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The Communities (Life Cycle) Matrix has been requested from places like Australia, Morocco, France, South Africa, New Zealand, Ukraine, Canada and the US. If you’ve found it to be useful for getting you &/or community to better understand itself, we’d love to hear about it.

One thing I didn’t mention at the Forum was how communities often see themselves with a much more critical eye than those from outside the community. Like families, we tend to beat ourselves up over our shortcomings. Interestingly though, when asked to describe themselves, we’ve found that communities list 3 to 12 times as many assets as liabilities. I liken this to the ‘zit effect’ - being in high school & having a pimple we think everyone else notices. It affects our whole day & we forget that our friends, parents & teachers don’t even notice it. Yet, it can become paralyzing for us. Communities have to learn to get beyond this ‘zit effect’ and focus on their assets.

Mike

Mike Stolte
Executive Director, CIEL
http://www.theCIEL.com

MikeStolte - Mar 26, 2008 11:28am

One thing I didn’t mention at the Forum was how communities often see themselves with a much more critical eye than those from outside the community. Like families, we tend to beat ourselves up over our shortcomings. Interestingly though, when asked to describe themselves, we’ve found that communities list 3 to 12 times as many assets as liabilities.

Mike Stolte
Executive Director, CIEL
http://www.theCIEL.com

Mike, I appreciate your analogy of the town of Salmo at the retreat. The issue I continue to see is a severe lack of volunteer effort in the community and the abuse of a few select persons. After a while, some of the abused people get tired and move on. How can we empower our entire community to become the volunteer force that pulls the community forward?

I really would like to see more people aware and involved in our communities.

Duane Waller,
Sutherlin Class.