May and June have been a whirlwind, between clients, keynote speeches, and conference presentations. I love months like this one!

Since readers often ask me for examples of how I help clients, here are some samples from the past month: I worked with a smart and committed group of law partners seeking to create a more cohesive future for their firm; a coaching client who wants to get more courageous in conflict with her male executive colleagues; the HR director of a multi-site corporation looking for advising on tricky conflicts in her organization; the New Hampshire Conflict Resolution Association as the speaker for their annual dinner; and the Women’s Leadership Summit, where 600 women from around New England came together and for whom I was fortunate to teach two sold out workshops to groups of very cool women.

And a new dog, Smudge, joined our home this month, a few months after the loss of our beloved little Luigi. Smudge is a Sato, a Puerto Rican street dog, trapped with his starving mom and siblings on the streets and relocated to NH to find a home. He’s got more carbon miles than your average mutt, that’s for sure; now we’ll work to balance them out over the coming years!

Mediation workshop now open for registration

I’m teaching a Basic Mediation workshop July 16-19 at Woodbury College in Montpelier, VT. I love teaching Basic because I get to co-teach with one of my favorite people in the world, mediation colleague Alice Estey, and because the course is so often the source of inspiration and insight for participants. It doesn’t get much better than that.

Learn more about Tammy’s Basic Mediation Workshop

There’s still space for a few more, so if you’ve been wondering what mediation is all about or thinking mediation skills would be a great supplement for your primary work, this is a terrific time to take the course (college credit is available). And Montpelier’s lovely in the summer!

Conflict Zen® elsewhere

A couple years ago, a book arrived in the mail. It was Unlikely Teachers: Finding the Hidden Gifts in Daily Conflict, sent to me by the author’s publicist. I’d met fellow New Hampshire trainer Judy Ringer before then, but the arrival of Judy’s book ultimately spurred a lovely lunch with Judy at Cafe Momo, a Nepalese Restaurant in Manchester, and Judy coming to present to my class of graduate mediation students. I could tell right away she was “my people.”

I reviewed Judy’s excellent book back in 2006 and you can read more about it at Finding the hidden gifts in daily conflict. If you’re a fan of Conflict Zen®, you will enjoy and appreciate Judy’s book.

Now I’ve contributed to Judy’s newsletter, Ki Moments, with some thoughts about resolving conflict as a manager (and therefore as an “insider mediator”). You can find Judy’s latest newsletter and my thoughts on being in the middle at Ki Moments, June 2008.

Good reads

I invite you to take a few minutes and spend time with these fine blogs:

• Zen and the art of saying no – Talented folk musician and completely wonderful chick Christine Kane offers some much-needed sanity to those of us who never lack for a big new idea.
• 12 tested ways to use a mantra – On Friday, after my sellout presentations for the Women’s Leadership Summit, several women approached me about one of the habits I encouraged, staying fully present during conflict moments. They wanted more ideas for focusing attention and energy. Their questions reminded me of Valeria Maltoni’s really good post on mantras.
• I survived an F5 tornado: Life lessons learned – When I first met my future in-laws 20 years ago, I didn’t understand why they had such a well-appointed basement, which included a t.v. area, kitchen and bathroom. Then I found out how many times tornado warnings occur in Illinois and the subsequent time spend in the basement. Jeff Nickles, author of this blog post, didn’t just survive, he figured out how to thrive from the experience.
• 73 women bloggers to watch for summer 2008 – Looking for some refreshing new blogs to follow? Heidi Richard, CEO of the Women’s Ecommerce Association International, compiled this terrific list of creative, interesting blogs by women.

Featured testimonial

"You have to go a long way to find a Tammy Lenski. In fact, I’m pretty sure she’s the only one. Her combination of intelligence, humanity, and spirit are so attractive that people lose their self-consciousness around her. She’s that sort of leader that only needs to walk or talk and the sense of where she’s headed is so obviously clear that a team follows. A partnership with Tammy is easy and fun, because she’s a master teacher with a beginner’s mind. Tammy’s fluency with communication in every form is amazing. She helped this experienced writer handle a most difficult client with finesse by showing me more useful ways to communicate with his specific personality type. In a situation that needs thoughtful or strategic communication, I can’t imagine anyone who could bring more to the table than Tammy Lenski." – Liz Strauss (read Liz’s recommendation on my LinkedIn profile)

Conflict Zen® articles from the past month

If you didn’t have a chance to read and reflect on them when they first came out, here’s another opportunity to slow down and savor:

• A simple meditation for tense and stressful moments
• The art of doing conflict slowly
• How to debug a disagreement and focus on what matters
• Anger management along a muddy road
• Fold an origami crane with video help
• The moment you choose to fight: Do you recognize it?
• A complication of conflict resolution quotations
• 7 top reasons to subscribe to Conflict Zen®

Happy solstice,

Conflict Zen® by Tammy Lenski is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Based on a work at ConfictZen.Lenski.com.