Virtual Meetup Impressions

Thank you @Simon Grant for the questions. I feel I want to give body and context to the idea of Purpose and through it to resonate with your questions.

Intro / Context

In a recent conversation with @Richard D. Bartlett he reflected back to me a framing of "paradox" and suggested writing about that. I was reluctant to do that ... but I do recognize that as I reflect on your questions ... paradox is all over my thoughts. So this may be that :)

I suspect this answer will be long and will have taken the better part of a day to write. Out of care and consideration for your (whoever may encounter and engage with this) time and attention I will do my best to keep it on point. It is embedded in my story not to draw attention to myself but to give my experience of purpose a real and tangible flavor.

This brings me to a first paradox. I sense a deep hesitation to write this because I don't want to waste your time. I am not comfortable thinking of myself as unique ... I prefer to think there are many others like me. Yet, in practice, I have not yet encountered (in group situations I've experienced) another person living in prolonged retreat and isolation while yearning to be with others. If it IS just me then I feel this may be a waste of your time. I feel there are more important things that deserve the attention of people and groups like you. Tending to my sense of inclusion and belonging feels like a risky (if not poor) investment (I realize I'm saying this in the context of Microsolidarity!). If there are others like me ... this may be a worthwhile exploration.

Maybe this puts us, at least temporarily, on a common ground of risk: I risk the effort of writing this and you risk the time and attention and possible side-effects of ingesting it!

How Purpose Came to Me & Moved Me to Romania

Two weeks before THE 9/11 I met Andreea. She was a Romanian foreign worker living and working legally in Israel. I usually don't remember dates but I remember this one because when we got out of bed together for the first time on 9/11the towers in NY had collapsed (It was good, but not THAT good!)

Over the next few months, our relationship deepened and we hit a serious problem: her visa expired and she became an illegal resident in Israel. This set us on a struggle with the state of Israel that lasted 7 years (it is hard to comprehend the depth of this crisis without learning more about citizenship in Israel).

I am not the "struggling type" ... I prefer to find my way around a problem than to tackle it head-on. Now I found myself in an almost impossible struggle ... and I had to ask myself "why am I doing this?" I didn't have a good answer. I am not a romantic at heart ... so "love" didn't work for me. I couldn't find an answer so I ended up living a life of inquiry around that question.

During this time I was starting to feel the itch of meaning and purpose ... mostly from a feeling of their absence in my life. I, therefore, insisted that Andreea not take some kind of job just for the sake of making money (I had that covered, it seemed pointless to waste her life too). I wanted her to be free to take a shot at following her heart ... finding purpose. She gravitated organically, naturally, and beautifully towards specializing in femininity - a cycle that encompasses women's health, fertility, pregnancy, birth and mothering.

Watching her made me both jealous and gave me courage ... I also wanted some meaning and purpose of my own (still not fully comprehending what I was seeking). That led me to end my professional career and, in a magical twist of events, immersed as a photographer among improvisation dancers. My heart sang (maybe for the first time in my life!) ... until I couldn't afford to do it anymore and my heart broke ... AND ... we started running out of money.

During all this time Andreea swore she would NEVER go back to Romania. I created for her a website in Hebrew ... and it (and her work) didn't take off. Then I created a site in Romanian ... and it blew up. She was CLEARLY being called back.

And so, 2 years after we "won" the right to continue living together in Israel we left to Romania. I liquidated my retirement funds (paid quite a heavy penalty) and we jumped off a cliff. We decided to move to a village close to a major city. This was both to avoid dumping money down the rent-drain and to be accessible to people. Andreea became one of the founders of home-birthing in Romania.

3 years later Andreea left. I was hurt, scared, alone in a village in a foreign country. Yet in the midst of all that emotional pain, there was something subtle hiding. I remembered the purpose I had attributed to our relationship. During all our years together I wanted her to be independent, to be able to make her own way in the world, to do what she cared most deeply about. That was what she was leaving to do - SUCCESS ... just not with me! We are still in a loving and caring relationship and I feel that I had something to do with every child she helped bring into the world. Her finding purpose gave me "access to purpose". The purpose lived (and literally lives) on.

A few years later Andreea gave up home-birthing too. It became too dangerous for her. About a year ago we finally took down her (by then anonymous) website ... millions of page views of (apparently) precious information that was, until then, not available in the Romanian language ... she wanted it gone from her life ... to be completely disassociated.

so you are seeking purpose eh? ... deep sigh ... pause ...

This experience has not turned me off from seeking purpose, however, it has made me more of a "purpose pragmatist".

Purpose in CSA (Food Boxes)

The "Peasant Box" project I mentioned in the call was created together with Andreea when she was still around. Given my "nothing to do with people" attitude it felt deeply ironic that THAT became a thing.

The "idea" came to me when we attended a peasant association meeting and what I understood was that there was plenty of good food being grown in villages that was having an increasingly hard time finding its way to consumers. For over a year I spoke out about this ... but no one showed any interest. The "idea" gained body after we bought the farm and moved to the village. there we met the first producer (who, as I mentioned in our call, had just decided to leave the project). Purpose came knocking on my door again.

What started as a simple site with a contact form and a spreadsheet has grown to be a technical platform. I dislike coding, but purpose motivated me to code. I was fueled by the moving stories (all primarily about RELATIONSHIPS ... food and money somehow always seemed secondary). And even now, as this founding producer has walked away, betraying my trust (and destabilizing my sense of basic income) ... I find myself going back to the purpose ... and again ... despite human beings stumbling about incoherently ... purpose lives on. The daughter who had a mother in winter, and her own room in a renovated warm house, moved to a better high school and now supported in university ... that, I believe, will resonate way beyond my comprehension and lifetime (regardless of anyone else valuing or appreciating it).

... but it feels fragile ... not as resilient as I would like it to be. After eight years, I am finding it increasingly difficult to care on my own for the technology that makes it tick. My attempts, so far, to mature from a one-person-team to a crew have failed (can say more about that) ... and THAT, I feel, poses the greatest risk to this project.

Seeking Purpose from Retreat

... now you know how I arrived at living in retreat :)

When I arrived in Romania I had been so let down, hurt by and tired of people (the cost of struggling?) that I wanted nothing to do with people. I wanted to grow my own food, cut down my own trees for fire-wood ... to disconnect from the poisonous experience of people. I bought into the "self-sustainability" narrative ... and quickly discovered that it was bullshit. I can't make a nail, or a hammer or a single cutting blade in the workshop "on my own."

After the first few years of endless work (a lot of it on my own) making the house livable, I arrived at a space where I had much more free time ... and a deeply embodied realization that if WE are going to have a future (worth living) it has to be in community (and that is all I feel confident saying about the word "community").

Over these years I have tried to reach out and connect with others/groups working on things that feel meaningful and good to me. If the outcome of these efforts is to be measured by "being involved in groups" I have failed.

My practice has brought me to a place of internal fine-tuning and well-being. I am looking to bring my well-being to a crew, but I am not willing to sacrifice it for a crew. In fact, I aspire to experience my well-being deepening and taking on new dimensions within the context of a crew.

I feel myself teetering on the edge of surrendering to complete retreat from the world ... but I have not (yet?) been able to shake off the (damned?) urge to crew (I am enjoying the transformation of that word into a verb).

Purpose & Microsolidarity

In my (limited) experience with groups over the last 10 years I've felt that there can be confusion of motivations. I felt that many (if not most?) people valued (defacto!) the socializing itself (being seen and heard) over the purpose around which the group convened (what we supposedly came to talk about). That felt out of tune for me.

I too am aware of the desire to be heard and seen and held in a group ... but I didn't come in expecting that to be satisfied. I came to be of service to the purpose that convened us. I was available both/either to do the work and if necessary to work on how-we-work ... I do find satisfaction in THAT ... in doing good work AND learning to be better at it as a group.

Looking back at this realization from the present moment it sinks even deeper. I DO NOT expect to find satisfying social-emotional support in a group. I LOVE the idea that this is possible and I YEARN to experience it ... but given where I am and my past experience ... I cannot IMAGINE this is a real possibility. Maybe this is more likely to happen where there is continuous physical proximity ... but not from MY physically distant place of retreat = NOT ON ZOOM!

This is where purpose comes in (perhaps a fancy defense mechanism?) I can find lasting satisfaction from being in service of a purpose. But if there isn't a clear purpose ... then that void is filled by personal purposes = emotional needs. And the people here are GOOD at listening and expressing ... so initially, it feels promising (<--- key word popped up: PROMISE) ... but then it fizzles out ... because 90 minutes once a month is ... well ... not much. And then the emotional promise vaporizes AND ... I find myself in emptiness again. When I get off the call ... if there isn't something lasting (beyond fleeting emotional satisfaction) ... I land back in yearning. I feel like I am looking for meaningful relationship, not a sequence of one-night-stands.

So ... again ... maybe IT IS JUST ME and shouldn't concern you? Then again, I don't know if "physical proximity" has ever been or will in the foreseeable future be a good qualifier for the forming of congregations and crews. Biological infection do spread well in physical proximity. Ideas like Microsolidarity ... I don't see that. If that is the case ... then maybe figuring out remote congregation is vital? that is something I may be able to represent :)

Me, Now

I've taken this section out. I intended it to give context to where I am personally, emotionally ... it came from trying to relate to Simon's question about "what would make me feel safe" but when I read it I didn't feel good about posting it here. I am happy to share it with anyone who wants to read it. Just ask.

I don't expect to feel safe ... I feel comfortable expressing myself even if I don't feel safe. I feel I am equipped to inhabit my insecurities. I desire to feel inspired, a part of, useful, in resonance ...

Purpose of the "Virtual Meetup" Group!?

Yes Simon, I welcome the question and line of inquiry around a "calling question" ... but I am not sure if that is sufficient (at least in this case). I am curious to see that play out and see where it goes.

I have a desire for there to be a call to action ... I would like to experience impact ... I don't want to talk about hammers ... I want to swing one ... to feel its weight, the texture of the handle, the energy it holds as gravity starts pulling on it, the impact when it makes contact. Pretending or simulating has never worked for me ... if it isn't real it isn't alive ... if it isn't alive there isn't real feedback to inform my learning. For example: I experienced satisfaction when I was able to help the group schedule the recurring meeting schedule.

Maybe in the context of Microsolidarity that impact can be (for example) supporting just one person in the group who is facing a challenging situation ... and if that if the case then let's DO that ... I prefer to dedicate an entire call or even numerous calls to one person or one question or one idea or one word (in the last call I heard the word trust beckoning for attention) in depth, over shallow rounds where everyone expresses something but no time is left for deeper exploration.

I don't enjoy and distrust ideation that is not applied. I want to experience you and your skills in practice. I want you to meet me and my skills in practice. If we try to get to know each other by talking about ideas (knowing what I know about myself) we'll likely get into some theoretically pointless dead ends. You will FEEL me and my ideas much better if we actually do together. I am not available for ideas that I cannot apply (so as an example I even limit my intake of ideas about Microsolidarity) and not interested in offering ideas that are not applicable to you.

Simon you wrote:

... learn more about what it takes to set up a congregation effectively, and that involves what it takes to provide the fertile ground for the emergence of crews.

and I ask: is it possible to learn what it takes to set up a congregation effectively without actually DOING it?

I can elaborately describe an asana (physical posture in Yoga) to you, but you would not be able to learn it from my description. You could even watch me do it and you still would not be able to learn it. It can only be learned in a mutual relationship ... I need to first learn about you in order to get a sense of how to best introduce it to you within your needs and capabilities, I need to teach you to breath in it, I need to teach you where to place your attention, we need to revisit the teaching over time as you respond and adapt to the posture. It has to be LIVED to be LEARNED.

In my mind the virtual meetup group is a liminal space ... an orbit around planet microsolidarity:

• Some of us are floating around in orbit looking for a place to land, connect, make a home.

• Maybe some of the "floaters" may bump into each other, connect, crew and gain enough collective mass for gravity to pull us down to the planet.

• Others are already inhabitants of the planet and they come up from the surface to visit the "floaters" and hold a connection between the liminal orbit and the planet ... to share with those in orbit about what is happening on the ground and with those on the ground about what new potentials have been attracted to the planet and are awaiting in orbit.

Reflecting on this I sense a subtle fear in me: if we pursue that line of inquiry the group may dissolve (maybe only for some?). What will "floating in orbit" be like without this group? Will the gravity hold me close to the planet or will I float back out into empty space?

Hi Ronen, your story and sharing here touched me deeply. Thank for you being so brave and generous in your enquiry. There is a lot here I feel to respond to more deeply, but the major thought I felt to share was that I believe fully virtual/remote congregations will definitely have a part to play in the wider movement of Microsolidarity and community weaving. There are after all sorts of people that for whatever reason (geographic isolation, being on retreat, physical limitations around mobility etc) cannot physically connect in with people they would wish to commune with , and really perhaps these are the folks that need such structures the most. My own Collective has been spread to the four corners of the earth due to Covid and so has essentially been in remote mode these past few months, and we've grown closer than ever though intensive online interaction in different formats.

Perhaps exploring the formation of a fully remote crew and then congregation is one way to start swinging the hammer?

I just wanted to leave a quick note to express my regret at having missed the second meeting. I must have mixed up my time zones or something because I had us down to meet at 5 pm EDT. I appreciate the recaps and conversations on this thread to fill in the gaps.

Having participated in the first discussion, maybe it will be helpful to add some of my initial impressions. First of all, I have to acknowledge that it was a bit trickier for me than I expected to meet what I felt were the group's expectations regarding intimacy and "presentness." I chalk a lot of that up to the (virtual) format of the conversation and the fact that I'm meeting all of you for the first time. Some of you seemed a bit more practiced / polished in relating through this medium than others, and I wonder if that disparity may have led to a divergence in how different participants experienced the meeting, both then as well as moving forward. It might be worth tracking (via temperature checks, or whatever) that dynamic as the group continues to meet.

All that being said, I was pleasantly surprised at the depth of conversation that was had and how much understanding I feel I was able to glean about each of you even with these impediments. Just makes me wish more that we were able to meet in person...

Another factor I'm certain was at play was that my wife informed me mid-call that my dog - whom we had to leave with her parents in her Peru and had been sick for several days - had just died. She was only 7 years old and had been an important part of our shared "story" together, so it was hard news for us to hear. Whatever the case, I felt that I was not able after that point to do justice to the spirit of the meeting and I regret what I may have missed as a consequence.

Finally, as several others have mentioned above, I also noticed a pretty wide diversity of motivations among the group for participating in these meetings and wonder if our purposes might be better met in the long-term by either splitting into smaller groups or perhaps providing some resource to help participants better gauge where they may fit in, even outside this group altogether.

Personally, I'm at a place in my life where shared purpose is much more important to me than shared community, and I recognize that that balance of priorities may put me at odds with those in the group for whom that person-to-person connection is the foremost goal. Perhaps a better way to say it is that I would be disappointed if the person-to-person connections I was making here didn't eventually translate into some sort of outward action down the line, and the main reason I'm here is because I see those trustful relationships as an essential condition of the sort of productive, meaningful work I want to fill my life.

Look forward to reading everyone's impressions from meeting 2!

Next Meetup: June 12, 2020

• The next meeting will take place on Friday June 12th, 2020.

• Please note UTC TIMEZONE to avoid confusion.

• Meeting time: 13:00 - 14:30 UTC + optional 14:30 - 15:00 UTC.

• A host/facilitator is needed for this meeting.

• Location: https://meet.jit.si/microsolidarity-meetup

This comment can be used as a thread for conversation in preparation for the meetup and for impressions following the meetup.

reminder bump: the next meetup is on June 12 (details above) and @Toni Blanco has offered to host this time.

I will suggest a concrete agenda at the beginning of the meeting when I know how many attendants we are. If nothing new comes out, we can share and talk about our particular "dogmas" or at least "strong hypothesis" on microsolidarity and crews and congregations formation we are testing with our experimentations. I hope that it will spark interesting conversations. I leave here a wise agenda link, just in case. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1AQgjvfaRPuuWcChjtO4czKmguRkCDlNETyfYZFkeOKI/edit?usp=sharing

Can't make this one unfortunately, am a bit too distracted with other things at the moment. Hopefully I'll join the next meeting again!

I also need to send my apologies. Was looking forward to Toni's hosting but I am exhausted so don't have anything to contribute today besides a nap :)

I am exhausted myself. Anyone willing to experiment with exhaustion and the vulnerability carried with it is welcome :-)
Also we can make it shorter. Or less participatory. I can tell you about my research and then Q&A
Let us decide after the check-in. Maybe a check-in as a fell-good-touch-base is enough.

Exhaustion -- we so much need to recognise this. To me this runs hand in hand with recognising diversity in terms of what is often called 'neurotypicality'. Some people really appreciate asynchronous, sometimes! Long-form, sometimes. Personally, I love both sides!