Rewilding Agreements: the Accord
Old English, “ácordan”, to accord, agree, reconcile (to reestablish a close and consistent relationship between).
I recently picked up Stewart Levine’s book, the Book of Agreement, and felt shocked - somebody had actually written about the “culture of agreement” that I’ve worked so hard to encourage in the circles in my life! What a relief. It has inspired me to write about this culture that I value so much.
We have so many traditions, cast aside hither and thither in the mad rush of “progress” to the modern era of abject american cultural poverty (I used to call it “spiritual poverty”…I still don’t feel totally satisfied on how to articulate our peculiar brand of glittery privation, emotional scarcity, and intangible inner destitution). The tradition of making clear, compassionate, wise accords, based on the world we want to create and experience together, falls among them. Instead, in the modern world, we create agreements of protection, those designed to help us experience as little harm as possible.
Relearning to reach an accord through agreements takes us closer to that place, of “oneminded” power/unity. That feeling of standing shoulder-to-shoulder with other adults, who inspire pride in us that we can call them friends, family, kindred.
How many activist movements, families, business, and other modern social groups, fall apart through infighting and politics? How many stay somehow half-alive, teetering on the verge of imploding? How many people do we know, keeping their nose to the grindstone, with a steady muttered refrain of discontent, disconnection, and intermittent despair?
Every single one of us, constantly make and renew agreements, implicit (articulated only on the inside), or explict (discussed out loud between each other). In every generation, we must remake this culture all over again, from scratch. A culture without a new generation, agreeing to its principles, means a culture on its deathbed. It takes tremendous work, tremendous energy inputs, extensive institutions of schools, government, law enforcement, to make this happen for the modern world.
We remake this culture, by assenting to abide by its implict or explict demands for accords. Often, by keeping these accords taboo, unarticulated, and invisible, this culture accomplishes the magician’s trick of having us hand over our souls, heart’s-ease, and life-purpose, for no more than dust, hollow dreams, and fragments of a life worth living. We see the rotten deal only when we can actually, finally, see it.
This stems from the entrapping and complex web of secular puritanism, in which we strive to accomplish a variety of things, trusting that since other people claim to value them (without ever explaining why), we must want them too. That in our rush to achievement we have no time for petty things like our “inconvenient” needs, and “intangible” feelings, since everybody else seems embarrassed by them too. We often can react in jealousy and rage when someone else stands up for what they so desperately need - for why should they get it, “if I can’t have it”. Except who exactly told me I couldn’t?
In order to find ourselves again, we must tug on the tangled strings of our own needs and feelings, finding our way back to heart’s-ease and life purpose, even amidst a natural world under siege. To make room for this work, and to live lives together worth having, we relearn to make accords. In making accords, we discover the deep nature of conflict, that of abundant energy for change and growth.
Instead of fearing conflict, we learn to revel in it as an opportunity to reconcile even deeper, to renew bonds of collaboration, friendship, and family. We plan ahead, and make a place for conflict, knowing that whether we will or no, it will soon arrive. If we welcome it, it will stoke the hearth fire of our community. If we resist it, its flames will burn, smolder, reawaken, blackening the timbers of our lives, house by house, until we finally consent to embrace its message.
May 22nd, 2008 at 9:43 am
Willem,
I have been enjoying your work here for a few weeks or more, and have blogged about it. I really am encouraged by your endeavor to articulate these all-too-hidden aspects of maturing as individuals and groups. I enjoy being privy to your burgeoning awareness as you articulate the insights you are experiencing. I thank you.
May 22nd, 2008 at 11:45 am
Thanks so much Abdallah! I always love to hear when these things matter to other folks too. In truth, despite my frustration at times, the “hidden-ness” of these things make them all the more interesting.
May 23rd, 2008 at 7:24 am
Sorry for the dumb sounding question, but which “hidden” things are you referring to in these comments? I’m not exactly clear on it. I think I can respond but I don’t want to go off on a tangent because I misunderstood. Do you mean society’s hidden agenda or the hidden-ness of the alternatives that we have?
May 23rd, 2008 at 1:57 pm
No problem, Billy - by “hidden” I mean, “hidden in plain sight”. Valuable things that you cannot touch, or hold, or sell, that don’t have physical weight or dimension, and hence few see value in them. They seem superfluous to modern eyes, which can happily consume physical objects of a spiritual nature; rattles, drums, sweatlodges, masks, pipes, but these eyes almost literally can’t see the invisible things that those objects point to. Making the objects no more than toys and curiosities, rather than powerful instruments of long-term survival.
Now you’ve got me thinking. We have physical technology (fire kits, traps, bow and arrow, hides), which mostly ensure short-term survival. Then we have invisible technology (clarity and commitment processes, associative thinking, storytelling), which mostly ensure long-term survival. Maybe that explains it a bit.
Anyway, yes, the “hidden-ness of the alternatives that we have”.
I suppose I could’ve just said that.
May 24th, 2008 at 7:40 am
Thanks Willem. I’m not sure how to put this in words. I often have to go back and edit things after I post them but I don’t think I can do that here so you may get a “rough draft” of what I mean to say.
I’m finding in recent years I am coming to some understandings that I don’t think I would have been able to get when I was younger. Things that seem to require a certain level of life experience almost as a prerequisite.
In a way, I could see them as being hidden or things that nobody talks about. Sometimes I find myself trying to pass something on to a younger person in the hopes of saving them some of the trouble that I had in learning and it backfires on me. I’m sure it has a LOT to do with a lack of skill on my part, but I also think that some things will only be understood when a person has the necessary prerequisites. Our elders have found that out already, so they let things unfold in the their natural course. These things aren’t hidden from anyone who is capable of understanding them.
I have also seen something that I mentioned a while back. That some of the younger people are coming to these understandings earlier in their lives than their parents could have. Just as their parents were able to do. I was able to stand on the foundation that my mother made for me and my children have started from a place that I made for them and I can see my grandchildren already benefitting from not having to begin where my mother did.
So Willem, are you saying that you are only now able to have these understandings? That these things were never hidden but your ability to see them has just developed? That’s what has happened for me. Some of it I can look back and see that I have understood it and lived it for a long time but was just not able to articulate it. Some of it is new revelations.
May 24th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
I’d say the two march hand-in-hand - both my ability to see, and also the deception of “pay no attention to that man behind the curtain” that our culture perpetrates.
I’ve had several folks, decades older than me, who have declared their investment in “eldering ways”, tell me that they don’t see the value in some of these things I talk about.
This does make me think that our cultural shell game of material happiness and puritanism partially intends to make it more difficult for an adult to fully realize their adulthood.
In fact, these things almost seem to scare folks at times; as if, once they can see something clearly, then they’ll have to make a conscious choice about something painful, so why would they want to see it clearly?
All this simultaneously feeds into one’s own readiness, I agree. Like we’ve talked about before, a member of this culture needs to “hit their bottom” before they will care enough to kick their addiction to enslaved and domesticated ways of living. Maybe that signals one’s readiness for adulthood, more than anything else!!
Thanks Billy for your thoughts!
May 24th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
“I’ve had several folks, decades older than me, who have declared their investment in “eldering ways”, tell me that they don’t see the value in some of these things I talk about. ”
I’m definitely not an elder, but I’m really enjoying the things you have been writing about here lately. I think it’s some pretty inspired stuff.
I just wish I could sit down and have a good visit with you in person.
May 24th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Haha! Me too. Someday…!
As far as my inspirations lately, yeah, boy do I feel blessed. This kind of thing, the “long term survival” stuff, really makes me come alive. I still think about your “Bob” story a lot. As far as my inspirations, we’ll see what comes next! I have a feeling more good stuff awaits my readiness…