Belief Makers

Over the past months I've had some rather enthusiastic and energetic discussions with many of you regarding the idea of an independent body of independent people who might serve as a peer review group regarding Option and the dialogue. In this article, I'd like to propose the creation of such a peer group.

Peer Review
Peer review is a process by which the creative work and/or performance of an individual may be evaluated by other people in the same field in order to maintain or enhance the quality of the work or performance. The basic ideas is that a larger and more diverse group of people will usually find more weaknesses and errors in a work or performance and will be able to make a more impartial evaluation of it than will just the person or group responsible for creating the work or performance.

To obtain an unbiased evaluation, the peer review process depends on the independence of the reviewers to discourage potential favoritism shown to relatives, colleagues and friends. Typically, the reviewers are not selected from among the close colleagues, relatives or friends of the creator or performer of the work, and potential reviewers are required to disclose any potential conflicts of interest. Peer review helps maintain and enhance quality by identifying potential flaws in work and recommending alternatives that might correct those flaws.

Monopolies
I'm not familiar with the process by which folks who have carried on the wonderful work of Bruce Di Marsico determine what is included in the canon of the Option Method nor am I aware of how or whether or not they have process by which people are certified to conduct Option Dialogues. I'm somewhat more familiar with the approach taken by the Kaufmans have put into place.

In particular, the Kaufmans' approach to review and certification is essentially the opposite of peer review; certification and review are conducted by a single group who assert exclusive ownership of the process and it at least appears to favor family members and friends. Further, certification of the quality of performance and/or creative work is lumped together with control of where and how one might practice the skills for which one has been certified. Several certificate holders have told me that they were told by staff at the Institute that that they would not be re-certified or not invited to participate in certain parts of the process simply because their activities were not viewed as "supportive" of the Institute.

Of course, the Kaufmans can do whatever they want with their certification; after all, it's their certification. However, the philosophy, the methods and the dialogue are not. Therefore, I'd like to establish an independent process that is owned by no one in particular and focuses exclusively on the quality of the work or performance.

Getting Started
At first blush it seems that there are two or three basic tasks that are required to get all this underway. These tasks involve the creation of original work that would not be beholding to anyone or any group.

The Philosophical Canon
The first thing I'd like to create and have reviewed by peers is a canonical representation of the core Option philosophy. Over the past couple of weeks, I've started to take a cut at various pieces of this and have been thrilled with all the feedback I've received, some reinforcing what I'd written and other challenging it.

I'd like to take the process beyond my musings on various aspects of what is and what isn't Option and collectively create a more formal thesis on Option. I'd be happy to work with others in any number of ways to do this. From taking a first cut myself and then asking for feedback from others, to creating an outline of the entire work and then dividing the work up among us, to simply coordinating the work of others.

My goal would be to have a clear, concise and immensely useful guide to Option that would be owned by no one in particular and available to anyone free of charge (electronically) or for minimal charge (to cover costs) were we to create a physical book. A peer review process would be employed to ensure the quality of the work. Not everyone would have to agree on every item; however, wherever there were significant disagreements, we would always present the minority view along with the majority view.

Application via the Dialogue
The second order of business would be a similar document regarding the application of the philosophy in the form of talk-therapy referred to by many as the 'dialogue'. I would love to come up with a basic 'How to' guide for the applying the philosophy in the form of talk therapy, a sort of "Dialoguing for Dummies" kind of book (though I'd love to replace dialoguing with an actual verb).

Much has been written about the dialogue and there are many bits and pieces floating about that identify types of questions, types of experience (e.g., thoughts versus feelings versus beliefs), or techniques to be applied under various sets of circumstances. However, I am unaware of any clear and systematic presentation of the techniques that would survive formal scrutiny of peer review process.

I would love to create something that is clear, concise and simple, while also being comprehensive and systematic. As with the canon on the philosophy, I would like this to be done in a collaborative manner in which the results would be owned by no one in particular and available to anyone free of charge or at minimal cost where costs have been incurred.

Certification Process
The third task would be to establish a set of criteria and process by which practitioners might be certified in teaching the philosophy and/or providing talk therapy. Documentation of the criteria would be based upon the two documents I've outlined above. The review process would be conducted by a subset of peers selected at random so as to preclude cronyism.

The trickiest part would of course be getting started or bootstrapping as we call it in the software business (pulling yourself up by your bootstraps). My thought is to create a volunteer group of anyone who has been previously certified by Bruce's or the Kaufman's organizations to conduct dialogues, and then as a group to determine the criteria and the process.

It could be that initially the intersection of the sets of ideas and beliefs is much smaller than the union; however, I also believe that through open exchange and in the absence of motivation to promote any specific brand of philosophy, we could arrive at a common set of criteria that we all agree upon.

Our goal would be to move toward consensus, identifying criteria upon which we agree and criteria upon which we don't. I believe that the result would be something that no one has yet fully conceived and that the result would far exceed the sum of the parts.

Once the criteria were established, the first task of the group would be to certify one another. Once a body of certified individuals were established, we could establish a process by which others might be certified.

In the case of certification, I would make all the criteria and documentation free of charge. However, I would want to at least minimally compensate individuals who spend their time reviewing the work of others as part of the certification process.

Open Source
In software, their is a concept called "open source". It's a process by which writers of software can make their work available to anyone for free and simultaneously protect the work from being picked up by others and marketed and sold as their own work, or even more importantly claimed as their own. I believe that many of the principles of open source apply to what I'm proposing here. There are standard licensing agreements that cover this type of work. I'll do a bit of research to ensure that whatever it is we come up with will remain in the public domain and cannot be copyrighted or trademarked by anyone else.

Interested?
I believe that the Option philosophy and its application in the form of talk therapy and thought process can have a profound effect on our world. However, based upon the number of people familiar with the philosophy and its application, I believe we have not been good stewards of what we been given. I'd like to change that.

If you would like to join me in taking this to the next level, please leave a comment, but more importantly, please email me at mark@tefsoft.com as blogger isn't always great at ensuring that comments actually show up. Even if you're not interested in what I propose per se, I'd love to hear alternatives to what I've outlined above.

Happy Wednesday!
Teflon

Labels: all blogs, empowerment, mark tuomenoksa, philosophy