My sweet tooth will be my undoing.
I just got back from the Association for Conflict Resolution (ACR) conference in New Orleans. Among other highlights, I got to meet some Twitter followers in real life — to wit, Jason Dykstra, Tammy Lenski, Cinnie Noble and Ben Zeigler. Check them out, because they’re doing amazing work. It was also great to hobnob with my fellow board members of the National Association for Community Mediation and the New York State Dispute Resolution Association, as well as my New York Peace Institute peeps…all of which rolled deep in the Big Easy.
And, I got to hear Leymah Gbowee‘s plenary spiel. If you’re not hip to her work, please watch Pray the Devil Back to Hell right quick. She’s fierce, funny, charismatic, and she’s done groundbreaking things to stop violence and promote women’s rights in Liberia. One the many gems she dropped: To build people’s capacity to build peace, first build yourself — a lesson I took to heart in the story that follows.
Click here for the rest of the story…
thehecklist.wordpress.com 
Loved this blog….so charming and great messages. Thanks for sharing. But would you have shared your stolen piece of cake? Kathy Giidman
That was Kathy Goodman not Kathy Giidman…bus lurched!
i’m in stitches.. brad this is hysterical! thanks for sharing, ummm…. well, you get it.
Heckman, you take the cake! Thanks for sharing. Who among us NY types hasn’t tried to pass her- or himself as a beer exec once in a while? Especially in New Orleans! Did anyone there mention you have moxie? Perhaps they used a different (spherical) term to describe the same…
So what’s the point in having cake and not being able to eat it? Joshua Greene won’t answer that, but he’s done some very interesting research with colleagues at the Moral Cognition Lab: http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/~jgreene/
IGreat story man. I agree with as you write: “…in mediation, we see a little slice of people’s lives that is probably not representative of the totality of their character. We often experience people at their worst — angry, hurt, frustrated, exhausted, defeated. Clients in mediation are far, far more than noisy neighbors, morose teenagers, contract Mediation is a great opportunity to help our clients see each other a bit more three-dimensionally. And if that can happen, mediation is successful — with or without a settlement.:
Best yet.
With the cake thing, as Fisher suggests, “make icing”.
Wow, Brad, this is brilliant. Thanks so much for sharing your misadventures with the world, and thanks for your kind words about the ACR Conference. I don’t usually drink Miller Beer, but I might pick up a six pack today and drink it in your honor.
Lou Gieszl
Past President
Association for Conflict Resolution
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