The Doug Noll Show

My guest is Dan Millstein, author of the book The One Minute Miracle. Dan spent 18 years in prisons around the world teaching inmates how to be self-aware, non-reactive teachers of peace. His book explains a simple and elegant guided meditation composed of twelve affirmations and twelve yoga hand positions, called mudras. As each affirmation is spoken, the hands change to a different position. This simple ceremony changed prisoners and prison populations, sometimes dramatically. Today, Dan is putting out the idea of creating 108 million Teachers of Peace. Again, by affirmation, he wonders what would happen if 108 million people declared themselves each to be a Teacher Peace. More information about Dan and his work can be found at www.visionsforprisons.com and www.teacherofpeace.com . Join us for a interesting conversation about Dan’s work.
http://www.teacherofpeace.com

Dan Millstein, Author of "The One Minute Miracle"
http://www.teacherofpeace.com

Dan Millstein, Author of "The One Minute Miracle"
http://www.teacherofpeace.com

Dan Millstein, Author of "The One Minute Miracle"
http://www.teacherofpeace.com

Kimmie Weeks has worked to alleviate poverty and human suffering in Africa and around the world since he was fourteen. At the age of nine he came face to face with civil war, human suffering, and death. At age eleven, he committed himself to creating a better world for children. Ever since, his life has been a journey toward fulfilling this commitment. Over the years, Weeks has formed partnerships and led organizations that have provided education to thousands of students in West Africa, lobbied the disarmament of child soldiers, and provided health care and recreation supplies to children. At 26 years old, Kimmie is a graduate of Amherst College and is now completing his Masters Degree. He will be entering his Ph.D. program this fall. Join us for an uplifting, powerful conversation about what one person can do to change our world.
http://www.youthactioninternational.org

Kimmie was targeted for assassination by the Charles Taylor regime in Liberia for his outspoken leadership against Taylor’s enslavement of children to fill his mercenary army. Kimmie was 16 years old at the time. Kimmie and I also talk about his organization to help children in Africa.
http://www.youthactioninternational.org

Marilyn and I talk about conflicts. We observe that conflicts are often necessary to point out things that need to change. Conflict is also an opportunity for spiritual growth. Cat calls in from North Carolina and adds her sense that conflict is necessary and how we approach conflict determines whether it is healthy or destructive. We begin to talk about what listening is really about. Marilyn points out that because so many of us live in fear, listening is very difficult.
http://www.reenchantplanetearth.com

Marilyn talks about listening with your whole body. By this, she means that we have to listen to ourselves as well as listen to what the other person is saying. Listening to ourselves means being aware of every emotion and feeling as it passes through us. At the same time, we are aware of the emotions flowing through the other person. This is a bit challenging in the beginning, but, as Doug points out, becomes like riding a bicycle with practice.
http://www.reenchantplanetearth.com

Not everyone is aware of what they are feeling in the moment. One of the basic tools of peacemaking is to create a safe, sacred space where feelings can be experienced without fear. Lynn calls in from Long Island and points out that this can allow people to speak honestly and authentically. Marilyn gives the example of a conversation with the principal of her step-son’s school. Marilyn observed that the principal was listening to her own fear rather than listening to her step-son. Once the principal understood the concept of listening, the conversation completely changed. Doug asks Marilyn about her energy model. Marilyn describes the work of Stewart Gellis and the being energy, the doing energy, and the dreaming energy. Being energy is about connection and relationship. Doing energy is about action, critical thinking, and analysis. Dreaming energy is about creativity. We tend to live in one energy to the exclusion of others, which leads to imbalances in life. When we are living in the three energies simultaneously, we are in balance with the Universe. When one or more of the energies is missing, conflict arises. One model of peacemaking suggests that peace comes from re-balancing and awakening the missing energies.
http://www.reenchantplanetearth.com

Marilyn describes her philosophy behind the Re-Enchant Planet Earth project. Re-Enchanters are global citizens interested in sustainability. One purpose of reenchantplanetearth.com is to connect people. Another purpose is to allow a space to talk about fear. By talking about what our fears are, we lessen the power fear has over us.
http://www.reenchantplanetearth.com

Leadership is a quality that many claim to have but unfortunately seems to be in short supply. How many of us can say that our bosses inspire us, support us, help us improve, and motivate us to do our very best? And honestly, how many of us really work at leadership ourselves, at home, at work, or in the community? Leadership is important and its particularly important for solving problems and effectively working out disputes and conflicts in the office. We are going to look at leadership through the eyes of an expert.
Craig W. Ross is President of Pathways to Leadership Inc., a leadership development company in business for over 15 years. For almost a decade, Craig has partnered with CEOs and high-level executives around the world to increase productivity and bottom line results through the development of healthy work cultures. Craig brings high energy and a dynamic approach to executive coaching, keynotes and the transformational Pathways to Leadership® program he facilitates to companies worldwide including Owens-Illinois, Procter & Gamble, Gerber, Nestlé, Mazda Motor Company, CIBA Vision and many others.Craig has a B.A. in English from the University of Minnesota and M.A. in Curriculum Instruction and Design from Colorado Christian University. The three attributes of great leadership are self-awareness/self-control, the ability to communicate with some charisma, and the ability to focus people’s minds on what is important.
http://www.pathwaystoleadership.com/

Focus-foward questions are one way to focus minds out of the past and into the future. He ability to ask well-phrased and well-timed questions is a leadership skill that pays huge dividends. We will always focus on a good question and leaders learn to use our innate curiosity through good questions.
http://www.pathwaystoleadership.com/

Jerks in the office are a huge problem. Dysfunctional office behaviors cost billions of dollars each year in lost productivity, not to mention lawsuits and claims. The real secret to dealing with the elephant in the office is to not fix people. Instead, develop some self-awareness. Am I focused on that jerk? If so, why? Can I put my focus in a more productive place? Teaching people how to do that is a critical part of leadership. Trying to fix people or setting down behavioral rules are simply not effective. Thus, leaders have to be thinking about working with the minds in the office to deal with the elephants.
The Peacemaker’s Bookshelf looked at the book Mediating Dangerously by Kenneth Cloke.
http://www.pathwaystoleadership.com/

A caller asked if the elephants ever go away. Doug felt that the elephants never go away and always provide us with lessons to learn about being aware, conscious, and even spiritual. Craig agreed and felt that elephants come in different shapes and sizes. As we learn to deal with the elephants through our own increasing awareness, they become less of a problem.
http://www.pathwaystoleadership.com/

Ever wonder where bigotry, stereotyping, and prejudice come from? Children are not born racist or sexist or as religious zealots; they are taught how to be that way. Usually, the teaching is indirect and by way of example from adults. If we want children to grow with tolerance, understanding, and acceptance of diversity among us, we have to be active teachers. My guest is doing just that. Matt Faulkner is a talented and clever picture book maker for children. His children’s book, "A Taste for Colored Water", arose out his lifelong exploraton of race and societal intolerance.

A graduate of Rhode Island School of Design, Matt has written and illustrated a number of children's books. His work has won wide praise for its humor, exuberance and sensitivity. In addition, he is a contributing illustrator to such national periodicals as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and Forbes. Matt currently lives in Northern California on San Francisco Bay with his son Gabe and their two cats Rosie and Leo. He teaches illustration at the Art Academy University in San Francisco.

In this segment, we talk about how Matt got into writing and illustrating children’s books. That leads to a conversation about the importance of teaching children about art in school.

Matt gives us a synopsis of his new children’s book, "A Taste of Colored Water". We learn that two 6 year olds, Jelly and Lulu, hear of a colored water fountain from their friend Abbey. They pester Uncle Jack for a ride into town. While Uncle Jack is buying a part for his tractor, Lulu and Jelly find the colored water fountain, which is next to the courthouse. Of course, the water fountain has a sign over it saying “Colored” and we see that Lulu and Jelly are living in the segregated south in the Civil Rights era. The children are confronted by a police officer with a vicious dog, told to stay away from the water fountain, and run back to Uncle Jack’s truck. What is not in the text is told Matt’s illustrations. During all of this, we see a non-violent civil rights protest and parade being broken up with fire hoses squirting water and knocking the protesters down.

Matt and I talk a bit about the stereotyping of the south. He tells us that he has been confronted about that stereotyping, but says that growing up Boston taught him that being a black African American was not a good thing.

We talk about the lessons that children can be taught from "A Taste of Colored Water". Matt describes some of the simple examples he gives to children that he reads to.

The Peacemaker’s Bookshelf looked at the book "Living Deeply: The Art and Science of Transofrmation in Everyday Life" by Marilyn Schlitz, Cassandra Vieten, and Tina Amorok

Matt’s son Gabe is 16 years old and is a minority student himself, a white kid in black school. Matt and I talk about how to help Gabe negotiate the shoals of bigotry. Matt tells us that he helps Gabe understand that the basis of bigotry and intolerance is fear. Once that is understood, handling racism becomes more manageable as the core issues of fear are accepted and acknowledged.

In any intimate relationship, there are really three relationships. Two of the relationships are relationships we have with ourselves. No relationship will truly be intimate unless both of the partners have high self-esteem. In other words, Helene says, they have a good relationship with themselves. The third relationship is based on communication—the bridge between the partners. When a relationship is dysfunctional, it is because there is low self-esteem or poor communication. When anger arises it is an indicator of fear, hurt, or powerlessness. In relationship conflicts, the key to good communication is being able to say how you feel, e.g., “I feel afraid.” “You” statements should only be used to compliment; otherwise, there is blaming and accusing.
http://www.lovetopeace.com

We talk about how fear manifests in the physical body. Helene tells us that our physical body is a literal map of our emotional state. By focusing on the fear associated with the part of our body that hurts, we can release the emotion and heal. Doug asks Helene about fear theat drives indecision. Helene tells us that we can overcome the fear of making a wrong decision by letting our Higher Self make the decision from love. She says that this is the essence of intuition or right brain processing. We too often ignore this part of our experience. By listening to our intuition, we can actually make decisions from a place of love rather a place of fear.
http://www.lovetopeace.com

Doug asks Helene how parents can be better at raising their children in a fear-free environment. Helene says that people have to learn to be parents. That requires reading, going to class, and studying. Many people are not able or willing to work hard at learning to be good parents. As a result, they pass their fears and scripts on to their children and the children end up with scripts of low self-esteem.
http://www.lovetopeace.com

Fighting among children is not new. Nevertheless, there is a big difference between sibling spats and learning the skills of peacemaking. How do we teach children to resolve conflicts peacefully? How do we give them the values peace, collaboration, and cooperation? And how do we do this while empowering them to make good choices and judgments about their relationships with peers and adults? These are tough questions and Doug’s guest gives us some answers. Naomi Drew is recognized around the world for her work in conflict resolution and peacemaking. She is the author of six widely used books. Her landmark book, Learning the Skills of Peacemaking was one of the first to introduce peacemaking into public education. “Peaceful Parents,” Naomi’s on-line newsletter, has a broad international readership. The Kids' Guide to Working Out Conflicts, the latest of her six books, was honored with four national awards including the National Parenting Publications Gold Award for Children's Resources. Naomi talks about an epidemic of cruelty sweeping through the school systems. Recent surveys show that 80 percent of middle school and 75 percent of primary school kids say that kids are mean to each other on a consistent and persistent basis. This epidemic is relatively new and seems to be caused by chronic stress and fear and by media emphasis on violence, cruelty, meanness, and sarcasm as being cool ways of dealing with conflicts. To a kid, meanness and sarcasm look cool and hip.

Doug and Naomi talk about reactivity as a central cause of conflict. Naomi teaches a technique to kids she calls Stop, Breathe, and Chill. The idea is to rehearse situations where you might be put down, treated cruelly, or disrespected and practice being less reactive. Naomi teaches kids how to replace angry thoughts with calm thoughts. Doug and Naomi talk about how violence creates a perception of power, but has the opposite effect. Violence actually takes power away from the offender.

Doug asks Naomi about bullying. In the survey research, 40-50% of the kids said that bullying is a serious problem. Naomi tells Doug that bullying causes depression, is related to suicide, and has been linked to the school shootings of the past 10 years. Naomi believes that schools must adopt and enforce an anti-bullying culture. Essentially, kids have to be taught to be kind and compassionate with each other. Doug and Naomi talk about how important teachers are in modeling kindness, compassion, and non-bullying behaviors. Doug asks Naomi about cyber-bullying. Naomi says that this is hugh unintended consequence of instantaneous communication. Through cell phones, text messaging, social network sites, cell cameras and the like, kids can catch other kids in embarrassing or stupid moments and broadcast that to 50 or 100 or an entire school in seconds. All kids are now highly sensitive to the fact that anything they do or say can be turned against them. This is breeding a new form of fear and paranoia among kids. Naomi talks of as a Lord of the Flies mentality as kids armor themselves against bullying and embarrassment. The challenge is to teach kids not to respond tit for tat. Kids subject to cyber bullying have some options open to them.

Doug asks Naomi about the difference between a bystander and an upstander. Naomi teaches kids how to intervene in bullying and effective techniques for defusing difficult social encounters.

The central question is, how do parents get past yelling, screaming, and threatening to reassert power over children. Kids learn that their bad behavior is a powerful trigger. This is an unconscious process. Most kids are not intentional or malicious when they are acting out their power struggles. The key for parents is to understand that a child cannot lead a parent out of an imbalance in family power. The parent has the sole responsibility for reestablishing power in the family.

Dr. Grosshans talks about a five step process that she calls The Ladder. The the first three rungs of the ladder are:
• Making A Friendly Bid for Cooperation. This is done by asking a child to do something or stop doing something in a tone of voice that is nice, and invites cooperation.
• "I Mean Business " reminder. If the child is not comply after Rung 1, Dr. Grosshans recommends that the parent change the tone of voice to a much more firm stance.
• In The Bedroom. In this third step, parents must move from words to action. In this case, a parent would, for example, move close to the child, and escort the child to a bedroom. The problem is the parents rely too much on talking and reasoning to elicit cooperative behavior. Children are simply incapable of responding rationally when a power struggle is in play.

The last two rungs in the ladder are:
• Shut The Door. This step is used when a child is resisting a timeout or is disobedient and wants to run out of room. The child is restrained without physical
force, but by simply shutting the child in. • The Parent Hold. When child is really acting out, the conventional wisdom of parental guidance says to walk away. Dr. Grosshans tells Doug to do the opposite. Approach the child approached a child with love and pull him or her close and a loving embrace. Hold the child until she calms down.

Understanding power, and the five aspects of power will help parents regain peace and harmony within their families.

Abuse of power is an all too common problem. From everyday abuses to horrible human rights violations, abuse of power seems to surround us. What causes people to abuse their power? What can we do to advise and help leaders be wise and compassionate rather than abusive. What can we look at in choosing leaders? Doug’s guest is an expert on power and on helping people deal with power abuse. Judith Barr has been a depth psychotherapist in private practice since 1975. She is passionate about helping to heal and transform the planet and is committed to making a difference one-by-one and on a global scale. Judith has earned an M.S. in Counseling and licensure as a Mental Health Counselor in Florida, New York, and Connecticut and has published a life-changing book, Power Abused, Power Healed, as well as an audio series, The Spoken Word on Behalf of the Feminine, and more than three dozen articles for both professionals and the general public. She offers her healing expertise in an array of formats, including working with individuals, groups, workshops, and consultations. In addition to this she offers training and supervision programs for healing arts professionals. Doug asks Judith how power abuse develops. Judith explains that the tendency to abuse power really starts with deep wounds formed in childhood that are never healed. These wounds are unconscious and drive people to gain power, then abuse it out of a misguided attempt to protect themselves.
http://www.judithbarr.com/

Doug asks Judith what advice she would give to the next president if he asked the question, “I’m about to have more power than I’ve ever had, but I do not want to abuse it. What do I do?” Judith says that the first step in learning about power is the willingness to explore one’s inner world. This exploration, or inner work, develops wisdom, understanding, compassion, and humility as a leader confronts the dark side of his or her nature. Power abuse arises in leaders who are unwilling to venture inside themselves. As a result, their reactions are unconscious and often unbalanced.
http://www.judithbarr.com/

Doug’s guest is James Miskel, Ph.D., an international security expert working in the field of post-conflict peacemaking and peacebuilidng. Jim describes the evolution of international peacemaking as it evolved from the 1970s forward In the 1970s, most of the conflicts were between adjoining nations. Typically, the UN would broker a ceasefire and send in a multinational peacekeeping force to secure the borders of the two countries. The important element was that the peacekeeping force was present with the mutual consent of the warring parties. The primary role of the peacekeeping force was to assure that th terms of the ceasefire were maintained by all sides.

In the 1990s, peacekeeping evolved into nation building. The UN and other international groups began to assist war-torn countries to re-establish a civil society through the rule of law, civil administration of government, and government service infrastructure. In the mid-1990s, international peace missions become actively involved in the affairs of countries experiencing civil war or insurrection. Thus, the scope of peacekeeping and peace building expanded dramatically.