What If…….?

What if our dreams could come true?

What if we could just imagine an end to our racial divides and other social problems and something or other, like magic, could make it all come true -- without any stress or struggle, without any blood shed?

What if, as in John Lennon’s song, Imagine, this is how our world could be – in a flash?

Jack and I took up the subject of “What if….?” on our last Possible Society In Motion Radio Show. And we did our usual fine job of working well together to create an interesting broadcast discussion, focusing mainly on how truth can set us free.

But afterwards on our Coffee House Conversation by Conference Call portion, we didn’t quite do as well. In my mind, I am always striving for the broadcast equivalent of Olympic Pairs Skating, Gold medal level. This time we wouldn’t have even made the cut. 

Definitely not! Rather, on our conference call portion, we were heading ourselves into the kind of everyday polarizing debates you can hear anywhere and everywhere!  We like to think of ourselves as, at least, a cut above such things. Nonetheless, once someone, probably me, brought up our campaigning politicians we were frustratingly ordinary!

Oh, well you can’t win them all!  And, we certainly learned a thing or two from the fallout of that discussion about what not to do next time. Read “Anastasia The Storyteller” blog articles for a taste of that conference call incident in The Price We Pay For Our Politics and Principles and Practices, Not Personalities for some of the points I learned from the episode. 

Later, after a bit of contemplation and offline dialogue, following the evening’s program, combining our Possible Society In Motion Radio Show titled, “What if….?”  and our Coffee House Conversation By Conference Call, the lessons did begin to accrue. 

Next time I think we will all be better prepared to use the guidelines, Contrasting Dialogue and Debate, for a more uplifting successful conversation. These guidelines have been serving us well as a foundation for our in-person Coffee House Conversations On Race Relations, now being prepared for a Fall series.  

Everyday Democracy is our source for these guidelines. They have given us a framework that works  well to help us guide our face time conversations into productive discussion channels on sensitive topics such as race relations.

From our bit of a fall, our Coffee House Conversation by Conference Call program participants and myself will now proceed with a bit more caution and awareness of the importance of maintaining these guidelines. 

So “What if our dreams could come true?” 

As we are likely to discover, time and time again, our dreams are most likely to come true, not by magic, but sound decisions, conscientiousness practices, determination and discipline. 

Jack and I are committed to this pathway. We hope you are too. And will want to become a part of our lively, developing forum and help us grow it into a regular roundtable discussion that, if nothing else, can provide all of us involved with an opportunity to take the pressure off ourselves as we learn better and better skills for discussing anything we choose – politics, race relations, religion etc. etc. -- in a safe, healthy and transforming-oriented setting for an hour or so, every other week.

Join Jack and myself this week on our Possible Society In Motion Radio Show where we will share our insights on “How To Talk About Politics, Race and Religion.”

Check this link for details on our after the on-air portion for our Coffee House Conversations by Conference Call.