A Selfless Art

During the course of the 20^th century, human life became steadily more secure. The change was uneven but a period of relative peace after the Second World War, and better health care, housing, work and education combined to improve the lives of most people, especially in the prosperous parts of the world. More comfort and security fostered the illusion that life is predictable, an idea that is fading painfully with the crises and instability of the 21^st century. In reality, life offers no certainties, a truth with which religion and philosophy have grappled from different sides in all cultures and all times. We should not have forgotten it.

Co-creation thrives on uncertainty and in practicing it I have learned to accept that nothing I do is secure or predictable. I have never surfed but I imagine that the experiences are comparable. The sea’s movement cannot be controlled or even foreseen: the surfer’s art is to read it as it happens and respond skilfully to its signals, riding the forces to a satisfactory destination.

That is how I practice co-creation, all senses alert to the data that is available from moment to moment, controlling only my own responses to what I sense is happening. A great deal of that is unconscious because it is so fast. Rational thought follows behind, reinforcing and building on what has already happened, or sometimes applying a course correction if the first reaction is proving mistaken.

This is one reason why it is so hard to teach co-creation practice, or even to explain what it is: too much of it is fast and unthought, a complex outcome of situation, experience and personality.

Uncertainty, like the sea’s movement, is a given. What matters is how I respond to it. There is uncertainty too in writing, though it is less complex and immediate than in co-creation. What is certain, however, is that I cannot control what a reader makes of it, any more than I can control what happens in a co-creation process.

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