General Learning • Tenneson Woolf

May 29, 2017

Tended

The photo above is taken from my second story balcony this morning. It’s part of the gardens at my home, about 6-7 feet wide and 20 feet long. That’s sidewalk edge on the right that leads to my front door.It is spring in Utah and on this past weekend, that meant tending to some gardens.

There’s a few details in this photo that won’t matter to most, but they are satisfying to me.

The open patch on the left is where I first cleared weeds and many perennials propagating into the space, and then planted seeds of beets and carrots. I’m experimenting. Not rows in this area, but rather a mixed spread.
The rhubarb on the bottom left is a patch trimmed in half yesterday. I made a cobbler that I have to admit was very tasty. The rhubarb is a start from my spouse’s father’s rhubarb. He died this weekend at 92. It was a bit of tribute to him to make this dish.
I pulled many weeds throughout. Long grasses. A few dandelions. A lot of something that I don’t know what to call. Trying to make more room for the lupines and California poppies.
Beyond the tree on the left is a small patch of petunias and marigolds that I planted this year. I’m excited to think how full that patch might get with bright pink, white, and yellow.
On the top is a red rose that I planted a couple of years ago to honor my Grandma Gould. I picked a few this weekend to enjoy inside. I try to keep that area a bit clear. Give it space.
And a whole pile of wild flowers that have been growing for ten years. Daisies. Black-eyed Susan. Some iris. Columbine. I usually thin them each year. However, they are prolific. And I love the wildness of them.

I take a particular satisfaction in this tending. It isn’t perfect. Of course not. But the fact that it is tended has me really wanting to pay attention to it. Funny, right? I’m proud. I’m satisfied. I like the feeling. I want to just look at with joy.

Tending to spaces to meet with people is also joyful. It can turn an unruly bunch into a really satisfying experience. Give it container for some inherent and needed wildness to be present. Tending to how we will begin. With what question we might use to say hello and further our learning together. Tending to how we will listen together in a thoughtful way. Tending to how we might make decisions together. Tending to the space of pause.

Groups aren’t perfect either. Nor is any hosting of them. But “imperfect” shouldn’t be confused with a “whole lot of good and delight.” It’s interesting to me that just a bit of deliberateness can be contagious and deeply satisfying and lead to more deliberateness and satisfaction.

Here’s to tending. And to the kindness for any of us to welcome the ongoing nature of how we just give our attention to a little patch here and there along the way.

May 25, 2017

The Daily Sip

Charles LaFond, above, writes The Daily Sip, a blog that I really enjoy. Charles is a friend. He has a lot of superpowers and super skills. He’s a priest, a fund-raiser, and a consultant. He’s a writer, a cook, and a potter. Loaded.

In the post below, copied in whole from his site (go sign on to receive his daily posts — it’s worth it, particularly if you are connected to faith community and a life of search for divine), Charles offers pretty stunning redo of Lord’s Prayer.

I find myself playing and working (“plrking” — thanks Lina Cramer) a lot with faith communities. I love being with those that are calling in new church for these times. I love using participative leadership as a way to support this. There are a lot of people hungry for it.

Enjoy this below, and thank you Charles!
asd

Matthew 6:9–13 (ESV) “Pray then like this: ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.’”

Charles’ Lord’s Prayer

God, you are Our Supreme Existence and being

but Father is not who you are, as much as Cosmos, or perhaps, supreme lover of souls. You exist in what we call heaven because we have no language which fits time outside of time and being beyond life…so we say heaven for the want of some other word.

Your greatness is un-nameable so we call you “hallowed” as a place-holder. It sounds better than “the great and powerful Oz.”

We want your justice and mercy to flow here on earth which is what me mean when we say “kingdom” and when we ask that “it come.” But really we like kings and queens, Archdeacons, Canons and Bishops. We like royalty because it makes us feel protected, which is quite far from the truth. So forgive our fetish for worshiping power and prestige. Generation X is trying hard to recover from that and the Millennials will recover from it, while at the same time, dismantling The Church and molting a new version. Church 2.0 with less money, fewer titles, and more kindness.. Which is fine, But painful to church hierarchy – so love on them please, because their world is crashing in on itself and they are running out of people to bully and dominate and tax. Maybe the silent generation and some of the older boomers will capitulate but that’s about it for victims. So they are sad. Give the church bullies a hug, Please. Or a scotch. Or a foot massage. Or, in some cases, all three please.

We want your will to be done but we know that “will” is not what we mean. We mean your “desires.” Because we no longer want to be part of patriarchy, edicts and memos. And we want the same desires you have in the Trinity to flow into us and onto our small planet, the way it flows from the members of the Trinity. Freely. We have read about “your will” in the Old testament and we are appalled. But we trust the “new you” we see in Jesus.

Give us enough food and resources for one, small day. Secretly we want lots more. We want desperately for you to give us bank accounts, legal assurances of ownership, deeds, 401K savings, real-estate investments and other sources of wealth which make it needless that we ever speak to you again. We want to be rich and independent of you, but we know that would end in spiritual ruin as it has for so many wealthy people. So just give us enough bread and protein for today. And one night of sleep in one bed. And some warmth when it is cold. And one person to look in our eyes with real love. And chocolate.

Forgive us for what we have done. But begin with helping us to forgive ourselves for what we have done and to forgive others for the terrible things they have said about us and done to us. Especially those whom we thought really loved us – since that betrayal is the worst pain imaginable.

Protect us from our own reckless desires and disordered loves. We want stupid things. And we will grab them given half a chance. Help to gently guide our hands and eyes away from the silly things we choose. And I don’t just mean the big sins but the billions of small ones. And help us to recover from thinking that the human body is evil and that “sins” are what we do with our body. Go ahead! Let us have wild and crazy sex! And protect us from leaders who are not getting enough good sex. But help us not to be unkind. Help us to recycle. Help us to bring doggie poo bags. Sex is not sin. “Mean” is sin. “Bitchy” is sin. “Slander” is sin. “”not being satisfied with what has been given to us” is sin. But we have made sin about sex in order to deflect our attention (and yours) away from the REAL evil…unkindness. And protect us from the Church when, in her anxiety, she tries to hurt us in your name. And love Bishops and hug them. They are in terrible pain and are afraid that their kingdoms are collapsing around them. Because they are. So love on them please. They can’t raise money to save their lives.

But good, authentic non-profits are raising money. That’s because they deserve it. So abandon the church when it raises money for empire or maintenance and instead flood secular non-profits with tons of money if they ease human suffering. If they deserve the money they are raising. And get in the way of churches and Bishops raising money for the spiritual eaee of upper middle-class white people. Upturn their tables. Make a big huge mess.

And help us to be kind to ourselves and to other. And that is enough. Really. That is enough. Then let us live wonderful, sexy, tasty, delicious lives.

AMEN

May 24, 2017

Working In Patterns

Most of us are trying to pay attention to patterns. See the bigger picture. Work from the macro, not just the micro (and let’s face it, sometimes it’s pretty tough to get beyond the insistent and persistent micro).

This has been true for me in my 15 years of working with The Art of Hosting as pattern. Pattern of practice. Pattern of learning. Pattern of teaching and offering. Pattern of inviting. And it was true for me in the 10 years prior to that working with The Berkana Institute on dialogue, change, and the human spirit.

Lately, I’ve been working with a few groups that are really hungry for a holistic form for retreating together and for doing their work and learning together. I’ve been listening to people speak about their edges. They, we, all want a quality of experience together that is a whole lot more than lecturing with good stuff. They want engagement of their brains and their bodies and their spirits and each other.

With all of this going on, I found myself looking for resources that I could send to help shape some of the expectation and some of the overarching narrative.

Knowns of Working in An Art of Hosting Pattern is a piece I wrote in 2009. I remember it all coming to me in a sparky clarity, and “aha.” It was a few words for the “template” of Art of Hosting that each team shapes into more specific choices.

A snip-it is below. The full list of patterns is in the article here.

we will move deliberately between – energy of the whole and energy of the small group and energy of the individual.
each day will have a theme
each day will include a checkin process – (coming present) and a checkout process (seal our time and release us to other spaces)
we will offer some models, methods and maps to support a world view of participatory leadership –
there are many ways to inspiration – play, music, meditation, prayer, stillness, dreams, methodologies, art, song, – dance. We use them as inspired.
we open and diverge so that we can choose how we converge

May 23, 2017

From Above

As one who gets to fly in airplanes a fair amount, I often found myself in renewed awe of the perspective from 10,000 – 40,000 feet above the ground. I’m the one staring out the window from seat A or F, filled with wonder. I didn’t fly as a kid. But as an adult, I still have a kid in me that is utterly delighted.

Both of these photos were on route earlier this week, early morning, from Cincinnati to Chicago. Lot’s of life in the packaged squares of homesteading, isn’t there. I imagine stories of people who have lived there for generations. I imagine neighbors that help each other. I imagine worries about the crops that they will grow. I imagine planning about water use. Lives are lived in this fields and homes that I’m just peeking at with privilege.

And in the photo below, I love being above the clouds (and yet still below others in this one). It was the swirling in this photo, the eye-like figure in the center that hand be bonking my wonder-filled nose to the window in seat 9A on this trip, getting a close-up view.

It’s just good to see from above, isn’t it.