DRAFT NOTES - MAY 19, 2010

Introduction

We are proposing the initiation of an organized international campaign to illuminate and proclaim what we are calling THE INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF THE CIRCLE.

We are suggesting that the message and vision of the circle is rising up through communities and organizations all over the world, and that in this vision and potential is to be found the greatest possible hope for an illuminated and wise and healthy human future.

Circles are the pathway to peace. Circles are the most powerful and efficient way that human beings can identify and address issues and problems we must face together.

We believe that circles are the embodiment of wisdom, the truest form of collective communication known to humanity. Through this simple and ancient approach to dialog and democracy, we believe world civilization and the human community can most fruitfully come together to address and overcome the great challenges we are collectively facing today.

Circles are a powerful networking principle. Because they are so simple, and because "circles have a center", separate and independent circles can be quickly interconnected into larger circles, or linked as overlapping circles. In a highly interconnected and networked world, the interconnection of circles offers a powerful new approach to building a unity of understanding in a context of extreme global diversity and misunderstanding.

Circles tend to produce "resonance" and resonant relationships within and among their members. Circles have an innate kind of guiding and instructive wisdom, that grows within each participant, bonding the members of the circle and authenticating and strengthening its purposes.

We are beginning an outreach to circle-workers and participants and developers everywhere, to call them into a shared recognition of the power and authenticity of this method, to honor circles everywhere, to help bring them into relationship with one another, and to offer an array of tools and options that we believe can strengthen the movement.

What is a "Circle"?

For us, a "circle" is a group of people who come together to explore and unfold their relationships and the creative energy contained within the group. Circles are a form of collective relationship that evolves over time as members of the circle get to know one another and learn from each other. Circles build trust and understanding. Circles have a "center". Some circles are small and meet in intimate and personal ways in some local setting. Other circles are larger, and may be conducted through electronic media like telephones or internet.

Circles are often convened in terms of a set of agreements or principles, that help guide circle-participants towards the most desirable experience, and usually include principles like sharing, listening, one person talks at a time, all voices are heard, build trust and a sense of safety, etc.

Vision

There are many thousands of circle projects around the world, emerging in many different ways, but all taking a similar form and following similar guiding principles.

We propose to contact these circle projects and group leaders, inviting them into a simple framework supported over the internet, that helps interconnect these independent circle projects, and offering a variety of options that may make each individual project stronger.

It's our instinct that there is a kind of "universal energy" that emerges at the center of each circle, and that we can understand this energy in terms of "resonance". Each circle, following its own principles and guiding instincts, comes together and creates its own resonance.

We are supposing that an organized outreach, bringing together circle-activists from all over the world, could begin to gather a large and significant "network of circles" which could form a single body of resonant relationships, and explore and unfold the commonalities and guiding principles which all circles seem to follow, each in their own way.

We might hope that in one year of organized outreach and development, it could be possible to bring as many as one million people into a single field of resonance, through the interconnected relationships of the many interdependent circles to which they belong.

By interconnecting circles everywhere, and by negotiating and defining their common principles, we believe we can take a significant step towards "building a resonant and harmonious world" -- where people are more inclined to listen to one another, treat each other with greater respect, and work together more effectively to address and resolve the many issues that face human civilization today.

Objective

The objective of this project is to contact as many circle-developers and organizations as we possibly can before the second Sunday in May, 2011 -- Mother's Day in the USA -- with the intention of introducing this basic vision, and offering a variety of network opportunities to our participants. We are thinking that a reasonable objective for this project might be "bringing one million people into resonance within one year." If we could excite 1,000 developers, who would radiate this theme out among their members and other networks to which they are connected, this goal might be achieved.

Action

We propose a simple networking principle.

• Please become an advocate and participant in the International Year of the Circle.

• Build a connection with our integrating web site, and become a partner.

• Explore the tools and options we offer. Consider building and activating circles within our framework.

• Develop your business and marketing options within the context of our outreach and the circle-people everywhere we are engaging.

• Work with us to identify and stabilize a body of shared and universal circle-principles that can help bring the international circle movement into focus.

• Radiate and nurture an expanding field of interconnectivity based on the emerging core principles.

Invitation

• We will devise a simple approach to possible participants, offering them a simple set of options to engage with this project.

• We will make connectivity simple and direct.

• We will offer an array of tools and options, all for free.

• We will build trust among all participants, and in the shared circle environment we are creating.

• We will make this project easy to understand, easy to join, and exciting to be part of.

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Additional Notes to be Incorporated

We are receiving the intuition that the time is right and the demographics in place to begin the expansion of a simple and widely inclusive marketing outreach, intended to interconnect "circles" and "circle-processes" all over the world.

Because we believe this project should be defined as simply and as non-controversially as possible, we are calling this project THE INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF THE CIRCLE.

We believe that the international circle movement is a powerful force for good, that offers great hope and promise for the future of the human community. Our initiative is designed to bring independent circle projects together, offering an array of support services and innovative ways to interconnect and support the growth of the movement.

We believe that a well-organized marketing outreach can contact hundreds or thousands of existing circles and circle-projects, and excite a ground swell of interest and enthusiasm, combining high idealism with sound methods and economic vialbility.

The Concept of Circle

We are suggesting that circles are a simple and universal form of conversation among human beings, with an array of powerful attributes that we consider highly desirable.

1. Circles are universal

2. Circles are powerful

3. Circles can be interconnected in dynamic and exciting ways

4. The circle movement is emerging all over the world. A major sector of this movement is "women's circles" -- but there are other sectors. All of these types of circles are relevant to our project and vision, but we can focus aspects of our marketing on specific types -- probably beginning with "women's circles", particularly as discussed by Carolyn Anderson in The Co-Creator's Handbook, and in the books of Jean Shinoda Bolen, Christina Baldwin and Ann Linnea, and in the ideas of the Berkana Institute ("whatever the problem, community is the answer").

Action Steps

Organize a systematic outreach of circles and circle-development projects anywhere in the world

1) Organize our work together in a collaborative database, that will enable us to build teamwork and a single authoritative listing of projects and participants

2) Create an outreach initiative, through which participants (volunteers, individual circle members, staff people) do systematic research that

• finds circle projects anywhere they may be
• contacts circle project leaders and invites them into our initiative

3) Bring this concept to a core group of creative people who will help us refine its essential themes, and make it stronger. What else should we include? How can we make this better? What else should we be doing?

Project Design

1) We have a project logo (or a variety of project logos), which contain links to our web site

2) We build up a momentum on "link exchanges" -- meaning that, for all circle projects that are members of the The International Year of the Circle, "we will link to your site if you will link to ours"

3) We will create a series of "circle principles" that we build by researching circles wherever they may be found, and we will negotiate a set of basic principles -- maybe numbering about 30 -- from which participating circles and circle-members can select, as a basic process of establishing agreement among circle-members on protocols and procedures. We can explore ways to contact circle-leaders around the world for their input on establishing a common and universal set of circle principles. We might look for translations of these principles into an array of languages.

Membership / Participation

1) We do not want to "massively centralize" the international circle movement -- but we do want to offer support to thousands of circle projects, and provide ways that

• circle projects can find one another and connect -- sharing resources and ideas
• individual people who are looking for circles can use our tools to find circles appropriate for them

2) Create a "partner" program, that offers a somewhat higher-level of visibility and connection to groups we believe are especially significant, or are more intimately connected with our outreach or marketing initiative.

3) We will create a "database of circles world-wide", and invite people everywhere to register their circles with us.

4) We will do our best to work with existing systems (Jean Bolen's Millionth Circle?), to help support these systems, expand their message, and support their circles. If desired, we can present their circle database through our framework.

Services We Offer

1) We offer a link exchange program, which provides visibility to participating members

2) We offer an array of networking tools operating through our web site, including the capacity to build on-line circles, create mailing lists, and send email messages to contacts and lists/circles -- as appropriate, and as managed through a "permissions-based" approach (to avoid problems with "spam")

3) We offer a large database of circles world wide -- and in the USA.

4) We support a wide variety of types of circles -- which can be local and face-to-face, or virtual and running on the internet, and can be associated with a variety of geographical levels. In the USA, those levels can include national, regional, state, country, city, or zip-code. Circle can be organized by issue or topic, or by geographic locale. In essence, we can take on "anything and everything" -- with the caveat that we support circle-based approaches and we expect all people to "treat each other with respect".

Marketing Outreach

1) Build into our system a series of marketing features that enable us to present various options to groups and individuals we attract

2) Include features like

• The WE LLC "Loyalty Card" as an option for all participants -- they can check this option when joining the network
• A "Green Card" option

3) Provide a suite of marketing options to all participants in the system. Build up a list of "online merchants" that are using our system, and give them the opportunity to build up a catalog of products in an online shipping cart we offer. Provide these services for free -- at no cost to the participants, as a way to attract additional participants

We're going to say -- that the first day of the IYC is Sunday May 9, 2010, Mother's Day in the USA -- and our kickoff circle is our Standing Women project, organizing hundreds of events -- mostly circles -- all over the world. After one year, by Mother's Day 2011, we are aiming to have brought 1,000,000 people into circle resonance.

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Standing Women can be seen as the core and foundational circle of the international women's circle movement. We are going to build the Standing Women project all year, to include as many women and women's organizations as possible. The vision of this project is profoundly simple and non-controversial, and resonates with the core values of feminine spirituality.

We should get The Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers to support the Standing Women project. If we approach them in the right way, I think they would do it.

We are in resonance with the heartbeat drum of the world...