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Creating Authentic Community 
- A Beginners’ Guide -

Compiled by Sara Ness​ ​ - ​ ​www.authrev.com

Check out other manuals here - ​www.gumroad.com/authrev

 
 
 
Contents 
 
 
 
 
Preparation 
 
Pre-Framing
Finding Your Community
Preparing Yourself

Making It Happen 
 
Planning Your First Event
Building the Event
Facilitating the Event
Completing the Event

The Afterglow 
 
Creating a Crew
Cohering a Crew
Dealing with Burnout
Personal Growth
Preparation

Pre-framing

“Forming a new community is like simultaneously trying to start a new business and begin a marriage —
and is every bit as serious as doing either. It requires many of the same planning and financial skills as
launching a successful business enterprise, and the same capacities for trust, good will, and honest, kind
interpersonal communication as marrying your sweetheart.”
- ​Diane Leafe Christian

● Meditate or journal on WHY you want to build Authentic community. What drives you?
What do you want out of it? What do you want to offer other people? Be open to your
intention changing, but notice what elements are most important to you. Your deeper
values are the compass by which you know what to hang onto and what to let go of.
These will help determine the form of the community that you create. They can also act
as a check-in when you feel off course.
● Find 1-5 other people who you genuinely want to begin community with. You can find
these people later down the road, but it is much more difficult to remain committed to
community if you’re not directly experiencing the benefits yourself.
○ Have a conversation with each other about:
■ Your intentions
■ Who you are to each other
■ What unique gifts and shadows you each bring (your superpowers and
kryptonites - often different sides of the same coin!)
■ What roles you would feel most fulfilled by and/or competent in around
creating and leading Authentic community
● See ​this page​ (courtesy of Authentic World) for community
archetypes, and the “Cohering a Crew” section for more
ground-level functions
■ How much time you are each willing to commit (min and max)

Finding Your Community

 ● Identify the groups you most want to serve and/or include. For example, Authentic
Houston began from a desire to offer depth to the local Ecstatic Dance community. The
Austin Love Juggernaut began from a desire to cohere the residents of college housing
cooperatives. You can choose one community or multiples, and can always expand
your base later on; but recognize that people tend to get involved in things that their
friends are doing, so it’s much easier to begin offering your work within an
already-established group that desires deeper connection.

● Groups that tend to be interested in Authentic work:

○ Ecstatic Dance
○ Nonviolent Communication communities
○ Intentional Living Communities (Cohousing, Cooperatives, Communes, etc.)
○ Acroyoga communities
○ OneTaste (OM)
○ Yoga studios
○ Improv groups
○ Tantra practitioners
○ Personal growth groups
○ Zen centers and meditation communities
○ Burners

● Get involved in that group’s events. Meet people, connect with them, get to know and
care about who they are, and find out what they’re wanting more of. If the group has a
community forum or space for announcements, let them know about Authentic Relating
offerings. Social media is a powerful tool, but you yourself showing up authentically to
other people is going to be the biggest motivator for them to attend your events.
● Be specific about when and where your events are held, and have business cards or
flyers with contact information. Make it as easy as possible for people to get involved!

Preparing Yourself

● Test out the games!

○ Invite a few people over to play (especially people you plan to include as
facilitators or logistic ninjas in your community). Pick your favorite games and
practice introducing them to each other, playing together, and sharing your
experience. As you step into the role of holding space for others, you should also
put aside intentional time to play. This will be crucial for you in avoiding burnout
and staying connected to why you’re offering AR in the first place.
 ○ OPTIONAL​: Play with the format of the games themselves. Invent new twists on
existing games, try different timing, play with your eyes closed, vary the number
of people included in each exercise, or even invent an entirely new game. Stay
true to the intention of Authentic Relating - creating experiential, loving
connection with yourself and others - but within those bounds, have fun and let
your imagination run free!
■ Always play-test new games among your core group before introducing
them in a public event.

● Get Trained
○ You do not have to be trained to build or lead an authentic community. However,
one benefit of getting trained, or at least connecting with mentors from
already-existing communities, is that you do not have to muddle through every
possible situation of distress alone. Whether or not you get trained, you should
be ready to confront the following situations (and by “confront” I mean that you
are totally welcome to have no idea what to do when the situations come up, but
know whether or not you’re okay with not knowing what to do!)
■ Participants getting “triggered” (upset, sad, angry, or afraid) or “blown out”
(overwhelmed and shut down)
■ Facilitators getting triggered and/or blown out before, during, or after an
event
■ Participants openly judging the process
■ Participants breaking the Agreements
■ Facilitators and/or Participants showing up with an undisclosed feeling or
motivation that is deeply affecting their experience (the “elephant in the
room”)
■ Facilitators and/or Participants arriving with a psychological condition that
disrupts group cohesion
■ Facilitators feeling unacknowledged, undervalued, or overstressed
■ What to do if your plan for the night is incongruous with what the group
seems to be wanting (ex. if you planned a night on deep presence and
people show up ready to party), if you run out of time for all the games
you planned, or other time-sensitive logistical snafus
■ Explaining what Authentic Relating is and what it means to you/why we
practice it
○ Open facilitation trainings are led by​ Authentic Revolution​. Contact
sara@authrev.com​ for more information.
Making It Happen

Planning Your First Event

● Find a location. You may want to offer Games to a group that already has a space (like
housing cooperatives, yoga studios, dance communities, or social clubs), or find your
own place (peoples’ houses or community centers). Make sure that you have privacy so
that your group can fully express, without fear of disturbance.

● Good Locations​:
○ Yoga Studios
○ Coworking Spaces (with rooms for rent)
○ Community Centers
○ Houses with big living rooms
○ Camping areas
○ Retreat centers

● Decide how long you want your event to be (usually 2-3 hours for a Games Night, plus at
least 30 min for hangout time afterwards)
● Reserve and pre-pay for the space
● Draft an event page. Include:
○ Date
○ Time (when people should arrive, when the doors close, when things start)
○ What Authentic Relating Games are
○ The theme for that event (if you have one), with an explanation of what it means
and why you chose it
○ A Paypal link or payment instructions (if you’re charging)
○ What people should bring (water and snacks if not provided)
● Create a Facebook group or page for your new community and invite people, and/or
create a Meetup group
● Announce the event on your Facebook page, in your chosen communities, on
Meetup.com, Eventbrite, in local event listings, Reddit, etc.
● Gather snacks (typically chips, carrots, hummus, popcorn, fruit, chocolate), and
materials (napkins, cups, water jug, business cards, donation jar, welcome sign, timer,
bell, chairs or cushions)
● Meet up with your crew at least 1-2 hours before the event begins to finalize and
integrate your event plan, connect with each other, and assign roles (more on this below)
Building the Event

● Decide who will plan out the night.

● One person can do this alone, or one drafts and the others give comments, or
you all create it together.
○ AUSTIN STYLE:​ Decide on one head facilitator and one to two
co-facilitators at a facilitator meeting, or an online scheduling
spreadsheet, ideally at least a week prior to the event. Head facilitators
must have gone through our training/practice process and been confirmed
by Sara (currently, head facilitators include Sara Ness, Chad Phillips,
Pete Michaud, Kay Pierce, Heather McClellan, Michael Blas, Jesse
French, and Brave Legend Pietri). Heads can define how they want
planning to go, what the theme is, and what roles they’d like co’s to play
during the night.

● Hold a Planning Meeting

● Meet up together at least 5 days before the event (on or before Wednesday, if
you’re planning a Sunday night). Pick a theme together (see below) and create a
flow that has people experiencing that theme through empathic connection.
○ If you cannot meet up until after Wednesday, decide on a theme together
through remote communication (or allow the head facilitator to pick the
theme), announce the event on Facebook before Thursday, and meet
BEFORE Sunday. Meeting on Sunday to plan will leave you feeling
rushed and ungrounded.
● At the meeting, drop in together (minis, group check-in, circling, a game, etc.)
before planning. The whole process will go more smoothly if you’re feeling
connected rather than challenging. If tensions arise at any point in the planning
process, check back in on emotions, practice active listening and reflection, and if
you need to, circle or propose a game that helps you come back into connection.
Or, take a break, get a snack, move your body, and come back refreshed!

● Decide on your theme

○ This can be anything you have been wanting to explore (like Empathy, Curiosity,
how to create authentic connections in the workplace), or connected to some
event going on in your city or peoples’ lives (ex. around Halloween you could run
a theme around Fear and Death, The Masks We Wear, or Play; around Austin’s
citywide music festival South by Southwest, we might run themes on staying
 connected to self during outside insanity, or how to create brief, intentional
connections with strangers).
○ Examples and Sample Plans

● Decide which agreements you will use to set the container (if any)
○ I highly recommend using agreements - they create a shared language and set of
understandings to work from. Even if you don’t, make sure to state that people
are entering a safe space, where vulnerability, self-awareness, and checking
assumptions are all highly encouraged. Give people the context that they’re
entering a different container from the outside world.
○ Once you’ve decided on agreements, I suggest always using the same set in all
events of that kind. People will start to use that framework in their thinking as
they step into each event, and even in their daily lives.
○ Examples

● Create the flow

○ Introduce the facilitators
○ Introduce Authentic Relating and why we do it
○ State the theme for the night (if any), and what inspired that theme
○ Set the Agreements
○ Have some sort of check-in with self (a meditation, wandering presence game,
etc.)
○ Have some sort of check-in with other (a sentence stem, eyegazing etc.)

● Create the progression of Games

● A Games Night can be likened to skydiving. There needs to be an initial draw and
excitement (promoting the event, welcoming people into the space) and safety
established (introduction of facilitators and AR, agreements). Then, the ride up
(initial connection and name-games), the jump out and ecstatic fall (games to
build intimacy and depth) and an integration on the ground (shares and Truths).
Afterwards, there’s time to hang out and share your experience!
● One Game helps set context and support the next Game, which helps support
the next game and so on. The ideal is to make such seamless transitions that
everyone is 100% engaged and enrolled the entire evening. Every Game serves
a conscious purpose (even if that purpose is just to lighten up and have fun).
● My barometer, in choosing which Games to play, when, and how to play them, is
how do I want the room to feel​? I close my eyes and imagine how people will
feel after a particular Game - will they be lit up, playful, contemplative, having a
range of different experiences? My goal is to create a smooth experience for
participants as we move from introduction to intimacy.
○ For example, if we’ve just played a high-energy improv game like
“Whatcha Doin’?”, I will probably not want to drop the room instantly into
Angel Walk or Circling - unless my theme for the night is something like
 “Dealing with Change”! Always check in with your intention first when
choosing games.
● See if you can take participants on a journey, one where they feel cared about
and held at every turn. The care you put into crafting the experience will be
reflected in the room.
○ And, never be afraid to change up your projected flow if the group doesn’t
feel cohesive, or you feel uncomfortable, or you just don’t like what is
happening. Facilitation would be boring if everything happened the way
you wrote it on paper!
● List of Games

● Create the play of Games

● Every Game can be played a myriad of different ways. To me, this is where the
real art of facilitation comes in. Pay attention to the balance between single, pair,
small-group, and full-group games; strictly-instructed games and more
open-ended ones; games that warm people up and games that bring intensity
(play vs. depth). As a general guide:
● Picking the Group Size
○ Single Games​ (ones played inside one’s own experience, such as
meditation) help participants drop into themselves without worrying about
how they are perceived. These are useful as a touchstone to get people
re-connected with their authentic truth, and to drop us back into presence.
I like to pepper meditations in throughout the night, especially when the
room is starting to get chaotic.
○ Pair Games ​(played in dyads) allow for individualized, customized
interactions. Pair games will produce a wider range of experiences, and
will help people get to know each other on a deeper level - often, these
interactions are what people will remember most. However, they don’t
allow for as many people to connect during the course of the night, and it
will be more difficult to tell whether or not participants are actually playing
or falling into conversation instead (which is fine, but not authentic
relating). Pair games are important to demonstrate. I also always have at
least one nonparticipating facilitator watching the room during pair and
small-group games, able to step in and re-direct an interaction that is
going off the rules, or in which somebody’s boundaries seem to be at risk
of violation.
○ Small-group Games ​(played in groups of 3-? people, usually not more
than 8) offer a good balance of community and individual depth. They
work well for giving participants a chance to experience different
perspectives, to allow everybody time to express, and to vary the feeling
of a game (for instance, we sometimes move pair noticing into groups of 3
or 4 after a couple rounds). Some Games are specifically constructed to
be played in small groups, and most can be modified to work with
 different numbers - see what happens when you try adding or subtracting
the numbers in your plan! Small-group games can become draining if
they last too long, which is an easy trap since giving each participant a
turn takes longer than it would in dyads. Pay attention to where
participants’ attention seems to flag, and ask the room how engaged they
are if you’re worried that a game has gone on too long (I will rarely plan
any one thing to last more than 45 minutes).
○ Full-group Games​ (played either in a full circle, or mingling among all
participants) can help create an atmosphere of safety and community,
because they give everybody a chance to interact. They are also helpful
as facilitator self-care, since you will get a chance to play with the group!
These Games are often the simplest to facilitate, since you can instantly
track anything happening in the room, and can more reliably alter or
check in on the emotional tone of the group as a whole. Caveat: in a
large group, beware of playing too many full-group games where
everybody gets a chance to talk (for instance, Sentence Stems or
round-robin Truths), especially if you choose a more involved prompt. If
each person takes a minute to answer, in a group of 30 people, other
participants may become disengaged before the circle is complete.
Full-group games often require more directiveness on the part of the
facilitator - learn to lovingly but firmly re-presence the kind of answer you
want, and how short you want it to be.
● Choosing and Introducing the Games
○ Order vs. Chaos: ​If you give clear and direct instructions for a game,
including examples and demos, people are more likely to have the kind of
experience you intend. However, giving too much instruction can limit the
parameters within which participants feel free to play, and give them a
less individualized experience. Play with setting different amounts of
context and demonstrating Games in different ways. PRACTICE setting
context before you run a new game!! One of the best ways to threaten a
beautifully dropped-in, safe space is to give unclear instructions and not
know how to clarify.
○ Play vs. Depth​: I like creating a balance between play and depth in my
nights, both in the Games I choose and how I lead the room - making a
joke can sometimes drop the room in deeper, by offering another layer of
comfort before diving in; while really exploring and honoring a
participant’s share after a silly game can bring a joyful room closer
together. In terms of choosing Games on a scale from play to depth,
decide what sort of experience you want to create. Neither end of the
spectrum is better than the other. YOU get to decide which you would
prefer, at any given time, and you can ask the room throughout the night if
they are wanting either more depth or levity. However, if you plan to offer
an especially deep dive, it’s helpful to note this in the event description
 pre-event. Participants who come in (and bring their friends) expecting a
light social experience, and get dropped into Fly on the Wall (where
others talk about you, in your presence, as if you weren’t in the room)
may be...less than happy.
● Leave time for shares after intense games (or after every game if you prefer -
shares can be a great way to establish group connection, especially if you circle
the sharers a little)
● End the night with Truths, Intimacies, or Appreciations, and announcements

● Roles
The last piece in planning a Games Night flow is to decide what roles facilitators will play
during the night. All of the following, except Head Facilitator, are optional.
○ Check-in person
■ Collects money or confirms pre-pays, gathers emails
○ Greeter(s)
■ Make attendees feel welcome from the moment they walk in (once you
have a community established, you can ask regulars to take on this role if
you want)
○ Head Facilitator(s)
■ Introduce and close the evening, have executive power to change up the
plan during the night.
○ Co-Facilitator(s)
■ Run different games, on hand for triage ​(supporting participants who have
an intense emotional experience and need to sit out of the group for a
time)​ or to give agreements to latecomers.
○ Ninja Facilitator(s)
■ Play in the games, but can step out on breaks to give the head and
co-facilitators information on how the room feels (the “temperature of the
room”) so that the facilitators can change up the plan or approach if
needed. Ninjas can also mark participants who seem to be having a hard
time, for anybody in the leadership team to check in with on breaks, or
partner with in pair games.
● New Facilitators
○ If your event includes facilitators who have little or no experience leading Games,
the Head Facilitator should decide which role these facilitators should play,
incorporating their desires as much as possible. Possible roles include helping to
demonstrate games, leading a game, or acting as Ninja Facilitator. New
facilitators should always take part in the post-event debrief.
○ If you are a new facilitator, and you want to lead a game, practice introducing it to
and playing it with friends or other facilitators BEFORE leading it during a Games
Night. During the night, remain open to guidance from the head facilitator - he or
she may add to or clarify your description, or may offer you a suggestion, and this
is not meant as any judgment against you! Please do not lead a Game you have
 invented on your first full-group facilitation, and please do not lead a Game that
you do not feel fully comfortable and able to introduce and take questions on.

Facilitating the Event

● The real paydirt of facilitation is holding the space for a group. One on one relating can
be authentic, but the real power and energy come from a group interacting with what’s
real for all of them collectively. You can set this space by A) Sharing your authentic
truth, B) Engaging the group as fully as possible, and C) Getting participants’ worlds.
How do you do this? Here are a few guidelines:

● Be Authentic
○ Share yourself. The more vulnerable you are, and the more you practice what
you preach, the more interested people will be in trying whatever you’re on!
Particularly, share your WHY for everything - why did you choose a particular
theme, or a game, or to start an authentic community in the first place? The
more open you can be about your own context, the more clear others can get on
their own.
■ Note - over time, this will begin defining the way you interact in all areas
of life. Authenticity, for a community leader, should never stop at the
door. The more you model your deepest commitments, the more others
will trust you, and feel inspired to do the same.
○ Demo the games. The depth of any given game, and the way participants will
play it, will be set by the context you give for that game and how you demo it.
Use expressions that are true for you in the moment, and experiment on pushing
your own edge in authenticity!

● Be Open
○ Go with the flow. A Games Night will rarely play out the way it looks like it will on
paper. Your skill as a facilitator depends on how well you can roll with what’s
actually true in a room, rather than what you expect to happen. You may want to
have some games on the back-burner in case a deep night takes a turn for the
fun, or you run out of time, or you have more/fewer people than expected.
Decide what’s most important to you to communicate, and be flexible on how that
communication is expressed.
○ Stay with shares, whether they’re “positive” or “negative”. Oftentimes, somebody
having an uncomfortable experience with a game and expressing it is a good
thing (although it can be scary, as a facilitator, to receive!). Welcome and invite
 all experiences, in service of individuals feeling safe to have all their experience
welcome.

● Use Nonverbal Communication

○ You can affect a room not just by the flow of games, group size, and timing that
you use, but also by your tone and body language.
○ If you speak quickly, use lots of body movement, and smile, people will feel more
playful; if you speak slowly and move slowly, people will slow their process down
to match yours. If you want to drop a room into presence, keep your hands open
and head up, leave space between your words, and lower the volume of your
voice a bit so people have to try to listen (once the room is quiet).
○ Your particular presence is your superpower and your kryptonite. If you tend to
speak softly, people may be more attentive; but getting their attention will be
more difficult. If your movements are jerky and withdrawn and you have trouble
making eye contact (awkwardness/introversion), people may not trust you as
much; but they may also feel respect for you and a desire to support because of
the effort they see you putting out to lead. Rather than changing what you
naturally do, first see if you can make it the unique gift you bring to leadership. If
you’re soft-spoken, ask somebody else to help the room wrap up after a game or
use a bell, and then your voice will create deeper presence in the silence. If you
feel awkward in front of groups, be honest about the effort it takes you to be
there, and your authenticity will inspire others.
■ Pro tip: Have your inner community, or friends, help you to identify the
superpowers and kryptonites that you bring.

● Engage the Group

○ Include and validate
■ When one person shares, you can ask, “who else experienced that?
Raise your hand” and/or “who had the opposite experience? Raise your
hand” and/or “Who had a totally different experience?” (to get a laugh and
include all perspectives). This has the individual feeling welcomed and the
group feeling involved.
○ Play with physical space
■ Stand further away from the sharer so they have to talk louder
■ Move around as you facilitate a large group
■ Play with different-sized groups and different people placements
○ Play with attention
■ Speak slowly to hold a group’s attention
■ Be ok with silence
■ Shut people up when you need their focus
● Pro tip: Try the phrase “If you can hear my voice say shh…”. You
can also use a gong, or ask people to clap their hands if they can
hear you.
 ● You may have to ask people to be quiet more than once - this is
fine; give them enough time to complete the interaction
comfortably (around 10-20 seconds). Then, ask again more
loudly, or make a joke to break up the energy.
○ Play with order
■ Change up who goes first in any given game. If A has begun last time,
have B start this time; or throw a wrench in things and make A start again!
Note: do this only when it feels called for - if you change things too much
out of a fear of getting “boring” or a desire to exercise power, people will
begin to feel distracted from their experience, and lose trust in you as a
facilitator.
■ You can decide who goes first by choosing the person with the
longest/shortest hair/nose/fingers, biggest/smallest ears/feet/name,
asking partners to reach out and tap each other on the knee (the one who
made contact first goes first, but make this clear after they tap), or making
a way of deciding up in the moment!
○ Call out implicit contexts
■ Speak the elephant in the room. If people seem on edge, say “we seem
agitated. Does anybody else feel that?” Or, “What isn’t being said here?”
Or, “We’re all sharing positive emotions. Did anybody have a different
experience in that game?”
■ Play with demographics and energy. Be willing to call out gender
balance, aggression, power, sexuality, race, age, etc. in service of having
more room to play. I mostly use this practice in nights with a specific
theme towards one of these contexts, or in a longer training - lots of
energy can be released when demographics are made explicit, because
it’s usually considered politically incorrect to speak them.

● Engage Individuals
○ When somebody shares, try:
■ Letting them know, by eye contact and body language (a nod or a hand
over your heart) that you heard them
■ Repeating (as closely as possible) exactly what that person said, to have
them feel heard, to check that they communicated what they wanted to,
and to make sure the group understood
■ Summarizing the share. What, to you, was the heart of what that person
said? Summarize that and check in to make sure you got it correct.
■ Expressing what you felt hearing their share - the personal impact it had
on you
■ Projecting. Imagine what that experience was like for that person, or what
they’re feeling as they share about it, or what their share says about who
they are, and share your imagination. Then check in about what you said.
 ■ Being curious. Ask more about what they said, how that experience felt
emotionally/physically, and what it meant to them.

● Managing Intensity
○ Sometimes, a participant may share something with you, or with the group, that
feels extreme. Examples might be a past trauma such as rape, abuse, or
suicidality; current mental or physical disorders; or worries about future harm or
instability. There are different ways I handle this - and, caveat here, I am NOT a
trained therapist (although I often consult with counselors and psychiatrists on
how to address issues such as this).
■ In a group​:
● One response is to pause the game, or whatever interaction is
occurring, and ask the participant who shared how it felt to share
that. You may want to circle them for a few minutes on their
experience. If the group seems affected, check in, “how are we
feeling right now?” Or, “What’s your experience of (participant)
right now?” The intent here is to have the person who shared feel
like their experience is welcome and they are validated as a
person, and as a member of the group. When you feel that
intention has been accomplished, you can thank the sharer for
their honesty, and move on with the game.
● Another response is to make eye contact, thank the participant for
his/her honesty and acknowledge the courage it took to share, and
then move on. While we are naturally inclined to bring attention to
the most intense experiences, the core of Authentic Relating is
validating all forms of humanity. A trauma does not necessarily
require more time or attention than an expression of joy - in fact,
over-focusing on intense experiences can have people feel
singled out or identified as victims.
● Your barometer for how to address situations like this can be your
felt sense, the sharer’s experience, and/or the group’s response.
If you feel a distinct shift in your emotional or physical experience
when somebody shares, that can be a sign to check in on their
experience - perhaps what they just shared was very vulnerable,
and could benefit from validation or a confirmation of acceptance
in the group. However, if you don’t feel much even with an intense
share, it may not be something the participant wants to explore
(they may be feeling guarded), or a story they have told many
times before. You can still check in on this, just don’t assume that
you always ​have to​ if you don’t ​want to​. Your desire is often your
best tool in facilitation. However, you may still want to check in
with the room if people seem uncomfortable after an intense share
 - “That was a vulnerable share. How are we feeling right now?
Would anything help you all feel complete with that interaction?”
● Regardless of how you deal with the situation, it is always a good
idea to check in (or ask another facilitator or community member
to check in) with the participant who shared, one-on-one, after the
event. This kind of care is simple and will help build safety in the
community.
■ One-on-one​:
● As a facilitator, you can sometimes (with or without desiring it)
become a confidant for your community. If a member shares
something intense with you one-on-one, the best first response is
to check in with yourself. If you’re feeling supportive and
available, you can ask the sharer how they feel, and offer them
empathy for their situation. However, if you’re feeling frightened or
overwhelmed, you do not have to continue the interaction. If
you’re overwhelmed but want the participant to get immediate
support, connect them with another facilitator to offer triage
(circling and/or empathic listening). If you are afraid for their
immediate well-being, connect them with somebody to offer triage
(or do it yourself), but also be honest about your fear for their
safety, and ask if you can help connect them with a trained
therapist. It’s good to have a list of therapists who know your
community and will be on hand for referrals.
● Authentic community can sometimes blur in boundaries between
social group and healing space. When we invite truth, we receive
all variants and intensities. Gauge your own ability to handle
these kinds of shares. Often, empathy is exactly what somebody
needs to feel comfortable in their experience. In two years of
running a community, I have referred members to therapists only
twice, and offered triage countless times. However, you are NOT
responsible for being a confidant in situations that you don’t feel
confident handling, OR for making sure that every person is safe,
sound, and happy after the night ends. Do not confuse being a
community leader with being a community parent. I often support
participants outside of a night, but I make sure that this is a choice
rather than an obligation, and will choose to offer formal coaching
or set a boundary if I begin feeling drained by a support role.
Completing the Event

● Offer triage/empathy at the end to anyone who needs it. Make it clear that this is a
community, not a single event, and people do not have to process their feelings alone.
● Make yourself available for shares or questions. Encourage testimonials, to be written
down in the moment or shared on the Facebook group afterwards.
● Collect money, pay yourself for snacks, and have a plan for what to do with any extra
(Nonprofit - cover scholarships to future events, pay for facilitator bonding events, have
better food, etc. Profit - pay yourself and your facilitators, and keep the excess!)
● Have a post-games wrap-up and debrief with facilitators. Ask:
○ How did the night go?
○ How was the flow of games?
○ How did new games work, if there were any?
○ What feedback does each person have for the facilitators? Try to share both
positive and negative.
○ How did the facilitators think they did?
○ What could be worked on for next time?
● Leave room as clean as you found it
● OPTIONAL: post on your Facebook group to ask people what they thought of the night,
and share your own experience.
The Afterglow

Creating a Crew

● It isn’t necessary to create a crew for running Games Nights. If you cap your numbers
for each night, and stay aware of your own capacity around how many events to lead per
week/month, as well as the degree of support you want to offer outside of nights, you
may not need help. However, if you want your outer community to grow, your own inner
community can help support that growth. Even if you don’t think you will need help in
leading events, it’s hard to get the full benefit of Authentic community if you’re not living it
as you lead it.

● Size and Structure

○ Each community does this differently. You may choose to lead your community
alone (as in DC and Santa Cruz), or to have a small, closed facilitator group (as
in Portland and Norway), or to open up facilitation to anybody who wants to learn
(as in Austin and Toronto). Each option brings its own challenges and
opportunities.
■ A​ single leader ​doesn’t have to worry as much about interpersonal
drama, scheduling, price sharing, or difference of opinion. But, he/she will
also have to be available to lead every event and can risk burnout from
never getting to play.
■ A ​closed crew​ can become deeper in connections, skills, and coordinate
more easily. But, not everybody may have the ability to commit as much
time as a small crew requires (since those members will be leading all the
events), and a closed crew doesn’t give others the opportunity to get
involved in a leadership role (which, I’ve found, is a huge way to catalyze
personal growth).
■ An ​open crew​ can benefit from their diversity of opinion and availability,
and allows more people to feel involved in the organization. On the other
hand, no one person feels as much responsibility to make things happen,
so coordination is necessary. It can become difficult to figure out
scheduling and make decisions. An open crew will require clearer
agreements and division of roles, which can be implicit in single-person or
smaller organizations. However, open-crew communities have the most
massive potential for growth, as there can be tens or even hundreds of
 leaders who each feel empowered to bring Authentic Relating to their own
areas of influence, which will cross-pollinate your events in turn.
○ Often, your community will begin with one structure, and change to another as it
grows. The Austin and Houston communities both began with a few facilitators
leading on equal footing, and transitioned into open crews with a single
leader/coordinator. Authentic New York began with two leaders and transitioned
to a single lead, while Authentic Portland quickly developed a 4-person closed
crew and stuck with that. Be ready for to re-evaluate what your group is needing
- and what you, as a leader, are needing - throughout the life cycle of your
community.
○ Regardless of what option you choose, make sure to put time aside for facilitator
meetings and your own opportunities for play.

● Finding Your Crew

○ Your crew can be made up of friends, acquaintances, or strangers you’ve just
met. However, I’ve found that a great way to find collaborators is to start holding
events, and see who of the regular attendees is most a) interesting to you to
collaborate with, b) skilled in the areas you want, and c) interested in
collaborating. When you identify somebody you feel lit up about, let them know
your feelings, and see if you can achieve reciprocality!
○ Make sure to pick your team carefully, and be clear with them about your
expectations, hopes, and desires about their particular role. It’s easier to add
people later on than to remove people once they’re on the team. On the other
hand, you never know what somebody will contribute to your organization until
they’re given the chance to try. In Austin, I’ve leaned towards making the greater
facilitator crew open to anybody who wants to join, but carefully picking the
people I want to work with on more involved projects such as immersions and
facilitator trainings.
○ As you add people to your team, figure out a way of introducing them to the
group culture: what roles do you play with each other (ex. who can invite new
people in, who makes decisions), logistics (when and where do you meet, how
often do you check in with each other, what communication formats do you use),
and norms (what agreements do you have together, how are conflicts resolved,
how do you co-support each other in growth). This can be achieved through
shared documents of rules and norms, assigning a mentor to each new person
entering, training days, or simply checking in with the new person over time to
see how they’re integrating and if they have any questions.
Cohering a Crew

● Creation is the easy part. Now that you’re together, how do you STAY together?
Regular meetings, division of roles, communication structures, practicing authenticity,
and an acceptance of change will help your community weather almost any storm.

Facilitator meetings
● The Austin community holds a meeting every two weeks, on average, for 3-4 hours each
time. One meeting a month will involve community logistics, and one will just be for
facilitator connection and play. We’ve recently opened the community meeting up for
anybody to join, facilitator or not! Meetings can include:
○ Personal connection
■ Space to check in and hear about each others’ lives. This could take
place through an open format, Games, or circling.
○ Community clearings
■ Have any issues come up in your community lately? Complaints,
concerns, suggestions for improvement by members or facilitators? This
can be an opportunity to discuss policy around these issues, or decide if
they even merit attention (not every issue has to be resolved - it’s
important to strike a balance between creating a safe container, and
over-protecting the community, which can stifle the agency and
expression crucial to AR)
○ Community development
■ What opportunities have come up for your community? What could you
use to feel more connected as a crew (like community retreats, facilitator
bonding events, happy hours, dinners, etc.), to offer AR in areas where it
currently doesn’t exist (like gender work, corporate, schools, different
areas of your city, etc.), and to make your community even more badass?
Have people present proposals and ideas.
○ Logistics
■ Who will be facilitating events for the next few weeks or months? Decide
what sorts of events you want to run, who will run them, and what support
your leaders need.
○ Taking stock
■ On a meta level, what is working and what is not in how you structure
meetings, events, and your communication with each other? Tensions
(according to ​Holacracy​) are often caused by the absence of some role,
process, or structure in the organization. Seeing issues as opportunities,
and taking a step back so that what is “personal” becomes process, can
help you form a stronger . . . everything.
○ Planning for growth
 ■ Community meetings are a great time to look towards the future, and
decide what pieces you can put in place to accelerate your group’s outer
reach and inner depth. Should you start a second Games Night, or
circling lab, or T-group? Should you bring in outside facilitators to lead
complementary events? Do you want to acquire a community center?
Planning meetings are a time to envision your group’s ideal future and
explore different people’s ideas on how to get there...while keeping in
mind that variables are always subject to change, and an system that can
evolve based on the needs of each moment is going to be the most
durable. Hold your intentions strongly and your expectations lightly.
○ Play!
■ If you’re going to be leading Authentic events, you have to be practicing
what you teach! Play Games with your crew, circle, and if you want to
invent new games, make sure you test them out with your crew before
leading them in an open night. This is also a great way for facilitators to
get practice - you can open up the opportunity for anybody to lead a
game, and then everybody can give them feedback on how they did, what
was awesome, and what could be improved.

Division of Roles
● In between meetings, your team will need a framework of responsibility to make sure
that everything that needs to be done, gets done. Division of roles operates at both an
immediate and a meta level.
● At the immediate level, you should make sure that you and your crew know who is
responsible for covering necessary tasks. Possible roles (each of which can be filled by
an individual or a team of people, and can stay the same for each occasion or be
delegated anew for each month/meeting/event) include:
○ The Schedule Czar
■ Sets up the events, coordinates your team’s meetings
○ The Copywriter
■ Writes event descriptions, sets out your group’s visions, keeps track of
what your group does - meeting minutes, past Games plans, new Games,
etc.
○ The Accountability Tracker
■ Checks in regularly with individuals and teams to make sure everybody
does what they said they’re going to do
○ The Moneybags
■ Tracks your group’s finances, opens a bank account, sets up Paypal
and/or Eventbrite, keeps a list of who is prepaid for events and shares it
with the door person, collects and deposits cash after events
○ The Facilitators
■ People trained and/or trusted to lead events
○ The Co-Facilitators
 ■ People trained and/or trusted to support events. Should also be able to
offer triage.
○ The Heartbeat Monitor
■ Keeps the “pulse” of your community and your facilitator team. Can
organize fun events, deeper dives, or even just ask everybody to stop and
meditate for a moment if tempers get high. Makes sure everybody is
getting their basic needs met, if not having a truly fulfilling time.

Communication Structures
● Whether it’s a text messaging service like GroupMe, a Facebook group, or an email
thread, have a defined way to keep in contact with each other. You can use this for both
formal needs (like coordinating a Games Night) and social/emotional requests (like
asking for the support of your community during a hard time).
● Ask your group to see what form of communication works best for them, and request that
they check that forum at least once every couple of days. You may want to use different
mediums for different communications - for example, text messaging might work for
reminding people of a meeting, while Facebook might be better for suggesting new
events.

Practicing Authenticity
● Even though we lead Authentic Relating, we can often let these skills and tools fall by
the wayside when the shit hits the fan. This is especially likely when emotions are
involved (ironically enough). Examples might include:
○ Having to plan a last-minute event (time crunch)
○ Dealing with interpersonal conflict
○ Not liking another facilitator
○ Feeling overwhelmed with commitments
○ Getting bored or uninspired by the direction the community is heading
● For all of these, the best answer (in my book) is to….relate authentically! And, have
roles and structures in place to help streamline the process. Here’s some practicable
suggestions for each issue.
○ Having to plan a last-minute event (time crunch)
■ Decide who is the final arbitrator for decisions, or who will put together
aspects of the event plan if it doesn’t get done (ideally this has been
decided pre-event, or you trust each other enough that anyone can take it
on at the end).
■ Spend a few minutes checking in about how you’re feeling right now - this
will calm the group down.
■ Clarify why you’re doing this, and/or how you want the room to feel
during/after the event, and/or what inspires you about doing this with each
other (if you’re feeling disconnected and not particularly inspired)
■ From that place of mutual appreciation and connection to your motivation,
start throwing out content ideas. Try to practice a “Yes, and…” mentality
 around each other’s ideas. If conflict emerges, come back to WHY you’re
doing this, WHAT you’re feeling, and WHY you care about/want to work
with each other.
■ Create the flow together from your suggestions, or give one person
autonomy to create it. Divide up who will lead what depending on who
wants to lead what, and try to create win/win situations by co-leading
activities, adding/subtracting/changing games slightly, and/or
emphasizing the group’s motivation for co-creation.
■ Express appreciation for each other at the end of the process! If you can,
cite specific examples where you appreciated how somebody else
conducted themselves to the benefit of the group.
● Pro tip: JUST CIRCLE. Jordan Allen and I plan immersions, labs,
and classes by circling each other, our motivations, our fears,
hopes, desires, etc. for 90% of the time before the event, and
planning (if we plan at all) in the last 10%. By the time we are in
such a deep relational space, we trust each other and are attuned
with each other enough to put a flow together in minutes.
○ Dealing with interpersonal conflict
■ This can be a tricky one, as egos and emotions come into full cross-eyed
antagonism with each other. Here, more than ever, authentic
communication is required. I suggest a few strategies:
■ Share the impact another’s actions had on you, and stay open to their
experience.
● Try using the format “When you...I felt…”, and then asking, “What
did you hear?” After they repeat it back, clarify what you said, if
necessary, to make sure it landed. Then ask them, “Hearing that,
what do you feel?” You can go back and forth sharing your
feelings about that interaction for a while, or move straight into
asking them to share their experience of the situation.
● Don’t get stuck on story. The most important aspect of conflict
resolution is to focus on EMOTIONS and NEEDS over
who-said/did-what. Your stories may never match. That’s ok. If
you’re focused on being right over being connected, I guarantee
that you will both walk away angry, frustrated, and unresolved.
■ Communicate IN PERSON, not over email or text.
● A huge amount of our communication is nonverbal. When conflict
happens over text, we only get half of the input we need in order
to know how somebody else is hearing or reacting to our truth.
Ideally, don’t call either when you have an active conflict with
someone - meet over video or in person.
■ Take a step back
● Connect to why you even care about resolving this issue. Where
do you and your compatriot-in-conflict have “shared reality”, or a
 point of agreement? Maybe you both care about the community,
or Authentic Relating work, or having conflict resolved cleanly.
Better yet, maybe you care about and respect each other. When
you can find some point of agreement, the issue at hand will
become much easier to approach - you can approach it
side-by-side, rather than at cross angles.
■ Get a mediator
● Bringing in a third party is one of the most effective ways I’ve
found to resolve conflict. A mediator can break the cycle when
you start getting stuck in patterns of blame or collapse, can call
out moments of shared reality (or create them), can help clarify
and reflect underlying emotions, and can provide community
support.
● An unbiased party is best, but more important is that the mediator
have strong skills in authentic relating, empathy training, or
circling. You may also want to check if anybody in your
community has been trained in mediation - it’s a useful certification
and integrates beautifully with authentic tools.
■ Take time off
● Sometimes, especially when you’ve tried all else, it can be useful
to take time away from a conflict and let the emotions settle. Put a
time limit on the separation, and decide who will take a hiatus from
the community. If you have suggested the separation, you should
offer to take the hiatus, unless your conflict-buddy is much less
involved in the community - do NOT try to kick somebody else out
just because you don’t feel comfortable with them. (This rule can
be broken if you are afraid of physical harm, to yourself or others.)
○ Not liking another facilitator
■ It happens. Sometimes, especially in an open community, somebody will
join who just pushes your buttons. If this happens, you can follow the
guidelines for conflict resolution, above. But most importantly - STATE
YOUR TRUTH! Tell that person how he/she impacts you, with as little
blame as possible (try to identify particular situations and what you felt).
Often, that sort of honest feedback will be a gift.
■ Do not assume that you or your emotions are unwelcome, or that you
need to remove yourself from the community because of a conflict or a
personal dislike that you haven’t actually tried to address. My biggest pet
peeve, as a community leader, is when somebody drops out of the group
because of an issue that they never actually spoke, or only told to people
other than the person with whom they had a problem. Conflict can be a
huge gift to a group. It means that we’re being honest with each other.
■ Caveat to these last two sections - if you are leading a community, and
somebody comes to you with a conflict or dislike, I recommend that you
 do not place yourself in the middle. Encourage them to speak with the
person directly, and offer to mediate or find a mediator. If you involve
yourself in the conflict, you will A) become drained, B) deprive facilitators
of a growth opportunity through addressing their own conflicts, and C) set
a tone of inauthenticity. If you want to create authentic community, the
members of your leadership team should be practicing these skills with
each other! A community evolves together.
○ Feeling overwhelmed with commitments
■ Again, the best tool here is honesty. If you have too much on your plate,
remember that in community, you are not obligated to play any particular
role. Explore with your group the ways that you can both stay involved
with the community (if you want to do that), feel supported, and bring
yourself in a capacity that doesn’t feel overwhelming. Maybe you host a
facilitator meeting at your house rather than planning and leading a full
Games Night. Maybe you volunteer to craft an acknowledgment for each
facilitator while you’re traveling, and send them back to the community.
Maybe you just attend events for a while rather than leading. Remember
that authentic community is founded on you getting to be your full,
authentic self - we don’t need anything from you that doesn’t feel true to
bring.
○ Getting bored or uninspired by the direction the community is heading
■ You can play me like a broken record, baby - again, ​just tell the truth​. The
more we’re showing what we actually feel, want, and believe, the more
we start finding subtle or radical places that our opinions differ. Maybe I
want to charge for events, and you think that’s unethical. Maybe you
want to invite friends into a circling night, and I think it should be closed to
the community. Maybe you want to turn all of our events into snuggle
parties, and I - well, let’s not be inauthentic here.
■ Whatever this difference of opinion is, practice A) staying in connection to
yourself and the others during the discussion, and B) Creating a win-win
situation. Get at the motivations behind WHY you want what you want.
For example, maybe I want to charge for events because I think people
will value the events more if they have to pay, and I want them to get
value out of the events. You also want them to get value, and you want
the maximum number of people to get it. We decide to both charge and
offer scholarships for work-trade.
■ Once again, don’t assume that a difference in opinion means that you (or
somebody else) has to give up their desires. As an example, Jordan and
I lead circling events together in Austin and across the US, although we
differ fundamentally on our core commitments. I focus on getting
empathic tools and experiences into mainstream society (emphasis on
high-volume, yin-heavy connections that anybody can access), while he
focuses on depth, evolution, and self- and group-transformation
 (emphasis on deeper, more developed relationships). However, we’re
both committed to bringing love and connection through relationship, so
we lead events together from that place and focus on different areas
(Authentic Relating Games vs. circling and Integral) when apart.

Acceptance of Change
● Even though there are many ways to keep a community together, committed, and
inspired, you should be prepared for your group to change over time. The biggest thing
to remember is that change is not your fault. If facilitators decide to leave your
community, your Games Night shrinks in size, or a conflict causes turnover in the group -
well, these things do happen. Yes, there are probably ways you had an impact on that
situation. And, it’s not your fault. Nor have you failed as a leader. Change is inevitable
in any group. As long as your intention is based in a desire to create loving, honest
community, you’re doing great, and you will do even better as you continue to lead and
learn. Just remember that many peoples’ lives have been made better by what you do.

Dealing with Burnout

● As you build your community, it is almost inevitable that at some point, you will hit a wall.
Maybe your numbers have dropped, and you don’t know why (note: this happens to
almost every group at some point). Maybe you’re not getting enough payoff for the
amount of time you’re putting in to serve others, or feeling overwhelmed by always
leading and never getting to play. Maybe your crew members are all pissed off and
putting butter in each others’ shoes. Whatever it is, burnout can actually be a positive - it
requires you to take a step back and re-evaluate where you’ve been and where you’re
going.

● Here are some ways to deal with burnout:

○ Ask your crew for help
■ Burnout is one of the primary reasons to have a crew! When you get
tired, there are other people already trained and ready to pick up the
slack. Call a facilitator meeting, and be authentic with people about how
you’re feeling. Have some suggestions for the kinds of help that you
want, and let other propose their own ideas. You might come out feeling
even more energized than before hitting the wall.
○ Ask your community for help
■ You put a lot of work in for others’ benefit. Even if you are charging for
your events, you’re offering a service in creating Authentic community,
 and you’re probably doing a lot of extra support outside of the events. Let
your community know the amount of work you’re putting in (most people
won’t have recognized the behind-the-scenes), and make requests for
how they can help. In my community, this was asking for more people to
become facilitators; for interns to help with promotional work and social
media; for hugs and genuine feedback on how I was doing; and even for
partners to start a business that could grow our range of programs.
○ Hold a Context meeting
■ Meetings are usually focused on the question of “what are we doing?”
Hold a meeting - with your community, crew, or both - that’s focused on
“how and why are we doing this?” Let yourself be surprised by the
answers, intrigued by new ideas, and inspired by people’s “why”.
■ This is a good way to address not only your own burnout, but a drop in
enthusiasm among your crew and community. If peoples’ needs aren’t
being met - especially if what you think their needs are doesn’t accord
with what they think their needs are - giving a chance for re-evaluation
can help bring out tensions that aren’t being spoken, which might be
causing people to drop out of your community.
○ Charge money
■ If you’re not getting fed - emotionally or physically - from the work you’re
doing, you might need to increase your own incentive. Asking for
donations at a Games Night can help your efforts feel more mutual. Most
community organizers charge between $10-20 per person for a 2-3 hour
event, or between $150-1,000 for a weekend. Gauge what feels fair to
you, poll your community if you’re undecided on how much to charge, and
(optional but recommended) include an assurance that nobody will be
turned away for lack of funds.
○ Contact other community leaders
■ We are lucky enough, at this point, to have a wide network of Authentic
communities spread across the globe. Many of us face the exact same
issues and inspirations, and most of us will happily make the time to talk.
Post a question on the ​Authentic Relating Event Facilitators​ or ​Authentica
Facebook groups - ask a remote community leader to commiserate for an
hour - read these documents - or ask the “old guard” (Decker Cunov,
Michael Porcelli, Kendra Cunov, etc.) what has kept them going.
Remember, you are not alone.
■ Check out a list of community and community leaders here: ​Community
Contact
○ Find a mentor
■ The Authentic world contains a huge number of coaches, consultants,
mentors, and leaders who can support you on your journey. Ask if
somebody is willing to work with you on an ongoing basis. You can even
ask another budding leader to act as a touchstone on your journey,
 somebody to keep in communication with around challenges and
excitements you both face. Or, join ConnectionCorps’ mentorship
program and we can help you to create what you desire! (Email
sara@connectioncorps.com​ if you’re interested in that.)
○ Connect back into your inspiration
■ If you’re feeling burnt-out, maybe you need a purpose re-infusion. Go on
a meditation retreat for a weekend. Play Games with your friends. Attend
an ​Alethia​, a ​Facilitation Training​, an ​AMP​ or ​AWE​, or join ​Authentic
World​ to circle and relate every day online. Remember why you’re doing
what you’re doing, and give yourself a chance to play!

Personal Growth

● In authentic community, the group becomes, to a greater or lesser extent, a reflection of

its leader(s). The demographics of your community - the kinds of events you run - the
gender balance - the balance between “fun” and “depth” - all will be partially determined
by the type of people you attract and how you show up. By the same token, the more
aware you are of these implicit contexts, the more choice you can have around them.
● One factor that will determine the form and function of your community is your own
degree of development. The places you can’t go are the places your group won’t be able
to either. If you’re not comfortable in situations of conflict, your group won’t be
comfortable in them either; if you’re disconnected from your own sexuality, your group
will have a hard time openly exploring that edge. Even if situations arise in which these
shadow places are right at the surface, your discomfort will have the group feeling that
their experience is in some way not welcome, or even wrong.
○ This doesn’t mean that you have to be comfortable in every situation. If you’re
not comfortable with sexuality, perhaps one of your co-facilitators is. Or, if you
notice a place you don’t feel able to go, you can open up the conversation
around it by speaking the context you see present and owning it as a personal
edge. Regardless, you should know where your blind spots are, so you don’t
come upon them suddenly in a group situation and shock yourself out of
presence!
● The best ways to both deal with burnout, become aware of your shadows, and create a
community that is authentic by example is to have a strong personal practice. My
favorite way to structure this is referring to Integral Life Practice. ILP creates balance
between mind, body, spirit, and shadow. Some examples for ILP include:

● Mind
 ○ Mind practices help your brain stay active and integrated as you develop. Study
the literature on places where you don’t feel naturally confident, such as
leadership, group management, nonviolent communication, etc. Write articles on
what you’ve discovered in your facilitation, or manuals such as this!
● Body
○ Keep active, both to manage your energy levels, to give yourself an outlet, to feel
more healthy, and the deal with stress. I follow my own felt sense on this one -
on any given day I might dance, bike, run, do acroyoga, or play around in a park
with friends. When I feel burnt out mentally or emotionally, it’s often a sign that I
need physical stimulation.
● Spirit
○ I conceptualize spirit practice as either something that keeps you connected to
yourself, to a sense of something higher - such as meditation or prayer - or as
self-fulfillment and self-care. My spirit practices include meditating; taking at
least one day every two weeks entirely off of work; hanging out with friends;
writing poetry in fancy dress at a steampunk bar; taking a bath with a glass of
wine and a few squares of chocolate; creating flash mobs; etc. Whatever feels
genuinely fulfilling to me and gives me energy back can count as my spirit
practice. In the same line, anything that allows me to give back to the wider spirit
of the world, like leading Authentic Relating Games, is also a practice in this
area.
● Shadow
○ Shadow practices help explore subconscious reality. Good practices include
therapy, journaling, some forms of meditation, and getting circled.

That’s all, folks. Forming and leading authentic community has been one of the greatest joys in
my life, and I wish you the best in guiding your own. If you want further assistance, feel free to
contact me at ​sara@authrev.com​. I can’t wait to see what you create!!
A Map of Community

Basic Needs ​– ​Sustainable Community

The social, environmental, and economic necessities for creating a living community. Includes

strategies for physiological need fulfillment, ways to translate personal energy into tangible resources,

development of a common vision, and a “membrane” for inclusion or exclusion of potential members.

Structure and Agreements ​– ​Intentional Community

The scaffolding on which a community is created and grows. This includes common agreements,

clear roles and responsibilities, separation of personal and private business, member accountability,

meeting structure, rules around decision-making, and community outreach.

Interpersonal ​– ​Authentic Community

The glue that holds us together. Interpersonal communication includes formats for relating and

ways to resolve conflict, as well as skills of self-awareness, personal agency, curiosity, appreciation of

others, and the ability to speak the truth.

Interperspective ​– ​Integral Community

The personal and interpersonal development that allows us to become greater together than we

are apart. Includes exploration of personal patterns and needs, development of a sense of self independent

of one's roles or others' opinions, awareness of context, the ability to take on other perspectives, and a

look at community needs from different levels of development.