Dr Tammy Lenski and I realized we have some fun shared and a few different pieces to a terrific puzzle we decided to complete together between two blogs. Look for the next pieces over at Tammy’s blog … Mediator Tech, and join is as we talk things out in ways that add new colors, shapes and sizes to ideas we all care about. 
Tammy’s site is blog-rolled here so you can find it easily to watch for Saga 2 of this discussion between two sites and all of you who care to jump in.
Ellen: Ok, Tammy let’s start the ball rolling on our shared investigation… People ask often how they can transform problems into possibilities…. What do you say they can do…?
Tammy: One of challenges of conflict is that it can feel like an overwhelming or insurmountable problem. As a mediator and coach, part of what I do is help people find and work with the opportunities that problems offer, and transform the conflict in the process. I'm interested in understanding, from a "brain" point of view, why problems get stuck and magnified in our minds. What's going on neurologically that makes this happen?
Ellen: Tammy, you make this stuff far too much fun! I love your suggestions and made notes in my daybook.
I’ll lay out some in-the-brain-stuff as a way to help out … and then I have a question back to you, Ok?
As you likely realize, Tammy, from the brain’s perspective you are doing amazing tactics and here is why.
1. Think of your basal ganglia as a big backpack inside the depths of your brain. The basal ganglia stores and uses people’s “stuff” and that sometimes comes back to create problems. Let’s say I give meta-messages to people at work until they get fed up and isolate me. That “stuff” gets stored and I feel in over my head, rejected and even victimized … and from the brain’s perspective I really am. What’s stored in the basal ganglia is deep, and hard to change and it depends on working memory to hand it new tactics like the ones you recommended.
2. Think of your working memory as a lovely wine glass near the front of your brain. Change takes place in the working memory and only sticks when it transfers into the basal ganglia. How does that happen? Fish around for opportunities, as you suggest to clients … and when these get used enough in your working memory… they move over. The working memory is your daily mental office … it’s smaller, and it’s rarely comfortable or easy to work from.
Notice the alive, new and unfamiliar working memory parts are quite opposite to the basal ganglia stuff which is like an old shoe to walk in … at least until it boots us in the butt … because the stuff we store creates problems for us at times.
Change takes place in the basal ganglia, only after what you work on daily … becomes familiar and doable enough to transfer from the working memory to the basal ganglia. That was a long answer to a great question. Here’s my question back, Tammy.
People tell me they cannot get their leaders to embrace change or to question personal flawed assumptions. In brain based terms ... their entire firm seems like a big basal ganglia, without much working memory in operation. No adventure... no challenge ... no fun ... they don't even like going to work the morale is so low. What do you suggest to help…?
Wow - are we into working memory here ... Thanks Tammy. I’ll check your site at Mediator Tech to see what’s up on this one and I hope others will weigh in….
Tammy and Ellen, I'd love to jump in and add that conflict often touches off emotions, such as anger, jealousy, or fear. Very few people are able to change how they feel about an event or a person connected to it. So they hide behind emotions so give themselves an excuse for behaving badly.
For instance, "Don't make me mad," is something you hear at times. If you think carefully about what prompta anger, it is a sense of loss of control. In using anger a person attempts to regain control of a person or group of people.
However, if you were to dip into the resources of your brain, you need a strategy in place to immediately lift you from the rage you might feel at the moment of conflict. You might shut your eyes and imagine the most happy event of your life, for instance.
The tactic is to have a toolchest of strategies in place to help yourself rise above emotions. Fact is, what is going on in your brain is that you are replacing the hormone Cortisol with Serotonin as you visualize a happy event.
While Cortisol is a stressor and prevents you from thinking clearly, Serotonin is a hormone of well being. If we learn resourceful brain based strategies we can learn to rise above emotional reactions. We can then step back and make more rational decisions. Maybe we could even prevent situations where mediation is required.... Thoughts?
Posted by: Robyn McMaster | October 9, 2006 8:52 PM | Permalink to Comment