Well, talking to a few of our Enneagram learners today, it seems I over-romanticised the keeping silence aspect of community building that I posted about yesterday: apparently a large group of them went off to the pub in the evening to talk over what they’d learned!
This was interesting to me, as it underlined that people form community in different ways, and it was clear today that the group had meshed some more. It also underlined how different we all from each other – had I been part of the learning group, I would not have felt able to go to the pub even if I’d wanted to, because it would have looked bad, and wasn’t “supposed” to be part of the experience.
So today’s group was relaxed, chatty, asking lots of questions and interacting almost seamlessly with each other. I say almost seamless because when we finished the weekend today with a short meditation, I could sense just a few individuals who were not in tune with the others.
But by and large here we were, 23 people who had never set eyes on each other 48 hours earlier, coming out the other side of our sharing as a little community. Temporary, of course, but a community nonetheless.
The late Scott Peck wrote an interesting book about creating community: The Different Drum. Well worth reading for anyone interested in creating or saving communities. And of course lasting communities take a lot more time and effort than one weekend.
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Dave, thanks for this comment. I’ll be interested to check out your site.