Crisis, Chaos and an Unexpected Gratitude

For the first time in the 4 years that we have been working on the ground with citizens in Greece, I heard Greeks saying that they are grateful for the collapse of their systems. No, not in a lighthearted way, not an the easy “This is all good.” Rather, they are saying it through the pain and despair of feeling the life they knew fall away and something opening on the other side of that despair.

In the Art of Participatory Leadership we offered this April (2015) in Athens, we heard participants speak of the anger and shame of encountering bureaucrats who do not take pride in being a civil servant – but who rely on old responses that have nothing to do with the collective reality or with supporting those who are wanting to change things. We heard of the potency of loss – the loss of identity, material life, money, hope –  and the necessity of re-inventing oneself. We heard of the gratitude for seeing new perspectives and world views that offer connection with each other and with a future that has a different blueprint than consumerism.

We heard this: “If there had been no crisis, we would not have met this way, could not have known this kind of quality of being together was possible.”

Since 2011, through the SIZ-Hellas, we have been witnessing and living the incredible stories of people on the ground in Greece, in their communities, across this country and beyond this country. People who are birthing new systems, ones that return us to the meaning of democracy, where citizens self-organize around what is needed and what we dream is possible in service to the Commons.

These stories, this courage, these actions of ordinary citizens who are creating the future now, are the threads of a new narrative that is emerging from places where the current systems are collapsing or deteriorating.

We speak a lot about the Chaordic in this work of Participatory Leadership: the chaordic that is born from creating the minimal optimal structure that allows just enough chaos to meet just enough order to find its route towards emergence. But the reality in places of collapse and crisis is that chaos is dominant.. So sitting with and in our internal and external chaos is an essential human capacity that needs attention.

The thickening threads of the narrative that make the new stories possible are around HOW we create the conditions to meet in our collective chaos, to BE in our personal chaos, and let the new patterns within that chaos unfold to show us a way, rather than trying to avoid the angst and fear of this state of being.

What I have been learning by working and living in Greece, and in Israel and Palestine, and being in the many places in our translocal network where the precariousness of life, the unpredictability of responses, and the shaking of the old and new which is not comfortable but filled with human emotion, historical tendons, unspoken inter-generational traumas, and the dance of paradoxes that are hard to reconcile – what I have learned is that

• Coming together to be in conversation about what matters most to us is a seriously political act, one that can often be a great risk to one’s personal safety or create the risk of being excommunicated from one’s “tribe”;

• Listening in to what we don’t yet know or see is an act of faith and also a skill, and this quality of listening is the most important skill to cultivate in oneself and collectively;

• Witnessing each other in the honesty of our expression – whatever that expression may be – is healing beyond all measure; and that

• Navigating chaos together by doing these simple, yet very difficult, things IS itself the work.

I say it is the work because once we have done this, once we have been in the hardest stuff together and learned from it and allowed it to touch us, there is a clarity and depth that is a new landscape. A new landscape of relationship and trust and shared wisdom. This becomes the ground, the new soil, for what we can plant.

To meet chaos, to be transformed by what we did not know or see before, to let these discoveries become part of us, and to let go of the old identities is a form of initiation. We are learning how to be in the chaos of our dying systems and create chaordic spaces for the emergence of the new, and importantly, we are learning how to be in this together. This is one of the many ways that courage is bred, and when we find our courage, live from our depths, trust our relationships, feel our gratitude for the hard things that have happened, then our actions … well, they are really something.

~Vanessa Reid, May 2015

Exploring the Chaordic. Graphic recording by Nikos Rovaris of Process Makers @ the Art of Participatory Leadership, Athens (April 2015).

Save the Date! The Next Art of Participatory Leadership, Athens is April 17-20, 2015.

As citizens, leaders and professionals, what are the ways of working we need to develop that will allow us to collaboratively address the challenges in our cities, communities, organizations and society?

WHY THIS TRAINING?  WHY NOW?

Since 2010 Greece has been the center of attention worldwide for several reasons: economic crisis, austerity, citizen movements, social innovators, corruption, the future of Eurozone and more. With the results of the recent elections, Greece once again draws attention to whether the new government will bring hope and change or if the economic situation will get worse. It is a question that reflects not only the future of Greece but also the future of Europe.

Underneath this is a question about what we mean by demokratia – the power of citizens to collectively define and create their lives and steward the commons with the interest of future generations in mind. We believe that the main differentiator that will make this new “era” successful is how citizens are engaged in new forms of governance, forms that are based on participation, dialogue, self-organizing, diversity and true consultation.

We invite you to this 4-day training to explore together:

As citizens, leaders, and professionals what are the ways of working we need to develop that will allow us to collaboratively address the challenges in our cities, organizations, communities and society?

WHEN: We start at 9.00 am on Friday April 17 and will to 5 pm April 20, 2015.

WHERE: IMPACT HUB-ATHENS.

This training takes place at the IMPACT HUB-ATHENS, a multi-use space and place for social innovation in the center of Athens. It is located in the Psiri a neighborhood known for its unique atmosphere that still has a sense of the old Athens. Accommodation will be at nearby hotels or local Air B and B. Details and options of accommodation and how to get to our venue will be provided upon registration.

PARTICIPATION FEE: A sliding scale participation fee for 350 to 900 Euros

In Greece, there is a growing network of complementary currencies and alternative economies flourishing. This is due to the massive disruption to the “mainstream” economic system. We want to honor that there are many people in Greece and elsewhere who are working and living with these multiple forms of currency, and that in fact, cash and money is not always available, but other forms of currency are.

We offer a sliding scale participation fee for 350 to 900 Euros which includes the training and a light lunch each day. This fee does not include accommodation. We wish to make this training available to as many people as possible and do not want economy to be a barrier. Therefore we work on the value “offer what you can and little more.”

Should you have ideas about offering OTHER FORMS OF CURRENCY to this AoPL, please contact us with your ideas! Also if you wish to join us and can’t afford to pay the lower price please contact Odysseas Velentzas: odyssol@gmail.com

LANGUAGE: The training is in English and informal Greek translation will be available, if required.

REGISTRATION: Please contact Odysseas Velentzas to receive a registration form or to ask any questions: odyssol@gmail.com.

*For more on “What is the Art of Participatory Leadership”, click here.

When Nature Calls – the Art of Participatory Leadership at Axladitsa August 2014

Come and join us from 28- 31st of August for our next Art of Participatory Leadership training. Living systems exist everywhere in nature. From the smallest living organisms to the largest mammals, life is organized in interrelated-interdependent colonies, nests, packs, herds etc. In nature, change is constant and occurs through self-organization and emergence. We believe that nowadays our societies, organizations and institutions are at the point of fundamental change. However we humans tend to seek for change in a mechanistic and controlling approach rather than work through emergence and self-organization. As a result we tend to struggle in the same loop while only dynamic changes occur. This 4-day training invites you to come to Axladitsa, a 24-acre organic olive farm in the Pelion Peninsula in Greece to explore together, with people and with our natural environment the question:

How can nature teach us to create communities, work and initiatives that are based on self-organisation by enhancing our understanding of how living systems behave?

On this 4-day training we will learn participatory leadership techniques and mental models as a way to work in self-organising patterns and we will explore and be inspired by nature’s patterns. In addition we will focus on how we can bring these patterns to our everyday lives, our institutions, our work, social movements and our organizational structures. We will be informed by Axladitsa’s nature itself. We will live with the rhythms of the land, the weather, the creatures here, as well as with our rhythms of the day which will include homemade meals, fresh from the garden. The land of Axladitsa holds many stories, ancient wisdom and practices -these will also be our teachers. This training is held by Stewards and Practitioners of the Art of Hosting Network, and is offered by Living Wholeness Institute and Process Makers who together are working on social change initiatives in Greece, Europe and the World. Come and join us in creating a powerful “parea” from 28th August to 31st of August at Axladitsa. *Parea: (Gr.) A Parea in Greek culture is a group of friends who regularly gather together to share their experiences about life, their philosophies, values and ideas. The Parea is really a venue for the growth of the human spirit, the development of friendships and the exploration of ideas to enrich our quality of life that is all too brief in time. In Greece, the Parea is a long-lasting circle and cycle of life nourished by the people who participate. photo by Vanessa Reid

Building the New Networks and Leadership ~ introducing the SIZ

“Hi! My name is Odysseas. I’m a young Greek citizen. I am 27 years old.

Me and my friends – I say friends because I can cooperate from my heart with them (from the person that I am I mean) – we made and created the Systemic Innovation Zone. Systemic because we want to have real systemic change, not to create something that in 20 years will collapse; Innovation because we need social innovation technology in order to step forward and make a new beginning; and Zone I would say in a mental way, rather than a specific area.

Here in Greece we train people in Participatory Leadership and also help them create projects in social innovation. Why not transfer our experience and learning to the rest of Europe and to the world? In Greece, actually, the system hopefully will collapse. I say hopefully because I need something new – everyone I think needs something new in Greece and in Europe, and we have to take action by all the people coming together to create the new system that we want to live from, to take decisions about our lives.

The people in Systemic Innovation Zone, I think, have the experience to help people to learn how to use participation. Actually, Greece is a country where the West and the East come together, which means the collective and the individual comes together. We need to bring back the old patterns that Greeks had, which is to help each other. Greece’s economy has collapsed many times but has survived many wars as well, and what helped the Greeks to survive was to help each other – and this is something that needs participation.

 

With SIZ we have the Art of Hosting in Participatory Leadership. I think it is very important. We don’t need experts and technocrats any more. We need leaders that we don’t actually know, and their work will create the space for people to come together and share ideas; we need to collect intentions, in other words.

So, in that way, I think our training in the different roles will be a new beginning here. And also for me, as I will participate. I really want to learn to train people in participatory leadership for two reasons: Mainly because in Greece we need to share this fire, to make the fire spread, and we need people to get used to participation in a real way. And secondly in order to create a sustainable way of living, not only for me and our project, but so that we can train people in other countries and share with them our experiences from Greece and the rest of Europe.

In that way this 3-day course will be very important. We want to help other Greeks to come and participate in the Art of Hosting. For the majority of them it is very difficult, so anyone that can support is inspiring, let’s say, and we will understand that we are not doing our work alone; and even if you are not here, your soul is here anyway.

We are happy to share our experiences in Greece. In this place, really, many things happen. The television doesn’t show that: social innovation with complementary influences; citizens taking care of their city. And we want to bring these new ideas to the surface.”

*thank you to Megan Williams for transcribing, and Dylan Reid for editing*

Citizen Participatory Leadership in the Re-invention of Democracy

What happens when a society goes through a phase of creative destruction. This is what we can now learn from Greece. To learn what it means to live in a paradox where institutions no longer deliver and citizens need to find new creative ways to organize their life. This is the space where democracy can be re-invented through participation.

Maria Scordialos, one of the co-founders of the Systemic Innovation Zone – Greece, affectionately known as the SIZ, speaks at the Trailblaze in Ireland on the resilience and solidarity that is knit together in the social fabric of the Greek culture at this time.

At the Trailblazery Speaking of the Dis-integration and Re-Birth of Greece.

Activist. Systems Theorist. Pattern Recogniser. Maria is co-founder of The Living Wholeness Institute based in Axladitsa Avatakia, a farm and home that hosts immersion learning in Pelion, Greece. She is also co-initiator of the Art of Hosting Meaningful Conversations, a practice that invites people to create new collective intelligence through generative dialogue. Maria is passionate about citizen led democracy where people can be part of crafting their own lives by living their soul’s purpose.

 

Greece in a Time of Change – Hosting Conversations in Crisis, December 2011

Ποια είναι η Ελλάδα που Ονειρευόμαστε;

What is the Greece that we are dreaming of?
Transformating Possibilities for the Present & the Future.

The Systemic Innovation Zone- Hellas, in partnership with the Hellenic Society for Organisational Learning (SoL Hellas) invites you to a pioneering event that is going to take place on Saturday, 17th of December 2011 at Hilton Athens Hotel in the context of Money Show Forum. The innovation of this conference is focused on the use of the World Cafe & Open Space methodologies, which allow us to trace and create conditions for the emergence of collective intelligence of the whole of the participants. For the first time in Greece, the “experts” will not be in a specific panel but in the whole group of the citizens that are taking part in the event: We are all “experts” and we contribute to the collective wisdom for catalysing solutions  through our  own knowledge!

We invite every active citizen to participate in this event by contributing his/her personal knowledge, stories and view about this crucial question, the opportunities and challenges of the Crisis that lead to Collective Action for the Transformation Possibilities of Greece.

With the use of interactive and experiential dialogue processes
we are going to work on the following questions:

~What do we dream possible for our country?
~ If we would wake up now and we would magically be in the ideal Greek society, what would we see around us? How would everyday life and institutions be?
~ What do we want to keep, which are our unique, positive traits that we want to strengthen and enhance?
~What do we want to become, what do we want to be?
~How can each of us and together contribute to the development, personal and collective and to the wide transformation of our country

The event and conversations will be hosted by Maria Scordialou, Maria Bakari, Vanessa Reid, Sarah Whiteley, Anthi Theiopoulou & Odysseas Velentzas.

Programme
10.00 – 10.15  Opening ~ Framing
10.15 – 12.45 World Cafe
12.45 – 13. 30 Break
13.30 – 16.00 Open Space
16.00 – 16.10 Completion ~ Closing

Registration
This is a free event. Due to the fact that places are limited they will be booked on a “first come, first served” basis. Please register by sending a message with your name and the indication “Conference” to the email: events@solgreece.org.
For any additional enquiries, please free to contact Maria Bakari on (+30) 6937107443.

Note:
The methodologies of World Cafe & Open Space have been developed in the framework of research through the multi~disciplinary exploration of Organisational Learning and they are used in the last 20 years by plenty of organisations so that useful conclusions are drawn in critical issues where the existing knowledge of all involved is a defining factor.

“We can be wise only together.”
~ Margaret Wheatley