Let me start by saying that Albert Einstein is just amazing! As he once famously said, "We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking that we used when we created them." While he may have referred to a political or systemic issue - or at least that is the context in which this quote is often used -, what he actually is relating to is to the way of how every single one of us is relating to our lives and to our challenges. From the point of view that identifies with our ego and the ideas, concepts, and roles it has piled onto the self. (…)

My colleague Martin and I gave a presentation at the ACR-GNY conference a couple weeks ago. We spoke about our mindful/meditative approach to conflict resolution and mediation to an audience of around 50 New York mediators and lawyers. It was pretty great, to be on the giving, talking, presenting end for once, rather than on the taking in, receiving, input side. (…)

I recently re-discovered psychotherapist Franz Ruppert, who focuses on researching and treating traumatic experiences that probably all of us carry to a certain degree but that are typically not acknowledged as trauma. Yet, as Ruppert claims, those are exactly the traumas that shape our society, our systems, and therefore need resolving on an individual and on a social level. (…)

I currently read Ken Cloke's "Conflict Revolution. Mediating Evil, War, Injustice and Terrorism". It is a long and dense read, full of insights, suggestions, theses, with a focus on rethinking and redesigning the systems we operate in (incl. our judicial, economic, political systems, which are intertwined and therewith based on the same principles anyway). (…)

It was during my studies in Israel when I dived into the connection between meditation, spirituality and its connection to conflicts and their resolution. At that time I thought this to be the most natural, accessible connection - not only for me obviously, but for everyone else. How would anyone deny the impact of our spirit, our values, our personal insight to how we deal with conflicts? And yet, it was this setting, in which I backtracked from my newly formed and formulated insights. (…)

Now that I’ve started teaching meditation to a larger group of people in an organizational setting, I’ve quickly noticed the points, in which I really get self-conscious. “Will he return to the class? Oh gosh, how does my voice sound! Oh man, there are a couple experienced meditators…what guidance can I possibly offer them??” (…)