn -- and somewhat confused about what the workshop would entail. What unfolded was an extraordinary journey into a way of being in community, supporting deep compassionate listening and the emergence of a practice of embodying peace that was in some ways new and at the same time described by participants as a remembering of something deep and familiar. What may have seemed like an opportunity to gather some tools for the challenging work ahead gradually expanded into a profound group inquiry into a deeper intimacy with our wounds, an experiential exploration of the nature of healing, and a witnessing and celebration of the emergence of a practice intended to foster the deepening of healthy community.
The training began on January 13, 2014, with an invitation to enter this space together and an acknowledgement of all who made it possible to come to this place and be together for these three days. Trainers gave some basic context and then invited the group into a “Silent
Council,” in which participants were asked to offer their positive regard to each, in turn, as the talking piece was passed. A candle was lit and a welcome offered and the field was set. Each participant held and felt into the powerful, sometimes uncomfortable, attention of the group. The debrief of this first plunge into Council evidenced the group’s willingness to explore embodying presence and deep listening, as well as their keen interest in learning new forms and pedagogy.
The rest of the first day wove together games, activities and a review of the five elements and four intentions of Council. The day ended with another Council, in which relations and family and the gifts they have provided were named and invited in. Throughout the next few days, the group alternated between games, Councils, teaching pieces and group activities and explored the experience of being seen (and being invisible) and of Speaking and Listening from the Heart. The group explored a variety of Council forms together (fishbowl, spiral, web, COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 34
dyadic, response…), discussed check-ins and witnessing and some key themes, including an exploration of the experience of blame (blaming another, being blamed for something). The group also looked at gender identification and shadow, at “agency and communion,” at leadership and stewardship – and how maintaining a position of “not knowing” may be the most important skill a Council facilitator can cultivate. Interestingly, Bernie Glassman’s organization was introduced by the Rwandan hosts as “The Peacemakers,” all mention of Zen and Buddhism seemed to be avoided, presumably so as keep the work familiar and resonant and to avoid a sense of its foreignness (Buddhism is generally held as rather exotic, it seemed).
Rwanda has recently made an official switch from being a Francophone nation to an
Anglophone one; the schools are teaching English, many street signs and directions are now provided in English. But the comfort level with English was lower than had been expected and much of what was said was met with blank stares until translated into Kinyarwanda. As language barriers broke down, there was also a gradual lessening of trepidation, though resistance was still apparent. In much of the approach, languaging (in as much as it was clearly translated) and practices embedded in the Council work were unfamiliar. The concept of leadership through attentive listening and service, came up, as did the value of letting go of agenda and “tools” and inviting the group to pause, settle and open their hearts to the emergent field was a shift that required attention and practice. The participants were often asked to settle, ground themselves, listen for what was in the room, beyond the room, in their hearts, and to wait
– and this caused an initial tension. Where was the teaching? What was the assignment? How is this a tool for healing? Where can this be used? This group gradually found their way to the inner work required of us all as we step into the challenge of being with deep wounding and grief. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 35
Gently, and through the activities and storytelling that unfolded in this workshop, each participant was asked to connect with places in themselves where they were healing, growing, evolving. Activating, witnessing and celebrating that healing was revealed in the exercises and experiences the workshop presented and led to a deep understanding of the connection between participants’ personal relationship with healing and the work offered to world. In some ways, a fundamental shift to the curious, the open-hearted, the compassionate inquiry on a very personal level positioned each of the participants in a deeper intimacy with his or her own healing. This required a letting go of all that participants had been presumed to be expected of them, of all the
“answers” participants were expecting to get from the workshop, of all assumptions. As participants moved toward “not knowing,” a tender and fecund field was revealed. This group field felt quite nurturing, safe, connected and resourced. It was a simple but powerful adjustment that all felt and tracked and it led the group to a place where they expressed feeling more alive, more connected to their true selves, more excited to come together, unify, cooperate, collaborate and build together. It was a fundamental experience of interconnectedness that was achieved through a willingness to try something new. And the trajectory of the workshop accelerated with new energy, clarity and optimism about how this work might serve the individual healing, the community work and the country’s deep need for healing.
Without going into detail, the stories shared, the witnessing expressed, the loving actions that arose, the transformation that was celebrated are clear testaments to a powerful and successful journey. Within days after the training ended, “The Rwandan Council Team” popped up on Facebook, an opportunity to continue the conversation and celebrate the unfolding work and growth. A participant who has been silently grieving about the improper burial of her relatives killed in the genocide had her story witnessed by another participant working on COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 36
relocation of human remains to memorial sites and plans were now being made to address this issue and relocate the remains. Another participant who had been carrying deep wounds around childhood experiences, and who had begun the training rather closed and leery, found courage to tell stories never spoken, found consolation and connection and expressed feeling a relief never experienced. Yet another participant's family, struggling with resentments and disconnection has begun a home-practice of Council that has surprised and delighted everyone; the children had asked every evening: “Can we do Council again tonight?” And one group of colleagues held a
Council in which doors opened that had been slammed shut for months, with tears, honest naming of pain and sadness, requests for forgiveness, granting of forgiveness, heartfelt laughter, commitment to heal together, more tears, and prayers of thanks for this field of compassionate arising; important steps for this group were taken, witnessed, acknowledged and watered with abundant tears.
Some comments submitted in post-evaluations (translated from the Kinyarwanda):
> “I have learned a lot and had many experiences in this training. I have
been able to know myself better, I have learned how to build trust between me
and other people and I feel I have a sense of how to work for peace with this
model. And also how to create safety with the intention of confidentiality.”
> “I think Council is a way of learning and understanding more deeply your
own nature and how you can help your friend or your mate or any other person to
understand better who he or she is and how to handle.”
> “Through studying Council these days, I have learned important things
about conflict exploration, healing, working with trauma and so much more.” COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 37
> “I value this Council training the way I value a doctor who really
understands a patient and has a deep knowledge of how to help the patient heal.”
> “Council is coming together and expressing what is on your heart which is
the spark of restoring peace in you.”
> “If we can stay together, work together like this and consolidate the
learnings here and the feelings we have learned in Council, our efforts will change
our country and the world – but only if we stay connected! This light that the
trainers have lit will continue to light flames for many other through our work
together.”
> “I have already transformed, the change is already in me. And now I feel
responsible to help other people to understand this process of Council and
continue to rebuild and restore trust in myself that I think I had lost.”
> “I understand Council to be about understanding myself, understanding
peace, letting go of burdens and stress.”
> “I value Council as a place where energy and hope can be restored for
oneself and for others.”
> “I think this training has helped me find my own peace so that I can be
better at helping my community find peace.”
> “Council is about caring for ourselves, helping us heal wounds of the heart
and bringing parts of ourselves to share with a group.”
> “I value this model of Council very much because it invites people to
bring out what they have. It is a good way to be together and a space to look at
your life and resolve many of the obstacles that you face.” COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 38
> “This was a very profound, effective, deep and clear training in the
powerful work of Council. I have grown courage to work hard to feel peace in
my heart, whether I have stress or not, and to bring peace work to my region.”
Center for Council continued to consult with the team of Rwandan trainers after the initial training. By the time of the Bearing Witness Retreat, in April of 2014, they had organized, practiced together and brought Council into their lives and communities and they were ready to mobilize! With some consultation and support, the group went through the elaborate process of becoming the “Rwandan Center for Council,” a certified, official Rwandan
NGO, approved by the Rwanda Governance Board and several other government commissions.
This local group would become a key partner to Center for Council and would coordinate the dissemination of Council practice into Rwandan culture, in particular in the transition and reintegration of formerly imprisoned genocide perpetrators into civil society.
The April retreat went quite well. Over 100 individuals participated throughout five days, at several sites where unthinkable atrocities occurred during the genocide, and the facilitator team from the Rwanda Center for Council was an anchor for some very challenging work. In addition to the international guests from a variety of countries, Rwandan participants included many survivors, rescuers and some confessed perpetrators (“genocidaires”) and the small breakout Council groups were mixed and diverse, each led by a trained Rwandan facilitator, partnered with an experienced American or European. At the conclusion of the retreat, the team from the Rwanda Center for Council was ready to look at the work ahead and planning meetings took place that paved the way for the broader program that would emerge, loosely based on the Prison Reentry Council Project that Center for Council was rolling out in
California prisons. Introductory meetings were held with several key Rwandan allies who were COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 39
responsive to the nature of the work of Council and to the vision of integrating this work into the immense challenges facing Rwandan corrections, law enforcement and civil society. The challenge of tens of thousands of imprisoned genocidaires reaching the end of their sentences and slated to return to their home villages, the sites of much of the violence during the genocide, loomed over many of these conversations and the dread of the impact of this massive reentry process was a concern for many working in both government and NGOs.
In the ensuing months, extensive correspondence was exchanged and meetings arranged with NGO leaders, caregiver associations (principally through ARCT-Ruhuka, the Association of
Rwandese Counselors of Trauma) and officials throughout the Rwanda Correctional Service
(RCS) and Ministry of Internal Affairs, as well as the Commission for National Unity and
Reconciliation (NURC) and the National Itorero Commission (NIC). NIC is the commission charged with reenergizing Rwandan culture and tradition, on the grassroots and village level, so as to support the reemergence of community, cooperation and national pride. The Chairman of that commission, Boniface Rucagu, a Rwandan war hero and leader of the government’s community building initiatives, was particularly enthusiastic about the work of Council, seeing in it a recapitulation of pre-colonial Rwandan traditions like Ibitaramo gatherings, where the whole community would come together to greet one another around a fire, listen to the communal stories of the tribe and celebrate shared values.
Chairman Rucagu’s Itorero Commission is charged with “educating and training
Rwandans on shared values and taboos in coexistence and contribution to national development.” The Chairman warmly embraced the project and instructed his staff to create working agreements so that the commission’s work could support the emergence of the Council program being planned by Rwanda Center for Council. His encouragement and support was COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 40
echoed in a series of meetings held with government officials, particularly those at Rwanda
Correctional Service, who are directly addressing the rehabilitation of prisoners and their reintegration into civil society. Several meetings were arranged at RCS with progressively higher-ranking authorities. Ultimately, it was Mary Gahonzire, Deputy Commissioner General of the Rwanda Correctional Service, in charge of all prisons and a revered leader and visionary, who made quite an impact when, after a reflective pause, she said that she felt that the budding partnership with Center for Council “can work miracles for Rwandan society.”
As the work in Rwanda was gathering allies and excitement, a meeting took place that explored the prospect of Center for Council and Threshold GlobalWorks joining forces and partnering on a project to support the work and bring the practice of Council, along with the
SRM model, to Rwanda by offering trainings, consultation and co-visioning. Planning and preparations began on this new collaboration and an application was submitted to the Rockefeller
Foundation, requesting the opportunity to convene a conference at the Bellagio Center, an Italian villa managed by the Rockefellers and devoted to supporting the emergence of innovative ideas and programs that promote peace and reconciliation.
Within six weeks, the proposal was approved for a conference to take place at Bellagio entitled: "The Role of Council and Self-Regulation Training in Offender Reentry into
Community: A Dialogue." This conference would provide an opportunity to explore findings from the current pilot and suggest ways in which Council-based programming, with the addition of skills training to stabilize the nervous system and promote healing and principled behavior, can be framed and implemented in reentry contexts to address an intractable and growing problem for cities and communities—one that interferes with economic development, employability and peaceful coexistence. The summer of 2014 was spent planning for this COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 41
extraordinary gathering of key stakeholders in the emerging collaboration.
VII. Combining Council and SRM in Prison/Re-Entry Settings – Similarities,
Contrasts and Blending the Two Modalities to Address Unique Needs of
Suffering in These Systemic Contexts
In The Archetypal Actions of Ritual (1994), Caroline Humphrey and James Laidlaw, suggest that ritual offers an opportunity to do something in a way that marks the activity as different from the everyday and invites participants to see it as important. In situations in which intense emotion and trauma are present, the practice of Council may be seen as the invocation of a ritual space in which to share our stories, without judgment, in an atmosphere of mutual respect. Council supports communities by providing an accessible process and a container in which to reflect, connect, empathize and heal. And yet, while Council is consensual, and nobody is ever obliged to share a story, there exists a real potential for re-traumatization, in the recounting of painful experiences, as well as secondary traumatization of participants who bear witness to the stories of trauma. According to Leitch, "Even when an individual has not directly experienced a trauma, listening to the after-effects of the events as described by those directly affected can result in what is commonly referred to as vicarious traumatization, or secondary traumatic stress (STS). It can also, in some instances, result in traumatic stress and the development of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)” (Leitch, 2012).
In the next few years, as tens of thousands of genocidaires are returned to the communities where their crimes were committed, the potential for re-traumatization is of great concern to the authorities. While rehabilitative practices have been attempted in Rwanda, post- COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 42
genocide, services were typically offered only to those perpetrators who had been assigned
“community service” by the Gacaca courts. Uniquely, the Council program now being designed and piloted provides services to prisoners who have been sentenced to long terms, as a result of their conviction for genocidal activities, and are now reintegrating into civil society and seeking reconciliation. Similar to California, the prison system is overburdened and rehabilitation services are stressed beyond their capability. As in California, there is great fear and dread in local communities and a need for both personal and community healing to accompany more effective rehabilitation supports for offenders and their victims. In the program being developed, as participants reach the end of incarceration, they will be woven into a network of Council- based programs being led by trained NGO workers in the communities to which the prisoners will imminently return – similar to the model unfolding in California prisons. The addition of
SRM training will provide a critical skill set as new communities engage the challenging process of being with and unpacking experiences of catastrophic social unrest and horrendous violence.
The program is intended to provide Council-based training and self-regulation skills to prison staff and inmates to establish therapeutic Council peer groups. This program will bridge with the services being developed in partnership with civil society, as the Rwanda Center for
Council engages a variety of other Rwandan NGOs throughout the country, on the community level, to support successful reentry and reintegration of former prisoners. The goal is to promote practices that will help both offenders and their victims —individuals and communities — to heal from their individual and collective traumas while developing resiliency. The tools are grounded in the understanding that the most effective intervention begins with an open space, a pause, the opportunity to be with things as they are now, not with an ideology or a “cure” or a sense of knowing. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 43
The process that unfolds in this project is positioned as a practice, along with a set of resources and tools, to be with the collective and individual suffering in a deep and generative way. The skills of letting go and bearing witness are supported in the teaching of Council and, as the intense experience of trauma is touched in the sharing of stories, SRM provides additional resources. This model is being piloted in Rwanda but may well have applications in fractured communities around the world. The overall intent is to spur a more compassionate and restorative system of justice that supports rehabilitation for the world’s incarcerated offenders.
VIII. The Bellagio Center Conference: Emerging Ideas, Challenges, Opportunities
and Working with Key Stakeholders
“The Role of Council and Self-Regulation Training in Offender Reentry into
Community: A Dialogue,” took place at the Bellagio Center, on Lake Como, on November 19,
20 & 21, 2014, and brought together nineteen participants, US and Rwandan representatives from government, academia, mental health and NGOs working in the area of corrections and offender rehabilitation, in collaboration with the leaders of Center for Council and Threshold
GlobalWorks, for dialogue and planning. The intention of the conference was to weave stakeholders working with Council pilot programs currently underway in Rwanda and California, exploring the systemic opportunities for transformational reintegration of ex-offenders into community. The goal was to initiate ongoing dialogue and encourage a partnership to support
Center for Council’s work fostering resiliency among ex-offenders and impacted communities.
This conference provided an opportunity for key stakeholders from the Council programs being initiated in both California and Rwanda to practice Council together, as well as to experience COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 44
SRM, to explore findings from the current pilots and to identify ways in which Council-based programming can be framed and implemented in reentry contexts.
The nineteen conference guests included key stakeholders from the Council projects in
California and Rwanda who play critical roles in implementing programs in prisons and the communities to which the formerly incarcerated return. From California, guests included:
Robert Barton, Inspector General of the state of California, responsible for oversight of the
Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation; Randy Grounds, former warden at the
Salinas Valley State Prison and the California Correctional Training Facility; Brian Biery, manager of Flintridge Center’s community and collaborative projects; Ugo Machuca, former prisoner who served 28 years as an inmate in Lancaster State Prison, currently a case worker supporting formerly incarcerated men and women as they reenter society; Fleet Maull, author, consultant, trainer and Founder of the Prison Mindfulness Institute, which provides prisoners, prison staff and volunteers with multiple modalities and tools for rehabilitation, self- transformation, and personal & professional development, including training in Council practice;
Julio Marcial, program director at The California Wellness Foundation, which funds programs related to violence prevention, leadership development, capacity building and innovation; and
Alan Mobley, Assistant Professor of Public Affairs and Criminal Justice at San Diego
State University. Participants from Rwanda included: Issa Higiro, President of Rwanda Center for Council, recognized as an official NGO by the Rwandan Governance Board in June of 2014;
Pastor Deogratias Gashagaza, Executive Director of Prison Fellowship Rwanda and member of the Rwanda National Unity and Reconciliation Commission; Dr. Naasson Munyandamutsa, professor and researcher at the National University of Rwanda and Deputy Director of the
Institute of Research and Dialogue for Peace; Rose Gahire, President of the Association COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 45
of Rwandese Trauma Counselors; and Jean-Bosco Kabanda, Assistant Commissioner of Prisons for the Rwanda Correctional Service, in charge of Incarceration, Social Affairs, Human Rights and Medical Services.
The conference began with a screening of the film Beyond Right & Wrong, a 2012 documentary about restorative justice and forgiveness. The film depicts victims and perpetrators of the Rwandan Genocide, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and The Troubles in Northern Ireland.
The film and the discussion that followed set the stage for a deep and dynamic exploration of that field beyond the labels of “offender” and “victim,” “perpetrator” and “aggrieved” – a field that represents a healthy and resilient community that grows and regenerates. Subsequent sessions alternated between large plenary sessions on the project, small breakout groups addressing issues like “communications,” “stakeholder clusters” and “operationalizing,” individual thought-exercises and generative sessions of Council, in which what was stirring in the hearts of participants was articulated, resonated, witnessed and celebrated. Unexpected gifts and transformative moments that could not have been foreseen unfolded, growing from the collective experiences and sharing. Individuals were moved to open to unexpressed empathy, articulate previously unspoken needs, speak of difficult ruptures and challenges and step into new accountability and commitments for future collaboration. One participant found himself moved to offer a deep apology on behalf of himself and his government that was extremely powerful and was received with great respect and appreciation by other participants. Another was compelled to move well outside of his comfort zone to express a difficult sentiment that was received with similar honor and gratitude. In addition to identifying and assigning concrete plans and action steps throughout the conference there was a striking amount of deep resolve, commitment and solemn pledges to move forward in partnership on this project – and COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 46
widespread expressions of gratitude, inspiration, motivation and optimism for the evolving future work.
IX. Findings and Recommendations for Further Application of Methodologies in
California, Rwanda and Beyond; Approaching Systemic Suffering from the
Perspective of the SEB Chaplain
Roshi Joan Halifax, in the Foreword to Faces of Compassion, writes: “…the bodhisattva is like a wooden puppet whose strings are pulled by the suffering of the world. There is a feeling of choicelessness and egolessness when the archetype of the bodhisattva is realized. The right hand takes care of the left without hesitation, not shining from praise or shrinking from blame” (Leighton, 2012, p. 18).
The Bellagio Center conference provided a unique and powerful opportunity to practice
Council, experience the impact of the SRM skills, hear the stories of the nineteen invited participants and witness the emergence of a resolve and series of commitments and agreements critical to the next steps for this program. The conference enabled the organizers and participants to take a backward step, to set aside their sense of what their work should be and listen to the deeper stirrings of being with the extraordinary lived experiences of those in COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 47
attendance and the challenges facing the correctional system and reentry work in both California and Rwanda. The conference provided an opportunity to both study the facts on the ground and to practice the work being developed, leading to both a greater understanding and an enacted experience of Council and SRM. There was an opportunity to comprehend the suffering, let go of what arises from stories and experiences of suffering, behold that letting go together and begin to cultivate a path forward.
In a piercing moment of poetry and clarity during one breakout group, Dr. Naasson
Munyandamutsa, a medical doctor, as well as a noted Rwandan academic, related a tender account of the practice of preparing the body after death. Except for one brother,
Munyandamutsa lost his entire family in the genocide. He was not in Rwanda during the genocide, but returned immediately after and, for several years, was the only psychiatrist in the country, creating an extraordinary makeshift system for providing support and healing throughout the country; he has been acknowledged to be “the father of mental health” in post- genocide Rwanda. As he described his response to the extreme suffering he encountered upon his return to Rwanda, he likened the process to the way one ministers to a corpse, after death has come. “You must first take a moment to be with the enormous grief and loss, really bear witness to the corpse and honor the life it has left behind,” he explained. Then, in great detail, he described the way in which the body is washed, clothed, prepared for burial. When it is ready and the time comes, the community must have an opportunity to come and say goodbye and to offer its respect. The ritual that accompanies the careful disposition of the body helps all who are left behind to process and integrate – to comprehend - the loss of life. Munyandamutsa’s deep and moving account conveyed so much about the experience of Rwandans in moving COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 48
through the experience of genocide, the aftermath of the trauma, the path to recovery and community health – and the role of those who are called to steward the process.
As a medical doctor, mental health professional, community activist and international program partner, Munyandamutsa’s story was en extraordinary modeling and teaching on the response to being with suffering. For years, Munyandamutsa has organized community meetings and radio discussions to promote conversations around the experience of deep loss. “In order to heal, silence needs to be broken and words need to be used to speak of the experiences endured by all Rwandans.” The convening of the conference, the design of the program in Rwanda, the deep conversation between those present in the ceremonial space of Council offered an opportunity to bear witness to historical events and felt sense of those impacted and to be with a deep call to action.
Whereas the participants may well have come to the conference with empathy and curiosity, the deep work of being present to the stories of these three days gave rise to a newfound sense of the necessity of action. The experience of those present was one of manifesting a sense of “one body,” in which a right hand experienced the urge to take care of the left. The suffering in Central Africa has everything to do with the challenges of integrating former inmates into inner-city California neighborhoods. The dehumanizing impact on communities of color that mass incarceration in California has wrought has everything to do with
Rwandan efforts at reconciliation amongst former antagonists. The deepening of the intimacy through the sharing of stories was profound. Suddenly, professionals working on addressing the challenges of corrections and reentry in situations worlds apart were sharing an experience deeply and feeling the resonance of their work with intense intimacy. The Rwandan genocide that occurred, in plain sight, during twelve weeks in 1994, began to feel newly relevant in the COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 49
deepest of ways (…despite the fact, as one Californian participant observed, that many
Americans during those weeks were much more interested in the television coverage of the OJ
Simpson “slow speed chase” than they were of the nightly news reports of the unfolding genocide…).
The Bellagio Center conference was an important step in the evolution of the project being developed to combine the practice of Council and the skills of SRM, applying these to prison/reentry work in California and Rwanda. In California, the initial pilot program in two prisons has generated enough positive outcomes to attract the support and enthusiasm of inmates, prison staff, wardens and the Inspector General, as well as key funders who will enable Center for Council to expand dramatically throughout the state. This work has also inspired a team of prison officials, NGO workers and faith leaders in Rwanda, who are deeply committed to growing a version of the California program in prisons and communities throughout their country. Key relationships and partnerships were established at the Bellagio Center conference that will enable support and collaboration to emerge around program development, funding and documentation. And a shared experience of the power of the Council process and the benefits of working with SRM was an invaluable contribution to the cohesion and motivation of this group of stakeholders.
The program combining Council and SRM in California and Rwanda corrections and reentry systems involves an emergent process, one that will engage this group of stakeholders, as well as other configurations that will form and morph as the project unfolds. The practice of
Council and the skills of SRM offer a ground from which this group will innovate, design, communicate, fund, measure and grow the work of rehabilitative programming and community building. As results emerge on the ground in California and Rwanda, and these practices groups COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 50
expand, it will be increasingly possible to analyze ways in which this work is promoting positive outcomes in the respective communities and affirming common approaches, practices, procedures, languaging and development opportunities, so as to make the work accessible to new and unfolding needs in different arenas and circumstance. The expectation is that Council and
SRM will provide beneficial tools and means for easing suffering in both contexts and that the experience of working with these tools will benefit others who have yet to be identified. As the group bears witness to the points of disconnect and incongruence, critical refinement will be possible.
In Leading from the Emerging Future (2013), Otto Scharmer and Katrin Kaufer argue that “All change takes place in context” and that systemic shifts begin at the periphery of a system. “Attending to the opening of a crack requires exploring the edges of the system and the self. At these edges, when we are lucky, we can sense a field of future possibility that is wanting to emerge.” To the extent that the Scharmer and Kaufer are describing the practice of collective wisdom, and that this process may be stewarded by those trained and oriented as system-oriented
SEB Chaplains, engaged deeply in easing the suffering experienced by communities and cultures, the work unfolding in this project and the accomplishments of the Bellagio Center conference may be seen as a powerful step forward and an encouraging application of the tools and upayas unfolding in this field.
Skillful means of attending to and comprehending challenging moments of profound change, and of “letting go,” require facility and comfort with deep-listening processes and an ability to self-regulate and move toward resilience in circumstances that tend toward contraction and systemic resistance. Scharmer and Kaufer lament that “We don't have places for co-sensing, for uncovering common sense and common will…” (Scharmer, 2013). Inasmuch as the SEB COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 51
Chaplain is called to provide and maintain such spaces, the work of this program may create new opportunities to embrace, let go, notice, practice. Rather than providing solutions, this program may be generating ground for the emergence of the embodiment of stability and ballast so as to comprehend, let go, behold and cultivate a path toward the end of suffering.
Which may be a wholesome place to begin.
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Appendix I
Letters from Prisoners
In June of 2014, Center for Council offered a 2-day training workshop at the Correctional
Training Facility (CTF), a Level 2 prison in Soledad, California, for a group of twenty-one prisoners, many of whom were serving life sentences. Unlike many prisons, CTF has welcomed rehabilitative programming for its inmates for some time; many of the participants had experienced other programs offered over the years. The Council program that unfolded over this particular weekend, however, was different. In the pages that follow, a collection of letters written to the Warden of CTF articulate some of what these participants observed had made this experience quite unique and powerful. COUNCIL AND SRM: UPAYAS FOR THE SEB CHAPLAIN 53
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Appendix II
Program Overview Handouts
What follows are “Overview Handouts” for:
Center for Council’s “Introduction to Council Practice” training;
Threshold GlobalWorks “SRM” training;
Center for Mindfulness in Corrections’ “Shift Readiness for Officers” training.
These handouts are being adapted, combined and distributed in the collaborative training offerings discussed in this thesis.
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WHAT IS COUNCIL?
Council is a practice of open, heartfelt expression and attentive, empathic listening. It is a great ally in introducing meaningful change in our institutions, schools, families, relationships. Council has been practiced with young and old from many cultures, races and nationalities. Passing the talking piece with the intention of speaking authentically and listening attentively inspires deeper communication, intercultural understanding and the non-violent resolution of conflict. Council is effective in organizations, communities and families that want to move from a hierarchical structure to a partnership model where initiative, responsibility, collaboration and leadership are shared. Through deepening trust, council supports the clarification of values, co- visioning and community building. The Way of Council has been explored, developed and adapted to work in schools, communities, businesses, service organizations, prisons, health care and end-of-life facilities, professional conferences, spiritual centers, family gatherings and private therapeutic practices all over the world.
Guiding principles: • Sit in a circle (ideally on the ground); on the same level, “in the same boat” • Use a talking piece so that the speaker is known and recognized • Listen deeply, between the lines, to what is said -- and to what is unsaid • Don’t interrupt, so as to respect the speaker; witness your internal responses and let them be until it’s your time speak • Speak honestly and from the heart • Speak succinctly, aware of the time and size of the group • Speak spontaneously, avoiding rehearsing • See each other as peers • Seek to reveal and understand positions and assumptions, rather than attacking or defending; avoid analysis and evaluation • Seek a collective truth, viewpoint, wisdom -- perhaps fuller than any one individual’s truth • Consider everything that enters the group’s awareness as part of the process, including place, weather, interruptions–and what’s unspoken, in the silences • Value inquiry over advocacy • Value curiosity over opinion • Value understanding over self-defense • Value building community over self-importance • Value being truthful over being right
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BASIC COUNCIL ELEMENTS
THE CIRCLE The quality of the circle is that the form itself creates a sense of equality. “We can see who is here.” “All seats are equally powerful.” “There is no beginning and end, but a continual process.”
THE CENTER Every circle has a center; make it meaningful. The center actually and symbolically holds common intentions and values … and objects of significance. The commonality is represented and the intention to honor “the greater whole” is represented by objects placed in the center which can be picked up and held by individuals. THE TALKING PIECE, then, is a tool for focusing attention and empowering the one holding it, on behalf of everyone.
MARKING THE BEGINNING To indicate that we are about to do something set apart from our Usual ways of being together – and that we step into this together.
INTENTIONS The root meaning of the word “intend” is “to stretch,” as one stretches A bowstring “to aim at” something. Unlike a “rule,” an "intention" is something we make up our minds to try our best to do, but we are also aware that it may be very difficult to achieve.
o Speaking from the heart
o Listening from the heart
o Spontaneity
o Being of lean expression
CLOSING THE COUNCIL To celebrate and mark the transition out of council and to denote confidentiality agreements, so as to build safety and trust.
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Brain Training: using simple skills to build self-control and re-wire your nervous system
courtesy of: Laurie Leitch, PhD Threshold GlobalWorks www.thresholdglobalworks.com
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courtesy of: Laurie Leitch, PhD Threshold GlobalWorks www.thresholdglobalworks.com
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Center for Mindfulness in Corrections READINESS
PREPARING FOR YOUR SHIFT: SET YOUR A.I.M. ATTITUDE INTENTION MINDSET
THE ADULT: A set of thoughts, feelings, & behaviors based on what is happening right now in the present moment.
SELF-AWARENESS: The ability to recognize your moods, emotions, and drives as well as their effect on others. Pay Attention to Your Body, Emotions, & Thoughts Practice Self-Empathy—I’m OK Reframe Negative & Reactive Thoughts Know Your Emotional Triggers Maintain Positive Attitude/Outlook
SELF-MANAGEMENT: The ability to control your emotions and behavior and adapt to changing circumstances. Don’t Act When Triggered (Emergency Response Only) State Shift: Feel Your Feet, Breathe, Count Stay in the Adult—Keep Your Head in the Game Stay Off the Drama Triangle—Don’t Personalize Practice Self-Care: Healthy Nutrition & Hydration
SOCIAL AWARENESS: The ability to sense, understand, and react appropriately and intelligently to others feelings and needs. Practice Awareness: Tune-in to Your Environment Pay Attention to Body Language & Facial Expressions Practice Empathic Listening & Reflective Listening Learn to Sense & Value Others’ Feelings and Needs
RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT: The ability to inspire, influence, and connect to others and manage conflict. Unhook from Negative Drama Avoid Blaming & Justifying Own Feelings & State Needs Clearly Make & Keep Clear Agreements Stay on the Empowerment Triangle: Co-Creative, Challenger, Coach
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Building resilience on and off the job requires developing consistent and healthy self-care practices. RESILIENCE
THE 4 KEYS TO SELF-CARE:
BODY 1 Maintain Healthy Nutrition Exercise Regularly Get Enough Sleep Limit Alcohol & Nicotine Use
MIND Practice Mind Fitness Training 2 Cultivate a Positive Attitude Reframe Negative Thinking Focus Attention Outside Yourself : “I am aware of…” Feed Your Mind Positive Ideas
HEART (Feelings/Emotions) Practice Good Listening Skills 3 Develop Emotional Literacy Manage Emotional Triggers Cultivate Resilience—Breathe Build Your Support Team
SPIRIT Cultivate Faith & Spirituality 4 Practice Gratitude, Forgiveness, and Letting Go Spend Time in Nature and/or Other Enriching Activities Volunteer-Community Service
SELF-CARE = STRESS REDUCTION It all starts You can’t always control the circumstances with that life throws your way, but you can control YOU how well you take care of yourself. Taking and the care of your body, mind, heart, and spirit can choices you increase your resilience and keep you in make! optimum shape for handling stress.
Center for Mindfulness in Corrections www.mindfulcorrections.org
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