February 4th 2005 • Printer version

PORTLAND CONFERENCE:
The Contemplative Practitioner:
Mindfulness Skills in Law & Mediation

This stimulating, day-long conference explores mindfulness and its benefits and applications for law, mediation and all forms of dispute resolution. 

The program will offer instruction and practice in mindfulness meditation, including mindful movement; exercises involving the application of mindfulness to listening, speaking, time pressures and stress management; and discussions on the application of mindfulness in mediation and law-related settings.

Mindfulness is an ancient method of deliberate, moment-to-moment attention, which has achieved popularity in the West in the past 20 years. A person cultivates mindfulness through meditation, and then applies it in daily life. It can help people deal better with stress, develop self-awareness and a better understanding of others, improve concentration, creativity, and work performance.

Mindfulness techniques have been introduced in health care, athletics, corporations, law firms, law schools, and in programs for lawyers, judges, and mediators. Mindfulness meditation helps people working in the law perform more effectively by listening better to clients and to themselves, and by gaining distance from their own habitual reactions.

Guest Speakers
Leonard L. Riskin has practiced mindfulness meditation since 1990, and since 1999 has taught mediators, lawyers, law students, and corporate executives and others across North America and in Austria and Denmark. He also provides advanced mediation training and negotiation training based on mindfulness. 

Much of his work has centered on mindsets with which lawyers and other dispute resolvers approach their work. He has published numerous articles and several books on dispute resolution, including Dispute Resolution and Lawyers (with James Westbrook).

Riskin is C.A. Leedy Professor of Law and Director of the Center for the Study of Dispute Resolution and the Initiative on Mindfulness in Law and Dispute Resolution at the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Law. He has been a mediator since 1980.
 
Charles Wiggins regularly offers negotiation training programs and courses in mediation advocacy for law firms,businesses and government agencies across the nation. His training clients include two dozen law firms throughout the country; businesses such as Nike, State Farm Insurance and Toyota; agencies at all levels of government; and nonprofit organizations.

An accomplished mediator, he has helped parties resolve scores of disputes involving matters contested in litigation, community conflict and complex public policy matters. He also maintains an extensive international training, mediation and facilitation practice. He has practiced mindfulness meditation for many years.

Wiggins is a Professor of Law at the University of San Diego School of Law. His specialties include Negotiation and Mediation, Constitutional Law, and Bioethics.