Key Points

• Entropy in spaces is natural but build-up then leads to other forms of entropy in the emotional and social sphere. In that way it can be useful to think about it as abstracted from just the physical to prompt ways of interacting with jobs to be done that doesn’t build resentment or negativity.
• Every space is different along with everyone’s standards of cleanliness or the way space should be managed, maintained or adjusted. In that sense this should be less prescriptive and more suggestive and taken as experiments to reframe the challenge inherent in hosting.
• Highly intellectual/creative people seem to also be particularly weak at tending for spaces from my experience.
• The aim with this, is to avoid negative judgements, rising frustrations that result in outbursts of emotion, and improved communication on what needs doing without always needing to be explicit. However these ideas may not always work with everyone and sometimes explicit requests or picking people up on things is necessary.

Space-making Ideas

• Demonstrate the community spirit you want to instil.
  • Try to show the standard for how you’d like everyone to tend for eachothers needs in the space for when the first people arrive. Bringing them into your space you can acclimate them to how you think it should work through your example.
  • In essence, everyone that comes in will be adjusting to your space and guidance, they will pick up your cues and try to emulate your behaviour. If you give signals of behaviour to the initial group who adopt and continue them while others join, the new people will also adopt these. (like the monkeys who get sprayed with water study 😛)
  • If they get the sense you’ve done extra than what’s expected to make them feel at home and landed well, they will be ready and willing to pass that on to others that come or support you when you ask for things.
    • This doesn’t need to be anything big, it could be making tea once they arrive or making up their bed. When others are arriving later on you can ask them to help you with making up another bed. You did the bed for them, now they can pass it on to those that come.
      • They experience the effort it takes, so build the appreciation for that extra effort you put in for them and you show them where everything is so they can pass on the job to someone else or take it up next time.
  • Pay attention to who has either social capital or who was an attractor for people coming and try to show them specifically what needs doing. For instance, laurence can be a bit of a space demon, yet he is often the one bringing people together to spaces to work on cool things, so others naturally pick up similar habits.
    • If you set expectations up front for involvement in the maintenance this
• Create an atmosphere they’ll want to maintain.
  • Mood lighting would be great in the living room. Any kind of floor light or side lights would add a lot to creating a chill variation to the outside for when the bugs start getting dense around the lights.
  • A table area inside with a power extension board could allow people to charge things like laptops which would reduce clutter for the outside tables.
• Make it easy for everyone to clean.
  • As a spaceholder, you’ll notice things others don’t. Pre-moving objects that suggest a cleaning action provides the possibility of agency on the part of the guests.
  • For instance:
    • making sure each bathroom has an easily findable sponge.
    • If floors get stuff on them quickly, consider putting a broom nearby and visible.
    • Indicate where to restock things like toilet paper so you don’t need to always do it.
  • Consider making things more or less visible depending on how used they might be. Make the environment reflect how you want it to be maintained. What is the placement of objects communicating about how it should be lived in?
• Tours of the space
  • The tour Roberto gave was really great to give a sense of what liminal village is up to and how everything worked and fed into each part. My recording of this is in the bloggie folder it’s not the best quality but perhaps gives a home video vibe.
  • I think it would be a great addition if Laura could also give a tour of the inside since its more suited. This could be a little tricky to manage but even if you both clarified with eachother what should be shown in both outside & inside this would help to lesson the load. You could also pass on this task to those that’ve had the tour.
  • This would be a great time to show where all the cleaning stuff is (ie mop, broom, hoover ect). This will help give agency to others to initiate cleaning and reduce potential resistance to it.
• Ask for help. spread out the work among the community
  • Reciprocity is a natural function of humans, so by you clearly doing small things for them to start with, this creates a desire to reciprocate, which you can direct forward into the community so it creates a feedback loop of standards. One simple technique here would be being attentive to the needs of others, then asking their help to support that need. Then they see what you’re doing for others and recognise they should be equally attentive.
  • Asking different people for help gets everyone used to also asking, or taking up support tasks when they see them. This also allows you to see who is less comfortable with doing tasks or requires someone to guide them on things.
  • Don’t allow yourself to struggle where resentment may build.
• Expectations on generative contribution
  • If it’s necessary for residents to contribute a certain amount each day, definitely make that explicit before they arrive. This will help to avoid any misplaced assumptions on what is paid for or expected.
  • A key trick is to hold high standards but without high expectations. If you expect entropy and recognise the responsibility and agency you have in creating it through the seeding process. You can also relax into recognition of it being a complex system and therefore beyond your entire control. Very much a both and situation here.
  • Seeding syntropy is an inverse behaviour to purely throwing out problems to the group. Often people will put forward a problem or need expecting the group to organise around dealing with it. Obviously there are some projects that need discussion or group coherence so this is contextual, but for something more manageable you want to instill the culture of doing something towards it, making it visible what you’re doing (nudging the group) or explicitly asking for help to complete it. This orientates the group toward action and promotes personal responsibility for the needs of the space. (Eg getting glue for a broken stool is quicker than discussion of who and how to do it, and can be passed on as project midway if the person spotting it doesn’t want to complete it)
• Feel empowered in a role of leadership
  • The agency offered in liminal village to contribute how you want is fantastic. Making it easier for others to also know what needs doing or what would be more priority may also help to hone that agency toward something actually useful.
  • Many that may visit liminal could be new to being in community spaces with others, and certainly will not have nearly the same experience or awareness you have around noticing others strengths, what things need focus, and what are the best ways to facilitate syntropy and good feeling in community. Therefore it's worth stepping into a guide for other hosts or guests, to share what you know from experience, so they can also bring it into their awareness. This will help them act from the base of understanding rather than direct suggestions they may not fully grasp the necessity of.
• As a guest be a host. As a host be a guest.
  • I liked this phrase that was used a lot in a regens unite event and stuck with the space that hosted it in berlin.
  • Creating and demonstrating a sense of enjoyment of hosting and tending for the needs of others, while making it easy for them to join in

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