How to wage a revolution

It's as simple as this, and my last post on holding local politicians accountable.

From Ten Bears at the Ohio Freedom Alliance Forum:

I've stopped in on occasion, but mainly have been active only in my local community forum.

I wanted the opportunity to share a recent event.

Last weekend on 2/20, I met with three other posters to my local forum.We recognized one another on the forum as people with genuine concerns and decided to meet one another over coffee. It was by far one of the most moving experiences that I have had in recent times, It would be pretty fair to say it was the most positive experience that I have had in at least a decade in regards to community.

Each one of us that met that day came from different backgrounds both personal and political. After the initial introductions, we struggled a bit as we really had not discussed the agenda of this meeting. Each of us had something to say, all of which were various tangents of the same concern...Government.

I have had a fair amount of experience in talking to small groups and directing the group to positive results. We agreed to a quick consensus exercise.The object of the exercise being to identify our common concerns.

Something amazing happened, after identifying the individual concerns and listing them, we then moved on by giving each person a piece of paper and a pen. Each person was to prioritize the list of concerns in order of their perception of importance. We then tallied up the concerns and the results were truly amazing. People from all walks of life from both sides of the aisle found common unity, we shared common ground. We learned something.

It was 2 and half hours on a Saturday morning. We're meeting again soon.We left the initial meeting determined. There is too much division, we've all participated in the "Us vs. Them" game at one point or another, it's futile.

We each are spreading the word to our friends and family and in just a few days have tripled the number of people that will join us for coffee the next time around.

This time we're going in with an agenda,
1. Introductions
2. Identify common concerns
3. Identify common solutions
4. Identify next steps.
5. Present the (me x 3) philosophy. If your coming back to the next meeting bring three or more people with you.

I'm looking forward to it. My intent is to share the results of the next meeting on this site. I just wanted to say that hey I'm still here and still alive, and have begun attempting to nudge people into action. I believe in democracy, I've always believed that it only works when people are involved.

Looking forward to sharing our results and expect that shortly you will see an increase in traffic, the consensus of the first meeting leaves no doubt.

Keep up the good work, Ten Bears -- but make sure you move from talk to action as soon as possible!