"Growing & Healing Through Conflict" with AddieRose Mayer & Ei Ei Samai
In this episode I talk with AddieRose Mayer and Ei Ei Samai. AddieRose and Ei Ei are fellow conflict transformation professionals. This conversation is grounded in reality-based optimism that’s rooted in our lived-experiences that show that not only is it possible to communicate across our differences, it is sure to create growth and healing for everyone involved.
In this conversation we talk about how conflict transformation skills are a powerful antidote for many of the social and political issues that we face today. We talk about how living and thriving in diversity is amazing, and that it is also hard work. We get into the important differences between deconstructing systems and transforming systems. We discuss how each of us are able to consciously design the processes, systems and cultures that work best for us, and we talk about the important role of grief and grieving in any process of transformation.
AddieRose
AddieRose is the Executive Director at SEEDS Community Resolution Center in Berkeley, California. Their mission is to “…cultivate positive communication and develop fundamental understanding so that all people can be in productive relationship with each other. [They] do this through mediation, facilitation, training and restorative practices.
AddieRose Mayer, Executive Director at SEEDS Community Resolution Services
Ei Ei Samai, Culture Designer & Principal at Samai Group
Ei Ei Samai
Ei Ei is a culture designer at the Samai Group. They are “committed to growing agility, resilience, and belonging in social impact groups through science-based culture design.” Ei Ei uses neuro, social, and design sciences to grow agility, resilience, and belonging in social impact groups.
AddieRose Mayer & Ei Ei Samai
Support Fractal Friends:
Ei Ei and I are part of the Democracy, Politics and Conflict Engagement (DPACE) Initiative of Mediators Beyond Borders International. DPACE is committed to enhancing the capacity of social movements and political organizations in the U.S. to engage with conflict creatively and constructively in order to strengthen democracy and create a more just society.
Check out DPACE’s Conflict Literacy Framework to learn more.
Other Resources
Here are resources about things that came up in this conversation.
Psychotherapist and author, Francis Weller, discusses the nature of grief and the impact on our culture of not having grieving practices.
Conflict Transformation (Resolution) Services
As we said, community mediation centers, are all over the United States and the world. NAFCM (National Association for Community Mediation) can help connect you with the mediation center near you.
This blog post that I wrote just when I started working at SEEDS is about the way that conflict transformation and dialogue is usually overlooked or underestimated until it’s too late: The Imperceptible Line between "It's No Big Deal" and "It's Hopeless"
Grief
Ei Ei talks about her recent interest in the grief work of Francis Weller, and we all talk about the important role of grieving when going through a process of transformation. Learn more about the 5 Gates of Grief from Weller’s book The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief
Note: XKCD was one of my favorite comics ever. Now that I’ve been reminded of it, I expect to spend many hours of my time reading it to catch up for the lost years (like this graph shows about bacon).
If you read it too, don’t miss the feature of seeing what pops up when you hover your cursor over each comic.
Eugene Kim
AddieRose and Ei Ei talk about the work of Eugene Eric Kim who is the creator of this fabulous website: Faster Than 20 and runs a training program called Collaboration Muscles & Mindsets, a space for changemakers to practice the skills they need to work effectively in groups.
Faster Than 20 is based on the idea that “Complex social change typically requires at least 20 years. The cynical explanation is that it requires a generation to die off and a new generation to take over before the mindset and corresponding structural shifts can take place. In other words, the bottleneck is people, and people don’t change. They die.
We can’t afford to wait this long. The world’s challenges are scaling in complexity faster than our ability to solve them. We need to figure out how to make positive change faster than 20 years.”
Belonging and Authenticity
Listen to past episode of Fractal Friends, "Discovering Authentic Presence" with Ash Adamson, to hear Ash talk about how to design your life by changing the stories behind you perceptions.
Check out Brené Brown's book Braving the Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone for a deep dive into the power and importance of belonging, especially in these times.
Music
The song from this episode is “Carry Forth” by the Boondock Squad (Comprised of jxtheo on the vocals, Mhyck on the guitar, Rodel on the vocals + keys, Judybelle on the bass and JSE on the drums.
Follow Boondock Squad on BandCamp, SoundCloud, Facebook and Instagram.
Learn more about and pre-order jxtheo’s project Paper Trail of FREEDOM.
