Remembering Dana Meadows on the 10th anniversary of her death

Yesterday (Monday February 21) was Dana (Donella) Meadows' 10th year death anniversary. A reminder of this transition appeared on my calendar. On this date, in past years, I have often shared one of Dana’s reflections on love, ethics or systems. But yesterday morning I heard a public radio piece on the arrival of the seed catalogues.

All her friends know that gardening was an important part of Dana’s life, and the arrival of the seed catalogues in frigid New Hampshire was an important, joyful, part of the garden cycle. I can remember the trays of seedlings that would appear on Foundation Farm’s first floor sleeping porch, catching the sun’s rays through the window. Later there might be almost too much garden to mulch, weed and cultivate.

In memory of Dana, here is David Mallett’s rendering of “The Garden Song”

Inch by inch, row by row

Gonna make this garden grow

Gonna mulch it deep and low

Gonna make it fertile ground

Inch by inch, row by row

Please bless these seeds I sow

Please keep them safe below

'Till the rain comes tumbling down

Pullin' weeds and pickin' stones

We are made of dreams and bones

Need a place to call my own

'Cause the time is close at hand

Grain for grain, sun and rain

Find my way in nature's chain

Till my body and my brain

Tell the music of the land

CHORUS

Plant your rows straight and long

Season with a prayer and song

Mother Earth will make you strong

If you give her loving care

Taking time for quiet and reflection - a note to students

Announcing a new Faculty Resident Event: A time of quiet and reflection - Faculty Resident’s Apartment, Anderson 101, 7:00-7:30 AM, Wednesday mornings, beginning tomorrow.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Most mornings each week, I seek to set aside time for quiet and reflection. This practice has roots in many traditions - Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Bahai, Christianity, Runi, and including traditions that are not “spiritual” in any conventional sense. Remaining quiet and reflecting for thirty or minutes or more, “emptying ones mind” as some Buddhists say, sounds as if it might be easy. I have not found it to be so, but I have found it to be valuable.

I thought it might make a contribution to share this practice each Wednesday morning, from 7:00 to 7:30, with any who might be interested. For about fifteen minutes, we will take time for silence, perhaps being conscious of our own breathing - “breathing in - breathing out.” For the last fifteen minutes of our time together, there will an opportunity for sharing thoughts, leadings and, for those for whom this is part of their practice, prayers. When others are sharing, we will listen fully and compassionately, without seeking to evaluate or judge.

We will conclude with a prayer attributed to the 12th and 13th century friar and preacher, Giovani Francesco di Bernadrone, known as St. Francis of Assisi.

St. Francis is venerated by Roman Catholic Christians as the patron saint of animals and the environment. His example has also inspired many who are not Roman Catholics or Christians, for followers of any faith tradition at all. Interestingly, it is reported (by Wikipedia) that in 1219, St. Francis traveled to Egypt, where crusaders were besieging the city of Damietta and reconciled with the Muslim Sultan.

The “St. Francis prayer” is a personal favorite of mine:

O’ Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.

Where there is hatred, let me sow love.

Where there is injury, pardon.

Where there is doubt, faith.

Where there is despair, hope.

Where there is darkness, light.

Where there is sadness, joy.

O’ Divine Master,

Let me seek not so much to be understood as to understand,

To be consoled as to console,

To be loved as to love.

For it is in giving we receive

Pardoning that we are pardoned,

In the death of self, that we are born to eternal life.

Following this, we will acknowledge each other using the South Asian gesture of respect and acceptance, Namaste. At 7:30, for any that wish to remain for a few minutes, there will be tea and coffee.

Dormgrandpop

Knowing one's limits

My son recently sent me the following quotation from Vietnamese Buddhist Monk Thich Nhat Nguyen.

We have to know our limits. We have to organize our lives in such a way that we can continue to get the nourishment and healing that we need. The solution is in your community. If you work with a community that practices together, a Sangha, you receive the collective energy of support. When you begin to feel exhausted by your efforts, the other brothers and sisters in your community will help with the work so you can take the time to restore yourself and continue. You must also have the courage to say no, or you will lose yourself very soon, and that will not profit the world. Learning to say no is difficult, but it is not impossible. You have to serve in a way that you can preserve yourself. To preserve yourself is to preserve the opportunity to serve others. Preserving yourself and your compassion is the answer. And that can be done easily within a community of practice.

Receiving missives such as this from one's adult children is among the great rewards of being a parent.

Acknowledgement of AU’s Honors Program Director, who is stepping down

It was recently announced that the Director of AU’s Honors Program, who had served for many years, was stepping down. Since the Honors Program adjoined the Center for Teaching Excellence (now the Center for Teaching, Research and Learning) where I served as Director, I could witness the service rendered by this compassionate, effective leader from an unique vantage point. Seeking to capture what I had observed, I shared the following acknowledgement.

Dear [Director],

Though my mother always told me “It is better to leave the stage while the audience is still applauding.” I was saddened to learn that you will soon be completing your tenure as Honors Program Director. During the years we were “neighbors,” I came to appreciate - and greatly respect - the passion and sensitivity with which you carried out this critically important mission. You demonstrated that a commitment to the well-being of and fair treatment for students is not inconsistent with demanding academic requirements and high standards. There was never any doubt in students mind that you were in their corner, but like the “second” of a championship prize fighter, mopping their brows, staunching their wounds and sending them back into the fray. You will be greatly missed, though the business school will, no doubt, be enriched and strengthened by your full time presence.

With best regards and best wishes,

Dormgrandpop

A Humane, Creative, Empowering Culture

As readers of this all-too-infrequently posted blog know, I will be completing my full-time service at American University, this spring, after 35 years. The recently published School of International Service Newsletter (The Diplomatic Pouch) included a “farewell” interview in which I described creating a “humane, creative, empowering culture” in AU organizations that I helped develop and lead as a major accomplishment. (The complete interview is posted at

http://www.american.edu/sis/news/upload/DPouch_Spring_2011_F_web.pdf )

A colleague wrote that she liked the concept but that it was new to her. In response, I provided the following elaboration.

I’m glad you liked the concept of a humane, creative, empowering culture, (perhaps sub-culture would be better) though I haven’t thought of it as all that revolutionary. This was my goal both as Director of Doctoral Studies and especially as Director of the Centre for Teaching Excellence. Creating such a culture simplifies the task of leadership since those functioning within it come to behave appropriately as a matter of habit - like not picking up food with your left hand in rural India and Sri Lanka and presenting a credit card or accepting a cheque deferentially with both hands extended in Singapore. If the culture is, indeed, humane, creative and empowering, members of the organization come to look forward to their work day - my staff often told me so and they stayed on, turning down higher paying jobs. I believe most human beings want a work environment where they feel productive; feel that they are making a difference; feel that their creativity is being affirmed. This is a self-reinforcing process. In such a culture individuals become more productive and the rewards they receive, both intrinsic and extrinsic grow.