If it quavers and shakes in fear:
let it be for the reasons we share with you.
Speak your truth with courage, and all your heart.
Inspire, then move us--with each word you expel, and each breath you spend. We'll catch our breaths, and then we'll respire.
We'll breathe as we move closer toward something worth every spirited breath of speech, story, and song before our lives expire.
But it ends not at your life, nor ours. Greatness flows over and through endeavors of legacy everlasting.
Free it with your voice and contribution to the world.
Let it ebb and flow from heart to heart: yours to mine, theirs to yours.
Call again!
Through sacred passage of wisdom in your call and listening--let your curiosity open the greatness of others, share your reliable truths, and always ask for the greatest of truth even when the only answer may be silence from your fellows.
The echoes of utterance will be great, and the world may quaver and shake in new movement as it awakens with the warmth of your voice for the reasons we share with you.
I recently gave feedback on the draft speech of a fellow social entrepreneur who was invited as a keynote speaker for the Jane Goodall Vision 2020 symposium.
While I won't be there for the symposium (it's in Australia), I can imagine the following for events of this caliber and magnitude: people are privileged to attend, and the event organizers bring in some of the best speakers they can find to leave all their attendees charged with the finest of rekindled hearts and solid wisdom.
While I was more or less familiar with various strategies she explores in her speech, I'm starting to realize how tremendous an opportunity it's been to have access to her speech and organization: due to the nature of the organization's programs, I've been privileged to learn about some of her organization's deepest challenges in ways that most people would never imagine possible for someone working with it in such a short amount of time. I know that in some way, the things they might have struggled with are the very same things I struggle with too. They probably boil down to very simple (but tremendous!) things that were affirmed at the end of her speech: perseverance, commitment, and belief in your own success before you begin.
If you're left with the same things you had questioned before, it's time to get moving--sometimes you must live to understand them, rather than know them to live. Some ideas retain resilience even when we don't feel we have a complete grasp of reality or the concepts in our minds. Those come from learning by undergoing the most trying challenges of fully living our lives.
Heed your vision to find your bearings before committing, keep your eyes open, and dive in
... there's more to this notion of love for sustainability (I feel like the ideas are 3/4 baked at this point). In particular, the role of concepts like compassion, love, hocma, and their relation to appropriately bringing one's courage, wisdom, and capacity for expressing it in life that signify the significance of an individual in the world. I can see it, but it'll take me a while to put it all down into writing. For now, here's something I call the conundrum of compassion: How an unsustained instance of kindness can create tremendous pain through disempowerment.
Good education allows us to discover, and some of what we learn from discovery enables us to wisely live through whatever truly matters in life. Oddly enough, increased exposure to the sensations of a holiday like Valentines day, or for those who experience it, exposure to loving people (even those with non-amorous intent) can be painful and disheartening.
When suddenly lifting the burdens of oppression and anticipated threat creates trauma in itself. When realized opportunities for that kind of reprieve are unsustained or non-existent, it doubly serves to break one's hope. It's a different kind of growing pain.
Sometime last year I started to realize it was very likely I was still clenching a few grudges so closely that they might have influence over how I trust and engage other people. I know of a few people who always have "an ax to grind", and could feel myself teetering in and out of bearing preemptive hostilities in almost every situation I came across. I frequently considered it mandatory that I prepare something to validate and assert about myself or my presence before I engage another person, or whatever event or activity before me. I'd come to an event out of curiosity, but find ways to point to bigger responsibilities or obligations beyond self-interest. For the most part, it works--people might know there's something more to what you do or they'll find out if they do something to trigger the unveiling of whatever you had to say for yourself. Yet working in many public forums and among passionate and injusticed community activists, I also recognized that this kind of armed or hostile mental mechanism quickly becomes a detriment to the intended consequences that people seek.
Exposure to a genuinely compassionate person or event that makes any anticipated hostilities pointless can become profoundly painful experience of remorse. You spend so much of your life living in anticipation of hatred only to realize that some people currently don't or never had to deal with systemic injustices the way you had to for all or most of your life. You also realize that their life and community might actually have all of the things that allow them to express themselves in ways that you'd have never conceivably done before.
If you carry a burden on your shoulders for long enough, your body undergoes a kind of traumatic shock from its sudden release and removal. I've experienced this physically several times in my life, but taken as a metaphor, it's a fairly new phenomenon that arose for me in 2012.
The best illustration of this experience might be seen in a film. To make this a bit more realistic, imagine a film where a malicious dictator was apprehended and eliminated from a country, or where the oppressed people were extracted and rescued from the grips of the regime. After having endured and been rescued from a terrible situation, a person of few words and grim resolve suddenly breaks down even though they're in a safe environment and one would think that they should be overjoyed about their favorable new circumstance.
To the casual observer, it's a bizarre token of sadness in humanity, but sometimes it represents something really profound: suddenly lifting the psychological burden of living in anticipation of threat and oppression creates trauma in itself. It might be good, but it's almost unbearably profound and it hurts almost as much, if not more than being in a state of consistent oppression. In essence, they're growing pains, but the brevity of the phrase doesn't do justice to the extent of the challenge some people have to endure.
I most keenly realized this phenomenon last year after speaking with a person whom I initially was extremely guarded around and was taken by surprise when she allowed a long phone discussion for me to address a lengthy array of personal concerns, and much later I realized she had sincerely entertained the possibility of being a girlfriend to me. Months before, as smitten as I might have been, I was convinced that people were more disposed to using each other for temporary personal gain and let that overshadow and sabotage the reality and opportunity presented in our relationship.
I later noted something similar when I shared conversation with a few people who considered me a friend over drinks in Detroit as we discussed transformative ideas for social justice and proactivism. Simple acts, but a taste of ambrosia--you've discovered a brutal possibility about compassion, love's prerequisite. It's something that everyone should be able to live with, but for some, it's rare to find in the environment they live in. A moment of genuine reprise from a struggle so constant, you never knew there were other ways of living life that don't require hindrances from hostility as a preemptive defense. Instead, you discover what it's like to live with a part of yourself that's exposed and unfamiliar. For some, it triggers an overwhelming kind of grief that results from suddenly lifting decades, lifetimes, or generations of burden. It's a traumatic appreciation--good grief in a literal sense--that has you wishing you had found and embraced the opportunity to act without hindrance or burden sooner. It's a naked consciousness that's as fragile in its being as it is mysterious in its resilience. At the same time, I think some people, myself included, are inclined to fight the signals of reality so as to minimize the pain of trauma--especially when we see those opportunities to openly live remain rare, inconsistent, or non-existent. We uphold facades of hollow identity to keep excuses at the forefront of our existence to the world that we're willing to engage.
Last summer, Willie of the Wellness Center at UM-Dearborn had said to me: "some people don't know what love is, or how to love--they never grew up with it" (paraphrased). In the context of his story, he was talking about juvenile delinquents in Detroit but it was profound to me given my circumstances. Thrashing through a mix of hardened oblivion, self-hatred, and what
almost certainly amounts to an iteration of unknown behavioral triggers for acute-traumatic stress coupled with behaviors to patch disingenuous actions [listen
to Paper Cuts by Broadcast for a sense of this "the things you miss out when you try to mislead..."], I know I've squandered even simple
friendships. From here, the only
solutions amount to giving up—which doesn’t fit with my ethical framework—or
belief in ideals that hold little other than disparate possibilities. Belief, and perhaps faith then becomes a requisite for
social sustainability as well.
"In the end we will conserve only what we love. We will love only what we understand. We will understand only what we are taught." -Baba Dioum
“What we need to match the science of human health is what the ancient Israelites called ‘hocma’—the science of the heart. . . the capacity to see. . . to feel. . . and then to act. . . as if the future depended on you. Believe me, it does.”-Bill Moyers
Alright, in heed of Valentine's Day, I've realized love is necessary for sustainability.
Again, there are some who’d argue that love goes well beyond romance, it's really about finding ways to embrace life to its fullest with other people whom you can trust, even in trying circumstances [1]. Perhaps in essence, much of the world is enamored with romance because it exists as the opportunity and hope for lightening discovery. But overall, love's about fostering relationships and circumstances that celebrate others as much as it invites and encourages them to become the best they can be at all times. Perhaps that's a key element for distinguishing love from compassion.
Love then becomes a requisite ideal for sustainability because people must move beyond a sense of duty in compassion. Compassion wholeheartedly considers a humane cause or misfortune, and like love, it may operate on a notion or ethos of improvement and hope. However, without commemoration or celebration-- outcomes from possible merits also fosters awareness about the products of something deeply appreciated. On some level, this can imply a deep understanding as well. The more you know, you're more capable of appreciating, and thereby loving. Which brings us back to Baba Dioum's statement:
"In the end we will conserve only what we love. We will love only what we understand. We will understand only what we are taught."
Those who find pain in loneliness or comfort in solitude have learned something profound as well, and in many cases, have an opportunity to articulate the experience in profound ways, often in the arts or through their commitment to substantive endeavors [2]. That's what makes the arts so elusive: they can commemorate an experience and guide us toward our shared humanity in tremendous ways. They can also inspire deeper appreciation and learning about the world we live with, and why the things we live with matter. That's necessary for sound conservation--the practice of ensuring near-term and long-term well-being.
... there's more to this notion of love for sustainability (I feel like the ideas are 3/4 baked at this point). In particular, the role of concepts like compassion, love, hocma, and their relation to appropriately bringing one's courage, wisdom, and capacity for expressing it in life that signify the significance of an individual in the world. I can see it, but it'll take me a while to put it down into writing...
"Today
there is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence. It is either
nonviolence or nonexistence." -Dr. Martin Luther King
"It
springs rather from my conviction that, if our civilization is to survive, we
must break with the habit of deference to great men." - Karl Popper
I
think Dr. Martin Luther King Day (which I learned is not his birthday! That happened January
15th) is an appropriate opportunity to reflect upon and reinvigorate our
commitment to the timeless legacy and vision of justice exemplified by Dr. King instead of giving deference to him as an idol of noble
aspirations. More than that, I think we foremost
benefit from recognizing our ability to empower ourselves and each other (all
people, of course not just men). Another quote, this time from the living Bill Moyers, shares this belief that action is up to you: “What we need
to match the science of human health is what the ancient Israelites called
‘hocma’—the science of the heart. . . the capacity to see. . . to feel. . . and
then to act. . . as if the future depended on you. Believe me, it does.”
In
that regard, all of us are capable of discovering greatness in ourselves and
one another. Among their
accomplishments, civil rights proponents like King succeeded in empowering
people by promoting awareness and opportunity to engage in justice through
democracy with disciplined planning and steadfast implementation. I recently met the Reverend Dr. James Lawson, who worked closely
with Dr. King, in the autumn of 2012 after he gave a speech about non-violence. By miraculous coincidence, I met him one day after I tasted the gunpowder from a gunshot meant
to kill a person less than 8 feet away.
At first blush, non-violence can seem like a
fairly simple, even vague if not hollow, term. If someone draws a gun with malicious intent,
what other choices do we have? Guns,
much like nuclear weapons, can almost guarantee mutual destruction. Yet if we ask why one would draw a
gun to potentially kill extended family, or even carry one in the first place, the answer had to revolve around personal security and insecurity when you boil the situation down it to its essence.
Security is a sophisticated need. It’s inherently dependent upon complex
systems which are beyond the full control of an individual. Even one’s perception can skew our judgment of
an already shifting reality.
I
suspect an answer to dealing with potentially absolute violence lies in
interventions that meet the following condition: overcome our human tendency to
engage in rules that necessitate the reciprocal escalation of powers. Undermine or reshape the entire premise of
our value system for fighting—the “rules of the game”—by changing the
perceptions and paradigms which shape how and why we think about combative
engagement in the first place.
People
are complex; fortunately, science helps us find ways to effectively work with
complexity, including social codes and personal beliefs. Complex systems scientists recognize tangible
behaviors as necessary for persuading peoples’ values, paradigms and
worldviews (see the list of 12 leverage
points for intervening in a complex system here: http://www.sustainer.org/pubs/Leverage_Points.pdf
). When appropriate, non-violence may
need to employ the use of non-lethal protective use of force
(check out Marshall Rosenberg's well-earned wisdom: http://youtu.be/21g1S7stoQI
), but no matter what, non-violence is exercised without malice in our actions. The way we communicate ideas, or even
notions, in language (can we speak without engaging in abuse or instigating
escalation?) usually becomes the first symptom for a potential intervention. To astute observers, it may be expressed visually in our physical posturing
and gestures (can you assert your presence without resorting to making it
threatening to others?) as well, and of course in how we physically interact with one
another (can you embrace and redirect a person's attack rather than impose force onto them? That's what the martial art Aikido focuses on).
Adding Popper’s contention about the notion of
“great men”, I gleaned another note for non-violence from Dr. Lawson: Non-violence operates via empowerment as its primary principle. “Non-violence
is premised on the idea that all people have power to act beyond the influence
of their circumstance.” But in this, there's a
challenge: unlike violence, which can quickly and easily interfere with the
integrity of an ideal like peace, trust, or love, non-violence requires
discipline, careful planning, and patient dedication.
We must act from a hope to overcome, we must plan to overcome.
Which leads us to another nuance of non-violence from Reverend Lawson: “Non-violence is the moral
equivalent to war. It requires
organization and discipline.” Consider the planning and commitment
that went into what we now see as watershed events: Coordinated planning took place for the
sit-ins from 1959-1964. The Montgomery
Bus Boycott officially began on December 1st of 1955, some of us heard that in
the history books or on television programs, but few of us realize the tenacity
of the cause: the boycott was sustained for over a year—381 days.
An ideal is a lot like other life-processes: education, communication and the arts, design, even ethics.
All of these activities involve intentions, actions, and consequences.
Among seasoned practitioners like Reverend Lawson, the term "non-violence" actually isn't representative of what people really strive for. Non-anything implies reaction and work that runs directly against something. If anything, I suspect people really strive to love--create it and do it. It's a noun, but most importantly a verb.
Love exists as a plausible ideal. We may bear compassionate and loving intentions. Caring actions may manifest loving intentions, and perhaps the desired consequence of compassion and love creates a legacy that reaffirms the intention and fosters more love.
Yet as an ideal, it becomes so expansive to act upon that many find--and take--temptation in believing ideals cannot happen in reality. Furthermore, it's possible, potentially even reasonable [using the word in a very strict sense, link goes to various definitions] though never justifiable, that a person can love the person whom they abuse. Their intentions may be true, but the actions they know or choose to express care through compromise the dignity and autonomy of another being.
This remains the challenge of Dr. King and many other notable living visionaries of our time: to truly validate worthy ideals such as peace, justice, and love all three aspects of the ideal must be good and present. That takes visionary planning to manifest dreams from ideal to real. When society-shaping, you need to do so with people, not just on behalf of them, and certainly not independent of them.
Keep it up, we shall overcome someday, but let’s discover the someday together, every day in our actions with one another.
. . .
Notes about music in the video above:
Minor variations and improvisations on the Civil Rights song "We Shall Overcome" recorded in the University of Michigan-Dearborn Wellness Center on January 21st 2013.
A few weeks ago I played it spur of the moment and it was a profound rendition if I say so myself, but I don't remember what I did and I didn't have anything to record it with at the time. There's some irony to the notion of playing a social justice song, solo, to no one but yourself on MLK day. I was somewhat disappointed that I missed a few opportunities including a symposium on social justice that day, so as I practiced other tunes, I decided to give the song another try in observation of the day as well.
I suspect playing a song used for civil rights alone doesn't quite contribute to making the dream manifest, but hopefully sharing it here might be worth your while. I'm drawing memory from a rendition I heard on a cd by Peter Paul and Mary when I was in second grade-fifth grade, and hadn't really prepared my playing as much as I now think I should have. Ongoing process...
