Forging Cohesion (Part II)
#campcrafting 006: Using identity, challenge, and ritual to supercharge spiritual strength
We don’t see things as they are; we see them as we are.
~Anaïs Nin, Seduction of the Minotaur
1. Who Are We?
It’s time to define the “us.” The task is to create a circle of identity. When your camp comes to see themselves proudly as who they are then it can be said that they share an identity. When your camp comes to believe and is happy to say that the group represents something they care about, it can be said they share a purpose.
This shift, behaviorally speaking, occurs when individuals begin speaking less about “what’s in it for me?” and more in terms of “what’s in it for us?”
Put another way, when the me becomes implied by the uttering of the word us you belong to an identity group.
As a group, the camp must define membership. Clear standards for membership are critical to forming and reinforcing group identity. Specifically, it is important to be clear who is inside and outside of the group. This may be easy for smaller groups, but eventually, if you get bigger and more ambitious in your campcrafting you will need to be explicit about membership.
Groups naturally form inner circles, which correspond to greater rights but also responsibilities. Outer circles may join and bolster your network, but correspondingly have fewer rights and responsibilities. One strategy is to have contributors being required to be sponsored by at least one member, with continued membership needing approval by all members. Clarity about belonging and clear rules for how membership is attained will enhance cohesion and make the group perform harmoniously. Finally, making sure there is an “onboarding” process for new members is important. This marks the time when a person crosses the “us” circle into the camp. This is where ritual comes into play. We’ll discuss below the way ritual can profoundly enhance their feelings of shared identity to the group. Initiation ceremonies are powerful tools to this end.
For example, my camp’s identity was co-created over several meetings, months, and even years of thoughtful consideration. We identify as The Atlanteans. In a previous article I gave a brief description, but we can flesh this out more here as an example of the kinds of things that can inspire your own identity.
Atlantis is a historical myth that has been prevalent in many cultures throughout history. As the ancient myth goes, a technologically advanced people, with complex otherworldly philosophies, were destroyed by a mysterious, cataclysmic event. The survivors scattered, left their home, and went back to the old world. Those who survived went on to spread their sacred values and way of life. In our shared mythology, we represent the descendants of these people and both the new and old ways of living to resurrect the tribe of Atlantis.
Our flag, designed and worked over as a group, is imbued with symbolism that conveys meaning and is linked with our mythology and our sacred values. If you read and worked through part one of this article then you’ve already got the raw materials to forge your own camp symbols. Recall the Atlantean creed: “Familial, Fiducia, Legatum.” Family, Trust, Legacy. Our symbol embodies our motto, which is based on our collective sacred values. See how it’s all coming together now?
Below, the Atlantean flag conveys our sacred values in the following way:
The outer circles are the progeny of the inner circles, from the founding members to those camps that will belong to future eras — the cornerstones of which are Familial.
A circle of trust representing the space created for meaningful communication to create Fiducia.
The lines that suspend the circle embed it with strength that will endure the test of time — imbuing the project with Legatum.
Now get after it with your people and craft a symbol worthy of your camp. Once your camp has a symbol in hand, it can be brought into the material world in ways only limited by your imagination. Shared uniforms (for example, tee-shirts, hats, or other clothing) all can enhance group cohesion, the social psychology of which is described in brilliant detail by Jay Van Bavel and Dominick Packer’s beautiful book The Power of Us.1 Creating material objects, wood burning with symbols and camp mottos can also be tasked. For the not faint of heart, tattoos or scarification has been a tact many people within many cultures have used to celebrate their group membership. A friend a colleague of mine, Christopher Lynn at the University of Alabama has a fantastic book out Transcendental Medication2 detailing the benefits to both individual and group that can be part of the tattooing process. Creating a camp symbol that can be put on a flag taps into the deeply rooted Tribe Drive to enhance group cohesion. It can also be incredibly fun!
2. The Ritual and Initiation
What is a ritual and why is it so important for your campcrafting quest?
Ritual is the performance of a pattern of actions that conveys meaning and significance using signals of coalitionary alliance. It exports these symbolic meanings each time it is shared with new members.
Rituals can be as light as a kiss goodnight, or as heavy as the sacrifice of a human life. In both instances, they signal to the performers that by this act we are known. By this act our values are expressed. Rituals can be public or private. For a group, they can denote the passage of time and mark transition. They can help us overcome challenges inherent in change and transformation, all while holding onto a constant value and identity. Rituals provide a space to ask and receive forgiveness. At the core of rituals are the power to connect the practitioners in a web of meaning. Therefore, ritual practice is one of our species' first tools to deepen the bonds of a social network. And so we will use it as a kind of camp adhesive.
Below is a table to help you and your camp co-create the most meaningful rituals for your group. Rituals can encompass many dimensions of the collective experience: groups can burn something – signifying sacrifice; they can put something on — signifying the taking on of a new identity and role; or they can pass something around — signifying the creation of a new community. In OUR TRIBAL FUTURE I survey several examples from cultures living and dead to help serve as inspiration for the creation of your own camp’s ceremonies.
As a camp, fill in the following table of sacred ceremonial rituals.
In the final fulfillment of the creation of a shared identity, authoring a proper initiation to emphasize the unique history of your group, and tie in their membership as part of that tradition, so that any new member now feels a connection to it from its beginning. This is the beauty of ritual; its magic is that you and your friends can author and customize the perfect rituals for your own life.
Now, let’s speak to the final group cohesion catalyst…
3. “A Community of Sufferers” and the ultimate hack to group cohesion
Harvey Whitehouse, a specialist who has studied ritual his entire career, notes that ritual has two distinct modes: “Doctrinal” and “Imagistic.”3 Doctrinal mode rituals are performed at scale and at the tribal (beyond face-to-face or peer-to-peer) groups. Think of them as mass exportation of a tribe’s social norms conveyed through the linking of symbol with ritual action. We’re not worried about this kind of ritual. What we want to leverage is Imagistic Ritual.
Imagistic Ritual is a small group purposefully engaging in extremely challenging experiences that create strong bonds and intense commitment.
Therefore, the final step in forging camp cohesion into steel is the catalyst of community challenge. The classic definition from 1950s group performance science defines group cohesion as: “the total field of forces which act on members to remain in a group.” Groups that contain members strongly attracted to the team stay intact, those that do not dissolve.
If ritual is the bonding agent, then facing and overcoming challenges is the heat that chemically strengthens that adhesive to bond separate parts into the whole.
Group challenges can be as limitlessly varied as the rituals you create. Good activities have some commonalities. First, they are typically cocreated (meaning everybody has a say in the activity). Also, they are not inwardly competitive (i.e., member against member) and highlight the group coming together to defeat an outward force (e.g., hiking a mountain together). Finally, they can range in difficulty. Meaning some challenges can be light and others heavy. An example of a light challenge can be one that is entirely in the realm of imagination. Cooperative video games, board games, and even tabletop Role-Playing-Games (RPGs) are ways to imagine and play out how a group could overcome adversity together. RPG’s are perfect to practice and play out sacred values of the group because whether you win or lose, if you play in accordance to your group’s values you gain esteem amongst your group. Nothing beats the real thing though — with heavy challenges camping, hiking, or any type of group activity that takes people out of their comfort zone generates valuable data of someone’s true nature under stress. These activities create a “community of sufferers” ultimately bringing you closer together.
For many in my Honor group, the experience of fighting in the SCA was the heavy challenge that served as a catalyst for life long bonding. To get a feel for the type of tempo of challenge this provides at the group level, here’s a short video to illustrate the point:
When at Pennsic, I fought under the banner of The Brotherhood of Steel, a fighting group based out of Bloomington Indiana and led by an SCA Knight named Cecil de Tueuleon. Living in pitched tents and cooking together, fighting as a unit (see image below), under one flag, one identity, amongst a constellation of competing tribal identities, leverages all the principles of the Tribe Drive behaviors we have explored.
Moreover, there is no single place and time where ceremony and ritual are better used to facilitate experiential bonding. It was here I experienced one of the most impactful rituals I had ever witnessed. The author of the ritual, described in the opening of part one of this article, was Gunnar Redboar.
Gunnar’s “mundane” (christened) name is Patrick Hayes. Patrick, a tribal maven, has practiced ritual in one form or another, throughout his entire life. He has been a member of the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Marine Core. He is a Royal Arch Mason of the York Rite, a 32nd Degree Mason of the Scottish Rite, and a member of the Widows Sons motorcycle club. In the context of this ritual, he serves as a Knight in the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA). According to Patrick, the ritual’s function is, “to sacralize time and space to imbue the experience with meaning. The community should feel that something has been done.” He further expounds:
“The erecting of the God Pole demarcates a beginning to make the time we are going to experience special.
4. The Burning of the God Pole
I gaze upon the wooden totem that symbolizes Troth-Heim’s sacred values, the base of which is now is fully engulfed in flame. I imagine the time, love, and effort of each artist, bringing the totem to life with hundreds of hours of carving. The thought of Buddhist monks working in meditative unison to craft a Sand Mandala4 floats in my mind as a worthy analogy to what their task must have been like. The mood is somber and little can be heard by the sound of the flames igniting the sacred symbols of their band. We had come together weeks before and faced trial and tribulation, and now the burning of the God Pole ends this collective experience. I feel a unique sense of oneness wash over me. It is the experience of something heroic and sacred and it serves as a touchstone to meaning punctuating my otherwise very regular life.
After a week of Tribe Drive simulation at Pennsic – fighting, drinking, building, crafting, singing, and experiencing — together you get to feel strangers becoming family. Case in point, my experience as a SCA armored combatant eventually led to Cecil and I forming the Honor Group, and a founding member of The Atlanteans, for which we now engage in active #campcrafting. This ancient formula, if properly harnessed, has a powerful capacity to unite people of an incredible breadth of background and life experience. If you want your camp to continue this process, feel free to share the article!
So far we’ve talked a lot about groups — but what does love got to do with it? Is the Love quest remotely connected to the #camcrafting quest? We’ll explore this topic in the next article.
Van Bavel, Jay J., and Dominic J. Packer. The power of us: Harnessing our shared identities to improve performance, increase cooperation, and promote social harmony. Little, Brown Spark, 2021.
Lynn, Christopher D. Transcendental Medication: The Evolution of Mind, Culture, and Healing. Routledge, 2022.
Jones, Dan. "The ritual animal." Nature 493.7433 (2013): 470.
A sand mandala is a traditional Tibetan Buddhist art form that involves the creation and destruction of a geometric pattern made from colored sand. The creation process typically involves a team of monks who painstakingly pour colored sand onto a flat surface using small, handheld funnels and brushes. The sand is carefully arranged in intricate, symmetrical patterns that often incorporate religious symbols and imagery.