THE PODCAST: DEC. 11 /18

HOW TO STAGE THE ROOM FOR HEALING, MOMENTUM, AND SERIOUS PROGRESS

In episode eight, Tim and Tuesday empathize with facilitators and collaborators separated by organizational difference or mandates — and explore how to go deep and draw out the greatest value.

Together, Tim Merry and Tuesday Ryan-Hart are THE OUTSIDE—systems change and equity facilitators who bring the fresh air necessary to organize movements, organizations, and collaborators forward for progress, surfacing new mindsets for greater participation and shared impact.

1.08 —— SHOW NOTES

Recent favourite binge-worthy shows: The Good Place and Occupied
The arc of our work—greater equity for a society that serves all—requires depth and constant analysis of ourselves and the power systems and structures that surround us. Ability to be in deep relationship with one another.
Tim: You can’t coast if you’re interested in big change.
Tues: We have been conditioned out of depth. The status quo in the workplace is not necessarily connected with the self or other people. We have structured our professionalism to not include vulnerability, authenticity or yearning. These things have been structured out of us.
Tim: A lot of our work is positioning depth within our projects as an essential ingredient to outcomes.
Tim: Where does exclusion of depth, emotion or vulnerability come from within our cultures, our communities, organizations, initiatives, projects? The easy default for me is patriarchy.
Tues: The white supremacist, capitalist patriarchy says there are people who have wealth and those who generate wealth for others. You cannot have relationship with folks who are ‘producers’ for you and nor can you be in relationship with people you are only producing for. We’ve been stratified and structurally separated and never should meet—this is part of it. See this at every level of an organization (front line workers, middle managers, senior leaders). Industrialism = strong separation between home and profession.
Let’s list our ‘positioning phrases’ to a participatory approach:
- Relationships = results
- We often tie depth to outcomes for people by asking: “What do you want? What’s the result you want?” Significant change requires we get to depth because it’s the only way we discover the detour to something new.
- Staying in it when it gets hard is imperative to try something different.
- Go deep, be in it together, get uncomfortable.
- This is also about discernment - let’s learn a new muscle or tool. Discern where needed or useful. Add something else to your tool belt that increases your chances of success.
- Depth builds ownership - quality of loyalty begins to change when there is ownership.
When we set up people in a circle, we invariably wind up having it feel like therapy. This can make some of us feel open, and others feel resistant. As facilitators, what can we do to position depth as a path to the outcomes we want?
In change, people often struggle with leadership because they fear the work will cause a loss of relationships. This has a lot to do with the mechanistic worldview that is responsible for setting up our organizations, when we didn’t realize the interconnectedness of things, and when we treat human organizations as machines, striving for efficiency.
This organizational structure not only fails to acknowledge people’s humanity, but is fundamentally oppressive. It’s not like these organizations set free people’s potential.
What allows or justifies the perpetuation of systems that are unkind?
If you can make non-emotional judgement calls, you’re successful. That’s part of the programming I received from my parents: that you actually can’t lead if you’re empathetically or emotionally engaged with people. — Tim
Song of the day: Frank Turner’s Be More Kind
Poem of the day: Self Portrait by David Whyte

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Find the song we played in today’s show—and every song we’ve played in previous shows—on the playlist. Just search ‘Find the Outside’ on Spotify.