Navigating in Dialogues

Drawing and text By Frits Ahlefeldt, FritsAhlefeldt.com

Some day in 1508 the Italian artist Michelangelo,  climbed up the scaffolding in the Sistine Chapel in Rome for the first time, climbed up, with his brushes in hand. Ever since has this ceiling, Michelangelo and the amazing frescoes that took him more than three years to create, been world famous… The Scaffolding that supported his efforts, not so much. It was most likely burned, nameless and forgotten, or reused in other places, with nobody knowing the story of the pieces of wood they where holding. But now storytellers have taken over the word scaffolding.  Finally giving maybe a taste of fame to the always willing servant of anybody trying to reach higher

Scaffolding conversations

Maybe it was the therapists that came up with the idea… scaffolding used as a word in how to best support dialogue, how to make a scaffolding in questions and in creating platforms.

In this new way, scaffolding might be seen as an important part of what coaches, therapists and facilitators  etc. do: they frame, give access to the heights and help turn the possible into reality, just like a scaffolding. The wood beams, platforms and connections, are hidden in their questions as an imaginative structure, supporting and making it possible for people to chisel out and brush up the unknown reality they crave for.

By Frits Ahlefeldt, FritsAhlefeldt.com