Unconditional Collaboration

Unconditional Collaboration

I’ve been thinking a lot about a recent conversation I had at school with a parent about the home/school partnership.

I was writing to update her on a conversation I had with her son, and we both expressed our gratitude in the process.  I also said, “I only wish everyone could have trust and see the results as we have.”

She responded, “Seriously. Being open to *unconditional* collaboration is the ONLY answer.  Once you put conditions in play, your results are bound to be limited.”

I read this aloud to our administrative assistant who said, “That needs to be on a poster!”

It does!

(But, I’m a writer, not an artist or calligrapher, so it’s in this blog for now.  We can work on a poster next.  Actually, our administrative assistant’s daughter is a calligrapher so it might all come full circle!)

Back to the main idea.

This idea of being open to unconditional collaboration transcends everything.  It is for sure not limited to a home/school partnership (although it’s something I hope every parent reading this will think about).  It is applicable in any kind of collaboration – groups, organizations, businesses, families and any other sort of relationships among humans at varying levels of intimacy.

When you are open, you grow the most and your heart is often touched the deepest.

When you are open, you have no expectations.

When you are open, you, as Mary Oliver once said, “Keep some room in your heart for the unimaginable.”

I think trust complements openness.  We have to trust the process.  We have to trust the people with whom we choose to have in our lives – and even the people who are around us by chance, not choice, like at work, or church, or school.  Not doing so is counterproductive.  If there is no trust, there is certainly not going to be any growth or true collaboration when things are hard.  Just like putting conditions in play will produce limited results, not having any trust will do the same.

I think another way this could be expressed is that you are always walking either in the direction of love or in the direction of fear.

Fear is boundaries.  Fear is conditions.  Fear is lack of trust.  Fear is being closed.

Love is openness.  Love is trust.  Love is unconditional collaboration.

And that is the only answer.