Within this picture are 2 Chinese characters: 開 心 – romanised as hoi1 sam1 from the Cantonese pronunciation, meaning ‘happy’.
In the same language, the ‘happy fruit’ is the name given to the pistachio nut – for its smiley-shaped opening in its shell.
A happy brief.
I was asked by a client to deliver a session for their team. They wanted people to leave ‘happy’. The work that followed left me with lingering thoughts about happiness more broadly. One thread:
…how happiness can be enmeshed with politeness, harmony, appeasement
…which can uphold a false peace in place of honesty and generative conflict
…and might be a product of living in ways that prioritises behaviour-management and avoidance – above understanding and meeting people’s needs (including our own).
And what questions does this pose relating to “difference” or “challenging behaviours”? Why are some feelings and behaviours acceptable and not others?
What can art teach us?
Or, how has art shaped my practice as a facilitator in these situations?
This ‘happy’ starting point gets interesting when we look at the character 開 and zoom into the symbols of the open doors.
We can use this as a metaphor for our relationship with doors: the times we like them open/closed/ajar, when people should knock/walk straight in, whether we even have a door of our own to speak of. It’s an opening for people’s stories about their communication needs and situations. What’s essential? What’s tolerable?
Images, metaphors and stories are some art forms that help us explore multitudinal realities: richer insight into what we might need from each other and more.
Processes of relating creatively – beyond words and their surface assumptions – necessitates pause, confusion/curiosity, subjectivity and meeting the inevitable pull of nuance. It makes these qualities more permissible to roam around without too much cognitive effort or instruction.
I notice that people are more able to observe, be with ambiguity, take risks, verbalise half-thoughts.. edges.. insights.. questions. Laugh. It’s all the stuff that invites more dialogue and collective wisdom, moving away from the myth of a correct response.
This happens with other forms of creative expression and sense-making – drawing, play-doh, lego serious play, jazz, song, dance, improvisation..
Can artful processes be described as an experiential language or toolkit for connecting and relating to our differences?
Back to the happy brief
We settled for the team leaving ‘satisfied’ in having more open, honest conversations (in place of ‘happy’). A more realistic expectation given the immense change and uncertainty that the team were all dealing with.
Back to the picture
The characters that form the meaning of happy, actually translate individually to Open (開) Heart ( 心). Which I prefer, especially in Arting x Facilitating.
Image description
Photo of author’s Chinese calligraphy practice on their desk. The subject being discussed in the written post appears on a white sheet of paper, with the calligraphy characters in black ink:
Two characters: 開 心 – romanised as hoi1 sam1 from the Cantonese pronunciation, meaning ‘happy’.
Red patterned calligraphy seals appear above and beneath these two characters: the one above represents the calligrapher’s benediction, the one beneath represents the calligrapher’s name.
Beneath this, to the left, is another character: 安 – romanised as on1 from the Cantonese pronunciation, meaning safety/peace.
To the right of the page are some hand-written notes in red pencil:
*Simple not simplistic
*Practising + blank page creepies
*Words aren’t enough
*X art : language for differences
*Realities of living experiences
*Subjectivity
*Nuance
This post was originally published on LinkedIn February 2025.