15 August 2015 Cape Town

Myrna was invited to speak at the Conflict Matters TEDx event. Her talk was con “Mining the Gold of Conflict” where she demonstrated core Lewis Deep Democracy tools to resolve conflict in relationships. The balance between freedom and control is a constant tug of war. In all areas of our lives - personal and professional, spiritual and practical, as individuals and as groups - we experience an ongoing tussle regarding whether and where boundaries should be drawn. This year, TEDx Cape Town's main event brings speakers and audience members together to explore the paradox "Open Access Control" in different contexts.

Theme of the Conference

The balance between freedom and control is a constant tug of war. In all areas of our lives - personal and professional, spiritual and practical, as individuals and as groups - we experience an ongoing tussle regarding whether and where boundaries should be drawn. This year, TEDx Cape Town's main event brings speakers and audience members together to explore the paradox "Open Access Control" in different contexts.

2015 marks the 5th year of TEDx Cape Town, which for the team and the community highlights five years of a fascinating journey. We have navigated our way through ups and downs and with retrospection have uncovered common threads that embody our journey, and TEDx as a movement. We have embraced the challenge that putting TEDx Cape Town together each year brings, almost as strongly as we have embraced the community that supports it. We too have experienced the daily dichotomies between openness, access and control that creep in when being part of any endeavor. Sometimes, we work within the parameters and sometimes we challenge them.

Is there a fine line between openness, access and control? Do constraints provide us with a safe and free society in which to thrive, or do they hinder our existence? We will be tackling these difficult questions at TEDx Cape Town 2015.

21 - 23 October 2015. Brussels

The Conflict Matters conference explores a crucial yet often neglected question: how can we learn to manage conflicts in a constructive way – in schools, in families, in society?

We believe conflict management is not just about resolving a particular problem. With the right skills, conflict is a fantastic opportunity for transformative change, creativity and growth. And managing conflict, from the personal all the way to the societal level, is an essential skill that needs to be learnt from an early age.

Focusing on conflict facilitates work on a wide range of urgent issues, such as prejudice, racism, school violence and dropouts; it helps to develop skills needed to deal with them, including cooperation, emotional intelligence, empathy and non-violent communication.

The Conflict Matters conference offers a platform to share and reflect on educational policies in the field of constructive conflict management. At the three-day event in Brussels, practitioners, teachers, policymakers, students and researchers will discover good practices and inspiring initiatives, and be able to forge new partnerships to better promote conflict-management education in the EU.

The Program highlights include contributions by education specialists, psychologists, neuroscientists; as well as tailor-made workshops and trainings on conflict management in school, handling controversial topics in classroom, alternative approaches to school rules and sanctions, school climate, shared decision-making at school, conflict and social media and many others.

This 2015 networking event is a unique opportunity to advance conflict management in education all across Europe.

3 October Vancouver and 8 October 2015 Halifax

"Is Hope Bullshit?" The Role of Leadership Beyond the Point of No Return

Many of us are working tirelessly to make a more socially just and sustainable world. We are determined to make our region green, equitable and inclusive. We are making big strides in many areas, putting us ahead of other places in the world.

At the same time, recent accounts suggest that the fight for the planet and its people is a lost fight, regardless of the success of our specific projects. We are too late to turn back the clock on climate change, or reverse the extinction of species and cultures, or correct the damages done to the social sector.

In a world largely divided along socio-economic, racial, religious and political lines, violent conflict over limited resources seems ever more likely. 


In the face of these possibilities, how do we as leaders in this field hold ourselves up and relate to our work and its context? Do we isolate ourselves in our projects, turn off the news, or do we more fully open to the pain of what's happening, at the risk of our own disorientation? Is hope an appropriate stance to take, and is there a responsible way to engage with despair? Can we afford not to have hope or can hope be re-imagined for this moment in time?

Gothenburg 4 and Stockholm 5 November 2015

“Leadership in times of complexity”

"We hear that we live in increasingly complex times. The issues are big and seem to grow the more we explore them. We know that you in your daily work as a leader are challenged by this. Maybe our traditional leadership is not as effective any longer..?

How can we lead when there's a sense of urgency, and at the same time a need for safety and predictability. The need for change is constant, so how do we transform resistance and confusion into energy, movement, and commitment.

Successful leaders of tomorrow have the ability to co-create and co-resolve all issues. Join us and share dreams, ideas, possibilities and challenges”

16 November 2015, Amsterdam

“Think Small” – Looking at Leadership at a Quantum Level

Join an unusual day on November 16, 2015 about leadership in a complex world.

As we have shifted into the age of complexity, our view on challenges we face has become wider and vaster. As a result, we tend to tackle those challenges by looking at them as a whole, rather than focusing on the micro-level, where ultimately all leadership starts.

You are invited to scale it down, even just for one day. Find out whether zooming in right down to the smallest mechanism, and operating there, brings powers equal to large-scale interventions.

Three short lectures will provoke your thinking. Speakers are Myrna Lewis founder of Deep Democracy, Pamela Venables, international consultant, and Yonathan Keren, education professional, followed by a Deep Democracy style conversation about leadership, facilitated by the speakers.

The distinctive style of Deep Democracy dialogue will include everyone’s’ participation, enable all diverse opinions to be heard and uncover the inherent wisdom in the group in relation to the topic.

Myrna Lewis: Co-Resolve: A pragmatic approach to more democratic leadership