Guidelines and Principles

Welcome! We’re glad you’re here!

We are excited that our site now offers full access to Imaginal Collectives’ essays, books, podcasts and videos, as well as courses for in-depth study and access to conversational spaces! We operate on the foundational belief that everyone’s voice is needed and contributes uniquely to the whole. Whatever your background or perspective, you are welcome here and we ask only that each member take seriously their responsibility to communicate openly and compassionately, especially at times when points of view may differ or disagreements arise.

Please read the following carefully, so that we can support one another in achieving an extraordinary standard of integrity in communication.

Our Responsibility to One Another

One of the challenging aspects of entering into online community is that we aren’t in each other’s presence when words, thoughts and feelings are put into form. Written communication can too often lead to misunderstanding. We miss the subtle cues and nuances that naturally soften our interaction when face-to-face. Who among us has not fallen into an impassioned argument online that quickly degenerated, or maybe even caused us to “unfriend” a person that is, after all, not so different from ourselves?

As members of this community, it is our responsibility to consider what story of community we want to act from, especially when conflict arises. Please deeply consider the problem of separateness and judgment that is far too common in online communities. We ask you to carefully read our Vision Statement and Being States and always interact and comment from that sacred place of Being.

What to do if things still get out of hand…

From time to time, despite all best intentions, problems arise. We recommend that in those instances, you move a conversation out of the public arena and into a private one. If you are able to resolve your differences by personal email or even by phone, that is ideal. And, if not, please contact one of our team members to discuss things further.

Our Commitment to You

We moderate comments and Facebook communities as best we can, and attempt to give individuals attention promptly when needed. Given our small staff, we can’t resolve every debate nor would we want to. We ask that you step into this space openly and compassionately, and practice embodying the principles of community that are in alignment with a more beautiful world.

If we sense, however, that a situation is lingering in deep upset, we will reach out to you directly. And we will respond if you reach out to us. We may not always know specifically what to do, but we are available to listen and will support each of you to the best of our ability.

That is our commitment to you, our community. We welcome you all wholeheartedly.

Privacy

Our online community and course environments support participants in delving deeply into new and sometimes edgy topics. We explore the known and unknown; the liminal space between what has been and what is yet to come. Such an experience can carry with it feelings of uncertainty and vulnerability.

We have done our best to design our online communities and courses so that you may share your story with others in a variety of ways. Nevertheless, even when a course or forum area is restricted-access, it is also public in the sense that there may be hundreds of people participating.

Obviously, some areas are more private than others. You should think carefully about what you feel comfortable sharing in the various environments since it is not possible for us to guarantee complete confidentiality. Trust your instincts.

That being said, we are asking everybody to hold the following agreement:

Privacy Agreement

We request that you do your part to keep our sharing spaces private and respectful. When something is shared in a private, course-specific Facebook forum, live call or webinar, please keep personal information among the participants and refrain from sharing it outside of our community.

Of course, there are always blurry areas. You might want to tell a friend, “Someone in the online course I’m in shared this amazing story about how she…” As long as it is stripped of possible identifying details, this kind of sharing is fine. In fact, we hope our courses and communities generate powerful stories that will ripple outward through our circles and beyond.

To prevent ambiguity, if you share a story that you don’t want shared in any form, even anonymised, then please say so. And if you are fine with a story to be shared with your name attached, also say so.

In other words, our default agreement is that it is OK to share things in anonymised form without permission. Any exceptions (i.e. “Do not share at all,” or “no need to anonymise”) need to be stated explicitly. But even when they aren’t, let’s trust each other to exercise care and discretion.

And now for the boring stuff…

Terms of Service

The following Terms of Service apply to your use of our online community and course environments. You are solely responsible for your conduct in regard to these terms. By registering with us, you acknowledge that you have read, understood, and agree to the following:

You acknowledge that you will receive email content from us for the purposes of sharing in ideas, conversation and community.

We reserve the right to remove any comment or discussion that jeopardises the safety and positive energy of our community.

We respectfully request that you refrain from solicitation and promotion of goods, services, websites or requesting money (profit or non-profit).

Personal contact information (including Facebook, Twitter, email/mailing addresses and telephone numbers) that is not your own, should never be copied, shared, discussed, posted or requested publicly in the community (ie, blog posts, discussions, wall posts).

Please do not post content from our community outside of this space. See the Privacy section above for more detail.

All content on this forum is the sole responsibility of the party who posts it.

In short, you agree that you will make your best effort to seriously consider and remain in alignment with the values and responsibilities voiced here, and of course, will under no circumstances will act in a manner that violates laws and community boundaries that have been established to respect and protect other human beings.

Privacy Policy

To view our updated Privacy Policy, click here: Privacy Policy

All content on this website is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Feel free to copy and share.

These terms of service have been shamelessly copied and amended (where appropriate) from Charles Eisensteins website. Charles is a fabulous commentator of the human condition at this time and a prolific writer. If you do not know his work then we would highly recommend that you visit his site.

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