Shambhala’s Resilient Heart
Though SMCD has gone through many changes in recent years, “along with all of Shambhala, worldwide,” the heart of our center continues to beat as it always has. Some may not recognize that, thinking that the changes at the top of the hierarchy have removed something essential, but this does not seem so to this longtime member, yours truly. While we miss the living presence of Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche at the center of our mandala, the community’s response to his absence is a very tender one, regardless of how we may judge anyone’s actions or decisions. As a community, we have been obliged to promulgate Shambhala Vision in all its vulnerable bravery and tender, sad joy, without a guru figure to look to, unless of course one continues to relate with the Sakyong as her guru. Our center is open and inviting of all meditators and students of any teacher, and we continue to offer avenues of access to Shambhala Vision and its brilliant, confident warrior heart. You may join us at the center and determine for yourself the truth of that proposition.
One of the most exciting “new” developments is the Denver Center’s adoption of Sociocracy as its governance and decision-making strategy. Sociocracy and Shambhala Vision are a good fit, and we’ve actually been practicing it for more than a year and a half. It has some aspects of democracy, mixed with the empowering elements of putting as many decisions as possible into the hands of participant-members. These are the people doing the work that makes the center run. It is “US,” and we are “IT,” in the sense that there is no one behind the curtain pulling the strings. We no longer pay a salary to a center director. We stopped being able to afford that some time ago and relied heavily on pairs of volunteer co-directors for some years. Then we looked seriously at how to operate in a less conventional and hierarchical way. In our search for how to make this transition into participatory self-governance, we’ve learned a lot. First we used a system called asset based community development, through which we assessed the community’s collective skill set, trying to find what we were capable of as a group of individuals with shared interest in meditation and its benefits. Then we started looking at how important decisions could be made without relying on a traditional “pyramidal” responsibility hierarchy. This is an important aspect of organizational health, without which fundamental operations would be likely to flounder. A famous way of describing Sociocracy’s essence is “who decides who decides.” This is also the title of a book that our research uncovered. We are getting coaching from its author, Ted Rau, who is a trainer and consultant with Sociocracy For All.
On July 21st, there was a community conversation entitled Soup, Salad & Sociocracy which mixed questions and observations about Sociocracy with good old-fashioned Shambhala potluck. It was very successful and seems likely to continue, maybe every quarter or so. Look for it and please, one and all, continue to seek your inner guru as well as your outer community, your bravery, the beauty of the natural world and inherent wisdom.
Post by Larry Seidl
