Year after year, decade after decade, the idea of living cooperatively with others in some form of intentional community has garnered increasing interest. Whether it’s a co-housing community or a full-blown ecovillage, people want to live more lightly on the Earth, share resources, and have a deeper, richer sense of community in their lives. Whatever […]
In yesterday’s post I suggested volunteering locally or running for local office. Here’s a story from a time I did that, in which my high level of communication skills made a difference. The scenario I was appointed by our county government to serve on a committee creating a 20-year plan for the area in which […]
The highest leverage point for effective meetings is mature individuals. By mature, I mean people who can self-manage. By self-manage, I mean people who ask themselves key questions before they open their mouth in a meeting. Questions like: Who is this serving? (Am I trying to look smart or impress somebody? Does this serve only […]
Many times I’ve attempted to take a shortcut, and the project, or the route I was taking, ended up taking longer. I’ve noticed the high cost of this approach especially in interpersonal situations. We avoid a conversation because we don’t want conflict, but the avoidance -or the shortcut- ends up costing more in time, energy, […]
What are we trying to accomplish? How much time do we have in which to accomplish it? If these two questions were asked at the beginning of every meeting, we’d save ourselves gazillions of hours of frustration, disappointment, and unproductive meeting time. […]