Weave - Self & Web

Welcome to the Weave!

Woven Web is a community rooted in Boulder Colorado and reaching beyond, with a deeply held vision for a more connected world. We seek to find greater harmony between technology, society, and nature through facilitating communication and understanding and developing systems for connection.

In this Weave

• Self & Web (A personal reflection)

• Coming Up in Community

Self & Web (A personal reflection)

The world seems to be constantly arguing these days about whether individualism or communalism is right. Rarely do we stop to ask ourselves whether we’re even asking a useful question. Perhaps it’s not the individual or the community that is the problem, perhaps the problem lies in the ‘ism’, the idea that we need to choose between this or that, the idea that we need to be right and the other needs to be wrong. It seems to me the balance actually lies somewhere in the middle, in which we can embrace aspects of both perspectives. After all, when we get down to it, we are communal individuals. If we’re interested in understanding and participating harmoniously in this web of life, it seems that we need to understand what it means to be a self in relation. We’re not isolated individuals as we’ve been largely conditioned to believe, but rather we are in relationship, with one another within this wider web. Understanding ourselves well involves participating in our relationships and participating in our relationships well involves understanding ourselves.

Woven Web is not a typical organization by any means. Most everyone who is playing an active role in our organization is simultaneously playing other meaningful roles in our larger community; facilitating more connected neighborhoods, supporting systemic change in our education systems, advancing conversations around regeneration and politics, and much more. We also all make time to collaborate on Woven Web projects, such as developing an app to support more spontaneous gathering, planning a game to support more connected communities, and facilitating convergences that support meaningful dialogue and networking. All of this is woven web work, whether it's contained within the membrane of this organization or not, it's all part of helping to bring about a more connected, inclusive and harmonious world.

If we become too fixated on our ideas of what should be - such as on our ideas of what an organization or our role in an organization should look like - then we begin to miss the necessary flexibility that enables us the kind of meaningful participation the world needs. With Woven Web, we're working to create the right conditions for real connection and collaboration to happen. Both within our organization and within the wider world in which we're participating. This is why it feels really important to not try too hard to "shape" this organization into a particular idea, but rather to listen and give space for it's emergence, and to actively participate in that emergence.

It's been a really interesting experience for me, stepping into this role of executive director, and helping this organization to find its form. I've been blessed with many co-creators who are helping to not only give it form but to bring substance into that form through their unique contributions, both within the organization and beyond. Being in this leadership role has also given me an opportunity to understand myself in new contexts; not only do I get to engage in a lively and connected playground of exploring what enables a healthy organization and a healthy community, but I get to explore who I am within that and what it looks like for me to lead and participate well.

I feel that what enables any living system, or at least any human system (such as an organization, a community, or an individual) to thrive is a coherent sense of meaning and an ability to integrate diverse parts together around this sense of meaning. I think this is what enables members of the Woven Web team to thrive in this context, because the work they are doing here is not separate from the work they are doing in other areas of their lives. One of our core members Savannah comes to mind here, who is engaging in very meaningful work with Cabin, fostering more connected neighborhoods around the world, including here in Boulder. Someone like Savannah has a clear sense of what kind of world she wants to help bring about and this enables her to contribute meaningfully to both Cabin and Woven Web, recognizing that it’s all connected. Savannah is playing a core role in helping us design an app to facilitate more connection in our community here and I'm tremendously grateful for her contributions, her presence, and her heart.

As for myself, much of my focus recently has been around living into this wisdom and weaving my contributions into a more coherent whole. I tend to be up to a lot in the world, and if I'm relating to everything as its own separate and isolated piece, which is how we're often conditioned to see things, it can become a lot to hold. But if I find ways for each piece to support and hold up other pieces, then there becomes an effortless and natural quality to what I'm doing. Woven Web is a nice meeting point for a lot of other work I'm up to in the world. I'm serving on the human relations commission with the city of Boulder where our function is to "foster mutual respect and understanding and to create an atmosphere conducive to the promotion of amicable relations among all members of the Boulder community". I'm heading back to school to study creative technology & design at CU Boulder, where this semester I'll be diving into case studies, design methods, and creative coding. And I'm also pouring myself into my writing, working on a few longer form essays and starting on a book as well. Each of these aspects has a home in Woven Web, although each one of these also has expression beyond Woven Web. Holding this balance feels essential for me to lead in a way that is both effective and sustainable.

Maintaining this balance feels like a constant process, but it's settling in a bit more now. I'm feeling really excited to get back into the school environment where I can focus more on cultivating my skills as a builder of technology, and I'm excited to build some momentum with this app a few of us are designing & developing, and to use it as a playground where I get to practice my skills. With my work at the human relations commission, I'm looking a lot at the need for better dialogue to address tensions in our community, and simultaneously I'm feeling new sparks of inspiration around returning to facilitating dialogue spaces with Woven Web, as we were doing earlier this year. And finally, I'm feeling really stoked about growing as a writer. Having the consistency of sharing with all of you once a week has been incredibly supportive for my growth process there, and one thing that is emerging now is the desire to slow down and allow for a bit more gestation between these "weaves" I've been sharing, and to also put a bit more focus on some longer form essays I'm writing, which tie into the work we're doing with Woven Web, and also extend beyond it.

With that said, I do have a little announcement to add in here. I'll be switching these weaves to every other week for now, as I give space to let these diverse areas settle into more balance in my life. Although with all of the creative agency that's being expressed by different members of Woven Web, and also with the systems we're starting to develop to enable us to operate more coherently, perhaps we'll see something new emerge here soon, a new form of the "Weekly Weave" that involves even more of us here within this web... Only time will tell, but perhaps in sharing this, some sparks of inspiration will ignite in one of us or in many of us and will dance forth into interaction…

Coming Up in Community

• 8/23 4pm @ Downtown Longmont - Unity in the Community

• 8/24 4pm @ The Hill - On the Rise Concert Series

• 8/24 5pm @ Growing Gardens - Farm Gala

• 8/25 10am @ The Riverside - Riverside Brunch

• 8/27 4pm @ Junkyard Social - Creating Connections

• 8/27 6pm @ A State of Mind Healing Center - Drop in Meditation

• 8/30-9/1 7pm @ Museum of Boulder - Sans Souci Festival

• 9/4 630pm @ Junkyard Social - Ecologically-Embedded Ethics

• 9/5-9/8 @ TicoTime Aztek, NM - Unison Festival

• 9/6 8pm @ Fox Theatre - River Mann w/ Clay Rose, Von Disco

• 9/7-9/8 @ VisionQuest Brewery - Community Roots Art Festival

• 9/8 7am @ Benson Lawn - Buffalo Bicycle Classic

• 9/12 6pm @ Founder Central - Boulder New Tech Climate Night

• 9/13-9/15 @ Downtown Boulder - Fall Fest

• 9/13-9/15 @ Roots Music Project - Streetwise Mural Fest

• 9/13-9/15 @ Boulder Public Library - Jaipur Literature Festival

Thanks for tuning in. Reply to this email and let us know what you’re thinking and how you’d like to engage. And forward this email to someone who you’d like to participate more in community with!

See you in the web,

~ aaron gabriel & woven web