Can happen, Will happen, Stuff happens

I have been in an awkward position lately regarding the whole “anarchist” thing. Here in Minneapolis there has been a big controversy involving a group that I have volunteered with and people that I know (on all sides of the issue) that has gotten so incredibly nasty that I have started feeling embarrassed to be associated with any of this. And more than anything I feel just plain heart-broken that all of this is happening. Also, in places much farther away from here other self-proclaimed “anarchists” are doing other things that I have similar thoughts/feelings about, though since they are so much more distant from me these are not quite as intense as the local Twin Cities stuff. No matter how you cut it, though, it is all just pain, exhaustion, embarrassment and overwhelming defeat all around.

And yet, despite all of this stuff, I am still whole-heartedly into the whole anarchism thing. My reasoning is this – people who consider themselves to be “anarchists” are not necessarily the same people who actually make real-life "anarchy" happen. The people who publicly adorn themselves with that particular fringe-label are the folks who (hopefully) subscribe to particular political & social analyses, values, principles and other theoretical interpretations. The actual making-anarchy-happen part is another thing altogether, requiring an entirely different set of skills. Some of the people whom I’ve met in my life who I would say are very successful at living anarchically in their own lives and relationships are also often folks who have never even heard of “anarchism” and who would run away as fast they can if somebody wanted to try to instruct them on the theory about it.

The same goes with social and political change. In my life-time perhaps two of the people to who were most effective at enacting change in the world at large (although not necessarily the kind of change that I am wanting) have been folks like Mark Zuckerberg and Mohamed Bouazizi - not the scores of people out there who proudly proclaim themselves to be “revolutionaries”, “activists”, “organizers”, and “social change agents”. In this current era that we live in, mass social and political change seems to come about more from somebody happening to do something at the right place and the right time that sparks something within people that already exists within them but has been laying dormant waiting to come out. This is the same rationale behind anarchists and other self-proclaimed “revolutionaries” who endorse things like riots and armed struggle, but the difference is that I don’t think that those kinds of things are actually successful at achieving the kind of society that “anarchism” is supposedly all about.

I once asked a guy who was an anarchist for many years why he still stuck with it all. Throughout his “anarchist career” he had seen so many different failures, dysfunctional dynamics and sheer nonsense over the years being carried out by people within the “anarchist” scene, and yet he's still there. His response to me was “well, what is the alternative to being an anarchist? To become a jerk who starts bossing people around and making threats?”

It is exactly this – anarchism is a way to look at the world that takes away the masks and the lies of the things that we call “government”, “capitalism”, and “authority” in general. Seeing the truth of these things does not suddenly make one into an angel in one’s own behavior. An evil is still an evil even if one has failed at achieving the good. I am not about to start believing in something that I know is wrong, harmful, and is in fact destroying so much of life on this planet just because the alternative has not come about.

What it comes down to is that I believe that an anarchist society, and an anarchist social revolution that achieves such a society, is possible, not probable. That is the difference. “Can happen” and “will happen” are two separate things. I believe that in all likelihood various authoritarian regimes, alienated social relationships leading to social fragmentation and ecological devastation are the future for humanity. And, at the same time, I do believe that “another world is possible”.

I am reminded of a quote by Carl Rogers – “When I look at the world I'm pessimistic, but when I look at people I am optimistic.” I believe that within each human being are great vast capacities for love, creativity, sharing, courage, cooperation and expression. The thing is that this is all safely locked away in people, made out of reach by fear, by anger, by old habits and sheer laziness. Continuing on with the same-old, same-old does nothing to unlock oneself nor does it contribute anything towards getting rid of the chains that the world at large has around us all.

The value that I find in anarchism is that of being an ethical framework that guides both how one sees the world and how one chooses to act within that world. The world is as it is, here and now, regardless of what labels are ostensibly placed upon that world or society. The people within any given society are behaving in certain ways and engaging in particular social dynamics, and the benefit of having an anarchist lens to view it with is that it enables one to more clearly determine how one wants to respond and act in relation to what is going on. In other words, one can see more clearly what one is contributing to, what one is not contributing to, how much, and in what ways. Certain dynamics, certain relationships, can be more liberatory, dare I say more “anarchist.” And these particular kinds of dynamics and relationships can build on each other to ultimately have an anarchist society, a new anarchist world.

Not that this will happen. But it can.

Some things never change

In 1999 I was a student at a two-year Community College, mainly because I did not know what else to do with my life. I was an angry, alienated, young anarchist guy, and I had to do a required Public Speaking class in order to get my degree. I ended up dropping out of that class twice because I hated it so much. By the third time that I took that class I decided to adopt a "fuck it" attitude and to just go ahead and give a public speech about something that I actually cared about - namely, anarchy.

I delivered that speech, with great enthusiasm and passion, and my audience was stunned. I was known (or not) as a quiet, friendless, shy and nerdy guy, and here I was standing in front of the whole class vehemently denouncing Civilization as such. People did not know what to make of it.

It just so happened that the timing of things was such that I delivered my speech just days after the Columbine High School massacre shocked the nation. I recall that after I delivered that speech and class was over, myself and a bunch of other students were walking to the parking lot to leave the school. One of the other students who was present was saying to her friend, "Oh my god, this kid is going to be just like those Columbine kids! Did you hear him?!" Her friend then noticed that I was walking within earshot of them and nudged her to draw her attention to that fact. The one speaking then turned and noticed that I was right there and shrieked.

With this as context for the whole thing, I now present to you the original speech that I delivered. I still do like what I said in it and I would make just small changes to it if I were to deliver it now. I can only hope that the other students who were present in the audience then ended up becoming life-long anti-civilization anarchists.

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Society is bullshit. With each and every day, with each and every minute the absurdity of it all increases.

It becomes more obvious that the way we operate now, the way we LIVE is a sheer mockery of all life.

With each moment that passes, more species of life become extinct, more pollution is released into the world, and more wild-life is being permanently destroyed.

With each moment the planet's very eco-system is being torn apart and it's effects become more obvious all over the world.

With each moment that passes economic stratification increases, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer all over the world.

With each moment more and more people are imprisoned, fined, taxed, executed, spied upon, bombed and murdered by government in various ways, eventually leading to the united states having the largest prison population in the world, and growing.

With each moment we become more detached from nature.

Concrete surroundings, air-conditioned rooms, automobiles and artificial lights become the norm while true nature becomes something that is seen in the back-ground of commercials that we watch on TV after work.

With each moment we loose touch with our spirituality.

Spirituality becomes institutionalized into religion and mass-marketed back to us, while cold notions of scientific reason and progress are used as an artificial replacement.

With each moment we become more UNHEALTHY!

We are over-worked and over-stressed with very little time left for sleep, rest and relaxation.

More junk-food is invented and marketed to us while the "healthy" food becomes filled with artificial chemicals.

Sports become "spectator" sports and concern for healthy living becomes a mere "health fad" or "health craze".

With each moment our creativity and imagination are destroyed.

Pressure to obey orders, follow the rules, blend into the crowds, and bend to the whims of the bosses and the Markets leaves no room for us to follow our own natural curiosity, interests and desires.

With each moment we all become BRAIN-WASHED, lied to, tricked and deluded in various ways.

Advertising, propaganda and the conformist mind-set are inescapable in our society, anywhere you look you find some product being pushed, some government lies being given, some ideology being crammed down our throats.

With each moment that passes we are all being MURDERED!

Unhealthy life-styles pushed on us by an over-worked, ignorant, stressed-out, fast-food consumer culture has lead to massive amounts of death caused by auto-mobiles, unhealthy diets, various forms of legal and illegal drugs, and cancers from man-made causes.

With each moment we loose our enthusiasm for LIFE!

We become used to the routines of mind-less repetitive and monotonous jobs, standardized indoctrination at schools, bureaucratic nonsense and red-tape, and bland "entertainment" that is marketed to as broad an audience as possible, that we forget and neglect the wide range of possibilities and potential that exists out there for us!

With each moment that passes we become more ALIENATED from each other!

Our society pushes us to view one another impersonally, as mere OBJECTS - objects in business, objects to be governed and controlled, objects in relation to the divine.

We no longer see one another as real human beings, we see each other according to a LABEL - you are an employee, customer, a "bad guy or a good guy", tax-payer, sex-object, criminal, parent, believer, student, you are not longer a human being.

With each moment that passes we become more alienated from OURSELVES, we let conformity to society determine who we are and obedience to authority determine what we do.

True self-reflection and self-responsibility is replaced by the opinions of others and mass-media and the dictates of the Rat Race.

With each moment hope is destroyed and replaced with defeatist ideas about "human nature" and "inevitability".

With hope gone, suicide increases drastically, among the young and old alike.

If we continue down this path, all life will die, it is as simple as that.

If we continue, we will become mere soul-less objects working blindly for our mutual destruction.

Authority is the cause of all of this, the moment we allow ourselves be controlled, we doom ourselves.

The moment we view our fellow human beings as mere objects to BE controlled, we doom ourselves.

A complete world-wide revolution is needed, but this can not be accomplished through politics, political parties, violence or ideologies.

The revolution begins with YOU, not anything above you.

Destroy everything that has been programmed into you, a life-time of school, mass-media, bosses and following orders has left us totally detached from reality.

Destroy authority, destroy society - Let us discover life for OURSELVES!

Anarchist Controversies

Controversies have been a part of the anarchist scene for a long time now. I recall being a brand-new, freshly-minted, teenage anarchist in the ‘90’s, looking around to see what anarchist projects existed out there. I came across the Love & Rage Anarchist Federation, I was intrigued by what I saw in a newspaper that they produced so I looked into what they were up to currently. What I came across was a huge passionate controversy going on full-force, people publicly flipping out, angry accusations being traded around, the whole works. “Well, I didn’t really want to join them anyway”, I thought to myself, and I didn’t look into them again.

Anarchists have a history with this kind of thing, going right back to the beginning. One could say that the very thing that first differentiated anarchism from Marxism, ideologies aside, was a big dramatic public controversy. Two charismatic alpha-males, named Mikhail Bakunin and Karl Marx, had it in for each-other, people took sides, and eventually Bakunin and his people got kicked out of the group. “Fine, we’ll create our own damn organization!”, Bakunin and his people said, and the rest is history.

As the years have gone by I have seen many countless different controversies come and go within the anarchist scene. I have actively participated in some, I have silently observed others, and I have seen friends of mine get burned-out by them and then leave the scene altogether as a result. I myself once took a couple years break from the anarchist scene after one such controversy - the whole experience was just so very disheartening and emotionally draining for me that I wanted nothing to do with anarchists anymore. Time and again I have heard people say things along the lines of “with comrades like this, who needs government agents?”

What has kept me with the anarchist scene all these years was not the people, but the idea and ideals behind it all. If I was to be into anarchism because of anarchists, I would have left the whole thing long ago. Say what you will about anarchists in general, it’s the whole big controversy thing that comes up again and again from time to time that is something that I believe really self-sabotages the whole “movement”. It is almost as if there exists within anarchists some kind of inherent genetic programming that periodically gets activated, to help to thin the ranks, to keep the whole scene from getting too big or too vibrant.

Right now a big controversy is taking place in Minneapolis, among the anarchist scene, and it looks like the San Francisco Bay Area recently had one as well. I am not really all that concerned by any of these controversies – they come and they go, and people come and go, and projects come and go as well, I understand all of that. What concerns me is that the whole thing is so damn repetitive, all the recurring patterns and predictable behaviors, it’s redundant. And worst of all the social atmosphere within the anarchist scene in general does not seem to demonstrate that people have learned anything from all of these countless controversies. All this blood, sweat and tears, to no avail.

One of the things that I believe is underlying this whole phenomena is that anarchists in general are a very ideal-based, principle-minded people. Such-and-such a position is defended, on principle, and that very same stance is also attacked by others who see it as violating some other principle. Compromise can be seen as violating principles and so can talking to “other side” or having them be a part of one’s group. The underlying assumption seems to be that by taking a firm, consistent, unyielding and principled stance, step by step, step by step, every step of the way, eventually the beautiful new world that one is yearning for will come to be. Given that the very nature of an anarchist vision is so very radical, fundamentally different from and at odds with the world that we all inhabit today, I can see why one would take this kind of strong principled approach.

At the same time, the people behind and surrounding the principles are not seen. In other words, real-life human beings both cause and are affected by these principles, and this results in real feelings and real lives being impacted. Principles are important, I would say vital, in that they can serve as guiding forces in an often-times savage and confusing world. And I want to ask – how are these principle-based actions affecting the real-life people in front of you?

What I am proposing here is not the abandonment of one’s principles, but the addition of new principles to one’s repertoire. In particular, there is empathy. By seeing the world through the other person’s eyes, by walking in their shoes, a whole world opens up. In the heat of the moment, flared tempers, passionate calls to action, the world narrows down, and people are not seen. Empathy, then, is intentionally taking the time to see things from the other perspective.

Another principle is that of assuming good intentions. I am struck by how people, again and again, go from seeing someone as being a comrade, someone with shared values who’ve they’ve known for x amount of time to then seeing that same person as… being a total scoundrel, with nothing but a desire to cause harm, and that they have never been up to any good. Remembering someone’s basic humanity means keeping in mind that we are not surrounded by demonic beings, but real-life human beings with values and needs similar to our own.

A final principle here is that of talking with each-other. This ought to be a no-brainer, but I see it pop up again and again that in a controversy people actually talking with each-other, face to face talking that is, quickly goes out the window. In place of face to face conversations are face to face shouting matches and face to face hand gestures. But more likely than that, even, is not being in the same room at all, but instead talking only with people whom one already agrees with, or communicating over the internet, which in itself usually has a very distancing kind of effect. Just getting together, in person, and talking – no special kind of talking, no fancy mediation set-up of some sort – just talking. This in itself often has a very positive effect, and it is also one of the first things to go when things get rough. This does not have to be the case.

But as far as talking goes, there is a kind of talking that I generally find to be very unhelpful, and that is arguing and debating. I remember once being at the (in)famous anarchist study group of Berkeley, California, and somebody posed a question to the group: “Has anybody here ever been convinced of something through an argument or a debate?” Everybody responded “no”. That incident really struck me, because with all of the time and energy that goes into arguing and debating, it all really does not change people – except to make them either want to start throwing punches or to walk out the door. This is not the kind of “talking” that I would like to see more of.

The kind of talking that I find to be really helpful is where people are being really real with each-other, where they are being open and they do not have their defenses up, and where people are really listening to what everybody has to say. When one speaks one does so to really express where one is at personally and where one is coming from, not speaking to try to prove to others how “right” one is. And when one listens one does so with the intent of really trying to understand the other person, what it all means to them, not “listening” so that one can find fault with something they said so that one can then trash them for it later. This is a whole different quality of dialogue that I am talking about here.

There is a lot that I can say about this kind of conversation, I can go into a whole rant about Nonviolent Communication and shit, but now is not the time for that. The point that I am wanting to make is that different kinds of approaches to big controversies can be taken. There are alternatives out there and they can be implemented. It is simply a matter of making a conscious decision to want to respond to these things in a different way and then making the effort to follow through with that. It is not necessarily easy, but it can be done. And it is worth the effort too, for the sake of more solidarity, more community, and all that good stuff.

I would like to conclude this by offering my services to anarchists anywhere who would like some more support in implementing the kind of things that I am talking about here. I am not saying that I am a bad-ass mediator that can solve everyone’s problems, or that I can say a few magic words and everyone will start loving each other again. But I can offer empathic listening and some coaching that can be supportive in difficult situations. And when times are tough, everyone can use some more empathy and support.

Reflections from a Ten-year Giraffe Freak

Around this time ten years ago I first fell in love with Nonviolent Communication (“NVC”). This love-affair has gone through all kinds of different twists and turns, ups and downs, but in some form it still continues on to this day. Myself, my life, who I am, has been so thoroughly affected by my involvement with NVC, that I can scarcely imagine who I would be now if I hadn’t gotten into the whole thing.

There is no one to blame

One of the most profound changes in my life that I attribute to NVC is the perspective that there are no bad people, there is no one to blame, and that moralistic judgments of any kind are ultimately not a helpful thing to do. When I first started studying NVC I was just emerging from a prolonged bitter judgment-fest that had gone on for over a year straight, and by the time that I came to NVC I was in a place where I felt like I had been dumped onto the side of the highway, through my own actions, as a result of my having burnt so many bridges with different people. Studying NVC then was in actuality a process of rigorously applying the lens of human needs to everything and everyone. If all actions, all feelings and all words are used as attempts to meet some fundamental human needs that we all share, then what could these needs be? So applying that lens of “fundamental human needs” to situation after situation, needs guess after needs guess, was a big part of my “learning NVC”.

In many regards, I look at who I was before I got into NVC and who I was the years following it, and it all just simply *feels* different from each-other. The difference is this: blaming people. Yes, I have and still do blame and judge people after having discovered NVC. Knowing NVC does not change that stuff. What has changed is that there is an underlying understanding that judging is not really a way that I want to go about doing things, and that another way is possible. With the whole lens of “needs” available to me, I can intentionally change around my inner state from one of judgment to one that approaches something resembling more compassion. Focusing on story-lines like “So-and-so did X, Y, and Z, therefore that person must be an A, B, and C” in my experience usually does not lead to more compassion. However, story-lines like “So-and-so could have done X, because they were feeling Y, and were possibly needing Z” in my experience often does help the whole compassion thing come out.

Being Present

In a way, the whole no-judging thing is just a starting-point, because what is really helpful, what people are really calling for, interpersonally-wise, is presence. People generally want other people to be there, for them, listening, paying attention to them. People usually aren’t after just having somebody’s physical body there while the other person’s mind is spacing-out thinking about someone something somewhere else. People want other people, right there, making space for them, alert to them. What one says while paying attention usually does not matter, but the paying attention part does.

So part of the whole deal, as I see it - going through the whole self-inquiry process, looking at the fundamental needs at play, transforming judgments and the like - is all a matter of “clearing a space”, internally-speaking, to make it possible to then be able to be really present for other people. You can’t really be present to another person if you are judging them – you are in your thoughts then (judgmental thoughts) and not really with the other person at the moment.

Authenticity and Congruence

One of the things that I really attribute to NVC in my life, ironically enough, is a way to access personal authenticity. That is, being real, and showing up that way with others. As a result of NVC, I later discovered the work of Carl Rogers, which introduced another concept that relates to this whole thing, called “congruence”. Congruence is where one is consciously aware of what one is thinking/feeling/experiencing in the present moment and articulating it. This is what NVC does, or rather, can help people to do. For me, it has helped when I first do “self-empathy”, that is, checking in with myself, seeing what I am personally feeling and needing in the moment. Once I am clear what that is, then expressing it. That’s “congruence”, NVC-style.

It does not always work out this way, of course, even after ten years of NVC I still all too often clam-up, disconnect, mentally flee or chicken out. But because I know NVC, the tools are there, and if I remember that and choose to do so, I can be really authentic if I wanted to. This has been very helpful for me. I have had a number of different situations over the years that I believe have been greatly aided in by my “cutting through the bullshit” and talking directly and personally about what is going on. I have found, in a number of different occasions, that people often feel a great relief and a sense of freedom by seeing that it is possible and “permissible” to be honest, authentic and real in a social environment.

Empathic Understanding

One of the great things about NVC, something that I have been totally gung-ho about over the years, is empathy. That is, people actively listening to other people with the explicit intent of trying to understand the other person’s experience from that person’s point-of-view. No analysis, no diagnosis, no advice-giving or telling other people what’s up. Just listening to them and trying to understand what things are like *for them*.

The ways and means that this is done through NVC is again through using the lens of fundamental human needs. That is, assuming that everything that people do, say, think or feel is motivated by some fundamental human needs that are at play, and guessing at and eventually finding what the motivating needs *are* in a given situation. This can help to facilitate more depth and clarity of understanding. Also, needs are relatable, you have them, I have them, we all have them, so looking at another person’s experience through the lens of fundamental human needs can help aid in one putting oneself in another person’s shoes.

At the best of times, empathically listening and empathically understanding another person can be a very similar experience to that of the heart-felt authenticity, or congruence, that I mentioned earlier. In other words, when one is speaking as deeply, personally, and honestly as one can, it is all very much like that of inviting and sensitively exploring together with another person their inner experience. Both personal authenticity, as well as empathic listening, are forms of intimacy and vulnerability between people. A big part of doing NVC, then, is that of consciously choosing to do that. This then leads me to…

Taking Emotional Risks

We all live in a mean, cold, cruel, fucked-up world. People everywhere are disregarding others, exploiting others, and hurting each-other in all kinds of different ways. Practicing NVC, then, is a pretty counter-intuitive thing to do, given how things are. Doing the whole NVC thing then involves basically opening up, being honest, authentic, personal, as well as being caring, empathic, and trying to understand people no matter who they are, what their beliefs are, and no matter what they have said or done. When one puts oneself out there in this way the risk is that other people may not notice, care or in any way receive what one is offering.

But it is all worth it. The reason why I think this is that when it all “works”, that is when other people do notice, acknowledge and respond to one’s authenticity, empathy and caring, wonderful things can happen. In relationships, people can melt, people can open up, heart-felt interpersonal connection can happen. And it is this, this connection between people, that is basically the whole point behind “doing NVC”. When this connection is established, the foundation then exists for resolving conflicts, creating action-plans and for giving and receiving in ways that everyone feels good about. Practicing NVC involves taking risks, and one can and probably will fall on one’s face at times when doing it. But the potential for real person-to-person contact and care is all the reason I need to continue to do it.

Taking Personal Responsibility

If there is one thing that I have learned through all of my years of practicing NVC, it is that it is all about the practitioner taking personal responsibility. Very often, I have seen people view NVC as being like a series of magic words or incantations that the practitioner is supposed to give, that if only certain things are recited in conversations then the conflicts would be resolved, other people would do what you want them to do, and everybody will then suddenly love each-other.

Or, another way that I have seen other people relate to NVC (and that I have sometimes fallen prey to viewing it myself), is that if one has made the choice to study and practice NVC, and then one approaches other people and tries to “use NVC” with them, that the other person whom one is talking with has then also, unconsciously and inexplicitly, made the agreement to also be using and practicing NVC as well. So then if one goes through the whole process of being vulnerable, authentic, empathic, what-have-you, and the other person responds with judgment, argument and general closed-heartedness, then that other person is simply not holding up their end of the bargain!

The way that I have come to view NVC now is this – NVC is a personal practice, and it involves you, the practitioner, taking responsibility. Other people will say and do whatever the hell it is that they say and do, but you, the practitioner, have a series of choices in front of you as to how you would like to respond, and the options exist before you to go for more of a heart-connection, or not. If you feel that you have made a commitment to living in alignment with these values, the “NVC values” of compassion and partnership, then it is up to you to follow up with practicing these things.

Partnership Not Demands

Even though I view NVC as being a kind of personal practice that one chooses to do, the whole world-view that NVC points to is actually quite different. This world-view, rather than being based on individuals and their own choices, is instead based on community, mutuality and interdependence. This view is such that although each person is responsible for their own feelings, needs and choices made because of that, everybody’s actions still do affect everybody else, and that everyone’s needs are still in some form met in cooperation with other people. With this being the case, if one then goes around pissing people off, screwing people over, jerking people around and beating people into the ground, one is not making for a good social environment for your needs, or anyone else’s needs, being met in the future. Resentments come up, rebellion can happen, fights can break out. Or, sometime in the future when you most need help, you can quite simply be ignored and left out in the cold.

This is why, from an NVC perspective, “looking out for #1” is replaced with “caring for everyone’s needs equally”. In other words, if you look out for the well-being of those around you, as well as yourself, then other people are likely to be pleased and step up to do the same. Caring invites more caring. This all involves having open acknowledgement, consideration, and dialogue when necessary about how all of our actions effect one-another. The goal with all of this is to create a kind of social environment where these values are more the norm, and where everybody operates under an assumption that we are all in this together.

Learning and Practicing

This then brings me to the topic of “learning NVC”, which supports the actual practice of NVC, which is the means through which all of these different wonderful things that I have been talking about here can happen. This is an interesting subject here, because “Learning NVC”, as it is usually presented and talked about in the world – I hate it. What I mean is, I have a strong dislike for scripted dialogues, workshop exercises, sub-cultural jargon and one-size-fits-all formulas. I also have a strong distaste for professionalizing and commodifying things like learning, personal development and heart-felt connection. I simply loose a sense of connection with people when those things come up, and I have a desire to go elsewhere. All of the different things that I cherish and love about NVC are not things that I usually find in formal NVC learning environments.

With this all being the case, even though I love NVC and have found it to be enormously beneficial in my life, I am reluctant to want to recommend to other people that they pursue official NVC training or literature. Often-times, the only NVC stuff that I feel comfortable offering to people who are new and interested in learning more are things that come either from myself or a small number of trusted “NVC” friends that I have. I quite simply do not trust the standard, “normal” way that NVC is offered out there. I fully expect social distancing, disconnection and inauthenticity to come about through the usual means that NVC is presented to new-comers. I feel quite sad and disappointed to say these things, because I would like to say that I feel like real buddies and comrades with all of the different NVC trainers/facilitators out there, but that is simply not the case

And, at the same time, I do believe that it is possible for me to eventually get to that place. Through using the different NVC principles and practices, the same stuff that I have been talking about earlier in this piece, I totally believe that real heart-felt connection and understanding can happen between me and all of the different “normal” NVC trainers out there. The one additional requirement for that to happen, though, is something that I have not mentioned here so far. It is that of explicitly setting aside particular time and space to have such dialogues take place. This may seem like stating the obvious, but it is actually quite a big thing. In a world of “busyness”, overwhelm and great stress are the norm, setting aside time and space in one’s life to have intentional dialogues with people can be a big thing to take on. But it is a necessity, I believe, for all important dialogues and for all of the relationships that one values. Perhaps this task is a part of the repertoire of things for the next ten years of NVC to focus on.

Vacillations - Reflections on 2012

I have a personal tradition that I have carried on for a number of years now where at the end of each year I think back on the year that just happened and I write a blog entry reflecting back on it, my experiences with it, and the personal meanings that they contained. So, here it is for the year 2012.

This year, similar to the years 2009 and 2010, was a year where I lived in one place for the entire year. Although I did do some traveling to different places throughout the year, my home was an apartment in the Uptown neighborhood of Minneapolis for the entire year. I’ve been living in this apartment with my partner Liz, and living with her is something that I have been very happy with and grateful for.

One thing that I was very disappointed with this year was politics. Whereas 2011 was all revolutions, protests and excitement, 2012 was dominated by the national elections, anarchists arguing about whether to vote and if so for whom, and the once-inspiring revolutions and protests in the Middle East turning into very messy and bloody affairs. Although I thought, talked, and wrote about politics a lot this year, overall that experience left me feeling very drained and discouraged.

As far as for my experience of the year itself goes, the first quarter of the year (January, February and March) I spent in a bad depression. A number of different factors contributed to this – one of which was feeling a strong sense of personal isolation and loneliness, another of which was finding out about my friend Mario’s suicide, and lastly in March there was the sudden death of the one person I knew in my neighborhood. My depression continued on until basically things warmed up outside and I made some plans to go travel to other places outside of Minneapolis. Doing other things with other people I believe did a great deal to help me to get a better sense of perspective.

Throughout all of that depression, one source of both emotional support, as well as stimulus for my feeling of social isolation, was my involvement with the internet and telephone-based group called the "Consciousness Transformation Community". I first joined that group back in 2010, and it was in 2012 that I saw that group explode in a big internal conflict that eventually left me feeling so disgusted and alienated with the group that I decided to leave it. A number of other people also decided to leave at around the same time I did, and I do not know if that conflict resulted in that group itself ending or not.

Speaking of the internet, Facebook ended up playing a huge role in my life this year, so much so that I actually feel a bit embarrassed to admit it. I spent way more time and energy with Facebook than I would like, and looking back I wonder what good that all was. My friend Rachel wrote a blog entry about her experiences and thoughts about Facebook, and in many ways what she says here mirrors my own. For 2013 I hope to dramatically cut down on my Facebook usage, and to interact with it more intentionally.

In the face-to-face world, as opposed to the Facebook world, I am pleased with how things evolved over the course of the year. I ended up feeling more connected with different groups of people in Minneapolis, including the Icarus Project, the Minnehaha Free Space, Sisters Camelot, the Twin Cities Anarchist Bookfair organizing collective, the Really Really Free Market and Radfam. I am also hoping to get to know some other groups better, such as the Mennonite Worker, the Rye House and the Common Ground Meditation Center. Altogether this is resulting in me feeling a much stronger sense of community and belonging at the end of the year than I did at the beginning.

As far as traveling goes, I did end up going to a number of different places, including Camphill Village Minnesota out in Western Minnesota, a gathering of Liz’ relatives in northern Minnesota, gatherings of my relatives in Ann Arbor and northern Michigan, the Illinois Vipassana Meditation Center and various parts of Arizona. This summer I did a massive trip that involved my going to Camphill Soltane in southeastern Pennsylvania, the Washington D.C. area, various intentional communities in central Virginia and to Cleveland, Ohio. I suppose you could also add Lewes, Delaware and Camden, New Jersey to that summer travel list too.

I am also glad to have had some traveling friends come to visit me here in Minneapolis this year as well, including my close friends Dan and Seth, as well as my friends Seya whom I previously had not seen in nine years and Jesse whom I had not seen in six years. Interestingly enough I had three friends from Cleveland come to visit Minneapolis just shortly after I saw them in Cleveland.

All this people-stuff aside, one of the most profound experiences of being really empathically understood this year came from the writings of a dead person. Jack Kerouac’s two-part book “Desolation Angels” and “Passing Through” (both of which are usually combined under the title “Desolation Angels”) was by far my reading high-light of 2012. In many ways that book and the sentiment expressed therein reflects back a lot of my inner state for this year.

Buddhism, both of the Kerouac variety and beyond, continued to be a big thing for me this year. This year I did a special Satipatthana Sutta course at the Illinois Vipassana Meditation Center, which I suppose is something like a symbolic entering of me into the ranks of the more serious old students within this tradition. This year I also officially joined the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, which is like the main group for "Engaged Buddhists" in the U.S.

Anarchism-wise, this year I read the book entitled Desert: Can Active Disillusionment Be Liberatory? and that had a big effect on me. This pamphlet, along with a piece that I wrote this year about Anarchy As A Relationship both express well about where I am coming from these days regarding the big a-word.

I still maintain an interest in intentional community living, particularly income-sharing intentional communities with cottage industries. This year I have been in touch with my friend Paxus about creating a new FEC community within the central Virginia area. I also attended this year’s Twin Oaks Communities Conference as well as a regular discussion group about intentional communities facilitated by EXCO here in Minneapolis. At the Twin Oaks Communities Conference I met some people who are from Innisfree Community, which is also based out of central Virginia, and I hope to check out that place again sometime as well.

I have to say, the very fact that the year 2012 came and went is something I find to be somewhat amazing. Around from 2005 to 2007 I was something of a believer that the year 2012 would bring great momentous world-changes in human consciousness, spirituality, the social-political order, you name it. There was even a part of me that believed that the changes in the world in 2012 would be so crazy and enormous that I could very well somehow be killed before that year was over. Of course from 2005 to 2007 I was far more open/susceptible to New Age and esoteric spiritual beliefs than I am now, but still even with me no longer subscribing to those beliefs I always remembered that I once had them and as a result a part of me was always keeping an eye out for Big Stuff to go down. Especially around December 21st, the supposed end of the Mayan Calendar. Nothing out of the ordinary happened, and life went on.

So where does all of this leave me? To an extent I have my hopes and dreams tied up in newly-forming projects with odd names, such as "The System Stinks" and “Chubby Squirrels”. I also have a lot of faith tied up in very old things, such as writing more, being with my partner, and practicing Vipassana Meditation. Beyond all of this stuff, I don’t have much more clarity than I did last year, or the year before that. The good thing, though, is that I am beginning to feel at peace more with that fact, and that counts for a lot.

I am wishing everyone all the best and May All Beings Be Happy!!!

A possible new nationwide organization of anarchists

There has been some talk recently about forming a new nation-wide anarchist organization. This is a project that definitely has caught my attention and interest, and I do think that some of the points that are made in this appeal are valid ones. At the same time I am also a bit skeptical, for I have been around long enough to have seen countless national and regional anarchist organizations come and go. This has all got me thinking though about the topic of formal nation-wide anarchist organizations. The thought of repeating the same old kinds of attempts that have been tried in the past does not appeal to me - whereas trying out something new does.

The real value for having a formal anarchist organization, I think, is that of providing a means for different anarchists to meet up face-to-face and having a venue for people to find folks to work together with on common projects that they all believe in. The focus of an anarchist organization should not be to provide content that reflects the beliefs and views of everyone who is associated with the organization, but rather to be a networking hub for anarchists to find each-other. Having a publication is not necessary, nor is having a formal membership structure.

The idea that an anarchist organization should have ideological unity and should have common positions that everybody agrees on ultimately leads to frustrating endeavors which become a big discouraging waste of people's time and energy. Even the term "anarchist" itself can be left undefined, although if some people want to meet up to discuss that they are welcome to do so. The key thing is for anarchists to be connecting with other anarchists, and from these connections the individual anarchists can create whatever common projects they want.

I also want to emphasize the importance of this organization being based upon people having real-life face-to-face connections with each-other. In this age of online digital connections being so pervasive I think that one of the biggest barriers for anarchists now to confront is the profound social alienation of our modern society. Much of the mutual understanding and trust that is necessary for enacting real solidarity and mutual aid is lost now thanks to an over-reliance and over-emphasis on digital technology. So a new anarchist organization would still use all the modern online trappings – a web-site, Facebook and Twitter accounts, all of that – but all of these things would exist simply as tools to facilitate real-life face-to-face meetings happening.

I picture such a new anarchist organization as being based around having a large annual national gathering, as well as regional gatherings, local and city-wide gatherings of anarchists. The format for these gatherings would be Open Space Technology, a means by which those people who are present at the gatherings determine themselves what the content will be. The organizing collectives for the conference would be concerned only with the logistical matters of making the conference happen, not with the content of what will be discussed at the conferences – that would be up to the conference attendees themselves to determine.

Ever since the National Conference on Organized Resistance (“NCOR”) stopped happening, there has not been an annual national conference for the anarchist movement to converge at. This new organization would exist in part to help support this conference in happening and to be a sustainable endeavor – independent of larger institutions such as universities and independent of any particular anarchist strain, ideology, or campaign. Given that this would be a nation-wide anarchist gathering, perhaps the location should be central for everyone in the country, let’s say: Wichita, Kansas. Unlike NCOR there is no reason to have to have a nation-wide anarchist conference take place every year at the capital city of the nation-state. However, like NCOR there is an advantage to having the consistency of the conference be at the same location every year.

By not endorsing any particular anarchist ideology and by not supporting any particular anarchist project, and by instead providing the means for different anarchist thinkers and activists to come together to meet each-other, it is hoped that the depth of anarchist thoughts and the creativity of anarchist projects would be helped more than if any particular partisan approach was supported. This is because more people from more of a diversity of backgrounds would be involved, with more of a cross-fertilization of ideas and perspectives taking place.

Internet-wise, it would be best for the web presence for this organization to support people in meeting up with their local anarchist groups, projects and collectives face-to-face. Picture a kind of online version of the Slingshot Organizer’s radical spaces contact list. The web presence would also have features available to support people in sharing transportation and places to crash at while traveling. There would be no place for debate or discussion online, all of this would be channeled towards other online anarchist projects that do that, or towards individuals or groups who are interested in having such discussion in-person.

With this kind of approach to a nation-wide anarchist organization, my hope is that quite a lot of new things could come out of it, both practical and theoretical, even new formal organizations! This organization would serve as a launching pad for other, separate, new things. The irony is that with having such an organizational arrangement, none of the new things that arise would officially be associated with this organization – they would be things that arose as a result of people meeting up through this organization and then going off and doing something else together.

Musings on Marriages

I read this recent blog entry by my friend Rachel about the topic of marriage and I am left feeling uncomfortable with it. This is because what is said here about marriage simply does not seem true to me, it does not mesh with my experience of the whole thing. It seems to me that what is being talked about here is an old out-dated model for “marriage”, and hence as a result by default it seems to me that this argument presented has become somewhat of a straw-man argument. What bugs the most with this piece is that I see this attitude reflected here as being one that is common within a lot of radical circles.

Let me say a bit more about where I am coming from here... I grew up, like many people did, with this idea drilled into my head that getting married, having children, yadda yadda yadda, is what I and everyone else should do with their lives. But then also, at the same time that that message was being conveyed to me, I saw what real-life marriage looked like for people. For my mother’s parents it looked like my grand-mother being disabled and my grand-father being the care-giver as well as the money-maker. For my father’s parents it looked like the two of them living in two different parts of the country and never seeing each other. For my own parents it looked like the two of them hardly ever being in the same room at the same time and then ultimately getting divorced, and subsequently each of them having such very different memories of their marriage that it is hard to believe that they are both talking about the same thing. For my mother and step-father it looked like my mother working two jobs and my step-father doing whatever it was that he did. In other words, the images that mass media was giving me for how "marriage" was supposed to look like was not matching up with what real-life marriages looked like before my own eyes.

Also, as a child, I grew up seeing many many many of the people in my parents’ generation getting divorced. I mean, seriously, I saw *A LOT* of divorces! Aunts, uncles, people in the Baha’i religious communities that I grew up in, friends’ parents, coworkers of my parents, you name it, everybody was getting a divorce. This left me with the impression that, despite claims to the contrary, marriage is just something that people do for a period of time, and then one goes on and does other things. Sort of like being in middle school or high school, but with more intense heart-breaking emotional pain involved.

Now, fast forward to my adult years, and I’ve seen some other kinds of marriages on display. I have seen first-hand unmarried couples, singles and groups of people have and raise children, people getting married for legal reasons to get citizenship, for financial reasons to get medical insurance coverage, I have seen polyamorous marriages, intense NVC-oriented emotional processing-based marriages, married couples living in income-sharing communes, married couples running Camphill-style homes, marriages based in weird obscure religions, marriages based on mutual Vipassana Meditation practice, same-sex marriages, and probably some other kinds of marriages that I am forgetting about at the moments.

This all leads me to a certain conclusion about marriage – thanks to the contributions starting mainly from the Baby Boom generation in the West, the old notion of marriages necessarily looking similar to each-other and being an institution of patriarchal domination is over. This is not to say that that way of having marriages no longer exists. I think that in many places around the world that old patriarchal model is still is how marriages are usually carried out. I also think that a lot of my peers in my generation, probably even some people I know, are having marriages done in that old way. The thing is that I do not think that marriages have to be carried out in a uniform pattern in the old patriarchal way any longer, at least in the West.

When I think about it, I suspect that this is very much related to the crumbling, shrinking and changing that has been taking place within organized religion as well. Organized religion is no longer the big social force that it used to be, and within many of the religious institutions that do exist nowadays an intentional process has been taking place to eradicate the old modes of patriarchal top-down domination. I think that it was probably the Baby Boom generation again that contributed enormously to initiating the demise and changing of traditional religious institutions and this probably relates to the parallel shifting of how marriages have been carried out as well.

Marriage as an institution is something that I see as being potentially valuable as not only being a public expression of love between people, but also being a kind of commitment of ongoing support and active involvement in each-other’s lives. Yes, this can happen outside of “marriage” per se, but the advantage to marriage as an institution is the legal and financial commitment and protection that comes along with the institution as well. That is, as long as we still live in a world where the concepts of “legality” and “finances” are still the norm!

Ideally I would like to see the institution of marriage be expanded and experimented with more as well. There should be same-sex marriage, of course, but also marriage between more than two people as well. Marriage, in a way, has some of the same advantages that the 501d tax status has, which is the same legal category that monasteries are put in, and that the income-sharing intentional communities within the FEC use as well. The differences between marriage and the 501d status is with marriage the couple has the right to visitation and involvement with the other when one is hospitalized, and has a say in what happens when the other one dies.

I do recognize that relationships based on guilt, shame, duty, obligation, fear, etc., as well as domination itself, can very easily exist within marriage. However, I see this as equally being the case for non-married romantic relationships, as well for relationships between people residing within income-sharing communities as well. These kind of social dysfunctions and psychological neuroses do not necessarily recognize the distinctions between “married” and “unmarried” people. This is something to be consciously worked on regardless of one’s relationship status.

Marriage as I see it now is basically a legal and financial structure for people to be more closely involved in each-other’s lives, as well as a social signifier of ongoing love and commitment between these people. Aside from that, it is basically a blank slate that the people involved can fill with whatever they want. You can choose to fill it with the old school stuff of patriarchal domination, social inequality, guilt, shame and obligation. Or, you could fill it with any number of different new, creative and interesting arrangements, patterns and relationships. It is up for the people involved in it to decide, for now, thanks to my parents’ generation, the old gods are dead.