Insight

[Ricardo Walters]

Over the last five years, one recurring question has filled me with singular distress: "so, what is it exactly that you do?". It would be so much easier to select from any number of other options - teacher, accountant, bricklayer. Certainly the butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker had all their bases covered. But, how to describe the role of a facilitation team? How to simply articulate the process of community counselling that stimulates, supports and transfers local community response?

In my search of an effective definition , I have been humbled by the simple wisdom of ordinary people whose intuition so perfectly captures our process with an economy that transcends words.

..."It's a little difficult to explain, Lunga". I am talking with 11-year old Lunga at a camp for children affected by HIV outside of Cape Town, South Africa. Lunga's still gaze is a study in too-early maturity, and when he next speaks it is with the quiet confidence of an old soul. "It's not that difficult", he replies. "I think I understand. You are the people who come to visit our mothers where they are working hard in the townships. When they are feeling tired, you tell them they are doing a good job, and not to give up. And it gives them strength to go on."

...Zachary is my 6-year old son who was learning about Careers at school. In the midst of friends whose parents were dentists, jewellery-sellers, art-teachers, Zachary explained that his Daddy travelled a lot. "He travels to visit people who are sad because the people they love got sick and died. And he listens to them and helps them feel better."

...In the urban township of Crossroads in South Africa, we were invited into a home by Andrew, a 40-year old widower who lived alone in a corrugated-iron shack. In the sweltering heat of the single-roomed dwelling, he asked us what we were bringing to give to the community. We clarified that we had been invited by some other community members - to visit; to learn. To learn about life, their lives, his life in this place. An hour later, as we exchanged goodbyes in the manner of long-time friends, Andrew called me away from the group and whispered, in a tone almost conspiratorial: "I thought you people were like all the others who come here with their promises and their solutions. No one ever comes here to ask us what we think. But you people are like door-keepers - you only help us open the door so the real light can shine inside".

[Rituu B. Nanda]

Dear Ricardo and Scott,

Thanks for sharing your beautiful stories. I am grateful to you both as what you said about facilitators being door keepers or creators of beautiful things but not owning them struck a chord. I often feel frustrated about my work which is primarily coordination. At the end of the day, I sometimes feel unfulfilled as I am just bringing together what 'others' are doing. Scott & Ricardo, what you said has made me value what I do. Today, I appreciate what Jean-Louis once said. Facilitators are like midwives who deliver someone else's baby but don't own it.

Best regards,

Rituu

[Scott Stonington]

I LOVE these stories. Laurence asked me to join this conversation and share the way I once described AIDSCompetence because it relates to these beautiful expressions of thanks. Laurence and Gaston and I met in Thailand, where we shared a love of the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh, a famous Buddhist teacher whose ideas are woven into many of the deeper philosophies of the Constellation. One of the fundamental principles of Buddhism is the principle of non-self, the idea that the ego plays a big role in causing suffering, and that wisdom is attained by becoming empty of ego. To me, the Constellation is a bureaucratic manifestation of non-self. As facilitators work and work to get better at their job, they are working more and more to simply get out of the way of what is already beautiful and strong and working in a community. It is when people arrive in a community and insert themselves into the process that it becomes gnarled and complicated. Ricardo, the reason you can't explain what you do is because what you do is make people more of what they ALREADY ARE. A carpenter takes wood, uses an idea in her mind, and then shapes the wood into something that it wasn't before. As a facilitator, you show up as an EMPTY SPACE, as a question. You create a vacuum, and you invite people's goodness and strength and beauty to step into that space, to be seen and recognized. Great facilitators help make beautiful things happen, but they don't feel responsible for them, they don't own them. In fact, when they leave, the communities often forget that someone from the outside was ever there. People just know at some new deep level that their communities are already great. Every place, every situation, every person, is completely different to facilitate. As soon as we cling to the way it has worked before, to the way that we think it should work, suddenly it all goes wrong. So we come back again and again and empty ourselves from what we do, and then we just get to sit and watch as amazing things happen around us, partly because we are there, but more because our egos aren't there.

[Risya Kori]

Very toughtful. It keeps me more and more motivated and believed .... this is something that will fulfill my life! I love the picture, it reflects you as an inspiring person!