What are Heart Politics Gatherings ?

• HEART POLITICS GATHERINGS were not created to build a movement of any sort, but to serve those people working for social change in our communities today. The gatherings create a place where social activists can take time out to reflect and renew themselves and their vision for their work. They are a time to share stories and support with others who understand the struggles they are taking with visibility, vulnerability and leadership in their issues.

  The gatherings are also a place and time to regain wisdom from the vast histories of social change that has already taken place in our societies and institutions. They are also a time to listen to and explore the personal wisdom that has grown out of social change work in the 1990’s. They are a place where our real questions about direction and strategy can be discussed with people who are working on different struggles, and probably have different points of view on their work for the common good.

• HEART POLITICS GATHERINGS seem to attract people who feel that their work for social change goes beyond the particular issue they may be presently working on. They see their work as part of their vocation or calling in the world, and their lives have become a part of the wider impulse in the world towards the realisation of universal human rights.

  The people who have participated in these gatherings so far have found them a way of challenging and exploring their own strategies within their own work for social change. They are challenged to explore ways of working that go beyond the old rhetorics of current national politicians ... ways of working that express a real connectedness with all the people effected by the issue they are trying to change. The participants are also usually people who recognise the need for personal change as much as the need for political transformation, and are often also involved in some sort of personal growth work, or spiritual practice.

• PEOPLE WHO CHOOSE to undertake serious social change work in their communities are often catalysed out of a reaction to what they feel to be injustice, cruelty, prejudice or inequity surrounding an issue. But they soon find that trying to make a difference requires a sustained struggle to make their voice heard, or a frustrating path of gathering resources in order to demonstrate a better way.

  Many people working for change are quite unprepared for the personal costs of sustaining their contribution through the years it may take to achieve real change. The disillusionment and cynicism amongst community and social change workers is very high indeed. They may suffer from a sense of urgency driven by an awareness that the earth and its people are dying, or being tormented as a consequence of the issue they are working on. They also frequently find their issues quickly polarising into battlefields of right and wrong thinking, or that power struggles over strategy within the social change organisations also takes its toll.

  Addictions are also more of a problem among social change activists than is usually known. So often, social change workers focus on controlling the external troubles of the world as a way of avoiding the uncontrollable darkness within themselves. We need to do both.

  All these factors work against these people creating good, solid and positive social change work as well as fulfilling personal lives sustained over time. Creating a space where social activists can step back from their daily struggles and reflect on these issues is an important contribution, and this is also part of the vision of the Heart Politics Gatherings.

• HEART POLITICS GATHERINGS began in Taupo, New Zealand in 1989, and are now also run by groups in Australia and the United States. In each country, the Heart Politics Gatherings are quite different and look at social change concepts in their own unique ways.

  The New Zealand gatherings are held at the Tauhara Centre, a retreat and seminar complex set high on a hill overlooking the Lake Taupo region on the North Island. Tauhara has a tradition of acting as a meeting place for people of diverse opinions and methods of working, and creating meetings which endeavour to find a place of goodwill, understanding and cooperation.

  The Australian and United States Gatherings have been held in different places, and have not been based at a particular centre. In both New Zealand and Australia, the Heart Politics organising groups are based around a looseknit network of friends who are already involved in some way with social change. This friendship network is growing and expanding as the gatherings progress.

• HEART POLITICS GATHERINGS have sought to create a simple context where the diverse participants can explore their own feelings, stories and wisdom ... without trying to create too many rigid structures, or a system of right and wrong thinking in the process. As you can imagine, this is a difficult enough step for many fiery and passionate social activists to undertake, and there have been some interesting struggles in this work in itself. The organisers have learned many lessons in how to create such places where people of diverse opinions and methods of working can indeed come together, and these lessons are ongoing.

  To some extent, the gatherings are a blend of conference, retreat, workshop and holiday. There is an ethic of openness, visible power sharing, and smallgroup work which enable people to go into depth on key issues. They are leisurely meetings with time also taken to also get into the bush, woods or other natural places.

• MUCH OF THE FOCUS at the gatherings is on sharing our Heart Politics Stories with each other, usually through the process known as Heart Circle Sharings. In these circles, the participants tell their own stories of what they have learned, what their questions are, what processes are working positively in their lives and social change work. These circles are times for both sharing our victories, and our despair. There is usually plenty of laughter, some tears, and a refreshing honesty moving between the gathered participants.

  At the end of the gathering there is a session evaluating new learnings, and asking new questions, and drawing up fresh personal goals for the future, and assistance in gaining allies to help reach these goals.

• WE ARE DISCOVERING at these gatherings that many socalled ordinary people are in fact carrying important insights and information on social and political issues. They are carrying this information on behalf of all of us. They might be exploring a new strategy for making a difference. They might find themselves articulating new concepts about their work for change in an entirely fresh way. This is the wisdom that is buried within their work ... the wisdom that really only comes out when we ask to hear their stories.

  An environmental activist may have a bright idea to share about really communicating with the factory managers that are responsible for polluting their waterways. A health bureaucrat might have learned some great local strategies while working with the breweries on a campaign to stop people from drinking and driving. An employment worker might have created a recycling scheme for the unemployed and other beneficiaries. These stories might spark and inspire similar strategies in totally unrelated issues that other people at the gatherings are working on.

  Not that we can pretend that our struggles are particularly unique to us or our generation. The gatherings are also a forum for remembering and carrying forward the stories and lessons and traditions of our ancestors, our political forebears and our mentors in social change work.

• HEART POLITICS GATHERINGS are not a time for people to come and prosletise about their particular issue. Participants are asked to come primarily as individuals, and not as representatives of their concerns. They are invited to leave their ideologies at the door, but bring their differences intact.

  The participants are not expected to share or agree on any particular philosophy, be it left or right in the political spectrum. But through the sharing of stories they try to get beyond philosophies and "politically correct" stances towards plainly speaking of what their hearts have been learning through the struggle of their work. This is a process that can't be forced, and the organisers work to create a sense of trust that allows people to explore common ground.

from "WHAT ARE HEART POLITICS GATHERINGS?"
section of a booklet called
"OUR HEARTS OUR POLITICS"
(1993) by Fran Peavey and Vivian Hutchinson.

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http://www.jobsletter.org.nz/hpx/hpx02.htm