A way of Being (in the staff of person-centered workshops)

Staff members spent time working through interpersonal frictions and differences, which we did not wish to expose to the participants. Gradually we have come to see our function as a staff in a very different way. Briefly, we believe that our major task is to be ourselves. To this end, we spend several days together before the workshop convenes so that, insofar as we are capable:

We are fully open – first to one another, and later to the whole group;

We are prepared to explore new and unknown areas of our own lives;

We are truly acceptant of our own differences;

We are open to the new learnings we will receive from our fresh inward journeys, all stimulated by our staff and group experiences.

Thus it can be said that we now prepare ourselves, with much less emphasis on plans or materials. We value our staff process and want that to be available to the group. We have found that by being as fully ourselves as we are able – creative, diverse, contradictory, present, open and sharing – we somehow become tuning forks, finding resonances with those qualities in all the members of the workshop community.

In the relationships we form with the group and its members, the power is shared. We let ourselves “be”; we let others “be.” At our best, we have little desire to judge or manipulate the other’s thoughts or actions. When persons are approached in this way, when they are accepted as they are, we discover them to be highly creative and resourceful in examining and changing their own lives….

……we do not persuade, interpret, or manipulate,…..during periods of chaos, or criticism of staff, or expression of deep feelings, we listen intently, acceptantly, occasionally voicing our understanding of what we have heard. We listen especially to the contrary voices, the soft voices, those that are expressing unpopular or unacceptable views. We make a point of responding to a person if he or she spoke openly, but no one responded. We thus tend to validate each person……

We are a thoroughly open staff, with no leader and no hierarchical organization. Leadership and responsibility are shared…… 

Carl R. Rogers: A Way of Being. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1980), p185-188.