What brought me balance was realizing that my goals and the participants' were not at odds with each other. In trying to use new values to inform my practice as a facilitator, I was in effect becoming a better, more attentive leader. This attentiveness fed the goals of the group. It was part of my research goals to try various activities and approaches to see what would work best in different situations. My goal, looked at from a different angle, was to bring the group the best possible class experience—to be what they needed.

Balancing Needs

Balancing goals reached beyond the tensions of research. Each person coming to the group had different needs. They had needs for their lives and within the group. There were two members of our group who needed to belong to a community where they felt they could contribute and belong. The first person was living in an unsafe situation and was just beginning to make positive changes in her life. She was often unable to concentrate and sit still. Her mind often drifted in and out of the class. Our second member had left an abusive relationship years before, but still struggled with shortterm memory loss and shyness. She needed a quiet space to slowly put down her thoughts so she could contribute in a manner in which she was comfortable. When she was disrupted, she couldn't keep her train of thought going, and therefore didn't feel comfortable with what she had to contribute.

As a facilitator, I needed to meet the needs of both women. To meet this challenge, Janet and I would adapt the lesson plan to both draw the attention of our distracted member, and interest the rest of the group. We had frequent and regular breaks with healthy snacks and began to incorporate non-writing activities. We soon realized that the snack we provided was a substantial part of what some of our students would eat that day. We switched from cookies and donuts to fruit plates and bagels. The activities allowed everyone to do something with their hands or bodies, as well as to talk in an informal manner. Even these discussions helped ease the tension; as members got to know more about each other they began to create their own ways of working as a group.

You can't always meet everyone's needs, but balancing them is important. It would have been easy to tell our disruptive member that this was a quiet space and she needed to act accordingly or to tell our shy person that she needed to learn to work with distraction. I decided that more than anything else, these two women needed to be in class and I kept trying different things until I found a way that worked for both of them.