by Mitch Bogen
Special to the Tribune
After hosting more than 30 successful and engaging Dialogue Nights events, the Ikeda Center debuted a spin-off called “Dialogue Nights Lite” this July. On Oct. 4, the second gathering of the new series was held.
During the inaugural event, the center’s Preandra Noel shared that, where the original Dialogue Nights are “centered around a specific theme such as friendship, loneliness, stress, among others,” Dialogue Nights Lite is inspired by the desire, expressed by members of the center’s youth committee, to practice specific dialogue skills “to better connect with people in their lives.”
Youth committee members moderate each Dialogue Nights Lite, which consist of multiple rounds of paired dialogues referred to as “speed connecting.” These connecting activities emulate the way that center founder Daisaku Ikeda always made sure to get to know his dialogue partners by asking questions about their lives.
The guiding questions for speed connecting begin lighthearted and grow deeper as the evening progresses. For example, this July, the first question asked: When was the last time you had a good long laugh and what was the context? The third question, however, invited participants to reflect: Looking back at the person you were, what are you most proud of about your current self?
Each Dialogue Nights Lite is devoted to strengthening dialogue skills. To reinforce this goal, at the end of each evening, participants are invited to write down “one fear or doubt around dialogue that you would like to leave behind” as well as “ways you strengthened your dialogue skills today and how you hope to apply it further in your daily life.”
Ultimately, these gatherings are motivated by the center founder’s conviction that “the true value of dialogue is not to be found solely in the results it produces but also in the process of dialogue itself, as two human spirits engage with and elevate each other to a higher realm.”[1]
October 18, 2024, World Tribune, p. 4
References
- sokaglobal.org/resources/daily-encouragement/january-18.html <accessed Oct. 10, 2024> ↩︎
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