Thanks to both Dave Pollard and Jim McGee, I spent some considerable time musing over Donella Meadows’ paper on “Places to Intervene in a System.” The paper takes a systems theory approach to identifying leverage points for creating change. In her language, the ten places, in increasing order of scale are as follows: 9. Numbers (subsidies, taxes, standards). 8. Material stocks and flows. 7. Regulating negative feedback loops. 6. Driving positive feedback loops. 5. Information flows. 4. The rules of the system (incentives, punishment, constraints). 3. The power of self-organization. 2. The goals of the system. 1. The mindset or …
Harrison Hot Springs, BC. Spent the day in a meeting at Seabird Island First Nation, a large community which is part of the Sto:lo Nation located in the upper Fraser Valley about 150 kms east of Vancouver. I was working with a group who was in some internal conflict, and I was very privileged to be working with Herb and Helen Joe, two respected Sto:lo Elders and traditional teachers. Herb told a very interesting story today. It was part of the Sto:lo creation story and it had to do with the destiny of human beings. In the story, the Creator …
Flattered to have been listed today as one of Dave Pollard’s favourite Canadian blogs. Thanks Dave. Now go read his stuff…it’s great.
One of the tenets of tae kwon do is “Indomitable Spirit” The practice of a martial art makes use of that spirit to sustain survival under life threatening circumstances. Indomitable spirit marks the small and almost forgotten community of Brainerd, Kansas on the American Great Plains. Offering an almost ethnographic example of indomitable spirit in the life of a community, Time, Place and Memory on the Prairie Plains looks at how a small settlement has sustained itself through waves of change. Although most of the town’s landmarks have long since been abandoned or demolished, they exist as powerfully in the …
The other day Michael Herman and were talking about compassion and mutuality. The idea is that mutuality is making someone appear as real to you as you appear to yourself. Naturally this means understanding that the person sitting across the room from you at this moment is full of an inner life that is as rich as yours. Confidence, self-esteem, confusion, love, pain, grief, celebration – all of these things are known to them too. It sounds so trite on one hand, but it is incredibly powerful the more I dig into this thought. So often we see others as …