Building bridges
Working with an appreciative stance means others are seen and heard, from a place of interest and genuine curiosity. There is a curiosity about the other and the otherness. The feeling that your ideas matter, means that as time passes connections – bridges, even – start to grow between people. I see building bridges as a verb; constant maintenance is required to ensure these bridges remain of the best quality. Bridges symbolise personal relations between people. From healthy relations emerge small and large, formal and informal networks. The social construct – the networks of and for people – can be compared to a web that both expands and continuously maintains and nourishes its individual threads. Keeping these threads intact, healthy, is an ever present challenge in the process of change.
Mutual trust is the basis of powerful change works.
Loek Schoenmakers
Dynamic network fields
From connections, we build bridges and create dynamic network fields. Mutual trust is the basis of powerful change works, a key word when discussing durability. During the process of appreciative interactions and healthy relations, social spaces are created, which offer a stage to plurality and the participation of all involved. The change process is fed and maintained by many and in a multitude of ways. Ken Gergen explained how the existence of multiplicity and the celebration of differences is probably the best strategy for developing a durable future together
Appreciation
Co-Creation
