As we live in a community, we are inevitably affected by certain group dynamics, so it is useful to be aware of the most important relationships. The elements of a group (community) are the individuals. In a community, the movements (interactions) of individuals will sooner or later select the leaders, and the others will be forced into the position of the led. The leader can be democratic or autocratic (maverick). A democratic leader seeks to ensure that each individual finds his/her place in the community and helps everyone to develop himself/herself during the pursuit of the community's goals, i.e. he/she seeks and finds activities for everyone at his/her level. In such a community, individuals feel well. 

The autocratic leader is only concerned with preserving his/her own power, so he/she surrounds himself/herself with impressionable, flattering individuals, while others are marginalized. If an individual has not found his/her place in the community, he/she must either confront the leader and fight for the position he/she believes to deserve him/her, and if this fails for whatever reason, he/she either submits and accepts a peripheral role or leaves the community. 

From this brief overview, it is clear how much damage autocratic leaders can do to the community (and to themselves), because they cannot mobilize all the individuals in the community to achieve their goals. The marginalized and the oppressed will react by withholding their skills and will not be able to contribute their knowledge to the community's goals, while the sycophants are incapable of independent solutions, as they are only busy seeking the leader's favor and therefore do not move the community's cart forward. While the democratic leader seeks to integrate everyone, the autocratic leader operates on the principle of divide and rule (“Divide et impera”). In this way, he/she divides the community and sooner or later produces his/her own opponent, who then on occasion overthrows his/her rule. 

These group dynamics are just as valid in kindergarten as in politics or churches, since the laws are not institution-dependent, but arise from the structure of the human personality. But if one is not aware of them, one can easily fall into illusion. 

There is also a third type of personality besides the leader and the led, the one who, by awareness - always takes the vacant place (vacancy) in favor of the community - because he/she is aware that the community works well when all the places are filled, but this is rare, like the white raven. The value of such an individual is most often not recognized by leaders and is relegated to the periphery. They can become the indirect leaders who move events from the background. 

If we look at the group dynamics from a spiritual perspective, we can see that the roles that individuals play in the community correspond to one of the Tarot's minor and major Arcana cards. Thus, there will be a Ruler or High Priestess everywhere, these are desirable roles, but every community has its own Fool. If there is no individual present to consciously fill the missing role, then group dynamics will squeeze an individual into that role. Thus, I have seen cases where highly educated, respected scholars, after retirement, have been forced into the role of the Fool as other aspiring individuals have competed for the position of ruler. 

Of course, in every community there are people who play the "negative" role; one who brings trouble to everyone and is hated by everyone plays the role of Death; and one who is always a bird of alarm plays the role of Doom. Once the community has somehow got rid of them, group dynamics will soon squeeze in others to fill the gap. 

This also shows that there is not too much sense in looking for another community, workplace, etc., because the same tasks will come back to us there, i.e. to find our place, our task, between the 22 initiation paths of the Tree of Life (small Arcana) and its side branches (big Arcana). Our only option is to raise our consciousness to a higher level, which will allow us to live through the initiation paths on a spiritual level, so that we can see over the games of others, and thus cease to be a distraction for them, and they for us.

Margaret Rhasoda-Varga
UCCM head-master
(The art of living life I. excerpt)