Isn’t that your bottom line question? What's the first step in doing Living System Ministry? Doug’s response is that you begin in the subconscious, but for me, that’s not very helpful. My subconscious is messy; it’s the place I put the stuff I don’t want to think about, where my bad feelings and memories – my negative internal running commentary – is suppressed, eventually rendering me closer to “un”-conscious or comatose! Doug and I actually had a big fight about it. He didn’t like me likening the precious subconscious to being so useless!

Then I began to realize that he has a very different idea of the subconscious as being a wonderfully deep creative space where innovation emerges. I guess my mental image of the subconscious is obnoxious orange and Doug’s is a soothing purple or blue. So, when Doug tells you that Living System Ministry emerges from your subconscious, think “blue,” think creativity, think positive thoughts!

Doug says this entrance into living system learning through the subconscious is a “light bulb” experience. After a recent lecture Doug presented, he was excited to see his students experiencing this:

“I truly felt that a communication process was taking place at a systemic level. I could read it in the faces of many of the students. I felt motivated by the environment, and most of their questions were strategic and insightful. Also, the small group meeting that I led following the lecture was stimulating; students seemed to be really grappling with systemic issues. ‘Light bulbs’ were going on as people were finally beginning to see the world at a whole new, more systemic level of understanding, and in a way that they hadn't been accustomed to before. As they followed the slide images in the lecture they had been engaging in a shift-of-thought in which they could process many complex interrelating variables. But they realized that their present understanding was temporary and that in later reflection, they would not be able to comprehend their notes because they would be reviewing them with their normal conscious thought, which is far less able to process such complexity. Seeing them realize these limitations of conscious thought in understanding complexity was very exciting to me because it was the first step in systemic learning.”

So, when you enter the good old “subconscious” and have the “light bulb experience,” savor it! Don’t discount it too quickly. Remember what it was like when you engaged in that “shift of thought” in which you could process many complex interrelating variables at once. Remember, the subconscious is where Henry Ford came up with cars and where Steve Jobs came up with iPhone!

Opening our subconscious is the beginning of letting God work in us from within. Notice in Jesus’ words in Luke 17:20, 21 that we don’t enter or attain God’s Kingdom with our conscious minds. “The Kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is within you.”

Who knows what you’ll come up with as you let the Spirit direct your subconscious in thinking about Living System Ministry, and how it applies to you and your ministry. We invite you to share some of your insights right here on this blog!