Fwd: [ncal-talk] Re: [ncal-info] NorCal Needs More Open Circles

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Taylor Fogelquist

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May 17, 2019, 2:20:02 PM5/17/19

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Interesting take on open igroups etc...per our June 20 discussion.

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Randall Larson-Maynard <randalllar...@mkp.org>
Date: Wed, May 8, 2019 at 9:00 AM
Subject: [ncal-talk] Re: [ncal-info] NorCal Needs More Open Circles
To: NCal Talk <ncal...@mkpconnect.org>, <ncal...@mkpconnect.org>
Cc: Peter Karp <plk...@gmail.com>

Men

My 2-cents...

I talk/text/email every man that goes through an NCal NWTA. I always encourage men to got to an igroup before they attend the NWTA; I state it to them, it's in the confirmation email I send each initiate.

I believe this is a HUGE step to helping men continue the work that is stirred up on the NWTA. I described it yesterday to a Warrior brother...it's like having 50 men push you off a cliff and 8 men catch you. It is a lot to ask a man to find a group after the NWTA; splattered on the rocks, below. We have all been there. It's disorienting and to have a group to "fall" into is, to me, a must.

Peter Karp is awesome at following up with men I send his way, BUT, if the circle is closed, what are we to do. How do I tell a man that the follow-up we say we provide is not available to him?

My challenge is to all 56 igroups, and any that start from here on out, is that they be open, period. Open means:

Dropping the story that having closed group is safer or necessary or....; every story is mostly myth we use to protect us from a fear (fear is another story we make up, too). Look deeply and you will see it is a myth.
Opening our arms and hearts to every man; all the time.
Show a new man what trust looks like..."come sit with us; we trust you from the start and you can trust us."
No new man shows up alone. He has an "escort" man that comes with him or meets him there...walks him into and through the night. That would mostly fall on the man he contacts about the circle.
Trusting that this will be a gift for you and him.
Trusting that you might less than 4 visitors a year; is that too hard to accommodate?

Here are some simple guidelines for a new man, a visitor:

Visitors must have a man with him the first night.
The escort will notify the group that a visitor is coming; your group decides on how far in advance.
Visitors can then come any night as long as notice is given to the group.
Visitors may ask questions and may pass at any time; or just sit silently and observe without judgement from any group man.
Visitors are told that at some point they may be asked to step outside because a man needs to do work and this will help him get it done; he does not go outside alone.
Do a regular meeting. No holds barred, do it all. Be ready to teach as you go, but do it all. Trust that this is what he needs.
Offer that this group is for him, from here on out, if he so desires.

NCal has always been an i group-cultured MKP Area. Bob Morrison and others pushed this early on and I believe it's why we have 56 circles and such a beautiful community of men.

Open your circle today...yeah, I am pretty much beggin' you.

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Register for a Northern California NWTA @ https://nwta.mkp.org/how-do-i-register
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Randall Larson-Maynard; ManKind Project NCal Enrollment Coordinator
530-219-7630 (cell/text OK); RandallLar...@mkp.org
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On 5/8/2019 7:05 AM, Bill Davies wrote:

Men,

NorCal needs more open circles in the MKP model. I am picking my words carefully but when I use the phrase “Open Circle” that means you promote your group on something like MeetUp and your group is open to any man who wants to visit. You may still have a pre-screening routine, or not. While you could have a co-ed group or some hybrid of an I-group, that is not within the MKP wheelhouse and so I do not count those within this request.

Example: https://www.meetup.com/Palo-Alto-Self-Improvement-Meetup-for-Men

What I have found is that some groups are open 3x per month and then retain one session per month for “closed” deeper work. There’s obviously a trade-off between always having new guys in the circle, vis a vis what you might get done if you had a completely closed container. On the other hand, there’s also personal growth in dancing with men you don’t know and seeing what that brings up for you.

MKP *does* have a nationwide-Meetup Pro account; regretfully groups need to pay the monthly fee themselves, this is not provided by MKPUSA. I think it also works better to have a stable meeting place, since it is hard to publicize something that moves around.

AND one of the proven ways to introduce more men to MKP has been shown to be open circles. Roughly 1/3 of NWTA attendees have started in an I-group, and some percentage of those were from open circles. We also have men coming off our very successful NWTAs this year who are saying that every group they contact has been full, or not open to new men.

So I am going to encourage and ask that our 56 NorCal I-groups figure out how they can dance with this, making space for new men, or even strangers, in a good way.

Best way to kick this around is to speak to groups that are doing this and get best practices (my data based on conversations with Rusty Gaillard and Ryan Blum-Krystal) and/or talk to our I-Group Coordinator Peter Karp who has oversight of our I-Group community. Here’s to getting more Open Circles going!!

Bill

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