Visioneering is the process by which you pursue turning your dream or idea into action. It is the process whereby ideas and convictions take on substance. The movement towards our vision can be powerful and life giving, as it often can breath purpose into our lives. You may have heard someone say 86 it, which means throw it out. At the Grove we say 96 it, which means to create it. I believe that permissioning others to create in an atmosphere that feels like an experimental laboratory empowers people to take risks with their idea and begin to engineer their vision.

I have heard it said that dreams are for daydreamers who sit and think through the shoulda’s, coulda’s, and woulda’s, without ever actually experiencing or pursuing a mission; however, dreams can be engineered. We must not allow our dreams and ideas to be aborted without attempting to engineer a way for a dream or an idea to be tried.

Often we put more effort on the thinking and less on the doing. I have found that you can’t think your way into right action; you must act your way into right thinking. This odd statement has been a strand of thought for me for some time now. When you do all the right things and you work hard in life, you can still come up short. Often we presume that if we can think it, we will be able to do it. I think that being able to see it makes it possible to do it. This statement simply says that good ideas grow into tangible realities the more we work at testing and acting on them. It calls for action, and reminds us that there is no shortcut if we are going to make good on our ideas.  As long as it stays in the thought realm, we will not be able to see it.

At the Grove, we are working with others who have a dream, and who want to begin making good on that initiative. One exciting development has been the new Create96 initiative. Jeff and Mason, two individuals who co-work at the Grove, launched this creative movement. Recently the two of them put out a challenge. They developed a “30 in 30 Challenge Board” and asked people to create one thing in the next 30 days.  Those who take on the challenge can build, paint, design, make, assemble, write, draw, record or do whatever it takes to create the item. Transformation through creation is their big idea. The power of this simple challenge is to move others to action. Jeff and Mason are helping people create and this is unlocking the creativity that often gets set aside and hinders the design steps we need to engineer our dream or idea.

Taking hold of a vision and beginning to work it is how we begin to see what it will be. The next time you have an idea or a dream do something, risk something and just go for it. Maybe Jeff and Mason can challenge you to create something as a first step to unlocking your visioneering skills.

A few weeks ago I set out on an experiment. I had a burning question – I had an itch that needed to be scratched. I was asking the question, Can the dreams of everyday citizens transform a city? I wanted to listen to others tell me their dreams. I asked a question, Can storytelling remake a city by making dreams come true? To find out, all I needed to do was create a way for those stories to be captured, permission people to dream big dreams, and build a system for people dreaming similar dreams to connect and begin to collaborate together to see those dreams realized. I believe  more is possible when our dreams collide.

My good friends at Ripple 100 decided to team up with me, and together we set out to tackle this idea. We built a website that people can visit and upload a video sharing the dream they carry. Many people have shared their dreams and told their stories, and now we are beginning to invite people to connect and collaborate together. I believe that its possible to transform culture if we change the way we problem solve. When people are given a chance to work together, they can find solutions to the systemic issues that clutter the landscape of our cities. Allowing others to dream unlocks possibilities.

The mechanism for incubating these dreams is The Grove, a co-working space in our city that I helped launch in the fall of 2010. The Grove is positioned to be a place where ideas and people can work together and find real support in the process of finding sustainable ways to make good on their ideas. We call this” social innovation”.  I define social innovation to mean: A novel solution to a social problem that is more effective, efficient, sustainable, or just than existing solutions and for which the value created accrues primarily to society as a whole rather than private individuals. To this end we are helping to grow a movement in our city.

At the Grove we define the social value created as the creation of benefits or reductions of costs for society. A social innovation can be a product, production process, or technology (much like innovation in general), but it can also be a principle, an idea, a piece of legislation, a social movement, an intervention, or some combination of them. Indeed, many of the best recognized social innovations, such as micro-finance, are a combination of a number of these elements.

The work of stewarding the real dreams or ideas of citizens for social impact is a task worthy of my efforts. I aim to see if collaboration across multiple sectors of society can create social value in our city. I want to foster the ‘social mission sector’ – an umbrella term used to describe the individuals and organizations whose primary mission is to produce some benefit for people and planet. Our social mission community includes individuals,  nonprofits, for-profits, entrepreneurs and individuals working for change. Please follow our progress via Twitter #DreamNHV. or visit our website at www.dreamnhv.com Dreaming is good, not living our dreams is bad.

Redefine Christmas is a movement that re-imagines the way we look at gift giving during the holidays. In addition to the things we enjoy shopping for and giving every year, we often feel compelled to spend money and time on gifts with little meaning. These are often gifts which are soon forgotten. Rather than giving in to the convention of giving, we can give out – by redirecting some of that money to charity.

At the end of the flash mob, a girl handed me a white gift box, smiled and said pass this gift on. I opened the gift box and found that I was given a “Give Now” card so that I could give the $25.00 amount to a charity of my choice. Statistics show that the average American family gives only 3.2% of their income to charity. The consumer driven pressure we feel to spend more than we have needs to be tamed by increasing our giving in more intentional ways. Giving to charities that work hard to care for those caught in the margins is one way to redefine Christmas and restore its real meaning.

Christmas is about the birth of Jesus. When Jesus loved, He loved in ways never imagined. Though rich, he became poor to love the poor, the forgotten, the overlooked and the sick. He played to the margins. By spending less at Christmas we have the opportunity to join Him in giving resources to those who need help the most. As we redefine Christmas, my family is going to give one less gift this Christmas, and instead give that amount we would have spent to join with others in giving to provide for those who need our help the most.

In my city of New Haven, we helped open a storefront downtown during the Holiday season. We invited over 30 local charities to display information about their charity as a way to help daily shoppers realize the work being done by so many non-profits in our city. We call our store front the “I Love Greater New Haven Nonprofits” Boutique. At this boutique you can review and select from the work of dozens of local non-profits to which you can make a donation in appreciation of your special someone. This is but another way I am trying to redefine Christmas this year. I encourage you to join us and give to a local charity through www.redefinechristmas.org , and if you live in New Haven, stop in and visit our boutique at 71 Orange St, New Haven, Ct 06510.

A dream is never realized outside of a community of friends and supporters who help to validate it. In our individualistic self made culture surrounded by the quiet isolation that robs us of our ideas, we need others. Others help us become what we cant become alone. I appreciate the love and friendship of many people who worked along side of me to ideate, design, construct, and imagine the way ahead. Some even gave financially to help us fill in the gaps. With out the help of those who believe in the dream its near impossible to see it realized.

The evolution of my dream took real perseverance. I can confess that there where many days that I wanted to give up and walk away. I couldn’t walk away because to do so would mean walking away from me. When the harsh reminders of failure linger near, the work of our dreams need to be rooted in ones identity. What I am trying to say here is dreaming someone elses dream is not sustainable. What we do should flow from who we are. Dreams are possible when they are our own dream. When a controlling idea gives birth to a dream, and the dream is yours, the contribution it is to others and society in general is hard to walk away from. Seeing a dream realized takes perseverance.  St. Francis of Assisi said, “Start by doing what’s necessary; then do what’s possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.”

To day I am writing this blog post from inside the Grove while watching others work on their dreams. At the Grove we don’t just encourage community, we depend on it! The energy of our space comes from those exceptional people who visit and work here every day. My dream has now become a collective idea that could not have been discovered alone. Co-creating brings a life that is larger than our singleness has to offer. The Grove proved that more is possible together than alone. Members at the Grove are value-driven, collaborative people building innovative solutions for a radically better world. They come from every profession, background and culture, work in non-profits, for-profits, or the many shades in-between, and bring in diverse skills, tools, and experiences – yet, what unites them is their intent, passion and commitment to make a positive difference and tackle pressing issues in a collaborative fashion.

Dreaming is good…not living the dream is bad.

This summer I led over 100 individuals on pilgrimage to Alaska, Nova Scotia and my own city of New Haven. I can say that my hope each summer to see individual lives experience personal transformation is never disappointed. Each year I have the privilege of working with an amazing travel company my friend Shawn Small launched 10 years ago. His company is called Wonder Voyage. They are dedicated to providing unique, customized pilgrimages around the world. Working with Wonder Voyage I enjoy seeing people captured with a true sense of wonder. I love helping people learn how to live in the moment, and teaching them how to encounter a spiritual moment that invades their heart and profoundly alters their perceptions. With each spiritual encounter woven between those moments of wonder, individual walls come down and life rhythms begin to change so that life starts to appear new and fresh again. This summer of pilgrimage was truly filled with wonder.

The reason I invest my life leading others on a pilgrimage is captured in stories. I hear dozens of stories from those who travel with me. Those stories become, portraits of transformation. This summer I took Rev. Jessica Hitchcock from St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Bethesda Maryland to Nova Scotia. Shortly after returning home she shared this with her parish. “Last Tuesday, the St Luke’s pilgrims arrived home safely.  Tired, itchy, smelly, and changed.  Our time in Nova Scotia changed us, changed us as individuals and changed us as a community. We can tell you what we did and share pictures of what we saw, but all that happened in our hearts and souls – words will fail us.” She went on to say, “We learned to look for the wonderful during our time in Nova Scotia.  We taught our eyes and hearts to keep an eye out for those sudden moments of overwhelming peace or quiet joy.  We began to recognize the times that God draws extra close.”

That is what pilgrimage is for.  Pilgrimage is a time to get out of our stuck pattern of jumping from one thing to another, doing the task in front of us while planning and preparing for the task ahead.  Pilgrimage shows us what it is like to be in the moment.  It teaches us to be present and aware.  It helps us see all the many times God shows up in our lives.

Learning how to see with new eyes can bring perspective. Life can be filled with surprise and meaning when we learn to look at things in new ways. While in Alaska, we saw Bald Eagles, black bears from afar, and sea lions frolicking in the water.  But one pilgrim this summer had a rainbow knock on her window. Rev. Gini Gerbasi, from Christ Church Parish in Maryland, told this story of an encounter with a rainbow. Gini wrote, “It’s been raining pretty much the whole time we’ve been here.  Our first day was a mix – bursts of sun, drenching downpours, and gentle misting rain – God’s weather iPod stuck on ‘shuffle.’  ‘Typical Juneau summer’ we heard, but we were not concerned.  We had gear; we had clean, dry clothes.  It was Alaska, we were finally here after years of preparation, and we were not made of sugar, as my grandmother used to say. That was Monday.  Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday it poured.”

She went on to say, “I went to bed Friday night knowing that God had helped us find light and warmth and joy even in those cold, wet days together.  It seemed enough – more than enough really – it was everything I had hoped for our time together. This morning God literally smiled on us, and the sun rose at 3:00 a.m., pushing aside the cloud cover and filling the bay with its warm light.”

At 5:30, Winnie looked out, hearing something none of the rest of us heard.  “A rainbow knocked on my window,” she said simply.   “Good Lord, we don’t deserve this.  But God keeps knocking.”

Perspective makes room in our hearts to find what is often lost. Another year of leading pilgrims to wonderful places, and returning home tired yet filled with new strength and hope. God points to that area of human experience where in one way or another man comes upon mystery as a summons to pilgrimage. More travel awaits, and you are always welcome to join me on the road less traveled.

In the book we discover that “we all have dreams. We dream of falling in love, some dream of changing the world, yet unless we are prepared to live with meaning and direction we are not able to avoid the drift towards the merely acceptable.” As someone who is always working with others to land a new initiative, or find the courage to take a risk and go for their dream, I began to think about how to help others discover their story as a key to helping them unlock their missional contribution.

I invited twelve friends on a journey with me to explore this idea, my objective was to create a learning community that could help one another find the missing elements needed for the story they wanted to live.  The out come was amazing as we talked through our lives and borrowed from the elements any author would use in setting out to write a story. We started with the idea that “A story is a character that wants something and overcomes conflict to get it.” This required people to talk about the object of desire that they carried and the fight to overcome the conflict that kept them from achieving it. Writing your story isn’t about making your peaceful fantasies come true, the point of a story is the character arc. The conflict is what changes us.

We talked about how we fight the drift to give up on our stories? One of the story lab participants, Dave Henry said “Honestly, it’s the pull to settle and go the safe route Conversely; it’s also about committing. So, how am I fighting these? At this point, it’s simply being aware of the drift and inviting other people into the mix. I need others to be a part of my story, or the story is incomplete. Not that the story wouldn’t continue, but for it to be epic, it needs other people” As we pushed and pulled the ideas of story around we discovered that telling a story with our lives would mean that we as the Character in our story would ultimately be transformed by the living out of the story.

Because a character is what he does. It is important that we remember that we simply cannot just write our story we must live it. This is the exciting part because now we are 12 people committing to live intentionally. With that intentionality comes our contribution of gifts, talents, and abilities that when focused has the ability to broker transformation.  As we change we change the world and for me I want to help others make a commitment to the “God Seed” in them.

I am now beginning to offer story lab as a seminar for others in our city. This will be for those who want to develop a premise for their story and discover how their part is connected to the Meta narrative being told. The controlling idea for our personal story can really be a help to understanding our own vision and mission for our life. We will offer Story lab at the grove when it opens and we can deliver it to other intentional communities as well.

As the ball dropped in Times Square signifying the beginning of 2010, I felt something drop inside me. This year can’t be a repeat of last year. Many have expressed that sentiment to me as we collectively made a mad dash into this promising new year. The pressure of economics, mortgages, and for me the journey to redefine my missional work in New Haven as a not for profit, made for a tumultuous year. Last year felt like I was drowning, and we didn’t know how to keep our heads above the financial water line. As 2009 came to a close, we had made it, and it would be 28 days latter before I realized at what cost.

I was invited by a friend to experience a new ocean adventure called Snooba. This is a combination of snorkeling and scuba diving. My friend paid for our excursion and so I was up for the adventure. With my goggles and breathing respirator in place, a weight belt around my waist to help me submerge, and a pair of flippers to push me along under water at depths of nearly 20ft, we were off.   It was so peaceful, like being in another world, and one can easily forget how dangerous that world can be.

Nearly 15 minutes into our underwater adventure, I began to feel a bit anxious as my goggles had begun to fill with water. Forgetting where I was, I took off my goggles to try and clear them, but water started to fill my nose and I really started to panic. I started trying to get to the surface, but the weight belt kept holding me down. As I kicked hard, I jerked out my only life line – the oxygen flowing through my respirator.  Now I was drowning, and I only had minutes  to save myself.  As I fought to get to the water surface, I could only crack the surface long enough to grasp a shallow breath before slipping below again. I fought this for what seemed like minutes, but I grew tired.  Just as I was about to sink below again, the diving guide swam up behind me and lifted me up so I could breath again. A moment longer and it would have been too late.  On the beach I worked to collect myself, but the experience was too much to just push away. Over the next week I would begin to find meaning in that fateful day and the near death experience I had.

My life has always been rooted in a sense of  sonship with my Heavenly Father. I am his son, and in that I have always understood my identity and my contribution. As a father of 4, I understand what it means to provide for my children; however, I began to realize that in the deepth of economic despair and financial anxiety, I had fought my way up to the surface repeatly only to sink again. Just like in the water, it was my Father who got me through 2009.  Yet I forgot who I was and fought for my own survival.  As I slid into 2010, I was exhausted, afraid, and feeling vulnerable to a seemingly hopeless economic situation.  It took me standing on the beach safe and short of breath to realize that He alone is my source and my provision.

Moments in the space of time can serve as a sign post for our travels, and this experience below the ocean surface is one I carry like a weight belt around my waist. To know who we are and to know how we fit in God’s design brings a confidence when everything around us seems to be so unclear. Please know that the financial pressure still remains, yet I am teathered to my oxygen supply.  My prayer life has deepend and I am at peace. I am not sure what is next, but I do know that as I go, I go as a son and I trust my father with each new step.

There is an underlying magic to social innovation that precludes any simple recipe for success. The pursuit of ideas for a better world is the economy in which we work.  We often need a place to bring our ideas – a place to find new ideas and connect with others who are willing to collaborate. This is our opportunity to exchange ideas that can spark projects and launch transformational initiatives.

Our space doesn’t quite exist yet; however, come imagine the future with us, a transformed space where we make things happen. Space for meeting, working, reading, and using the tools needed to cultivate an idea, launch a project, host a meeting and operate a business. In this space we imagine that you will find a permanent project desk, a suite of computers with leading-edge software, a library of progressive books and journals, and walk-around phones with dedicated phone numbers. People will be able to utilize voice mail with no line rental, machines for printing, projecting, faxing, copying and high-speed wireless internet, and a server for backup and file sharing. In addition, there will be a program of seminars and evening gatherings designed to inspire and support people with progressive ideas to transform our world.

The current economic and employment crisis demands an innovative response that both addresses short-term problems and establishes a foundation for long-term solutions. We want to provide this space for our diverse community to utilize. This space is just one of our collective dreams. We desire to create events that generate ideas, create networks of collaboration, develop skills, and create learning communities. From high–energy, idea-generation gatherings, to cross-sector innovation labs, to conversational dinners, we aim to help cultivate ideas and dreams.

We want to support and launch sustainable solutions to complex social issues.  It is only when we bring together people working in different sectors, such as the arts, business, sciences, education, etc… around a complex issue that we can truly see systemic change and begin to transform our city. To accomplish this task, we have been learning about the innovation process.  Social innovation needs a conducive physical environment. Social innovators need actual spaces to spark, develop and apply their ideas. Without access to resources and support structures, even the best ideas have trouble taking flight. We will find ways to create and curate spaces that foster social innovation. We’ve learned that the best spaces are a mix of utility and community. When ‘bearing down’ and on the task at hand, social innovators need a functional work environment with reliable office infrastructure. By balancing these characteristics, we hope to create a dynamic that stimulates new ideas.

Finally, in addition to the physical space and a diverse mix of people, it is the interventions and learning opportunities that help to foster connections and stimulate new thoughts and ways of doing. From formal capacity-building workshops to informal social mixers and message walls, we apply devices that foster individual and collective growth and create an environment that produces original action. Our key is to adopt a light touch. We do not program with an expectation of uniform engagement. We offer opportunities for individuals to ‘find their own level’; to dip in and dip out of the community in a way they find comfortable and natural. And when a new idea begins to surface, that same gentle touch helps it to grow. This will be our role within the Grove: to animate the ideas that have developed in the spaces we have created, and to nurture a participatory culture where all members feel welcome to bring their ideas and to leave their fingerprints.

These are a few of our key learnings. We don’t for a moment pretend that these are the only factors or that we have mastered them, but our experience and trajectory tells us we are on the right path. We are committed to refining our theory and practice as social change agents. Keep watch as we work to find the capital to launch our next Groundworks initiative in New Haven. To learn more about the grove please visit www.grovenewhaven.com

I have been working with civic leaders, aldermen, and our urban neighborhood group called “Chatham Square Neighborhood Association”, to see our city come back from its decline.  It is hard to put your finger on the moment when it happened, but whenever the tipping point was, there is little doubt now that New Haven is a healthier, more prosperous, more fun, and a safer city than it has been in the memory of most. I was recently interviewed by the Yale University newspaper where I was asked to discuss how community mobilizing can be a catalyst for transformation. The story ran in the Yale newspaper recently and the article can be viewed here.  Click On The Link.

New Haven still resembles any number of post-industrial American cities: disproportionately poor, too much youth violence, and too few opportunities for the products of a broken public education system. Our communities are working together more, and each of our city’s successes to date have begun to instill a confidence among community leaders that even the remaining seemingly intractable problems might be addressed.

Cities change when people work together, engage the issues, and fight for real  change. Working as social missionaries, we have lived as missonal people working to help our neighborhood help itself grow stronger, healthier, more stable, more prosperous and more peaceful. Many stories have been written about the Chatham Square Neighborhood Association and the work we have been up to in our neighborhood. To read these stories Click On The Link. 

I believe that as we work to help people change, we should remember that the place we labor can change, too. Creation groans in eager expectation for God’s people to step up and meet the needs of the land in which we live. Working to change my city has changed me and helped me understand what Jesus meant when He said, “Go into the world and disciple the nations.”

The course was offered this year in New Haven. Mary Hui attended the course, taking the train up from New York City. The process she went through to help discover her story is still unfolding, which is common for most who embark on the “Makebelieve” journey. This is  a glance at the developing new story line that she is imagining for her future. Mary is leaving next month for Cambodia, a dream she thought was far away. Before this new story could be realized, she needed to “Makebelieve”.

“Sometimes I like to tell people that Makebelieve messed me up. I went to a great church, worked at a top economic consulting firm, and lived in the most glamorous city in the US. Yet, on the nights when I looked through the tall glass windows overlooking the bustling 6th Avenue in midtown, I was always reminded of a nagging sense of discontent. Though I may have acquired a variation of the “American Dream”, it was not my dream. It seemed apropos when a trusted friend suggested that I take the Makebelieve class. The class christened a new journey towards the fulfillment of a purposeful life with God through a community of believers.

If God gave me the pen to write the next chapter of my life, what would I write? How many of us are given this level of permission to dream? I remember one of my first impressions of the class was the freedom to imagine and to literally leave the worries of my world for that weekend and engage with the difficult questions of life. My problems would always be there but the free time to sit at the feet of God is precious and rare.

Most of us are afraid to examine our lives for fear of acknowledging that we are falling short of living the life we envisioned. Most of us may not have even spent time thinking about what we truly want out of life or who we are once our jobs, church and family traditions, and obligations have been stripped away. During our weekends in New Haven, we were challenged to push and pull what we believe, and answer difficult questions. How different would our lives be if we realize that God created us to be co-creators and active agents in this world? How would our lives transform if we realize that we can also bring about the Kingdom of God by living out the dreams and passions that God created within us?

In this process of discovering what I believe, God revealed to me a side of Him that calls me Beloved. The shear simplicity and unconditionality of this love is freeing me to live life creatively and boldly. I know that I am committed to God’s command to “act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with the Lord your God” from Micah. In our society where billboards tell us what we should eat and fashionistas advise us on what we need to wear, it is refreshing to stare the world and its invisible hand in the face and decide what is truth, what kind of job to have and how to be in relationship with people.

Through the Makebelieve course, I met fellow sojourners in this life. I am challenged to commit to communing with a group of believers, intimately. In January, I will be moving to a city in Cambodia which has been recovering from internal genocide. I will be working for a small company and making a little more than one-tenth of my previous salary. Yet, I am more excited about the journey with God and my new family than ever before.”

The vision we have will become the stories we live. Author Donald Miller wrote, “Our stories matter not just for us but for the world. A story is based on what people think is important, so when we live a story, we are telling the people around us what we think is important.” The story of our lives should reflect a truth that we live. The way we live tells the story of what we believe. When we begin to “Makebelieve” we start to reconcile the truth we believe with the life we always knew we wanted to live.