Community Care Working Group Meeting

July 6, 2004 (final minutes as of July 8)

Action items are in red italics.

Mental Illness Section of Community Caring in Action discussion:

The group discusses what the title of the section should be. David had written “Mental Illness”. Amy had written “Mental Health and Well-Being” because this is what had been discussed previously. When David named the section, he had in mind people with mental illnesses that are more extreme than the average person would have. He was referring to people who would need professional help. The group thought we could say this in the document – who we are talking about who needs care in that category. However, the group thought that other less extreme cases should also be addressed in this section. People who have temporary depression after hard times or people with addictions might also be addressed in this section. A few other titles for the section were discussed such as “mental instability”.

“Mental and emotional difficulty” was the name chosen by the group in the end. We decided to take out the other references to “illness” in that section. We added “Have a list of mental health resources at the center.” And a reference to “addiction” in the text.

The Vision/View statement

Several folks on the call thought we should use the View statement written by Alan since he is using the same straightforward language that is in the rest of the document.

We observed that the 2 view documents are so different in style. It was suggested that we incorporate some of  Dennis’ and John’s work into another section of the Community Caring in Action document or take parts of it and fold it into Alan’s document.

We agreed that Dennis’ and John’s view statement had some ideas in it that are at a higher level of abstraction or may be less understood by newer sangha members who may be among the recipient’s of this document. Jay agreed to work on editing the final View section if Amy would attempt to incorporate into Alan’s document any of Dennis and John’s ideas that we don’t want to lose.

Alan explained that he wrote his statement based on a ground, path, and fruition logic. He asked that in integrating John’s and Dennis’ work, that we be aware of that logic so it still makes sense.

We all expressed appreciation for John’s and Dennis’ and Alan’s work.  We all agreed that wording in the document should sound like it was written in one language style. We want people to be inspired by it and not frightened or intimidated by it. We want to make sure that we don’t create something that is heavy handed.

Other

We discussed whether or not our document addresses the sangha members who have drifted away or are disgruntled with the way things are. We could suggest that “ If you are not happy, do something.” Someone jokingly (kind of) stated that “ Humans are initiators or complainers.” How can our document address this and offer an invitation to do something about it in the community and encourage participation? People who complain or dissatisfied DO care. When people are in a negative space, they are also likely to learn a lot from the situation.

There was a short discussion about the resource list Amy is putting together. It is currently very short, but she will ask for input from Center Directors and Reviewers. Amy will send an email to center-talk asking for resources that could be used in different regions (not just local resources.)

Judith will send Amy a description of Shambhala Café.

The interim July 2004 report on our work to be presented at the Center Director’s meeting:

It was suggested that the questions in the document be made to be open ended instead of yes/no.

The Working group was asked to review the document more carefully to make sure it properly represents our work.

Amy will have 15 minutes to present our work at the Center Director’s meeting in July at Shambhala Mountain Center. She will ask “Are there objectives that are missing?” and explain our next steps of developing a facilitation guide and an online resource list. 

We set our next meeting for September 7th at the same time as usual. The newer conference call number will be used.  Call 641-497-7200 code 111359# at 4pm Pacific time, 5 pm Mountain time, 7 pm Eastern, 8 pm Atlantic time

Amy will be at SMC until August 15th, but will try to send the group a message about how our work is received at the Directors’ meeting.