Notes from the key meeting dynamically facilitated by DeAnna on November 3, 2007

The last few days have been very rewarding given the various happenings involving DF and Wisdom Councils.

• Random selection - we confirmed that this is an essential aspect of what gives our process legitimacy, and will once again make it a key feature of the next WC or Insight Council. We will seek waysto make the process easier -- including involving the community to a much greater degree in preparation for the council (see Cultivating below).
• Geographic area - it feels natural at this stage to refine our focus from the Victoria level to the Fernwood community level. There was a major shift in energy when the focus landed on Fernwood, with lots of potential for synergy-- e.g., Doug has been asked to come up with some ideas fora conversation cafe, Ian Dakers is working on conversation opportunities at the new Green Goddess restaurant, the Fernwood commuity group wants to facilitate a vision for the heart of Fernwood.... (see more about this below). DF facilitators will be in big demand!
• Cultivating the community -- it is becoming apparent that it would be much easier to convene a WC if the entire community is on board and anticipating the event... aware of what's planned and looking forward to receiving our invitations and possibly phone calls. For example, the Village Vibe community newspaper is mailed each month to 4,000 households in Fernwood (see below for what's planned...)
• Metaphors & Stories -- the metaphor of starting a fire with kindling proved very powerful. You can choose to spread your kindling around on the floor and try to start a fire, or you can pile the kindling in the fireplace and watch it quickly spark into flame. Another metaphor was that of the convenors forming the trunk of a tree with the WCs like leaves. I forget who proposed this metaphor but I really liked it. However I saw the WC's as fruit rather than leaves. If the tree grows in a quiet alley where no one sees it, the fruit will fall to the ground and rot. But if it grows in the public square, people can't help but see the fruit and digest it. CD We came to realize that the role of the convenors and the story we've created together is an important part of the overall Wise Democracy story in Victoria (and perhaps globally)... and provides a continuous thread for the stories of the individual WCs.This point bears emphasizing. The convenors are creating an important story that is nourishing orchardists around the world...CD.

Flip chart notes from session kindly facilitated by DeAnna

16 participants

The Next Step?

Problem Statements

1. How to move forward with Wise Democracy Victoria?
2. How to get community sanction?
3. How to build awareness about WC's?
4. How do we sustain the relationships that form so the story builds?
5. How to define what’s working – what does "working" mean?
6. How do we create action from the dialogue?
7. How do we get the message to the whole community?
8. How do we cultivate and enrol the whole community?

SOLUTIONS

1. Get traction and interest so people say yes when asked to participate

• Put description, date & invitation in paper(s) and ask people to show interest by email or call
• Then random selection
• All Fernwood or Fernwood High School
• Get sponsor eg. Principal, Mayor, Churches who speak to our TRUST worthiness

2. Build awareness
3. Do WC in small closed group/community, so success becomes the story that can help spread the work
4. Concentrate the WC in an area where there is a feeling of community – James Bay, Fernwood
5. “WC is a democratic process that sparks a fire within a community”
• Communicate … “WC’s bridge polarities to build community”
• Find Leaders connected to community groups &
• Leaders educate groups and members
• Do WC with leaders, then groups then community

6. Get permission from leaders to present to groups, gather names in a hat of those who want to do WC, then randomly draw
7. Involve leaders in doing something new with their fractal groups
8. Include all those from the group except those who say no up front
9. Making a personal connection is essential; making a nurturing process to engage people in the new way
10. Use the initial statements from WC’s and their story into the community and feed their results into the next to build momentum
11. Behave ??? that participants can participate…call on phone, child care, food, transportation
12. Tell the story we’ve created so far…This becomes part of the new bigger story
13. Invite past participants to tell us where they’d like to go?
14. Stay with what you’ve created in Victoria

• Get city council to sponsor, get voter roll, official acknowledgement, go to churches – how would you like to participate?
• Tell the story, “Help us move it forward”
  

15. Said we’re going to try three cycles in Victoria, committed, then do cycle in Fernwood. Something is happening through each cycle of exposure
16. We need to adapt and learn. Do 3rd cycle in Fernwood
17. Use different selection process – those who are willing to participate
18. For the 2 recent Wisdom Council results to make a difference… form a Civic League.
19. Stick with a dialogue-based, participatory process.
20. Empower people to get more involved in the municipality… In lot’s of ways!
21. On a regular basis have a ‘dialogue on democracy’ perhaps with some people in a fishbowl as a focus, perhaps for 4 hours in an evening every 3 weeks or so. Get Bodies in the room…
22. Initially focus on people already out of the box or “moving out.”
    
23. Our convenors/nurturers support WC participants to find ways to take action in their lives based on their participation.
24. Create a strong body of WC experience as grist for creating new stories of democracy (perhaps through the Wiki).
25. Keep it simple… (direct, plain language and metaphors vs. elaborate concepts).
26. Keep the process going through our convenor meetings (where we express the “we the people” notion in our meeting behaviour)
27. Do things on a smaller scale… e.g. do Fernwood next!
28. Develop the “convenor story” as a way of attracting participants and others into action.
29. Awaken people to what can happen in dialogue… It doesn’t matter about randomness & perfection. Give yourself freedom to provide the WC experience in other ways: e.g. pick a topic, don’t have to be random
30. Goal is to be connected & to have relationship.
31. Look for opportunities for connection – to facilitate difficult conversations in the community.
32. Our work is to cultivate moments where we notice that we are cake… (i.e. are joyously acting and thinking from ‘we the people’)
33. Present ourselves to Fernwood, enrol them as convenors to cultivate the community to do a WC. In Fernwood there is potential to overcome some polarization (e.g. the 2 different community centres). We would remain as convenors who support the local convenors in the process…
    
34. Present this idea at the Nov. 14 community meeting to create the Fernwood Commons. Speak to the organizers about it.
35. Offer a different process for the conduct of the above meeting.
36. By doing it in Fernwood, it focuses our energy while still being in Victoria.
37. Do a WC play at the Belfry… draw the participants from the audience (add some drama(?), other layers of involvement)… be funny and poignant.
38. Talking about this to others and how we do it, really matters and is making a big difference in some of our lives… hence, there is no question about WCs not working… it is working in some or all of our lives.
39. This ripples out through each of us.
40. Get comfortable with the idea that it is still working and it will be in Fernwood for now.
41. We can always come back to our convenor meetings to experience it working!
42. Dropping in and out is okay.
43. Keep communicating about this process and offering connections for others to become involved.
44. Try doing a WC over 4 days with 4 sessions, maybe in 2 sequential weekends… Put the emphasis on “telling the story”, and less pressure to draft the statements… spend time on sharing the story, and let it be and/or become the statement.
45. Do something in the Belfry!
    
    -- use the pub, the coffee house, etc. in support or as well, as a regular hangout
    -- support in form of conversation cafes,
    -- talk about WCs and how they could help to resolve polarized situations.
    
    46. Hold a Democracy Café monthly in Fernwood.
    47. The Green Goddess Café is looking for ideas – Ian can talk with owner on how to use their space for our efforts.
    48. Hold regular Dynamic Facilitation (DF) sessions in Fernwood on hot community topics.
    49. Conversation Café dialogues are also possible in the cafes as well.
    50. Notice the distinction between dialogue and ‘choice creating’ activities. Consider how to fit them together, as well as the role of i) taking a whole system perspective, vs. ii) generating small group activities.
    51. On-going dialogue processes, on-going DF processes, etc. create an appetite for Wisdom Councils.
    52. Potential meeting space for these activities at new coffee place at Haultain and Belmont.
    
    

CONCERNS

1. Doing WC by groups would reinforce factionalization.
2. Encouraging diversity, encouraging leaders.
3. Those who become leaders aren't necessarily the best leaders.
4. Names of those interested = same old group...include those who'd say yes.
5. Just because you've got them, doesn't mean we can keep them.
6. Victoria feels too big...
7. Community perception might be damaged if we change course without completing program.
8. It didn't work.
9. It did work! I'm trusting the package!
10. Learning, protecting ourselves from burnout.
11. Implementing feels like going back into the box.
12. After WC happens, there's nothing there to stay out of the box.
13. People in the box can get outside of it & transform.
14. There's no living alternative to the box right now.
15. If people don't stay involved, that's okay.
16. Approaching organizations in Fernwood reinforces hierarchy...
17. Not following through feels like
18. Diversity not present at community meetings.
19. Doing Fernwood isn't a violation of original commitment.
20. I can't change society. Try to change me and society changes.
21. Duration - 1.5 days not enough.

DeAnna's Reflection of What We Had Done

1. Moving forward…

• continue our convening
• focus/engage our efforts in Fernwood
• kindling/fire metaphor – what's the best way to assemble the kindling and ignite the fire?

2. Powerful learnings from the experience so far...

• is it working or not? what's our purpose?
• connection…
• the story is key – keep the convener story
• the conveners are being the change they seek to make, the holders of the story, the tree of which the WC's are the fruit…

3. Next step… Fernwood focus

• draw from what pool?
• random selection or working through groups or something else?
• who to enrol?
• get community sanction?
• what design… WC's? DF meetings?

Outcomes

We will pursue opportunities for dialogue in 3 coffee shops as well as the Fernwood Inn – Ian, Dan, Caspar

We will pursue the possibility of having a participatory Wisdom Council (in which councillors are selected at random from the audience) in the Belfry – Dan

Next Steps

Ian will contact the convener of the November 11 Fernwood meeting re facilitating the meeting using DF or (more likely) giving a presentation on DF at the meeting. If we get a DF presentation on the agenda, the presenters will be Colin, Dan, George (?). In any case, as many conveners as possible will show up.

NEXT MEETINGS November 17 and November 24?

As George has reported things have shifted since Saturday. The Fernwood meeting is at the Cornerstone Café, on November 14 not November 11 as we thought. It is focused on a film and is therefore not appropriate for a DF presentation, but things look very good for coffee shop events