I was listening into an invitation phone call yesterday. It was a beautifully hosted. It was friends and possible participants exploring an Art of Hosting event in June that is focused on this core question:
Some of these possible participants were asking why it would be important to be at the event. The spoken needs ranged everything from desparate for “practical tools for the trenches” to much needed “philosophical reeavaluation of the financial and wealth paradigm.”
As I listened, a core question became clear to me that underlies the specifics of the financial questions.
My bias is that we are “facing an unprecedented unknown.” (health care, food and sustainability, education…). I find this helpful to name. It helps name the need for why a project or an initiative matters. For why pioneering efforts matter. For why pioneering process matters.
Learning surfacing through Art of Hosting, Berkana and other groups supporting engagement is that the “how” of “facing unprecedented unknowns” is found in community. This is what I am learning. This is what leading practitioners are sharing. This is what academians are reporting.
More specifically in the “how” is the importance of colearning (think of this as core competency to adapt) in community. And real work that people care about. And relationships that are real and close enough to endure and thrive in the knowing and the not knowing that most certainly shows up in unprecedented unknowns.
Christina Baldwin has been a great example of a “namer” for me. She names what is going on so that we can have choice of what to do with it. It is my learning that naming the magnitude of unknown helps people focus beyond the tools and tricks. It takes us into the core competency needed of creating the new together, gathered in community.