Saying "No" to Prospective Members

One of the trickiest issues that intentional communities face is screening prospective members.

Some groups find this so odious (judging whether others are good enough) that they don't even try. Instead, they rely on prospectives to sort themselves out appropriately, based on what the community has said about itself (on its website, in brochures, or in listings), and how the new person relates to the community when they visit.

Another factor when it comes to screening is that communities often borrow money from banks to develop their property and are thus subject to federal Fair Housing Laws, which means they may not discriminate against people on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, disability, or familial status. Some groups mistakenly translate this into a proscription against using any discernment about who joins the group (or buys a house) but that's not true. It's perfectly legal to insist that people be financially solvent, not have been convicted of felonies, or agree to abide by common values and existing agreements. In fact, it's legal to choose against a candidate for any reason other than the seven protected classes listed above.

What's more, there are any number of people who are attracted to community for the right reasons but are not a good fit, and it's better all around if the community plays an active role in screening for decent matches. In many cases (unless the would-be member is a community veteran) the new person is still wrestling with the question of whether any intentional community is a good choice for them, much less your community. There will be many new and strange things that people have to make sense of during their initial visit, and in the process they can easily miss clues as to whether the visit is going well or not as seen through the host's eyes.

Finally, when you take into account how important it is to have your membership aligned about what you're trying to create, it becomes clear why it's not a good plan to rely mainly on the new person figuring it out on their own. Yes, this may mean that someone washes out sooner, but isn't that better for them as well—rather than getting a false impression about how things are going and discovering the mismatch six months after moving in? Delayed disclosure may relieve the community of having a difficult conversation up front, but at what cost?

OK, let's suppose I've convinced you that communities should get actively involved in membership selection. In broad strokes, there are four possibilities about how a prospective visit may go:

a) Both the community and the prospective realize it's not a good fit. While there's the possibility of some hurt feelings if the prospective feels that what they found did not match what the community promised, mostly this ends amicably and there's no problem.

b) You both like each other and the prospect converts to becoming a new member. Hooray! That's what you had in mind and you're off to a good start. Of course, the honeymoon will end and not everything that starts out well stays that way. While there's no guarantee of long-term happiness, you did your best and now you take your chances.

c) The prospective doesn't feel there's a good fit, though the community likes what they see and wants to encourage the prospective to hang in there. Most of the time when this occurs it's because the prospective comes across as a "good catch" and will likely be attractive to a number of communities. In short, they have options. In this situation also, there's unlikely to be hard feelings. The community may be sad at losing a good prospect, but dating doesn't always lead to marriage and you knew that all along.

d) The hardest combination—and the one I want to focus on in the remainder of this essay—is when the prospective likes the community but it's not reciprocated. Now what?

In general, this is because of one or more of the following factors:

o  Poor social skills
There's a high value placed on good communication skills in community and it can be a serious problem if the prospective is not good at:
—Articulating what they're thinking
—Articulating what they're feeling
—Hearing accurately what others are saying
—Expressing themselves in ways that are not provocative
—Taking in feedback about how others are reacting to their behavior
—Being sensitive to how their statements and actions are landing with others

The issue is not so much whether the prospective fits right in, as whether the members feel they can work things out with the prospective when there are differences—because there will always be differences (eventually).

o  Weak finances
Sometimes it's a question of whether the prospective has sufficient assets or income to meet the financial obligations of membership. Not everyone who is drawn to community has their life together economically.

o  Too needy
Occasionally prospectives come to the community to be taken care of, and there appears to be a frank imbalance between what the person can give relative to the level of support they're needing. For the most part communities are looking for a positive or break-even balance from prospectives and will tend to shy away from those with mental health issues, emotional instability, addictions, or extreme physical limitations—unless there is a plan offered whereby those needs will be taken care of in a way that works for all parties.

Note that there are some excellent examples of communities that have built their identity around serving disadvantaged populations:
—Gould Farm (Monterey MA) focuses on mental health
—Innisfree Village (Crozet VA) focuses on intellectual disabilities
—Camphill Village (the first in the US was located in Copake NY and now there are 10 others) focuses on developmental disabilities
—L'Arche Communities (the first in the US was located in Erie PA and now there are 17 others) focus on intellectual disabilities

o  Failure to keep commitments
It's hard on communities when members make agreements and then don't abide by them; when they make commitments and then fail to keep them. Sure, everyone has a bad week, but with some people it's a pattern and communities are leery of folks who aren't good at keeping their word.

To be sure, it can be difficult to discern a pattern during a visitor period, yet it's one of the reasons groups like to ask prospectives to lend a hand in group work parties—so they can assess follow through and work ethic. People who come across as allergic to group work don't tend to be viewed as good members.

o  Too different
This factor is something of a nebulous catchall. It can be an unusual personality, a quirky communication style, strange tastes or habits… Perhaps this traces to a different cultural background, but regardless of the origin it can be hard when there are no others like this person already in the group. Members may feel awkward in this person's presence and questions arise about whether they can make relationship with this person.

Even where there is a group commitment to diversity, that doesn't mean that everyone can find a happy home there.

• • •

One of the measures of a group's maturity is its ability to have authentic and compassionate conversations about hard things. And discussing the sense that a particular prospective is pushing the group's edge around the limits of what it can handle is an excellent example of a difficult conversation.

Saying "no" is not fun, and it can be very hard to hear it if you're the one being voted off the island. Yet sometimes groups have to do it, and putting it off doesn't make it easier later. The best you can do is anticipate that this is coming and discuss ahead of time what qualities you want in new members, so that you've already established the criteria you'll use before you start applying them.

There will still be challenges: such as the dynamic where one member wants to stretch to take a chance on a prospective that another member is convinced is a poor risk, but at least you'll have established a basis for the conversation—in this case: what is the perceived risk, and how much is too much?

While living in community can be a wonderful experience—I've been doing it for four decades and love it—it isn't always easy.

Communities and chronic illness

I recently received the following inquiry about what intentional communities might offer folks who struggle with chronic illness, from someone who had been tracking what I'd written about Ma'ikwe's ongoing battle with chronic Lyme disease:

With your brief glimpse into the disabled life (and with your familiarity with Lyme via people close to you) can you envision an intentional community that includes and is framed to support people with chronic health issues such as rheumatoid arthritis, Lyme, fibromyalgia, etc? This is a resource I've wished existed. I've looked into intentional communities in my region (northern California) but haven't found any that appear suitable for me (older, with Lyme and Babesia). How would such a group begin to create itself?


This is a great question.

My experience here—as someone who has been a community networker for 30+ years and visited perhaps 150 intentional communities—is that support for people with chronic health challenges sorts sharply into two different responses, depending mainly on whether the illness emerged before or after the person applied for membership. If the person joined in good health and the chronic issues emerged afterwards, communities will overwhelmingly rally around the person in struggle. While this result is even more certain if the person has been a member in good standing (as well as in good health) for a number of years before they are stricken, the key thing is that they have already passed the membership portal successfully. Once in the club, they can more or less count on community support, at least at a basic level.

On the other hand, if you apply as someone who is already in the throes of wrestling with a debilitating illness, membership is a questionable proposition, principally because the prospects for an equitable give and take (in terms what what the community will be expected to provide in relation to what they'll likely receive in return) is far more dubious, and the anticipated imbalance is somewhat odious. Even though intentional communities are especially well-suited to handle this kind of burden—because the support called for can be spread out over so many people, minimizing the inconvenience to any single individual—most times the group will balk at the prospect.

Ironically, one of the reasons groups are hesitant to swallow a projected trade deficit with a prospective member suffering from a chronic illness is that they'll want to protect their reserves against the possibility that a current member may become ill, and are not highly motivated to tax themselves at the rate needed to provide a more robust reserve. This is a tender example of the people in a stout lifeboat not wanting to pull half-drowned people in over the gunwales, for fear that there may not be enough food and water to accommodate those already in the boat. This is tough stuff.

And at the end of the day, it is much easier to say "no" to a stranger than to an established neighbor in their time of need.

All of that said, there are some communities who have developed an identity connected with service to people suffering from health challenges. There is Innisfree Village (Crozet VA) and the L'Arche communities (in several US locations and in Canada and Europe) that work with people with intellectual disabilities. The Camphill communities (in several locations in the US and Europe) work with the developmentally disabled. Gould Farm (Monterey MA) works with people suffering from mental illness. Unfortunately, I know of no community that offers analogous categorical support for people suffering from the debilitating effects of rheumatoid arthritis, Lyme disease, or fibromyalgia. 

Though it would be a godsend to those in need, that particular prayer has so far gone unanswered. To manifest an answer to this prayer would probably require a group that was willing to dedicate itself from the get-go to meeting this need, to accept this as part of its core identity. As the handful of established communities that I mentioned in the previous paragraph can attest, it is possible to do this, but the initiative on this will have to be undertaken by the healthy, not by those whose energy budgets have already been sharply compromised by their illness.

Remembering Marcos

I learned yesterday that an old friend, Marcos Canyon, died of a heart attack. I hadn't had contact with him since the early 90s and had lost track of what he was up to. But for a period of five years in the mid-80s, he and I worked closely together as fellow delegates to the Federation of Egalitarian Communities (FEC). Hearing this sad news brought back a flood of memories...
As I recall, Marcos joined East Wind (a sister community to Sandhill, it's located in south-central Missouri) in 1983, when he was in his 50s. He retired early from the 9-5 world and decided on a rigorous program of lifestyle experiment for the latter half of his life. East Wind was either the first or second stop on his adventure. His modus operandi was to select some innovative situation that caught his fancy and then fully immerse himself in it for five years. He didn't just want to observe, like a tourist; he wanted to roll up his sleeves and try it out first hand. More than that, he wanted to help. When five years was up, he'd select something else and move on. I've never seen curiosity subjected to such strict discipline.
After East Wind, Marcos devoted his next half-decade stint to Innisfree, a cmty nestled in Virginia's Blue Ridge Mts and noteworthy for its efforts to create a therapeutic and respectful environment for the developmentally disabled, integrating them into everyday cmty life. Marocs served as their Outreach Director for a time.
(Innisfree is an excellent example of the growing understanding that belonging to a community, all by itself, contributes to health. In essence, humans are herd animals and we crave close connection with our own kind. In isolation—think suburbs—our lives become fragmented and basic health is undermined. The good news is that the damage is largely reversible.)
After Innisfree, I lost track of Marcos on his next rotation.

• • •

Because we were both active FEC delegates, it meant we maintained a regular correspondence—this was back in the days when people wrote letters—and we'd sit at the table together twice a year at the semi-annual assemblies (when the delegates gather to discuss business). His given name was Mark, yet he affected a Latin air; hence Marcos. (Although I never asked him, I always wondered if he was partly moved to select that name in honor of the imaginative child who served as the protagonist in Dr. Suess' first classic, And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street. He was curious, too.) A careful dresser, Marcos carried himself with erect posture and something of an patrician air (think South American aristocrat). He was not snooty, but precise. He'd occasionally season remarks with bits of Spanish phrases. Whether his actual heritage was Spanish I never knew.
For such people, how they are perceived in public often carries high significance, and one of my cherished memories of Marcos is how he taught me a humbling lesson about the trouble one can get into by failing to take into account that people differ in how they like to be approached. Let me tell that story.
Marcos shouldered more than his share of the FEC workload and was a respected delegate. Because both of us were busy in Federation affairs, our work tended to intersect. Mostly that was good (FEC was, after all, a network of cooperative communities). However, occasionally there would be tension. My style, when I have an issue with what someone has done (or not done) in the context of organizational business, is to bring this up directly at the next business meeting. When this involved an unflattering observation about Marcos, he would bristle, and the exchange would invariable go poorly. To set the stage properly, I mostly admired what Marcos did and was generally careful to make sure that I appreciated the things I liked, so that my comments about his performance were not overly slanted toward the critical. While he acknowledged that the ratio of my observations was overwhelmingly complimentary, he dismissed it with (and I remember the quote because it stung so much at the time): "When I go to the symphony, I only hear the sour notes."
OK, now I was really pissed. Who did he think he was, dismissing me and acting as if his actions were above evaluation? Even at this early point in my nascent career as a process consultant, I was already locked into the idea that in a healthy group all members need to provide each other an accessible avenue for feedback about their behavior as a member of the group. It looked like Marcos was shutting me out and I was getting pretty righteous about how wrong that was.
This pattern persisted for a couple years. Because we were both high functioning, the work was still mostly getting done, but I was doing a slow burn about not being able to bring up with Marcos the occasional problem I had with his choices. Then, one day, we had an unexpected break in our schedule at an FEC assembly and Marcos and I went for a walk. With considerable courage (which I didn't recognize fully until after the fact), he asked why I tended to pick on him at meetings. Huh? Here I thought he was arrogantly ducking responsibility for his actions, and he experienced my attempts to discuss it as disrespectful churlishness! Once the dam had burst, it only took us about five minutes to sort it all out.
I explained my need to be able to comment—sometimes critically—on his choices, and he had no trouble at all agreeing with the legitimacy of that request. In turn, he requested that I raise my concerns in private; he didn't want to have his pants pulled down in front of the whole group. To my chagrin, I realized that I had never asked him how he wanted to be approached. I had just blithely assumed he'd be OK with whatever I preferred. Boy was that stupid. And ineffectual. After that five-minute conversation, we never again had a problem giving each other feedback (I'm not saying we always liked what was said; I'm saying we never again had a problem with how to say it).
It was one of those keep-your-eyes-on-the-prize lessons. The point of feedback is to solve a problem (or at least reduce tension and/or clear up any misunderstandings); it is not to look great or to embarrass your audience. That means paying attention to the need for delivering feedback in the manner most likely to be received constructively by your audience.
It was my dance with Marcos 20 years ago that brought this invaluable lesson home to me. Muchas gracias amigo, and adios.