The importance of letting go

(or ‘Brmmm brmmm’, how do you work the gears on this thing?!)

When we start the organising process we have to steer, support people to believe that they can reach a further destination and help them map how to get there. We facilitate connections to develop, plan and reflect upon how to build solid teams, and introduce tools to develop successful campaigns and actions. We guide people through the organising process and gradually challenge them to take on more responsibility, more ownership until eventually they don’t need our support at all.

That makes the community organising process all sound smooth and easy. It is many things, but it doesn’t tend to be that.

A colleague describes it as learning to drive. As organisers, we start in the driver’s seat. We pick up a potential leader (insert wolf whistle here), and encourage them to try out the pedals as we pick more potential leaders up.

At some point our potential leader #1 gets in the driving seat, though the organiser still has those emergency pedals that give everyone such a feeling of safety. We might even have to grab the steering wheel now and again. Some of our leaders speed off without knowing the route, whilst others need excessive encouragement to leave the car park.

We get out of the car park & pick up our core leadership team as we go, perhaps after initial awkwardness they relax their elbows, bin off the expected ‘I Spy’ chatter and start connecting more deeply. They share stories of journey’s that they have been on before, and dreams of journey’s they would like to take in the future. At some point, they find a shared destination and they work out how to get there.

Once the destination is known they each try out roles, maybe someone is in charge of the music selection, another has navigation duty, whilst another makes sure that we have the right snacks to enable everyone to get through the journey. We might have to break up bickering in the back seat & take a few diversions along the way, but we are moving!

At some point we as organisers will need to jump out & let our car full of leaders breeze off without us. It can be difficult not to leave your ego in the boot. By now we have spent plenty of time in that car, so we quite like it. But our work is letting go — if we try to own all the successes others can not. Like any decent driving instructor, success is making yourself obsolete.

We know that we can trust leader #1 to take the pedals and get someone else in the driving seat now. We can move on to another car. Hitchhiking not necessarily needed. But hey leader #1, could you send me a photo or 2 of where you end up next?

The driving analogy is speaking to me today, as I am just about to take off my P plates after passing my driving test a few months ago. Let us not stay in new learner mode forever more but embrace revving hard and stalling like a pro…

Check out some of the journey’s at www.connectingforgood.com