Peter Merry's Evolutionary Leadership has been published at last!

You can buy it from Integral Leadership Review - 20% discount if you order it before April 15th.

I can thoroughly recommend this book - having reviewed it (read the review).

It's the only book of its kind I've found anywhere - not surprising, since Peter is the only man of his kind I've found anywhere!!

You can find out more about Peter on his new website - worth a visit.

This blog post is inspired by a conversation I had with Peter Merry the other day - we were discussing the relative merits of sharing good practice versus experimentation on the path to the new era... and went on to cover online versus physical and global versus local.

Understanding this to be a polarity to be managed rather than a problem to be solved, the best approach seems to be to explore the up-sides and down-sides of both options. As synchronicity would have it, the day I started writing this blog, a colleague of mine told me about the Cynefin framework, which exactly situates this topic in the field of complexity management.

What if the best practice is experimentation?
In their book ‘A simpler way’, Meg Wheatley and Myron Kellner-Rogers say: “Experimentation doesn’t use up possibilities; it creates more. More information, more experiences, more insights. We have limited the world, but it remains wide open to us.

“Many of us have created lives and organisations that give very little support for experimentation. We believe that answers already exist out there, independent of us. We don’t need to experiment to find what works; we just need to find the answer. So we look to other organisations, or to experts, or to reports. We are dedicated detectives, tracking down solutions, attempting to pin them on ourselves and our organisations.”

Why do we look around at solutions that are already out there, rather than learning how to experiment?

This is a very special time to be contemplating this question. The picture (it comes from Peter’s slide show on evolutionary leadership  – he attributes the diagram to Ervin Lazlo) situates us at an epochal bifurcation. All those little lines you see at the base of each steps are experiments. Each time, certain experiments succeed, take root and spread, bringing civilisation to its next level of complexity. When I first saw this slide, I was filled with delight because I understood that as long as we are experimenting, we are playing our part in evolution.

But how do we learn how to experiment, if the most we ever do is try out other people’s best practices? One down-side of trying to apply other people’s solutions is that we end up wasting a load of time trying to adjust their solutions to our context. Funnily enough, it’s often only by doing that that we discover what our true context is in the first place! That’s when we realise how out of touch we often are, in our organisations, with the reality we are operating in.

When we experiment inside an organisation to find our own solutions, we are sensing into our own situation, our own context, our own meaning, our own purpose, with our own people. It’s a great way to create ownership.

I’ve been learning about a new governance approach, called Holacracy, which uses practices like integrative decision-making and dynamic steering, where we explicitly state we’re not after the best solution, only a workable one. This allows us to stay agile. We want to keep changing and developing and probing and sensing and acting and sensing and acting, as we go along, as we discover how our inventions mesh with messy reality. To my mind, if there’s a good practice, it’s that.

Reframing good practice as success stories

And yet, we intuitively know that it’s important to learn from the experience of others, too. Peter asked a great question: What’s the relationship between stories of the past and stories of the future? Framing good practice as ‘story’ helps, because it connects us to that deeply human, ‘tribal’ part of us that honours the wisdom of the elders. It also reminds us of an important and empowering assumption that we need to adopt in these times of terrifying and exhilarating change: the fact that everything we need to survive and thrive is already there… AND there is a current and unfolding context in which everything that is already there comes together. Viewed from this perspective, good practice is seen not as a blueprint, but as a story that we can then take with us into our ‘presencing’ of our current context and situation.

Stories around the virtual camp fire

One thing stories do is draw us in around the camp fire. They create contact, they inspire us and give us energy – the energy of possibility, which recently won the US elections and will – if anything will - carry us over the threshold of impending disaster and into the future.

In the global era, this sharing of stories is also very much related to the use of an online space. Many of us who are engaged in large-scale, non-local change initiatives are grappling with how to make on-line environments work for collaboration, helping us find people with similar experience, working in similar fields across the planet. If we think that sharing best and good practices won’t be as effective as our own experimentation, why do we need to use online environments? What is the purpose of any kind of global interconnection? Why even bother to do that? If it’s all really about synchronicity, knowing that if you put out an intention to do something and then look, you will find the people you need to find, simply because of the interconnectivity that’s part of the physics of the universe. So we have to be really clear about the purpose of any on-line environment we invest in. If it really isn’t contributing, then why waste resources, when nobody’s going to use it?

In my own experience, the people I’m meeting online are sufficiently rare that I don’t meet them in my local space – developed individuals that you don’t find on every street corner. For a small community that’s spread globally, meeting online is very important. But it’s not necessarily going to be as useful for others who are focusing on their local environments. However, in this age of transition – we hope – to a sustainable global society, each of those local environments needs, at some level, to be connected to other local environments. The 1% of people who actively contribute to and benefit from the growing global knowledge ecology are scattered across the planet, and they feed what they are learning into their local communities in ways that those communities can utilise. So it’s not necessarily about mass participation in on-line environments, it’s about spreading it around so that it can be drip fed, hydroponically, down into the local communities all over the place.

The dance between global and local

… And the local communities ultimately have to create their own material, because that’s what they will take ownership of in their local context. Solutions can’t be rolled out as templates. And yet templates, too, are needed – but for processes, rather than content. An example of very useful and virally spreadable templates for change are the different methodologies for having the large-scale conversations needed to generate collective ideas for experimentation in local communities. As more and more groups experimenting around the same theme find each other (usually online) and compare notes, we can see patterns in the content they are generating. An example where the urgency of climate change, peak oil and social fragmentation means it makes sense to share good practice is sustainable cities: of all the work that’s been done in urban environments throughout the world, what seem to be the top seven pillars for sustainability in cities?

AND each group must dive into its own inquiry and work out what it has to do.  Perhaps the ideal approach is to do start ‘at home’, with your own situation, and then look at what others have done, and ask: How do our results feed into the  global body of knowledge in this field? How do our findings relate to that? When we look at what others have done, do we see any blind spots in our own approach (or in theirs)? Part of what this does is help light up things we don’t know that we don’t know. It’s a delicate balance. If we just do our own local thing, we fail to acknowledge all the resources that are already there somewhere else and we risk getting into blind spots. But trying to force a template through from top down is how you fail to get ownership, and your solutions will be neither emergent nor context specific.

The magic of ownership

Once a community takes ownership of its solutions, people start to have the confidence to open up to solutions from elsewhere – they go ‘Hey, that’s great! Grab it, we own this too!’ But you’ve got to start from your own base.

This is a real edge to keep exploring – this interface between the global ‘knowledge field’ and local, context-specific ownership, and how those two can best interface with each other.

Where good practice is concerned, we don’t want a ‘knowledge database’ crammed with templates. Rather, we need a blog of stories, so we don’t forget that these are experiences in the past. That way we are less likely to fall into the trap of ‘this is how it worked here, so therefore it’s a template for how to do it elsewhere.’ 

This was the largest gathering so far - 16 women in all - gathering in the intimacy and earthiness of the beautiful King's Mill in Eliksem (Flanders) for four days over the transition between January and February.


We always gather around guiding questions, but this time the question we had crafted during our months of preparation really held us and drew us in in a way we had not experienced before:


The State of the World - the time we are living in - was also inexorably present with us. Our current context somehow raised the stakes of our gathering - already at the beginning of our day of preparation together, the four co-hosts - Ria, Judy, Lisette and myself - found that we had learned to go deeper together in search of Source, to recognise when we 'weren't there yet' and to release our effort and sink down deeper still, into the silence of pure potential, where nothing stirs, and everything is possible.


We were more intergenerational this time than before, too. My daughter Anna, at 13, was the youngest but by no means the least, coming out with the occasional bolt of wisdom from under her curtain of hair... and totally disrupting proceedings on the second evening, when she had us in stitches of laughter for over an hour. Seeing the ease with which this new generation can cut through complexity and home in on an essence is truly hope-giving. We patronise them at our peril!

As usual, we dispensed with any kind of facilitation after the first few hours together and settled into a self-organising, self-regulating flow of conversation, silence, contemplation, movement and creativity that delighted and nourished us all.
Again we were reminded that women need to touch each other - and again I was blown away by how soft we are!

In the middle of our circle, along with the talking pieces and flowers, were pens, paints, crayons and chalks, coloured paper and sequins, scissors and glue (not to mention the licorice and chocolate)... as time passed, beautiful pictures emerged from the centre to grace the walls, all produced as the conversations interwove and the circle birthed its magic.

With four iterations of this process behind us already, we could really see how the field has deepened and learned. Ria has been able to make some of our discoveries explicit in her model of source and spirit and Judy has also elaborated on this. This time, we learned how to collectively move through one woman's individual experience into the wordless space of source and healing together. It kept happening, and we got better at it each time. Each time there was a movement from the mental realm into the experiential, embodied, felt sense - from 'what do I think?' to 'how does it feel?'. From a place of confusion and discomfort to a place of spaciousness and deep rest, the experience of the individual acting as a gateway through which the collective could move. And it wasn't just done with words. There was the touching again - the physical support of each other's soft, warm, insistent presence. Stay with it - don't flee back into rationalisations and judgements... just stay with it... Truly a collective coaching to be with the living experience of NOW.

It felt as if the 'new paradigm' was in our midst - and it kept astonishing us: it really is EASY: just do it! It's time to bring the feminine back into the thick of things - and she won't come a little at a time. Just as you can't be a little bit pregnant. Either you give us the floor, or we take it! When the feminine bursts onto the scene, our bodies come alive - my god, I had goose bumps almost permanently for four days, it was so electric! What a world this will be when we can be in it in this way.

You can see the photos here and here.

Michel Bauwens - ever the purveyor of great learning - just brought this article by Alex Steffen, Executive Editor of WorldChanging, to my attention... It really speaks to me.

Some highlights:

"Here's what I see (today's mainstream) politics being:

1) An explicit statement that we are incapable of actually solving the planet's most pressing problems, and that to consider doing so is "unrealistic."

2) A mostly unstated assumption that the reason embracing bold solutions is unrealistic is because those solutions involve unbearable costs.

3) A rarely voiced belief that "realism" ought best to be defined as "in the interests of those doing well today," and that "unbearable costs" ought best to be defined as "any meaningful change in circumstances whatsoever."

4) A widely practiced stance that, therefore, expressions of concern and extremely modest, almost symbolic, small steps and half measures are the appropriate course of action.

Consider, instead, the politics of optimism:

1) That realism ought best to be defined as "within our capacity" and "necessary."

2) That we have the capacity to create and deploy solutions to the world's biggest problems, and the magnitude of the consequences of failure (both for ourselves and generations to come) demands that we act immediately.

3) That it is possible to act in such a way that the prospects of most people on the planet are improved. While certain costs will be incurred, the returns on those investments will be quite attractive, not only in ecological stability, international security and human well-being, but in terms of plain old economic prosperity. These solutions will make the future better than the present for the almost everyone, and greatly improve the lots of our children and grandchildren.

4) Therefore, defining our win scenarios, imagining the kind of future we want to create, describing the solutions that will make building that future possible, and publicly committing ourselves to success are the appropriate course of action.

...

We need millions of people who are willing to teach the teachable, comfort the disheartened and confront the scoundrels. We need to take our politics public and take on the whole culture of cynical defeatism. "

Can you imagine what it would feel like if our politicians and business leaders were to adopt this attitude? What do you say? Shall we do it anyway?

This blog post sprang from a conversation between George Pór, Matthieu Kleinschmager and Helen Titchen Beeth in Brussels in September 2008. The conversation was prompted by our shared passion for capturing the essence of conversations that we have participated in so that they can have a longer life and a greater impact than just the fading memories and flip-chart sheets of the original participants.

Understanding that many of the ills in the world have arisen as a result of the conversations that should have been had but weren’t, there is a growing interest in the art of hosting conversations that matter. In today’s globalised world, where impacts and consequences of all kinds can spread rapidly across the planet for good or ill, there is a sense of urgency about how to capture the essence of our most important conversations so that they can be more widely dispersed. Like beneficial seeds - that can be sown in hearts and minds hundreds and thousands of miles away from the place of the original conversation and weeks and months and years away from its time - the fruits of our collective inquiry into questions of relevance to human thriving should be spread far and wide.

Every time we share our view of a conversation after the event, it is
as if we are throwing a pebble into the pond of human culture. The
ripples move away in all directions, not stopping in the boundless
noosphere until they encounter ripples from other conversations. It is
in the beautiful resultant interference patterns that arise when
different conversations meet and connect that the next level of
conversation is born. This is the source of emergence, where new connections are made.

There is nothing quite so wonderful as participating in a conversation that changes us. The very fact that we are different when leave is a form of harvesting that has a huge impact. Because we are changed, our subsequent words and deeds are different than they would have been if we had not had the conversation. So this is a harvesting that practitioners of intentional conversation attend to: how to create the container in which we can be metabolised and transformed together.

But that’s not enough. It’s not just the fact of talking together – it’s the fact that we’re talking about something that matters to us, about something that exists in the world in some way. If we want to change our societies, if we want to unleash human potential beyond our destructiveness and survive the next 50 years, if we want to open up the prospect of another 100 000 years of human flourishing on planet earth, then we need to learn how to connect up our conversations and move into wise action inspired by our new-found collective clarity, rather than just let them turn to dust and fall through the floor-boards.

Heartfelt call from the future in need of us
What would it be like to live in a future in which our conversations are connected? Where all our social institutions – schools, business, government, even the military - were designed to enable and facilitate the emergence of the best in each of us, individually and collectively, designed for the blossoming of human and social potential? That’s not such a far-out fantasy. The ancient Greeks had that kind of society, so it’s clearly a potential that’s deeply embedded in the human psyche. It’s true that they didn’t bother much about their women or their slaves, but today we are living at a new turning of the spiral and we are wise enough now not to leave people out of our connected conversations.

If we step into that future, in our mind’s eye, and look back towards today to see the trajectory that brought us there, we can see that these connected conversations can happen because most of us are powerfully equipped with  a deep – not just intellectual – knowledge of an integral way of relating to self, others and technology. We have the tools to cultivate and disseminate our personal and collective knowledge gardens… and gardening in this future society has become an attitude not only to the natural world, but to the built world and the virtual world as well. In that world, the work of the knowledge gardener is seen as sacred, because it is serving our communities and serving evolution.

At the heart of the work that will bring us to this future society is our work on harvesting meaningful conversations. Already, through the internet in particular, we can see what happens as ever more conversations are joined, as the community of engaged and active virtual conversationalists create and straddle an ever-growing multiplicity of conversations rippling out across space and time. What is the ultimate purpose of all the conversations we are having? What if we were all having different manifestations of the same conversation? What is the deeper pattern that we are trying to surface?

An evolutionary perspective
This is where the evolutionary perspective links in. Even if we don’t believe that evolution has any ultimate stage or goal, it nevertheless moves in a clear direction. In the case of the evolution of the social world, we can see – particularly if we take a giant step back so that we can see the sweep of social history since our earliest days as homo sapiens on this planet - that it is moving towards ever greater complexity and compassion. So the type of society that is asking us to help it come into being is a vision – not a purpose – a future possibility that we feel attracted to. What if the pattern that connects all our conversations is this question: “What is the future that attracts us?” And what if our ongoing inquiry around variations of this question – and the action we engage in as a result – is the way in which we are co-creating that future already, now?

It is useful to remember that evolution is the way things get done around here. It’s that simple. It’s not something we have to aspire to. It’s the way things happen and have always happened. It’s the way the big bang developed into the beacon of human consciousness. We might not be the only conscious beings in the universe, but the fact that we are conscious is a rare and precious thing. And what’s happening now is completely changing the evolutionary game: we are now conscious of our consciousness. So all of a sudden we are conscious of evolution, we are conscious that what is evolving is our consciousness itself, and a small percentage of humanity has now reached a stage where it is intentionally engaged in the conscious pursuit of the evolution of consciousness.

So it’s important to keep this perspective in mind: evolution is happening anyway, but now humanity is volitionally involved. And from now on, the only way that evolution is going to happen on planet Earth is if we say “Hey, let’s do this!”


It will not have escaped you that there is a paradox here. Evolution is happening anyway, but it won’t happen unless we engage in it. So what is this about? As we awaken as individuals to an awareness of our own consciousness, it seems that we are also becoming aware of the evolutionary urge awakening as us. As we now intentionally engage – through practices of all kinds - in our own conscious evolution, we are drawn by an irresistible urge to sit in circles and inquire together. I see this particularly strongly in the community of practitioners of the art of hosting meaningful conversations. Not only do we convene conversations for others who wish to do things better in their lives, we also sit together to inquire into what it is we are doing as we do this. This is intentional learning and evolving. We have understood that our social world, and its entanglement with its natural surround, has reached such complexity that a single mind, however powerful, cannot hope to make sense of it. Although we don’t have a collective sensing organ or a collective brain, we are nevertheless drawn together to do this collective learning which enables us to know things together. Seeking ways to enable our entire species to know things and learn things. That’s the pursuit that we’re in now.

In many ways, the central task of our journey to learn how to connect our conversations is to build a collective sensory organ. The collective sensory organ that we are becoming is a soft system – another name for it would be our collective knowledge ecosystem. This ecosystem does not reside in the hardware alone – so it’s not about computers or software or data. Rather, it consists of at least three complementary and overlapping networks – a network of people (friends, colleagues, members of our community); a network of knowledge (all the ideas and inspirations we are generating in our conversations); and lastly, the network of tools, software, processes, protocols, tags, taxonomies, folksonomies, etc. that support the other two. This sensory organ is guided by our intention and our attention, individually and collectively, and includes all the tools and processes we use to guide, capture, organise, portray and share our conversations.

What I have described above is a description of the external dimension of this collective sensory organ – what it might look like from the outside, where we might find it and what physical evidence we might find that it exists. But being part of this collective sensory organ also has an inner dimension – what it feels like as a person to be participating in this organ. In my personal experience, we must come to this work empty of our own thought and personal agenda if we are to be fully available to serve as the eyes, ears, lips, tongue and epiglottis - and heart and lungs  - of the collective and the mysterious ‘middle’ that is seeking to emerge through us. And when we are moved to speak, it is perfectly possible that we won’t remember what we have said – certainly not well enough to repeat it.

The universe speaking to itself
Herein lies part of the importance of having people harvesting what others are saying. And in this perspective, we might even venture to say that the role of harvesters is to capture the messages of the universe as they are spoken through others. It also helps us to answer the question “what is worth harvesting and what not?” In the end, it comes down to this: What is the place I am talking from? If I am talking from a personal place of ego, then the chances are that what I am saying is not worth harvesting – at least not from the evolutionary perspective. But if the place I am in allows the universe to talk through me, then this is definitely worth harvesting.

Which brings us to a most promising question: What is the capacity that we need to develop as harvesters to sense where the pearls are coming from?

The most obvious answer to this question brings us right into another of the practices of hosting great conversations – a focus of much fruitful inquiry in its own right: This is precisely why we hold the space. The deepest practice of space holders is to be in that space of sensing the universe. Together we build the field – this is the universal gravy that we’re all lumps in, and together good conversation hosts can make it really strong. It’s a kind of collective satsang. Rather than going and sitting at the feet of the enlightened guru who gives off a vibrational frequency that everyone else is then entrained and elevated by, in a good conversation the source of the field is not at the centre, it’s at the periphery. The space holders are creating a container around – a field throughout – and people are then invited into that field, where they will themselves naturally aligning with that field, with each other, increasing the likelihood that the universe will feel invited into the conversation and have something meaningful to say.

This is how the three practices and disciplines - holding space, hosting and harvesting - are unified. What do we harvest? The universe as it speaks through people. In order to do that, we must be in alignment with the universe. Many members of the global hosting community explicitly engage in practices which help to get into that space – all different ways, some physical, some cognitive – of deepening:

• warrior of the heart
• action learning
• deepening questions
• presencing
• systemic constellations
• tarot...

These are the practices I am aware of – there are bound to be plenty more. Please add to the list by commenting on this blog.

Intention and attention are key
Throughout the hosting process - through the calling, the inviting, the preparation and design, the hosting and the harvesting – intention and attention are key. At the very highest level – and it’s so good to be quite conscious and explicit about this, at least within the core team hosting any process - the intention is to capture – no, to be - the wisdom of the universe. Let’s be bold here in restating this: the intention behind the art of hosting essential conversations is, for the duration of the conversation, to be the wisdom of the universe. Outrageously pretentious? Hardly. Because what could it ever be, if not us? It’s not something that is happening out there, it’s something we are co-creating together on the evolutionary edge. It is we who are enacting it. As for our attention, there are two sides to this: where are we attending from? and what are we attending to? Again, at the highest level, where we are attending from is that space of total alignment, and what we are attending to is that space of total alignment. So it’s the universe attending from itself to itself.

This might all sound very daunting and inaccessible, but the good news is that as we are learning how to create this field, and how to hold it, it’s probably true that everybody can learn. And so the next stage of this inquiry might be: what are the conditions that must be in place in order for this level of harvesting and space holding to happen? What simple practices will most rapidly spread this capacity to the largest number of human groups and communities, so that so that the wisdom of the universe can be embodied by the whole?

Jessica Roemischer has written up an interview with Don Beck over on her blog. I particularly rejoice in Don's call for whoever wins the election to call together a wide spectrum of perspectives to re-invent the system, which is in so much trouble these days.

Oh how I pray that something different can come from this election. That the US can provide the rest of the world with an example of something different, something evolutionarily different that can focus the global mind on hope and action to move us towards the future we aspire to, rather than fear and blame that moves us further down the slippery slope to the Lord of the Flies - adult version.

This year's SDi EuroConfab is set for 31 October-2 November - Don't miss it!

Check out the details.

Reflections on Ethics

by Oscar Motomura

Reflections on ethics and the process of making things happen: effective implementation of solutions for critical sustainability equations.

If ethics is the choice for the common good (global reach and  including all living beings):

1. Deciding to act small because it is more comfortable… is not ethical;
2. Deciding to hold back (your proposals, ideas and actions) because  you don’t want to go against “the group” … is not ethical;
3. Deciding to do the possible instead of trying to make the  impossible possible… is not ethical;
4. Deciding to use just a part of your potential (to “save” it for self-interested purposes) … is not ethical;
5. Deciding not to act, to stay silent, letting fear stay in the way…  is not ethical;
6. Deciding to conform to the “letter of the law” instead of  persisting on the path defined by the “spirit of the law” … is not  ethical;
7. Deciding not to try because nobody tried it before… is not ethical;
8. Deciding not to pursue perfection but to conform to what seems  “negotiable” … is not ethical;
9. Deciding to postpone bold actions again and again “waiting for the  right moment” … is not ethical;
10. Deciding to “play the game” and pretend that you are not seeing  the manipulations underway… is not ethical;
11. Deciding to live in the realm of ideas, diagnosis and theories  instead of taking the risks and going for actions… is not ethical;
12. Deciding to act only when all is scientifically proven, even when  the truth is self evident… is not ethical;
13. Deciding to reject all radically creative ideas (yours included)  when the “traditional, not-so-radical ideas” have not been working… is  not ethical;
14. Deciding to reject every proposal that looks “idealistic” or  “utopic” … is not ethical;

(Insights of Oscar Motomura during Tallberg concert that followed a session of the Moral Boundaries Workshop, Summer 2008)

I just tried something new. For the four days immediately before moving house, I took off - out of time - to be with friends in an authentic collective exploration of what it means to be a warrior of the heart in today's world.

There were 24 of us - folks from Belgium, the Netherlands, Ireland, USA, Canada -  led by Bob Wing and Toke Møller - practicing sword training in the aikido tradition and the art of meaningul conversation. Some of us were beginners at one or other of these arts, and some were sensei already - true masters. We were a truly multigenerational gathering, from 13 to 60-something... And the children were omnipresent...



As is often the case when this particular extended family gets together, the place was one of the participants. Our gathering was hosted at the Kingsmill (Koningsmolen) in Eliksem-Landen (Belgium) - it's maiden voyage as an evolutionary learning centre since coming into the stewardship of Lieven Callewaert and Judith Heezen.

 

I wonder whether I will ever be able to articulate everything I learned.

• The warrior soul is not warlike - rather, it is dedicated. It is dedicated to seeking clarity and cutting away that which is not authentic. It is rooted in love and reverence for the earth and all things on it and does not waver from its heart's course.

• The soul families to which we belong are quite vast. As an individual steps into a collectively-held field of intent, he or she can quite literally be transformed. During these four days I witnessed the collective midwifing the birth of warrior souls.
  

• Battle is where you harvest your practice. During our time together, Toke mused that the highest that a human being can aspire to is to become a practitioner of something. Each of the people present was a practitioner of something. I learned that I can apprentice myself to each person I meet. It's good to have so many sensei's. Who are you, and what is your practice?

• I realise that I am no longer interested in individual work. Although my practice to hone my warriorship might happen in solitude when I am at home, I am constantly called to the collective. It is the large collective fields that nourish and intrigue me, that really give me something to sense.

• We were honoured to have among us tarot master Ulrik Golodnoff, whose cards made visible for us that which was holding us, supporting us, shaping us and challenging us. Learning to read tarot like Ulrik has become a real ambition for me.

• As a woman, I was struck by the wonderful quality of the men at this gathering. Watching them tune into their essence as men, and the way they were together, amongst themselves, made me contemplate starting a harem...

I can see myself re-editing this blog as gifts bubble up from my subconscious. But now, I must return to unpacking my boxes. You can see my photos here, and Justin's photos here.

This is another of those essays that slipped out of me unexpectedly while responding to a message on a list serve. In this case, the message was from Dr Don Beck, venerable guardian of the Spiral Dynamics integral pattern. It stirred up some interest, so I thought of publishing it here, too... With thanks to Russ Volckmann of the Integral Leadership Review for the title!

We are faced with a growing list of models designed to guide us in leading change in living systems. Too often we espouse one model or another and skirmish with ‘the competition’ in our conversations, failing to draw on their collective potential. In this essay I would like to explore the ways in which we can individually and collectively engage in the transformations that can move the organisations and communities to which we belong towards a dynamic and sustainable future.

There are a number of angles I'd like to comment from, coming out of my own personal experience of various approaches to change. I cannot claim to speak from any great theoretical wisdom, only as a curious pioneer with my sleeves rolled up who is writing as a way of clarifying my own thinking. After all, if we are to explore the process of change we need to find ways of integrating divergent perspectives.

Living systems

Don Beck often referred to his work using Spiral Dynamics integral to foster change (examples can be found in Integral Leadership Review - articles by Elza Maalouf, Rafi Nasser and others) as "integral design engineering". I can't help wondering whether "engineering" is the best metaphor for that work or for what needs to happen in the world. There is a danger of looking mechanistically at living systems and “doing to them” from the outside. Such efforts are not going to work for long— and the engineering metaphor does not do justice to the richness and sensitivity of Don's and others’ work!

I am greatly helped by the following list of 'properties' of living systems (I'll be revisiting some of these as I go along):

(1)    A living system only accepts its own solutions (we only support those things we are a part of creating).
(2)    A living system only pays attention to that which is meaningful to it (here and now).
(3)    In nature a living system participates in the development of its neighbour (an isolated system is doomed).
(4)    Nature and all of nature, including ourselves is in constant change (without ‘change management’).
(5)    Nature seeks diversity – new relations open up to new possibilities (not survival of the fittest).
(6)    ‘Tinkering’ opens up to what is possible here and now – nature is not intent on finding perfect solutions.
(7)    A living system cannot be steered or controlled – they can only be teased, nudged, titillated.
(8)    A system changes (identity) when its perception of itself changes.
(9)    All the answers do not exist ‘out there’ – we must (sometimes) experiment to find out what works.
(10)    Who we are together is always different and more than who we are alone (possibility of emergence).
(11)    We (human beings) are capable of self-organising – given the right conditions.
(12)    Self-organisation shifts to a higher order.
(These principles were formulated for me by the 'Art of Hosting' community)

What I understand of Don Beck’s work in Palestine shows clearly that he understands and incorporates these principles.

Diversity Rules - Especially if it Interacts!

It is also fair to say, I think, that an understanding of Spiral Dynamics integral – or any model, for that matter - on its own (as if it were possible to separate this out from the living minds in which such understanding is embedded!) is not enough. So all the other development and change models that have been developed over the years can be very beneficial. For example, I often use Theory U (Otto Scharmer) as a guideline when I work to give me an insight into where I might be in a process and what might be the next step, what I might have overlooked or forgotten and, most importantly, what attitudes of consciousness might be most helpful for me to adopt to move things on.

I am part of a small-but-growing community of change agents inside the EU Commission, where we are experimenting with systemic change. The Commission is a huge and rambling bureaucracy with real and valuable work to do in the world, but like all large public administrations, it is hampered (and knows it) by it's internal organization into departments (silos) which tend to seal themselves off from each other and compete rather than cooperate. We are playing with different ways to lure people into collaborating more in their work and into entering the necessary degree of authentic relationship with people elsewhere in the system (in other silos) who hold other, crucial parts of the picture. In this connection I see how true it is that "a system changes when its perception of itself changes". The community is also exercising (and exploring) collective leadership as one of the principles of sustainable change.

In fractal terms, I see the same tendency towards 'silo thinking' sometimes in the various communities of interest I belong to. These communities are drawn together by their fascination and passion for their field of interest and practice. They often have a tendency to compete with other communities—and to look at ways in which their model or approach is better or more effective than the others. A conversation about Theory U (or any other approach) inside, say, the Spiral Dynamics integral community, could go in that direction, but I would prefer to raise another kind of question:

What is it that Theory U contributes to the field of human flourishing that wouldn't be there without it? I ask the same question about Spiral Dynamics integral, Chaordic design principles (Dee Hock), the art of hosting meaningful conversations, other developmental models (Kegan, Torbert & Cook-Greuter, Laske), Wilber's Integral theory, Tarot as a presencing tool, Holacracy as a model of governance, systemic constellations as a tool for systemic insight and transformation, and so on. Each of these discoveries/inventions/insights adds something. And not one of them stands up on its own. Which reminds me that "in nature a living system participates in the development of its neighbor (an isolated system is doomed).”

To give an example, one of my current fascinations is how the different developmental theories fit together. I am acquainted with four or five of them, and have studied a couple in some depth. I experience the truth in each of them, so I can't say one is better than another—and yet they are all different and I assume they each serve particularly well in particular contexts. One thing that SDi does that none of the others appear to do, for example, is to map social currents so elegantly. The other models seem to me to be applicable to individuals alone. And yet, if I assume that all these models are different maps of the same territory, there are some complexities in each that mean I cannot map one model onto another without discrepancies.

For example, if I take Laske's scale of social-emotional development (based on Kegan's, with the refinement that he clearly and cleanly separates out social emotional development from cognitive development), I find I can't just overlay it onto the SDi spiral, because somehow it seems to run perpendicular to it (which doesn't make Laske horizontal where SDi is vertical). Laske's different stages, like Kegan's, look at how the individual constructs his/her reality, and where the focus is at each stage. Adult development starts at stage 2 (adolescent), which is very much about gratification of one's own needs with an instrumental view of others as pawns to be manipulated. It moves to stage 3, with full 'socialization' into the social norms—whatever 'games' the society at large happens to be playing. At this stage, conformity is key. Stage 4 brings individuation, when a person moves away from the conventional mindset to find his/her own voice and values, and one's own integrity must be preserved at all costs. Stage 5 (Laske and Kegan venture no further) is where we begin to deconstruct ourselves, understanding, among other things, that we are not our values, but beings with the capacity to generate value systems. Our focus moves towards transparency and insight into that which is and the ways in which our own inner constructs distort that.

My reason for laying all this out is to verify my understanding of how this system fits with the spiral. As I see it, the key lies in stage 3 (conventional), because a person can be completely identified with the social norm at any place on the spiral. I have seen this in my travels around Europe. You can be 'stage 3' in Greece, which is predominantly Blue—or in Sweden, which is as Green as you get. You can be identified with the counterculture as well as the culture. The point is that you are immersed (unaware) in a cultural surround. That is just one example of the way that the different models, when studied in relation to each other, can really add value (and I'm not claiming that SDi is valid only for social groups!!!)

Working Intentionally to Change Systems

Now we come to the work of changing systems ("Living systems cannot be steered or controlled – they can only be teased, nudged, titillated"). I make an assumption here that most readers are pretty interested in systemic change, one way and another. Personally, I cannot resist playing with it, whether or not it does any good. But I've watched 'management' try to steer and control the living system I am embedded in and the system just doesn't want to play, thus leaving everybody feeling pretty frustrated and disempowered. Why is this? Because we only support those things we are a part of creating. That's not because we're stubborn or stupid; it's because change needs to make sense to us.  It needs to be meaningful to us (here and now). Leaders with long-term vision can influence a system in a wise direction only if they are part of the system. Really part of the system! When you are working on a system from outside (and don't see yourself as part of the system – this is a pitfall for many consultants), you can provide environmental stimuli, but you cannot determine how the system will respond to those stimuli.

In these circumstances, teaching Spiral Dynamics, the Integral model, Theory U or anything else makes no sense. They are just more models you're trying to sell me (I've tried). What does seem to work is a chaordic approach (See the Birth of the Chaordic Age, by Dee Hock). The word 'chaord' comes from merging 'chaos' and 'order', and describes the interface between these two forces of nature where living systems reside. (As compared with the interface between order and control, which is where traditional 'management' tends to reside!) The chaordic approach starts by identifying/responding to a need that is sensed in the system. Some place of pain or discomfort (yes, the 'beta' phase—the change conditions model used in Spiral Dynamics is a very valid description of the territory). Those who make the first move to address the need (the 'early adapters') come together to find a solution. Until they find a clear sense of collective purpose, nothing will move. But regular meeting to explore the situation in search of solutions will deepen the relationships in the group and help it to clarify the principles that will govern how they pursue their purpose. A cohesive group with strong trust and a clear sense of collective purpose can move mountains. In this context, the practices of circle, Bohmian dialogue and action learning in conjunction with the movement down the left side of the U will help. Once the purpose and principles are clear, new people tend to be drawn into the group. The process experienced so far then needs another iteration. Each time new people come in, they need to go through the process of gaining clarity of purpose and buying into the principles (or adapting them). All this is in aid of understanding and engagement. We are building a living system that is creating its own solutions—concepts, organisational structures, products and even practices come later, almost as a by-product of the functioning living system.



Once this new living system—which is growing up inside the environment of, and as a generative response to, the dysfunctions in the old living system—starts engaging more actively with the surrounding system and encountering resistance (that can threaten its existence if it triggers the old system's immune system), that is when it will need—and be motivated—to learn new models and approaches (SDi among them) to wisely navigate the much more complex and entrenched (because successful in addressing the dysfunctions it was created to solve) older system. At this stage it is very useful to have very detailed models of adult development and very exquisite active listening skills in order to engage with key stakeholders in the larger system. And, too, this is the stage at which we start moving up the right side of the U, prototyping in the new system.

If the new system is doing well and achieving results that the surrounding, senior system wants, more and more people will be drawn to join the new system. It is important to keep iterating the process of achieving collective clarity about the purpose of the system and its principles as it grows, while constantly sensing (presencing) into the needs in the environment and realigning purpose when necessary. The alignment with the larger environment is crucial in order to institutionalize the new ways of doing business in a sustainable way.

All this is, of course, simply the sum of my own experience of working in the complex, multicultural, multilingual bureaucratic hierarchical system where I operate. I am aware that I am assuming that my perceptions are scalable and transferable to other systems, and you will all be able to sense from your own experience whether that is the case. Those of you who have read my review of Peter Merry's (still unpublished) 'Evolutionary Leadership' in the January 2008 issue of the Integral Leadership Review might recognize the 'imaginal cell scenario' of systemic change in what I have described here.

Within the context of the small system (in my own case this is the small but growing community of change agents in the EU commission), I have found that it is important to attend to the deepening and development of the individual members of the group and of the community itself. While it is advisable to greet the larger system as we find it— everybody is entitled to be wherever they are on the spiral—it is important, as a newly emergent system evolving out of the older one, to maximize our chances of survival by building our individual and collective capacity for deep insight, flexibility and wise action. We do this through collective practices—like learning to ask challenging questions (action learning is a great way to do this), presencing, systemic constellations, silence, circle practice, Bohmian dialogue, and the study of models—so that the group knows what each individual member knows and all members learn from each other and continually then take their collective practices to new levels. The diversity of backgrounds and contexts of the members makes it possible to bring the collective learning, wisdom and practices of the group to bear in the many different contexts in which the individual members habitually operate.

Evolutionary Leadership & Collective Leadership

This intentional work has to be set in a broader context of all the other movements emerging on the planet today, in particular the peer-to-peer movement in all its manifestations (which are being beautifully mapped by Michel Bauwens and his Foundation for Peer-to-Peer alternatives).

But this web of innovation and generative change is bubbling up spontaneously all over the planet without anybody engineering, coordinating or orchestrating it. It smells very much like evolution to me as we see it manifesting in the lower, collective quadrants. Synchronicity is at work everywhere in this brew. For example, the following quote (from a paper by the Tellus Institute) literally popped into my mailbox as I was writing this, sent me by soul-brother Mushin (a fellow community-straddler): "A specific type of leadership is emerging that is developing the authority and resources to convene and maintain the dialogues for developing shared visions and perspectives. Movement diplomats work to complement civil society's paid staff, charismatic visionaries, influential philanthropists, community organizers, and organizational heads. Trained and supported directly by organizations or communities, these diplomats are charged with the task of building systemic coalitions. They translate the rhetoric of different factions, foster communication and find common ground. They provoke learning in their own organizations in addition to reaching out to form alliances. This new evolution in leadership includes core competencies of facilitation, strategic dialogue, systems thinking, and familiarity with future scenarios and the requirements of a sustainable world." I can add to that list of capabilities: knowledge of many different models (including those I have referred to above), a wide network of deep and generative relationships with other such practitioners and diplomats, and an understanding of what kinds of interventions are most appropriate for what circumstances.

I'll close with a quote from John Heron over on the p2p foundation's forum in a discussion on 'Hierarchy in peer-to-peer': "Hierarchy here is the creative leadership which seeks to promote the values of autonomy and co-operation in a peer to peer association. Such leadership, as in the free software movement, is exercised in two ways. First, by the one or more people who take initiatives to set up such an association. And second, once the association is up and running, as spontaneous rotating leadership among the peers, when anyone takes initiatives that further enhance the autonomy and co-operation of other participating members.

"This also mirrored in the action research method of co-operative inquiry. Someone launches an inquiry, co-opts participating co-inquirers, and initiates them into the methodology. Once they have internalized it, a genuine peer inquiry is under way with different members at different times taking spontaneous leadership initiatives which raise key issues for peer decision-making and thereby take the inquiry in fruitful directions."

... and beyond?

But it goes deeper than this. In my experience, it is no longer just about networks of individuals or groups of networks. Evolution is marching on in ways that aren't showing up on all the radars. I do not yet have any evidence that it has been picked up by Ken Wilber and the integral crew, for example, though it may be one of the phenomena now emerging at SDi turquoise and beyond - at the collective level at least: "So human evolution has something to do with human consciousness awakening first to itself, then to its own evolution and to a recognition and finally an embodied experience of the ways in which we are organically part of a larger whole. As we enter this new stage of individual/collective awakening, individuals are being increasingly called to practice the new life-form composed of groups of individuated individuals merging their collective intelligence as the circle being." (From Why the Next Buddha will be a Collective. ).

And of course, to create the conditions for these 'circle beings' to emerge, many of the practices I have mentioned throughout this essay are wickedly effective...