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What is our community for and how does it serve us? Learning how to speak to the world
Submitted by Helen Titchen Beeth on September 13, 2008 - 22:16.
There has been a fantastic conversation going on on our list serve. I post it here for posterity, and so that we can come back to it in hindsight and be further enriched by what we have unfolded together.
It was set off by a post on another thread in this community's forum, about our community's use of the term 'pattern'.
First to respond was Jeannel, with an emotional plea:
The chaordic article you included in your post stated that abstract thinking--or finding enough people in our networks capable of necessary levels of abstraction to sufficiently define the principles that truly represent the essence of an organization, and to define these principles in such a way that lay people will understand them.
This brings me to the biggest problem I'm having with AoH, and a main reason why I haven't posted here for some time. There is a critical piece missing for me--the piece of action in the lay world. It's nice to think abstractly and hold conversation upon conversation exploring the principles that may be emerging for a person/group/situation. It's fun to go to a gathering of practitioners and hold these conversations, harvest in groovy ways, connect with fellow practitioners and all that. But give me a break, already!
It's not about "them" being able to think abstractly. It's about "us" being able to communicate in ways that people can comprehend (without annoying or alienating ones audience in the process). It's about "us" being able to model our principles through, amongst other things, our deeds, so that others might possibly do the same if they were so inclined. Or, in other words, the ability to translate from thinking to doing. And that is something I don't really see as part of the AoH. I see lots of prosaic talk, I see lots of feel-good tough-personal-work kinds of conversations, but in terms of those conversations resulting in layman's actions or layman's results, well, that seems to be another story altogether.
And yes, I'm pissed about this. When I first discovered this community and this movement, I was so excited--it resonated to my core and I embraced and immersed myself in it. I went to several AoH gatherings, I wrote my masters thesis about AoH, I' took related seminars with Otto Scharmer and others to deepen my understanding, I created opportinuties to practice in all aspects of my life. Now I feel like Thich Nhat Hanh writes about in his experiences of engaged Buddhism--when he watched all those monks hanging out in their monastaries in the mountains doing their practice while the reality of the "laypeople" of a war-torn Vietnam cried for putting ones practice where ones hands were, so to speak. People didn't need monks joining them and reciting sutras. They needed clean water, food and shelter for their families. And I have to admit that sometimes I just want to kick this online community as I read message after message of "oh, that's an interesting thought," or "here's a poem I wrote about something," and just shout "OH COME ON! WHAT ARE YOU REALLY DOING FOR THE ISSUE?" For me, it's like the online community sits in its own space getting high on its own thoughts while the reality of the world simply continues.
And then I think maybe that's not the purpose of this at all, and I need to get over myself. Perhaps the purpose of the AoH is to sense what's emerging with others who seek to sense what's emerging, and that's pretty much it. Perhaps it's me wanting to take that "creating and maintaining the space for people to sense what's emerging and tap into the wisdom of the collective whole" stuff and tack on my own clause saying "and then do something with it for the world."
So, this is an imperfect post with imperfect thoughts on what may be a perfectly flawed concept of pattern for the Art of Hosting, but I am sending it out there anyway because if I don't express these things to this community I am very likely to leave it.
Sent with frustration but also with love,
Jeannel King
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Action in Kalamazoo
In the World Café online community you can read one of the stories where -by using World Café and the Art of Hosting principles - something really changed in the world.
It was posted by Frances Baldwin. She writes: "My purpose for sharing this story at this time is to highlight the deepening fusion and connections that I am recognizing, between our work especially in AoH and TWC and to thank you for continuing my learning. I know that the scenario described is just one more example of experiences that we are all having in places around the world."
"The Drug Courts of Kalamazoo County have made a revolutionary shift in the way that they process drug use offenders. The court has shifted from simply penal system to a problem-solving resource for 1,500 recovered addict/criminals (over the past 10 years) who are now law abiding contributing citizens. Success rate in the program is high...."
Read more
Pattern - by Michel Vandermeulen
To all, hello
In my earlier contribution immediatly after the asking to define of "pattern" from an AoH perspective and an intervention from Jeanel, I pleaded for a down to earth approach beside of the more abstract one. Mr.Graham is saying what I meant by this more pratical approach in a managerial world.
Well, the idea of working out my definition never left my mind, and so this is mine : maybe to much down earth for some of you, but meaningful for and understandable, I think, by "layman" like me.
A pattern in AoH is the personal representation (drawing, diagram, mind map, flow chart, document, mindset..)
by people participating in a AoH meeting
of the steps
favoring their learning and experience
in self-awareness and
in their vision, capability, and attitude
to come to their expression and invitation for a new meaning making of " being together"
when contributing to the world around them after the meeting.
I know this sounds maybe too very HR-like, but that is what my profession is about.
One can of course argue if the "pattern" has to be viewed from the point of view of the "hosts" rather than the one from the "guests". I took this last one, because the value of the learning only exists if it is in the acting afterwards.
And right now I realise that it was in fact a pattern representation I did and presented at the final moments of the AoH meeting mid march in Belgium and put on a large flipover page I have still hanging in sight at the wall just above my pc-screen. So: promise is promise: I'll type this sheet over and send it in, to show you "my" representation of "my "pattern.
Be well,
Michel .
From Graham Boyd
I've learnt to listen through the words to find the meaning. Most people in the world of business (and I assume politics and burocracy too) have neither the ability nor the patience to listen through the words. For me, finding the language that the listener uses, and then using that, is at the heart of hosting conversations. We all get tied up in our own 'group speak'
A second barrier to conversation lies in some of the rituals and explanations. Many of these don't carry over well. So again here, it's essential to take the heart of a ritual (e.g. provide security to individuals in a group) and re-frame it.
Fields and energy are two of the big 'red buttons' I avoid. (Energy in a mystical context, not people being energetic!) I often replace both with phrases like 'team spirit' or 'infectious enthusiasm'. Or whatever seems to get the message through.
It's very painful at times; sometimes just doesn't feel worth the effort.
If I can give any advice on any specific please let me know!
Until our community does this for itself
Thank you Helen!
For posting all these jems!!! I was thinking of doing the same. I couldn't stand it that so rich content would be wasted in email boxes!
From Philippe Dancause
Someone once told me you had to dive in when you felt it was time to…
First, as this is my first post, let me introduce myself to the community.
My name is Philippe Dancause. I meet some of you last summer at Shambhala (Thomas, Chris, probably others in chit chat talk) and have been integrating the AOH in my practice since then, first in my current practice as a business consultant working with companies and public organizations and secondly, as founder , with Jean-Sébastien Bouchard, of Grisvert, a company aiming at helping organizations in the design and facilitation of collaborative processes. (BTW, please excuse my English, which may provide you with funny misspelling at times, I’m from Quebec and speak French.)
So, here's my take on the language and action topic.
This post comes at an interesting time for me.
In the last few weeks, I have tried to make my way through the meta-language of the AOH and jump in the practice (thanks to this list, your blogs and Jean-Sebastien’s advices) using current assignments and the development of Grisvert’s pitch. While doing this, I felt some sparkles trying to go from the context of my assignment to the “theory” of the AOH and then back to the real world. I felt a bit “weak” sometime when I had to “transform” the language of the AOH in order to fit the situation I was in.
Then, I became aware that I was going through a process I had previously experienced when trying to integrate new approaches in my practice. I call this moment the “savoir être” moment. Some may translate it as embodiment (which may have more subtle meaning to some here). This is for me the moment when you go from trying to apply the notions, theory and words coming from the insiders and “true practitioners” to being able to translate and adapt the fundamentals of a practice to a given situation. This means adapting words, understanding the deep principles and choosing what is important and what brings confusion to the people involved in the situation where you are trying to apply the given approach.
The moment I realized I was getting through that process (of developing a “savoir être”) , I began to make a difference between the language of the community and the language I had to use in order to get results in my work. I started to focus more on the deep principles of the AOH and tried to translate them, even imperfectly, in the real world of the situation I was in.
Telling this in another way, I would say that learning a new approach like the AOH is learning to become a mediator between the deep principles of that approach and the situations where this approach is being applied. I feel the language one has to use in order to bring specific principles in a given context has to take its root in that context. In the same way a great question has to take its root in a given paradigm and bring conversations out of that paradigm, the language one chooses to use when doing AOH is a tool to reach to people and bring them to a new level of thinking and involvement.
This (I feel) can only be done if one can mediate between the theory of the AOH and the situation where it is applied. This involves being at ease with breaking from the meta language of the community (As Chris says: one that enables pointy headed conversations “) and being able to find the words needed to reach to people in a given situation.
The risk for a facilitator (for me at least) is to use that meta language directly in the field, without mediation. Also, the risk for a community of practice like this one is to have new comers never get through the “language barrier” and never make the difference between the “community language” and the language used in the field (those will leave with a strange opinion of the community and of the practice I guess).
In summary, for me, it all happens in the mediating moment: the fear, the right words, the friction between theory and reality, the connection. Once I get through that moment, once “I reach to people”, I know people can get in and we can do something together. From there we can make our way to action and results.
That’s it. This must have more meaning for me than it has for you all but this thread really called me. Hope this brings a little something in.
With heart,
Philippe
P.S. BTW, Helen, calling it “ the art of participatory leadership” gives me a great insight as it provides better meaning in French than the plain translation of “art of hosting conversations that matter”. Thank you!
From Tatiana Glad - reflection and action as 'art'
Hi all,
For those of you who know me you know that I am usually too busy (in action!) to spend much time reflecting online, it just isn't my preferred medium, but am so very grateful for those of you more fluent in this 'language' of e-mail lists who share so many valuable reflections that allow me - in reading them - to sharpen and hone my own practice in the world. For me the value in here is to make visible where the inner practice meets the outer work, where hearts meet hands. Offer what you can, ask for what you need. So you can do what needs to be done.
As someone who can do a pretty good rant against 'fluffiness', i have also learned about the value of a 'homebase' to check-in with once in a while to refuel and reflect so that my do-ing continues to be relevant... this AOH community is one of the key ones for me. And I have learned that when I am frustrated by seeming in-action and all talk, then maybe it is my turn to host some practical doing.
I love poetry,
and I love concrete stories about doing this in the world...
Story 1: the art of hosting from 'stuck' to flow
A group of theatre entrepreneurs that has founded a company together is experiencing team issues and differences of opinion on scaling up their enterprise. We played a FlowGame, with each player having made their playing pieces to represent the dimensions of personal leadership we will explore - embodied by the archetypes of the Deer (direction), the Eagle (meta-level perspective), the Mouse (community-building) and the Bear (taking action). The team of 6 played the game, drawing on cards to provoke conversation around key questions, and together we discovered patterns of behaviour that were impeding their putting their individual and collective dreams into healthy flow. Contracts were made at the end and they were set to embark on a bold new vision together, taking their ambition on a road trip which led to further clarity on the ongoing journey.
Story 2: the art of hosting change agents
Open Space became the core technology for meeting and generating inspired new actions in a community of change agents in a major international bank. Participants self-organise around a core questions of concern or inspiration that ranged from internal matters such as employee engagement to external opportunities such as "what is this bank doing about poverty in the world?". With conversations generated from the passion and responsibility of the participants, the outcomes often challenged the organisation to be more relevant, responsible and responsive to what most matters.
Story 3: the art of hosting real-time community
A development agency dealing with digital divide and e-inclusion issues in communities around the world hosted a gathering last year where we designed a World Café process to explore: What are our shared learnings about what makes a best/most sustainable telecentre practice? What are the synergies and opportunities for inspired regional and international collaboration between us? The group of 50 people discovered - and lived - the variety of specific experiences and contexts that are shared, which reflects a 'local ecology' and identified 9 action areas to take forward. The World Café provided these digital change agents from many countries a "human googling" experience! As a result of 3 'art of hosting' inspired gatherings, the 20+ partner organisations across the continent have now co-founded a regional network to activate action (across the spectrum from initiating policy change to supporting social enterprise) for reducing digital illiteracy and reconnecting millions to the part of the world that is mostly online.
best,
Tatiana
From Thomas Ufer
I love when things are cooking, and even better when I feel called for action.
First, thanks Jeannel for poking one of the wounds of this community, thanks Chris for the clarity (and fierceness) around language and how and where to use it, and all the others for the inspiration (Tenn, as always, great).
Before I dive into the topic, I just want to say that I hear you Toke, and I´m stepping up for taking in any success stories and putting them up on a new session on the web-site. If anyone feels called to share, please send me a small text (maybe a couple photos), in a language and format that would fit well on the web-site, and I´ll put it up.
The main reason that I feel this conversation about action and reflection creates so much echo, is that there is a lot of truth to it... mainly on the micro level, following up on specific action to the conversations that happen on the gatherings we convene. If we look at it on the macro level, and see the big movements (large scale change projects, trainings etc), seeing these as action, it´s easier to feel that there is something happening. But definitively I agree that even with it´s flaws in being effective on the translation to action, a lot of people are getting there hands dirty!
So, just to share a bit...
I´m just on my way back from the Pioneers of Change 10th anniversary global gathering, where over 30 people from around 15 countries were together for a week, engaged in the next level of emergence of the collective consciousness, the importance of multi-generational presence in the communities and learning how to live together in a life-affirming and sustainable ways. Many art of hosting practitioners where present, and clearly our way of working was applied there. On the very first level, it was amazing to see the personal transformation that a few people went through, from shy held back to fierce and committed. Just magical... The gathering happened at Axladitsa-Avatakia, a beautiful piece of land in Greece, that embodies the art of hosting pattern into creating a place of sustainable living and learning. This alone is a great example of dirty hands (literally, we even harvested beans and worked on the garden to make our own soup).
Another example, is the "Vanguard in Education" project, to create learning networks to take corporate education to a new level that´s being supported by Banco Real in Brazil. Next week we are having the first co-creation meetings, in which 8 important organizations are coming together to plant the first seed for this community of practice. The 4 days of workshops have a lot of art of hosting elements in it.
Well, let´s find the inspiration and energy to harvest this stories in a proper way for the web-site.
Big Hugs (from my pit-stop in Munich),
Thomas
From Tenneson Woolf
One of my own versions over the years of the inner dialogue on efficacy of hosting goes something like this:
Does this stuff work? Hell yes.
Do I fear it not working? Yup, I’m aware of that.
Does it work beyond just fun events? Hell yes.
Beyond listserve exchanges? Yup, that too.
But do I fear it not working? Yup, I’m aware of that.
Do I want it to work well and better? Hell yes. This is what hosting as practice is about. (Memo to self – all of life is practice! That pile of memos is very tall)
Is it killer now? Yes. Ala Byron Katie, yup, quite a bit of evidence that makes me feel a bit silly for asking my own question.
Does the language work? Sometimes brilliantly. Sometimes pathetically. Good to notice.
Is it good to communicate in the language of the land? Oh yes. (Memo to self – all of life is practice!)
Does this stuff make a difference in peoples lives that matters? From what I heard yesterday in a closing circle of Union educators and leaders, yes. The difference is in the tilling. And it is in the shared tilling that leads to occasional leaps like creating a plow and yoke.
Always? No.
Enough to notice? Would a baseball player batting 900 be noticeable? (Memo to self – all of life is practice.) Hell yes.
But do I fear it not working? Yup, I’m aware of that.
….
For me, good to notice. And good to tuck it away so that I can just get back to picking and canning the tomatoes.
Thanks Jeannel, Helen, all.
To Susan – thanks for “high fliers, poets, and tillers.” That is better than chocolate ice cream.
A few more musings on the Union tillers, high fliers, and poets that I cohosted this week with Chris Corrigan and Nancy Fritsche Egan: http://tennesonwoolf.blogspot.com/2008/09/high-fliers-poets-and-tillers.html.
The time is now…
From my guts,
Tenneson
From Helen Titchen Beeth
I know it's probably not my turn yet, since I was the one that launched this particular brick in the pond in the first place... but I'm pouncing on the piece anyway, becuz today's gifts and learnings have given me something I'd like to share with you all - and it follows right on from Chris's comments about the importance of languaging.
The background: We (Toke, Monica, Phil Cass, Matthieu Kleinschmager and myself) are preparing to host a group of over 50 managers and their teams inside the EU Commission for a three day process we are calling "the art of participatory leadership". We decided to call it this because the name makes more sense in this culture than "the Art of Hosting conversations that matter." A rose by any other name, and all that.
Even with the invitation we sent out, we found ourselves getting stung by some reactions - either people simply not grokking the questions we had asked them to answer ("what relevance can it possibly have to ask us what we would like others to know about us before the course starts?"). A reference to "deep questions" people might have - some seem to have found this deeply offensive! Ouch!!!! So we have gone through all our literature again and sanitised the language.
But they pick up fast, when we use our community's vocabulary to name experiences that they have just had but have no name for. This afternoon, Matthieu and I had a preparatory meeting with a group of colleagues who will be attending the training, and who will be walking straight into the fire a couple of days later to host a stakeholders' meeting in a different way. In pursuit of elusive purpose, we waltzed straight into divergence, and after about 2 hours, we'd filled up the flipchart on the floor with different questions and perspectives, and our three colleagues were speechless, like "Oh shit, what have we gotten ourselves into"... And I named it: t"he community of people who practice this work for a living have a name for what you are experiencing right now. We call it the "groan zone"." The sense of relief emanating from them was palpable. Ah, this is normal, it's known territory, it's part of the process. We're not lost, we're not stuck. OK, we can handle this if we know it's going to end. We even left them stewing in it because time ran out. We just reframed it for them as part of the process of marinating to distill their collective clarity about what this meeting was going to be about. And they went away grinning with a spring in their step.
As you say, Kathy - it take champions inside organisations to do this work - and Matthieu and I are learning now a little more what that means. Among other things, we are the sensory membrane that picks up the cultural needs that our wise eagles cannot so easily sense in advance. So I think this might be another role to add to all the others that we are starting to play with in Chris's pattern language over on Evolutionary Nexus.
Oh boy, what a beautiful pond this is, when we stir it up!
From Kathy Jourdain
I was about to pick up the talking piece when Chris’ email arrived (I’m smiling Chris, thanks) – and so I will go next (and haven’t been able to go before now because of the demands of the variety of projects I am working on at the moment where I am applying Art of Hosting and achieving results).
I have been loving this exchange reflecting the variety of experiences, reactions and desires we all hold in this Art of Hosting world. It always intrigues me to see which comments will generate response and reactions and I’m glad to see this space can hold so many diverse views.
To me Art of Hosting is about building capacity – and that takes on many, many forms including informing thinking and informing action. I have people tell me that they want to specifically work with me because I help them build capacity. I can do this because I am always looking to build my own capacity (hosting myself), I am continuously looking for ways to create the space for people to do meaningful, relevant work (hosting others) and because I can draw on my good friends in this community of practice.
Examples of where and how I use Art of Hosting principles, philosophies and methodologies to build capacity show up in one-on-one coaching work I do with others where they often report astonishing results. Working with teams – often executive/management teams who never built a language or a practice of conversation and, as a result, don’t know how to work collaboratively, collectively or co-creatively who now have common language and practices to shift the way work is done in their team, then in their department and then maybe in the whole organization. Working with cross-disciplinary teams in health-care where new understandings are enabling interesting and surprising shifts to begin to emerge.
I see immediate shifts in individuals and in teams that come about in shorter time frames. Some of the other larger, more extensive projects are still waiting to experience the full extent of shifts – for the same reason that other successful change efforts and mechanisms also take a long time – because there are no miraculous cures or solutions to large scale culture shift and the AoH is also not a miraculous cure – it takes time, dedicated effort, a continual revisiting of the outcomes, matching process to outcomes and to the current situation or needs. It takes champions inside organizations to do this work.
My experience with Art of Hosting is that people do have a different experience and yes, just having a different experience is not enough – we also need results. I concur with Chris – look harder, look deeper – create success stories yourself and find the people you can share with, collaborate with and learn from about how to take these exquisite on-line discussions and grow both your capacity and the capacity of others.
This community meets a wide range of my needs and interests and is one of the reasons I stay tuned into the conversations that emerge here, in person and in other related forums.
From my heart, Kathy
From Chris Corrigan
Hey guys...hey jeannal...good to see all this. Jeannel...you got a good rise out of me!
So here's my take on a few things relating to language and action.
We need language to talk to one another. We need to be able to speak each other's languages, and within our community of practice we are working with a language that helps us to communicate concepts and ideas about our work that offers some precision, so that we can at least try to find a way to talk to one another.
The philosophical conversations are important to me for a number of reasons. First of all, I think we operate out of a common set of assumptions and worldviews, but we don't often talk about those assumptions and worldviews much less question their relevance or validity. Our grappling with language and concepts at the E-Nexus for me is about trying to be more precise and more wise about what is underlying all of the work I am doing. It helps to have a specialized language that is formed and shared especially in face to face conversations that we have with each other. When we meet to talk about our work (as opposed to creating learning events for others) we talk about our world in a certain way, and its not necessarily understandable to the rest of the world. I don't think it needs to be, actually. Specialized and technical language has its place, and used well it helps us goo deeper into concepts and ideas in a faster way.. When it's used out of place, it is jargony and exclusionary.
So I think we DO owe a responsibility in learning events to be clear with our language and to speak plainly. I have heard over and over that some people have a hard time trying to understand what we are saying, and I have a dedicated practice to trying to explain these things in plain language and using stories of my work and experience. This is just a wise thing to do as a traveller: learn the other person's language and don't assume they know yours. Also in learning events, something that happens is that we introduce and invite people to join the kinds of inquiries we are having inside the community of practice. If we are sincere about that invitation, I think it bears repeating that we help them to understand that there IS a language within our community and here's what it means.
With respect to Jeannel's strong call to action, all I can say is come up here and play with me. My work is not Art of Hosting work, it is rather helping groups and communities find ways to do things better in a way that results in wise action that is sustainable and long lasting. That means mostly I spend time facilitating events, and designing processes that build relationships, accelerate learning and get shit done in a good way. I work with indigenous communities, non-profits, businesses and many forms and levels of governments with people that are doing good and some times critical work in the world. So are many of us in this community, and I'm proud to be associated with the Kunfundis, the work in the learning centres, the Louisville United Way, Santrepol Roulant, our friends at the Columbus Medical Association, and all the men and women, youth and children that I have met through this community that are ACTORS in the highest and noblest sense.
I am a community developer at heart and my work is made a magnitude better for being able to think and imagine and philosophize and dream about the concepts and worldviews that underlie our work. These pointy headed conversations may not be for everyone, but speaking personally, they help me do better work. And I just have to say I love engaging with THIS community of practice because it is largely made up of people that are doing things and making a difference. This is hardly an armchair community of practice. Instead it seems to me to be a community of action and reflection, and in that sense, it is a great and unique gift in my life.
So Jeannel...I love you and look harder. People are doing incredible work in the world. I appreciate that you are pissed, but I'm a little fierce about carving out a little space here to acknowledge the real work that many of us are doing with real people, affecting real lives, meeting real needs and trying to figure out how to do it better. Even Thich Nhat Hahn takes time to pause and reflect before acting. He engages deeply with the philosophy that underpins his worldview about action.
Peace in the middle.
Chris.
From Katherine Weinmann
Greetings.
I participated in an early iteration of the Art of Hosting at the 2002 Shambhala Institute with Toke and Marianne. This is my first foray into this community and the image is of one of me taking a running leap onto one of those moving sidewalks at airports - though this one is moving very fast, given the energy, clarity and eloquence of thought being expressed.
Following both this current thread and that of patterns - I found myself recalling the reflections I shared at the end of Day 1 in the "Getting to Maybe" module on complexity at the Ontario Shambhala Institute this past May: my own deep vulnerability with my, and as I observed, our collective awkwardness, even frustration at finding words, let alone the right words, to describe what we were trying to bring into the field, move into action on... in many cases, that which has never been before, at least from our perspective and knowing.
That here we were, a group of people whose "stock in trade" is the ability to express our own thoughts and meanings, and synthesize for others, with clarity and eloquence, and yet, for those things that are on the edge of imagination and innovation, in the the void before emergence into pattern, we don't have the words.
And that how many times I, using words, may have named the pattern - prematurely - only to have then made it something that "was", something I thought I knew because I sensed the energy converging in pattern, therefore could feel some degree of comfort, familiarity, certainty, power over. And that in so doing, I, perhaps with hubris or arrogance, made mundane even profane the new pattern that was sacred.
I make these as statements with an inherent tentativeness - so perhaps, better as questions...
Thank you.
Katharine
From Andre Ling
I've never met anyone face-to-face from the AoH community, but still I feel drawn to follow it because it inspires me, provokes me to think, takes me to deeper/higher levels, and makes me feel that the efforts I am making out here - in the 'real world' - are part of some larger evolving process with a hub and thousands of little branches spread out in other parts of the world. It's like a kind of living on-line haven for facilitators - especially if combined with evolutionary nexus and many of the fine blogs that those in this list also host!
My work (the 'hands' of my being) ranges from the nittiest-grittiest stuff of working with all kinds of marginalised and fragmented communities (with high levels of discrimination based on gender, age, caste, religion, political-affiliation, etc. as well as some quite serious poverty) in rural and town settings in a small part of India. It also includes helping the organisation I'm associated with evolve in such a way that it becomes better able to respond to the needs of the community. I blog about this mainly on my own personal blog. Now a lot of what I come across through AoH is not directly linked or applicable to the realities that I face... But at the same time, the concepts, the principles, the processes and the values that are reflected through here are a great help... And I love having a space where I can take all my experiences from the field - all these grounded, tangled up, complex, messy bits of reality - and zoom out and see the meaning that emerges when sufficient levels of abstraction are attained... this lets me go back to my work with new hypotheses, new approaches, new insights into what is required to bring about changes in the system. So, thank you!
At the same time, I can feel what people are saying. I supplant this mailing list with dozens of blogs and all kinds of other readings. If I were dependent on this alone, I might feel that I was not getting what I want. But one thing that I feel for sure, is that lurking in the sidelines (no offence to anyone) in community that welcomes questioning, that welcomes challenging, that welcomes diversity of opinion - well, it just doesn't seem fair really. So congratulations to all of you who broke your own silences. A recent blog post by Helen (over on E-nexus, see here) talks about the use of action-learning circles/cycles as a way of getting deeper into an issue. The main point being that the process starts with a question. We must invite the flood of responses that we need. We can't just expect that people will tell us what we always wanted to know just like that. So, to those of you who want to give shape and life and vibrancy to the community and see it fulfill your own needs, the best way may be to ask the questions that are sitting deep inside you to the community as a whole... And then just see what emerges!
Perhaps we need to host some kind of collaborative inquiry into what it would take to make this community more alive and fulfilling for all of us...?
Thank you! and Much Love!
Andre
Susan Szpakowski's reply
Isn't this why we need community?
It occurs to me that every community has its bias and tends to attract like people. What would it be like to have a community that really honors head, heart, and hand? That kept stretching beyond its comfortable gravitational pull?
I am enjoying these voices expressing different biases than mine, full and loud and clear. I agree that this community, like most, has to be careful not to become a caricature of itself.
Susan
Michel's reply to Jeannel
Dear (to me unknown Jeannel
I totally agree all with your thoughts and your feelings.
I want to add to your comment that I often feel so disconnected from some words, ideas, celebrations and symbolism, that I think: there is too much of esoterism in to be something for me. And it is not that I have no imagination, can't see or feel relations, similarities , have an excluding mindset, or am blind when it comes to complexity.
I met Helen at lunch not so long ago and expressed it in a somewhat different way : I accept there are energies we can not messure, I accept that you can believe in creating and holding an energy field when people meet, I accept that energies that meet create multiplied energy and not summed energy, I see the utility and benefit of techniques to boost this harvesting, the limitations of language to describe the world, and I respect people who go further in this, but there it stops for me.
So I've not the intent to become a brother, a master, ..I want to learn about real practices, learn to use the tools properly to create benefits in an untradtional way because it is the only way to really be in complexity and work with multiple layers. I like to meet others who present to me some of their daily practices (Helen is so great in this), to find inspiration and my way in it, and to create myself an understanding that would not exist otherwise.
I miss this so much in the circle of Aoh. Just people who talk about their learning, their errors, thier inspiration while doing things in the real world.
This is not frustration, this is not my shadow or ego ( in classic greek it is called hubris I think) , this is not about being or becoming a warrior.
This is about growing, mature and then harvesting,
about dealing collectively within a chaord and multiplex evolution,
about opportunities for individual growth in wisdom , sharing and debating it.
I don't mind that some people get their kicks from abstract reasoning.. But I get my kicks from not only seeding, growing and harvesting in me, but also just in my real garden here at home and the human garden around me. So..can we do something together in this perpective?
Michel
In-community oasis
It's so good to hear your authentic voice of frustration. It's funny - I have the same rant on other e-lists, where armchair philosophers and heads-on-sticks sit and take potshots at each other and intellectualise endlessly while Rome burns. But I don't get that feeling here. Perhaps its because I'm in communication (elsewhere than on the list) with members of the AoH community who are working hard in the 'real world' hosting grassroots work that makes stuff happen in the world. You're completely right that if this stuff isn't relevant to real life and real situations, it's just more la-la navel gazing and I wouldn't blame you from walking away from it.
Personally, I use this list for sharing stuff that is relevant to the Art of Hosting community as a community of practice, talking about this work at higher levels of abstraction, where we learn how to more efficiently distill principles, etc. because in order for me to really effectively apply this stuff in the layman's world (in which I am very much rooted in my own work, as we all are) I need to understand what I'm doing really, really well. Only then can I completely drop all the jargon and abstraction and get to grips with the real issues exercising the men and women in front of me, and really understanding their work, their concerns and their perspectives. And holding space for them to knuckle down and work out their actions.
So in many ways, I think this list serves as a kind of oasis where people can speak AoH language without alienating folk. But in my experience, working in a very complex but very real organisation with very relevant work to do in the world, part of the problem that I'm seeing is exactly that people don't know how to abstract enough to get to the root of the problems that they are faced with. They can't think big enough or deep enough, so they skim along the surface and get precisely nowhere but round in circles.
But what I understand you asking for, Jeannel, is more stories from the field about the different contexts in which people are doing this work to bring change into the world. Is that correct? What about you? Won't you tell us what you're up to these days?
It would be a pity to lose your voice from this community...
:-)
helen