WindSong

Yup, I woke up early again this morning. This time it was 4.30 a.m., so that was a half hour improvement over yesterday. But the good thing about my jet lag is that, although I have a full day ahead of me, I still get a chance to blog.

Along with some residents of eight intentional communities in Coastal British Columbia, I am participating in a consensus decision making workshop.

On this occasion the host community is WindSong Cohousing Community in Langley. This is the first time that I have seen the community that provided the inspiration for the design of my own community, Pacific Gardens in Nanaimo.

Here is the glass-covered pedestrian street that inspired the founders of Pacific Gardens. We too have an atrium. I thought it was an awesome design for the rainy winters of the Pacific Northwest. Ironically, I am experiencing it as a terrific design even during the glorious summer weather that we're having right now. WindSong has lots of young children, and it provides them with a wonderfully safe environment.

Here is another part of the atrium.

Some apartments and townhouses at WindSong obviously are home to kids .......

....... while others have a more sedate, adult look about them.

Here are the vegetables gardens .......

.......and next to them are one of a couple of different playgrounds.

During meal breaks, we workshop participants are able to spread out amongst WindSong's gardens.

These are my charming hosts, Marcus and Julian. When I return home, I will take with me instructions to give their Ouma Mia big hugs on their behalf.

Response to the responses

There have been some thoughtful comments on my previous blog post in which I confessed to being a so called Controller.

OVERLAP

One of the questions Krista asked was whether or not I had observed any inconsistency between the Pursuit of Excellence (TPOE) and Nonviolent Communication (NVC). So far, I have observed only very minor contradictions between the two. They have been differences of style rather than substance. In fact, I believe that TPOE and NVC complement each other. They, in turn, tie in nicely with two other concepts I have been studying, namely, consensus decision making and conflict resolution.

REFRAMING

I agree with MidnightCafe's observation that "Controller" is an unfortunate label and that something about "leadership" would sound more constructive. I like the way in which Krista used the language of Nonviolent Communication to reframe the labels in terms of needs.

NUANCES

I want to add to the information about myself that I provided yesterday. I am not a pure Controller, what the Pursuit of Excellence folk call a Controlling Controller. When I completed the communication Styles questionnaire, I recognized myself in each of the four quadrants to some extent.

This was confirmed yesterday, during a chat with one of my fellow Pacific Gardeners who also had done the Pursuit of Excellence. He said that he saw me as being close to the middle of the graph, where the four types intersected. However, our Pursuit of Excellence instructor encouraged us to identify our strongest quadrant, even if it represented only a mild preference.

The exercise in TPOE revealed that I had a secondary communication style that moderated my primary one. My secondary personality type is what they called the Supporter. That is the sympathetic person who loves to help others, who will go to the ends of the Earth to save a relationship, and who avoids conflict. The Supporter's downfall is that he or she finds it difficult to say, "No." Hence, his or her needs often go unmet. That was the person whom I used to like to think I was.

So, in TPOE language, I am a Supporting Controller.

STRETCHING

My fellow Pacific Gardener with whom I discussed this told me that he was a Controlling Analyzer. The Analyzer is a person who loves to study facts and data. He or she does not like to look foolish. He or she also dislikes being rushed. At the extreme end of the spectrum this person can suffer from analysis paralysis.

He told me that, since he had become aware of the personality types, he had made a deliberate attempt to stretch himself. For example, it does not come easily to him to be spontaneous (like a Promoter). He also may overlook other people's suffering (which a Supporter automatically would notice). So, from time to time, he reminds himself to be sensitive to other people's circumstances, and he also reminds himself to have fun.

MORE STRETCHING

On Monday night I experienced an extraordinary example of someone stepping outside of his comfort zone. The weekly meeting of Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community's shareholders was challenging. There was one point, in particular, in which I had a meltdown. As had been the case the last time this had happened, I felt deeply ashamed of myself, and apologized to everyone.

About twenty minutes after I got home, the phone rang. It was one of my fellow Pacific Gardeners. He is not a Controlling Analyzer, like our other co-owner whom I mentioned above. Rather, this person is a pure Analyzer, an Analyzing Analyzer. He examines numbers in spreadsheets and the wording of legal documents in excrutiating detail. He expresses his emotions relatively rarely.

He said, "Hi, Judy. After what happened at the meeting, I just wanted to check how you were feeling now." To say that I was surprised doesn't even begin to tell you how I felt. This question, coming from our resident Analyzing Analyzer, was nothing short of astonishing. I also felt deeply touched that he had reached out to me. I knew that he too was a graduate of the Pursuit of Excellence. I was in awe of the positive effect that his efforts at personal growth had had on him.

ASKING FOR HELP

Being aware of the weaknesses of my personality type helps me to identify areas in which it would be wise to ask for assistance. For example, I made a snap decision to buy into Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community. Last August, I travelled to Nanaimo, a place to which I had never been before. I looked around the city, met the folks who were involved with Pacific Gardens, and did a tour of the construction site. Three days later I signed on the dotted line.

When I look back on that, I shake my head. It's true that I'm glad I moved here. I love my life in Nanaimo. Although we go through wobbly patches, I also love my involvement with Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community. But it was a huge decision with significant, long term implications. If I was faced with such an enormous decision in future, I would force myself to spend more time in Analyzing mode. I also would solicit the opinions of a couple of Analyzers who had no vested interest in the outcome.

UNDERSTANDING OTHERS

Awareness of personality types helps me in my dealings with other people. A while ago, a man -- whom I now recognize as a Promoting Promoter -- let down a volunteer organization to which I belong. He said he would do something for us, and he didn't. As is typical of a Promoter, he is full of brilliant ideas. But his strength lies in starting things, not in finishing them. Now I will take into consideration the fact that he is weak when it comes to focus and closure. Instead of being disappointed in him, I will be realistic about the gifts that he can and cannot contribute to our group.

In saying that this man is a Promoting Promoter, I don't want to suggest that he has been sentenced to that pigeonhole for life. Maybe his self-awareness will increase, and maybe he will expand into the other quadrants in due course. But, at this point, he is not a close friend. Other than wishing him goodwill in a general way, I don't care what he does with his life. The only information that feels useful to me right now is an awareness of his personality type insofar as it affects the volunteer organization to which I belong.

Being aware of personality types also helps me to package information when I'm making proposals. I now understand that an Analyzer, for example, will want lots of information and will want time to process it before making a decision. I will allow the time and space for him/her to do that, rather than expecting him/her to get back to me right away.

VARIED TERMINOLOGY

There are other personality classification systems. Two that I have studied in the past are the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) and the Enneagram. In the MBTI, there are sixteen types, while in the Enneagram there are nine.

I don't think it matters which system I use. I think they all offer the benefit of awareness that some people view the world as I do and some people view it differently.

Owing to my previous studies, I already knew that when I went into the Pursuit of Excellence. The big Aha for me during TPOE was that the Supporter was only my secondary personality type, while the Controller / Leader / Decision Maker was my primary one.

Feelings and values

Something that I learned in my conflict resolution workshop and that I witnessed again during the meeting facilitation training in Courtenay, British Columbia was the importance of a dialogue in which feelings and values are expressed and heard.

When people encounter challenges, they often respond with what they believe are solutions. Hasty solutions, however, sometimes have unintended consequences that, in themselves, become problems.

One of the issues that we trainee meeting facilitators observed the members of Creekside Commons discussing was whether or not to surround their community with a deer-resistant fence. Prior to our arrival, members of the community had been divided on the question.

Attempted solutions that had created new problems were the fences and walls that about forty percent of the households had erected around their individual back yards and the temporary fences around the community vegetable garden and community orchard that many residents considered ugly.

When people who disagreed with each other about a perimeter fence sat down and had a dialogue, they were very surprised to discover the values they shared.

A theme that emerged was that members of both camps cared deeply about the meadow on which they had built their community. Most of them also were committed to sustainability. But what did sustainability mean? Did it mean ensuring food security for humans? Did it mean living in harmony with deer and other wild animals?

Creeksiders also found out that many of them regarded themselves as prudent. But again, how was that defined? For some community members prudence meant fiscal responsibility. For those people, the cost of a perimeter fence and Texas Gates (cattle grids) were a concern. For other people, prudence was tied to stewardship of the land for future generations.

Other issues that emerged were aesthetic considerations (what balance to create between edible and ornamental landscapes), privacy in individual owners' back yards, and maintenance of an open and accessible community while providing safety for children.

Allowing for minor modifications because of our community's different layout, I can see us at Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community having to address the same issues in due course. I also see the same range of values and interpretations of those values represented amongst our community members.

The meeting that we external trainees facilitated for Creekside Commons did not result in a consensus decision. But it cleared the air and elicited mutual compassion amongst Creeksiders who previously had disagreed with each other. Towards the end of the meeting they figured out some next steps that we all were confident would result in a resolution in the near future.

This exercise demonstrated to me very powerfully that a discussion of feelings and values was not a waste of time. Indeed, while it involves an upfront investment of time, it is more efficient in the long run. It also leads to win-win outcomes.

An engaging workshop

The first workshop in the Community Facilitator Intensive Series was a heart warming and meaningful experience for me.

It was the first time that I'd participated in an event with members of other intentional communities. In this case there were representatives from six cohousing communities and two ecovillages in Coastal British Columbia. It was wonderful to hear about life in other intentional communities and to witness it first hand in the case of our hospitable host community, Creekside Commons in Courtenay, BC.

The purpose of these workshops is to teach meeting facilitation skills. That, in turn, is intended to build the capacity for consensus decision making within each participating community.

During the three and a half days that we spent with them, our host community had two meetings. In advance of those meetings, members of the host community briefed us trainees. They explained to us what the issues were, how long they'd been wrestling with them, and what they'd done so far in an attempt to resolve them.

We trainees, in turn, chose meeting formats that we thought would be most constructive for each issue, and we created agendas for each meeting. The facilitator, time keeper, vibe watcher, scribe and minute taker for each meeting was one of us external trainees.

In case you don't know what a vibe watcher is, it is someone who monitors the moods of meeting participants and alerts the facilitator to an emerging issue if it escapes the facilitator's attention. A scribe is someone who jots down key points on a flip chart that is visible to meeting participants.

The two community meetings resulted in a rich cross fertilization of ideas. The host community had a chance to try meeting formats that were new to them. There was one in particular that they liked a lot and said they would use again. They also had the benefit of external facilitators and other meeting aids who felt compassionate towards them but who were not personally invested in their issues.

For the trainees, it was a high privilege to witness members of the host community discussing their challenges at an authentic level. It was comforting to hear from the members of established communities that they had grappled with the same issues around the two year mark (which was the age of our host community). Those of us who belonged to forming communities or communities under construction gained insights into what it would be like to live in community. From the point of view of our training, it felt much more relevant to work with real issues being debated by real people in real time than it would have felt if Tree had created hypothetical scenarios.

The drive back to Nanaimo with Roz, my fellow Pacific Gardener who had participated in the workshop, was delightful. She wisely chose to take the slower but more scenic route that hugged the coast, rather than the quicker but more mundane inland highway. On the way home, we unpacked the meaning that the workshop had held for each of us.

I am deeply grateful for this experience.

The adventure expands

This is a short break during a three and a half day workshop in consensus decision making that I'm doing at Creekside Commons in Courtenay, BC.

For me the rewards of this experience are off the charts. I'm learning so much from observing the dynamics of our host community, and from accessing the combined wisdom of eight intentional communities in coastal British Columbia. Besides that, it's just plain fun.

I rather suspect I could get used to this cohousing gig. :-)

How could I?

During a meeting that I attended a couple of days ago, I had a temper tantrum. I shouted and swore at the facilitator.

As soon as I'd done it, I felt ashamed of my behaviour and apologized.

Luckily it didn't phase the facilitator. As a matter of fact, she gave me a ride home after the meeting, and was perfectly friendly.

But that isn't the point. What's more relevant is that I am deeply committed to compassionate communication, and I violated my own principles.

Only a week previously, I'd participated in a two-day conflict resolution workshop. I did a consensus decision making workshop in September, and I'm registered for another one in April. One of my favourite books is Nonviolent Communication by Marshall Rosenberg.

Yet, when it felt to me as if one of my core buttons was being pushed, the blood rushed to my head, and I lashed out.

When I later recalled what I'd said, I was grateful for a couple of things. First of all, I had used I statements. Secondly, I had criticized the facilitator's behaviour (or at least my perception of her behaviour). I had not called her names or questioned her integrity as a person.

Of course that doesn't excuse my behaviour. I consider it to have been totally unacceptable.

I have been going over the incident in an effort to recognize the dynamics, learn from it, and be better prepared when a similar situation arises in future.

I have tried to avoid beating up on myself, as that would only compound the problem. I've tried to accept that I'm imperfect and to forgive myself.

In our Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community meetings, which was where this happened, we have a beautiful tool that is designed to address this very scenario. Each meeting participant has three cards.

When a meeting participant holds up a green card, it means, "I agree," or, "I have information to contribute." A yellow card means, "I have a question," or, "I have a concern." A red card means, "I disagree," or, "There is something terribly wrong going on here."

When a participant holds up a red card, the facilitator is obliged to stop the main discussion so that the issue can be addressed. If I had remembered to use it, that one thing -- a little red card -- would have created a very different outcome.

I also forgot to maintain an attitude of curiosity. Instead, I jumped to conclusions about the facilitator's intentions.

In the interim, I have thought of a way of tweaking the meeting process so that it will accomplish what the facilitator wants while at the same time addressing my needs. I will suggest it to her before our next meeting.

Interestingly enough, I once again have found myself playing leap frog with another blogger. Yesterday there was an entry entitled Control on the Sensible Living blog. As soon as I saw it, I thought, "Oh, Annie, you've read my mind."

Listen for the Truth

This is a follow up to my previous post about people's unmet needs.

When Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community participated in a consensus decision making workshop with Tree Bressen in September 2008, she told us something related to this.

She said that, whenever someone else was talking, it was important to listen for the truth in what they were saying. Again, this was in the context of someone behaving "badly," expressing themselves poorly, being too strident, etc.

Tree said that, in these circumstances, the person often had a gift to offer, even if they were failing to package it attractively. It was our job to find the tiny kernel of truth that was buried deep in the middle of what they shared with us, regardless of how inarticulate they were.

I have found that this has been a valuable practice when someone has been venting. Some of my ranting friends have gifted me with pearls of great wisdom. :-)

Unmet Needs

One of the nuggets of wisdom I learned from Marshall Rosenberg's book, Nonviolent Communication, is that a person who is behaving badly has a need that is not being met.

When I say a person is behaving "badly," this could mean mildly negative behaviour, like pouting or rolling their eyes at what you're saying. At the other end of the spectrum, it could mean they're holding a knife to your throat.

But, wherever their behaviour is on that continuum, they have an unmet need.

Since I have become aware of this, I have found that it has taken a lot of discipline for me to remember it when someone has been ranting at me. But, wow, it sure improves the outcome of the conversation!

When I have been able to listen to someone and let them finish venting, they eventually have calmed down, and we have gone on to have a rewarding interaction.

Recently my son asked me about the main insights I'd gained from the consensus decision making workshop I'd participated in and my reading of the book on nonviolent communication. I cited the recognition of unmet needs as one of them.

My son then asked, "Well, what has that enabled you to do? Have you recognized what the other person's unmet need is, and what have you been able to do with that information?"

I responded that I had not always been able to recognize what the other person's unmet need was. Sometimes all I had been able to do was say to myself, "S/he is ranting. Therefore s/he has an unmet need."

I told my son that, if nothing else, this helped me to avoid getting caught up in the other person's drama. At a minimum, I was able to stay calm, and listen. This bought me time. I felt that that alone was valuable.

But, later in a conversation, when my initial feeling of defensiveness has quietened down, I often have been able to detect what the other person's unmet need has been. Then I have been able to acknowledge it and, together, we have been able to discuss how the need could be addressed.

My point, though, is that this insight has been valuable to me even when I have failed to recognize exactly what the unmet need has been. Just reminding myself of the existence of the unmet need in itself has been useful.

With that having been said, I do not want to sound as if I am discounting the amount of commitment and self control that are required to implement this strategy. At times, the effort needed to do this is huge.

More Flying Toys

In an earlier blog post, I stated that I was angry and felt like throwing my toys out of my playpen.

Unfortunately, when people throw their toys out on a larger scale, it creates enormous suffering. The news story of the moment is Gaza, but this year tragedies also have unfolded in Sudan, Chad, Zimbabwe, Congo and elsewhere.

It is my dearest wish that humankind would create peace.

I don't know how to persuade people in far away places to do that. The only thing I know how to do is to spend each day learning a bit more about compassionate communication and implementing it right here in Nanaimo, British Columbia, Canada. My primary vehicles for that are my membership of Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community and use of our consensus decision-making model.

As Gandhi said, Be the change you want to see in the world.

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.