Developmental Processes
The final installment of the application of the Seven First Principles of Regeneration to our work in the world.
develop(v)/development (n) - from French developer, "unwrap, unfurl, unveil; reveal the meaning of, explain," emerged in English 18c. and after: Transitive meaning "unfold more fully, bring out the potential in" is by 1756, "a gradual unfolding, a full working out or disclosure of the details of something". Meaning "the internal process of expanding and growing" is by 1796; sense of "advancement through progressive stages" is by 1836. The intransitive meaning "become known, come to light" is by 1864, American English. -etymonline.com
Development is the process of bringing out the capabilities or possibilities of something to a more advanced or effective state. It is a journey of a constantly evolving unfolding to manifest inherent potential. It begins by becoming aware of how our internal world affects the external and vice versa.
The first time I consciously engaged with Carol Sanford was in May of 2013 in New York. I had been resisting attending these sessions with a couple of my 7group partners who had been attending for a few years. I had initially met Carol several years before, and I did not initially resonate with her contrarian persona, so I wasn't sure that this was right for me. My initial impressions of this Work (from my 7group partners) were that it sounded somewhat ungrounded, very heady, and academic; hence, these were my expectations. The language seemed off-putting, the frameworks confusing, and the practical application of the Work was very unclear to me.
My experience that weekend, however, was anything but intellectual alone. What struck me after that first weekend was how deeply personal it was. How engaging the Work in any affective (and effective) manner required me to deeply engage my own personal development (ironically Carol was actually calling these sessions "Personal Development" at the time). That weekend, we worked on discerning the difference between our essence (see Manifesting Quiddity) and our personalities, then exploring the different roles these play in our lives. We applied multiple frameworks to organize and order our thinking. As I reflected on the weekend, tears came to my eyes realizing this level of personal exploration was long overdue.
That first session also revealed that while I need to more consciously work on my own personal development, I could not effectively do so exclusively alone. Like everyone else, I have my blind spots. I can't see myself the way others see me. So in addition to feeling this Work as deeply personal, I also realized that in order to develop myself, I needed to be in a community of others also engaged in their own personal development - to work with people who are simultaneously engaged in their own and each other's development (with their permission of course).
“A developmental community continuously presents us the opportunities to evolve our thinking and our state of being, even as we invite those around us to evolve as well.” –Carol Sanford, No More Gold Stars
Being developmental constitutes the heart of the Seven First Principles of Regeneration. It embodies and includes the other six principles as the means for engaging them all. It is the bridge that joins together the inner and outer transformations required to bring these principles to life, in our daily lived experiences. Without the application of a developmental practice, the inner and outer transformations separate and fracture. Development is a process of continual becoming. A life-long application and recognition that we are regularly growing our ability to be conscious, learning new capacities for understanding, and evolving our capabilities to challenge ourselves and others. This is a living systems phenomenon: As I work on my own development, I also build my capacity to be in service to building the capacity of others to develop. This requires that we nurture the field of interrelationships, recognize the evolving nested roles embedded in the systems being transformed, and seek nodal interventions that regenerate flow in these systems - all while being an instrument to explore the higher orders of potential inherent within the essence of the whole living system we are collectively being called to work on and be a part of.
The practice of being developmental is a mindset shift, a paradigm, both new and ancient. In our dominant culture we are habitually conditioned to obtain more and more information and/or skills. We mine and extract knowledge as a means to enlarge our expertise so we can sell what we "know" or that particular skill in exchange for life's necessities and niceties. If what we end up doing with that information or skill causes some harm to a living system (ecosystem, neighborhood, community, other people), assuming the harm is even recognized, we rationalize its necessity and maybe try to ameliorate the damage it causes. Virtually all of the green building movement for the past 40 years+ has focused on "doing less bad". As this approach evolves and with high enough aspirations, it can evoke some attempts at improving and sustaining life, not just less bad but trying to do some good, like universal best practices aimed at enhancing life. All of these paradigms emerge from a binary, dualistic view (good/bad) of the way the world works. The reality is that the evolution of dynamic and constantly evolving living systems requires a third force that transcends, harmonizes, and balances the apparently conflicting dualities, generating a field of reconciliation. A developmental mindset is required to engage this third force in an effort to create a more complete understanding.
"We cannot move knowledge to understanding, and the value it can bring to evolution of being, without moving from a two-term system ("I want to know the answer so I have it") to a three-term system ("It changes how I am seeing myself and how I, and the world, work"). In the triadic experience, the ego drops out and the being immerses itself in the experience of the knowledge, as they image it in their concrete life, how different it is than what they previously 'understood' and how they could be affected and changed by it." –Carol Sanford
"I can now practice away of reasoning that does not take sides but instead allows two opposites to dance together until the face of a third presence starts showing up." –Arkan Lushwala
Being developmental requires a process of ongoing exploration of the potential embedded in each of us, in us as a group, and in the systemic affects and effects we are seeking in the world. It is a process that includes a robust curiosity that feeds into a through-line of questioning to get at the heart of the matter. This capacity for resourcing, helping others reconnect to "source", to more deeply connect to what they care about, and to elevate all of our thinking to a higher level, is an essential part of engaging with others in a developmental way. This process help us to de-veil, or remove the veil that often covers our ability to see something anew, to see beyond our inherent blind spots and conditioning. This includes being able to see the energies at work in any particular situation and purposefully interconnect beyond our own knee jerk reactions, automatic behavior, and ego-infused opinions.
The questions being considered should invite deeper consideration in ways that require us to actually pause and think, instead of quickly offering our mechanical and largely unconscious reactions. It is in the space created by pausing that we can reflect on our thinking. All new and truly creative thinking requires the curiosity to engage a reflective process. If we are to affect change in the world in a way that enhances all life, we need to develop higher orders of discernment around complex issues to discover the innate potential that lies beyond considerations of what already exists. The value derived from this process and purpose allows us to see past the parts and pieces of our designs to the integrative potential of seeing systemic wholeness.
The examination should extend beyond what we are thinking to questions like "What is sourcing our thinking?" and "How do we change how we think?" and "How do we become more discerning about the unseen energies at work?" If the actions and outcomes you seek are different than the status quo, then the thinking behind them is what needs to change. Without a shift in thinking, the actions or doings will remain essentially the same. A developmental process includes an assessment of what is behind our thinking. What are the assumptions informing my thinking? What beliefs am I holding about the nature of how life works, the nature of human nature, and my own limiting beliefs about myself? What are the sources of these beliefs? Are these beliefs objectively or subjectively true? Which worldview or paradigm do these beliefs come from? Do these beliefs actually align with the way life works? What principles should guide my actions? A developmental process seeks to affect transformation and the growth of our capacities to distinguish whether I am simply parroting the thoughts of others, including my past self, or I am genuinely creating new thinking.
Once we are clearer about the source(s) of our thinking, a developmental process simultaneously uses frameworks to help organize our thinking. As our use of, and familiarity with, frameworks enlarges, our capabilities to see which framework is at work in each situation grows as well. Frameworks help us more deeply consider complexity, allowing us to see the situation from a new perspective. Each framework is a potential lens or unique point of view from which to examine the same situation. Frameworks allow us to move our thinking from the things (the parts and pieces) to the connections and interrelationships between them as a whole system and between other systems within which they are nested. This brings the frameworks alive as we interact with them and through them. Frameworks can also raise the level or order of our thinking by examining interrelated issues like the level of work being employed, the level of energy and/or communication we are engaging, and the level of consciousness we bring to our individual and collective being states.
Fundamental to our internal processing are an internal locus of control (I control how I react); external considering (being in service to others without judgement or attachment to particular outcomes); self-observing (simultaneously observing our thinking and being state in order to wake up from our normal mechanical ways); self-remembering (once awakened, engaging in a more conscious choice about how you are thinking and your state of being; and personal agency (generating the will to work on something greater than yourself). A perhaps simpler way of saying this is that participating in developmental processes is required for the development and growth of our character as fully human beings, thereby allowing us to express and manifest our own essence.
"This works on the effects of our mental frameworks and thinking processes as well as the intrinsic patterns on our intelligence, being state and ableness to manage our motivation and behavior, on demand." –Carol Sanford
7group has engaged a developmental process to work on our internal organizational development for many years. We regularly embrace a developmental mindset to engage and challenge each other to grow and develop as individuals and as a cooperative collective. We have given each other permission to challenge our thinking and to work through any disputes in an open, honest, and transparent way in service to our own development.
"At the top level, develop, we use communication as a process for evolving being and generating a new order of spirit and will. All participants in the communication are transformed-they become different people with new orders of capability. Ultimately, regenerative development works on creating the context and capacity for this level of communication among individuals, organizations, and communities." –Regenesis, The Regenerative Practitioner (TRP) course
We also participate in a wide variety of developmental communities/schools of regenerative practice in conjunction with the Regenesis Institute (TRP network) and Carol Sanford (Change Agent Development). We are mindful that developmental work requires engaging others further along their paths than we are currently and, equally importantly, with those not as far along their path as we are, realizing, of course, that the "path" is not a linear progression of knowledge accumulation but a growing understanding that gets richer and deeper as it includes more and more diverse perspectives. 7group hosts weekly calls on Friday at noon with those who have started down this path. We also work with many local groups focused on becoming regenerative through numerous initiatives undertaken by our nonprofit affiliate, Regenerative Nexus. We regularly strive to work this way with our clients and associates interested in going beyond business as usual. Transforming the status quo by engaging caring relationships in service to life lies at the core of our vocation.
We do not have to continually develop as humans, we choose to do so. Ultimately, being developmental aligns with an intention to continuously grow and develop our personal capacities and capabilities, while at the same time engaging with others in a way that we all grow and develop together. It is an intention to consciously evolve our own thinking and being in the search for meaning and purpose. In short, this is an act of deep caring, an act of love. Both for ourselves and for others. It requires the constant regeneration of will to evolve ourselves by developing the mindset and the capacity to see the world in new ways.
"Love is the will to extend one's self for the purpose of nurturing one's own or another's spiritual growth... Love is as love does. Love is an act of will -- namely, both an intention and an action. Will also implies choice. We do not have to love. We choose to love." –M. Scott Peck
This article concludes an eight-part series aimed at exploring how regenerative practices can be used to build our capacity to engage with larger living systems. In particular, we've examine how built environment projects can serve as powerful and effective instruments for doing so. These practices are grounded in the Seven First Principles of Regeneration. These principles emerged through the work of Carol Sanford, a wise and insightful elder, and through our work with Carol, Bill Reed, Joel Glanzberg, and others over the past decade. Inspired by this continuing work, we have unpacked these seven principles through the context of our experiences co-creating habitation. The principles include:
Nodal Discernment
Developmental Processes
