Dear Wilfried, Preeti, Alemka, Jan, Max, Dan
I'm naming you in particular because it is your contributions of late that have
got me engaged and made me write to CT rather than just hold discussions in
my head, as I usually do. In this act of inclusion I also don't want to exclude
others or suggest that other contributions haven't engaged me too - it's just
that these latest are particularly close to my heart as a consequence of
life's"accidents" - of where I was placed in a particular family, of a
particular country and in a particular place in time in history. Born in
England of Polish political refugees who had gone through the second world war
and the trauma of Siberian labour camps as well as forced migration to a
foreign country, it is not surprising to me that particular themes have got me
going - themes around the use of language; exclusion and inclusion; openness
versus censorship; politics and power; the position of "the other", the
outsider; justice and giving each
according to his/her due; cultural influences; real community versus a
pseudo-community; war and conflict.There has been so much richness in these
latest contributions that its difficult to focus on just one aspect. And then
there is the whole question too of how do these themes relate to constellation
work and are my contributions valid for the CT forum.
What I hope is valid is picking up from Wilreid's latest contribution
about community and the general theme that has been much in discussion, that is
the impact of censorship:
"Forums like CT are useful tools for information and communication but they
cannot represent something like the worldwide FC community (if there is
something like this)" Wilfried
It's a relief to me to have the whole idea of a community questioned. CT can't
in my opinion possibly represent a community - it's a source of information, a
place where ideas might be exchanged, support given, networks established, egos
polished, friendships formed, challenges thrown out, and much more, but to hope
or pretend it is a real community is in my mind fostering an illusion.
I have appreciated what I leaned from Scott Peck's Different Drum and the
courses about community building I attended in the 1990s. What I leaned and
experienced in large group meetings was that initially in any group formation
we get what Peck called pseudo-community - looking out for those we like or to
whom we can relate to and seeking out alliances. This pseudo state of unity is
accomplished by simultaneously dismissing the differences or the strangeness of
"the others". Some groups never really get beyond this stage of development and
as soon as differences or hostilities do emerge the chaos is too threatening
and the group draws in on rules and regulations and by excluding the
threatening members. It survives but its membership stays limited and stifled
by the clinch of colluding with each other, silencing dissent through wnat are
often subtle forms of shaming or acts of excommunication. It fakes "niceness"
and becomes self
congratulatory.
To create real community we need to allow the expression of difference and even
hostility, to be willing to abandon our identification with what we know and
feel easy with, and even to welcome the expression of conflict. Open to the air
the chaos created by such an allowing can often become the harbinger of growth
and creativity; stifled it goes subterranean and festers like a swamp.
Stripped of the illusion of 'togetherness and sweetness' we make ourselves
vulnerable and it is this vulnerability and the commitment to the hard work of
dialogue that opens the heart and moves us closer to each other. So community
can be formed.
I'm not convinced that even with the best of good will CT could ever become the
place where such a dedication is achievable because it is inevitably limiting
by its very format - but I do think it's an 'impossible ideal' worth working
towards, and that we can aim to keep CT as open as possible to dissenting,
unpopular or even strange views, and that any censorship that it deemed to be
necessary should be of the absolute last resort and be delivered with the
lightest of touches and the fullness of transparency.
Thanks for staying with me
And wishing you all a fulfilling and well lived year ahead. Happy new year
Barbara
Barbara Stones
stonesbarbara@xxxxxxxxxxx
59 Englewood Road
London SW12 9PB
020 8673 2508
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