12 Roles that Remind:
1. We are less rewarded for our involvement in a meeting when we assume that our role has
been more central to its processes than when we are able to question its value to other
participants.
2. We degrade and pollute the meeting environment more when we assume that any negative
impacts of our initiatives on other participants are of little consequence than when we have
doubts concerning the ability of the meeting to deal with them.
3. We exhibit a greater degree of ignorance in a meeting when we assume the adequacy of the
knowledge we demonstrate than when we question its validity from the perspectives of other
participants.
4. Our contributions are less nourishing and enlivening to other participants when we assume
that they are naturally fruitful than when we question their fruitfulness to others.
5. We contribute more to the mismanagement of a meeting when we assume that our favoured
procedures are the most useful to other participants than when we have doubts concerning their
efficacy for others.
6. We are less productive in a meeting when we assume we are responding productively to
other contributions than when we have doubts concerning the contribution of our efforts to the
productivity of other initiatives.
7. We are more threatening to other participants when we assume that our role is not
experienced as intimidating and discriminating by some than when we question how others may
be threatened by our actions in the meeting.
8. We bring more malaise to a meeting when we assume that we are paragons of well- being
than when we have doubts concerning our degree of health in the eyes of others.
9. We are more exploitative in a meeting when we assume that our initiatives do not impoverish
the experience of other participants than when we question this possibility.
10. We make more inappropriate contributions to a meeting when we assume that they are
naturally appropriate than when we have doubts concerning their degree of appropriateness to
other participants.
11. The representation of reality that we endeavour to communicate to other participants is
experienced as more incoherent when we assume that it offers unique integrative advantages
than when we question whether this may be the case for others.
12. We are more effective in turning cultural and religious celebrations into meaningless rituals
when we assume that they are not experienced as such by some than when we question why
this may indeed be the case.
1. Tales of Rabbi Nachman Monday,...
