Tonight I facilitated a community gathering of people in the heart of an area named this year as one of the urban poverty centers in the country. My job was to help them create a proposed list of prioritized environmental options for a planned area school.

We prepared them for the task by creating a 6-month community of practice featuring lectures, tours, and discussions. They did a great job of understanding every technical feature and had no problem articulating priorities. By the way, this was the same group I blogged about earlier this year having no problem describing their collective 20 year vision for their neighborhood.

The most significant part was the non-linear storytelling that cultivated the community created here. It was a beautiful reminder that we get together secondarilyto make communal decisions. We gather primarily to celebrate everyone’s stories - in this case, the stories of parents and children, retired teachers and community leaders, homeowners, and friends.

Community emerges naturally when being becomes more important than doing, trusting that good doing together will always flow from good being together.

…You have a dream — call it a vision. It has some degree of power and purity for you or you wouldn’t bother. But as long as that dream/vision is yours alone it will never be the foundation of a new viable venture. And here is the rub . As soon as that dream is shared it will change.

An excerpt from one of Harrison Owen’s posts today on the Open Space listserve.

My friend Ed Morrison who directed the economic development team here at CWRU was yesterday canned and the program hijacked by university officials. With Ed’s leadership, the program fostered self-organizing civic efforts aimed at higher levels of community dialogue, connectivity, and innovation - the prime drivers of surprise.

It reminds me of one of the themes of “Accidental Conversations”, that the purpose of the formal organization is to prevent surprise. That’s why there the talk is all about predictability through conformity and control.

And that’s exactly why we look to the edges of ecosystems for signs of new life because that’s precisely where they tend to emerge, and thrive.

Do we learn more from pain or gain? I think many of us are more socialized to pain as teacher. The more appreciative coaching I do, the more it’s clear that most people simply don’t reflect as deeply on their successes and achievements as their shortcomings and failings. That being the case, the only meaningful learning comes from pain rather than gain.

As for which can be a better teacher, pain or gain, I say … whatever works for you.

In today’s NY Times, Rob Walker writes, The Moleskine just looks like a thing that holds interesting, and possibly important, jottings and sketches. Even if you’re carrying it to another boring staff meeting to take notes about sales projections, the notebook makes for a fantastic emblem of creative possibility.

It’s the celebrated nicely designed notebook of the likes of Hemingway and Picasso. I’ve been a fan for a couple of years now and would use nothing else. It’s a fashion statement as much as a garden for the muses - a reminder of the magic of the sensual in a digital world.

For fun, visit Armand Frasco’s blog on all things Moleskine - Moleskinerie.

It’s interesting that so many cultures have their own version of bread - bread loaves, pita, matso, crepes, tortilla chips, rice crackers, pastries. Grain is at the heart of food. In each case, the form provides a perfect context for the content of what it holds and conveys.

Websters defines “true”in 3 ways: (1): being in accordance with the actual state of affairs (2): being conformable with an essential reality (3): fully realized or fulfilled.

I think it’s fascinating that true is only one-third about alignment with reality as it is - the domain of facts. The other two-thirds has to do with what resides within our comfort zones and what aligns with our dreams ….

JackZen is now being published from a brand spankin’ new iBook. It’s a world of difference from the countless PC products and MS environments I’ve had since my first computer ever in the ’80’s - yes, an Apple 2C 80/86. My key chain has more memory than the 2C with its tiny little green screen and very pre-mouse arrow navigation.

The whole package is inspired and elegant in every sense of the word. Like its European design cousins, the iBook reminds us of why beauty in any genre needs to be an aesthetic imperative in whatever we choose for our world.

I was walking up to the library at the end of our street last night and a woman in the park approached me with “a question”, which in this park is usually a euphemism for a lively pandering encounter. “Hey, do you know anything about bugs?”, she queried. I admitted to knowing some, but far less than any respectable entomologist.

“What’s your question?”, I asked, realizing quickly I had slipped into channeling a reference librarian from my youth. “You know these bugs all over now - are they mosquitoes?” I asked if they’re biting and apparently some do and some don’t. This is May Fly season here, more annoyance than bite. She seemed relieved and followed me into the library, nabbing the first librarian for “books on bugs.” In this online age where anyone can wear sheep’s clothing of expertise, one is wise to seek the second opinion.

One of the values that is vital to happiness is self-trust. It’s a value based on a belief that if we just witness, just pay attention to the flow of our experience in the present, we will decide wisely in each moment what to do and how to be.

This is what happens in flow experiences where we effortlessly act skillfully without trying to be clever. We allow our moment to moment decisions to flow from being present.