For tribes, book clubs or individuals wanting to think more deeply about what the paradox of Sameness and Difference might mean for them and how they make a difference, these questions offer a way into reflection.
The first group are focused on making sense of the paradox, the second group offer ways of thinking about how it might connect to your tribe and work with others.
Sitting in the tension
- What happens when you think of who you are, and what makes you different, as layered, changing and made up of both big and small differences?
- What becomes possible when you think of sameness and difference not as things we have, but as things we do?
- Where in your life have you felt tension between wanting sameness and needing difference to be recognised?
- When have you experienced difference as something that created distance, and when has it opened up the possibility of connection?
Navigating sameness and difference in your practice
- What is shared in your tribe — purpose, background, values, experiences? What is consciously built, and what is simply assumed?
- What differences exist in your tribe that are named, and which remain in the background?
- What boundaries shape who belongs in your tribe, and how easy is it for new people to enter?
- What happens when disagreement emerges? Is it seen as a threat, a surprise, or a normal part of working across difference?
- How does power shape the way your tribe holds sameness and difference? Whose voices are heard, and whose are ignored?
