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And welcome.

We are exploring tonight.

This is our second of a two-part series on navigating conflict.

And we're going to continue the exploration starting with one of my favorite little parables

that has to do with porcupines that are going through the coldest winter that have been

known for many, many years and many animals froze to death during this one.

So in an effort to save themself from this icy fate, they decide to gather together and

fend off the chill.

And they huddled very close to each other and covered and protected from the elements

that are worn by their collective body heat.

But as you can imagine, what happened was their prickly quills proved to be a bit of a

problem in that kind of close contact and they were poking and stabbing each other.

There was some wounding going on with their closest companions in particular.

So the warmth was wonderful, but the needling became really uncomfortable and eventually

they began to distance themselves, one from another and they scattered in the forest only

to when they were alone start freezing up and many of them died.

So it soon became clear they had to choose and they had to choose between solitary deaths

and a kind of frigid environment and the wilderness or the discomfort of being close up but being

...