Todd Hoskins with Peter Kaminski, 2023-12-08
Author: Peter Kaminski Issue: 2023-12-20
Todd Hoskins with Peter Kaminski, 2023-12-08
Intercommunity; Community Collisions
(Todd and I share an interest in “intercommunity”)
In the spirit of intercommunity, how can we have not just individual voices that represent different communities, but how can we have “community collisions” in which there is some output from that?
And I don’t really have an answer to that.
But I feel like it’s very interesting.
Productization, Replication
So if you’re not a technologist, how would you describe yourself? Or, what are you thinking when somebody else is talking?
I am constantly seeking underlying principles.
I’m looking to confirm, validate, adjust, or find evidence for or against the principles that I hold dearly.
And then I’m looking for new applications of those principles–new and creative ways of thinking about them.
And everything in that is more process-oriented.
So the product for me is always the process.
There’s not a thingness to it.
And I had somebody a year ago say, “I want to productize what you do.”
And I said, “How are we going to do that?”
He said, “Well, if we just spend enough time together, dive in, we can figure out how other people can do what you do.”
And I said, “That sounds like a fun exploration – but I don’t want to be married to the outcome of replication.”
Fluidity, Flow, Structure
So to a technologist, when you say process, I think they think of workflow engines and assembly lines.
And it goes quickly into thingification.
So when you say process, is it sometimes technological?
Is it sometimes human? Is it always human?
That’s a great question.
It’s always a flow, but it’s not always the workflow.
I’m going to start, see where that takes me.
I was reflecting lately with a colleague, that the fact that I tend not to use any off-the-shelf methodologies for the work that I do within teams and organizations or networks can sometimes just seem foolish and exhausting.
Because if I could just pull something off the shelf and use it, I wouldn’t have to have such a long immersion period, or I wouldn’t have to utilize so much creative energy.
But the value is in the creative energy.
And it’s not my creative energy, it’s a shared creative energy that is with those that I’m working alongside.
In that sense, the process that I am feeling out–finding where the flow is, is just a deep listening and understanding, a dialogue and a sense of, how can we envision this, and then, what comes next?
You know Marti Spiegelman?
She sometimes intersects with our circles. She is my podcast partner, and she’s a mentor and friend.
We used to have these ongoing conversations around structure and flow, because she has this phrase that is based upon Indigenous wisdom, that fluidity speaks its own best structure. This means that the best frameworks are created on the fly, and then they evolve.
My argument was, “Sometimes you need to start with a structure and find the fluidity, to adjust the structure.”
And she would say, “Even before you start with the structure, you’re likely finding the fluidity before you start with that structure.”
I get it. I used to try to be a walking library of theory. And now, I’m a believer–that the structure needs to follow the flow. Principles are universal. Methods are not. We apply principles to context.
So with the process-orientation, I am tracking, I am watching, I’m monitoring – where is there a flow that could move this initiative forward?
And then, how is the structure coming into form? We are in-formed by what we know–frameworks and such–but the context likely needs something new if it’s complex and evolutionary.
What does this have to do with community collisions?
We don’t know what will provide value until we experiment. We don’t know what will work and won’t work. When there is magic, we don’t look to replicate it as much as we seek to understand the principles at work and then experiment more.
Related:
- Peter Kaminski (author)
- 2023 (year)
- Topics: Wisdom Traditions and Ancient Knowledge