This is the second PowerPoint presentation that Tom Brackett offered to the Episcopal Church in Vermont, during their Annual Convention in November 2013, at the Cathedral in Burlington.

2. Session #2
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"Don't step on that
new life emerging!
Session #2: "Don't step on that new life emerging! Try this path through the middle!”
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Friday: 1:15 - 3:15
Description: Sometimes we are so good at measuring the past that we forget to notice the new life emerging right beneath our feet. This session is devoted to the local community practices of engaging emergence. Did you know
that discerning in community oftentimes asks us to try our ideas that don't give us the results we expected?" This interactive session will feel like a bootcamp for innovators! Ana Hernandez and Tom Brackett will lead us through the
disciplines of learning from failure and the practices of being the "Beloved community" in the presence of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and making peace with not knowing.

3. TITLE of the PRESENTATION
PAGE INFORMATION
I love this graphic illustration of the space we are called to inhabit right now. I’m pointing to the odd label underneath this narrow path between order and
chaos. The word chaord. The word chaordic is a portmanteau like the word “smog” – it's a combination of two morphemes – two words with their sounds and
meanings. Just as smog is the sum of smoke and fog combined, chaordic refers to a way of being with both chaos and order at the same time. Both are
present, neither is dominant. The sum of these two words is used to describe an emerging space between the two conditions – it’s often referenced as a
chaordic space or a chaordic way of being.
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This narrow space between the two is also referred to as the Chaordic minefield. It helps to explain why, when we stray too far over to order, we restrict our
field of view too narrowly and we cannot see what is actually emerging. When we get lost in the chaos, we cannot sense the hand of God at work in the
world about us, either. There is a narrow path that is not at all straight and bounded. Because of the influence of chaos, this path is constantly shifting - it’s
often the kind of moving target that it takes a whole community to discern! This is where over-bearing Heroic Leadership gets us in trouble, as a
denomination. So many of us joined because of a proclivity towards ordered worship and an ordered “way of being.”

4. A
n
a
r
c
Control
h
y
So let’s work through a couple of questions, OK? Given our cultural sensibilities in the Episcopal Church, on which side of the chaordic space do you think we tend to wander off? Our internal culture does not prepare us for being
present to chaos. In fact, we often overreact and leap to controlling tendencies. My sense is that, many of us are quite fond of a command and control environment and we experience chaos as intolerable! It is experienced as a
disruption of our coherence. Remember the film clip: “For the Birds”

5. F i v e practices for
engaging emergence

6. Step Up:
!
take responsibility
for what you love,
as an act of service.
Step Up: take responsibility for what you love, as an act of service.
Love is the PERFECT antidote to fear . . . “Longings greater than the fear of loss”
The answer to “How?” is “Yes!”
Lean into the next “yes” that you have to offer, just in that moment. This is joining God in her vulnerability to our “yes’s” and No’s” There is a kind of holy attachment to what we perceive as God’s longings, here. The more this
practice becomes our operating norm, the more innovation, joy, solidarity, generosity, and other qualities of well-being appear. The capacities for listening and connecting grow through this practice.
!
The EMS story - Bruce is living only because Tom didn’t want him to sit alone in his car, while waiting to be transported. The rest of the interaction opened up only after Tom offered his Presence.
In yoga we invite people to show us as a YES, on their mats...and then in their lives. What would it look like to show up as a yes in the church?

7. Step Up:
!
take responsibility
for what you love,
as an act of service.
“Longings
that
match or exceed
the fear
of loss”
Step Up: take responsibility for what you love, as an act of service.
Love is the PERFECT antidote to fear . . . “Longings greater than the fear of loss”
The answer to “How?” is “Yes!”
Lean into the next “yes” that you have to offer, just in that moment. This is joining God in her vulnerability to our “yes’s” and No’s” There is a kind of holy attachment to what we perceive as God’s longings, here. The more this
practice becomes our operating norm, the more innovation, joy, solidarity, generosity, and other qualities of well-being appear. The capacities for listening and connecting grow through this practice.
!
The EMS story - Bruce is living only because Tom didn’t want him to sit alone in his car, while waiting to be transported. The rest of the interaction opened up only after Tom offered his Presence.
In yoga we invite people to show us as a YES, on their mats...and then in their lives. What would it look like to show up as a yes in the church?

8. Prepare:
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awaken your curiosity!
Prepare: awaken your curiosity! Take on a hermeneutic of curiosity.
Make the commitment to move from Descriptive language to Generative language.
Embrace the mystery of God’s “not yet”, choose possibility, and follow the life of the Spirit.
How do we bring curiosity to something we think we know everything about? When you drive the same route to work each day, what are you curious about? When you come back to your yoga mat and do the same poses over and
over again, what can you be curious about? When you hear the same scripture stories you have heard all your life, what can you be curious about? Can we create safe space for curiosity for those who don't yet know the way or the
stories? Can we walk alongside them in their curiosity?

9. Host:
!
setting the table for the
Feast you have to offer!
Host: Setting the table.
Abraham and the three visitors on the Plains of Mamre.
Peter has a vision and now he is ready to welcome the Samaritans.
Even the host of the Wedding Feast asks, “Who is not here?”
Our call is to create “containers”—hospitable spaces for working with whatever arises. Inviting diversity is one of the most time-consuming, challenging, and critical activities of engaging emergence in ministry.

10. Step In:
!
take deep dives into local
possibilities
Step In: Deep Dives into possibility
To inquire appreciatively is the second game-changing skill of “engaging.” This is the farmer walking the fields reverently after seed time, looking for evidences of the crop about to emerge. This is the midwife checking in with the
extended family to discern their readiness for a new life about to be birthed among them.
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The questions we ask determine the answers we uncover, shaping our experience, actions, and outcomes. Typically, the more positive the inquiry, the more life-affirming the outcome. Open to the unknown. This practice is an act of
faith. Once open, we can’t go back. It may be the most countercultural practice of them all, requiring the courage to be vulnerable. Reflect, name, and harvest can be sacred acts. They call forth that which previously didn’t exist. The
arts—music, movement, painting, sculpture, poetry, film—often enhance the effectiveness and reach of these practices.

11. Iterate:
!
experiment
courageously
Iterate: Experiment courageously
Try out a community response to that which you believe the Spirit is asking of you. Reflect on the experience and harvest learnings. Re-iterate!

12. !
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disruption
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dissonance
Emergence
disturbance
Getting clear about the evidence: disturbance, disruption and dissonance. Emergence disrupts, creates dissonance. We make sense of the disturbances that emergence creates partially through developing language that helps us to
tease out useful distinctions. As the vocabulary to describe what is emerging becomes more familiar, our understanding increases. For example, disturbance, disruption, and dissonance are part of the language of engaging
emergence. These terms are cousins, and I often use them interchangeably. Disruption is the most general of the three words. If something involves an emotional nuance, chances are that I call the disruption a disturbance.
When conflict is involved or the disruption is particularly grating, with a lack of agreement or harmony, I will likely refer to its dissonance.
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Holman, Peggy (2010-09-13). Engaging Emergence: Turning Upheaval into Opportunity (pp. 17-18). Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Kindle Edition.

13. The
Risks
of
Avoidance
When we draw boundaries and insist on loyalties, we actually isolate ourselves from those we need most.
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In our fear, we miss the Spirit’s wave of possibilities. (Acts 2)
When we rely on trailing indicators, we starve for the lack of imagination (2 Kings 7).
When we rely on mechanistic approaches, we often make the disruption even worse.
When we rely on hero-based leadership, we seal our fate.
In contrast, engaging emergence uses our differences to bring us together, opening us to creative involvement.
Holman, Peggy (2010-09-13). Engaging Emergence: Turning Upheaval into Opportunity (pp. 5-6). Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Kindle Edition.

14. Gal5Fruits
Are the Fruits of the Spirit enough evidence of God’s hand?
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Galatians 5:22 By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

15. Trying on hunches …
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… the practices of
testing the waters.
Are the Fruits of the Spirit enough evidence of God’s hand?
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Galatians 5:22 By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

16. Embrace the risk of “failure”
Embrace failure - Stop calling for sustainability!
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Tom has the story about babies falling 300 times before 1st step: 350 before first walk
Mary has the story about falling 100 times before you learn to surf.
Are you going to quit at 50? or 60? or 75? You have to see it through.
Falling is not necessarily failure. Quitting is failure! Beckett quote: Fail better!

17. Lower the cost of failure by
harvesting the learnings.

18. Bet the farm, or sell it?
Betting the Farm versus Selling the Farm. The “ask” is different.
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If you love funding the status quo, you’ll probably not fund “Stirrings.”

19. May I suggest
May I suggest to you
May I suggest this is the best part of of your life
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May I suggest
this time is blessed for you
this time is blessed and shining almost blinding bright
just turn your head
and you’ll begin to see
the thousand reasons that were just beyond your sight
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There is a hope
that’s been expressed in you
the hope of seven generations, maybe more
this is the fate
that they invest in you
it’s that you’ll do one better that was done before
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inside you know
inside you understand
inside you know what’s yours to finally set right
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the reasons why
why I suggest to you
why I suggest this is the best part of your life
and i suggest
and i suggest to you
and i suggest this is the best part of your life
there is a world
that’s been addressed to you
addressed to you, intended only for your eyes
a secret world
a treasure chest to you
of private scenes and brilliant dreams that mesmerize
this is a song
comes from the west to you
comes from the west, comes from the slowly setting sun
this is a song
with a request of you
to see how very short the endless days will run
and when they’re gone
and when the dark descends
we’d give anything for one more hour of life
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a tender lover’s smile
a tiny baby’s hands
the million stars that fill the turning sky at night
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Oh I suggest
Yes I suggest to you
Yes I suggest this is the best part of your life
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may i suggest
this is best part of your life
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written by Susan Werner

20. Can you still imagine your best days
might be out in front of you?

21. What is it that you notice
God is birthing in this moment,
here in the Episcopal Church in Vermont?
Needed:
Time-keeper
Harvester
Host

22. The Rev. Thomas Brackett
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New Church Starts & Missional Initiatives
Episcopal Church Center
815 2nd Ave.
New York, NY 10017
646-203-6266
tbrackett@episcopalchurch.org
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Schedule a phone call or meeting with Tom here: http://doodle.com/TomBrackett
Tom offers a blog at http://5marks.org/blog/
Skype: thomasbrackett
Twitter: @tombrackett
http://5marks.org/