This is holy work
This is holy work, sacred. What makes it so? Bringing us together, opening.
:- Doug.
Archive for the 'Conversations' Category
Participation is like a mother
Participation is like a mother putting a sweater on her child—sees the child feels cold before the child feels cold.
:- Doug.
We pray for and hold in the light
We pray for and hold in the light
Those moving to new communities
Let us pray for and hold in the light
Also these communities
For surely by introducing
These new elements into them
They are changed for ever
And so are the communities
They are leaving
When they might come back
And when they do
:- Doug.
And flowers:
And flowers: There is a life force in them that is itself emergence perhaps. And perhaps it moves toward other flowers in pollination, which is diversity, and interdependence is the bees and the other flowers and the sun, soil, and rains. Ponder, reflect, reflect.
:- Doug.
Children as mere ships
Are your children mere ships you have launched, or does a part of you need them now?
:- Doug.
Don’t just interact with our environment
We don’t just interact with our environment—we are our environment.
:- Doug.
We are lost
We are lost
Because we see ourselves as particles
Because and so long as; until we see our wave
:- Doug.
Diversity in tension with emergence
Diversity in tension with emergence
Emergence in tension with interdependence
Interdependence in tension with diversity
All this produces movement
Here are the working principles of life
:- Doug.
Life wants ever more
Life wants ever more diversity, interdependence, and self-organization.
:- Doug.
whole family system
We work with your whole family system in these situations, so it is important for me to get a feel for how things go.
:- Doug.
One family thing
What’s one thing important for me to know about your family? Tell me a story that illustrates that.
:- Doug.
A story of family
Tell me a story from your life that helps me understand an important aspect of your family.
:- Doug.
Your commitment to your father?
What is a story from your life that tells a little bit about your commitment to your father?
:- Doug.
A story of Dad
Tell me a story that will help me understand what your Dad’s situation today means to you, what your dad has meant to you in the recent past.
:- Doug.
Brought to us already aflame
Some fires we face were brought to us already aflame. Some come upon us with a stroke.
:- Doug.
Seeking an even larger view
I have felt best about my work when I sat with the man whose wife is in the nursing home and we pondered about how life changed in a stroke—literally—and how to respond to a daughter who is both in denial and meddling. And when I sit with small groups and get them to ponder about their own deaths and how they want to live up to the very last breath. And when I counsel with families about the struggles around being advocates for Mom or Dad with the nursing home staff.
Giving out my heart, even when my head does not know the answer, offering a hand.
These are larger views. I am struggling to find an even larger view, so that I can live my days contributing sacred work to a sacred world. And you?
:- Doug.
The question working me these days:
The question that is working me these days is this: what is the larger picture of my work in the world? There is a family view, and there is a societal view. Both are larger than my little how I get the job done, how I market myself.
We all have a view like the shopkeeper’s: The world is only what is inside the walls of this shop: the inventory, the suppliers, the customers we lure in; and the sidewalk and street outside.
So we see how we do our work, and how to get more customers into our lair. But there is a larger work. There are things we seek to do because it makes the world better.
:- Doug.
