Tag Archives: servant-leadership

April 15, 1947 – The Day Jackie Robinson Came to Bat

Posted on April 15, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Sixty nine years ago today the Brooklyn Dodgers broke the color line at Ebbets Field when Jackie Robinson took the field, playing first base. The door was opened and it was the beginning of the en…

Source: April 15, 1947 – The Day Jackie Robinson Came to Bat

When I taught, I used a social justice activity. Most of the junior high students knew about Nelson Mandela and Mother Teresa, but few had heard about Jackie Robinson. He was important for some students who did not connect until they understood athletes were part of social change.

Jackie Robinson had a Canadian connection. He played his AAA baseball for the Montreal Royals. This point led to talking about Willie O’Ree who broke the colour barrier in hockey. He may not have seemed as impactful Jackie Robinson, but many black NHL players refer to Willie O’Ree as a role model and he remains an ambassador for the game.

Furthermore, it is not enough that those who want to break through a barrier do so alone. For Jackie Robinson and Willie O’Ree, white players gradually (perhaps it was glacial) realized how good these guys were. In Montreal, fans cheered Jackie Robinson because he was a great ball player. Colour seemed overlooked in that environment. I admire Jackie Robinson, Willie O’Ree, Rosa Parks, etc. for their contributions, but community becomes important in sustaining real change and seeing beyond colour, gender, religious, etc. If we could do that, what a difference it would make in the world.

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Walking Meditation With Thich Nhat Hanh

Posted on April 14, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Thich Nhat Hanh wrote about an experience while visiting Seoul, South Korea. He walked with a large crowd and felt tired. When he meditated on his walking and the earth beneath his feet, he felt lighter. The earth supported him and he walked tirelessly. Tess Gallagher writes about a similar experience.

I often take for granted people and things that give me comfort and support. I take for granted the earth and how it effortlessly supports me as I walk, but I also take for granted the steps I take in moving the mountain.

Through mindfulness and attention, I live with the ebbs and flows of energy that I experience in daily life. We become part of the world and it becomes part of each of us.

Fifty of us follow him loosely
up the mountain at Deer Park Monastery.
We are in the slow motion of a dream
lifting off the dreamer’s brow. Steps
into steps and the body rising out
of them like smoke from a fire
with many legs. Gradually the flames
die down and the earth is finally under us.
Inside the mountain a centipede crawls
into no-up, no-down.

Our meditations
waver and recover us, waver
and reel us in to our bodies
like fish willing at last to take on the joy
of being fish, in or out of the water.
When we gather at last at the summit
and sit with him
we know we have moved the mountain
to its top as much as it carried us
deeply into each step.

Going down is the same.
We breathe and step. Breathe,
and step. A many-appendaged being
in and out of this world. No use
telling you about peace attained.
Get out of your feet.
Your breath. Enter
the mountain.

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Posted in Community, Leadership, Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments and tagged community, creativity, Mindful Practice, mindfulness, poetry, servant-leadership, spirituality, teacher as transformer, Tess Gallagher, Thich Nhat Hanh, Walking Meditation With Thich Nhat Hanh. Bookmark the permalink.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful

Posted on April 9, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

if you were a butterfly and I was a bee wouldn’t it be wonderful we would fly and be free in a world full of somethings in a world full of woe wouldn’t it be everything to fly to and fr…

Source: Wouldn’t it be wonderful

I had a long day. It began in Fernie, BC in the midst of great ski country. I got as far as Olds, Alberta, within view of the Rockies, and encountered car trouble and was towed home. We have a regular shop we take cars to, so we dropped it off.

What a treat it was to find this poem and image waiting. What if we were butterflies and bees? We could live in a world of somethings.

David at Barsetshire Diaries suggested we need a contemporary Dr. Seuss. Perhaps with a concerted effort we can match his wit and wisdom and as Jonathan at By the Mighty Mumford commented we would have a Seuss on the Loose. Oh, that is so wonderful and Seussian.

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Freedom…

Posted on April 5, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Life in itself is an empty canvas, it becomes whatsoever you paint on it. You can paint misery, you can paint bliss. This freedom is your glory. ~ ` ~ Osho &nbs…

Source: Freedom…

There are series of pictures and quotes in this post about freedom. Life happens to us and there is no question of that. When we have freedom, we respond to what happens.

Others’ freedom depend on our love in ways that they know they are free. Love does not place conditions. Thomas Merton argued we call it falling in love because we open up, make ourselves vulnerable, and risk being hurt. The opposite is also true. When the love is returned without condition to us, it is a great gift.

With the gifts of love and freedom intertwined, we fly with the wings we receive. We attend to and mind the others in our lives and even those we do not meet. Love and freedom resonate beyond our horizons.

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To Myself

Posted on April 3, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

In being mindful, I think the person I overlook sometimes is myself. When I mind my self, I mind others better and I offer a better version of my self to them. In this way, mind is a verb. I attend to and care for my self and the other.

As well, myself is two words and not one. The self I mind and attend is real, even if it is mine. Better takes on an ambiguous meaning. What does it mean to do something better? I leave certainty behind, because better does not come with fixed criteria.

W. S. Merwin wrote this poem about being mindful to one’s self. In other words, to fully mind my self. When I fully mind my self, I continuously find my self anew, even in those moments I feel lost.

Even when I forget you
I go on looking for you
I believe I would know you
I keep remembering you
sometimes long ago but then
other times I am sure you
were here a moment before
and the air is still alive
around where you were and I
think then I can recognize
you who are always the same
who pretend to be time but
you are not time and who speak
in the words but you are not
what they say you who are not
lost when I do not find you

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Today, Like Every Other Day

Posted on April 2, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

For me, there are poets, like Rumi, whose poetry stand the test of time. After almost a century, the poetic text lives and remains ambiguous searching for meaning.

Now, I don’t play a musical instrument. I sing poorly. I have two left feet, so dancing is out of the question. What Rumi calls on each of us to do, in our particular and unique fashion, is to express ourselves and be creative.

Thich Nhat Hanh said that the extraordinary is found in the ordinary, the ordinary tasks such as doing dishes and enjoying a cup of tea. As we do, we meditate about those who enrich our lives through their efforts. We celebrate people who contribute to our lives in a human and humane manner.

Yes, I do wake up empty, but it is an emptiness that can be filled with each way I celebrate my humanness.

Today, like every other day, we wake up empty

and frightened. Don’t open the door of your study
and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument.

Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.

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Lost

Posted on March 31, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

I sometimes feel lost in the world, without bearings. David Wagoner counseled that when we feel lost to stop and listen to the world, as if it were the forest and a powerful stranger able to speak to us.

When I stop and pray, I ask someone for help, but, if I rush on, without listening, the prayer cannot be answered. I pose a question that I cannot answer. Prayer is not just speaking. My heart opens and receives what is returned to me.

Is it in the form of words? Or, is it the gentle breath that is hardly perceptible? When I am mindful and listen to listen, I intuitively sense differences. Mindfulness becomes an attentive and sensitive way of life, as opposed to just happening.

Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you,
If you leave it you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.

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Freedom to choose

Posted on March 26, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space there is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and freedom. ~Viktor Frankl Sometimes we make decisions in t…

Source: Freedom to choose

Viktor Frankl was a psychiatrist and neurologist who developed a school of psychiatry called logotherapy which is the search for meaning in life. He used his experiences as a Holocaust survivor to help inform his findings.

Humans choose their responses and seek life’s meaning. When we lose our meaning in life, we drift, feeling rudderless and without mooring. What keeps us grounded is the choices we make in life and the meaning we find in life. For example, becoming a teacher, a farmer, a parent, etc. gives life purpose and calls us to take action.

We express who we are through responding to the continuous calling, the vocation, that we find through various meaningful roles. When and if we find our life’s meaning, it allows us to make a difference in the world, for other sentient beings, and for the non-sentient elements of the world. We care for all aspects of the world and feel connected to it

Thomas Merton suggested some humans find there calling and others search throughout life, unable to find it. Perhaps, it is they do not hear what calls them and are unable to respond. Mindfulness and silence open spaces to hear the calls that give our lives meaning and make living meaningful.

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Posted in Community, Education, Leadership, Mindful Life, Reflective Moments, Uncategorized and tagged community, creativity, Logotherapy, Mindful Practice, mindfulness, servant-leadership, teacher as transformer, Thomas Merton, Viktor Frankl. Bookmark the permalink.

Walker

Posted on March 3, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Antonio Machado reminds us that the path we follow is both made anew when we walk it and that once we step we can no longer go back.

We can look back and see where we came from, but that is a distorted image and, the further we move away from that point in time, the more distorted the memories we recall. We can reflect upon those moments and steps in a caring way that takes place only after the step.

It is in mindful walking that we make the path. There is an awareness and senstivity that only happens in the very moment we exist in, the present. Our presence is important in that moment as we step and live at that point on our path of life.

The mindfulness of our steps is important when we realize we lead others in their steps. They cannot walk the identitical path to our path, but the way we compose ourselves is a model for how they might live.

Walker, your footsteps

are the road, and nothing more.

Walker, there is no road,

the road is made by walking.

Walking you make the road,

and turning to look behind

you see the path you never

again will step upon.

Walker, there is no road,

only foam trails on the sea.

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Posted in Education, Leadership, Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments and tagged Antonio Machado, community, creativity, education, Educational Leadership, leadership, Mindful Practice, mindfulness, poetry, servant-leadership, teacher as transformer, Walker. Bookmark the permalink.

I love Hermann Hesse

Posted on September 2, 2014 by ivonprefontaine

I love Hermann Hesse.

Hermann Hesse’s book The Journey to the East set the stage for Robert Greenleaf writing about servant leadership. The quote in the post is about the character that unfolds, revealed in living life, not as a planned, linear project, but a dynamic journey. We do not know what is about to happen and it is in the joy, sadness, exhilaration, and disappointment our humanity is revealed.

We live in a world which is can be paradoxically forgiving and unforgiving. It is the attitude of letting go which helps us overcome, moment-to-moment, the unforgiving part. It is in these challenges that the character lines are revealed in the continuous sculpting of our faces which appear over time.