Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Opening Ritual

[Tree Bressen (tree]

Hi,

I echo what Lynn said about getting things like this established early on
as part of the culture.  I think a lot of the ideas sent in so far have
been great.  The opening can be something as simple as lighting a candle
and/or asking each person to state one quality they want to bring to
today's meeting.  Or asking each person to share 3 words about how they are
feeling right now.

At FIC meetings we often draw two tarot cards at the first session of the
morning: we interpret one as giving us some kind of insight for the day,
and other we leave turned down until the end of the day, then turn it over
to see what extra bit of insight it adds to the time we've just shared
together.  

There are more ideas for openings on my website (www.treegroup.org) in two
places: in the Articles section there's an article called Meeting Openers
or some such, and in the Toolbox section there's a page with Exercises for
Community-Building.

Good luck, and have fun!  

--Tree


>At a recent meeting, we discussed a desire to have some kind of ritual at
>the start of the meeting, to help us to create a sense of community, and
>help remind us of what we are building.  In "The Cohousing Handbook" book,
>they celebrated the group's identity by visualizing an empty chair as this
>new entity.   We are looking for something like that, but something simpler
>that we can do at each meeting.
>
>Has any group created a such a ritual?  Any ideas you can share?  Other
>ideas for creating that joint sense of purpose?
>
>Thanks,
>Meryl Birn
>Yellow Plum Cohousing



-----------------------------------------------

Tree Bressen
1680 Walnut St.
Eugene, OR 97403
(541) 484-1156
tree [at] ic.org
http://www.treegroup.info
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