The Elephant in the Room

Do you have many elephants in your life? You know the kind I mean. They are the subjects or issues that, if acknowledged, will almost certainly wreck havoc somewhere in your circle of relationships! I have my share of the herd.

In my extended family the one elephant likely to be wandering around is labeled “politics.” It sometimes lies down under the Thanksgiving dinner table. I try and keep my foot on its trunk so it doesn’t snake out from underneath and spill the gravy, so to speak!

Most of us, I venture to say, have at least one or two elephants. But we learn to live with them – or at least maneuver around them when necessary. Some elephants are more dangerous than others. Like the ones labeled spousal abuse or alcoholism or sexual harassment. Some are just too dangerous in our lives, or even our society, to allow them to be ignored.

The problem, oftentimes, with disturbing these more dangerous elephants is that they are rather difficult to control. We know that. We have the hoof prints on our body to show for it! OK, I think I’ve taken this analogy just about as far as I can.

How do we handle difficult issues between one another? We need a place of safety where we can address such issues in a manner which leads to everyone involved being kept from harm. Something like a container that will contain the energy – the emotions – but enable the issue to be visible and addressed in whatever appropriate manner.

The technology developed by Scott Peck has the potential to create just that kind of container that can hold difficult issues. And not just difficult issues but life and death issues. It was used in Bosnia, following the war, to bring Muslim, Serb and Croat educators together for the first time of face to face communication. These were the men and women who would be responsible for helping children grow up with a different view from their parents of what constitutes different.

Raise your hand if you have ever experienced religion as a difficult issue! I sat in a room for three days with national religious leaders from the Muslim, Jewish and Christian faiths and heard people speak to relatives having been killed by the relatives of others in the room. And everyone in the room came out alive! Not only did they come out alive but they asked if we could do something like this that would include their spouses the next time.

For the last eight years I have been going inside prisons in America – both state and federal – using this technology with some tough men and women. From these experiences, and those with my own family, I can attest to the strength of the social containers built with this technology process for dealing with difficult issues.