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I just wanted to follow up on my last blog post entitled "The Touchy Subject of Religion". And by the way, a big thank you to Jeff Thompson for adding it to your blog "What's Happening in Conflict Resolution". 

If you want, go back and read it first but I wanted…

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You've got your Christians, your Muslims, your Jews, your Atheists, your Agnostics, your dogmatists, your "pseudo-ists" and about everything in between. Some show great tolerance and some shout from a pedestal, leaving no room for any interpretation but their own. How important is one's religion when it comes to conflict? It feels like sides are being drawn. And we haven't even begun to figure out how to moderate the extreme influences of groups like ISIS. (Do they belong in this…

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Literally, peace work does come in all shapes and sizes. Recently I came onboard with an organization called Arts Action Group. Some really great folks who are arts educators have been traveling to Kosovo and Western Saharah to involve children and youth in arts education and conflict resolution work.

When people find out about this work they question how it resolves conflict. Well you tell me, if children have been affected by dangerous living conditions and the rhetoric of how to hate… Continue

I got a great education at the Werner Institute. I felt on fire with knowledge throughout the program and now I go equipped with my new degree (and my old degree and experience) out into the world to search for meaningful work. This of course if no small task. I haven't written any books or articles, or won any great awards but I did graduate with a 4.0 and my professors nominated me for a prestigious national honor society into which I was inducted as a lifetime member.

In…

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The Origins of Deep Conflict

 

As I prepare to become a conflict specialist,  I will be charged with the task of listening ... really, deeply listening. Conflict specialists in any discipline are not to guess of the content of someone’s conflict. We are to understand and to do that we need to listen and then ask the right questions so we can more fully understand.

 

I have been observing the sound bites, blogs, posts, news stories, conversations, and bewilderment…

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I just came on board with The Center for Cultural Exchange (http://www.cci-exchange.org)

This is a sponsor organization that places International Exchange students with host families here in the  United States. I will be their Local Coordinator, matching host families with students within a 120 mile radius of Omaha. They have an awesome database, and a well organized system in place. I am impressed.

I am less than half way through my…

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I just finished my mediation residency at the Werner Institute. Although we didn't have a peak experience like we did last October with the Arab Spring panel discussion occurring on the day Gaddafi lost his life (wow, was that powerful and timely), many of us attended two great films that addressed the healing slowly progressing in N. Ireland. That was a very good night..... a very good night indeed.

Regardless, the massive amount of learning that took place at the residency (through…

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I will continue this blog post as time permits.... but I just wanted to report how much insight and pleasure I am getting from reading Bernie Mayer's "Beyond Neutrality". Besides being fascinating, it is also frightening, enlightening, and reassuring because I am an original thinker and I was starting to think that we would all have to go the route of the Neutral Third Party Zombie style of Conflict Engagement. (Note the correction from Conflict Resolution to Conflict Engagement.)

I…

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