Mediation is:

Mediation is a voluntary, consensus-based problem solving approach. This means all participants retain the ability to walk away and stop the process at any time.

The mediator uses facilitated communication, emotional processing, heart-to-heart communication, creative problem solving, brainstorming, impasse resolution, and trauma-informed practices to bring conflicting individuals into constructive and creative dialogue.

Mediation differs from legal avenues because the mediator is not a judge, jury, or arbitrator and therefore is not able to decide the issues for the parties. The parties themselves find the best solution with the mediator’s help.

Together with the mediator, the parties define the issues, identify their needs, hear the needs of the other person, and collaboratively implement new solutions that honor all needs. These steps allow parties to retain decision-making power.

Mediation looks for a solution that tends to the needs of all people in the conflict, that’s what makes it a “win/win” process. Unlike legal action in which one party must lose while another wins, mediation recognizes the legitimacy of all parties’ self interest.

Mediation can help people learn more effective communication skills, avoid bitterness and hostility, process emotions that are stuck, and build conflict resilient relationships.

Rather than endlessly re-living the past, our focus in mediation is set towards the future and how to transform the dynamic and relationship in new ways.

The mediation will spend less time concerned with who is “right” or “wrong” and more time understanding unmet needs, both your own and those of the other person in the conflict.