Since we live in a narcissistic society that glories in Sinatra's "I did it my way"--theme song of countless high school graduations--most of us have little awareness of how:

1. egocentric we truly are;
2. few of us can see ourselves, our blind side, as others see us; and
3. most of us are shaped in some way from our families of origin;
4. many adults have less "community" than their teens who at least share intimate feelings with their friends;
5. much we urgently need the input, sharing and challenge of others, the bonding of community to become whole, to be healed, to learn to listen, to resolve conflict, to learn compassion.

When we risk sharing our journey in some small group experience:

• We learn from & are challenged by the differentness of others, their experience, pain, courage and humor.

• Others show us the similarities & divergences of our transitions and paths.

• In the presence of others' sharing themselves and making themselves vulnerable, we learn to risk being vulnerable & risk facing more of what & how we hide.

• We learn to listen and respect others by this process being modelled by others.

• Whatever illusions, myths, distortions and blindness we bring from our history gets gradually challenged, reworked, and eventually healed.

We do not fully encounter the strange Otherness of God except in personal encounter with the story and pain of others, particularly those who are different. Each Otherness we encounter is an invitation to respond at a deeper level of faith, hope and love to this Vast Mystery of our existence whom some call God.

Sooner or later in community or in intimate relationships we will also encounter some darkness. It will be first seen as mostly outside, externally caused. The challenge of grace is to grasp and redeem our part in the dance that brought the darkness rather than the typical blaming. This may be naivete, gullibility, projection, the rescue game, pretending, denial, or a hidden step in the dance of conflict, or an old script.

We learn faster and accomplish this growth far quicker in a small group. Our sense of being an outsider by birth, fate, rejection, history, illness, poverty, bad choices or some handicap or personal setback not only diminishes, but we begin to realize that we "outsiders" are the majority, and that it was only our isolation and self-illusion that kept us alone, separate, and wrapped in ourselves. We become empowered to change our inner and outer worlds and become more fully ourselves & more loving.

We do not yet understand the awe-ful, awesome truth that we have the power through acts of love or lovelessness really to create one another. Love is the power to act-each-other-into-well-being. We either set free the power of God's love in the world or we deprive each other of the very basis of personhood and community. Our actions have awesome power to create or to destroy. We learn this only through the shared journey.