Fanny Matheusen gaat in gesprek met Myrna Lewis, stichtster van de Deep Democracy Lewis Method. Ze hebben het over de meerwaarde die de methode kan betekenen voor een aantal ‘grote’ hedendaagse vraagstukken. (In het Engels)
In the world today polarisation is omnipresent also in our daily conversations. How can Deep Democracy find answers to questions that occur in interaction between people. Is the method strong enough to sit in the fire? Myrna Lewis, founder of the Lewismethod of Deep Democracy in conversation with Fanny Matheusen, instructor of the method in Belgium.
Fanny: In organisations where I worked lately I met a lot of ill and insane people. The roles of autism, and psychopathy were present in these organisations. Sometimes in a very extreme way. Often also attached to people in leadershippositions. The team where I worked with outed the desire to throw them out, to get rid of these people. I know from my Deep Democracyperspective that although you can ask or oblige people to leave, that the role will stay. So these practices, urged me to state these questions: is there always a pathway to keep everyone on the bus? Is it safe to spread the role if this is a role of insanity?
Here are some thoughts form Myrna’s side: For people with specific problems or needs, the Deep Democracy method surely offers opportunities but is as well a challenge or burden in other ways. If we talk about autism what would surely help a person in a leadership position is to be able and to learn to follow the four steps in decisionmaking. The guidelines structure for them the interaction. What would be difficult for people with autism is that they don’t talk so easily about emotional stuff. They would prefer to talk about taskoriented stuff. So we will need the others to bring in the emotions. And here’s an insight: everyone finds it hard to bring in emotions, we’re not used to do that. So in a way there’s no need tot make autism bigger than it is. Normalize it and recognize that in a way we are all autistic. People with autism can be seen in this way as a gift for others or their organisation. They give us the opportunity to become aware of this side in ourselve that is afraid, confused to express emotions.
> Lees het hele interview op Fanny’s blog
(c) Fanny Matheusen