What's Possible with the Chrysalis Wisdom Council?

In teaching the Chrysalis Wisdom Council to hundreds of other people, I have found that it is an excellent method of producing noetic dialog in small groupsâ€”a powerful process for creating an energy shift that can change your behavior. The Wisdom Council is a practical application of short-term inner silence to create an authentic dialog that leads to deep relational knowing, clarity, and wisdom.

You can use this exercise with groups of two to seven people to distill the group' s deepest wisdom about a common problem, to resolve conflicts, to create a mission statement or vision, to clarify relationship issues, or to help an individual in the group with emotional, spiritual, or personal issues. This "dialog compression" exercise enables each person to discover the value of inner silence to access your deepest wisdom.

The energy shift or change within the paradigm of the group can be very profound, and can have long-lasting effects. The shift in perspective tends to continue to cause a shift in behavior for weeks and months thereafter, but that shift happens in a natural, unstressed manner.

The reason the action of the Wisdom Council is so gentle is that the dialog takes place without drama, without heat, and without defensiveness. It is therefore a tool that can cut through many of the issues that present a couple or a group of people from reaching resolution.

How is the Chrysalis Wisdom Council Done?

For many years, I have been unwilling to provide the directions to the Chrysalis Wisdom Council to anyone who has not tried it. It is unlike anything you have experienced, although it's similar in flavor to a Quaker Meeting, but if you read the instructions and think it's like anything else, you've probably not understood it.

The Wisdom Council is a combination of inner silence and conversation. The inner silence is at least 30 seconds long; for convenience, just count four quiet, slow breaths. Being inwardly silent for 30 seconds or so quiets your reptilian mindâ€”especially the amygdala, which is considered the basis for emotions and reactivity.

I've published the instructions for the Chrysalis Wisdom Council on this Web site so that I can also demonstrate the use of the "What's Next?" sections in the Global Wisdom System Handbook.

Each of the 300 meditations and exercises in this system are followed by a "What's Next?" section which will guide you to appropriate exercises and sections that will enhance what you just learned. This is the method by which the Global Wisdom System provides you with self-guided spiritual and evolutionary instruction. (Click for a detailed example of how the Main Navigation Strategy works.)

Click here for step-by-step instructions for the Chrysalis Wisdom Council. At the end of the page, please click the link to the "What's Next?" section. In this section, look for a link to "Listen to the Core Messages from your Essential Self," which is a solitary version of the Chrysalis Wisdom Council. This exercise is only available through the "What's Next?" page-- because I want to encourage you to look at the "What's Next?" page.

Note: Click here for a printable version of the Chrysalis Wisdom Council: TheChrysalisWisdomCouncil.pdf

What Do You Talk About with the Chrysalis Wisdom Council?

When I first started announcing Chrysalis Wisdom Councils, I was convinced that I needed to list topics to draw people to the discussion. I don't know if this was really important at the beginning, but during a session with Trish Gardham of Montreal, I reminded myself that group coaching is really a better use of the Wisdom Council than discussing a topic.

I will soon be posting two blogs to clarify this. One is a report of my session with Trish Gardham, which I will be doing with her permission. I will also be discussing a Wisdom Council that my wife and I did in front of a crowd of thirty people with a volunteer from the audience to facilitate--a volunteer who did not know the technique before our workshop.

Twenty-two months later, Tana and I still consider that public Wisdom Council to be a turning point in our relationship. Although we're being private about some of the details these days, I will be blogging about how we have integrated what we learned in that public Wisdom Council into our relationship coaching and into our own relationship.

If you print up the pdf file of instructions for the Wisdom Council in the previous section and if you try it with a group of people, I suggest that you volunteer yourself as the first guinea pig, if possible. Or find someone who is gregarious and open, and use the Wisdom Council to explore their key issues or concerns.

It may seem safer to start with a general topic, the way I did when I started offering the group in SIA, but it will be juicier and more productive if you can do this work on a more personal basis.

The next online Wisdom Council will take place on Saturday, February 3 at 10:00 PST. Instead of posting a topic for the dialog, I'm posting an invitation.

I invite any participant that wants to bring a personal challenge to the Wisdom Council for group coaching. This is the most ideal use of the Chrysalis Wisdom Council. We will all gain the most from the Wisdom Council if we have such a volunteer. In such a situation, all participants will gain equal value from the process, whether they act as coach or coachee.

If you think you'd like to have help with an issue, write me at globalwisdom (at) sbcglobal.net, so that I can verify that your issue is appropriate for a group meeting. If it is not, I will offer you an individual session.

At the end of the session, whether individual or group, I will offer you an opportunity to acknowledge the value of the session by leading you in a three-minute Donation Meditation, an exercise that leads you into communication with your higher self. As a result of some coaching from Stephen Dinan, I will be updating this meditation soon, but for the moment, click here for a printable text of the Donation Meditation.

Read the section Become an Effective Guru for Yourself to explore the importance of communication with your higher self. In the near future, this page will also provide you with links to two other exercises for developing a stronger relationship with your higher self.

However, personal issues, relationships, and challenges are not the only topics that can be handled more productively through noetic dialog. It is also very effective for working out understandings, agreements, and vision statements with groups of people. I envision that in the future, such a dialog may occur to clarify points of agreement in the Global Wisdom System or in IONS.

An Experimental Process for IONS or for the Global Wisdom System

I will be actively creating a structure which contains two or more groups with a few common members such as the following. While my plans are far more complex than this, keep in mind that these groups are using a consensus building tool which operates on a depth level.

Initially, the connecting group will explore together how to support the other groups best. However, as the Global Wisdom System gets off the ground, this structure will begin to serve a new purpose.

Using the Chrysalis Wisdom Council to Create Consensus in the Global Wisdom System

The original purpose for inventing the Chrysalis Wisdom Council was to provide a consistent, rapid, consensus-forming tool for building the Global Wisdom System as a nonhierarchical, nondogmatic, spiritual organization with the power to change the world.

The development of this organization as a large, consensus-based organization will require periodic inquiries that contain a feedback mechanism like the one illustrated in this diagram. At the end of the inquiry process, the groups will be able to put together interesting plans and policies for a democratic vote. However, this vote will not be divisive, but will rather be a confirmation of the group process.

Plans will proceed with an unusual level of participant buy-in.

Using the Chrysalis Wisdom Council to Create Consensus Throughout the All the Wisdom Paths on the Planet

The curriculum will become most exciting when it begins to create strategic partnership with other training organizations and spiritual paths. For example, within IONS today, there are members who identify with a Taoist point of view. My experience is that people like to share the Chrysalis Wisdom Council, so it will be virally shared with a Taoist organization that these IONS members belong to.

When that happens, there will be a mechanism already in place whereby this Taoist group can easily plug into the IONS or Global Wisdom System process, and thereby becoming co-leaders in the evolution of the curriculum which is the Global Wisdom System.

As more and more luminaries and organizations begin to plug into the process, the shape and power of the curriculum will evolve to creative levels that do not exist in our consciousness today.