I was going through my various accounts and Parker Palmer posted this on Facebook. After a challenging week, I read it and realized this was what my week had been like, very up and down. What do I say to those emotions which temporarily move in and shake my confidence? Or what do I say to those emotions which mislead me with their false promise of all things gold and glittery?
Thank you to Parker Palmer for this sharing.
And in the end we follow them-
not because we are paid, not because we might see some advantage,
not because of the things they have accomplished,
not even because of the dreams they dream
but simply because of who they are:
the man, the woman, the leader, the boss
standing up there when the wave hits the rock,
passing out faith and confidence like life jackets,
knowing the currents, holding the doubts,
imagining the delights and terrors of every landfall;
captain, pirate, and parent by turns,
the bearer of our countless hopes and expectations.
We give them our trust. We give them our effort.
What we ask in return is that they stay true.
With leaders who are at times pirates, we can colour outside the lines and think outside the box. Organizations, institutions, and communities want leadership. Exploration of past times included pirates who navigated new and treacherous waters and helped find new nautical paths past the visible horizons. Yesterday, someone told me a recent comment I made about a need to name school and community values was received with openness and yet I felt that openness was not reflected by the group. Leadership is speaking one’s truth while honouring truths of others. It is a respectful rather than ‘relativism gone wild.’ What can each voice add to the conversation? It is lonely and dangerous being a pirate without others helping in the navigating.
Learning, school, education, or life lived; whatever we choose to call the enterprise it is important we live the words of Gary Snyder.
The rising hills, the slopes,
of statistics
lie before us.
the steep climb
of everything, going up,
up, as we all
go down.
In the next century
or the one beyond that,
they say,
are valleys, pastures,
we can meet there in peace
if we make it.
To climb these coming crests
one word to you, to
you and your children:
stay together
learn the flowers
go light
The line which draws my eye and means so much to me, as a teacher and learner, is the one about statistics. Each year, I spend time with the Grade 9 class discussing the average student and the potential absurdity of the concept. Students realize there might, in fact, not be such a person. It might only be the ‘mean of the average.’ In our classroom, is a poster of Einstein. Several years ago, a student asked who the person in the poster was and I answered by saying it was my Dad. I do resemble him, or like to think I do, with the wild hair and idiosyncrasies. We refer to Einstein as Mr. P.’s Dad. His quotes are a marvel and the one I feel fits with the Gary Snyder poem is:
We must take care and insure the stories of each person who lives life is fully heard. We are not numbers. We are the stories come to life. We should always ask, “What makes the number relevant?”
Here are words to live by offered to us by the German poet Rainer Marie Rilke. Enjoy.
When I woke up this morning, I was thinking of words of poetry about morning. Words like awake, observed, welcomed and others appeared on my mind’s palette. I opened my blog and found this gift from Thelma that spoke words I was looking for to start the day. It was a totally serendipitous moment after reading Father Richard Rohr’s meditation about being our true, authentic self. At a retreat on Bainbridge Island (what a breath-taking place) with familiar strangers based on some of Parker Palmer’s writing and work, this is an amazing way to begin the day. Thank you.
AND NOW IT IS JUST ME
And now, It Is Just Me
I woke up this morning,
I looked all around,
I beheld my environment,
I got out of my bed and bent
my knees to pray,
For you see,
For now, it is just me,
Jesus,
I know that I first should be thankful
about things,
I know that I should start
this communication giving you
thanks and praise,
So help me because,
Now, it is just me,
I do not understand how predicaments
seem to be assigned or some how
unfortunately come to be encountered,
But I know that I have had my share,
And finally,
From them,
I am bewildered,
Tossed,
Lost,
And exhausted,
Let me not forget to admit in
danger and in a state of crisis,
Since it is just me,
I know that you do not mind and
understand my sincere tears and
soul…
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We talked about community today. Community is organic. Through and in it, we tell stories revealing relationships. It grows around what is held in common. We communicate what is held in common, valued, and shared. Community is breaking bread and being true companions with those who join us. We hold and share vision denoting our shared nature within community and exist in paradox. It is what is today, the present, and what was, a historical memorial.
The poet David Whyte wrote “What we hold in community is loved, because it is offered from the heart; a place of love.” Because it is a place of love, it is a place of abundance. Even in crisis, members of a community find ways to heal and regain wholeness through resiliency. Its members know there are others to turn to and seek help from. We do not have to ask; it is given instinctively and intuitively. It is the right thing to do and not the easy or expedient thing to do.
Community is a place we identify with and it signals we are entitled to membership. It is a safe place to be and someone wants us there. It is a sacred place; hallowed ground. We share and expose personal vulnerabilities, because those around us love us unconditionally. Community is a place of discovery. We are nourished and nurtured and grow. It is a place of invitation and opportunity due to its abundance. A wonderful metaphor emerged. A community is a garden. You plant a seed and it prospers in the abundance of the place we name home and community.
One of my favourite poets is Mary Oliver. Here is one of her poems called A Summer Day. After a weekend of not great weather, it was a timely poem to receive, read, and reflect upon. Mary Oliver, through her poetry, poses such great questions and asks us to take time to enjoy our life. It is the only life we have. Live it well.
While on holidays I read My Invented Country: A Memoir by Isabel Allende. It was a chance reading as I purchased the book at a second-hand store. Once I began reading it, I could not put it down and finished it in one sitting. A line that stood out was “I can’t pretend to know what part of my memory is reliable and how much I’ve invented, because the job of defining the line between them is beyond my ability. I have read that the mental process of imagining and that of remembering are so much alike that they are nearly indistinguishable.” We imagine the life we live as much as we live the life we live.
Isabel Allende recounted her love for the poetry of Pablo Neruda. My favourite Pablo Neruda poem is Ode to My Socks. This is the last stanza: The moral of my ode is this:/beauty is twice beauty/and what is good is doubly good/when it is a matter of two socks/made of wool in winter. I remind students, when they write poetry, reveal the ordinary as the extraordinary. The knitting of socks was an act of love as was the wearing of the socks.
Kathy picked up a book by Paulo Coelho knowing how much I enjoy this particular author’s books. A line about life and its meaning is “A strange transformation began to take place: now that she had the bird and no longer needed to woo him, she began to lose interest. The bird unable to fly and express the true meaning of his life began to waste away and his feathers to lose their gloss; he grew ugly; and the woman no longer paid him any attention, except by feeding him and cleaning out his cage.” With meaning in life, we discover beauty and fulfillment or, perhaps, they discover us.
Paolo Coelho spent time touring Europe including Spain and one result was his best-known book, The Alchemist. Spain was the homeland of a poet I enjoy, Antonio Machado. The following lines are from his poem, Cantares: “Traveller, the road is only/your footprint, and no more; /traveller, there’s no road, /the road is your travelling. /Going becomes the road/and if you look back/you will see a path/none can tread again.
There is never a shortage of great reading. We only have to find it.
ivonprefontaine
Teacher as Transformer 