The difference between what’s wholeand what’s held, what’s withheldor revealed, what’s real and what’s revelation – that’s what I seek,rest of my life spent in search of little epiphanies, tiny sparks surging out of the brain during the clumsiest speech. – Allison Joseph from Little Epiphanies It feels like that, combing through stories, looking through graphs and charts and frameworks to find the little insights that spark the little actions that spark the little changes that might topple the biggest dragons. (Poem published today at whiskey river)
This morning the wind and rain continue here in the islands of the south coast of British Columbia. It has been a wet fall and winter – perhaps the wettest since the time of the Flood stories – and this is the coldest May we’ve had for a long time, which brings its own hazards. It’s all down to an extended La Nina event that pipes cool water into the north Pacific and keeps the air masses cold and turbulent, resulting in reliable patterns of convection, instability and therefore precipitation and windy weather weather. I live in a very rainy …
I can barely say the word. I don’t use it much anymore. So much needs to be done before we can contemplate it. So much truth, so much restoration of lands and people and communities. But today I came across this poem by Anishinaabe (Wasauksing First Nation) poet Rebeka Tabobondung who is the founder of MUSKRAT Magazine. She published this in 2013 and I will let her say it, because at some deep level this is what I am always working towards: Reconciliation We are waking up to our historyfrom a forced slumberWe are breathing it into our lungsso it …
On the Art of Hosting list today there has been a very interesting conversation about some of the Japanese words that are used to describe space and container. As I will be working this spring in Japan with these very concepts, I thought it would be interesting to hear from my colleagues Yurie Makihara and Kazuhiko Nakamura about these ideas of “wa,” “ma,” “ba,” and “tokoro.” Yurie shared her thoughts, on some of these words, including noting that the word “ba” is often cited by foreigners as an example of a word describing the quality of dialogic container that exists …
Harvest from a three hour check in circle this morning, building a social field among 40 health promotion practitioners from across the Navajo Nation. The circle was at times tender and wickedly funny. It built a beautiful field to begin our three day training. Here’s the poem: Yá’a tééh! It’s a good day. I am here for the wellness of our nations; we have stationed ourselves inside our families where we teach and learn reach each parent and turn around their minds to a kind of space that is safe to face what flies over our heads as we sit on …