After the June Rally (Rally!), I decided to share some of my after-the-fact thoughts and notes with you guys.
Mainly because I thought it might be useful to see what a possible version of an Exit Process looks like — that Revue and Review thing we’ve been talking about.
And also because it helps me remember to document the process.
So I’m doing it again, this time for the July Rally that just ended Thursday night.
And who knows, maybe you’ll find something unexpected in here that will secretly help out with something else you’re working on in a fractal flower sort of way…
New traditions that showed up at this Rally.
Muscle-hippo on the move!
In addition to constantly moving the fairy door around from place to place (the wooden one, not the pink one!), there’s another version. A spin-off?
We started obsessing over the sparkly and self-satisfied weight-lifter hippo statue.
So now we’re moving him around the Playground as well. And also posting sticky-notes on him.
Things like: “Love me tender!” and “I’m too sexy for my shirt.”
It was pretty entertaining. I hope it sticks.
Ringing the bell.
At the first few Rallies, I’d ask in the morning when we wanted to break for lunch.
That way, anyone who wanted to lunch with other rallions could meet up at the door. Or decide to stay at the Playground.
At first, lunchtime varied. 11:45? 1:15?
Eventually it just became 12:30. That was just when we’d get hungry.
So the plan would be to gather by the door. Except they’d wait for me. Or forget entirely. And then I’d end up ringing the bell.
But that doesn’t fit with the DIY culture of Rally. So the new thing is that someone can just decide to ring a bell at 12:30. Which is pretty vague. But then it totally worked.
And a continuation of fairly recent traditions.
Extra bonus superpowers whilst schmurphling.
Everyone loves bonus superpowers!
Reminding people to read the PLUM.
The PLUM is the Playground User Manual (thank you, commenter mice, for helping me name this!).
And whenever people get stuck at Rally, it’s invariably because they missed part of the PLUM.
I kept it out in the middle of the room and that helped.
Remembering to notice the side effects.
You know how everyone gets way more good-looking at Rally?
Sometimes I forget to pay attention to this until the last five minutes when all of a sudden we’re all like, Whoah, did it get hot in here? When did everyone get so outrageously gorgeous?
But we remembered. And seriously, we were smokin’ hot.
Some interesting things about Rally #11.
A very quiet group.
Thoughtful, introspective, reflective.
People did their own thing. We did not need a Talking Room. It was chill. I like it all ways, so this totally worked for me.
Some quality blanket forts.
Oh how I wish someone had taken pictures.
There was some really creative blanket-forting going on.
Skewing a bit younger?
If the last Rally was more towards the over-50 side, this one was more like 40-and-under.
Interesting, interesting. You never know. And it never matters. We always connect in weird and wonderful ways.
Some things we changed for this Rally.
I re-thought the closing ceremony and mixed things up a little.
This was the first Rally when I didn’t renovate any of the rooms beforehand.
Thoughts and ideas for future Rallies.
A systems thing! I really need a receipts envelope for things (extra snacks!) that I end up buying during Rally.
And maybe I will save the Ritual of Releasing Expectations for something else. Or do it beforehand?
Stray observations.
I really need to tell people — out loud and possibly also here on the blog — mre about what I’m doing when I’m Intentionally Not Shepherding.
This not-shepherding is a Hiro-concept, and a really important part of Rally.
Sometimes there’s light interpersonal drama at Rally and I do not interfere, other than strengthening the force field of Rally culture.
It’s not that I’m unaware of drama-ing, just consciously choosing to not engage, because it’s really important for everyone there that they channel Rally culture.
Which means working on sovereignty, taking responsibility for your own experience, separating out your stuff from other people’s stuff, and having a conscious intentional relationship with whatever is coming up for you.
That way, when you leave Rally, you can be in your strength.
NOT: “Oh Havi is so great and she resolved everything for us.”
BUT INSTEAD: “Hey, I’m getting better at owning my space, caring for myself and separating from what is not mine, thanks to Rally, yay!”
It always works out exactly as it needs to. And it might also be useful if I did a more thorough job of explaining this out loud before Rally in some form.
What I worked on
My personal focus/theme/project/mission for this Rally ended up being the ever-changing role of Shiva Nata in my business, and how it all works together.
Big stuff.
Favorite part?
Oh so hard to decide!
The madcap shivanauttery, of course.
I loved having such a mix of levels of shivanauts (two teachers there, some people with a semi-regular practice, some who had never done it). Neat.
This made teaching extra fun. We made the practice challenging in the most ludicrous ways.
I also took advantage of this young group to do a much more athletic practice than I usually might (with some sweaty high-impact jumping around!), and that was new.
The amazing results.
So many that I could write up an entire blog post just about the fabulous stuff that happened to us. But I will leave you with these:
Liz: “Ohmygod! Everything you said about Rally was true!”
Tim: “This is truly the most productive I have ever been. I got more done in the hour and a half between morning Shiva Nata and lunch today than in the past four months combined.”
Rhiannon: “This Rally left a wake. I’m almost more in it now than when it was happening. Ripples and ripples…”
And everyone loved the stone skipping card decks! Yay.
Hanging out with the Rallygators.
Especially at the Wine-and-Cheesening on Wednesday.
And going out for pizza lunch on Thursday.
Also having a crazed manic bubble-blowing/bubble-stomping romp with Tim when we were both having a fit at the same time.
Play with me! And comment zen for today.
If you would like to do a Revue for something and you want a place to put it, go for it.
If you’ve been to a Rally and want to share favorite memories, that’s welcome too.
And if you have interest in processing a thing which has happened or things you want to try, go for it.
As always, we remember that this is a process, and a process is really a tiny, sweet thing, so we tread gently.
We recognize our stuff, we let other people have their stuff, we take responsibility for our experience and we don’t tell each other what to do.
Love to the rallygators (past and future!), to the commenter mice, the Beloved Lurkers and everyone who reads.
p.s. The September Rally is nearly full. We do have a couple more spots for August. Rally!
Follow
I was at the June Rally and it was great. This month, since that stupid Reality thing meant I couldn’t be a Rally again (again!) I tried to Rally at home. You know what? Rally at home has had unexpected side effects.
When I returned home from Portland, I had to deal with travel exhaustion. Since I was already at home for this Rally, I just picked up my usual routine and, surprise! I have been way more productive than I was before I rallied.
When I chicken on Friday, I’ll have more to say. But for now, I just want to say that the exposure to the Rally culture and the Rally experience was like a launching or training for doing it at home, and the at-home rally has helped spark all kinds of progress and productivity and ideas and things.
It’s wonderful how the effects of being at Rally keep making itself felt.
Oh goodness. Havi, do you remember how I had my crazy vision of the big exploding orange chakra ball at the first Rally (http://myseedhouse.wordpress.com/2010/08/30/when-visions-explode-dark-stars-explosions-symbols-and-getting-kicked-out-of-your-own-vision-rally-thoughts-part-two/) and it was like a big message I didn’t quite know how to read (though I had inklings) and now it’s been nearly a year and I’m finally beginning to to understand it? Or at least to see how it’s chosen to explode and become beautifully messy and interesting in many other areas of my life? Wow.
I was reminded of it because you mentioned the bubble romp, which reminded me of the romping at Rally #1 and how that was all part of it too. The magic energy I poured into the vision to help it help me.
Wow and wow and wow. Rally is crazybigmagic and this is the space where I remember that, with a grin on my face and magic in my heart, even when it’s hard and it makes life change in unexpected ways. Okay, second chakra. Party on, Rally on. Forever.
And: the careful non-shepherding is one of my favorite things. I noticed it at the Great Ducking Out and it was pretty amazing. There’s both {noticing my own reaction to not being shepherded} and {deciding if I want to try to shepherd instead} and {noticing how others react to the moment} and it was a very cool thing.
I love Rhiannon’s description of a Rally! wake….. What a perfect way to describe it. I was at Rally! In March and I’m still in the wake. I may never be out of it. That is how powerful it is… In a totally non-threatening way.
I was one of those people who didn’t read the PLUM until after I flipped out & was weird & convinced I was totally out of my element (outsider myth!!!!) & pretty sure I was “bad” for spending $$ to go to Rally! …. Then someone (Havi) gently suggested I take a peek at the PLUM and then I did and then I was like “ohhhhhh, that is what is going on with me….” and then I was fine. More than fine. Anyway. I like the PLUM.
The non-sheperding was a little difficult (that isn’t the right word…) for me. Of course my monkey brain decided that it must mean that there was something “wrong” with (here’s a surprise) me and/or my group as a whole, but probably me. I think I would have benefitted from a little more explanation/discussion (reading the PLUM?) of the concept up front. Or maybe not… I think I needed to sort through lots of stuff on my own.
Love to the whole concept of Rally!
Oh that Rally was marvelous.
Not kidding about the hotness thing! I have a couple of people really insisting I’ve lost crazy amounts of weight. Nope. Just lookin’ good from Rally. 🙂
So in my experience of Rally #11 I guess what I would say is that I just took everything as a sign that it was working. My dramas. Other people’s dramas. My confusions and fears and flailings and epiphanies and dreams (good and bad, literal and figurative) and any/all the connections I made, with Rallions and non-Rallions alike. Be they cats. Cart vendors. Clouds. Stuffed alligators. Rockstar avatars. Concert-goers. Etc.
The most intense and powerful thing (for me) was the mirroring/modeling/osmosis effect. Shiva Nata is a great metaphor for that, but the whole week abides in it. And that energy (or whatever less New Agey word you want to use) moves from Havi to Rallions, Rallions to Rallions, and it sounds like it moves from Rallions to Havi too.
That’s the cool thing about it. The creative conductivity. Yeah, I think that can be particularly fertile territory for boundary work (which I’m not always so great at). But (again) in my experience that’s (A) important and (B) almost unavoidable in any creative community. And, crucially, (C) I felt totally safe at all times.
So. Yes. I report that (for me) Rally #11 totally, totally worked: shook out the effing cobwebs in a major way.
Thanks to everyone and kudos to future Rallions for having the courage to confront the Better Version of yourselves…
“a grin on my face and magic in my heart” Amen, Jesse!
I was at the february ’11 Rally! I accomplished sooo much in those few days, I was determined to take Rally home with me.
The biggest, most successful, and consistent piece of Rally culture I keep at home is: how is your project going to bed? (that is, my projects are not allowed to keep me up at night). I came up with what I call The Night Shift. It’s a few of my [many 🙂 ] stuffed animals. Their job is to work on my projects while I sleep. I put them on my desk chair then tell them they’re now on shift. My projects haven’t bothered my sleep at all – at all! – since february, and believe me when I say THAT was a BIG problem before Rally. Purple Yowl and his good Rally buddy, FP Crow, live on my computer desk to remind me that Rally(Rally!) is only a thought away.
I took my 2nd office room which had been an unorganized, uninspiring catch all and Playground-ized it. It’s now a calm, pretty place to flail, rejuvenate, do yoga, do nothing, color, build blanket forts, and paint-and-glitterize little wooden doodads. Another team of stuffies live there, the CultureKeepers. How did I live without that space before?!
The past year and a half has been dominated by a “revenue generation” problem. After Rally! I looked at that problem in a whole different way. Recently, all my flailing, vpa’ing, gwishing, and pattern-recognizing-changing came together and the method of revenue generation has come to pass for real. That’s the good. The notSoGood is that instead of working from home, I am now on site in cubicle nation. yikes! haven’t done that in 14 years. But the gig is good, the peeps super smart, and the project hits my heart & jazzes me up. I’ve been working on how to take Rally! there. A second night shift has been born, and I’ve been really practicing my force field. Now to discover a place to do my midday flailing without anyone calling 911 on me.
Thanks again, Havi, for Rally – it’s such an amazing thing!
Havi, this sounds luscious and fun and brilliant. I hope a Home Study version will magically appear, very soon!
Someday, I will make it to a Rally, as Selma is my witness.
One thing that worked really well about our large family gathering in honor of our parents’ golden wedding anniversary was the place we stayed, which was perfect. My sister summed it up well:
“Being in a gorgeous place in a great big rambling inn that isn’t the home of any of the family was just absolutely perfect. We all had the space we needed behind closed doors whenever we needed a moment of private conversation, and there was almost always family to wander into on the big second floor porch, or the comfortable air conditioned, snack-and-beverage supplied gathering room, or the big beautiful garden (with a folly! — so cozy and sweet; I want to revision our second story shed as a folly now).”
No one had the stress of hosting, of cooking or cleaning or any of that, and in fact we were well cared for by the good people at the bed and breakfast. I don’t know when we’ll ever be able to do something on that scale again, but it worked, so it’s well worth remembering.