Insight dialogue is an interpersonal meditation practice that brings together meditative awareness (e.g.,
mindfulness, concentration), the wisdom teachings of the
Buddha
Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism.
According to Buddhist tradition, he was born in L ...
, and
dialogue to support insight into the nature, causes, and release of human suffering. Six
meditation
Meditation is a practice in which an individual uses a technique – such as mindfulness, or focusing the mind on a particular object, thought, or activity – to train attention and awareness, and achieve a mentally clear and emotionally calm ...
instructions, or guidelines, form the core of the practice.
Rationale
Engaging in mindful dialogue with one or more other people supported by instruction in the guidelines and by contemplations that encourage a direct and intimate inquiry into the human experience is the form of the practice. Insight dialogue is taught and practiced in a number of contexts—residential retreats, daylong workshops, community practice groups, and online (e.g., via
Skype
Skype () is a proprietary telecommunications application operated by Skype Technologies, a division of Microsoft, best known for VoIP-based videotelephony, videoconferencing and voice calls. It also has instant messaging, file transfer, deb ...
).
Insight dialogue has its roots in the Buddha's early teachings on the human experience (
Pāli Canon
The Pāli Canon is the standard collection of scriptures in the Theravada Buddhist tradition, as preserved in the Pāli language. It is the most complete extant early Buddhist canon. It derives mainly from the Tamrashatiya school.
During ...
) and the practice of
Insight or Vipassanā meditation; however, people of all faiths and backgrounds can practice. Gregory Kramer and Terri O'Fallon co-created insight dialogue. Gregory Kramer, the Founder and Guiding Teacher of Metta Programs, continued developing the practice and has been teaching it worldwide since 1995.
Guidelines
Although designed to work together, the insight dialogue guidelines are typically taught individually, in sequence.
Pause
Temporal pause; stepping out of habitual thoughts and reactions into experience in the present moment; mindfulness.
Relax
Invitation to calm the body and mind; receiving whatever sensations, thoughts, and feelings are present; acceptance.
Open
Extension of mindfulness from internal to include the external; spaciousness; matures to include the relational moment; mutuality.
Attune to emergence
Entering the relational moment without an agenda; awareness of the impermanence of thoughts and feelings; allowing experience to unfold; "don't know" mind. This guideline was originally termed "Trust emergence".
[In a January 2019 blog post, Gregory Kramer suggested the new wording "Attune to emergence": ]
Listen deeply
Listening mindfully, with an awareness that is relaxed and open; ripens into unhindered receptivity to the unfolding words, emotions, and presence of another.
Speak the truth
Articulation of the truth of one's subjective experience with mindfulness; discernment of what to say amid the universe of possibilities; ripens into an acute sensitivity to the voice of the moment that "speaks through" the meditator.
See also
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Appreciative inquiry
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Bohm Dialogue Bohm Dialogue (also known as Bohmian Dialogue or "Dialogue in the Spirit of David Bohm") is a freely flowing group conversation in which participants attempt to reach a common understanding, experiencing everyone's point of view fully, equally and ...
*
Community of inquiry
The community of inquiry, abbreviated as CoI, is a concept first introduced by early pragmatist philosophers C.S.Peirce and John Dewey, concerning the nature of knowledge formation and the process of scientific inquiry. The community of inquiry ...
*
Dialogue mapping
The issue-based information system (IBIS) is an argumentation-based approach to clarifying wicked problems—complex, ill-defined problems that involve multiple stakeholders. Diagrammatic visualization using IBIS notation is often called iss ...
*
Double-loop learning Double-loop learning entails the modification of goals or decision-making rules in the light of experience. The first loop uses the goals or decision-making rules, the second loop enables their modification, hence "double-loop". Double-loop learnin ...
*
Focusing (psychotherapy) Focusing is an internally oriented psychotherapeutic process developed by psychotherapist Eugene Gendlin. It can be used in any kind of therapeutic situation, including peer-to-peer sessions. It involves holding a specific kind of open, non-judging ...
*
Four-sides model
The four-sides model (also known as communication square or four-ears model) is a communication model postulated in 1981 by German psychologist Friedemann Schulz von Thun. According to this model every message has four facets though not the sam ...
*
Improvisation
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Learning circle
The learning circle is a mechanism for organizing and honoring the collective wisdom of a group.
History and overview
Learning circles are present in many indigenous cultures. For example, in some Native American cultures, councils of elders come ...
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Nonviolent Communication
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T-groups
__NOTOC__
A T-group or training group (sometimes also referred to as sensitivity-training group, human relations training group or encounter group) is a form of group training where participants (typically between eight and fifteen people) learn a ...
*
Theory U Theory U is a change management method and the title of a book by Otto Scharmer. Scharmer with colleagues at MIT conducted 150 interviews with entrepreneurs and innovators in science, business, and society and then extended the basic principles i ...
References
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Further reading
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External links
Gregory KramerMetta ProgramsTowards a Mindful Cognitive Science: An Insight Dialogue Retreat, 2014
* ttp://dharmaseed.org/talks/audio_player/77/17473.html Insight Dialogue: The Power, Challenges and Joy of Meditating Together (Part 2) (audio, Dharmaseed.org)
Insight Dialogue: The Power, Challenges and Joy of Meditating Together (Part 3) (audio, Dharmaseed.org)
Buddhist meditation
Mindfulness movement