It feels good to fight and argue, but when there’s no pressure to convince others or be convinced, we listen in ways that allow us to improve our communities.

Community Learning

We only organize together if we are in the push and pull of conversation, wrestling with the action we feel we need to take. If not, we are being organized, passive participants in the status quo doing others’ bidding.

The Agony of Conversation

How do you design a public meeting when you believe that everyone has something to share, not just the vocal few?

Transition-Making is Choosing Changing

When we avoid sharing opportunities to make meaning of our experiences and make choices from the meaning we've made, we avoid the challenges and brilliance of community. And the choice, in every moment, rests with each of us. Choosing transition means choosing to participate in our changing.

Transition Bypassing

We want change to happen without changing ourselves, without having to do anything differently. Yet, choosing transition means choosing to participate in our changing.

Community Bypassing

When we avoid sharing opportunities to make meaning of our experiences and make choices from the meaning we’ve made, we avoid the challenges and brilliance of community.

Relationship Bypassing

Agreements about how we’ll talk and relate to each other are a commitment to be responsible for the quality of our relationships. In this article: 2 symptoms of, and 7 antidotes to, relationship bypassing.

Civic Practice, Art of Hosting, Social ProximityBeth SandersMarch 29, 2022relationship, Conversation, Connection, BypassingComment

Conversation Bypassing

Assuming that the expertise in the room is in one or a few people disables and minimizes the resilience of a community. In this article: 4 symptoms of conversation bypassing and 5 antidotes.

Art of Hosting, Civic Practice, Social ProximityBeth SandersFebruary 15, 2022Bypassing, Connection, Conversation, Art of HostingComment

Connection Bypassing

Whether online or in-person, how we gather fosters connection between people only when we design in opportunities for people to make contact with each other. When we don’t, we engage in connection bypassing.

Civic Practice, Art of Hosting, Social Proximity, Community BypassingBeth SandersJanuary 21, 2022Bypassing, Connection, Contact, Art of HostingComment

Explicit Agreements

Agreements about how we’ll talk and relate to each other are a commitment to be responsible for the quality of our relationships.

Art of Hosting, Civic PracticeBeth SandersDecember 3, 2021Agreements, Art of Hosting, Conversation, CircleComment

I Said YES to Evolving Professionals

To participate in the evolution of our cities and communities, city planners can no longer work the way they’ve worked for decades.

City Making, Civic Practice, Art of HostingBeth SandersNovember 15, 2021work, planning, planners, urban planning, evolution, Art of HostingComment

Prescribe AND Enable

In my quest to figure out how planners and everyone else in the city can work better together, I’ve learned the magic of finding the minimal critical structure that enables new possibilities.

Art of Hosting, Civic Practice, My WorkBeth SandersMarch 24, 2021Art of Hosting, Facilitation, city makingComment

Let’s Exercise Our Inquiry Muscles

Improving our cities requires us to be in a better relationship with ourselves: our intentions, actions, and the consequences of our actions.

Civic Practice, Art of HostingBeth SandersMarch 12, 2021Inquiry, improvement, Feedback, feedback loops, IntentionComment

Sovereignty is Necessarily Disruptive

What I did not say to her: when you exercise your sovereignty he is not going to like it. He will find the new you disturbing and destructive to his sense of self and he will do everything he can to claw you back into that place that is unhealthy for you–-even while telling you he loves you and supports you.

Civic Practice, Art of Hosting, Cities as Survival SkillBeth SandersOctober 28, 2020Power, Sovereignty, Harm, Power imbalanceComment

Are We Aiming to Fix or Improve?

The energetic pattern of a gathering, both in how we design them ahead of time, or the dynamics during the gathering, need our constant attention. One of the ways I keep an eye on things is to ask: are we aiming to fix or improve?

The Expert Trap

Have you ever landed in the expert trap? I was really stuck a couple years ago: I started talking and talking and talking, not leaving any room for anyone else.

Civic Practice, Art of HostingBeth SandersOctober 21, 2020circle, Art of Hosting, participatory leadership, cities, engagement, communityComment

Meeting for Instructions or Discernment?

My favourite fire chief had a split personality. He recognized and practiced two kinds of meetings with his staff in the fire department: the ones where instruction are issued and the ones where the team sits back to listen to their own wisdom and then act accordingly.

Civic Practice, Art of HostingBeth SandersOctober 20, 2020Art of Hosting, Conversation, circle, EngagementComment

What If We Are Not Planning to Survive?

I have lost my desire to be in learning spaces that claim to be about community when they are not. I have a shift to make in my approach, as well as name the shift to the people with whom I am creating the learning habitat. The shift I must make is simple: from "me and community" to "me in community".

Activate the Expertise of Many

What would it mean for a city to embark on a host-as-all-of-us journey, for citizens to be in conversation with ourselves about who we want to be as a city, and what it will take to be that city?

Art of Hosting, Civic Practice, ConversationBeth SandersOctober 8, 2020Conversation, Art of Hosting, cities, nest cityComment

8 Strategies to Navigate Underlying Power Patterns

I caused a disturbance a few years ago. Near the beginning of a three day meeting of a community I am part of I spoke up, as a participant, and named a harmful and racist practice in which many of the group were participating.

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