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In the flow of outer activity there is rarely the time or energy to do any inner work. The outer activity fills up the space of the mind. There is no time to think. No time to think! Aren’t we all the time thinking? Well, there is thinking and there is thinking. One kind of thinking is actually reacting to externals through established patterns. But another kind, sometimes called ‘thinking about thinking’, is for changing patterns.

In the diagram the arrows indicate the flow of energy. In the loop, the energy flow is reversed in one part of the cycle. This means going against habitual thinking and ‘thinking again’. The ‘zero entropy’ inside the loop means there are no distractions and thinking can be more coherent
	Loops like this operate in living organisms and are very complex. There are countless numbers of such loops in each of which a special process can take place that cannot exist outside it. The inside of organisms is very different from outside them.

RESTORATION

Humans interact with machines and systems so much that their ‘loops’ can collapse into just activity. That’s why we need to recuperate in all the various ways we have. If we don’t have time ‘with ourselves’ we can become highly stressed. We need to have a more inner work that involves more of ourselves

ANOTHER KIND OF WORK

People go on ‘retreats’ to restore themselves. In business, there is a need to do this and also, at the same time, do some work that otherwise would not be possible. Both the individual and the organization need to benefit. Taking a break from work means doing a different kind of work.

REFLECTION

The reversal of the flow relates to reflection. This means holding a mirror up to ourselves so that we can see ourselves and what we are doing. By seeing this, we can see what’s missing and new opportunities. Simply gathering together what we know and putting it all together can help us see something new. Is it making sense? Can we do things differently? What sort of future are we striving for?

THINKING TOGETHER

There is an important place for people doing this reflection together. Each can be a mirror for the others. Many more things can be known. There are more points of view, giving better chance of seeing the whole. The people can become more coherent as a group if they spend time together without the everyday pressures.

The inner work needs a container so that energy can build up and attention become more coherent. This works in two ways.

OUTER CONTAINER

First, it is a matter of excluding distractions. This means having time away. It means having an environment that supports the work, an attractive space, in which the impacts of the familiar world are suspended.

INNER CONTAINER

Second, it means having a structure. Reflection and thinking do not just happen by themselves. The process of the work has to be structured to support them; it is the ‘inner container’. The basis of all inner containment is agreement of purpose

The outer container can include positive features of an environment. The often sterile rooms for meetings do not help in this regard. The environment can be designed to embody, stimulate and reflect learning. This has become accepted in education but not so much in management. Use circles not rows, boards and not tables

The inner container is a structure of process. We are all familiar with ineffective meetings. We know how hard it can be to have a group of people pay attention to the same thing at the same time. We know how prevalent the play of personalities and politics can be. We know how often people think in competition with each other and how rarely they think in co-operation with each other. We know how often it is the case that some leading personality draws the conclusions, which then fail to reflect the whole thinking of the group. A useful structure of process must deal with these issues.

Without both excluding what is distracting and also including what fosters understanding, nothing of significance is likely to happen. The outer and the inner container make it all possible.

The LVT method is such a container. It enables people to think together coherently, without imposing any set models.

COHERENT ATTENTION

It enables people to pay attention to the same thing because it begins with constructing a common reference, or ‘language’, which is contributed to by everyone and shared by everyone. This consists of what is agreed to be the realities of the situation to be dealt with. What are the facts? What do we want? There is an assembly of such elements before anyone even begins to offer any approach to resolving difficulties or making a plan. Everything that everyone comes up with that is agreed to be relevant is included in all stages of the process.

BEING ON THE SAME LEVEL

It enables people to effectively neutralize the play of personalities by treating everyone as equal. This is built into the process. Everyone contributes to the common reference and everyone contributes to its interpretation, using all the elements and not simply those belonging to the individual.

THINKING TOGETHER

It enables people to think together – or ‘co-think’ – by ensuring that how the facts or views expressed in the collective reference are being interpreted is made visible to all. It becomes a workshop of thinking. The process involves physical ‘mirrors’ in which people can see what is going on. These ‘mirrors’ are visual displays that reflect back to people how they are thinking and enable each person to see how others think.

SEEING THE WHOLE

It enables all the facets of interpretation to be integrated together into a single model. It leads people to distil the essential meaning of their thinking in a concentrated form that can be assimilated at a glance. This becomes the new common reference for any decision making of plan of action. It also enables each person to reflect on their own understanding – their own position in the whole, their motivation and their own needs – so that self-development is not divorced from accomplishing tasks.

FACILITATION

The containment of the process can involve a facilitator who is able to grasp implications of the work being done that may not at first be apparent to the group. He is able to do this because the method makes so much visible, that might ordinarily be unexpressed. He can be as directive or as permissive as is desired.

GENERIC METHOD

The basic form of the process is: Gather – Organize – Understand. There are many particular techniques around that centre on one restricted and explicit model of this, but the greatest value is to be found when the approach is made as simple as possible and the people are able to find their own way. This relates to the all-important theme of ownership: people will naturally actualize what they feel is their own thinking, rather than anyone else’s. This is the deepest aspect of containment, that the people can contain the process as being ‘their own’.