"Community Building[edit]
In his book The Different Drum: Community Making and Peace[12], Peck says that community has three essential ingredients:
Inclusivity
Commitment
Consensus
Based on his experience with community building workshops, Peck says that community building typically goes through four stages:
Pseudocommunity: In the first stage, well-intentioned people try to demonstrate their ability to be friendly and sociable, but they do not really delve beneath the surface of each other's ideas or emotions. They use obvious generalities and mutually-established stereotypes in speech. Instead of conflict resolution, pseudocommunity involves conflict avoidance, which maintains the appearance or facade of true community. It also serves only to maintain positive emotions, instead of creating a safe space for honesty and love through bad emotions as well. While they still remain in this phase, members will never really obtain evolution or change, as individuals or as a bunch.
Chaos: The first step towards real positivity is, paradoxically, a period of negativity. Once the mutually-sustained facade of bonhomie is shed, negative emotions flood through: Members start to vent their mutual frustrations, annoyances, and differences. It is a chaotic stage, but Peck describes it as a "beautiful chaos" because it is a sign of healthy growth. (This relates closely to Dabrowski's concept of disintegration).
Emptiness: In order to transcend the stage of "Chaos", members are forced to shed that which prevents real communication. Biases and prejudices, need for power and control, self-superiority, and other similar motives which are only mechanisms of self-validation and/or ego-protection, must yield to empathy, openness to vulnerability, attention, and trust. Hence this stage does not mean people should be "empty" of thoughts, desires, ideas or opinions. Rather, it refers to emptiness of all mental and emotional distortions which reduce one's ability to really share, listen to, and build on those thoughts, ideas, etc. It is often the hardest step in the four-level process, as it necessitates the release of patterns which people develop over time in a subconscious attempt to maintain self-worth and positive emotion. While this is therefore a stage of "Fana (Sufism)" in a certain sense, it should be viewed not merely as a "death" but as a rebirth—of one's true self at the individual level, and at the social level of the genuine and true Community.
True community: Having worked through emptiness, the people in the community enter a place of complete empathy with one another. There is a great level of tacit understanding. People are able to relate to each other's feelings. Discussions, even when heated, never get sour, and motives are not questioned. A deeper and more sustainable level of happiness obtains between the members, which does not have to be forced. Even and perhaps especially when conflicts arise, it is understood that they are part of positive change.
The four stages of community formation are somewhat related to a model in organization theory for the five stages that a team goes through during development. These five stages are:
Forming where the team members have some initial discomfort with each other, but nothing comes out in the open. They are insecure about their role and position with respect to the team. This corresponds to the initial stage of pseudocommunity.
Storming where the team members start arguing heatedly, and differences and insecurities come out in the open. This corresponds to the second stage given by Scott Peck, namely chaos.
Norming where the team members lay out rules and guidelines for interaction that help define the roles and responsibilities of each person. This corresponds to emptiness, where the community members think within and empty themselves of their obsessions in order to be able to accept and listen to others.
Performing where the team finally starts working as a cohesive whole, and to effectively achieve the tasks set of themselves. In this stage individuals are aided by the group as a whole, where necessary, in order to move further collectively than they could achieve as a group of separated individuals.
Transforming This corresponds to the stage of true community. This represents the stage of celebration, and when individuals leave, as they invariably must, there is a genuine feeling of grief, and a desire to meet again. Traditionally, this stage was often called "Mourning".
It is in this third stage that Peck's community-building methods differ in principle from team development. While teams in business organizations need to develop explicit rules, guidelines and protocols during the norming stage, the emptiness' stage of community building is characterized, not by laying down the rules explicitly, but by shedding the resistance within the minds of the individuals.
Peck started the Foundation for Community Encouragement (FCE) to promote the formation of communities; which, he argues, are a first step towards uniting humanity and saving us from self-destruction.
The Blue Heron Farm is an intentional community in central North Carolina, whose founders stated that they were inspired by Peck's writings on community; although, Peck himself had no involvement with this project.
Characteristics of True Community[edit]
Peck describes what he considers to be the most salient characteristics of a true community:[12]
Inclusivity, commitment and consensus: Members accept and embrace each other, celebrating their individuality and transcending their differences. They commit themselves to the effort and the people involved. They make decisions and reconcile their differences through consensus.
Realism: Members bring together multiple perspectives to better understand the whole context of the situation. Decisions are more well-rounded and humble, rather than one-sided and arrogant.
Contemplation: Members examine themselves. They are individually and collectively self-aware of the world outside themselves, the world inside themselves, and the relationship between the two.
A safe place: Members allow others to share their vulnerability, heal themselves, and express who they truly are.
A laboratory for personal disarmament: Members experientially discover the rules for peacemaking and embrace its virtues. They feel and express compassion and respect for each other as fellow human beings.
A group that can fight gracefully: Members resolve conflicts with wisdom and grace. They listen and understand, respect each other's gifts, accept each other's limitations, celebrate their differences, bind each other's wounds, and commit to a struggle together rather than against each other.
A group of all leaders: Members harness the "flow of leadership" to make decisions and set a course of action. It is the spirit of community itself that leads, and not any single individual.
A spirit: The true spirit of community is the spirit of peace, love, wisdom and power. Members may view the source of this spirit as an outgrowth of the collective self or as the manifestation of a Higher Will."
To change your relationships to money, time and community for the better, please read/watch this blog or just phone/text Paul for a chat:
Zero7807 066 202
& the Care4Care.mov message (from Prof Heinz Wolff) that I'm taking personal responsibility to deliver to 19,000 doors in Hastings & St Leonards is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_MZZnJhsvI
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What do you make of the #2066 #Timebanking Gallery?
(We're based at Southwater Area Community Centre, TN37 6LA).
You might, for example, come along to discuss or play "Yes to What? The #2066 #Timebanking Game".
The Gallery is open Mondays and Fridays from noon-6pm (or later by request) and the next "almost monthly event" is Saturday 15th March 2pm-9pm with Kurt as the main performer.
The full programme of monthly events is on the 1st #2066 #Timebanking leaflet, which is also available online i.e. as the Facebook cover picture on the Action for Hastings Happiness Facebook page.
If not leafleting or litter picking around your street or helping with running the freelender.org Mind Body Spirit library, how would you like to earn your first 15 Timebank hours etc.(& what service/events would you most like to spend your Timebank credits on?) Tel Zero7807 066202
To register your interest and thereby hasten the convening of meetings for the 20+ other locals who are interested in moving this forward for the welfare of all: http://stleonardstimebank.blogspot.co.uk/p/welcome-register-page.html
And for a general introduction to Timebanking from one of the national organisations who commissioned me to create a social media strategy for them, see: http://timebanking.org.uk
