CAPSULE | READS: On Dialogue

Key Takeaways on Dialogue vs Negotiation, Empty Space & Thought as a Process.

ON DIALOGUE VS NEGOTIATION:

The object of a dialogue is not to analyze the things or to win an argument or to exchange opinions, rather it is to suspend opinions and to look at the opinions, to listen to everyone’s opinions, to suspend them and to see what it all means.

• Dialogue is about open communication between people to take in and understand.
• We tend to think of dialogue as a negotiation, as if we’re trying to come to an agreement or solve an issue
• In principle, dialogue should work without leaders or agenda

ON EMPTY SPACE:

We must have an empty space where we are not obliged to do anything, nor to come to any conclusions, to say anything or not say anything — an empty space.

• One of the points of dialogue is that it has to be empty to hold something
• Leisure: to have empty space (you can engage in leisure activities because you have space in your schedule)
• Occupied: to not have space (if you are occupied, you do not have the space available)

ON THOUGHT AS A PROCESS:

The process of thinking becoming a thought involves: tacit knowledge

• experience
• knowledge
• thought
• emotion
• practice

Thought produces action.

You cannot defend something without first defending those thoughts.

Problems originate in thought.

In principle, dialogue should work without leaders or agenda.

We must have an empty space where we are not obliged to do anything, nor to come to any conclusions, to say anything or not say anything. It’s an empty space.

Leisure: to have empty space | Occupied: to not have space

One of the points of dialogue is that it has to be empty to hold something.

We tend to think of dialogue as a negotiation, as if we’re trying to come to an agreement or solve an issue, instead of open communication between people to take in and understand.

The object of a dialogue is not to analyze the things or to win an argument or to exchange opinions, rather it is to suspend opinions and to look at the opinions, to listen to everyone’s opinions, to suspend them and to see what it all means.

• if we can see what all of it means, it means we are sharing a common contact, even if we don’t agree entirely
• it may turn out that the opinions aren’t even really important, they’re all assumptions. we can see them all, we may move them all differently or in different directions. we can simply share the appreciation of the meanings and out of this whole thing, truth emerges unannounced that we have chosen it

When you have anger, it has a reason, a cause. You say that you are angry because of this or that → it builds up to rage and hate at which point it no longer has a particular reason anymore — it just sustains itself.

• that energy of hate is sort of locked up and is looking for an occasion to discharge
• same holds true for panic

What is needed to look deeply? (think of aggression)

• what are we looking at?
• suspend the activity allowing to reveal itself
• observe from a bird’s eye view

Dialogue is concerned with meaning, not truth.

Dialogue is a matter of roads, we share the roads.

Dialogue is being able to soften the mind by looking at all the opinions, is collective way of challenging assumptions

If you see other people’s thought, they become yours to. Emotional charges or humor can diffuse unshared meanings

Meaning is not static, it is flowing.

3 dimensions of human being: the body | the collective dimension of human being | cosmic — immersion of human being in nature

Thinking vs Thought

Thinking: present tense | perception within | goes into the brain and leaves a trace (thought)

Thought: past partisan | response from memory (the past)

Feeling: present tense | active present that the feeling is in direct contact with reality

Felt: feelings in felt | feelings recorded

Thoughts and Felts = one process (come from memory) (effects sensations)

You cannot pay attention to what is outside the representation

• the only time you can pay attention to it =

1. when there’s trouble
2. a surprise comes
3. when there’s a contradiction
4. when things don’t quite work

• one of our representations is that everything we do is in time
• we project a goal and find the means the achieve the end
• something that can be handled

Introducing Reads as a capsule in the Learn Segment. Each week for the remainder of the year, we’ll be extracting key takeaways and notes from 26 books read in 26 weeks as a practice to nourish learning. Join us in the (re)wiring!