May 13, 2015

Other People’s Ideas

What do you do with other people’s ideas?

Here’s a scenario I see a lot in the church these days:

Someone does Something in their congregation that really works. It’s a little off the beaten path. Let’s face it; the “we’ve always done it that way” path is famously hard-beaten in the Episcopal Church. I won’t bore you with change-the-light bulb jokes.

Our Someone does their new Something because the usual thing isn’t working, and they’ve had the courage to stop trying to make it work and try Something else, Something that seems like a better fit for the reality they see around them. It works! They are excited because it worked. They want to be helpful. So they tell the world about it in a blog post or article or book.

Then this happens:

A few people recognize that the Something that worked for Someone might work in their context as well. They take the suggestion and run with it. It’s a win.

Some other people doggedly try the Something even though their context is pretty different from the original Someone’s. That usually doesn’t work out very well. They grow discouraged.

Everyone else thinks about it, and says, “Hmm. I can’t really see that working in my place.” Either what they do already works, or they’re pretty sure this won’t solve their problem either. So they pick the Something apart in the comments, or just discard it as one more not-useful idea.

Might there be another way to read other people’s ideas?

What if we read to understand their discernment process? How did they get from “we’ve always done it…” to “let’s try…?” What wasn’t working? How could they tell? What did they figure out about why it wasn’t working? What gave them courage to ditch the “always done it” way? How did they work with people’s doubts about change? How does what they decided to try reflect what they figured out about their people, their place, their strengths and weaknesses?

Now you’ve got something you can use, even if your context looks very different from the one you are reading about. What isn’t working in your place? What would it take to change it? What is it about your particular place that makes this thing not work? What are your people good at? What makes them feel able to give of themselves? How might you use that knowledge to come up with a new idea of your own?

Someone else’s Something may not work for you. What can you learn from someone else’s effective discernment to make your own effective as well?

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