Photo by @xjrlokix
Colin and I drove up to the Atherton Tablelands on Wednesday to attend the inaugural meeting for the embryonic FNQ Rising Forum:
A gathering of the individual leaders of the natural therapies industry, pioneers in alternative healing modalities, social entrepreneurs and community development [to create] an intentional coalition/ network/ association/ collective for all the natural therapies and healing modalities in the far north [of Queensland, Australia].
I rarely attend social or networking events these days.
I only found out about this meeting when the organizer Sjoerd Aardema sent me a text message out of the blue. I had no idea about the meeting, or even who he was.
The antisocial bitch side of me went, “Not interested!” However the intuitive side of me went, “You should.”
Just to check it out. Just to observe and to… smell the people, as I call it.
The meeting was already underway when we arrived. The tantalizing smell of fresh durian greeted me but I forced myself to focus and concentrate on the proceedings at hand.
There were about 25 people gathered in a circle on the grass, on chairs and mats. The Tableland air was crisp. The atmosphere was gentle and calm.
Each person was taking turns to introduce themselves and share the reasons why they were there, as well as their personal opinions about FNQ Rising.
Several reasons were put forth, by various individuals, as to why a collective would be beneficial, but I can sum up the various reasons here into:
- Support, and
- Marketing.
I disagree. You do not require a collective identity for either.
- People will either help one another, or they won’t.
When humans truly want to support one another, we do not wait for a reason.
Social support either exists, or it doesn’t. And if it doesn’t, it is not the lack of ‘infrastructure’ that’s the problem.
- Marketing is something the individual entrepreneur has to master.
Marketing is tough. No two ways about it.
So what do we do? We turn to organized networks to do the ‘heavy lifting’ for us.
What we don’t like to admit is that relying on an organized network to ‘get the word out’ is a lazy gamble intended to benefit from the network more than contribute to it.
Is this just a very sour outlook? Hardly.
It’s just painfully realistic.
I have:
- Set up my fair share of groups,
- Administered and moderated many others, and
- Been long term members in all sorts, offline and online.
Time and time again, I have seen the same old patterns play themselves out. Why?
The harsh reality is that we humans are an exploitative lot.
Our natural, lazy predisposition is to only sniff out what advantages there are for ourselves and not see, much less even care about, the value of the collective, or group, whatever you want to call it.
People join on the pretext of contribution but are only focused on the benefits.
I’m not saying all potential members are like this. However, I am saying that a sad majority will be and there’s nothing you can do about that.
Yes, there are many instances where collectives work for the good of all involved.
However I believe these are the exceptions, rather than the norm.
So what does a collective need in order to succeed? You sure you want to know? Okay… you asked for it. Here’s my brain fuck answer.
- First and foremost, you must not organize a collective.
{haha} I know. You’re going, “Huh?” Right now. You are asking, “If a collective is not organized, how then can there be a collective? If there is no intent for something to be, how then can that something be?”
Pah. Us humans. We take this ‘intentional creation’ shit thing way too far and way too seriously.
There are too many stated {supposed} advantages of ‘intent’ but what few people want to know is how ‘intent’ can fuck up, and how it often does. Especially when we attempt to create something ‘intended’ to influence far beyond just our personal little sphere. Like the world. {Pah haha}
You want to know why? We think we know so well what we need, and what every other thing or person on this planet needs. We think we are so wise, so all seeing, so all knowing. {pah hahaha!}
- Secondly, a collective must not have any declared identity or purpose.
Anything declared is fodder for the human mind to clutch onto and attach itself.
Attachment causes stasis. Stasis causes stagnation. Stagnation is the antithesis of growth, development and evolution, the very things most collectives are created to support. Irony, no?
- Thirdly, a collective must not have any declared benefits for participants.
A collective, working as it should, will automatically provide all sorts of benefits for all that need no declaration, description or elaboration.
The benefits should not be the goal. That will only attract exploiters to plunder what they believe they can get from your list of benefits.
- Finally, a collective cannot be comprised of a majority who believe they need a collective.
For whatever reasons, personal or professional.
A collective needs to be comprised of a majority of independent individuals. Independent professionally and personally. Why? Dependency is not conducive to creation. Creation is more giving, less taking. Dependency is more taking, less giving. Period.
Soon as you create a collective ‘to support’, you cannot not attract exploiters of all types because they are the ones convinced that they need the collective for some reason and these are the individuals who will exert all their power to manipulate and control the collective towards their own ends and milk it dry.
In summary?
The collective that doesn’t exist as an intentional collective in the minds of its participants is the collective that will function as it should, and succeed.
For this collective will be the unexpected result of organic, unintentional and unplanned alignment of all involved, who then reap the benefits, often without even knowing so, or why.
Such a collective, free from the inevitable interference of attachment manipulative control of the human mind, is then free to, truly, organically evolve. An outcome that we humans are so fond of spouting, philosophically, but are apparently so incapable of truly understanding, much less allow.
{Oh listen to me! Spouting my own ideals now. How shameful!}
Organic evolution happens in the absence of attachment and control. But no, our human need for control is far more important. Just sounding wise is good enough for our egos.
I believe that the ideal of a collective is a heady illusion. Tantalizing in its appeal. Do you want to know why?
We are a race who is brought up to believe we are cripples. That we need this or that in order to walk, nay, in order to be complete, to be whole. To do anything really.
To be human.
We need crutches. Of all sorts. Thus our obsession with creating structures like collectives.
We create concepts like collectives because we believe we cannot do anything on our own. We believe we are incapable.
Then we spruce the whole idea up with ideals. To mask the less than inspiring reality.
{Ideals. Broad, sweeping brush strokes of beautiful color to delightfully distract ourselves from reality, which is often ugly and boring in comparison. Uninspiring. Reality doesn’t quite get our heart rates up as much. Not much to sing about there.}
To me, a collective is, more often than not, a convenient nursery for the worst of our human tendencies.
Like attachment and control.
Like stagnation and coagulation.
That’s why I do not believe in collectives. I have seen that we as humans are far too predisposed towards the above.
If there were ‘universal law enforcers’, we would all be doing time. There’s a ‘universal law’ that supposedly states, “Change is the only constant.” Boy, aren’t we fond of flouting that law!
All of life is mutable. We, as humans, are part of life. Therefore I believe that we are, by nature, mutable. So is anything we create.
What do I mean by mutable? To be mutable is to be able to change form. But for anything to change form, it must first end. Birth, life and death. Creation and destruction. I don’t care what you call it.
Yet look at us and our obsession with forever. With ourselves and anything we create. We want everything to last forever. Immortality we call it. Mummification I call it.
To be alive is to be mutable, yet most of us would sacrifice limb, life and soul to stay immutable even in our personal existences.
That is reality.
When we create something like a collective, we are just asking to be mummified into a very pretty sculpture of human flesh and ideals.
For it is far, far easier and much more fun to congeal en masse. You want to know why? You have company!
One of the points I brought up that evening, though probably not half as well as I had hoped, was this:
All things come to an end.
FNQ Rising will come to an end one day and when that day comes, will you have the clarity and courage to destroy what you have created? Beautiful as it was?
Or will you cling onto the status quo? To your addiction of attachment?
Too many human organizations fail at this step and resort to mummification ploys like ‘new management’ or ‘updating core values’ to desperately cling onto decay. All the while wondering why nothing seems to work any more.
A rotting corpse doesn’t function very well as a body, does it?
Am I then criticising Sjoerd for attempting to set up FNQ Rising?
Actually, no, not at all. This post is just my opinion. It is neither right nor wrong.
FNQ Rising may work out, it may not. It does not matter. For either way it will be a valuable experience for all involved. There is no right or wrong action, only experience. I believe in that, above all.
I definitely no longer believe in the creation of yet another group identity for people to subscribe to. I have no allegiance to any group vision or any collective that any human can create.
However, that is not to say that I will not contribute if I can. I just choose not to be part of any core ‘committee’ or even be directly affiliated any more. I have wasted enough years of my life tolerating the inevitable shenanigans of group politics.
In conclusion, I’m glad we went. We didn’t stay for the fruitarian dinner though, tempting as the durian was. I was not in the mood for socializing that night.
Before I left, I went up to Sjoerd and shook his hand, thanking him for the evening and telling him that I would be pleased to meet up with him again to talk more about FNQ Rising.
Colin and I hopped into our ute and drove off into the damp and chilly night. We stopped by at McDonald’s and shared a large fries with coffee before continuing on our way home.
We animatedly shared our observations on the way back. We giggled over how we probably stood out like red flags. We didn’t fit in at all {chuckles} and it was obvious we piqued everyone’s silent curiosity.
We were asked to fill out our names and modalities in this large notebook. I wrote, “Critic.” I’m happy with that. I think I played out my self chosen role semi-adequately. But mostly, I was listener and observer.
It was a good experience.
PS.
Curious about the photo that I chose to illustrate this post? Well, in the writing of this post, I found myself thinking a lot about the hackivist ‘group’ known as Anonymous, and wondering about what I’d written here and how it compares to what Anonymous does. Read about the history of how the Guy Fawkes mask became associated with Anonymous.
