A story is more than just an account of events; it is an expression of the narrator’s values. To understand this project it will help to understand a bit about myself as the agent of change: the values I brought into conversations and discernment. set the stage for this story it will help to understand the values I enacted in designing and conducting meetings and conversations.
Competition and I have never sat well together. Like most, I don’t like losing. Paradoxically, I don’t like winning either. To be more specific: I don’t like who I am when I win. The joy that I feel at winning sits uncomfortably with the knowledge of another’s loss. I am repulsed by my own joy at winning. Perhaps it’s simply that I’m projecting my own feeling about losing onto others, and don’t want to cause the same pain I would feel to others.
In my early teens, after receiving my first black belt my martial arts teacher clearly spoke to my condition. He told me that I should not be too concerned with tournaments, and that I’d never be a winner no matter my skill. He said, “You have no desire to beat your opponent.” With his guidance my focus switched from developing my own skill to bringing other students up to my level. That was my earliest experience of leadership, and my first sense of working toward the greater good.
As a martial arts instructor I quickly learned that we all have different body mechanics, and that demonstration and imitation only got students so far. This is where I caught the collaboration bug (and in retrospect my earliest inklings of a form of inclusion). The one-on-one work where together we puzzled out techniques that worked for their body, were hugely gratifying. The curiosity, experimentation, playfulness, and a shared mission came together to and gave me my first taste of belonging (outside my family).
As a young adult I found myself gravitating toward collaboratively governed groups. In my early twenties I apprenticed as an ecological designer with a Quaker elder. It was through studying natural systems that I learned the value of careful and protracted observation over action. I also saw this systems value expressed in Quaker structures and processes, and it was a natural step for me to become active in our local meeting. It was with fellow Quakers that I came to understand what it feels like to be a part of a self-organizing system.
Later in life the collaborative bent continued in the form of performance arts, in particular improvisational theater. Seeing every event as a gift, embracing failure, and being present in the moment, are all skills that have been invaluable to me in aspiring to be an agent of social change. They also can lend much needed levity in uncomfortable situations. As an instructor of improv theater I gained another skill watching students: to step out of what’s currently going on and look for patterns and dynamics. As a facilitator this is sometimes called “going to the balcony” in order to get a larger perspective on a meetings challenges.
So I hope it’s clear by now that I am far from a specialist: actor, dancer, carpenter, social worker, farmer, forester, safety officer, educator, organizer, etc. Throughout I have carried a collaborative approach: working to understand people, plants, animals, and natural/social systems to develop ways that work for the common good of all.