My Big Dream

Consensus decision making and compassionate communication, which I have been learning about through Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community, have so captivated me, that I want to take these topics further.

Developing my communication skills is helping me in my personal life and in my relationships with my fellow cohos. I would like to share these skills with others in cohousing circles and in the wider world as well. That is My Big Dream -- to find a way of expanding nonviolent communication skills into the larger community.

Luckily, I'm going to have a chance to learn more. First of all, belonging to a cohousing community in itself is like signing up for a lifelong workshop. But, in a more formal sense, Tree Bressen is going to be facilitating a series of workshops for the cohousing communities in British Columbia over the next couple of years.

We in the cohousing communities in BC want to develop our capacity to practice these skills ourselves and to teach them to new cohos who join us in the future. Fortunately, Tree shares the dream of building this capacity amongst the cohousing communities in BC.

One of the neat things about cohousing is that the larger cohousing movement is to individual cohousing communities what those cohousing communities are to the people who live in them. Just as a cohousing community offers opportunities for some shared meals, communal gardening, car-sharing and so on, the cohousing movement, collectively, creates economies of scale.

Thus, the cohousing communities in BC have agreed to take turns hosting the series of workshops that Tree will offer to us over the next couple of years. Since Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community's building still is under construction and we haven't even moved in yet, Tree has promised to schedule our hosting stint towards the end of the series.

I've already participated in one of Tree's workshops, back in September 2008. I am so excited to have an opportunity to work with her again early in 2009.

What's more, in addition to the formal part of the workshop, it will give me a chance to visit the cohousing community that hosts the first workshop in the joint two-year series. That will be an opportunity to see how the host cohousing community functions and to meet other cohos from around BC. What a treat that promises to be.