December 13, 2024 • 36 mins
Dominic Barter returns to Perspectives on Peace: Transforming Tomorrow to discuss his work with Restorative Practices in schools and prisons. In this episode, Dominic sits down with Erin to share insights from his recent research and experiences in schools and prisons worldwide, including a visit to Padilla High School in Rochester. He explores the parallels between schools and prisons, the role of listening in creating change, and how restorative practices can reshape social systems for the better.
Learn more about Dominic's work: https://www.restorativecircles.org/
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Perspectives on Peace
Transforming Tomorrow, thepodcast brought to you by the MK
Gandhi Institute forNonviolence.
My name is Aaron Thompson andI'm very pleased to be seated
once again with Dominic Barter.
Good morning.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Dominic.
Good morning Aaron.
It's a great pleasure to beback here.
Really good to and with you.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Yeah, it's the same.
Very good to be chatting withyou once again.
Dominic is, I wouldn't say, afrequent flyer, but has been on
here a couple times in the past,and we have talked about some
of the work that you do, dominic, in the context of restorative
(00:46):
processes and practices.
Would you agree with thatcharacterization?
Yep, okay.
So, dominic, you were last onthe program, I don't know a year
or so ago and letting no grassgrow under your feet as you do.
Can you give us a little bit ofan overview of what you've been
up to since that point in time,as a highlight to you?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Yeah, it's been a really interesting time in my
life because my daughter hasgrown up and gone to university
and now she's in employment andlives with others and is having
her life.
So that sense of needing toalways rush back home has
changed into the spaciousness tobe able to develop the work
(01:31):
that I do outside the context ofRio de Janeiro specifically and
Brazil in general.
So I've had the opportunity tospend extended periods of time
in different places around theworld and begin to pick up the
possibility notice where sproutsare sprouting, where seeds are
(01:54):
being planted for thepossibility of doing the work
that I do in a deeper and morestructured way way.
So that's involved a secondphase of the work in prisons in
Italy building restorativesystems amongst the prisoners
(02:14):
for the conflicts they have witheach other, but also stretching
that to those prisoners who areon work leave, so they still
sleep in the prison but they getto leave during the day and
work.
It's meant being able to gointo new wings and to start
projects in new prisons.
Sometimes we don't evenactually get to the prisoners in
(02:35):
one particular prison.
The focus of the work the folksin the prison who make this
decision has been on simplysupporting the governor and the
court team.
They all just recognize thattheir capacity to bring about
the kind of changes that theywant to see in that context is
(02:56):
dependent on their ability tojust survive the day in their
job.
We know from studies all aroundthe world that the mental
health impact on prison officersand administration in prisons
is incredibly high and, ofcourse, the impact on prisoners
and their mental health is alsoincredibly high, and it just
(03:18):
creates a hugely problematicenvironment.
So that's been a veryinteresting new turn.
And then just lots of work inschools, which always requires
ongoing commitment and time.
So we started a new project inhigh schools in Italy, started a
project in a public primaryschool in Switzerland that's the
(03:38):
first of its kind in thatcountry and the first time I've
worked in that particularcontext.
And that month last year, thelast time we spoke in the States
, was really fascinating Went todifferent communities in
different parts of the country,both urban and rural, and just
(04:00):
sitting down with people who areon the different kinds of front
lines and looking at what theirreality is like and what they
need in order to shift things ina direction which increasingly
trusts the intelligence of thecommunity, trusts the experience
of people who are suffering themost adversity and just
transitions away from this logic, which is still really dominant
, of seeing everything in termsof projects and programs and
(04:22):
manuals and trainings.
Everything is about theimposition of knowledge from
outside and, however wonderfulthat experience is, however
useful the origin of it is, thefact is that we keep repeating
this basically colonial dynamicwhere we're saying the folks who
are suffering are unable tosustain themselves and something
(04:43):
must be brought in from outside, are unable to sustain
themselves and something must bebrought in from outside, and we
keep accidentally trampling ontheir own endogenous
understanding of their ownreality, the understanding that
grows where they are in theirlife experience and missing so
much of that wisdom.
So it's been wonderful to dothat and I'm super happy to be
(05:04):
back and have another go.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
Indeed, I am really intrigued by the work that
you're doing in the prisonsystem, which, almost by
definition, is hyper regimented,rule based.
There's a strong imposition oforder.
I'm really curious about yourability to work your way into an
(05:35):
actual prison system and beginintroducing some of these
concepts that would seem toundermine a lot of the order and
the ways of maintaining safetythat are hallmarks of prison
systems.
How have prison leadershipreceived you and been receptive
(05:56):
to your message?
Speaker 2 (05:59):
All around the world, wherever I go, folks and
institutions are aware of thepressures that they're under.
Um, so many aspects of the waythat we're currently living are
not sustainable?
Um, for all kinds of reasons,and one of the very basic ones
is that they are their.
Their procedures are divergingincreasingly from our most basic
(06:23):
human values, and that's thedoor that's left the jar.
And really the challenge ishaving the concrete experience
that enables them to be able tothink okay, this is someone I
can let in.
It's not lack of willingness, itoften seems, I think, to many
(06:43):
people oh, my goodness, how am Iever going to make it into the
big building where people makedecisions?
But those people are looking outof the window longingly at us
outside thinking.
Please will you give me thesolidity, the experience that I
want to feel that you've beenthrough the things that I've
been through minimally enoughfor me to be able to justify
(07:10):
letting you in because we needso much help.
But, of course, when we standthere either shouting at them to
change or saying well, I havethis brilliant idea, you should
give me a chance to experimentwith it.
Well, that's a pretty toughcall to make when you are
responsible for an environmentlike a prison, like a school
system, you can't really playaround.
It's not very good reason whythey don't let us in.
(07:32):
So I think a lot of it is justmaking sure that we have done
the groundwork before we knockon the door, and most times I
(07:54):
find these folks know theirsystems well.
They can work out in just a fewminutes.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
So are you approaching prison officials
with a specific proposal?
What are you?
Speaker 2 (08:10):
offering when you approach them.
I think the most fundamentalthing that we're offering is
that we're interested inlearning from them more than
we're interested in applying ourgood ideas.
Okay, and that's already sadlyvery refreshing for many of them
.
They've had a lot of proposals,they see a lot of projects.
They're always aware that thereare folks in political
(08:34):
positions and different placesin the hierarchy or neighboring
hierarchies that want to maketheir mark by doing their pet
projects and they have to dealwith the consequences of that.
So if someone shows up and saysI'm actually interested in
finding out what you havenoticed works best and
strengthening your ability to dothat, that's already
(08:56):
interesting.
The place where it gets trickyand potentially powerful for
them, but also somewhatdisorienting, is when we say and
we want to do the same, forinstance, in the school system
with the students, or in aprison system, we want to do the
same with the prisoners, wewant to listen to the guards.
In the same way, I'm interestedin the experience of the people
(09:18):
who sweep the floors and cook,because everybody in these
contexts has really valuablewisdom to share.
But the folks who are mostdistant from the center of the
hierarchical power are often theones who have most access to
that local intelligence thatoften goes is ignored, unnamed,
(09:39):
unseen.
So it's not every administratorof a social system who is
willing to take those steps.
But, unfortunately or not, asthings get harder for them, the
willingness increases becausethey know they need help, even
if it's uncomfortable for themto take it from people who don't
(10:01):
have the same structural powerthat they do.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
So you mentioned that you've been active in the
prison system and in theeducation systems and a lot of
your earlier work and currentwork has been focused in Brazil,
but now you've also moved intoItaly and Switzerland.
(10:27):
In the school systems, um, inboth cases and in the prison
system prison system in Italy Iam, um, I'm curious about what
you are, um, what's consistentin these, in these environments
that you're in and you know, uh,what's consistent in these
(10:49):
environments that you're in andyou know, with the bulk of your
early experience being in Brazil?
I could see how it might bethought that there are certain
elements that are particular tolocation or to the particular
circumstances of the schoolsthat you've been working in in
Brazil, like are there universaltakeaways that you're arriving
at?
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Yeah, I'm always curious about that.
I can't say.
Maybe none of us can ever saythat something is universal.
But already many years agobecause I would obviously travel
, even if only briefly I canremember walking into a prison
in the middle of a rural area ofSenegal and immediately knowing
where I was and thinking, well,how is this possible?
How am I not disoriented?
(11:30):
This is a completely differentculture.
Well, yeah, but that, that model, that that colonial suggestion,
that this is how we deal withconflict, um, that,
unfortunately, is similareverywhere.
So there, we may not be able tosay it's universal, but you can
certainly say where there'sEuropean colonial influence, you
(11:53):
see the same strategies comingup time and time again and you
see the same thinking that thepopulation needs to be trained
in in order to be able tosustain these processes, and it
needs to be really strongindoctrination, because these
strategies are horrendouslyineffective and profoundly
dehumanizing.
There are so many reasons whyyou wouldn't want to do this.
(12:17):
It's expensive, it corrodescommunity safety, it diminishes
the cohesion, it breaks upfamilies.
It's a horrend, horrendousstrategy.
So why would it be so popular?
Why do we put so much resourcesand attention into it?
Um, so, yeah, so it's, it'spretty common.
And then, uh, another painfulthing to notice is that the
(12:40):
architectural similaritiesbetween prisons and schools.
That's also pretty commoneverywhere you look, and it
hasn't been different in thebuildings that I've been able to
observe everywhere I've been sofar.
So there's also something goingon there.
And as we're talking about bothprisons and schools at the same
time, it's inevitable werecognize the similarities and
(13:03):
how different that is from theoriginal vision of what
education is to be.
And a school is a space inwhich all the conclusions and
fixed ideas are temporarilysuspended so that we can look
and inquire into the dynamics ofthe universe and of ourselves
and of all the differentsubjects, all the different
aspects of life on this planetwhich are so fascinating to us.
(13:26):
That dream of a school.
It's extraordinary that it'sstill alive, but it's under huge
pressure from the imposition ofthese ideas that in there is
one group of people whose job itis to control the other group
of people.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
How long does an engagement last?
Because I'm hearing that you'redoing a lot of deep listening,
um for um, for people'sperspectives and stories, uh,
across the spectrum of differentroles that they hold in the
school or in the prison.
You're you're you're.
(14:03):
You're getting a sampling of umkind of a holistic view.
Ideally, after that, listeningtakes place.
What happens next?
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Well, I think that's interesting because most people
would invite me in to initiallyobserve, to listen, to notice
what's going on and then expectthat there's a response.
But my understanding is thatlistening is learning.
There isn't an after thelistening.
Listening is, in fact, theactivity.
So listening to ourselves,listening to each other and of
(14:39):
course that includes listeningto someone with life experience
and wisdom that I don't have,listening to someone who's
profoundly studied a subject sothat I can borrow and grow from
their learning and from theknowledge that they have.
But it also means the piecewhich is often missing from many
of our current schools,especially in the high school
area, which is the time tolisten to each other, to process
(15:01):
what it is that we're learningand that subject which gets left
(15:21):
off the curriculum again, whichis particularly important for
adolescents, which is me.
A primary source of learning ofadolescents is themselves
there's so much to say and thecapacities that they're going to
need to not just live in theworld as it is, but to survive
the current moment that we're inand to adapt and transform the
(15:41):
conditions that science tells usare unsustainable and to be
able to deal with processing andtransforming the many
injustices which we'reincreasingly unable to repress
within us and between us and insociety, and are coming out and
(16:01):
for health and survival, need tobe expressed, and not just
expressed, to be heard in asense, like oh yeah, and I heard
what you said, but to to,through being heard, to actually
transform the reality that thatwe're, that we're talking about
.
So I'm not sure that there isan after listening.
Okay, I think, because oflistening, then action is
(16:24):
possible yeah, you know, hmm,you know.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
there's this saying time is money.
Speaker 2 (16:30):
You've heard that.
Speaker 1 (16:31):
And certainly here in the States in the West and
throughout the world largely,there's kind of this capitalist
sensibility that wants to.
That's like keeping track oftime spent on a thing before you
got to get to the next thingand there's a sense of like
scarcity of time and I thinkthat that's contributes to some
(16:54):
of the um, the lack of evolutionand movement and change in some
of, in some of our, our systemsthat we're, that we're working
in.
You know there's, there is asense of pressure that's felt
and you know any movement awayfrom what's known and
established or anyexperimentation, it's like you
(17:15):
know there's an expectation ofpayoff for that.
I'm curious about yourrelationship with time and if
there's any sort of um sentimentor sensibilities that you hope
to like stimulate in people thatyou're interacting with in in
(17:37):
these forays into the schoolsand the prisons relating to time
and pressure, um uh, that youhope might, you know, continue
(17:58):
to reverberate after, afteryourate, after your immediate
work.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
There is done, chosen , different aspects, different
kinds of time than maybe we dothese days in the way that we
speak about it.
Our understanding of time,clock time is very much focused
on stimulating productivity, andthat has its place.
We have a financial systemwhich there's always more debt
than there is money incirculation, intentionally, and
(18:23):
that keeps us running after thesense of lack all the time and
keeps us in a state ofcompetition with each other,
even if we've never met, or evenas we sleep.
We're basically competing forthe scarce resources to try and
compensate for what's missing.
But there's so many otheraspects of time and I think, in
an environment like a school,relational time which is not
(18:49):
measured by the clock butmeasured by the depth of meaning
and connection between humanbeings and the games, both
playful and very serious, thatwe can make the agreements that
we can question, the agreementsthat we can transform.
This is one of the reasons whyI'm so interested in the
(19:10):
transformative power of conflict, because conflict requires that
relational time, it requires adynamic of shared power, it
requires a circularity in orderfor the change that it is
offering us to manifest in newpossibilities, in new agreements
.
So I think there needs to be anunderstanding, an economic
(19:33):
understanding of forms of timebeyond the productive, and I
think education is a key space,social space, in which that's
possible there are.
In a religious environment, thetime of contemplation is also
equally crucial to ourwell-being.
(19:53):
But in an educationalperspective I often miss that
sense of time.
So the last two weeks of August, so just the week before last,
I had a wonderful opportunity toexperiment, creating an
experimental testing ground forwhat could be a high school in
Italy.
We just had two weeks togetherand I heard on the last day a
(20:17):
phrase that I've now heardeverywhere I've been.
Someone was saying I usuallyfeel so alone, even with my
friends.
Sometimes I feel so alone.
And here I feel so alone.
And here I was never alone inthe sense of abandoned, when I
was without other people.
It was because I was fullyengrossed in the activity that I
was learning myself, and itgives me the sense that I've
(20:41):
known all of you forever, eventhough I actually only met you
two weeks ago.
So this is a high schoolstudent talking about that
position and that experience oftime being suspended.
I mean not being able tomeasure how long we've been
together.
That indicates for me a veryfertile and essential potential
(21:15):
for development.
There's a sense of being, adeep sense of belonging and
connectedness into a communityof people not based on knowing
their name or agreeing withtheir opinions on things liking
the same music, wearing the sameclothes.
It's not based on affinity.
Same clothes it's not based onaffinity.
It's a sense of community basedon a shared understanding of
the fact that we inhabit thisplanet together.
(21:37):
So the realities that we createon that level are the
fundamental realities that willend up having been most
meaningful.
One of the subjects the kidswanted to look at, of course we
were looking at history,philosophy, mathematics, music,
languages.
There were all kinds ofsubjects that they wanted to
look at, which wouldn't bestrange on a school curriculum.
But they also wanted to lookinto questions like how does
(21:58):
change in society happen?
They ask questions like what doI need to do now so that when
I'm 60, I don't think that mylife was wasted?
So obviously that was a littlebit hard for me to hear because,
like, 60 is your idea of whatold is.
I was hoping that they weregoing to think about that in
(22:19):
terms of 80, but no, okay, 60.
And these are questions thatnormal schools don't have space
for and these are questions thatrequire time.
It was they that organized thetimetable.
They decided that we were goingto spend three hours together
every day, 2.30 in the afternoontill 5.30.
We didn't leave at 5.30 asingle time.
(22:40):
We were leaving at 7.30, 8.30.
One day we left at 9.30, andthe reason was because, after
the more subject-focused lessonsthat occurred, they wanted to
process what they learned, theywanted to investigate what it
meant for them and they wantedto hear what it meant for us.
And those conversations requirea quality of listening which
(23:02):
the clock cannot attain, whichthe clock cannot attain.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
Could it be said, dominic, that you're in a sense
kind of preaching to the choirin the environments that you're
in?
So these are non-traditional,perhaps schools?
Right, and correct me if thatisn't the case.
I am thoughtful about how doesthis experience spread into the
(23:28):
mainstream?
Like, what is?
What is the process of that?
You know you are a dynamo andyou, you, you.
You go to and find yourself indifferent spots around the world
and you are an individual.
So do you have co-conspirators?
Do you have people that you'reworking with?
You know how does this workbegin to scale?
Speaker 2 (23:52):
Yeah, so I am interested in creating new
social systems that are foundedon a dialogical or relational
conception, rather than the onesthat we're used to, and the
high school that we ran in Riofor several years and this
little two-week experiment lastmonth in Italy are examples of
that.
But most of the schools in thecontext that I'm talking about,
(24:12):
they're very traditional, veryhierarchical.
They're schools like I went to,like we went to.
I'm not really preaching to thechoir, I'm listening to the
choir, thank you, I'm learningfrom them.
These experiences were entirelycreated the two I just
mentioned by the students and bythe adults.
It's not a student-ledinstitution, it's a dialogical
(24:35):
institution, so it's about theinteraction between people, and
all knowledge is welcome andvaluable in that context.
Context, but most schools thatI go into are not like that.
Okay, so yesterday I had thegreat privilege to finally spend
an entire day in a school inthe US, so it was in Padilla,
here in Rochester, on theFranklin campus.
So the school that many of youmay know previously as having
(24:58):
been called Franklin and nowit's called Padilla, and so
you're an adult.
So you go in through adults,you meet adults initially and
adults are the people you orientto.
But as you get to spend morethan a few hours but a whole day
there, you keep noticing thesame faces showing up, the same
kids on corridors in lessons,coming into the help zone, and
(25:22):
you see the liveliness of them.
And you also see themindicating.
They're pointing towardssomething, they're speaking
about, a possibility.
They may not have language forit, they might not be able to
articulate in the way thatadults are interested in or give
value to, but what they'repointing to, what they're
indicating, is of great value tome and great interest.
I'm always curious about what'slurking at the edges.
(25:42):
What is it that's showing upbut not being named?
What is it that exists butdoesn't appear, doesn't get
validated, because that's wherechange, that's where innovation,
that's where creativity comesfrom.
You can see it really clearlyin music.
The way that new movements ofmusic appear is always basically
(26:02):
the same.
It starts really at the edgeswhere no one is looking is
always basically the same.
It starts really at the edgeswhere no one is looking and just
through pure force ofcreativity and insistence and
just being closer to speaking atruth about the way we're living
now that music is unstoppable.
It just overwhelms us and Ithink that that is very much
(26:22):
what Gandhi and other peoplewere talking about when they
were naming nonviolence.
I think that's how nonviolenceworks, very similar to how art
works.
I think it happens in science.
I think it happens in all kindsof areas of life, that
something that is just closer totruth, closer to precision and
accuracy.
It can be repressed and denied,but eventually it will come
(26:44):
through.
I think the same happens in thesphere of innovation and social
systems.
So my co-conspirators are thefolks who no one else is paying
attention to or the people whomaybe are receiving attention,
but they're receiving charitableattention.
Oh, I'm going to help thembecause they're suffering,
(27:05):
they're in difficulty, they needextra attention, but not
necessarily listening to what itis that they're saying,
recognizing their situation butnot actually validating their
voice.
So those are my co-conspirators, and that's what makes it a
little tricky, because theadults who invited me in haven't
always planned on.
I try to be as transparent as Ican, but they haven't always
(27:26):
planned on.
I try to be as transparent as Ican, but they haven't always
planned on me doing that.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
Yeah, yeah.
What does a school leader, aprincipal, a superintendent,
what, what, what do these peopleneed in order to invest in
restorative practices in ameaningful way?
What preconditions need to bethere?
What support?
What are the ingredients thatmake for possibility?
Speaker 2 (27:54):
there most truthful answer is I don't know.
I never know, and recognizingthat I don't know for me is
essential, because that orientsme towards listening, towards
learning, towards understandingthe experience of the other.
(28:15):
When I respond to any questionthrough knowledge, then I
accidentally deny their ownexperience and I deny what's
happening right now and replaceit with the accumulated memory I
have of the past.
So I don't know what thosepeople need, and that's why I
need to pay a lot of attentionto what they say, but, more
fundamentally even than that, towhat they actually mean by what
(28:38):
they say.
So a lot of us are usinglanguage in the way that we've
been brought up we're repeatingexpressions, we're repeating
phrases that have already beencooked, and most of the time
it's close enough to what'sactually happening right now for
us to be able to work it outtogether.
But there are times and I thinksocially we're going through
(28:58):
one now when we really need tobe able to articulate things in
a way that doesn't refer to thepast, because this moment is not
a moment that humanity has beenthrough before.
So I want to listen to whatthey say, but I also
fundamentally want to see if Ican tap into what they mean, and
then I want to respond to it.
I want to make sure that eachtime I listen, I never stop by
(29:20):
saying, hmm, interesting, thanksfor sharing, but that it
actually moves forward intoaction, because if things don't
change, people will stoparticulating the truth.
Because it's very painful todig down inside and actually
speak about what's happening andthen find that nothing happens.
As a result, there's nocelebration, there's no mourning
, there's no transformation.
(29:47):
So I want to listen to whatthese people are telling me that
they need, and what they'retelling me that they need often
is a great deal more support.
Of course, support can be manykinds of material support,
financial support,administrative support, all
kinds of support but I thinkthere's a quality of moral
support or empathic support.
There's a there's a willingnessto be present to the other
person in a way that doesn'tinterfere, doesn't try and
(30:08):
change them, save them, guidethem, teach them, doesn't agree
with them and doesn't disagreewith them, and that's beautiful,
because anybody, at any moment,with no prior preparation, can
do that, can be present tosomeone else like that.
I think that's an essentialnutrient that is missing for
many people, and often thereason it's missing is time.
(30:29):
Oh, I don't have time for that.
So support is crucial.
And then we get onto the morepractical things, and then what
we need is people to just bemore transparent about what they
see, what they're noticing, sothat we have a sense of company,
because many of these people inleadership positions, almost
the definition of leadership issolitude, and this is a problem.
(30:53):
Leadership as isolation fromothers is not a helpful strategy
.
So that military definition ofleadership is something that I'm
really interested intranscending and moving towards
a really, really differentapproach.
And I can see I've had theprivilege even here in the last
few days of being with people inleadership positions who the
(31:17):
first thing they do is humanizethemselves and make it clear
that they are open to adifferent kind of relationship.
That gives me a lot of hopewhen I see that.
I saw that at Padilla yesterday.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
I am curious, Dominic , about what you do to sustain
yourself in the course of thework that you do in environments
that are experiencing variousdegrees of challenge.
Uh, there's, there's apressurization that's taking,
(31:54):
taking place.
Um, you know, you're makingyourself available and being
present and listening, and um,and there's, there's, there's an
energy exchange there you knowhow do you sustain yourself to
continue to show up and be andbe present and uh, and fully
(32:16):
invested in this work.
Speaker 2 (32:17):
Well, I try to take myself as seriously as the, as
the people I get to learn from.
So I try to to make sure thatI'm as fully nourished with
support, in particular thatquality of presence and empathy
that I'm talking about as thefolks I have the privilege to
hang out with, and I try tolisten to the voices, the
(32:37):
feelings, the desires in me,which are also marginalized and
unheard and often disregarded,the voices at the edges of my
awareness of myself, just as Imight do in a social institution
, take them seriously and makesure that everybody gets their
place at the table and everybodygets fed.
(32:58):
I think that that's just asimportant, and I was resistant
to do that for a long time.
I thought it would be a kind ofto take, take, basically to
take care of myself would kindof be a luxury which would
further separate me from otherpeople.
It's a very strong idea, um,and I only that only began to
change when I realized that Idon't actually get support for
(33:22):
myself.
I get support for the peoplewho have to deal with me when I
am undernourished, because,despite all my best attempts,
other people will suffer theconsequences of hanging out with
me when I'm not well fed, giventhe things, the tasks that we
are all trying to do together,and there will be hard moments.
(33:45):
Just before I came in here, Iwas on a meeting and someone was
dropping out of a project thatwe'd just begun, and it's a huge
loss, not just the talent ofthis individual, but we're not
keeping our word with theinstitution that we're working
with anymore and we're oneperson down and I don't know
where to find someone else.
So a knock like that, if Idon't make sure there's a space
(34:08):
where my concern about thathappening, the impact that it
has on me, gets fully listenedto and that transforms into
action, and I'm going to comeinto this conversation and,
unbeknownst to you, with noexplanation, you're going to pay
the price.
Hey, what's happened to Dominic?
Why isn't he not?
He's just kind of not all here.
He's showing up with 95% and Idon't know why.
(34:30):
And now I have to carry the can.
So I think taking care ofourselves as seriously as we
take care of other people is, infact, part of taking care of
other people.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
I appreciate that For folks who want to connect,
connect with you, learn moreabout your work is.
Are there other ways for?
Speaker 2 (34:52):
you to be.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
What are the best ways for folks to reach you down
?
Speaker 2 (34:54):
yeah, I have to admit the last year.
One of the best things thatI've done is take a step back
from social media.
Um, I was pretty active and Itook a pause because someone
mentioned health consequences ofit and I was a little skeptical
, but yeah okay for a couple ofweeks, let's see what happens.
Speaker 1 (35:12):
Everybody's talking about the impact on your mental
health Sure it doesn't doanything to me.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
Oh, my goodness, I was astonished by the impact.
So your mileage may vary, butit was extraordinary for me.
So you can still find me online, but not as frequently as in
the past.
You can find me on X or Twitter.
You can find me on Instagram Um, uh, yeah, I think in English.
(35:38):
Those are, those are the.
Those are the places, becausemost of what I posted was on was
in Portuguese.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Those are the places, because most of what I posted
was in Portuguese.
Okay, care to share with usjust what's next for you, what's
on your immediate horizon,before we conclude for today,
damian.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
Yeah, I'm just about off to RIT to give a talk with
students there.
Then we drive to Montreal.
We have work in Montreal, thenback to the States.
I'm going to Maine, going toTexas and then back to Brazil,
and I'm just going to.
At the moment I'm going to keeptraveling and I'm really
(36:23):
enthusiastic about thepossibilities that are opening
up in.
Speaker 1 (36:24):
Rochester, especially in the school district, and
hoping I'll be back and able tocontinue that conversation in
the near future.
I appreciate you spending thistime with me today.
Dominic Barter, thank you somuch.
And um, this has beenperspectives on peace
transforming tomorrow.
Thank you very much forlistening.
Welcome to Perspectives on Peace
Transforming Tomorrow, thepodcast brought to you by the MK
Gandhi Institute forNonviolence.
My name is Aaron Thompson andI'm very pleased to be seated
once again with Dominic Barter.
Good morning.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Dominic.
Good morning Aaron.
It's a great pleasure to beback here.
Really good to and with you.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Yeah, it's the same.
Very good to be chatting withyou once again.
Dominic is, I wouldn't say, afrequent flyer, but has been on
here a couple times in the past,and we have talked about some
of the work that you do, dominic, in the context of restorative
(00:46):
processes and practices.
Would you agree with thatcharacterization?
Yep, okay.
So, dominic, you were last onthe program, I don't know a year
or so ago and letting no grassgrow under your feet as you do.
Can you give us a little bit ofan overview of what you've been
up to since that point in time,as a highlight to you?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Yeah, it's been a really interesting time in my
life because my daughter hasgrown up and gone to university
and now she's in employment andlives with others and is having
her life.
So that sense of needing toalways rush back home has
changed into the spaciousness tobe able to develop the work
(01:31):
that I do outside the context ofRio de Janeiro specifically and
Brazil in general.
So I've had the opportunity tospend extended periods of time
in different places around theworld and begin to pick up the
possibility notice where sproutsare sprouting, where seeds are
(01:54):
being planted for thepossibility of doing the work
that I do in a deeper and morestructured way way.
So that's involved a secondphase of the work in prisons in
Italy building restorativesystems amongst the prisoners
(02:14):
for the conflicts they have witheach other, but also stretching
that to those prisoners who areon work leave, so they still
sleep in the prison but they getto leave during the day and
work.
It's meant being able to gointo new wings and to start
projects in new prisons.
Sometimes we don't evenactually get to the prisoners in
(02:35):
one particular prison.
The focus of the work the folksin the prison who make this
decision has been on simplysupporting the governor and the
court team.
They all just recognize thattheir capacity to bring about
the kind of changes that theywant to see in that context is
(02:56):
dependent on their ability tojust survive the day in their
job.
We know from studies all aroundthe world that the mental
health impact on prison officersand administration in prisons
is incredibly high and, ofcourse, the impact on prisoners
and their mental health is alsoincredibly high, and it just
(03:18):
creates a hugely problematicenvironment.
So that's been a veryinteresting new turn.
And then just lots of work inschools, which always requires
ongoing commitment and time.
So we started a new project inhigh schools in Italy, started a
project in a public primaryschool in Switzerland that's the
(03:38):
first of its kind in thatcountry and the first time I've
worked in that particularcontext.
And that month last year, thelast time we spoke in the States
, was really fascinating Went todifferent communities in
different parts of the country,both urban and rural, and just
(04:00):
sitting down with people who areon the different kinds of front
lines and looking at what theirreality is like and what they
need in order to shift things ina direction which increasingly
trusts the intelligence of thecommunity, trusts the experience
of people who are suffering themost adversity and just
transitions away from this logic, which is still really dominant
, of seeing everything in termsof projects and programs and
(04:22):
manuals and trainings.
Everything is about theimposition of knowledge from
outside and, however wonderfulthat experience is, however
useful the origin of it is, thefact is that we keep repeating
this basically colonial dynamicwhere we're saying the folks who
are suffering are unable tosustain themselves and something
(04:43):
must be brought in from outside, are unable to sustain
themselves and something must bebrought in from outside, and we
keep accidentally trampling ontheir own endogenous
understanding of their ownreality, the understanding that
grows where they are in theirlife experience and missing so
much of that wisdom.
So it's been wonderful to dothat and I'm super happy to be
(05:04):
back and have another go.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
Indeed, I am really intrigued by the work that
you're doing in the prisonsystem, which, almost by
definition, is hyper regimented,rule based.
There's a strong imposition oforder.
I'm really curious about yourability to work your way into an
(05:35):
actual prison system and beginintroducing some of these
concepts that would seem toundermine a lot of the order and
the ways of maintaining safetythat are hallmarks of prison
systems.
How have prison leadershipreceived you and been receptive
(05:56):
to your message?
Speaker 2 (05:59):
All around the world, wherever I go, folks and
institutions are aware of thepressures that they're under.
Um, so many aspects of the waythat we're currently living are
not sustainable?
Um, for all kinds of reasons,and one of the very basic ones
is that they are their.
Their procedures are divergingincreasingly from our most basic
(06:23):
human values, and that's thedoor that's left the jar.
And really the challenge ishaving the concrete experience
that enables them to be able tothink okay, this is someone I
can let in.
It's not lack of willingness, itoften seems, I think, to many
(06:43):
people oh, my goodness, how am Iever going to make it into the
big building where people makedecisions?
But those people are looking outof the window longingly at us
outside thinking.
Please will you give me thesolidity, the experience that I
want to feel that you've beenthrough the things that I've
been through minimally enoughfor me to be able to justify
(07:10):
letting you in because we needso much help.
But, of course, when we standthere either shouting at them to
change or saying well, I havethis brilliant idea, you should
give me a chance to experimentwith it.
Well, that's a pretty toughcall to make when you are
responsible for an environmentlike a prison, like a school
system, you can't really playaround.
It's not very good reason whythey don't let us in.
(07:32):
So I think a lot of it is justmaking sure that we have done
the groundwork before we knockon the door, and most times I
(07:54):
find these folks know theirsystems well.
They can work out in just a fewminutes.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
So are you approaching prison officials
with a specific proposal?
What are you?
Speaker 2 (08:10):
offering when you approach them.
I think the most fundamentalthing that we're offering is
that we're interested inlearning from them more than
we're interested in applying ourgood ideas.
Okay, and that's already sadlyvery refreshing for many of them
.
They've had a lot of proposals,they see a lot of projects.
They're always aware that thereare folks in political
(08:34):
positions and different placesin the hierarchy or neighboring
hierarchies that want to maketheir mark by doing their pet
projects and they have to dealwith the consequences of that.
So if someone shows up and saysI'm actually interested in
finding out what you havenoticed works best and
strengthening your ability to dothat, that's already
(08:56):
interesting.
The place where it gets trickyand potentially powerful for
them, but also somewhatdisorienting, is when we say and
we want to do the same, forinstance, in the school system
with the students, or in aprison system, we want to do the
same with the prisoners, wewant to listen to the guards.
In the same way, I'm interestedin the experience of the people
(09:18):
who sweep the floors and cook,because everybody in these
contexts has really valuablewisdom to share.
But the folks who are mostdistant from the center of the
hierarchical power are often theones who have most access to
that local intelligence thatoften goes is ignored, unnamed,
(09:39):
unseen.
So it's not every administratorof a social system who is
willing to take those steps.
But, unfortunately or not, asthings get harder for them, the
willingness increases becausethey know they need help, even
if it's uncomfortable for themto take it from people who don't
(10:01):
have the same structural powerthat they do.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
So you mentioned that you've been active in the
prison system and in theeducation systems and a lot of
your earlier work and currentwork has been focused in Brazil,
but now you've also moved intoItaly and Switzerland.
(10:27):
In the school systems, um, inboth cases and in the prison
system prison system in Italy Iam, um, I'm curious about what
you are, um, what's consistentin these, in these environments
that you're in and you know, uh,what's consistent in these
(10:49):
environments that you're in andyou know, with the bulk of your
early experience being in Brazil?
I could see how it might bethought that there are certain
elements that are particular tolocation or to the particular
circumstances of the schoolsthat you've been working in in
Brazil, like are there universaltakeaways that you're arriving
at?
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Yeah, I'm always curious about that.
I can't say.
Maybe none of us can ever saythat something is universal.
But already many years agobecause I would obviously travel
, even if only briefly I canremember walking into a prison
in the middle of a rural area ofSenegal and immediately knowing
where I was and thinking, well,how is this possible?
How am I not disoriented?
(11:30):
This is a completely differentculture.
Well, yeah, but that, that model, that that colonial suggestion,
that this is how we deal withconflict, um, that,
unfortunately, is similareverywhere.
So there, we may not be able tosay it's universal, but you can
certainly say where there'sEuropean colonial influence, you
(11:53):
see the same strategies comingup time and time again and you
see the same thinking that thepopulation needs to be trained
in in order to be able tosustain these processes, and it
needs to be really strongindoctrination, because these
strategies are horrendouslyineffective and profoundly
dehumanizing.
There are so many reasons whyyou wouldn't want to do this.
(12:17):
It's expensive, it corrodescommunity safety, it diminishes
the cohesion, it breaks upfamilies.
It's a horrend, horrendousstrategy.
So why would it be so popular?
Why do we put so much resourcesand attention into it?
Um, so, yeah, so it's, it'spretty common.
And then, uh, another painfulthing to notice is that the
(12:40):
architectural similaritiesbetween prisons and schools.
That's also pretty commoneverywhere you look, and it
hasn't been different in thebuildings that I've been able to
observe everywhere I've been sofar.
So there's also something goingon there.
And as we're talking about bothprisons and schools at the same
time, it's inevitable werecognize the similarities and
(13:03):
how different that is from theoriginal vision of what
education is to be.
And a school is a space inwhich all the conclusions and
fixed ideas are temporarilysuspended so that we can look
and inquire into the dynamics ofthe universe and of ourselves
and of all the differentsubjects, all the different
aspects of life on this planetwhich are so fascinating to us.
(13:26):
That dream of a school.
It's extraordinary that it'sstill alive, but it's under huge
pressure from the imposition ofthese ideas that in there is
one group of people whose job itis to control the other group
of people.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
How long does an engagement last?
Because I'm hearing that you'redoing a lot of deep listening,
um for um, for people'sperspectives and stories, uh,
across the spectrum of differentroles that they hold in the
school or in the prison.
You're you're you're.
(14:03):
You're getting a sampling of umkind of a holistic view.
Ideally, after that, listeningtakes place.
What happens next?
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Well, I think that's interesting because most people
would invite me in to initiallyobserve, to listen, to notice
what's going on and then expectthat there's a response.
But my understanding is thatlistening is learning.
There isn't an after thelistening.
Listening is, in fact, theactivity.
So listening to ourselves,listening to each other and of
(14:39):
course that includes listeningto someone with life experience
and wisdom that I don't have,listening to someone who's
profoundly studied a subject sothat I can borrow and grow from
their learning and from theknowledge that they have.
But it also means the piecewhich is often missing from many
of our current schools,especially in the high school
area, which is the time tolisten to each other, to process
(15:01):
what it is that we're learningand that subject which gets left
(15:21):
off the curriculum again, whichis particularly important for
adolescents, which is me.
A primary source of learning ofadolescents is themselves
there's so much to say and thecapacities that they're going to
need to not just live in theworld as it is, but to survive
the current moment that we're inand to adapt and transform the
(15:41):
conditions that science tells usare unsustainable and to be
able to deal with processing andtransforming the many
injustices which we'reincreasingly unable to repress
within us and between us and insociety, and are coming out and
(16:01):
for health and survival, need tobe expressed, and not just
expressed, to be heard in asense, like oh yeah, and I heard
what you said, but to to,through being heard, to actually
transform the reality that thatwe're, that we're talking about
.
So I'm not sure that there isan after listening.
Okay, I think, because oflistening, then action is
(16:24):
possible yeah, you know, hmm,you know.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
there's this saying time is money.
Speaker 2 (16:30):
You've heard that.
Speaker 1 (16:31):
And certainly here in the States in the West and
throughout the world largely,there's kind of this capitalist
sensibility that wants to.
That's like keeping track oftime spent on a thing before you
got to get to the next thingand there's a sense of like
scarcity of time and I thinkthat that's contributes to some
(16:54):
of the um, the lack of evolutionand movement and change in some
of, in some of our, our systemsthat we're, that we're working
in.
You know there's, there is asense of pressure that's felt
and you know any movement awayfrom what's known and
established or anyexperimentation, it's like you
(17:15):
know there's an expectation ofpayoff for that.
I'm curious about yourrelationship with time and if
there's any sort of um sentimentor sensibilities that you hope
to like stimulate in people thatyou're interacting with in in
(17:37):
these forays into the schoolsand the prisons relating to time
and pressure, um uh, that youhope might, you know, continue
(17:58):
to reverberate after, afteryourate, after your immediate
work.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
There is done, chosen , different aspects, different
kinds of time than maybe we dothese days in the way that we
speak about it.
Our understanding of time,clock time is very much focused
on stimulating productivity, andthat has its place.
We have a financial systemwhich there's always more debt
than there is money incirculation, intentionally, and
(18:23):
that keeps us running after thesense of lack all the time and
keeps us in a state ofcompetition with each other,
even if we've never met, or evenas we sleep.
We're basically competing forthe scarce resources to try and
compensate for what's missing.
But there's so many otheraspects of time and I think, in
an environment like a school,relational time which is not
(18:49):
measured by the clock butmeasured by the depth of meaning
and connection between humanbeings and the games, both
playful and very serious, thatwe can make the agreements that
we can question, the agreementsthat we can transform.
This is one of the reasons whyI'm so interested in the
(19:10):
transformative power of conflict, because conflict requires that
relational time, it requires adynamic of shared power, it
requires a circularity in orderfor the change that it is
offering us to manifest in newpossibilities, in new agreements
.
So I think there needs to be anunderstanding, an economic
(19:33):
understanding of forms of timebeyond the productive, and I
think education is a key space,social space, in which that's
possible there are.
In a religious environment, thetime of contemplation is also
equally crucial to ourwell-being.
(19:53):
But in an educationalperspective I often miss that
sense of time.
So the last two weeks of August, so just the week before last,
I had a wonderful opportunity toexperiment, creating an
experimental testing ground forwhat could be a high school in
Italy.
We just had two weeks togetherand I heard on the last day a
(20:17):
phrase that I've now heardeverywhere I've been.
Someone was saying I usuallyfeel so alone, even with my
friends.
Sometimes I feel so alone.
And here I feel so alone.
And here I was never alone inthe sense of abandoned, when I
was without other people.
It was because I was fullyengrossed in the activity that I
was learning myself, and itgives me the sense that I've
(20:41):
known all of you forever, eventhough I actually only met you
two weeks ago.
So this is a high schoolstudent talking about that
position and that experience oftime being suspended.
I mean not being able tomeasure how long we've been
together.
That indicates for me a veryfertile and essential potential
(21:15):
for development.
There's a sense of being, adeep sense of belonging and
connectedness into a communityof people not based on knowing
their name or agreeing withtheir opinions on things liking
the same music, wearing the sameclothes.
It's not based on affinity.
Same clothes it's not based onaffinity.
It's a sense of community basedon a shared understanding of
the fact that we inhabit thisplanet together.
(21:37):
So the realities that we createon that level are the
fundamental realities that willend up having been most
meaningful.
One of the subjects the kidswanted to look at, of course we
were looking at history,philosophy, mathematics, music,
languages.
There were all kinds ofsubjects that they wanted to
look at, which wouldn't bestrange on a school curriculum.
But they also wanted to lookinto questions like how does
(21:58):
change in society happen?
They ask questions like what doI need to do now so that when
I'm 60, I don't think that mylife was wasted?
So obviously that was a littlebit hard for me to hear because,
like, 60 is your idea of whatold is.
I was hoping that they weregoing to think about that in
(22:19):
terms of 80, but no, okay, 60.
And these are questions thatnormal schools don't have space
for and these are questions thatrequire time.
It was they that organized thetimetable.
They decided that we were goingto spend three hours together
every day, 2.30 in the afternoontill 5.30.
We didn't leave at 5.30 asingle time.
(22:40):
We were leaving at 7.30, 8.30.
One day we left at 9.30, andthe reason was because, after
the more subject-focused lessonsthat occurred, they wanted to
process what they learned, theywanted to investigate what it
meant for them and they wantedto hear what it meant for us.
And those conversations requirea quality of listening which
(23:02):
the clock cannot attain, whichthe clock cannot attain.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
Could it be said, dominic, that you're in a sense
kind of preaching to the choirin the environments that you're
in?
So these are non-traditional,perhaps schools?
Right, and correct me if thatisn't the case.
I am thoughtful about how doesthis experience spread into the
(23:28):
mainstream?
Like, what is?
What is the process of that?
You know you are a dynamo andyou, you, you.
You go to and find yourself indifferent spots around the world
and you are an individual.
So do you have co-conspirators?
Do you have people that you'reworking with?
You know how does this workbegin to scale?
Speaker 2 (23:52):
Yeah, so I am interested in creating new
social systems that are foundedon a dialogical or relational
conception, rather than the onesthat we're used to, and the
high school that we ran in Riofor several years and this
little two-week experiment lastmonth in Italy are examples of
that.
But most of the schools in thecontext that I'm talking about,
(24:12):
they're very traditional, veryhierarchical.
They're schools like I went to,like we went to.
I'm not really preaching to thechoir, I'm listening to the
choir, thank you, I'm learningfrom them.
These experiences were entirelycreated the two I just
mentioned by the students and bythe adults.
It's not a student-ledinstitution, it's a dialogical
(24:35):
institution, so it's about theinteraction between people, and
all knowledge is welcome andvaluable in that context.
Context, but most schools thatI go into are not like that.
Okay, so yesterday I had thegreat privilege to finally spend
an entire day in a school inthe US, so it was in Padilla,
here in Rochester, on theFranklin campus.
So the school that many of youmay know previously as having
(24:58):
been called Franklin and nowit's called Padilla, and so
you're an adult.
So you go in through adults,you meet adults initially and
adults are the people you orientto.
But as you get to spend morethan a few hours but a whole day
there, you keep noticing thesame faces showing up, the same
kids on corridors in lessons,coming into the help zone, and
(25:22):
you see the liveliness of them.
And you also see themindicating.
They're pointing towardssomething, they're speaking
about, a possibility.
They may not have language forit, they might not be able to
articulate in the way thatadults are interested in or give
value to, but what they'repointing to, what they're
indicating, is of great value tome and great interest.
I'm always curious about what'slurking at the edges.
(25:42):
What is it that's showing upbut not being named?
What is it that exists butdoesn't appear, doesn't get
validated, because that's wherechange, that's where innovation,
that's where creativity comesfrom.
You can see it really clearlyin music.
The way that new movements ofmusic appear is always basically
(26:02):
the same.
It starts really at the edgeswhere no one is looking is
always basically the same.
It starts really at the edgeswhere no one is looking and just
through pure force ofcreativity and insistence and
just being closer to speaking atruth about the way we're living
now that music is unstoppable.
It just overwhelms us and Ithink that that is very much
(26:22):
what Gandhi and other peoplewere talking about when they
were naming nonviolence.
I think that's how nonviolenceworks, very similar to how art
works.
I think it happens in science.
I think it happens in all kindsof areas of life, that
something that is just closer totruth, closer to precision and
accuracy.
It can be repressed and denied,but eventually it will come
(26:44):
through.
I think the same happens in thesphere of innovation and social
systems.
So my co-conspirators are thefolks who no one else is paying
attention to or the people whomaybe are receiving attention,
but they're receiving charitableattention.
Oh, I'm going to help thembecause they're suffering,
(27:05):
they're in difficulty, they needextra attention, but not
necessarily listening to what itis that they're saying,
recognizing their situation butnot actually validating their
voice.
So those are my co-conspirators, and that's what makes it a
little tricky, because theadults who invited me in haven't
always planned on.
I try to be as transparent as Ican, but they haven't always
(27:26):
planned on.
I try to be as transparent as Ican, but they haven't always
planned on me doing that.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
Yeah, yeah.
What does a school leader, aprincipal, a superintendent,
what, what, what do these peopleneed in order to invest in
restorative practices in ameaningful way?
What preconditions need to bethere?
What support?
What are the ingredients thatmake for possibility?
Speaker 2 (27:54):
there most truthful answer is I don't know.
I never know, and recognizingthat I don't know for me is
essential, because that orientsme towards listening, towards
learning, towards understandingthe experience of the other.
(28:15):
When I respond to any questionthrough knowledge, then I
accidentally deny their ownexperience and I deny what's
happening right now and replaceit with the accumulated memory I
have of the past.
So I don't know what thosepeople need, and that's why I
need to pay a lot of attentionto what they say, but, more
fundamentally even than that, towhat they actually mean by what
(28:38):
they say.
So a lot of us are usinglanguage in the way that we've
been brought up we're repeatingexpressions, we're repeating
phrases that have already beencooked, and most of the time
it's close enough to what'sactually happening right now for
us to be able to work it outtogether.
But there are times and I thinksocially we're going through
(28:58):
one now when we really need tobe able to articulate things in
a way that doesn't refer to thepast, because this moment is not
a moment that humanity has beenthrough before.
So I want to listen to whatthey say, but I also
fundamentally want to see if Ican tap into what they mean, and
then I want to respond to it.
I want to make sure that eachtime I listen, I never stop by
(29:20):
saying, hmm, interesting, thanksfor sharing, but that it
actually moves forward intoaction, because if things don't
change, people will stoparticulating the truth.
Because it's very painful todig down inside and actually
speak about what's happening andthen find that nothing happens.
As a result, there's nocelebration, there's no mourning
, there's no transformation.
(29:47):
So I want to listen to whatthese people are telling me that
they need, and what they'retelling me that they need often
is a great deal more support.
Of course, support can be manykinds of material support,
financial support,administrative support, all
kinds of support but I thinkthere's a quality of moral
support or empathic support.
There's a there's a willingnessto be present to the other
person in a way that doesn'tinterfere, doesn't try and
(30:08):
change them, save them, guidethem, teach them, doesn't agree
with them and doesn't disagreewith them, and that's beautiful,
because anybody, at any moment,with no prior preparation, can
do that, can be present tosomeone else like that.
I think that's an essentialnutrient that is missing for
many people, and often thereason it's missing is time.
(30:29):
Oh, I don't have time for that.
So support is crucial.
And then we get onto the morepractical things, and then what
we need is people to just bemore transparent about what they
see, what they're noticing, sothat we have a sense of company,
because many of these people inleadership positions, almost
the definition of leadership issolitude, and this is a problem.
(30:53):
Leadership as isolation fromothers is not a helpful strategy
.
So that military definition ofleadership is something that I'm
really interested intranscending and moving towards
a really, really differentapproach.
And I can see I've had theprivilege even here in the last
few days of being with people inleadership positions who the
(31:17):
first thing they do is humanizethemselves and make it clear
that they are open to adifferent kind of relationship.
That gives me a lot of hopewhen I see that.
I saw that at Padilla yesterday.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
I am curious, Dominic , about what you do to sustain
yourself in the course of thework that you do in environments
that are experiencing variousdegrees of challenge.
Uh, there's, there's apressurization that's taking,
(31:54):
taking place.
Um, you know, you're makingyourself available and being
present and listening, and um,and there's, there's, there's an
energy exchange there you knowhow do you sustain yourself to
continue to show up and be andbe present and uh, and fully
(32:16):
invested in this work.
Speaker 2 (32:17):
Well, I try to take myself as seriously as the, as
the people I get to learn from.
So I try to to make sure thatI'm as fully nourished with
support, in particular thatquality of presence and empathy
that I'm talking about as thefolks I have the privilege to
hang out with, and I try tolisten to the voices, the
(32:37):
feelings, the desires in me,which are also marginalized and
unheard and often disregarded,the voices at the edges of my
awareness of myself, just as Imight do in a social institution
, take them seriously and makesure that everybody gets their
place at the table and everybodygets fed.
(32:58):
I think that that's just asimportant, and I was resistant
to do that for a long time.
I thought it would be a kind ofto take, take, basically to
take care of myself would kindof be a luxury which would
further separate me from otherpeople.
It's a very strong idea, um,and I only that only began to
change when I realized that Idon't actually get support for
(33:22):
myself.
I get support for the peoplewho have to deal with me when I
am undernourished, because,despite all my best attempts,
other people will suffer theconsequences of hanging out with
me when I'm not well fed, giventhe things, the tasks that we
are all trying to do together,and there will be hard moments.
(33:45):
Just before I came in here, Iwas on a meeting and someone was
dropping out of a project thatwe'd just begun, and it's a huge
loss, not just the talent ofthis individual, but we're not
keeping our word with theinstitution that we're working
with anymore and we're oneperson down and I don't know
where to find someone else.
So a knock like that, if Idon't make sure there's a space
(34:08):
where my concern about thathappening, the impact that it
has on me, gets fully listenedto and that transforms into
action, and I'm going to comeinto this conversation and,
unbeknownst to you, with noexplanation, you're going to pay
the price.
Hey, what's happened to Dominic?
Why isn't he not?
He's just kind of not all here.
He's showing up with 95% and Idon't know why.
(34:30):
And now I have to carry the can.
So I think taking care ofourselves as seriously as we
take care of other people is, infact, part of taking care of
other people.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
I appreciate that For folks who want to connect,
connect with you, learn moreabout your work is.
Are there other ways for?
Speaker 2 (34:52):
you to be.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
What are the best ways for folks to reach you down
?
Speaker 2 (34:54):
yeah, I have to admit the last year.
One of the best things thatI've done is take a step back
from social media.
Um, I was pretty active and Itook a pause because someone
mentioned health consequences ofit and I was a little skeptical
, but yeah okay for a couple ofweeks, let's see what happens.
Speaker 1 (35:12):
Everybody's talking about the impact on your mental
health Sure it doesn't doanything to me.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
Oh, my goodness, I was astonished by the impact.
So your mileage may vary, butit was extraordinary for me.
So you can still find me online, but not as frequently as in
the past.
You can find me on X or Twitter.
You can find me on Instagram Um, uh, yeah, I think in English.
(35:38):
Those are, those are the.
Those are the places, becausemost of what I posted was on was
in Portuguese.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Those are the places, because most of what I posted
was in Portuguese.
Okay, care to share with usjust what's next for you, what's
on your immediate horizon,before we conclude for today,
damian.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
Yeah, I'm just about off to RIT to give a talk with
students there.
Then we drive to Montreal.
We have work in Montreal, thenback to the States.
I'm going to Maine, going toTexas and then back to Brazil,
and I'm just going to.
At the moment I'm going to keeptraveling and I'm really
(36:23):
enthusiastic about thepossibilities that are opening
up in.
Speaker 1 (36:24):
Rochester, especially in the school district, and
hoping I'll be back and able tocontinue that conversation in
the near future.
I appreciate you spending thistime with me today.
Dominic Barter, thank you somuch.
And um, this has beenperspectives on peace
transforming tomorrow.
Thank you very much forlistening.
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