Re: step by step community formation CORRECTION

Advice on "lurkers": Anyone not immediately forthcoming with bios &  
pics after your stated need to rock'n roll BEFORE  
national/international crisis is not ON your list. Continue invitations  
and ramp up the ante for staying on the list, ie $ commitments, travel  
commitments, work commitments. Don't let assumed crisis dates push you  
faster than others can be nudged, dragged & pushed along-you seem to be  
operating in a sustenance situation which likely has little "fat" & you  
could be the big loser if you jeopardize that situation before there is  
sustainable commitment from others.

Keep in mind with the how-to books & plans that creating community is  
very hard, never-ending work & convey that emphatically to prospects.  
Look at small real-time communities as well as intentional ones. (Many  
many of course started out as intentional communities a few hundred  
years or so ago). See how people come & go in a natural way-what they  
are attracted to & driven out by, the many winds of change that blow  
through any long-term community.

I hear your impatience & perceived lack of time for planning. Do rough  
out the core philosophy, point at appropriate precedents as approximate  
examples, propose at least one conflict resolution mechanism and get  
consensus. Speaking of "best practices" some form of consensus decision  
making is usually  a requisite for success & if you can't get consensus  
in the short-term you are unlikely to get it in the long-term.

Given where you are going, learn a lot about wild edibles (if you  
haven't)-that way you won't be so disappointed if it takes a while to  
get garden production on line. Old fallow farmland usually has a lot of  
edible "weeds" well colonized, even potential cash-crops of wild &  
semi-wild herbs, mushrooms, earthworms (for verimiculture composting,  
soil rehabilitation,  chicken feed & bait for fishing).

Are the Yahoo potentials geographically/politically able to relocate  
without undue hassle? I know lots of people want to come to Canada to  
make communities but the immigration law situation is very formidable.  
People actually buy land & then find they can't easily stay. In the  
many years people have been asking me about joining a community,  
immigration has most often become the insurmountable hurdle.

best wishes
david cameron

On Jan 24, 2006, at 12:07 AM, BT Benjaminson wrote:

> Johan,
> I deeply appreciate your efforts to guide me to useful resources. I  
> had a short look at the web site you suggested.
> I don't think it meets my needs. Here's why: I am a busy mother of  
> young children, run a home-based business and a micro-farm, and am  
> forming a community to move to a more sustainable location. I have to  
> be very practical. I don't have time for lots of planning. As it is I  
> am rising at 5 am to do the basic leadership tasks with the people  
> involved, before I have to start my day. The community tool box looks  
> like it was developed by people earning salaries so they can sit  
> around and make elaborate planning documents that are geared for  
> increasing the functioning of physically-existing communities. That's  
> just not what I need. I don't have a salary. I also don't think  
> there's much time to plan; from what I've read about the energy  
> situation, peak oil is happening this year.
> Right now I have over 20 people on a Yahoo group, all of whom have  
> expressed keen interest in moving to a sustainable community. I don't  
> know how to organize them to gradually build up the group to real  
> functionality. Some are sitting back and lurking, waiting for the  
> community to form to their liking, then (I think) plan to jump in and  
> benefit later. Others are charging forward, contributing to the list  
> their own personal dreams. Not too many people are expressing fears on  
> the list and getting through them to the point of making practical  
> progress in getting organized. I realize I have to do that somehow.
>
> We are going to a place with an existing infrastructure of empty  
> houses and ample farmland.
>
> I have a copy of the ecovillage training manual from the ecovillage  
> training offered at Findhorn.
> This provides some building blocks I can use immediately. The manual  
> outlines eight levels of sustainability (ecological, economic, health,  
> cultural, education, spiritual, political, communications). I am  
> thinking to ask the group members to choose an area, then learn about  
> it, and teach the group about best practices and other aspects. I hope  
> that eventually those teachers will become leaders and planners in  
> each of the areas of their own choosing. But I am not so confident  
> that this will work, as many of the group members have not even  
> responded to my requests to submit a self-introduction or photos.On  
> the other hand, perhaps those lurkers are not good prospects for  
> community membership anyway, so I should just keep inviting people to  
> join the group and see which ones step to the forefront of action.  
> They will all sort themselves out eventually. Anyone have any comment  
> on this approach?
>
> Jan Martin Bang's book on ecovillages is being shipped here as we  
> speak. I hope it also can provide practical how-to guidance that  
> doesn't take a PhD to implement.
> Thanks again, though, and please keep sending resources, I'm open to  
> looking at anything.
> Bat-Tzion
>
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