Author: Tenneson Woolf

From an email that my friend Bob Stilger sent. Bob gives much of his attention to Japan. He has been doing so for many years.

This piece below shares some of the story that he is sharing with friends and colleague there as they respond and grow from the impact of the earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear power disasters. He references Kufunda, a Zimbabwe learning village that we visited about 10 years ago together.

I’m posting these five points as another example of messages of clarity. As it was in my previous post, I appreciate the simple clarity here of grounding principles, beliefs, and practices.

What is clear to many is that this isn’t just about the Tohoku Region.  The earth shook, the tsunami came, the nuclear reactors spewed their terrible waste in Tohoku — but it is all of Japan and all of the world that needs to change.

Where to start?  I tell them stories about Marianne Knuth and Pioneers of Change (www.pioneersofchange.net) and Kufunda Learning Village (www.kufunda.org).  The five core principles of Pioneers of Change are as pertinent now as they were when they were developed over a decade ago:

1. Be yourself.  It is up to each of us, as moral beings, to decide how to act and to freely form our contribution to the whole. We must think this reality through, and not hide from it. This means looking inside oneself and asking “What are the basic principles which help me decide what is good?”, being able to listen to one’s intuition, even when it contradicts the social structures around us. We are all a part of life, and we all have a unique contribution to make. What is it?
2. Do what matters.  The world needs us more than ever. It needs pioneers to be treating problems at the root causes, not just the symptoms, to be making change at a systemic level. Doing what matters requires a capacity to diagnose the problems we face, to understand the underlying patterns, to remove barriers, to find the leverage points and make the change there. It requires us to be conscious of the consequences of our actions, and to choose to do good, not harm, according to the deeper values and the higher ideals we each hold.
3. Start now.  The future is created by how we live now. It is not necessary to compromise who we are in the present, or to wait to take off the lid that is keeping us from allowing our creative expression to be put to use in areas that matter to us and the world. We don’t focus on all the reasons why it might not work – if the platform and tools do not exist to make our dream possible, we get going in creating them. Learning comes with action.
4. Engage with Others.  Connect with something bigger than yourself. Search for those who are working on similar or related things, share ideas with them, ask them for help and work with them where useful. Be willing to offer them help when they need it as well. Engaging with others is about engaging with those who share your visions, but also about engaging with those who think differently from you and are doing something that may seem completely different and unrelated. Engage across diversity, for that is how we learn.
5. Never Stop Asking Questions.  Understanding is constantly evolving, and there is always the possibility of future discovery. While committing to our current intentions, we have to continue to question our own views as we continue to question others and listen to their answers. As we start to view the world from the perspective of life, more and more practices around us simply do not make sense. We are surrounded by paradoxes in a phase when established systems no longer meet our needs. We need to perceive and question these paradoxes, daring to appear naive, while developing the capacity to transcend them. As Einstein said, no problem is solved from the same consciousness that created it.

There are moments of succinctness that are exquisite to me. Slow cooked over years to become beautifully blended. Distillations that are the essence.

Today I saw some of this on the Open Space Listserve, offered by Harrison Owen. He offered it as his version of story. What was, is, and with invitation to come.

“From 50 years of thinking and looking, two conclusions and some follow-ons. I don’t know that they are “true” but they account for my experience.

1) All systems are open. All systems, human and otherwise are open to each other, interconnected, interdependent and always moving.
2) All systems are self –organizing. The open, interconnected systems interact and co-evolve, each system making demands and offering gifts to all other systems. The result is a living community which dies, in whole or in part, when it runs out of time/space in which to grow.
3) Opening space provides the essential condition for continuing life. When space is opened for human communities, life can be renewed. This is an ongoing and natural process. And we have learned to initiate the process intentionally – which is what happens with Open Space Technology.
4) To this point, our efforts have been limited to “better meetings” and a little bit beyond. Next act is enhancing the naturally occurring opening of space, the Tahrir Squares of this world… and much, much more. That’s the quest, I think – and the invitation.

Way to go Harrison!

In graduate school twenty years ago, as final evaluation of a readings class, my professor, Bonner Ritchie told me that I was a master of juxtaposition. I didn’t know what that meant.  I just remember feeling excited that Bonner would call me a master at anything. He was someone I respected a lot. He was somewhat legendary in the program of which I was a part.

For that class, I had chosen several books to read. With Bonner’s invitation, they could be about anything. I read a couple of novels. I read Meg Wheatley’s Leadership and the New Science — that is when I first came to know her and her writings. There were six books as I remember. The paper that I wrote at the end of the class (as well as the presentation I offered to my classmates) shared some of what I learned in those books and the thoughts they stirred around leadership. The beauty of Bonner was that the learning could apply to life, to community, or whatever we wanted. He didn’t want summaries — oh, how fresh I remember that being. He wanted what interested us. Bonner was a master at welcoming critical thinking anywhere. I realize I miss him as I write this.

That kind of sharing, that kind of linking, juxtaposing of ideas, I realize is what I do a lot of now. It is a lot of what I do in facilitating groups. Connecting ideas. Connecting questions. Looking for what emerges. Looking for the insights that none from the group came with yet that became available because of being in association with each other.

These days, this way of working and thinking has even more meaning to me, in part because of my perspective from a quantum world view. To give attention to something is to create it. To observe creates physical form. To observe, tunes the channel so to speak, so as to make visible a world that already exists. Naming the links — this contributes to an evolution of consciousness, I feel. Seeing a bigger picture and naming connections helps evolve an ability to see in broader levels of wholeness. Not just for one, but for many.

I’ll just pause with that, aware that there is much in that world view.

But there is something further about this pattern of notice – juxtapose – name. It has only occurred to me in the last few days. From a systems view, I have come to believe in the traditions that emphasize a consciousness of the whole. It is true for me in groups. It is true for me as I think of a broader consciousness in the world. I think of it as “the wholeness of the world.” I know it it names many things from many traditions. I further have come to believe that the wholeness of the world wants to be in communication with us. Or, is in communication with us. The kicker here is that that communication comes through symbols. The very symbols we see and notice just as I was learning in that graduate readings class with Bonner. Not the summary. Just the symbols that have energy. To then link those — as stories, images, reference points — to a domain of learning (for me about leadership, change, dialogue) provides the essential doorways needed to practice accessing that wholeness of the world. It is like receiving coded messages from a consciousness that wants to speak, evolve, and be in relation with us.

I offered a pop-culture metaphor with my friend Roq last week. It was from the movie Transformers. One of the autobots communicates with the boy he is protecting by playing lyrics from songs. It can’t speak directly. It can only offer the symbols of song.

There is much to be excited about. In working with organizations and teams, to give attention to the world views from which we are so busily engaged — yes, this is important and essential. To think that we can shift worlds by shifting our attention — yup, very cool. To think that we have numerously more, networked channels of communication and dimensions of consciousness — yup, that too is very enlivening.

Twenty years ago, I was following my nose. Learning as well as I could. Connecting ideas. Asking questions. As instinct. With support from people like Bonner. Today, that learning and practice carries forward with significance that I would not have imagined as I’m able to open myself further to world views that incorporate the sciences of our times. Thanks Bonner. And others. Good to be part of what feels like an evolution of consciousness, and an accelerated one at that.

I am grateful for the last ten days. Very unique. Firsts. Things that in the past I would not have let myself do or would not have had the freedom to do. A bit of writing about it now as I approach the Salt Lake City airport via Seattle.

Part one was a road trip with my good friend Roq. I flew to Fairbanks, Alaska, where he met me. We stayed a night with new friends, Julie and Doug Smith. Then on to Little Gold,  Yukon where Roq was stationed for a summer work assignment. Our trip was to road-trip from there down through the Yukon (with stops in Dawson City and an overnight in Whitehorse). Then down through British Columbia (with stops near Muncho Lake and in Quesnel) before reaching Vancouver.

Our trip was to return Roq to Bowen Island. It was to meet again as friends. To paddle, so to speak, into some of our current learning and questions with each other. To laugh. A lot. To be really goofy. And really serious.

There are many reasons that this trip is holding my attention. As I think of hosting conversations, one that becomes clear is that we had no agenda. A direction, yes. But no hard and fixed agenda for our conversation. And not really for the physical journey we took. We got in the car. We drove. We talked. We meandered in and out of topics. The beauty of meandering was spectacular for me. A chance to release concerns about time and to do so in the company of good friend. And of course, in the spaciousness of five days, perhaps even moreso, in our relationship to spaciousness, we covered all that I would have hoped for. Such a treat to release into what Roq and I began to reference as the kairos of time more than the kronos of time.

What happens when we meet as human beings to explore with one another? What happens when we trust that the things we give our attention to will serve as helpful doorways into the whole of what we might want to cover? What if our work was just simply wholing, as Roq referenced it in out travels? What if meandering, and noticing what holds our attention, were spot on for core learning and creation strategy in organizations?

Part two was a back-packing trip near the Esmerelda Peaks in Washington State. This was my first back-packing trip. I was quite stunned to think of how much weight each of us would be carrying. And wondering if I would be able to make it. My camping instincts are reasonably good, but I don’t have the back-packing experience. Fortunately, I had the good help of my partner Teresa, her kids Patrick and Kate, and our Oregon friends Jeff, Jill, and their two kids.

Beyond learning how jello-like my legs could feel, what a fantastic experience for me to again, wander into a different relation with time. No email. No computer. The first time that I’ve gone without email for four days in probably the last ten years.

Again, of all the things that hold my attention from this trip, one is that of feeling healthy in my body. Yes. Four days of hiking. Enough to stretch. Enough to feel tired. Enough to build a bit of muscle and cardio. All good. But perhaps even moreso, feeling myself in relation to a big, beautiful, gorgeous expanse of land, trees, mountains, peaks, creeks. I see all of this as living system with a healthy, undeniable wholeness in it. It reminded me of something my friend Toke once shared — I am nature. To strip down some of the human created systems to feel the identity and rhythm of self as nature — what a treat.

Again, with appreciation for this experience, what becomes possible when we give primary attention in organizations to a wholeness and health? What happens when we welcome a timing that has very natural rhythm to it, one that feels more apparent in nature? What energy becomes released to clear the way for the important work many of us crave?

Many more questions. But enough for now. How important and well it feels in this moment to remember an unplugged quality and the wholeness experience of these two journeys. And how lovely to feel a freedom and clarity and partnership of offering in human systems.