What Was The Magic in South Bend

by Doug Germann Sr.

Published on this site: May 12th, 2005 - See more articles from this month...

"I could not imagine that sitting around talking was working. But I have been getting work done."

This woman was talking about her work at The Doers Conference in South Bend, Indiana, in early 2005.

So what made it work?

Here were 22 "Doers" from the local community people who are activists, social entrepreneurs, and gadflies, all doing projects to help other people settled in for 2 1/2 days (can you imagine devoting that much time in one shot to improving your community?). Their theme: "Opening Space for Making a Greater Difference."

As we were inviting people to The Doers Conference we got questions like, "So it's a brainstorming session, then?" Or, "It's like a networking event?" I was tongue-tied; I did not know how to say it was like those things but so unlike them....

As I have pondered what was the magic of The Doers Conference, both during the Conference and in the weeks that followed, here is what I have come to think:

On the continuum of conversation there are "How much is the T-bone?" conversations, "Did you have a good vacation?" conversations, "Why would you vote for that candidate?" conversations, and someplace we get into heart-to-heart territory. But out beyond the emotional, there are conversations which touch our aspirations, bigger pictures, and very beings. This is the place that these Doers reached.

Sure, they exchanged tips and tricks, contacts and even e-mail addresses. But something else flowed among them. They were talking about what really mattered to them. They were being heard. They were saying things they had never said to anybody in their lives in some cases because the opportunity to speak about what mattered to them gave them opening for making sense out of something from their roots. They were heard, then, not just by others, but by themselves. Their deepest desires to serve were witnessed and validated by others.

There was a camaraderie that sparked creativity between them as well as within them.

This is important, so please permit me to say it in different words: creativity is not solely the province of the individual. Make no mistake, we are all gifted with our own peculiar creativity. But there is a creativity that is emergent in the very spaces between people. Putting people together in an open, accepting space, people who already have a focus outside themselves for the good of others, will bring about new creations. People literally surprise themselves with what they generate.

The aim of dialogue, of persons, is being meeting being. We drop who we think the other person is, to hear who he or she really is. We drop our own shields which protect our encapsulated notions of ourselves to find that we are really much larger, stronger, and full of life. We open to the larger in each other. We open to the larger being of each other. This is from varied directions: we open to the other and we open to how the other experiences us and we open to how the other is opening our experience of us.

This is the way of grandparents isn't it?: paying attention to the person of the grandchild: listening, speaking to the being, hearing the being who wants to blossom, whispering "Bloom, bloom!"

At The Doers conference we had the meeting of being and beauty.

These Doers set about the meeting of being with being, beauty with beauty. We saw others for who they really are, and the meeting helped us to see ourselves for who we really are.

We went beyond the meeting of tips and techniques and traps and tests; we went beyond brainstorming; we moved to heartstorming and to spiritstorming. We moved to root causes, to essence, to What are we about? and What can I learn by seeing your being? and What brings us into harmony with larger pictures of ultimate reality, particularly in its holy and sacred qualities?

In short, we have moved from the ordinary to views of ourselves and our work which brought out a new harmony. From here we work purposely, one-pointedly, and effectively.

That's why people stayed for 2 1/2 days. That's why sitting around talking was getting work done. That's why the Doers in your town need to gather, and why you are the one who needs to make it happen

If I can help show you how to do it yourself, please call or e-mail.

Contact Doug at: P.O. Box 2796, South Bend, IN 46680-2796; telephone 574/291-0022; fax 574/291-0024; [email protected]. More info on The Doers Conference at www.FootprintsintheWind.com