Pragmatism and Optimism
American Q1 is both practical and playful. A colleague of mine, Bill Barber, offered a very playful exercise many years ago that he called the “relationship contraption.” This exercise exemplifies this feature of the American spirit. When conducting this exercise, the facilitator asks participants to pair up and begin a conversation about any topic that they find mutually interesting. The facilitator then indicates that she would like each pair to make their conversation more intimate and disclosing. She indicates this move toward a deeper conversation by moving her arm downward.
The facilitator then moves her arm upward to indicate that the conversation should become more superficial. The conversation shifts between shallower and deeper modes as the facilitator periodically moves her arm upward and then downward. This exercise is intended to illustrate the fact that we can choose how open and disclosing we will be. It rests on the assumption that disclosure is something we can control and that human interaction is an intentional act. Both the British and Continental Schools would be quite critical of this exercise. Bill Barber himself has moved to a more British-orientation in his work.
As an individual-based model of human relationship, the American school places the obligation for improvement of a relationship squarely on the shoulders of each participant in the relationship. The same responsibility is assumed by each participant in a group. It is through individuals that improvement occurs in either a one-on-one relationship or a group.
This, in turn, leads, potentially, to a sense of disengagement among all parties to the relationship. No one is responsible for the third entity (the relationship or the group)—only for their own individual role that is played out in this relationship or group. Members of the relationship or group must, therefore, be deliberate (intentional) about establishing the “rules of the game” and in finding shared meaning in the relationship or group—otherwise nothing will exist.
