Donna Frost

Philosophical foundations and methodological principles 79 3 responses and to pay attention to the more invisible parts of practice. These two metaphorical principles within critical creativity asked us as inquirers to create room to ‘notice what we were noticing’, to ask questions of our bodies and of each other about what we were sensing, doing and responding to. ‘Openness to all ways of being’ gave us permission to begin where we were, wherever that was, including being novice facilitators, novice researchers and novice co-inquirers. Further, these metaphorical principles invited us to pay attention to the ways in which our ways of being and doing changed throughout the inquiry. Practical challenges arising from the methodological principle of an inclusive epistemology include the development, within an inquiry group, of a common epistemological language that is both useful within the group and understandable to those outside the group. Effective methods of surfacing, capturing and using various ways of knowing are needed, remaining open to alternative perspectives and alert to situations in which particular kinds of knowledge or ways of knowing are privileged over others. Creating conditions for human flourishing This principle assumes that research activities should be nourishing and affirming for all involved. It is on the one hand a moral priority, as argued earlier in this chapter. At the same time, creating conditions for human flourishing creates, simultaneously, the conditions and space required for effective research practice: reflection and reflexivity, coming to know self, the other, and practice, coming to understand and moving towards transformations of perspective and perhaps practices. Titchen and McCormack ( 2010 ) and Titchen et al. ( 2011 ) consider the ways in which such conditions can be created. They emphasize the importance of creating spaces of stillness, for example within busy healthcare settings, as an ‘essential starting point for energy flow’ (Titchen & McCormack, 2010 , p. 543 ). Stillness is necessary for engagement with self and others, but also for recovering equilibrium and maintaining engagement after working together intensely. Further, human flourishing is enabled by the condition of ‘embodying the landscape’ of one’s guiding theories, in this case critical creativity, by living its values and assumptions (Titchen et al., 2011 , p. 12 ). This has to do with paying attention, collectively, to the ways in which the values and assumptions are translated into action in ‘real life’. The theory becomes internalised as the co-creation of methods, over time, results in shared understandings and an easier and more supple movement between different kinds of physical, metaphorical and metaphysical spaces (Titchen & McCormack,