From Playwriting to Palliative Care. Member Spotlight: Arabella Tresilian
For Arabella Tresilian, mediation is less a career than a calling that weaves together every thread of her life. With roots in the arts and years spent as a caregiver, she has always been attuned to the power of story, dignity, and presence. Today, those sensibilities define her work as a mediator in healthcare and palliative care settings, where conflict often touches on the most human questions of fear, grief, and compassion.
With roots initially in Southwestern England, Arabella studied English Literature in Edinburgh, Scotland during her university years and later obtained a postgraduate degree in Educational Leadership and Management. Arabella’s background as a playwright running a theater company taught her early on that stories can reshape the world. Her scripts did more than entertain–they created dialogue around difficult social realities, bridging key groups in difficult situations through an unexpected medium. These verbatim scripts were powerful, she explained, sharing that her “passion really was for dialogue and communication.” One of her most impactful works was performed before 400 senior police officers, with the intention of educating officers about the realities of experiencing a mental health episode from the perspective of a mentally ill individual. The play, based on a patient’s true story of evading police while experiencing a psychotic episode, was performed and received a standing ovation from the officers. The patient, who attended the performance, found the experience restorative as it allowed his story to be understood and potentially influence police practices. “It was just such a beautiful moment,” she shared, “because nothing else had changed the dial for these police officers until experiencing the impact of this dialogue.” Merging theater and mediation allows individuals to “tell our stories and be understood… making these human connections changes things.”
Her work underscores how art can break barriers and challenge entrenched perspectives. “Storytelling,” she reflects, “is how people truly come to see one another. It’s where empathy begins.” Arabella mobilizes unexpected mediums to break down the complexities of the healthcare system in order to create a more understanding, empathetic world. Theater has been an anchor throughout Arabella’s mediation journey, and she continues to apply these skills through writing scripts for mediation training. By combining her passions for theater and mediation, Arabella brings joy, dedication, and commitment to her everyday work.
Today, Arabella specializes in medical mediation, often called upon when disputes arise between doctors, patients, and families. These are conflicts where fear and heartbreak are as present as policy or procedure. Her approach is holistic, blending careful attention to emotional dynamics with awareness of the systemic structures that shape healthcare. She has become especially devoted to mediation in palliative contexts, helping families and clinicians navigate agonizing choices. Working alongside those in palliative care, she witnessed how much it matters for people to be seen and heard, especially in moments of vulnerability. “When someone is nearing the end of life, what matters isn’t just medical treatment but dignity, respect, and presence,” she explains. This philosophy now permeates her mediation practice: every party, however embattled, deserves to be met with humanity.
Beyond her casework, Arabella is committed to building a sustainable field of practice. She is outspoken about the need for mediator self-care, noting the risks of burnout in a profession that demands such deep emotional labor. “We become peacemakers because we are empaths. But when you sit with others you begin to experience vicarious trauma. Learning how to protect ourselves emotionally, psychologically, spiritually, energetically and physically is an integral part of mediator training that has historically been neglected,” she observes. Arabella wishes to see a change in how mediation is viewed in medical settings, especially in cases involving treatment disputes. In strengthening legal professionals’ confidence in and understanding of mediation, fewer cases might end up in court, and a more peaceful solution might be achieved.
When asked about key lessons learned throughout her career in mediation, Arabella emphasized the importance of not forcing resolutions on people, and instead allowing them to interact with mediation naturally, and encouraging mediation to be an organic response. “Mediation is something that we can offer as a tool, but we have to allow people to come to it on their own accord. We can offer it,” she explains, “but we must never chase people with it.” At the heart of her philosophy is the conviction that conflict is inevitable, but hostility is not. Arabella understands that conflict is unavoidable, however, if approached with curiosity, respect, and the courage to listen deeply, mediators can transform even some of the most painful disputes into spaces of healing and mediation.
Looking ahead, Arabella is expanding her reach through Peaceable, her platform for making mediation skills accessible to broader communities. She seeks to address the reluctance in Western discourse to embrace spiritual and sacred discussions about death and dying, especially in multicultural communities. As a Churchill Fellow, Arabella will explore global approaches to healthcare mediation and end-of-life decision-making. Her work will delve into how different communities discuss end-of-life and palliative care to enhance cultural sensitivity in mediation—all across the globe. Arabella has come to find that the reason people are “struggling to discuss death across the UK public sector is because we are reluctant to embrace certain discourses around spirituality and the sacred that is integral to so many different cultures when it comes to discussing how we depart from this life.” With a burning desire to travel the world and immerse herself in new communities, far and wide, Arabella hopes to build a community of “soul-led peace builders” to foster dialogue on mediation and spirituality, with the goal of creating resources of conflict prevention and palliative care. She envisions a more connected, international community of mediators learning from one another’s practices. Her travels have taken her to India and South Africa, and she is absolutely thrilled to continue on to Peru, where she will be participating in the 2025 MBBI Global Summit in October. Arabella truly cannot wait to continue expanding her network of passionate mediators around the world.
Article by Sarah Stenovec, MBBI Writer