Creating a Life Together: Practical Tools to Grow Ecovillages and Intentional Communities / Cheap-Library.com
Creating a Life Together: Practical Tools to Grow Ecovillages and Intentional Communities
Diana Leafe Christian
$6.57 (USD)
Publisher:
Release date: 2003
Format: PDF
Size: 2.04 MB
Language: English
Pages: 272
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Creating a Life Together: Practical Tools to Grow Ecovillages and Intentional Communities Kindle Edition
by Diana Leafe Christian (Author), Patch Adams (Foreword)
4.8 out of 5 stars 54 ratings
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Length: 274 pages Word Wise: Enabled Enhanced Typesetting: Enabled
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Finding Community: How to Join an Ecovillage or Intentional CommunityKindle Edition
Diana Leafe Christian
4.7 out of 5 stars 111 offer from AUD 21.23
Creating a Life Together is the only resource available that provides step-by-step practical information distilled from numerous firsthand sources on how to establish an intentional community.
It deals in depth with
- structural,
- interpersonal and
- leadership issues,
- decision-making methods,
- vision statements, and
- the development of a legal structure, as well as
- profiling well-established model communities.
This exhaustive guide includes excellent sample documents among its wealth of resources.
Diana Leafe Christian is the editor of Communities magazine and has contributed to Body & Soul, Yoga Journal, and Shaman’s Drum, among others. She is a popular public speaker and workshop leader on forming intentional communities, and has been interviewed about the subject on NPR. She is a member of an intentional community in North Carolina.
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Editorial Reviews
Review
An intentional community is a group of people who have chosen to live or work together in pursuit of a common ideal or vision. An ecovillage is a village-scale intentional community that intends to create, ecological, social, economic, and spiritual sustainability over several generations.
The 90s saw a revitalized surge of interest in intentional communities and ecovillages in North America: the number of intentional communities listed in the Communities Directory increased 60 percent between 1990 and 1995.
But only 10 percent of the actual number of forming-community groups actually succeeded. Ninety percent failed, often in conflict and heartbreak.
After visiting and interviewing founders of dozens of successful and failed communities, along with her own forming-community experiences, the author concluded that "the successful 10 percent" had all done the same five or six things right, and "the unsuccessful 90 percent" had made the same handful of mistakes. Recognizing that a wealth of wisdom were contained in these experiences, she set out to distill and capture them in one place.
Creating a Life Together is the only resource available that provides step-by-step, practical "how-to" information on how to launch and sustain a successful ecovillage or intentional community. Through anecdotes, stories, and cautionary tales about real communities, and by profiling seven successful communities in depth, the book examines "the successful 10 percent" and why 90 percent fail; the role of community founders; getting a group off to a good start; vision and vision documents; decision-making and governance; agreements; legal options; finding, financing, and developing land; structuring a community economy; selecting new members; and communication, process, and dealing well with conflict. Sample vision documents, community agreements, and visioning exercises are included, along with abundant resources for learning more.
Review
"Before aspiring community builders hold their first meeting, confront their first realtor, or drive their first nail, they must buy this essential book: it will improve their chances for success immensely, and will certainly save them money, time, and heartbreak. In her friendly but firm (and occasionally funny) way, Diana Christian proffers an astonishing wealth of practical information and sensible, field-tested advice."
―ERNEST CALLENBACH, AUTHOR, ECOTOPIA AND ECOTOPIA EMERGING
"Wow! The newest, most comprehensive bible for builders of intentional communities. Covers every aspect with vital information and dozens of examples of how successful communities faced the challenges and created their shared lives out of their visions. The cautionary tales of sadder experiences and how communities fail, will help in avoiding the pitfalls. Not since I wrote the Foreword to Ingrid Komar's Living the Dream (1983), which documented the Twin Oaks community, have I seen a more useful and inspiring book on this topic."
―HAZEL HENDERSON, AUTHOR CREATING ALTERNATIVE FUTURES AND POLITICS OF THE SOLAR AGE .
"A really valuable resource for anyone thinking about intentional community. I wish I had it years ago."
―STARHAWK, AUTHOR OF WEBS OF POWER , THE SPIRAL DANCE , AND THE FIFTH SACRED THING , AND LONG-TIME COMMUNITY MEMBER.
"Every potential ecovillager should read it. This book will be an essential guide and manual for the many Permaculture graduates who live in communities or design for them."
―BILL MOLLISON, COFOUNDER OF THE PERMACULTURE MOVEMENT, AND AUTHOR, PERMACULTURE: A DESIGNER'S MANUAL
"Creating a new culture of living peacefully with each other and the planet is our number one need―and this is the right book at the right time. Creating a Life Together will help community founders avoid fatal mistakes. I can't wait to tell people about it."
―HILDUR JACKSON, COFOUNDER, GLOBAL ECOVILLAGE NETWORK (GEN); CO-EDITOR, ECOVILLAGE LIVING: RESTORING THE EARTH AND HER PEOPLE
" Creating a Life Together is a comprehensive, engaging, practical, well-organized, and thoroughly digestible labor of love. Hopefully scores of wannabe community founders and seekers will discover it before they launch their quest for community, and avoid the senseless and sometimes painful lessons that come from trying to reinvent the wheel. This book is a gift to humanity―helping to move forward the elusive quest for community, fueling a quantum leap towards a fulfilling, just, and sustainable future."
―GEOPH KOZENY, PRODUCER/EDITOR OF VIDEO DOCUMENTARY,"VISIONS OF UTOPIA: EXPERIMENTS IN SUSTAINABLE CULTURE"
"While anyone can build a village, a subdivision, or a housing development, the challenge is filling it with people who can get along, who can reach agreements, and who can achieve far more together than they ever could alone. If your aspiring ecovillage or intentional community gets even this far ― and this awesome book will show you how ― then maybe you have a realistic chance of living sustainably and, by example, of changing the world.My appreciation grows daily for this thorough, practical, and engaging guide."
―ALBERT BATES, DIRECTOR, ECOVILLAGE TRAINING CENTER, AND INTERNATIONAL SECRETARY, ECOVILLAGE NETWORK OF THE AMERICAS.
"Developing a successful community requires a special blend of vision and practicality woven together with wisdom. Consider this book a marvelous mirror. If the abundant, experience-based, practicality in this book delights you then you probably have the wisdom to realize your vision."
―ROBERT GILMAN, FOUNDING EDITOR OF IN CONTEXT, A QUARTERLY OF HUMANE SUSTAINABLE CULTURE, AND AUTHOR OF ECOVILLAGES AND SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES
"So many well intended communities fail because they don't even know the questions to ask, let alone where to find answers. This book offers a wealth of detailed information that will help guide communities to finding what is right for their specific situation, and greatly increase their odds of their success."
―KATHRYN MCCAMANT, COHOUSING RESIDENT, ARCHITECT, AND PROJECT MANAGER, AND AUTHOR OF COHOUSING
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Product details
File Size: 2445 KB
Print Length: 274 pages
Publisher: New Society Publishers (January 1, 2003)
Publication Date: January 1, 2003
More about the author
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Biography
Diana Leafe Christian is an author, former editor of Communities magazine, and nationwide speaker and workshop presenter on starting new ecovillages, on building communities, and on sustainability. She lives in an off-grid homestead at Earthaven Ecovillage in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, U.S.
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4.8 out of 5 stars
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Hopeful co-houser
4.0 out of 5 stars Building the human communityReviewed in the United Kingdom on February 29, 2016
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
If you have been involved in people-process for much of your life, (teacher, social worker, personnel manager etc) this book may 'only' consolidate many of your practices. But if, like me, coming from a technical background, with plenty of practical applied experience but with no formal people-skills training, this book was a revelation. It is very accessibly written, with exercises that could be used for self-realisation before trying them with other people. Although written for the North American market, almost all the information can be readily "translated" to the UK, though our planning and legal systems are very different. But the legal concerns that are raised in the book would be raised here, and it is useful to consider the type of questions that could arise before consulting a lawyer. The human development work is the really valuable part.
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Michael Layden
5.0 out of 5 stars Herding Rabbits.Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 20, 2011
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
One of the great problems of Environmentalists,Alternative types and sustainability gurus are that they are often the greatest individualists and independent thinkers. This can make them unsuitable for establishing working communities which have to cope with simple everyday concerns.
Almost by definition anyone who is able to look at their society and understand the insanity of the world is not a group thinker. Starting a community with hyper individualists who are natural contrarians is a lot like herding rabbits. Impossible in an open space but somewhat possible if there are some boundaries to channel their hyper activity.
This is what the book is about. It discusses some of the ground rules and strategies successful communities use. It also discusses why intentional communities fail (90%!!! of them) and why others succeed.
It fills in enough detail that gives you a sense of the extreme frustration of the breakups. Not exactly "war of the roses" but you get a hint of the anguish.
Often it is the discussion of specific rules that really shows the wisdom of the groups that survived. Something as simple as how to deal with pets. For a community to survive there needs to be a strong framework in place to deal with pets.i.e How many pets an overall community is the relevant figure rather than the individual needs.I.e how do people get sleep if the dogs are barking or how do you have a nature reserve if there is a pack of cats and dogs in the community.
Similarly work load, finances, external pressures etc have all to be worked around. Who owns what, what happens if the community breaks up or people want to leave are all discussed. The delightful dictatorship of the founders, the difficulty of conflicting personalities and diverging dreams all add spice to the book.
For a very practical book, I found myself laughing quite a bit. Almost dare I say it, the book almost has the puerile appeal of a reality TV programme
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Nika
5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant resource!Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 11, 2012
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
If your looking for a practical and accessible read on community life & where to even begin- this is your bible! She's very matter of fact and real in her way of writing & offers other writers as useful references too- very refreshing to read the honesty of community life
3 people found this helpful
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