The Art of Meeting

For Full Bloom to continue to function, grow, and ideally thrive we (all the adult residents of Full Bloom which is currently 11) choose to have a community meeting once a week.  I thought I would share a little about how we structure our meetings so that they are both nourishing and effective.

We begin each meeting with 2 minutes of settling time.  This may be guided by the facilitatator (a position which rotates weekly) or may be simply time for each person to arrive and settle into being with this particular constellation of people for the next hour and a half.  We then move into engaging with each other using the Matrix Leadership model (www.matrixleaderhsip.org) of group facillitation.  In this model members of the group connect with another member directly in “the eyes and ears of the whole”.  This allows for connections to be fed that may have been underfed during the week.  The sharing from individual to individual may be an expression of gratitude for what the other has done or a “check-in” about what’s been going on emotionally for the person during the week.

We intend to keep this heart connection as we move into the logistical portion of the meeting where we take agenda items from all the residents such as: Chore check-in, food garden planning, plan for upcoming party, work day, compost pile location etc.  As you can imagine it can be difficult to keep the group on topic and to move through a topic in a reasonable amount of time.  That’s where strong facilitation comes in.  It is an art and we are all learning it as our live unfold here together.

“The facilitator’s job is to support everyone to do their best thinking and practice. To do this, the facilitator encourages full participation, promotes mutual understanding and cultivates shared responsibility”  Sam Kaner et all “The Facilitators Guide to Participatory Decision Making”