Innovations 1999
|
| I then asked everyone to
take a few moments in silence to focus on the candle flames and consider
our purpose for being there—our students and their learning and the
service we provide our communities—as well as to remember colleagues who
might need our special support, due to illness, loss, or other difficult
challenge.
After cabinet members mentioned names of several colleagues in need of our support, we spent about three minutes in silence, focusing on them and on our students’ success. The time of focus enriched the thoughtful and spirited agenda-related conversations which followed. At the end of the meeting, members expressed delight with the opening ceremony and asked that it continue as part of our weekly ritual. . . . one pass of the baton . . . Although my original intent was to gather up the centerpiece and have it returned weekly, members suggested that it remain in the conference room to be used by the many other groups which meet throughout the week in that space. Later that afternoon a formal invitation was posted on the conference room door:
. . . another pass of the baton . . . The invitation continues to be accepted by many of the groups which meet in the conference room, now with fewer surprised reactions than in the beginning. For President’s Cabinet members, the ritual was immediately a welcome opportunity for focus and has continued to be. Some members of other groups, however, were somewhat startled at first. One supervisor, anticipating the traditionally contentious meeting over schedule-building, invited her group to light the candles and start the meeting in focused silence. As the meeting adjourned, a couple of participants observed, with raised eyebrows, "Did you find that a little weird? Kinda like prayer?" Others responded, "But did you notice how uncharacteristically well everyone seemed to behave? How quickly we came to consensus? And how soon we accomplished our business? A little meditative focus sure works for me!" The group continues to use the ritual, and no one seems to mind now. As people participate in meetings using this format, as they read minutes from these meetings, as they communicate about colleagues needing our support, or as they talk about the phenomenon through the grapevine, organizational values of caring and student focus are being reinforced in numerous ways. . . . a growing number of baton passes . . . Parker Palmer says that being fully alive is acting in a way that "involves expression, discovery, re-formation of ourselves and our world. As we act, we not only express what is in us and help give shape to the world, we also receive what is outside us, and we reshape our inner selves. When we act, the world acts back, and we and the world are re-created." As a leader, I cannot predict what I will discover when I take time to reflect, to look inside-—like seeing a heron pass a baton to a gull. I have learned, however, that "contemplation-and-action" is more likely than either contemplation alone or action alone to yield behavior that is authentic to who I am. And when I am more fully alive in that respect, my colleagues and our students are the beneficiaries. . . . baton passing without end . . . which Nhat Hanh, "Ceremony to Begin Anew," Plum Village Chanting Book (Berkeley: Parallax Press). Parker J. Palmer, The Courage to Teach (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1998) Parker J. Palmer, The Active Life (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1990), 16-17. Matt Weinstein and Luke Barber, Work Like Your Dog, (New York: Villard, 1999)* *This reference was cited by Dr. Mittelstet in follow-up questions regarding a work that incorporates much of the spirit of mind-body health in the workplace; one of the co-authors, Dr. Luke Barber, is a professor of Philosophy and English at Richland College.
|