How to have truly meaningful gatherings: Priya Parker, author of the Art of Gathering скачать в хорошем качестве

How to have truly meaningful gatherings: Priya Parker, author of the Art of Gathering

Priya Parker - facilitator, strategic advisor, founder of Thrive Labs, has been making big waves since releasing her book, The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Matters. In this interview, we discuss why gatherings are of increased interest at this historical moment, how we can make them more meaningful, how we can sustain them, and the importance of bringing them to a graceful end. We also go into the need to embrace conflict and non-neutrality more, not less! ”For me, a question worthy of pursuit was this: how can we make our everyday gatherings more meaningful and how can we equip more people to have the tools to do that in an accessible and democratic way?” Right on! -- WHERE DO WE FIND MEANING? For many of us, our historic ways of finding purpose and belonging no longer work. Yet we all still want meaning. As a result, we see a rising crisis: Where do we seek meaning now? Gatherings have always been a big way we find meaning but with the break-up and/or disintegration of historical sites of meaning-making gathering, we are faced with new and challenging questions. Who gets to gather people legitimately? You no longer have to be a pastor or rabbi. Long-held assumptions about who has that authority and legitimacy to convene have disintegrated. This opening up of who can gather is both dangerous and a sign of progress. So it’s good that this field, this interest in gathering, is developing and exploring answers to these questions.  -- NOT MORE GATHERINGS, BUT MORE MEANINGFUL GATHERINGS It’s not that we necessarily need to gather more or less - we need to gather better. Gatherings that lack structure or meaning can be worse than no gathering at all. Priya argues that every time you gather should be set up to be transformative. To ensure your gathering is meaningful, approach it with this question: “what is a need in my life or in this community’s life that by bringing a specific group of people together we might be able to address?” To achieve sustainability and growth, hone in on that need face the challenge of having both safety/known and excitement/unknown within the gatherings over time. Just like a long-term relationship, you need some excitement, some reason to show up.  “It’s a very interesting question to say, can you set up an experience for a group of people, just through conversation - just through dialogue - that by the way you sequence it, and by the way you prepare for it, can transform their actual relationship. Can language change a group?” -- ENDING GATHERINGS Everything has a healthy life cycle—when you start a community, it’s healthy to think about when and under what circumstances it might be brought to an end. Not only do fixed time limits to gatherings lower the threshold to gathering itself (committing to once a month for three months, and not indefinitely), it helps ensure things don’t slowly die out (which can lead to disillusionment and meaninglessness all over again). Don’t be embarrassed or think you’re failing if things end. The gathering is about fulfilling a need for you and your community. Those needs can be met and/or they can change. Honor endings! -- Priya’s final message of encouragement: ”Don’t be afraid to be disputable. Don’t be afraid to draw lines in the sand about what you’re for and what you’re not for. What your gathering is for and not for. What you stand for and not for this time. I think many of our gatherings suffer not from unhealthy conflict but from unhealthy peace. I think many of our gatherings don’t suffer from abuse, they suffer from anemia—without life, without blood—and what I mean by that is that gathering when it’s powerful is when someone sticks their neck out and says ‘I think this is important and worthy of our collective attention.’ To be a generous source of authority, to know what your purpose is, to be okay if not everyone agrees with it, and then to connect your guests around it, to protect them and to equalize them. And if the purpose is no longer relevant, then you’ve actually done your job and you should ask what the next purpose is. But I think one of the ideas of facilitators is that we need to be neutral and I think the most interesting gatherings have a strong point of view.” -- Priya’s got so much to share. Follow her on [Instagram](  / priyaparker  ) or [Twitter](  / priyaparker  ) for more! -- (Originally recorded for Gathering Summit, April 2019)