In the US right now, the health care “debate” is raging and town hall meetings being held across the country are being deliberately hijacked by those who don’t want to see reform go ahead. This tactic is discouraging but predictable. “Town Hall” meetings are not usually conducive to democratic deliberation, and they are never about dialogue. Over the past few days an amazing conversation has unfolded on the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation listserv about what these events mean for deliberative democracy. Tom Atlee has summarized a lot of the learning from these in a long blog post which …
Reading David Holmgren’s book on Permaculture right now, sitting on my front porch overlooking the garden that we have created using some of his principles. I love the permaculture principles, because they lend themselves so well to all kinds of other endeavours. They are generative principles, rather than proscriptive principles, meaning that they generate creative implementation rather than restricting creativity. At any rate, reading today about the principle of Design from Patterns to Details and in the opening to that chapter he writes: Complex systems that work tend to evolve from simple ones that work, so finding the …
Was listening on the beach yesterday to a good talk by Joseph Goldstein about four reflections that bring the mind to dharma. These relections are used by Buddhists to become mindful in everyday life. Mindfulness – individual and collective – is a resource in short supply in the world. A lot of the hosting work I do is about bringing more mindful consciousness to what groups are doing. These four reflections are useful in that respect. From a dharma perspective, the four reflections are: Precious human birth Contemplation of impermanence The law of karma Defects of samsara On their own …
Thank you Euan. Now, there is a time and a place for judgemental skepticism and cynicism (I suppose) but somehow there is a widespread sentiment that associates these two stances with expertise and prudence. Now I don’t want you to think that I am all about squashing opposition or creative tension, but I have to say that when I am working with groups of people to create processes that will help take people out of their comfort zones, there is a particular cynicism that does not help. Euan Semple calls this “pomposity” and that certainly seems to capture the holier …
Anchored down in San Francisco awaiting a delayed hop to Eureka California, from where we will drive to the Hoopa Valley and work there for a couple of days. On leg five of the epic journey. So a little time to breathe and reflect on a couple of harvests. First from Geoff Selig who was at the Pembroke Art of Hosting, and who collected the tablecloths from a final day World Cafe on what we have learned about the power of conversation. Second, a harvest poem from the Open Space I ran yesterday in Kelowna. This was …