Like many of us, I’ve found myself having to re-design pretty much everything I do. This applies to both our personal lives and our work lives.
For example, as someone who’s depended upon day hikes in beautiful places on a regular basis to maintain my mental health, I am now finding new beauty (after lots of initial resistance) walking around my urban neighborhood, enjoying neighbors’ gardens, discovering the natural topography of my city, and happening upon hidden bits of forest leftover from development.
When it comes to work, the question is more what has not been changed, than what has! Because it’s been pretty much everything. Live in-person client sessions have moved online. Loss of income has inspired me to innovate into developing low-cost, high-value two-hour online workshops. And, of course, there’s the West Coast Intensive, which is now a 3-day online event rather than a 5-day residential one. Talk about resistance: after a year of planning this event, it took me a long time to permit such a significant adjustment!
I just finished a book called “How to do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy,” by Jenny Odell, an Oakland, CA (my home town) writer and activist. She introduces the idea of “Manifest Dismantling” as a counter to the older narrative of “Manifest Destiny.” The latter has been presented to Americans as the signal act of progress and creativity. We now know, of course, that in most ways, it’s been our signal act of destruction and theft.
“Manifest Dismantling” is her proposal for a new way forward. She offers the example of getting rid of dams, focusing on one such local project, the San Clemente Dam, outside Monterey, CA. After many years, silt had built up so much that the dam was at risk of failure, with risks to a large population downstream. It was also no longer able to fulfill it’s original function of reserving water. Finally, it had contributed to the collapse of fish populations and fisheries.
So, it was decided to bring down the dam. But it couldn’t just be destroyed: the build-up silt behind the dam was itself a threat, and so the dam had to stay. To adapt, engineers planned to re-route the river around the dam, and then allow it to develop as a natural streambed. It couldn’t be simply destroyed. It needed a creative process and inquiry so that the end wouldn’t be even worse that the original problem. It required strong vision and community. The result is pretty magical.
But no one would say it is easy. It requires community, commitment, inspiration, and an openness to a radically new way of working with the intelligence of our systems.
This is something we’ve all been engaged in recently, one way or another. Think of the things you’ve had to re-shape over the last few months, and see if you can’t see it as something like “manifest dismantling.” So many of us are discovering that, even when we resist for a time what is happening, many of the adjustments we have to make are resulting in healthier behaviors, systems and perspectives.
Obviously, this is not universally true. We are also surrounded by death, loss and fear. This is not a “silver lining” story, which is appropriately offensive. Our creative adaptations must include and honor the losses, rather than wave them away.
And, at it’s best, this all sounds like constellations work to me. Through honest engagement with the truth of what is, we find creative responses that were not available or allowable within the previous paradigm.
You are warmly invited to consider joining us for our newly re-designed Intensive, which is being adapted in faithful and bold response to our situation. The extra good news? It is now much more affordable, and easier for people who lived far away. You can save $100 through May 13th. Go to West Coast Intensive to see all the details about how it will work online. Please consider that along with my other re-designed offerings.
How has “manifest dismantling” been part of your life of late? How might you have resisted, and yet eventually found something that was valuable? Share with us your stories of loss, grieving and unexpected life on my blog below.
Note: Many of you have enjoyed by nature photography over the years. In this newsletter, I am showing some new efforts, revealing a different kind of beauty, drawn from my Oakland urban rambles…
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