Jon Husband has been threatening to write his book on Wirearchy for as long as I’ve known him, and I can’t wait for it to come out, but in the meantime, he is posting what could well be a chapter from it in two parts over at his blog in a post he calls Perspectives on Designing and Managing Knowledge Work.
(This is me nudging him to get it done so I can add it to my list of books by friends…:-) )
In a synchronous moment, also today George Por, a mutual friend of Jon and I published a nice set of thoughts about collective intellegence and spaces in organizations for the new to emerge.
It’s so interesting to be relationship with people thinking so deeply about organization.
One of the great things about working with Tenneson Woolf is that he is a pretty careful note taker. He usually has a good blog post tucked away before I even get home, and the same is true today.
Have a read of what he noticed in our work together with the Canadian Union of Public Employees this past week, working with union developers and educators – a marvelous group of people, full of heart and life and love and solidarity. The very best of what we are.
This morning, driving up to the clubhouse at the Seven Hills Golf and Country Club near Port McNeill, there was a mother black bear and her cub roaming around the parking lot. They took off before I could get a photo.
The journey continues…I’m in Vancouver tonight enroute on a red eye to Toronto and then Ottawa.
The “new road” from Nanaimo to Campbell River takes you high above the ocean, across the tops of the lowlands where the Vancouver Island range mountains slope down to the Strait of Georgia. It’s a long fast stretch of double highway, posted at 110 km/h and taking only an hour and a half, which is a full 30 minutes shorter than the more scenic, but interminably slow Ocean Route.
What you gain in speed though, you lose in character, and other than a few stunning lookouts, the scenery is dominated by recovering clearcuts on the mountains all around. You miss towns completely until you descend into Campbell River. The only crossings north of Parksville are mainline logging roads, with the exception of the road up the Comox Valley.
Off the road however, there are a few places to stop and get some good rest. Whenever I do this trip I always stop in at the Java Shack in Campbell River, which has some of the best espresso on Vancouver Island, and fantastic homemade soups and baking. It’s right down by the ferry dock, so is a great place to stop if you’ve missed the Quadra Island ferry.
Today though I’m pausing here on the way north, into high mountaon logging country, up highway 19 to Port MacNeil. North of Campbell River the road cuts inland through incredibly steep terrain and seeks out the Nimpkish Valley, giving equal access to both sides of the mountains that form the spine of this Island. Up here the economy is strictly about access – access to timber mostly, so the main highway splits the difference between both sides of the Island and the clear cuts come right down to the road. In Sayward once I was almost denied service at a gas station because I tried to pay with my VanCity Enviro Card. People are serious about logging here, and the great unspoken terror of fish farming, an industry that is driving a wedge between people and communities. The Broughton Archipelago, a maze of islands and treacherous channels, is the home to two dozen fish farms and a formerly thriving wild fishery. The wild fish fleets are down significantly – it’s hard to even find wild fish on the menu in Campbell River except at the excellent fish and chips stand in the Discovery Marina – and the resulting hit to traditional diets and ways of life in local First Nations is devastating.
I’ve driven this road dozens of times, awed by the scenery and the impact that humans can have on such a vast territory (see Google maps for evidence of the logging activity, none of which is hidden from view north of Campbell River – in the southern part of the Island, a nod to tourism means that clear cuts are carefully contained behind view corridors that give the impression of pristine forests). Not too many tourists wander up here, and I guess people kind of like it that way. A few make the trek for the world class salmon fishing and the whale watching tours out of Telegraph Cove and a few others get up to Port Hardy and board the ferry for the inside passage to Bella Bella, Bella Coola and Prince Rupert. But by and large this land belongs to the people that live here, Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, and that’s why I’m here – to run a gathering tomorrow in which these folks will talk to one another about what’s possible together.
Should be interesting.
I am heading out on a mammoth trip today. My itinerary looks like this:Monday – drive to Port MacNeil on northern Vancouver Island
Tuesday – Facilitate community to community forum with North Island First Nations and local governments. When finished, drive back to Campbell River and jump on a plane. Fly to Vancouver, then Toronto then Ottawa.
Wednesday – Facilitate workshop in Ottawa with the Canadian Union of Public Employees.
Friday – Finish workshop and return to Vancouver
Saturday – Facilitate one day Open Space for the Ministry of the Attorney-General Family Court Committee. Return home Saturday night.
This is a little unusual for me, in that I usually don’t do a red eye flight across two thirds of the country. I know I will be tired, and I know I need to stay focused on these three jobs and what I am doing. And believe it or not, I woke up this morning deliciously anticipating the journey ahead.
For me, this kind of travel and work is a mindfulness practice. I use these journeys to be very mindful about where I am and what I am doing. Often, when I am en route, I don’t speak to other people at all, preferring to travel in silence, reading, listening to music or podcasts or writing. If I do speak it is only to be politie, get where I am going or ask for help. As a silent meditation I find travelling in this way to be incredible practice, and it brings me to the work I have to do with as much presence as I can. In general I don’t check my emails when I am on the road, preferring instead to give as much attention as I can to the work I have at hand. Fortunately I have my partner Caitlin Frost is back in our office, answering phone calls, sorting logistics with clients and flagging important emails for me. This is an incredible gift as it allows me to be on the road, safe, undivided and present for my clients.
Seeing travel as a meditation retreat for me shows up in many ways. For example I have a few practices I cultivate on a daily basis and being mindful means focusing on doing them in unfamiliar places with limited access to tools. I try to exercise everyday, and have developed several “hotel room” workouts, that can be done between queen sized beds in small roadside motels. These are 20-30 workouts focusing on strength, flexibility and cardio fitness. Of course, access to a weight room or a gym makes this easier, but it isn’t necessary. Sometimes, if I’m driving and I get tired I pull over and go through a circuit of push ups, sit ups and squats or I run through some of my taekwondo patterns to get the blood flowing and energize my body.
Eating is another area that becomes a mindfulness practice. Because it’s so hard to find good and healthy food on the road, I think carefully about everything that enters my body. Instead of defaulting to restaurants, I’ll often stop in to grocery stores and stock up on fresh fruit and vegetables, pre-mixed salads or healthy instant soups that can be made with only boiling water. Travelling does not have to mean bread, oil and potatoes.
Travelling offers several benefits to the emotional side of mindfulness practice as well. It is a rare trip when everything goes according to plan and delays, changes and inconveniences force me to be mindful of my emotional states and to practice equanimity with people, machines and other pieces of reality that are out of my control. Some of my favourite trips have been those which have gone horribly wrong, with missed connections, bad weather and few options. If I come through those with a minimum of anxiety, the journey and the return home seems sweeter for it.
Travel can be stressful because it breaks our routines and rhythms. We need to become completely dependant on our own resources, carrying everything we need with us. It forces us to make careful choices about what we take and what we do on the road. We have to live differently than we do at home and that forces us to pay more attention to what we are doing. THAT alone is a gift, for if we can use the opportunity to focus ourselves and work with our mind, we can not only travel better, but understand ourselves better as well.
Slow down, be careful and attentive and see what you learn about yourself.