‘Yes, and…!” – Jumping into the unknown – Why don’t we do more of it?

Posted on June 30, 2012 by seeandconnect

The other day, I had a coffee with a friend who is promoting change in how we do democracy. She is particularly preoccupied with the way well-educated, professional middle (and upper middle) class people dominate the mainstream politics and the conversations along the Beltway.  She has repeatedly said to me: “Veena, we go about our business as though it is merely business, but for some people these matters are life and death!”

She’s right.

A lot of people in the United States (and, of course, around the world) are in basic survival mode. Bills to be paid, increasing debt, an education system that is letting them down, unemployment, exhaustion etc. In some ways, the description I just wrote applies equally to lower and middle folks alike. Yet, my friend – let’s call her Paula – was thinking about the people who are just keeping their heads above the water, who live in communities plagued by drugs, violence, large numbers of men in prison and other destructive dynamics. You would think – or at least I did – Paula would be ready to do almost anything to feel like she is doing all she can to push boundaries, to wake people up. Because, after all, she is feeling very awake to the idea that on the one hand people’s lives are at risk and on the other our democracy is trundling along weighted down by professionals (everywhere on the political spectrum) pushing papers, stroking their own egos, debating ideas, being partisan, living comfortable lives and being very reluctant to break with convention.

Yet, I witnessed in Paula something that surprised me when we were talking. It also left me feeling a bit sad. Not withstanding the life and death nature of the business we are in, Paula seemed afraid to break with convention, challenge the rules, take risks.

Last week, I wrote about jumping – jumping off the train we often ride in our social change work, the train that takes us through the lands of frustration, disempowerment, lack of voice, conflict etc, within our organizations and partnerships. My conversation with Paula reminded me of another aspect of jumping – jumping into the unknown. 

Paula’s organization is going to have a big event next year. We – or perhaps I – started kicking around different ideas for it. I was feeling playful and a bit agitated. I was thinking: “Okay, you are frustrated with the status quo, so DO something! DO something DIFFERENT!” One idea that came to mind was to have the event in a place like Detroit. Work with local people to use the event as a hook to do some regenerative work in a city that is full of degeneration. I said this in the context of thinking that it would be amazing if bunches of people – of Occupiers, for example – went to Detroit with the intention of slowly rebuilding the city (or a small community within it) applying the range of so-called alternative principles and systems that we progressive social changemakers say we are about and that are being lived out in community pockets around the world.  It would take time, creativity, love, patience and perseverance. It could be done by stepping on convention over and over again, by tossing aside rules, regulations, bureaucracy. It could be done by drawing on internal, relational and material resources in ways that we right now perhaps cannot even imagine – but can trust will unfold.

We agreed that DC has its own fair share for need regeneration, and thus Janet need not go so far afield.  I responded to this with “Ohh, yeh, you could do the conference in DC, but do it differently. You could make it so all the services, e.g. catering, are done through local vendors or even train up currently unemployed folks to do everything. You could build on that by somehow making it that everyone at the conference has a service role to play (even if only for a few hours) and the traditional service providers, e.g. caterers, cleaners etc. all participate in the conference. This could break down the server/served split and nurture a more meaningful sense of equality in the space. It could bring more active voices into the dialogue. Yeh, you could have FUN with this!”

As I was talking about all this, I got excited. I moved myself to the edge of my chair and did this bouncy thing I do when I get enlivened by ideas. So there I was, bouncing on the edge of my seat and throwing out ideas for doing a conference differently- which to me means something like making the conference an imaginative living model of how we really want the world the be.  

Janet responded to my excitement and my ideas with: “Now, now, I can only take on so much at once” or something like that. I stopped bouncing.I got the sense that she wanted to do a conference that tweaks the status quo around its edges. I said ‘Yeh, sure.” I was thinking – “If we are talking life and death here, surely, now is the time to be pushing the boat out, making a leap – even if you don’t quite know where it takes you or how exactly you get there…”

I didn’t say that. And I don’t know that I even was thinking that so clearly at the time. At the time, I was more feeling it – feeling something in the pit of my stomach that just made me contract a bit, made me reel in that sense of expansion I had been feeling minutes before. It is only now, as I reflect on the conversation, that I’m getting clarity on what I was thinking in response to what I experienced as Janet’s reluctance to get excited and go “Yes, and…!” I was thinking: For F&^%$*’s sake, Janet – JUMP!!!!” I didn’t care if she did or didn’t like any of my specific ideas – I just wanted her to be excited about stepping over the threshold and jumping into different territory – some of it explored, some of it not – as a way of really challenging the status quo.

Jumping – so often easier said than done.  What prevents us – social changemakers – from jumping into new/different territory? Why, when we are so fed up with the status quo,  do we become reluctant to do things differently? What holds us back from taking risks? What kind of risks could more of us being taking in our day-to-day work that could open up our creativity and help us align more deeply with our values? 

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JUMP!

Posted on June 18, 2012 by seeandconnect

I recently had coffee with a staff member of non-profit organization here in Chicago. I was meeting her to get to know the organization – as I love the work it does and want to see if can contribute while I’m in the area. I asked a lot of questions. I then played back to her what I thought I was seeing – my understanding of the situation. It went something like this: “So, you came here with a heart full of passion and excitement and now you are sitting here frustrated because you have ideas and no one’s listening. In the struggle for money and the stress that goes with that you are deflated. The passion that brought you to this organization has walked out the door because it was getting suffocated. You are frustrated because you feel you cannot communicate with the people in the offices over there (pointing to the offices down the hall). You are working here in this organization that is meant to help strengthen communication in communities, yet within the organization you feel that people don’t communiate with each other very well. And you are sad because you have the sense that this organization can do amazing things and you want it to do amazing things – but it seems stuck, trapped and it is taking you with it.”

The woman let out a sigh when I was done. In NVC training, this is called the ‘audible sigh.’ It refers to that sigh people let out when they feel a sense of relief at having been fully understood.   

I experienced this meeting as a reminder of what it can mean to be the change we want to see in the world.  So many non-profit organizations are in a similar situation. Staff are frustrated. Money is tight. People come in passionate and energized and leave burnt out, disgruntled and perhaps even cynical. Often, serious amounts of energy go into crafting fundraising applications and trying to sell the work of the organization as a worthwhile investment. Equal amounts of energy and time go into writing up performance reports. I can’t help but wonder “What if all that energy went into working with the people the organization was set up to serve?”

I’m sure I’m not alone in wondering this  – it is not in any way a novel question.

But the point isn’t the energy put into fundraising. The woman I met was frustrated by poor communication, by the sense that she wasn’t being heard, by her creativity and passions being crushed. Isn’t that what we – social changemakers – are usually meant to be all about, met to be growing in this world? Aren’t we trying to nurture and sow seeds to grow ideas, actions, collaboration, creativity and thriving communities?

I can’t help but wonder: “If we aren’t able to do all these things in our organizations, how are we going to be successful playing a supportive role to make this happen on our doorsteps and in the wider world?

Again, I’m sure I’m not alone in wondering this – it is not in any way a novel question.

Next question that comes to mind: How do we jump off this train, and head in a different direction? 

Again, I’m not unique in asking this. A lot of people are asking it and responding. My friend Liam (@hackofalltrades), for example, is writing a book on this – on jumping off the train. His focus is on how organizations can be more like people – in particular, how we can build organizations, e.g. NGOs, charities, and non-profits that operate in line with how people generally tend to create and thrive together. His argument is that too many social change organizations are locked into conventional corporate systems and cultures that stifle and suffocate, rather than expand and unfurl our individual and collective creative potential. He wants to offer up an alternative. His ideas are best represented by his own words – I encourage you to check out his blog posts at Concrete Solutions.

And he’s definitely not the only one writing, thinking, experimenting on this subject.  I am highlighting his work in particular because he’s a friend and I’m excited for him that he is writing a book to tell his story and disseminate his ideas. Also, his recent posts have really engaged and energized me!

The rest of this week I’m going to reflect on the following questions – inviting you to do this same (if not this week, then maybe another week):

  • In what ways am I already experimenting with jumping off the train? 
  • In the future, in what ways might I experiment with jumping?
  • What kind of support do I need/want to jump?
  • What makes me afraid to jump?

And, perhaps not surprisingly, throughout the week, I’ll often be hearing this song in my head: JUMP!

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Resource-full: reconfiguring how we create in community

Posted on June 9, 2012 by seeandconnect

On Tuesday, I did what parents around the world tell their children not to do. I turned up at a parking lot and met up with a bunch of people I did not know, but had found through the internet. I even got in cars with them and drove to another state.

What was I doing?

I had joined a group of half a dozen Illinois Democrats in a carpool to Wisconsin to pound the pavement and get out the vote to recall Governor Walker.  But I’m not here to write about the dangers of the internet or about the dangers of hanging out with Democrats-I-do-not-know.  Or even the Walker-Recall campaign. Rather, I’m thinking about a chat we had in the car on the way back. We started talking about obesity. A huge (I know, I know – how could I resist the pun!?) issue in the US. Our discussion eventually took us into the territory of individual responsibility, media, messaging, government. When the conversation concluded I kept thinking: we talk a lot about lack of resources to create change – when what we are really lacking is imagination, connection and spirit.  We also lack a commitment to taking responsibility – too often, the average citizen/resident will say ‘Well, it is the fault of such-and-such and the responsiblity of so-and-so”- rarely factoring themselves in to the equation.

Jack (not his real name) looked at obsesity as a cultural issue, placing significant blame on the role of the media and advertising in pushing people in a particular, unhealthy direction. He seemed to think government needs to intervene somehow to counteract the message.

Blame the media. Blame the government. Blame advertising.

And when that doesn’t work, just blame the system. Blame the system – for example – where people are so busy working to pay the basic bills they don’t have time to shop and cook. This is why – Jack exclaimed – fast food is so popular.

I agree with him – in different ways, through different influences, people are pushed into behaviors that aren’t serving them and their families very well. At the same time, I found myself – bouncing in my seat – describing how, in community, we can create counter cultures and that everyone has a role to play. I talked about individuals and their choices – including people like him. Yeh, even thin Jack who lives in an upper middle class Chicago suburb with his thin family has a role to play in creating culture and systems change that addresses (among other things) obesity in the United States.

A lot of what I said to him is based on stories I know from ‘inside-out’ community development.

Let’s take a neighborhood – Anywhere, USA. It is a neighborhood with a lot of working class families – people who have little free time to cook and shop and no extra monies to pay someone to do the cooking or buy healthy pre-made meals.  As Jamie Oliver has been doing in the UK and the US, someone could set up some sort of project to teach people different ways to eat healthy, yet inexpensively. Some of the issue is, after all, lack of experience with healthy eating as a result of what’s been passed from one parent to the next.  But, as Jamie found out (I say this based on watching the documentary about his UK experiement – unfortunately, I haven’t found the weblink for it), this isn’t particularly straight-forward and it isn’t a silver bullet. ‘Educate the people’ is effectively what he was thinking/trying to do – thinking this was THE answer. And really, I think Jamie knows that it is not THE answer.  In fact, from what little I read about his work in New York, he also started working with farmers’ markets and other local inititatives to create healthy eating communities.

We are talking about cultural and systems transformation – which involves a lot of players – in and out of the neighborhood.  I shut my eyes and just spit out different ideas that were coming to mind:

  • While there are a whole bunch of people with not enough time to cook and shop, there could also be people who have time to cook, e.g. a retired person who still wants to be active, and maybe even has the know-how and passion for it.
  • While the local shops might not be selling fruits and vegetables, in the surrounding areas there might be farms or even bigger shops that are harder for people to get to.Maybe some of those people who have spare time might be interested in shopping for others that don’t.
  • It might be that the people with time and an inclination to be actively involved could be connected with those wanting support – new networks could be created.
  • Or, as Jamie is trying to do, a core group of people can become educators in a community and teach others how to cook inexpensive, quickly-made, healthy meals.
  • Potentially, small service-oriented businesses are created. This isn’t about charity or huge volunteer schemes. Sometimes, money might be exchanged in return for a service. Or another type of currency exchange might take place. 
  • It might be, for example, that some people are out there who would love to cook for others and in return would want a seat at the dinner table, because they have no one to eat with at home.
  • Maybe some local people would love to create a community garden for growing vegetables.
  • Maybe some want to work with nearby farmers and other food providers to generate a greater supply of affordable healthy fruits and vegetables that can be brought into the community.
  • Some of the relationships might play a role in nurturing individuals to become more confident and have a stronger sense of self.
  • Some of the relationships might lay a role in job creation.

All of this – and an infinite range of other types of relationships an exchanges  – can happen through the forging of new connections in creative ways – ways that harness existing resources differently, sometimes uncovering resources where people thought there were none. I mean ‘resources’ in a very broad sense: people’s passions, skills, thirst for learning, secret talents, desire to belong, participate, be heard etc., alongside money and other systems of currency/transaction.

I let out such ideas in a torrent – bouncing, bouncing, bouncing in the passenger’s seat as Jack drove. Jack’s response was: What’s the business model? What business model would support this?

I stopped bouncing and slumped in my seat. “I don’t know. I don’t think about business models. My point is that we have way more resources and capacity to do things differently than we think and it is about opening up those resources. But it takes people coming together creatively and collaboratively. Anything is possible, Jack! But we can’t leave it to that small portion of people we like to accuse of having all the power and get mad at for using that power simply to line their pockets or give them status. .”

“Hmmm” was his response.

I know that in different spaces around the world, people are playing and experimenting with being resource-ful. And it is slowly spreading.  I hope people like Jack start hearing about these stories and get inspired – connect with the spirit of them – to ask “What could my role be in reconfiguring how we live together and how we work with our resources differently?’ or ‘If I could imagine how our communities could be different – more nourishing, healthy and thriving, what would I begin to see and what might my role be?’

That said – to give him credit – maybe Jack’s onto something…all about media, he said. Hmmm. How can we get more publicity to draw widespread attention to the potential alternatives – economic, political, social – we have within us? How do we – people seeking to unleash the alternatives to the status quo – start doing our fair share of nudging people generally in a different direction?

Thanks to Jack – for inspiring me to write this post and nudging me to keep thinking about resource-fulness, how we get the message out there that we have way more creative power than we think we do. We are resource-full.

 

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This I believe – what ‘be the change’ means to me…

Posted on May 31, 2012 by seeandconnect

Gandhi’s dictum: ‘We must be the change we want to see in the world.’

My work centers around this instruction. Increasingly – as I make an effort to explore it openly, I get backlash, resistance, skepticism, and people just being irritated. One question I keep coming back to – or others nudge me towards it – is:  “What does individual change have to do with systemic, institutional, structural change?’ A variation on this question is “How is me or anyone else being a nicer person going to address, for example, the sorry state of our inner city schools or the access to healthcare challenge or the crazy income disparities we have?  

Here is my current answer to such questions.    

I envision a world where more of us are committed to building strong, nourishing relationships. The change I want to see is greater awareness of our beliefs, attitudes, assumptions and behaviors. I want to see greater awareness combined with a commitment to openness and action. I want more of us being open to change within ourselves and to be willing to take the action necessary to make it happen. I want to see on-going evolution in how we relate to our selves and each other. 

Why? Because how we relate to our selves and each other – our relationships – matters.

Systems, institutions, structures are nothing without the people who bring them to life. A myriad of relationships between people sustain all of our systems, institutions and structures. The result can be pretty messy and complex. For example, we are all likely to have witnessed in our families, in our schools, in our workplaces how it is that we create or are put into a system (however unspoken and informal) and then it in turn shapes our relationships. In this way, we become trapped in systems and knowingly or unknowingly behave in ways that might actually be going against the kind of person we would really like to be and can be.

A small number of people might/often have the majority of the power in any given system, institution or structure. Yet, we all have a role to play in sustaining what has been created. Namely, by being complicit. We can blame the culture we are in and the constraints this puts on us. Yes, we can. We would be partially correct. Yet, ultimately we have our autonomy and we can take responsibility for creating new types of relationships that do not feed and sustain existing systems, institutions and structures.  Yes, we can.  

The dynamics of our relationships – how much we trust each other, how much we support each other, how much risk we take, how much we think about how our choices impact on others, in what ways we feel comfortable collaborating and creating together – all depend on what each of us brings into our day-to-day interactions with each other.

What each of us brings into our day-to-day interactions with each other depends on what each of us carries around inside us in terms of beliefs, attitudes and assumptions. How we move through the world and what we create and destroy around us tends to be a reflection of how we view ourselves and understand our role in the world.

This I believe.

Back to the questions:  What does individual change have to do with systemic, institutional, structural change?” or “How is me or anyone else being a nicer person going to address, for example, our inner city schools or the access to healthcare challenge or the crazy income disparities we have or our screwed up political system that rarely feels like it has anything to do with public service?

For me, it is about the multiplier effect:  one person relating to the world in a different way might seem irrelevant to systems/structural/institutional change. One thousand could perhaps change a neighborhood. A few thousand? One million? One million people who believe change is possible, who think differently from how they used to, and who are relating to and working with each other compassionately, creatively and collaboratively could start to reshape our social, political and economic systems, no?  My assumption is that getting to one million starts with each of us as individuals taking responsibility for what we believe, our attitudes, our assumptions and our behaviors – for how we move through the world. Getting to one million starts with one.

I am also assuming that ‘being the change’ is not merely a matter of being nicer or kinder to one another- though this is part of it (and we shouldn’t underestimate how challenging this practice of being kinder to ourselves and each other can be).  For me, being the change is about forging healthy relationships rooted in individual responsibility, in non-judgement, in empathy, compassion, forgiveness, unconditional love (oh, yeh, that’s right the ‘L’ word).  I am trying to do this on a day-to-day basis in my own life. I know I am not alone. And while it might sound light and fluffy, I also know it is hard work. Yet, I am committed to it. Because I believe that, in turn, such relationships can form the basis of vibrant, creative, resourceful communities where people come together in collaboration to build and sustain healthy systems, institutions and structures – in a friendship, in a family, in a school, in a workplace, in a neighborhood, in a town, in a city, in a state, in a country and so forth. 

This I believe.

Do you think it is really that farfetched to believe that individuals forging healthy relationships with their selves and one another has a pivotal role to play in creating a different world – a world that is more nurturing for everyone? What has your experience been of this idea that individuals changing how they relate to their selves and others can change a system, a structure, or an institution (however big or small – from a friendship to a school to an economic system)?

 

 

 

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Seeing with a Gardener’s Eye….

Posted on May 25, 2012 by seeandconnect

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I am spending this summer visiting my parents. My eighty one year old dad is avid gardener – and a very good one. His garden contains a vast array of flowers that start blooming now and will carry on through the summer.  All the colors of the rainbow will be well represented in different shades. Throughout the season, my senses will be enraptured by a range of colors, textures, shapes and scents that emerge, change and thrive in this garden.

Not only do I sit in the garden, but I’m also working in it. I’m new to gardening – all these years, I’ve made practically nil effort to learn about how my dad created his masterpiece. This year is different. I’m a keen gardening apprentice. This excites me for a number of reasons. They include, as I’ve suggested in a previous post, my belief that the gardener and his/her garden have a lot to teach me about social change and activism.   This week, the practice of watering the plants has instructed me on the basics of awareness.

Warning: Some of you might get a bit distressed by the quantity of water you can imagine is being used to maintain the garden. Water is a precious resource that I do not take for granted. Yet, the joy gardening brings to my dad – and the joy his garden brings to anyone who sees it (as well as the bees, birds and bunnies that seem to be enjoying it, too!) – prevent me from boycotting it in the name of water conservation.

This morning, hose in hand, I slowly made my way around the garden to water the plants. In the past, I never had much patience for this vital task. I’d stand for probably what was a minute and then be ready to move on. ‘No, no, no,’ my dad would shake his head ‘Go back, you need to stay there for almost ten minutes – it’s really dry.’

Ten minutes watering the same set of plants? Really?  I couldn’t fathom it. Thankfully, my capacity for patience has developed greatly in the past year. 

Previously, my dad had mentioned to me that he likes watering; he finds it meditative and relaxing. Thus, I assumed that when he waters the garden he tunes out and his mind goes blank. The other day he explained that this isn’t the case at all. Rather, while he is watering, he uses the time to look closely at all his beloved plants and the happenings in his garden. Sometimes he focuses in on the minutia, sometimes he casts a wide glance to take in the big picture.

Look, the buds on that plant aren’t opening and the leaves on that one have a lot of holes. Maybe those plants would be better over there – more sunlight. And those plants are starting to take over – making the other one’s struggle. And these plants, well, the bunnies must be getting fat! And so forth.

He uses the time while he is watering to SEE his garden and understand it better. He is very present to all the creations in the garden – some of which he has had a hand in, and others that are beyond his control.

This morning, while watering, I started to play around with this practice. I quickly became pleasantly surprised by what I noticed when I paid close attention. Well, not so much by what I noticed but by how much I noticed. I was amazed by all the details I was seeing, e.g., amidst the browned, dying leaves are a whole bunch of tiny buds, if I consciously choose to pay close attention.   So it is that watering the garden is also becoming a meditation for me  – which most certainly is a tuning in and not a tuning out.  In fact, it is about becoming finely tuned and is rather similar to my daily meditation practice of Vipassana – which involves closely observing what’s alive in me.  

When I finished watering today, I found myself wondering, in what ways can I  – and activists more generally – be more attentive? How can we create more spaces to meditate on the environment in which we are working? After all, our ego-driven activist instinct – in my experience – can easily default to “Here’s what I think you need to do….” or an anxious and overly-eager “What can I do?” without a pause to watch and observe.

Which of the mundane tasks we perform in our activism potentially give us an opportunity to see and connect with the world around us more deeply and thoughtfully? How can we create more spaces in which we can focus on soaking in what is before us in the here and now?  How can we integrate different meditation practices, i.e., increased focus and awareness, into our activism?

 

 

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Relationships, systems and stories…

Posted on May 17, 2012 by seeandconnect

The past few days, I’ve been thinking a lot about relationships. Human relationships is the aspect of social change that gets me super excited. I’ve also been thinking about systems and processes. These don’t get me so excited – thinking about them usually leaves me frustrated. On Monday I was coaching a colleague, Andrew, to support him with his restorative justice (RJ) project. Andrew’s specific task at hand is to work closely with a social landlord committed to urban regeneration and responsible for some nine thousand homes. We quickly identified that one of his challenges is the way that generally the staff of public service providers, e.g. those delivering social housing, often get tangled up in and constrained by their systems. Life, as a an employee for a public service provider, can easily become a daily grind of following the rules to be able to tick boxes and show you’ve done your role in implementing the latest system or process created to address some problem or another.

How uninspiring is that?

And how often does this cultural norm result in cycles of problems that seem to get a bit better only for a short time or, in fact, never really change at all?

Talking about this context, it quickly became clear that Andrew would benefit by working out how he can support the social landlord staff to understand RJ as more than just another system to implement. His work to promote RJ runs a high risk of the main staff question becoming: “What are the basics I need to do with this new process, you know, to get my job done?’

What’s Andrew to do?

One of the questions I asked Andrew, who has facilitated many successful cases in his RJ work to date, is: ‘What makes you so passionate about RJ – what about it really gets you excited?’ He responded by telling me that he loves it when he sees people let go of their assumptions about others – and that this is a crucial dimension of the RJ process.

To which I responded: “Now tell me a story – tell me about a case that you get excited about when you think of it?” I asked him if he has a partner – answer, ‘Yes.’ “Okay” I said “Pretend I’m your partner and you’ve just come from work, we are in the pub and you can’t wait to tell me about what happened in a case you facilitated that afternoon – what do you tell me?

This time Andrew started to become animated as he told me the story of a adolescent burglar meeting the victim of his crime – an elderly woman living alone in the house that he broke into. I prodded him to tell me what he felt when he was watching and listening to these two people he had brought together. I wanted to know what he witnessed happen between them. I wanted him to make RJ come alive for me, so that I could start to get a sense of what it was about and connect with it emotionally.  I encouraged him to flesh out a few such stories, so he can take them along whenever he goes out to talk about RJ.  

But he can also benefit from communicating more than just the individual case stories.  When we communicate about the social change we want to see, we can easily miss out on what Andrew called the ‘meta-narrative.’ This isn’t a term I would normally use, but it did seem appropriate. What we were both thinking is that he has a larger story to tell – one that is bigger than the details of individual cases. It is about the types of communities he wants to create. RJ is not just another system, it is part of the journey to create a different world – or if that feels too grand, to create a different neighborhood.

Really.

For example, maximizing the impact restorative justice practices can have in our communities requires that the people involved are prepared to listen to the ‘enemy’, to put aside their assumptions about people and see the other through different lenses, to work with compassion and forgiveness, to make themselves vulnerable, to trust a process where the outcome is not pre-defined – which ultimately requires trusting others, to be open-minded and ready to create in new ways, i.e. come up with actions that will bring about justice in a way that is healing.

Thus, the bigger story that holds restorative justice processes within it is that we are committed to building communities more strongly rooted in trust, compassion, forgiveness, connection, visibility, creativity, collaboration and healing. To do this we need to relate to each other differently from what we are doing in the status quo. 

On the surface, what’s there not to like, right? Wrong. Many people find it hard to believe that the communities we live in can have such roots – our experience has pushed us be distrustful, cynical, pessimistic and wary of both systems and people. Which means that Andrew, and any of us when in a similar situation, are faced with the often-difficult task of taking people on a journey. 

Yet, we sometimes approach the task as though we are making a sales pitch. We try to explain away why our system is better than the one currently being used. We make a business case. We do this when, instead, we could be extending an invitation to join us on a journey – a journey where we work together to create different kinds of relationships and different kinds of community/communities.

What would inspire you more – to be asked/encouraged/directed to implement a new, more effective system or to be invited to play an active role in collaborating with people – perhaps in ways that are new to you – in order to reshape the communities you all work and live in?

I’m now thinking about the following questions and I put them to you: As a social change activist, what kind of communities do you want to create – what are their main characteristics in terms of how people relate and collaborate with one another?  What are specific stories you have that illustrate what can happen when we head off in this direction? How might integrating your big-picture change story – your ‘meta-narrative’ – into your day-to-day work help you be more effective in creating change – whatever the arena?  What indiviual, specific scenario stories do you carry around with you to help communicate why your work matters to you and why you think it should matter to anyone else?

 

 

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The Great Work of Laughter….

Posted on May 10, 2012 by seeandconnect

Laughing_buddha

I have a lot of topics I can think to write about, including: what is meant by ‘be the change you wish to see’; the relationship between law and creating cultures of integrity; deliberative ethics. Yet, somehow this week, I’m not moved to write about any of these topics. Instead, I’m in the mood to write about laughter. A few months ago, a friend started talking to me about Buddha. She said that she thought that, for a lot of us, one of life’s lessons is to laugh more. “I mean,” she explained “think about all those Buddha images where he is just laughing.”  

As happens, over the years, I’ve been collecting Buddha images – little statues picked up in my travels. I only bring home the ‘Happy Man’ figures. I also have one that was gifted to me by my brother and his wife. I’d put a picture of it here, but it is currently packed away. It is a sandalwood Buddha carving with one big Buddha in the middle and a few smaller Buddhas surrounding him, including flying about his head. They are all laughing ecstatically. I love this carving and usually keep it on my desk – I find it inspiring. Likewise, I’ve noticed that often the Dalai Lama has a huge grin on his face when pictured. This is a man who feels deeps compassion for humanity – he meaningfully feels the pain of others on a regular basis. Yet, what a smile – the face of joy.

Isn’t it easy, as we work for our social causes, to forget to laugh? After all, the issues are sooooo important. And we are sooooo important, aren’t we? We are fighting for justice, equality, freedom – are we not? We must always be serious, if we are going to do great works…

Really?

I reckon if we want to create a more joyful world – which is definitely something I want to do – part of doing so is the expression of joy, which often comes in the form of laughter. I reckon if we want to create a more healthy world – which is definitely something I want to do – part of doing so is release, which often comes in the form of laughter. I reckon if we want to create a more humble world – which is definitely something I want to do – part of doing so is not taking one’s self so seriously, which often comes in the form of laughter.

I’m one of those people who frequently used to tell myself, and be told by others, to ‘not be so serious all the time’ or to ‘stop taking everything so seriously.’ My laugh didn’t used to come from the belly – it was usually a sort of shallow, perhaps a bit nervous kind of laugh. In recent years, I’ve come to know the joy of a good belly laugh. I’ve experienced times where I’m laughing so hard my face hurts.

And when this happens, I think ‘Why don’t I let myself do this more often?’

A wise woman recently advised me that laughter helps open us up to our intuition. As I understand it, intuition is the wisdom we all carry that is bigger than our own individual experience. I would also like us to create a world where we are more tuned into, and making choices guided by, our intuitive selves.  I like this idea that laughter can help us do that.

In short, this week when I think of social change and activism, I’m thinking about being silly, laughing, giggling, joking around with people. Compassionate, robust activism need not be mutually exclusive to joy – quite the contrary, I should think.

Okay, perhaps I was wrong at the start of writing this post. I guess I did feel like writing about being the change we want to see – just not in my usual way.

When is the last time you laughed so much your face started hurting or your eyes starting tearing? When you laugh, do you laugh from your belly? How often do you giggle? When is the last time you did something silly?

 

 

 

 

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Can we talk? Frequently, well, no we can’t….

Posted on May 2, 2012 by seeandconnect

I recently visited a friend who last year became a mom for the first time. At the time of her pregnancy, she was working for an organization committed to gender equity. Certain responses to her pregnancy – to her entering the community of mothers – have saddened me. I’m not sure what has been more saddening – the responses or the fact that I was not surprised when I heard about them. I’ve posted about this before – about how we activists sometimes struggle to be the change we are seeking. I’m writing this post to remind myself and others to look in the mirror and self-scrutinize. Do I want us to aspire to be perfect? No. No one is perfect. But I do want us to be more of who we truly are. Because for me the starting point is that the human spirit is – we are – intrinsically creative, compassionate, collaborative. Let us be more inspired – in spirit – in our actions and in all our relations. 

And let us recognize that life (and therefore activism) is full of contradictions and dilemmas. Often, however, we don’t like to talk about them openly and in our silences we end up suffocating our spirited selves, moving further away from – rather than closer to -who/how we want to be in this world.

Here are a few of the responses my friend received to becoming a mother:

  • Upon telling her employer that she was pregnant, certain aspects of her contract all of sudden became complicated and not what she thought was originally agreed.
  • One colleague told her to get in touch when she feels like coming out of slavery (in reference to the fact that my friend is not in paid employment – is, as the label goes ‘a stay-at-home mom’) and into the realms of empowerment.
  • Fellow feminist friends, including those who have children, are not interested in hearing about her experience of motherhood – which, of course, is a huge part of her life at the moment.

Since leaving her employer, she has frequently been sought out to give solace to those who have stayed. Mothers or not, many of her colleagues are worn out from the politics which involve pettiness, bullying, power struggles. We’ve all seen it, I’m sure. Sometimes we’ve been victims of it and sometimes (I hold my hand up) we’ve been aggressors.

I find myself repeatedly coming back to the complexity of the situation – rooted in the fact that we are trying to change the cultures we are in, at the same time that those cultures heavily influence our behaviors.  I am perfectly aware that I’m stating the obvious. So what is it that I could possibly hope for in making such a statement of the obvious? I guess I’m just wanting to go with what’s alive within me and it is this niggle that what’s really critical is awareness. And not just awareness of ‘We’re not living the change.’ That in and of itself doesn’t really get us anywhere. As I reflect on the stories my friend has told me, I think about entanglements.

For example, a woman is in a workplace and the culture is aggressive. The work the organization does is important for social change and this person wants to be there and contribute. She’s thinking of leaving the organization because of the culture and is upset to have to make the choice. She is frustrated that she feels she cannot speak up, voice her concerns because she fears the consequences. What if the culture is so dirty it results in her losing her job? And this is not just a matter of principle. It is also one of practicalities. Her income is important to her family, the job is easy to travel to and has employee benefits that really help her family financially. She feels trapped within a web of systems that seem to limit her choice and her power when it comes to employment. The issue of the aggressive workplace culture is entangled with finances, healthcare, transportation etc.

That’s one set of entanglements – the practicalities of speaking up to challenge workplace conditions. This kind of entanglement is totally non-unique to our woman in the workplace. Millions of people in workplaces around the world are in similar situations.

Another set of entanglements that stands out to me is our limited capacity as activists to talk about the contradictions that plague us in life (and activism) and how we all struggle with navigating them. Instead, we too often try and be black and white about it all.  For example, the mother who chooses to work during her child’s early years then openly looks down, judges the mother who is staying at home. And perhaps, vis-versa. Both might consider themselves feminists. Each, outwardly, can be smug and self-righteous. Yet, each, inwardly is struggling to create what feels like a balanced healthy life. Each is struggling to understand what’s right for them as an individual, what is right for their child, and what is right for their family as a whole.  I get the impression we aren’t so good at talking openly about such struggles. Instead we choose to take up a firm stance and stick by it – believing, it seems, that to do so is empowering.

This has got me wondering about how we – activists – get sucked into prevalent cultural conventions that make us ashamed to show our vulnerabilities – which include confusion over what is ‘right’, the fear that we are getting it wrong, the sense that there must be another way that is more empowering for more people, and the desire to raise a hand and say “Hey, can we pause for a minute to reflect and talk with one other about how life really works?” 

And I’m asking myself: ‘What does it mean if we, who are trying to drive and create positive social change, are unable to hold spaces for ourselves to grapple with life’s challenging entanglements openly and honestly? What does it mean for the change we are trying to create? What does it mean for how we relate to the people we are trying to support and influence (be they the people standing up for rights or the people who are trampling on them) if we ourselves struggle with navigating the contradictions, tensions, complexities?’

Ahh, I know, know – but we already do so much talking when what we need is action. Thing is, we don’t necessarily have to talk with each other more, we just have to talk with each other differently. 

 

 

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The ‘soft’ side of activism: giving ourselves an advantage…

Posted on April 15, 2012 by seeandconnect

When I was working in social policy and employment, I would frequently be told or read that what ‘disadvantaged’ individuals need is more social capital and soft skills – sometimes soft skills fit under the umbrella of social capital. The point being made was that the right people connections and the ability to connect confidently and effectively with people, e.g. in a job interview, are as important as formal qualifications to succeeding in the world of work. Lately, I’ve been thinking about social capital and soft skills, but in a new light. The questions I’m currently playing with are: What kind of social capital and soft skills most nurture inspired (in spirit) social change activism? Are we giving enough attention to developing these resources in ourselves and our communities/movements?

When I was working in the arena of workplace equality and I kept coming back the questions of ‘What are we trying to do here?’ and ‘What do we think is the most effective path the follow?” Where I was going with these questions is to try and understand: Were we – social policy people – trying to change the nature of the game or were we wanting to ensure that everyone had a fair shot at the game? Were we wanting to advise on how to support people to play the game better?

This question is totally not unique to workplace equality matters. I grappled with this question back when I was working to tackle racism using international human rights standards. Our work cut across the range of arenas – criminal justice, immigration, education etc. I was an American working in London with people who self-identified as Black-British. Some of the people I worked with looked at the US civil rights movement in awe – and I wasn’t quite sure what direction they were taking from it. This was in the mid-nineties. I distinctly remember a period when I became seriously concerned. I wondered – are some of my colleagues fighting to ensure Black people can attain as much wealth and White people – can play capitalism to their advantage equally? Because if so, that’s not my gig.

At the time, I wasn’t necessarily thinking ‘Oh, we must dismantle capitalist infrastructures’ but I was thinking ‘Surely, the struggle is to liberate all people from poverty and from injustices that shorten and destroy lives and leave people in basic survival mode. Surely the struggle is not about ensuring that Black people (using this word in the old political sense) can have big houses and big cars, too.’ Nearly two decades later, I’ve got a much broader and more developed take on liberation and what it means.. I’ve also left the social policy world to focus my energies on working with how we (social activists) develop human relations – who we are as individuals, collectives, communities.

Which brings me back to social capital and soft skills. Liberation, for me, is about freedom from the constraints, illusions and destructive behavior patterns that arise when we become driven by ego and social, economic and political conventions and systems rooted in fear, insecurity, greed and shame. What kind of social capital and soft skills do we – as activists – need to open ourselves up and bring about such freedom?  

I think – though we might not use the jargon of ‘social capital and soft skills’ – we are increasingly exploring this terrain. Compassion, vulnerability and empathy, for example, are starting to become hot topics in many activist circles. People are increasingly feeling an itch with regards to the ‘soft’ side of activism. Recently, I was coaching an activist who is organizing a training day for her organization’s leading members around the country. Let’s call her Sophia. Sophia has gone around and asked people what they thought they needed in terms of training and development. She kept hearing answers like ‘How do we do power-mapping? Or how do we develop a media strategy?’

She was frustrated by these answers. Because her spirit and gut have been directing her towards wanting to support others to open up their activism to be more creative and collaborative – and less about towing a ‘party’ line and trying to persuade others of ‘what needs to be done.’. She told me how she recently organized a meeting where she tried to dismantle the usual format. Instead of a plenary she had discussion circles – to give everyone a chance to contribute and share. To spark lively, thought provoking discussion among equals rather than question/answer between the experts up there and the listeners on the floor. To focus attention on exchange and opening up of ideas, rather than on persuasion.

However, as she moved about the room, she could tell that in those circles people were trying to bring people to their point of view and/or to simply to assert their position. People were not really listening to each other – they were plotting what they felt needed to be said to hold their own ground. People weren’t asking questions, they were asserting what they felt they already knew. People weren’t allowing themselves to be challenged, they were only seeking to challenge others. People weren’t allowing their thoughts to be provoked, stirred, shaken, they were wanting to walk a straight line with no detours. With this experience in mind and given the answers participants for the training and development were giving, she asked me ‘What can I do to get different outcomes, to take people in a different direction?’

This isn’t the place to go through the specific options we generated together for designing the event. No. What I want to focus on is the conclusion Sophia and I both agreed on: the training and development session could be an opportunity to hold a space for activists to work on who they are in human relationships. An aim of the session could be to offer up a space for developing all those practices which you really only learn through interaction with other people and greater self-awareness. A starting question for designing the event became “What skills can these activists develop to strengthen the types of relationships they are creating in their work – so that they grow relationships which have strong foundations for creativity, agility, collaboration, contribution and individual/shared responsibility?”

Sophia’s instinctive answer: we need to develop our skills in active listening, questioning, self-reflection, empathy and reframing.

These skills, we agreed, fall into the category of ‘soft skills’ – not the hard, methodical stuff of power mapping. Arguably, ‘soft skills’, in any event, have a role to play in strengthening how we work with some of the more ‘hard’ skills – people who are able to listen, see and connect with open minds are more likely to understand the nuances and subtleties of situations. Consequently, they are more likely to work with the ‘hard tools’ more accurately and creatively.

As for social capital – the ‘who you know’ factor. Well, I’m thinking that the way we need to work with social capital takes us in the direction of ‘how you know.” That is, what kind of relationships from the get-go are we forming with ourselves, each other, and people in the wider space? What invitation (as Margaret Wheatley might ask) do we extend to others when we are out and about and doing our thing?

A dimension of this idea is well-illustrated by Peter Bregman in his piece on How to Attend A Conference as Yourself.

Looks to me like social capital and soft skills aren’t just for the so-called ‘disadvantaged.’ Or maybe we need to start questioning how it is that in one way or another any one of us can be considered ‘disadvantaged’ in terms of achieving success in getting where we to go. Is a matter or perspective, isn’t it? One determined by your direction of travel and where you think you are trying to get to…

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The personal is political – and it is not always serving us well…

Posted on April 7, 2012 by seeandconnect

The other day I was in a coffee shop talking with an old friend about our personal demons. Demons – we all got ‘em. This friend also happens to be a social activist and a political science professor. It wasn’t long before our talk of the personal turned political. And I got very excited because I’ve been thinking a lot about that seventies feminist catch phrase “The personal is political.” This phrase/idea really resonates with me – but not in relation to what I’ve always took to be its original meaning. These days, I’ve got a new angle on it.

Until the last few years, for me ‘the personal is political’ meant personal issues, e.g., what goes on in our bedrooms, relationships between men and women, childbearing, tie into social, political and economic dynamics – ergo,  they deserve to/needs must have a space in activist and political debates and deliberations. The struggles and power plays in our homes cannot be disconnected from the struggles and power plays on the Hill (or in Westminster).

I still agree with this idea, but now I’m also thinking about the personal being political in relation to our demons – our inner struggles – the stuff discussed (if it is discussed) behind closed doors with a therapist, a counselor or simply in our own heads.   

I have another friend who is very political (well, actually I’ve got a lot of politically active friends) and works in the gender equality arena. I used to work in the race equality arena. We used to compare notes and have a little competition on whose people – meaning colleagues – were more high maintenance – ‘crazy’ is often the word we would use. We would laugh and joke about it, but underneath we were both making a serious point. Between us, we had plenty of experience of working with/in organizations, campaigns, committees, working groups etc., and witnessing a lot of destructive behavior.

These behaviors included people acting like bullies, being very controlling, defensive and aggressive. On the one hand, we’d be together talking about and advocating for equality, fairness, respect and on the other we were treating each other with disrespect, being unfair and playing power games that invalidated any sense of true equality between people. And I raise my hand to confess that, at times, I was a guilty culprit.    

I could easily say I got caught up in the cultures of the organizations I was in or I was responding to how I was being treated – I’ve had my fair share of bullying  and harassing colleagues in the workplace. As true as that may be, that is not the full story. Organizational cultures are strong and can pull people into their ways quite easily. Yet, at the same time, my behaviors were also the result of what I brought to the table – of my demons tied to insecurity, self-esteem, negative beliefs etc.  Thing is, I’m not alone – we’re all bringing our demons to the table.

We bring our demons to our activism.

These demons direct us to create tense, difficult, destructive relationships with each other and the world around us. They influence how we do our work in and out of the office, how we handle negotiations, meetings, protests, etc., What’s significant about our demons is they tend to direct us using fear, anger, rage, and sadness, despair.

While it is often the case that these very emotions are the catalysts that prompt us to get involved in social change – that prompt us to want to stand up and speak – we start getting into trouble if it is these emotions that are guiding our every step.  Imagine if fear, anger, rage, sadness and despair are guiding an individual’s movement in the world. Imagine if they are guiding our collective social movements. Surely, when this happens, we are not at our creative and collaborative best.

As we sipped our coffee and talked about all this, I explained to my old friend what I think frequently happens in activism. Let’s say – for example,, you are in a meeting about some social policy matter. Someone presents a set of policy recommendations. A person of authority (could be from the same organization or could be an adversary of sorts) says that those recommendations are rubbish, impossible, absurd. Sometimes what happens is that an activist – goaded on by their demons – who has worked on those recommendations experiences the criticism as a personal affront rather than a mere challenge to the policy recommendations. The exchange becomes much more loaded and they hear something like this: “You are rubbish. You are absurd. You always want the impossible – you just don’t think.’

They experience criticisms of their policy recommendations as a personal, invalidating, belittling attack.

Thing is, this isn’t consciously done – they don’t know that these thoughts are driving what happens next, which might be a tightness in their belly, a feeling in their chest and/or heat in their face as a anger begins to well up.  Reacting to the strong emotions arising in the moment, our activist speaks full of fear, rage, and/or despair. And perhaps you can imagine the exchange that follows is not hugely constructive.

Wounds. These wounds are our demons and we carry them with us. My point is that we might say we are going into social justice to fight for others – for people living in poverty, for people being discriminated against, for people who are in particularly vulnerable situations etc., and this might be true. At the same time, however, we are often also going into social justice to fight for ourselves – we are reacting to our own wounds. Sometimes we are conscious of these wounds and they are directly tied to the politics at hand – a victim of domestic violence seeks to get better policies to lead to the prevention of violence in the home. Other times, however, we aren’t conscious of our wounds and they aren’t linked to the social-political issues at hand. They are instead battles we fight connected to old, usually subtle wounds that go way back – wounds that might have been created soon after that first wail we gave when we came into world. Often they are tied to a sense of invisibility – a need to be heard, seen, valued, loved.   

And this is what I think of these days when I consider the catch phrase ‘the personal is political.’ Our personal demons/unhealed wounds come with us wherever we go – including the office, the basement, the coffee house, the street, the Occupy camp – wherever it is we are doing our activist thing. And what becomes important is that we develop self-awareness of these demons so that our fights for justice can be separated out from our individual fights for a sense of self-worth and validation – which ultimately must come from within.

What’s really clear to me right now is that when the personal and political get tied up in this way, we do a disservice to our selves, our relationships and our movements. What can we do about it? Become more self-aware and create more spaces that allow for and support internal reflection, work and change.

 

 

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