Date: Sat, 21 Jun 1997 14:26:43 EDT From: "the sweet tink of success, the sour stench of failure" Subject: FILLER: Check Assumptions At The Door, Please? While wombling about the web recently, I stumbled across the suggestion that part of how a group interacts may depend on the "basic" assumptions that individuals bring to the group. The reference I found suggested at least three kinds of "basic assumptions" that people might make in joining a group: 1. Dependency -- "the group is met in order to be sustained by a leader on whom it depends for nourishment, material and spiritual, and protection." 2. Something I'll call Optimism -- "an air of hopeful expectation [that] usually finds expression in ideas that marriage would put an end to neurotic disabilities; that group therapy would revolutionize society ...; that the coming season ... will be more agreeable; that some new kind of community --an improved group-- should be developed; that a Messiah, or a Utopia, or a New World Order is just around the corner" (this is called Pair -- Basic Assumption Pair or BaP in the literature I was reading) 3. Fight/Flight -- "The group has met to fight something or to run away from it. It is prepared to do either indifferently." Part of what I find interesting about this is that the expectations which an individual brings to the group starting from these assumptions of what a group is about are very different, and likely to cause serious conflicts. For example, suppose Newby Gates joins WRITERS expecting to find a dependency group. They expect to be able to quickly identify a shining leader, who is able to cure plot thicknesses with a single word, dispenses streams of wisdom that transform the work of writing into simplicity, and otherwise feed their desire to bask in the revelations of the secret inwardness of the writers... And they find us instead. No wonder they get frustrated and angry. We aren't measuring up! Or take Dreamer Sandy, looking for optimism. They expect that simply being in the group will improve their lovelife, cure us all of our illetteracy in five easy steps, or perhaps just prepare them in some mystical way for the coming of the New Word, the Nouvelle Critique Fantastique, or whatever. And again, they find us. A few people may be interested in those things, some refuse to move, others have their own agendas, and the optimism trickles off, too often, into resignation. Last, but not least, we have the fighters and the leapers. Some seem to enjoy the clash and bash, others take one look at the struggle and dash on. But in any case, the fields are alive, with the sound of thumping and wailing and carrying on... This suggested to me that when someone else seems to be approaching the list with a bit of a different slant, I should think about what "basic assumptions" they might have. After all, stumbling across this outpost in the hinterlands of cyberspace, listening to the drums beating and looking at the leaping flames of the torches, one might not recognize the old saloon at first, or even second glance, and may need some orientation (spin this way, flip twice, and can you do a corkscrew dive? good, now repeat it blindfolded, and see if you feel oriented...) [spinning on your magnetic axis? looking for orientation? try the FAQs at http://web.mit.edu/mbarker/www/faqs/faqs.html --even has an old bar tale or two] Something to think about. Dependency, Optimism, and Sparring Partners... or what? tink incidentally, for those of you who may be concerned about the parthogenesis of "wombling", I thought about rambling upon the reb, wambled and waffled, and settled on the fine inwardness of wombling. I refuted the call of the wembles, off in their own little town in the Isles; decided that the wimbles of religious garb were not for me, and with such thoughts, came home to wombling with a view again. So we womble forth, and womble home once more, all linked with sparkling pixels of hue. Thus it was born.