Intentional Society: Thickening the Why
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This last week we (in our community call) looked at Impact zone, projects, and meaning-making around "What does “outer work” look like in your life?" There's a list of 10+ projects that individuals are already working on, and we're shaping up a "collaboration marketplace" frame for that part of our broadening ecosystem. All in all, not a bad start!
But also, it felt a little "bumping around in the fog" as practice and project elements intermingled in our session. And frankly that's not a bad metaphor to apply to the last three weeks of Zone touring overall — some enjoyment, some enthusiasm, and also some "okay cool but why?" energy coming out.
I, James, look at this feedback and think I've fallen victim to one of the classic blunders: Every book, article, and listicle out there on organizational communication says something like "leaders (as message deliverers) need to feel like they're significantly overcommunicating in order to even come close to communicating enough." And when I ask myself how much and how well I've been communicating the big picture of what we're doing right now I see... Oh. Not that much, not that well.
It's more than the big (month-level, in this case) picture, too. Within each of our activity zones, there are some things that I think I pretty clearly know as the primary vision-holder and steering designer, and I think I've been mushy (still!) in holding the line between directed-structure-scaffolding and space-to-play-inside. I say "still!" because this has been something I've already been trying to work on.
There a strong, connected web of "why" reasons in my inner landscape for the where-now-and-how of this season of change. But, the strand of its transmission feels thin and needs thickening across the interpersonal connections of our communal space. I'm accepting that more and more, so let's see if I can come into integrity with that in a way that allows for a much more energetic resonance in the collective system!
I'm grateful to IS members for their contributions and feedback in so many ways, and for the culture of acceptance and okay-ness that makes it okay to freely flow experience-expression honestly and openly. A system must see itself well in order to have the meta-systematicity that can live and learn and adapt and thrive in a landscape of fractal-scale complex systems. Onward and upward.
Cheers,
James