Interaction is Needed for Authentic Interaction
Last fall I attended a conventional event, with a speaker and an audience. It enjoyed it, and it did not feel like I was in the expert trap, because I got what I was looking for: one-way information from an expert about how to do something. We were looking for guidance and instructions.
I also got something I wasn't looking for: the understanding that it is a big deal, and rare, for people to be in the same room together. This feels even more significant now that we are not able to gather in large numbers indoors due to the COVID-19 pandemic because when we could gather together, we choose to stay apart. Even when hungry for connection, when we gathered we avoided connecting with each other. And this pattern continues in our online world now, as the pandemic continues.
Let’s remember that even when our bodies can by physically close, it does not mean we are connecting with each other.
Even when hungry for connection, when we gathered we avoided connecting with each other
Authenticity
At last fall’s convention, the emcee, when thanking the speaker, was effusive about how fantastic it was for “us to be together, in this room together, authentically.” My brain screeched at me, “Hold up! Does he think being in the same room means that we are having authentic human interaction?”
Is this what we believe, that by being in the same room we are in relationship with each other? What does it mean to be authentic? Does being with each other face-to-face somehow pull out our authenticity in a way that does not happen through our devices, before after COVID-19?
A definition for authentic (adj):
Being what it is claimed to be; genuine
Made or done in the traditional or original way
Based on the facts; accurate or reliable
Relating to or denoting an emotionally appropriate, significant, purposive, and responsible mode of human life
If something is authentic, it is real, true, or what people say it is (Cambridge Dictionary).
When it comes to people, Christopher Collins, in his article about the 5 qualities of an authentic person, defines an authentic person as, "representing one's true nature or beliefs; true to oneself or to [another] person." The person is not false or copied, not phony or fake.
I add this: present. A person must be present and attentive to their needs, and to others’ needs, to be authentic.
A proposition
So yes, the audience and I showed up to get the information we were looking for. There was a little bit of time for questions and answers with the speaker, but otherwise there was no interaction between attendees, the speaker, and the emcee. We were in the same room, sharing the same air, interested in the same topic, but that was where our connection with each other ended.
Here's my proposition: when there is little or no interaction between people, there cannot be any degree of authenticity that we offer to ourselves and each other.
“When there is little or no interaction between people, there can not be any degree of authenticity.”
We have to get to know ourselves and each other in order to know our true nature or beliefs, let alone if we are each living in accordance with our beliefs. And the only way to get to know each other is to interact with each other, communicate with each other in multiple ways and directions.
Simply: if we don't interact, it is not possible to be authentic, never mind know if we are authentic. Without interactions with others, it is not possible to be conscious of our own authenticity, our trueness to ourselves. So when we assemble in a room together, it is not a given that we will interact with each other.
Usually, we organize so most of us sit side by side and dutifully listen. Or assemble at our individual screens to listen as a largely invisible audience on Zoom. And even if we can see our faces on Zoom, if we are not interacting with each other, we are not revealing ourselves to each other. As we do in a conference room, we remain invisible.
The minds of the emcee and the organizers at that convention were making a significant assumption: that since we are in the same room together that we are in relationship with each other. We are not.
We might share similar beliefs, because we have gathered to hear the same speaker, but we are not in relationship. We might have shared interests that provide us with a sense of community, which is true, but this is not relationship because all that is happening is that we are in the same room.
At the event in question, the organizers and the speaker were authentic in that the event was what it said it would be: expert advice. And it was not authentic human interaction that allowed everyone an opportunity to represent their true beliefs with integrity and explore each other’s beliefs. We were in the room together but with exception to the speaker, we barely exchanged a couple of sentences with each other. We did not offer our presence, to self or others, to explore the world and how we make our way through it.
Authenticity does not automatically happen. To get to know self and other, to be in relationships, we have to interact with each other. At gatherings, we need to create opportunities for this to happen regardless of whether we are meeting online or in-person.
We are hungry for human connection, to dig into the hard work of improving our communities and cities, because it is our experience that they aren’t serving us as well as they could. We see improvements that will help us meet our needs, and help others have their needs met.
Design gatherings for connection, interaction
What keeps us away from connection, and even organizing to make the improvements we see need to be made, is how we meet. Here are eleven principles I use while designing social habitats that spark collective brilliance, rather than default to the expertise of one, or a few.
Design
Find the simple question that can serve as the ‘spine’ for the inquiry that will lead to wise action
Choose whether to gather to tell and direct, or listen and explore
Activate expertise of many by creating the conditions for the group to be in conversation with itself
Craft an intentional invitation
While hosting
Question, at every turn, how much of me to put in to the conversation
Confirm clear roles for the hosts and participants of the conversation
Keep an eye on whether our energy is aiming to fix or improve the situation
Be conscious of and navigate underground power dynamics
Make space to hear about harm
Allow for the disruption that comes with the exercise of sovereignty
We are well conditioned to remain separate from each other, even when we have gathered in the same room and we believe the same thing. This is how we maintain the status quo.
It is time to reach out to each other, allow our paths and beliefs to cross, to pollinate our souls.
If we are hungry to simply be in the same room together, are we also hungry for more human interaction that explores ideas and feelings and how we think and feel about those ideas and feelings? I am. It is in this realm that humanity expands itself and grows into new potentials.
“If we are hungry to simply be in the same room together, are we also hungry for more human interaction that explores ideas and feelings and how we think and feel about those ideas and feeling? I am.”
REFLECTION
What habits are you putting in place to remind you to design for the intelligence of many (rather than one or a few)?
What habits are you practicing that will make room in your life for perspectives that are different than yours?