BeiYin: I am not tired of being the leader, because I am not the leader, at least not in our set up of the FalconBlanco 'IC'.

Comment:  At your web site I couldn't find much on political structure. There are some rules... I am just not familiar with your social decision making system.

BeiYin: The 'rules' are written for people who are interested to come to live here. We don't need these rules so we don't feel these as restriction. 
Working together with people and about this I have written in many articles, I have stressed that self responsibility and getting out of dependencies is one of the basics. When I am tired then because of the need to move 'potato sacks', as they don't have the necessary motivation and initiative themselves.

Comment: Each individual is different in degree of responsibility, but it seems that in our consumer society people are getting lazy and are not motivated...

BeiYin: Probably because responsibility is connected with awareness and also getting out of dependencies. People are so used to do what they are told by authorities: Their father, their teachers, their boss, their doctor, their government, etc. or they have developed resistance and do their 'own thing', which is not much better because they are still dependent. Then they need to be told what to do and this might work but they are not able to do something by themselves. Like when they pass the empty water bowl of the dogs fifty times a day and even when the dog stands beside it with hanging tongue then they are not aware what is needed. Our chicken are free and can move wherever they want although they know their territory well. We have twelve chicken, three dogs and about twenty cats, they live all together in peace and respect each other. Sometimes it happens that a chicken goes to the kitchen terrace and as the chicken are not capable to control certain body necessities, so it happens that they leave something on the terrace floor. So even there are half a dozen member aspirants around, guess who is cleaning up the chicken shit? It's me or one of the other members if not the other would step into it and then have a reason to complain... Oh boy!
There are those who want to do things by themselves, but they are also not aware and when they are told then they are highly resistant and then defending their resistance with aggression. Self responsibility and self consciousness still far away...
If somebody doesn't know a certain work, then telling them about it doesn't mean that I am the leader, but if this person then is resistant because has something running caused by a father problem and when projecting the father onto me, will not listen to my advice or do the opposite, then I have to go beyond this...
Going beyond by not taking the father role and trying to make clear what is going on. Maybe pointing out the unconscious background of this person. But then this is problematic because people are not interested to know about it, so they will defend themselves. But to go on being together or working together often is only possible if they go into a conscious growing process. To deal with this has more of a leader role, depending what this means for you.
In all those years my tendency and intention was always to let people make their own mistakes so that with their experience they would come to the best solution.
But this also means that people's work mostly is very inefficient and sometimes work has to be redone and then is three times more than if it would have been done from the beginning in the right way.

Comment: Yes I have been in that situation several times. With these people simply I request a cash donation or give them very simple work to do, bet even this might give problems sometimes...

BeiYin: This problem you have also with people you are paying. I remember when I started to build up this place and had paid workers. I am not only an architect but I also know how to do things in an effective way. So it is very easy to understand that one puts the wheelbarrow as near as possible to the material one wants to load and there is a certain way to hold the shovel which is the most effective. So when I saw that they did it the most ineffective way possible then of course I told them, as they were not wasting their energy but my money of which I didn't have any to waste. But then when they were resistant telling me that they are doing it like this since ever, then I had to tell them to change or to leave, as it was not possible to request a cash donation from them how you suggested it. Then they did more or less how I told them, but then their resistance found another way: The neighbors told me as soon I left to go to Ibiza to make my shopping they were laying down in the shade and started to work when they heard my car coming back. So this was my experience with paid workers. So what would you do if this happened with people who want to become members of a community? Of course: talk with them about it. In this case again you have to take the 'leader role'. Their argument might be (this happened): "We are volunteers, we work when we feel like it..." etc. I could write a book about it.
A professional knows how to do the work, but even then if there is a psychological underlying problem there will show up resistance and the work will not be done or badly.
Once we had a member who was a lawyer and we decided to make a nonprofit foundation out of FalconBlanco. So this lawyer was working with the paperwork. Then she refused to do certain work and we got stuck and could not continue. She was not behaving professional and probably she had reacted like this in her job and had to go. This was an example and things like this happen very often and then such a situation would need a strong leader, but I mostly let it go in its own flow and didn't interfere, so things moved all the years very slowly.

Comment: I have been in many similar situations over the years, enough to almost  giving up like you... I suggest that you study consensus decision making...

BeiYin: I don't need to study this because decisions are made by all the members together, we even include short time guests in the discussion.

Comment: I would like to hear how you run your meetings exactly?

BeiYin: About this I will give some examples: Do ants need meetings for their decision making? Are bees into consensus making? How does it work that a whole flock of flying birds change simultaneously their direction? The same with a swarm of fishes. Do they need a meeting for their decision making? Of course not. It has to do with group consciousness. In a bee hive or in an ant group there is a constant exchange of information going on. All members are nearly instantly informed what is going on and they make instantly their decision and react to the need of the whole. Well, this is more or less how it works in FalconBlanco: There is a constant flow of information, we talk about what is going on, about the work, our thoughts, our feelings, etc. Apart of this everybody has one's own computer and all are connected with each other through an internal network. We copy actual messages or pictures to the network screen and send important posts as FW email or as CC, which each of us receives also instantly. Can you see that it is hardly necessary to have 'meetings'? As we live together, we meet in many occasions, when we work outside, when we eat together or at 'tea time'.

Comment: And I would suggest that you turn the place over to a non-profit consensus land trust and be one of the consensus board members and see if you are ready for that level of non leadership. There may many who come and go, but if you find just one passionate about consensus non leader paradigm and are open enough yourself to letting go of leadership.

BeiYin: It looks very much to me that this comes out of a concept you are carrying with you but haven't done in practice.

Comment: I introduced the consensus idea to a food coop I belonged to many years ago and after they started operating with consensus I became a board member. I also founded an IC years ago using consensus decision making council, it would still be together perhaps if the person who gave her word that after many months of monthly land payments the land would be put in a trust with all our names in the trust. This person failed and I lost a lot of money. My physical energy went down, I almost died from frustration, anger, sadness, disappointment.

BeiYin: Obviously you are still finding confirmation from introducing your ideas to others. Isn't this what most people are doing? You are trying to convince people of something you believe that it works. It might work on a certain level but on another it fails. It would if... So you have a well thought out concept, but then there is the human factor: The conditioning, the personal limitations, the dependency, etc. If you are involved then people might betray you, - how you described it. So what is a piece of paper with a contract worth if people are not ready and capable of being part of a growing group consciousness? 

I never felt as the owner of this place and also about this I have written several times. For me it is absurd to 'own' land. I feel responsible for the place, but I think the owner is the one who takes care and feels responsible.
So this can be done in any given moment by all the other members and it doesn't need a paper from the state about ownership, which anyway is an illusion and can be nullified at any moment.

Comment: Yes, I have always felt that way, that is why land trust and non-profit appeal to me as a good way 
until enough trust is developed to get beyond ownership or legal documents, but for now I see legal aspects as quite important, until 100% sustainable and 100% trust is developed. It is harder to nullify a legal document than some verbal agreement. Many successful consensus IC's consider legal documents as crucial to their success. 

BeiYin: What I meant about the legal paper from the state about one's ownership is that the government is the owner, you are kind of renting it by paying tax, but they can nullify this paper anytime they want because they have the power and will find a reason. An example: Who was the original owner of this land called US? Who came and took over without asking if this would be right for the people living there? They were not asked and if they didn't agree then they were killed. Later they were put in so called 'reservations' which seemed to be worth nothing and given a legal document about their ownership. Impressive. But then when there was discovered something of value like oil, uranium, etc. then this precious paper was nullified and they were kicked out. So the underlying consciousness of the two parts seems to be the most important and if one of the two doesn't complete the necessary awareness then the relationship will fail and with it the contract. Then the paper is worth nothing.

Yes, it has to do with awareness and personal development. If people must have a paper to feel as equal partners, then for sure they are not ready in their awareness and the feeling of being equal part will not happen even with a legal document which tells them this material aspect and gives them a certain outside security.

Of course it always depends on the situation. I think we need to adapt ourselves to some situations and then it might be necessary to stay firm with a decision in another. Sometimes it might be better to sit down doing nothing, just reflecting about a situation before making a step forward and sometimes it needs a jump over an obstacle. Important is to relate to what shows up in front of you and then relate to it and also to the reactions the situation is causing within yourself.

Comment: What i mean is that as we continue to develop our ability to get along better with each other, then we are moving closer toward perfection or idealism, and that is a spiritual experience. It starts when one finds some level of perfection and then seeks another and then proceed together and on toward tribal consensus experience. I see a balance between spontaneous in the moment decisions and organization with consensus is good, so for now I believe legal and formal meetings are important for success, even in relation to spirituality.

BeiYin: As long as there is the need to find confirmation for one's concepts and the way one sees life, it will not be possible to relate to reality and also not to response in an adequate way to it. Striving for perfection means that reality should come near to one's concepts. That's not possible and one might need to fight a good part of one's life to come to the moment when one can see this and drop one's concepts... And as people are identified with their concepts, so this feels as a loss, but this is the moment when another dimension might open up...

I am sure that it is possible to find people who get passionate about concepts of whatever kind, but this is the difficulty: There are very few who are willing and capable to go beyond concepts and theories, going into a transformation by relating to daily life, responding out of their own capacity not depending on outside authority and also not on concepts given by authorities. There is a lack of such people and I believe that only with individuals of this kind is it possible to form an 'Intentional Community' which doesn't need a 'leader'.

Comment: Somehow we need to create a filter system that brings those at about the same level of trust and responsibility together.

BeiYin: We have already too many inbuilt 'filter systems' and these make it so difficult to come together. If we could go beyond those concepts which filter with the need to find confirmation around then there can open up a field which contains other values which are not bound to personal perception... But this only can be a result of a growing process and can't be gained through any concept. Oh boy, life seems to be quite complicate... 
Now I need to feed the chicken, water the plants and go for a walk with my dog...