Experiencing the giving field

After a talk we gave recently, we had a brief chat with Marion Adamson, a facilitator here in Cape Town. A few days later, after having checked out the Organization Unbound website, Marian sent us the following email:

I read the blog post of the Giving Field – and immediately my son’s preschool came to mind. It’s the place I find myself being drawn to when I’m most struggling with […]

At The Change Collective

Last week we convened our first workshop in Cape Town, at the invitation of the Change Collective Cape Town. It was definitely one of the more engaging workshops we’ve ever done. It seemed to get under people’s skin- both positively and negatively- in more of an immediate way than we have previously experienced.

Transcending discontent

We aim to make more people see that Nigeria is not “them” but “I” and “us”, bringing closer to home the urgency and the responsibility of change. We aim to show that change begins when many more Nigerians stop being frustrated at the government, the polity and the society and channel the same energy into becoming the bigger change they seek, in day-to-day interactions with family members, friends, colleagues, clients and other Nigerians and non Nigerians.

From the archives: “Inscaping”

Brandon, a teacher’s aide at Southwest Baltimore Charter School once said to me, “The weak link isn’t necessarily the person who doesn’t do the job well. It’s the person who doesn’t do the job from within or truthfully.”

The simple idea at the heart of expressive organizing is that people experience the organization’s core purpose in their daily work. Over time, that experience, though imperfect and often challenging, can become […]

What if an art gallery was itself a work of art?

“Is it possible that creativity in arts organisations not be limited to the gallery space?”

Anne Bertrand has been flirting with this question for as many years as I have known her. When we first met almost a decade ago, she was asking it from a place of frustration. She had spent several years working for an artist-run organization and was feeling quite disheartened as a result. How can it be, she would say to me in exasperation, that […]

More reflections from Greece

To wrap up the revolution-themed month of January, Sarah Whiteley of Axladitsa shares two very personal in-the-moment accounts of the citizens movement that took place in Greece’s Syntagma Square last year. Her reflections highlight the non-linear nature of building a movement that is deeply aligned with its values and how to approach it with patience and reverence.

How to occupy democracy

When the civil rights movement abandoned its focus on nurturing personal, individual relationships and instead resorted to broad principles and detached theorising, it lost its power. It became coopted, removed from the people who otherwise held it accountable with the gentle discipline that is required in being true and kind to one’s friends.

I suspect that this aspect is where grand nation-building projects, based on the most beautiful of ideals, stumble.

Taking the revolution inward

Any categorization of outside and inside, enemy and friend, good and bad is an illusion of the mind. I remember a quotation by the first prime minister of the transitional government after the 1979 revolution in Iran, who said, “The Shah (king) is not gone, because there is still a little Shah living within each one of us”. His message was that the spirit of monarchy and dictatorship is not gone by the departure or execution of the monarch, but that it could continue in every meeting, every election, every institution, every family and so on.

The learning stance: A conversation with Anthi Theiopoulou

Warren: What are the particular qualities of the demonstrations in Syntagma Square that you most appreciate and would love to see deepen and expand?

Anthi: In my opinion, one of the very important ones is the learning stance. It is crucial because without this quality present, we cannot develop and work with any other quality… and because this movement in Syntagma Square is oriented towards something that still does not exist, this implies that it needs a lot of learning.

The promise of the square: A conversation with Motaz Attalla

Warren: Can you take us back a bit to how you experienced the early days of Tahrir Square?

Motaz: There was this sense of rediscovering pure community- with all its good and bad. Knowing what it means to receive gifts and give gifts, to receive care and give care between absolute strangers and with a totally open heart. And feeling just a sweetness of courage. And to know that we don’t have to worry about the consequences of stepping out- not because things won’t turn out bad but because there is a lot of support for the act of bravery itself. And to me that’s the glue of society. Feeling like people are for you and you are for people.