FootprintsintheWind.com

How is it that small changes can lead to wholly different outcomes? It must be that we live very close to, without touching, the profound. If we merely look close by to our bedrock, we find ourselves choosing generosity over selfishness, creativity over grabbing, life birthing over bored killing. Look and stretch.

:- Doug.

Don’t retire: get active better.

:- Doug.

You see some things
others do not
It is your duty
to share
when it can help

:- Doug.

Humor connects us on a deeper level than everyday surface chit-chat or exchanges of dry information. This is why we are drawn to humor and comedy: it hears us.

:- Doug.

Listening changes little
Hearing changes worlds

:- Doug.

Conversation requires the hearer to be open to the between, to perhaps even call forth the speaking Thou: the hearer has a responsibility. This is a corollary of Faith comes in through the ears: the ears call forth what is inside the person so that the speaking Thou can hear him or her self. Now we see that the ears call forth the speaking Thou so he or she can speak forth his or her self. Expression now is not of any individual self but of the between-self.

Either party can close the door to communication. The hearer cannot always be expected to consciously draw forth the speaking Thou. Nonetheless, the hearing I bears responsibility for the turning that comes: turning away or turning toward. In situations where there is a shield or filter up, the speaking Thou either must redouble his or her efforts, or choose to go elsewhere. The latter may be necessary at some point; the former fits many times. But the speaking Thou must see what is going on, be alert to it, attend to it, intend the turning.

:- Doug.

There is an affinity among conversation—turning—and attention and intention—stretching—and transformation—changing shape or level or direction. Conversation faces us in different directions, whether the turning be as in a compost heap or as in dance.

What this tells us is that major change is possible by listening, paying attention, intention. This is such a minor change in initial conditions from which can emerge major changes in the atmosphere a few iterations ahead.

:- Doug.

Stretch to the and

:- Doug.

Discovery is
every day
if we attend intend bend

:- Doug.

Growing G-d
How can we grow G*d?
G*d is not simply Is
but is in motion
changing, growing
We
can draw G*d
out
Grow G*d
So too we can
encourage invite
self organization
others
the between
the ands
growing G*d

:- Doug.

Just as we ask “Saved for what?” we need to be asking “Sustainability for what?” “Long-term survival of our species for what?”

:- Doug.

The hearer calls the notes
from out our mouths
—and hears no tune
but only garbled words—
and we ourselves are denied
our tune
until the hearer calls

:- Doug.

Transformation is a slight change
in attention
intention
Small changes, initial conditions, new worlds!
The and is central to I and Thou
The stretch of conversation brings us to life
The stretch begins with a slight change
in attention
intention
Slight change
Little and
attend
intend
stretch
the root of attend intend is stretch
stretching perspective
conversation turns us
seeds transformation

:- Doug.

The key to I and Thou is in the and. Here we add; here we are more than we are. Here we meet and birth and are birthed. Here we exist and probably no place else. Here in and. Whom can you be and with?

:- Doug.

We are admonished, and rightly, to get beyond dualism: them/us; good/bad; war/peace; rich/poor; and on. Less recognized are the dualisms inner/outer, subjective/objective, inside me/out in the world; even me/you. If we get beyond, what then? What if there were not just in here and out there, but in between? What if there were only in between, and the rest just aspects of the between?

:- Doug.

In conversation we discover other people. Sometimes they are us.

:- Doug.

What distinguishes debate and selling from conversation is people choosing to stretch and be stretched.

:- Doug.

This morning I read something about the truth and reconciliation commissions around the world and wondered if that might be an alternative in Iraq. We think we have two options: more guns or leave. Truth and reconciliation might require something that is not present: a desire for reconciliation, but the thought of how that has worked in other tough places might give us pause to consider third alternatives. Another: how about if we get someone from Northern Ireland to go to Iraq to talk with the dissidents? Might there be some reason brought into the mix? How about instead of either going in with guns blazing or running away, we walked into the fire with some other approach? If we see the options as only these two, we have a failure of imagination. We have also given up…whatever is our real power and opportunity. Who are we: the jack-boots? Or inviters of something higher and better?

Could truth and reconciliation commissions work in Iraq? The specific answer matters little. What the question suggests is that our approach puts blinders on us for other approaches. Let us open our eyes. Let us try something else, since this is not working. There is hope.

:- Doug.

Last evening I read an interesting piece from Vaclav Havel on power and powerlessness. He offers a glimpse into life in a totalitarian society. He talks about the greengrocer who is given a sign to place in his window, “Workers of the world, unite!” He speaks of how he could protest or just not do it, but then he loses his job, his child loses his entrance into college and on and on. It is a matter that the requests are subtle, easy, and they do not call to mind that the state has total control or that you are ceding that to the state. Protest then is a matter of choice and self-exile from friends and system and community, but toward truth. Protest takes effort and resolve. Protest may be costly. But what of the cost? Eventually we die anyway. Truth lives on. Spirit lives on. This is the only hope that life will get better.

:- Doug.

The magic of conversation comes from the stretch—it stretches us outside ourselves and outside our assumptions and outside our perceived and maybe real abilities—to whom we might yet be. Only when we stretch do we converse.

Some stretching arises from or draws us into the between, some we choose, some we can seek. Some opens our eyes, some engages our brains or even our minds, some shakes our being, some changes the world we hold in common. All engages our hearts or spirits. It might be wholly involuntary or partially.

If we meet we are changed. We grow or we break. Either way we grow. Either way we gain life. In all cases stretching is core and cor. This distinguishes chit-chat and debate. For we can stretch the mind in debate, searching for a stronger come-back, but it is not conversation. Conversation involves the turning of the compost and the spinning of the dancers: that is stretching. This stretching is of the kind that we seldom can go back to our prior size or shape.

:- Doug.

How can we stretch what works to make it better?

:- Doug.

Raise more questions!

:- Doug.

If you want your dreams to go, you have to risk your dream going (away from you).

:- Doug.