Intentional Society: Welcoming a wave

Our next (large!) orientation call is this Saturday, March 5th at 1:00-1:55pm Pacific Standard Time (4pm Eastern, 9pm UTC).

Welcome to all the new subscribers of this little list! About 30 people attended Monday's Stoa session live, with about 500 subsequent views on YouTube. Here is that recording, which contains a 20 minute presentation plus 35 minutes of Q&A.

With the interest/awareness triggered by the Stoa session, we might have a noticeable jump in our attendance this week. Last Sunday in our meta time, we considered how to respond to a possible surge, with "sure, let a big cohort in!" being favored over "make a waitlist and trickle people in." So if that's you, don't hang back!

Last week I was talking about relational cases, so here's a brief update. We did take the “What I really want to say” setup and pair that with Circling (more-or-less) as a sort of "relational case" or "case circling" mash-up. (When I say "case," that concept/word is sourced from Theory U's Case Clinic practice.) We're not necessarily done with it, but here are a few observations:

• In presence-based case work, you do not attempt to solve someone's problem. Circling, with its present-moment focus, makes it extra clear and apparent when some of that fixing/solving energy starts to show up.
• With the case-giver talking "to" someone who isn't present, the other circlers reported from multiple perspectives: what they felt directly from their "bystander" vantage point, and also what they imagined the recipient might feel upon being so addressed.
• Lots of cases might have both a relational/interpersonal and a systemic component to them... (and we may explore in this direction next)

Cheers,
James

P.S. Issues of this newsletter come out weekly, on either Wednesday or Thursday, and you are welcome to follow along even if you never participate in any other way. As you can see above, we share reflections on what we're learning — but it also gets a bit more philosophical at times. Feel free to email-reply directly and liberally with any questions or thoughts.