--- title: "Where are my tensions and how do I process them?" description: "Your tensions live in the lightning-bolt panel in the top bar and in the Tensions list, where each one becomes a proposal, an agenda item or a task." category: structure-governance section: proposals-and-decisions type: Tutorial lastUpdated: 2026-09-08 locale: en canonical: https://support.talkspirit.com/en/structure-governance/tensions-overview --- # Where are my tensions and how do I process them? ## Where are my tensions and how do I process them? Talkspirit collects the tensions you raise in the **lightning-bolt panel** in the top bar, and the panel's **See all tensions** link opens the full **Tensions** list. From either place you open a tension and turn it into a proposal, an agenda item or a task. Tensions are part of the **Holacracy add-on**. If the lightning bolt is missing from your top bar, either your organisation has not enabled the add-on or an administrator has switched the tensions display off. Switching it off hides the tension screens rather than deleting anything: your tensions come back if it is switched on again. Your organisation can also rename the word "tension", so the term on your screen may differ from the one used here. ## What is a tension? A tension is the gap between how things are and how they could be, sensed from one of the roles you hold. That role is what connects it to a circle and makes it someone's to act on. Typical examples: - A process that no longer works the way it should. - An opportunity the organisation is not yet taking. - Work that needs doing with no one clearly accountable. A tension is not a complaint or a conflict. It is the raw input of governance: the material a proposal, an agenda item or a task is built from. ## Where do I find my tensions? There are three ways in, and all three show **the tensions you raised**, not your colleagues'. - The **lightning-bolt panel** in the top bar lists your open and in-progress tensions, with a count badge on the icon. **Add tension** sits at the top of the panel and **See all tensions** at the bottom. - The **Tensions** list, which that link opens. It is not in the Structure sidebar, so the panel is the usual door to it. - The Cockpit's **Requires attention** queue has a **Tensions** tab, so your tensions sit alongside your tasks and goals. ![The Tensions panel open under the lightning-bolt icon in the top bar, listing three tensions with their circle underneath each title, an Add tension button at the top and a See all tensions link at the bottom](/images/structure-governance/tensions-overview/01-tensions-panel-top-bar.png) The list opens on a filter of **Open** and **Processing** tensions, shown as a count on the **Filter** button. Clear that filter to see resolved and closed ones too. Each row shows **Title**, **Status**, **Priority**, **Assigned Circle** and **Created**. Three controls narrow the list down. The search box matches words in the title. **Filter** adds filters on **Status**, **Priority** or **Circle**, and the **Active** and **Resolved** quick filters apply the two most common ones in a click. **Group** offers **Circle** or **Priority**. ![The Tensions list in the Structure module, with the Add tension button, a Filter button carrying an active-filter count, a Group button and a search icon above a table of three tensions showing Open badges and Low, Medium and High priorities](/images/structure-governance/tensions-overview/02-tensions-list.png) ## How do I capture a tension? 1. Click **Add tension**, at the top of the panel or in the list header. 2. Enter a **Title**. 3. Under **From which role?**, choose the role you are sensing the tension from. The list holds only roles you fill, grouped by circle, and that role's circle becomes the tension's **Assigned Circle**. 4. Add a **Description**. 5. Set a **Priority**: **Low**, **Medium** or **High**. New tensions are **Medium**. 6. Click **Create**. > **Note:** you need at least one role to capture a tension. Without a role assignment **Add tension** stays unavailable, because a tension has to be sensed from somewhere. ## What do the statuses mean? A tension carries one of four statuses: - **Open**: captured and waiting to be processed. - **Processing**: a proposal built from it is under way. - **Resolved**: addressed, with whoever resolved it recorded. - **Closed**: closed without resolution, because it no longer applies. If a proposal built from a tension is rejected or withdrawn, the tension returns to **Open** on its own, unless another proposal from the same tension is still running. Nothing about it is lost, and nobody has to validate the outcome on your behalf. ## How do I process a tension? Processing means deciding what the right next step is and creating it. Open the tension and use **Process this tension**: - **Create a proposal**: to propose a governance or structural change. This one needs an assigned circle. Without one the option is greyed out and says so. - **Create an Agenda Item**: to bring it to a meeting and discuss it with your circle first. You choose which meeting. - **Create a Task**: to turn it into a piece of work someone can pick up. ![A tension's page showing its title with Open and High badges, a General card with the description, assigned circle and assigned role, a Process this tension card offering Create a proposal, Create an Agenda Item and Create a Task with a hint under each, and an empty Transformations card](/images/structure-governance/tensions-overview/03-process-this-tension.png) Creating a proposal moves the tension to **Processing**, and the panel then reports that the tension has already been processed. An agenda item or a task leaves the status alone, so the three options stay available and you can raise more than one thing from the same tension. **Create a project** is not one of these three: a tension cannot become a project directly, so do not look for the option here. It appears one step later. Turn the tension into an agenda item, then open that item during the meeting: its **Actions** menu offers **New Task**, **New Goal**, **New Project**, **New Proposal**, **New Election**, **New Metric** and **New Checklist**, plus **Link existing**. That is where a project comes from, and it is also where a task can be placed in a chosen project and section, which the tension's own **Create a Task** dialog does not offer. The labels follow your organisation's terminology, so a renamed project or task shows its own name. Everything you create this way is listed under **Transformations** on the tension itself, with a link to open it and a button to unlink it again. A tension can therefore be followed from the moment it was sensed to the decisions it produced. ## Who can edit or delete a tension? **Only the person who raised a tension** can edit, resolve, close or delete it. This is rarely visible, because the panel and the list show you nothing but your own tensions. Open somebody else's tension from a link and the menu still appears, but the action is refused. The actions menu offers **Edit**, **Resolve**, **Close** and **Delete** in the panel and in the list. The tension's own page offers **Edit**, **Resolve** and **Delete**. **Resolve** and **Close** appear only while a tension is **Open** or **Processing**; **Edit** and **Delete** stay available whatever the status, so a resolved tension is still yours to correct. > **Warning:** deleting a tension cannot be undone. Anything already created from it survives, but the trail back to the tension is gone. ## What's Next? - [Setting up tensions for my organisation](/administration-security/set-up-tensions-for-your-organization) - [Holacracy Add-on Overview in Talkspirit](/structure-governance/holacracy-add-on-overview) - [How do I create a proposal?](/structure-governance/how-to-create-a-proposal) - [How do I use Bring to meeting?](/structure-governance/how-to-use-bring-to-meeting)