How we will build our Butterfly Communities?

How can we meet the people that resonate with our values and worldview?

We can significantly alter the probabilities to meet such people through choices we make on a daily basis. Let us talk about “shaping serendipity through open-story” (the whole article is adapted after John Hegel).

At the beginning let us address the concept of “shaping serendipity”. We will focus on a specific form of it: unexpected encounters with others who could become co-creators with us. We can increase the probability of that kind of serendipity through a wide range of choices. We could choose environments and actions that increase the likelihood of such encounters: live in a big city, travel, engage in different projects, events, festivals, initiate your own blog, your own projects, be more open to new people or ideas, etc.

Let us talk about the power of stories. In general, stories are self-contained: they have a beginning, a middle and an end. Stories are about the storyteller or about some heroes, but they are not about you, the listener.

Open-Stories are open-ended: there is no resolution yet. There is some kind of opportunity in the future and it is not clear whether it will materialize or not. The resolution of the open-story hinges on you, the listener: the resolution depends in part on the choices you will make and the actions you will take. An open-story (an open-project) is a call to action directed at the listeners, stressing the role that they can and need to play in resolving the story. Effectively framed open-stories are designed to inspire and motivate others to come together to accomplish something that none of us could fully accomplish on our own.

Serendipity is shaped in part by the ability to attract others, to draw people to us that we never knew existed and that we had no idea could join us in bringing forth the world we want to live in.

How can we harness that ability to attract others?

We need to frame an open-project that will motivate people to seek us out.

That requires a project that is deeply meaningful not just to ourselves, but to others as well. It is also important to identify an opportunity that can be shared by others. It needs to be not just about something that will benefit me, but something that we can all benefit from.

It will be even more powerful if the opportunity grows as more and more people join the quest to achieve the opportunity. That way, we are not just sharing a smaller and smaller piece of a fixed pie, but the pie is growing as participation grows. This provides a powerful sense of shared interest: the more who join us, the bigger and more attractive the opportunity becomes. Butterfly Communities Open-project it is exactly about this. Word will spread rapidly that there is an opportunity really worth pursuing. People are likely to surface from unexpected places, seeking to learn more about the opportunity and how they can participate.

An open-story is a powerful call to action, because it is a transparent invitation toward collaboration from equipotent positions. Not only are people motivated to seek us out, they are more likely to share ideas with us because there is a level of trust that invites true cooperation and sharing.

There is a third element of open-stories that helps to enhance the potential for serendipity: they encourage new ideas. An open-project could frame an opportunity with enough specificity to be credible and inspiring, but it doesn’t develop the opportunity in such detail that there is nothing left to be said.

The most inspiring open-projects are those that invite exploration of the full richness of that opportunity and co-creation of the opportunity as it emerges and evolves. Easily, you can understand that Butterfly Communities is such an open-story: We thought of its basic principles and outlined its basic organization, but the whole development of the project, how it will really unfold, its details – all depend on you: on those who will join it with their ideas and creativity.

Open-projects also leave a large open space regarding the detailed actions required to achieve the opportunity: there is an invitation to join in crafting approaches that can have a greater impact on achieving the opportunity and learning from the experiences to date. Open-projects represent an invitation to contribute ideas at multiple levels, both in developing a deeper understanding of the opportunity ahead and in evolving more and more effective approaches to achieve that opportunity. As a result, people are motivated to exercise imagination and creativity even before they connect with others to pursue the opportunity. When they show up, they often have ideas that they want to share because they have already been inspired to come up with those ideas. Those initial conversations can generate a lot of new insights on both sides because everyone is motivated to seek out ways to achieve even more impact. Open-projects have the potential to build a deeper, long-term meaningful relationship as we join together to pursue that inspiring opportunity.

In framing an open-story that can be a true catalyst for others and in joining this kind of open-projects there is always a “First Threshold” we have to cross. It is about the real threshold we have to cross as individuals: from individualistic to cooperative ways of living. All of us have to join on a “heroic journey” to address an opportunity that extends beyond our narrow self-interest and beyond our individualistic life strategies.

We acknowledge that we alone cannot achieve this opportunity and that we alone don’t have all the answers. We understand that only together could we fulfill this opportunity. The rewards, though, could be enormous. We could achieve an opportunity that would have been beyond our reach if we sought to pursue it on our own, an opportunity that is likely to be even bigger as more participants join in the quest. On the way, we could build a rich network of enduring relationships with people who share our passion for the opportunity and who are committed to work together to achieve something that is truly inspiring, forward-looking.

Inspired by many people, I crafted an open-project that could be meaningful for most of us. Beyond all the destructions and dysfunctionalities, I see a way forward and a great opportunity: to reverse the social dissolution process. Let’s enhance the mutual-consistency between us. This is what Butterfly Communities is all about.

We are called to co-create the future of human civilization.

First of all, we have to imagine one. Then we have to believe it is possible to bring it forth. We can’t follow our allurements without a kind of belief. If we will choose to be honest with ourselves and follow our allurements, we will evolve. Something greater than us is calling us to evolve. Something greater than us is coming to life. It is our turn to enter the Story and become one of its heroes.