Category Archives: Community

Thought for Today

Posted on March 12, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

“The most precious gift we can offer anyone is our attention. When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers.” –Thich Nhat Hanh

Source: Thought for Today

Genie shared this quote from Thich Nhat Hanh about what our mindfulness means for others. When we do not offer our undivided attention to other, it diminishes who they are.

However, a risk is we diminish mindfulness and it becomes a clichéd word that loses its full meaning. Occasionally, I read articles that suggest mindfulness is a “business tool” that we turn off and on as a calculated choice. When someone is truly mindful, they attempt to be present in every moment, realizing that is not humanly possible.

When I am present to the other, it means I give my attention as an unconditional gift with no advance calculation. Mindfulness is not a business calculation. When we are mindful, we attend to each word, not seeking to answer, but to hear what the other says to us.

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Capturing Life’s Precious Moments

Posted on March 11, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Yesterday at work I was given the privilege to escort an elderly gentleman from one of our treatment rooms to the waiting room where his sweet wife was waiting patiently for him. The couple’…

Source: Capturing Life’s Precious Moments

Whatever our job, it should inspire us in extraordinary ways. Tina‘s post makes that point so well.

Thich Nhat Hanh reminds us that we find the extraordinary in the ordinary. When we pause, enjoy the moment, and our mindful, we share what is important to us with others. We make the world a better place.

When I taught, I loved being in the classroom with students and sharing with them in many ways. What I found important was that, when I enjoyed what I was doing, they enjoyed it, as well. One student told his mother that he could not understand why he enjoyed Social Studies that year as he had not before. She answered, “When the teacher is enthusiastic and lets you sense that, that is what happens.”

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The Methodology for Happy

Posted on March 10, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

“It is not possible to live happily if one does not lead a beautiful, righteous and wise life, or to lead a beautiful, righteous and wise life if one is not happy.” Epicurus (341-270 B…

Source: The Methodology for Happy

The linked post is a wonderful, concise description of happiness beginning when we help others without expectation of something in return. Aristotle spoke about doing good for one’s self and others as the greatest Good. We each have ethical responsiblity for all sentient beings, non-sentient things, and the world we co-inhabit.

Harlon provided a short list which help me understand what it takes to be happy. It is not a recipe, as I need to be mindful and attentive, always asking questions. What are the necessary and unnecessary desires in my life?

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Posted in Community, Mindful Life, Reflective Moments, Social Justice, Uncategorized and tagged A Patient Voice, Aristotle, community, eloquent questions, Epicurus, Ethics, leadership, Mindful Practice, mindfulness, teacher as transformer. Bookmark the permalink.

Prayer

Posted on March 8, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Enjoy the day as If it was the last one for The dawn is so far. Be patient and take care A prayer flies to Heaven. The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.

Source: Prayer

Prayer is about listening. When we just speak, we cannot listen as closely and attentively as we need. Esther used the words patient and care in her beautiful poem. When I am patient, I listen more closely and take care to hear what is said and what is unsaid. The spaces between words, lines, and stanzas call to me, but in the busyness and noisiness of the world I can lose my way.

When I have faith and accept that my prayers will be answered in inexplicable ways, ways that I cannot understand, I find my way by being patient. I trust what is intuitive and I cannot possibly know fully. I walk the path carefully, but not alone. When I walk with others, it is an ethical journey where I take responsiblity for my actions and hold my hand out to the others I journey with.

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Roofless School

Posted on March 5, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

a dictionary of true mirages bird songs instead of geometry plus a clock with no hands many very magic felt pens words like primrose or rainbow painted on a huge whiteboard come into the roofless S…

Source: Roofless School

John Dewey suggested education is not preparation for life, but life itself. The poem, Roofless School, extends that metaphor to poetry.

Poets sit under the sky and experience the world in the most complete ways, but their poetry is subject to diverse interpretations. When I go back and read a poem, I find new meanings.

Each time we experience the world, we experience something new. Regardless of how familiar it seems to be, an experience can only be experienced once, in the moment I experience it. We re-experience the experience retrospectively and find new meanings in a new, reflective experience.

When I taught, I tried to begin each day fresh. It was not erasing the past, but I realized how the past informed my relationships with students, curriculum, and digital technology in the present moment. In those moments, being mindful and sensitive was paramount.

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Mountains Speak

Posted on March 4, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Source: Mountains Speak

Let the mountains speak and share their story. As leaders, we must let the world and people speak to us and be sensitive and attentive listeners as it shares its stories.

I enjoy traveling through mountains. It is hard work, because heights terrify me. Kathy and I tell others that she drove on the Going to the Sun Road, because the driver has to have their eyes open. There are places that the drop off of a narrow road is thousands of feet.

The beauty of mountains is hard to fully describe in words. It is an experience, soaking in the moment. We lived in a small town, McBride, BC, for 2 years. It is in a mountain valley.

Mountains speak to me. The wind is different. The weather socks in for days and weeks. Animals appear at the door and appear unthreatened by human presence. One Sunday morning in McBride, I waited for Kathy on the front steps and about 20 feet away was a young cow moose, eating, and keeping a close eye on me. She moved when we decided it was time to get in the car. We were not separate from nature, but part of it in those moments.

When we are sensitive and mindful of the environment, so much of it speaks to us. This includes nature, the workplace, our families, and in our communities.

I did not take that picture. Kathy did as she drove through Glacier National Park, MT.

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…HEALING…

Posted on March 2, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

🍀 I HAVE PICKED UP THE PIECES 🍀

Source: …HEALING…

The words healthy, heal, whole share a common etymology about wholeness. It is in picking up the pieces and making ourselves whole that we find good health and heal.

This includes being in community whether we are face-to-face with each other. Parker Palmer suggested “Community does not necessarily mean living face-to-face with others; rather, it means never losing the awareness that we are connected to each other. It is not about the presence of other people-it is about being fully open to the reality of relationship, whether or not we are alone.”

When we connect with each other, we become whole and belong to community. When we are mindful and attentive of the other, we become whole and belong to community.

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Spring

Posted on March 1, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Source: Spring

Mary Oliver is one of my favourite poets. There is something deeply spiritual about her poetry that finds its way into my heart.

I was not familiar with this poem. Poetry allows us to imagine that we have wings. With those wings. we tap our experiences more fully as we fly with others who join us. When we share the journey with others, it becomes much richer. It is not only our journey.

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Smart Cookie

Posted on February 25, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Richard Schiffman counsels that when we are hunting for something, whether it is a cookie or wisdom, it is harder to find it. What we look for can sometimes be right there in front of us, but, in looking for it, we cannot find it. In fact, what we are looking for can end up in the most unexpected places: in a jar in Tennessee.

It is in mindful, sensitive being in the present moment that what we look for finds us. When we apply this to leadership and education, it is about listening to the world and others.

What we each seek is unique to each of us. When we tell the stories and speak the poems about what we seek, we do so finding the words that suit our stories and our poems. Leaders sense this and offer others space to find the words for their stories and poems. In finding and choosing our paths and our words, we can become the smart cookies we seek.

The fortune that you seek is in another cookie,

was my fortune. So I’ll be equally frank—the wisdom

that you covet is in another poem. The life that you desire

is in a different universe. The cookie you are craving

is in another jar. The jar is buried somewhere in Tennessee.

Don’t even think of searching for it. If you found that jar,

everything would go kerflooey for a thousand miles around.

It is the jar of your fate in an alternate reality. Don’t even

think of living that life. Don’t even think of eating that cookie.

Be a smart cookie—eat what’s on your plate, not in some jar

in Tennessee. That’s my wisdom for today, though I know

it’s not what you were looking for.

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Prayer to Mansur Al-Hallaj

Posted on February 24, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Source: Prayer to Mansur Al-Hallaj

Prayer is about listening to the world and is part of an internal conversation. The Sufi prayer is about listening closely. Each stanza of the poem begins with a word that entreats God guide me in sensing the world more deeply, not as something I hear, but as something all my senses are able to engage with.

We think of leadership as action and speech, but it is about sensing the world in a sensitive and mindful manner. Leadership is about a conversation and the questions we ask. It opens up space where there are no preconceived answers and followers can be part of conversation and lead, as well. Leadership and its communication is about community, a gathering of people who do not always agree, but hold something in common.