Gumption

The Dalai Lama and the Reflectance and Resonance of Greatness, Understanding and Humility

His Holiness, The Dalai Lama, is in Seattle this week. I don't know if I'll get a chance to see him, personally - I've just returned from Florence, Italy (CHI 2008), with a really bad cold - but I just read a report by Ward Serrill in The Seattle Times on connecting Eye-to-Eye with the Dalai Lama when he first arrived in town that resonated deeply with me:

We don't speak a word. As he moves in front of me, my hands involuntarily reach out to grasp his. As our hands meet he looks up into my eyes and my world stops spinning. His eyes reveal a deep gravity. I see the serious work behind his childlike humor and spontaneity. The man has suffered much and discipline has made him into a spiritual warrior. This is serious work, these eyes tell me, this inner work to discover peace and being.

His attention is riveted. In this moment he is not a busy spiritual leader but simply a human looking gravely into the eyes of another. In this moment I see his greatness. It is this:

Humility is not a discipline; it is not a practice with him. Humility is simply what he is. I see in this moment of eyes meeting that he is incapable of placing himself above or below me. I am stunned by the reality of our equality.

And then he is gone, swept out of the room by his handlers. For the next three hours I am nearly incapable of speaking, stunned as I was with the presence of this understanding.

Ward's experience reminded me of the altered states and magnetic attraction of awakened people I experienced at Pop!Tech 2007, which had, in turn, reminded me of some earlier reports of this kind of high-resonance experience:

I was also reminded of Oriah Mountain Dreamer's observations in her audiotape, Your Heart's Prayer - which I'd earlier projected onto the practice of unfolding through blogging - about people who come into contact with spiritually enlightened individuals, such as Mahatma Ghandi the Dalai Lama or Mother Teresa, likening the experience to what happens when two tuning forks coming into proximity of each other: the strong vibration of the spiritually enlightened person transmits energy to any other person that comes near.

[Having just listened again to the passage, I've amended a memory / transcription error in the original post above ... all the more apt because Oriah had actually referred to the Dalai Lama not Ghandi.]

As I have continued to reflect on how highly enlightened people have such a great impact on us, I am reminded of Don Miguel Ruiz' insights into the ways that people act as mirrors for us - enabling us to better see who we really are ... and/or what we could be. As he notes in the introduction to The Four Agreements, where he relates the enlightenment of a Toltec man:

He had discovered that he was a mirror for the rest of the people, a mirror in which he could see himself. "Everyone is a mirror", he said. He saw himself in everyone, but nobody saw him as themself. And he realized that everyone was dreaming, but without awareness, without knowing what they really are. They couldn't see him as themselves because there was a wall of fog or smoke between the mirrors. And that wall of fog was made by the interpretations of light - the Dream of humans.

I would expand this to claim that highly enlightened people act as highly reflective mirrors for us. When we encounter highly enlightened individuals, there is less fog in the local atmosphere, and so we are thus better able to see the light in ourselves being reflected back more clearly.

Ward had made earlier comments in the Seattle Times on developing his film, The Heart of the Game, that further resonate with all of this:

"I am in awe of the journey right now," said Serrill. "It really is a labor of love that's gotten bigger than me. It's really opening its own doors right now."

Although I have not yet seen the film, Ward's comments suggest that he is not a stranger to greatness, understanding and humility, himself, and I would not be surprised if his film acts as an agent of reflection and resonance for others.

And I can't help but reflect on my last post - Do YouJustGetMe? Do I Even Get Myself? - and wonder how well highly enlightened individuals might score on guessing or being guessed in a personality test. [And, reflecting on humility, I wonder if the subtitle to that post should have been "Can I Even Get Over Myself?"] Somehow, though, these ideas regarding reflectance and resonance suggests that there may be a deeper level - perhaps deeper than western science can effectively probe - than guessing or being guessed. That the ultimate goal is simply to understand and accept ourselves, exactly as we are ... and to mirror that understanding and acceptance to others.

Amy, who cut out the article for me while I was away, just pointed out her favorite passage, which resonates with all of this, and aligns closely with our own view(s) of religion ... and humanity:

When asked about his [Dalai Lama's] religion of kindness, he replies, "... all these things: compassion, charity, patience, forgiveness, joy; these do not belong to religion. One does not need religion to understand or practice them. They are simply the expressions of what it is to be human."

[Update: having mistakenly attributed Oriah's remarks as referring to Ghandi rather than the Dalai Lama, I decided to go back for a more attentive listening of the passage in Your Heart's Prayer (Side 2b, about 18 minutes in), during which I saw the further connection that involved another filmmaker. I transcribe the passage as attentively and faithfully as I can, below:

I had a dream a number of years ago, this was after I'd heard a couple of stories about people being deeply affected by being in proximity to the Dalai Lama and Mother Teresa. One was the story of a man who was a friend of a friend, and he happened to be somewhere where the Dalai Lama was, and he wasn't particularly interested in hearing him speak, but for some reason, encountered him coming out of the lobby of the hotel. And the two of them spoke to each other and the two of them had this moment, and this man just felt this sense of incredible love and well-being in himself.

And another dear friend of mine who's made a film about Mother Teresa, talks about one of the first times she tried to talk to Mother Teresa about making the movie, and my friend, who is Ann Petrie, was on a bus with Mother Teresa, knelt down and had her sunglasses on, and mother Teresa flipped her sunglasses up, and Anne was ready to launch into the business of when can I film you, and Mother Teresa said to her "You're so tired, why don't you just stop for a minute?" And Anne had this experience of this sort of bolt of light going through the center of her body, not from Mother Teresa, but what she felt was really from God. And she had been in her own words a lapsed Catholic for many years.

So I had been hearing these stories, and I had a dream one night, where the grandmothers, who I mentioned earlier, said here is how it works: I saw an image of a glass cylinder filled with coarse salt, and then somebody poured a pink fluid, like colored water, into the container and it started to come up from the bottom up through the salt. And they said, this is what a person is like. The fluid being poured in is like their level of consciousness of who they really are, that what they are is a participant in this sacred life force, and the higher their level of awareness, two things happen: the more the salt dissolves, so the more there is a dissolving of all the structure of the identity that they think they are; and the other thing that happens is that everything becomes colored with this awareness. And when they are in proximity to someone else, because we're all made of the same stuff, it sets up a similar knowing in the other person.

So what people have a flash of when they are near someone who is very conscious of that Chui-ta-ka-ma, that life force energy that they are, is they experience the same thing in themselves. It's a little like bringing a tuning fork next to another tuning fork. So it's not so much they get an awareness of the other person being that divine life force but themselves.

The good news for me about this is that the task, then, is to just try to be with that awareness to the best of my ability, and that will create a ripple effect in ways that I can't even anticipate, because of the nature of our interbeingness. And it means we can have an enormous effect on the world by simply paying attention.]

A More Perfect Union: Obama and Transracialism

Barack Obama's speech last week was the most inspiring speech I've seen by a U.S. president - or a major U.S. presidential candidate - in my adult life. I've seen video footage of inspiring speeches by Lyndon Johnson, John F. Kennedy, and Robert F. Kennedy, and a number of other inspiring speeches by earlier presidents profiled on the PBS American Experience series, but this is the first time since I've been of voting age that I feel truly inspired by someone with presidential prospects.

I'd read and heard excerpts of the speech during the week, but it wasn't until yesterday that I finally set aside the time to watch Obama's 37-minute speech [transcript] in its entirety ... and I'm glad I did. I admire the way that Obama was able - and willing - to articulate issues involving race that are typically considered undiscussibles, at least in national political discussions (e.g., anger that "may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends ... but does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table"). He embraced his multiracial heritage and shed light on some of the shadows that often permeate our thoughts, feelings and judgments about other races ... and I found myself wondering how many critics of Obama's controversial former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, have never harbored or uttered a racially motivated criticism.

Obama offered a vision for what I might call a transracial union, based on my recent rumination on building a multidisciplinary team, which was greatly enhanced by Anne's comment introducing me to the concept of transdisciplinarity. I believe that Obama is, in effect, applying one definition of transdisciplinarity in scientific research to the far more politically charged topic of race. Riffing slightly on a Wikipedia definition of transdisciplinarity:

A transdisciplinary style of research [or politics] can only arise if the participating experts interact in an open discussion and dialogue, accepting each perspective as of equal importance and relating the different perspectives to each other. Working together in a transdisciplinary way is difficult because participating scientists [or politicians] are often overwhelmed by the amount of information in everyday’s practice and because of incommensurability of specialized languages in each of the fields of expertise. Therefore people with the competence of moderation, mediation, association and transfer are needed to initiate and promote a critical and still constructive dialogue. For these individuals it is crucial to have [their] own in-depth knowledge and know-how of the disciplines [or races] involved.

I don't want to say too much about the speech, in part because I feel too many people (including myself) are participating in what seems to be a snack culture (an evocative label I first heard from my colleague, Rick Hangartner Peyman Faratin) - or what Sherry Turkle calls talk culture - subsisting on snippets of information rather than sitting down to a full meal from original sources, and I want to encourage people to see and hear the speech in its entirety.

I will say that Obama discuss racial issues from a variety of perspectives, noting that one of the core issues is that in a time of scarcity, opportunity is seen as a zero-sum game, with anger and fear operating as powerful motivators, for all races. Unfortunately, however, this anger and fear can motivate us to focus on distractions rather than the problems that transcend racism (or other isms). As he notes in describing his motivation for composing and delivering this speech:

... Reverend Wright's comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems - two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.

In this brief respite from snack culture, I decided to dig around a little for a fuller meal of what Reverend Wright, the former pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ, whose motto is "Unashamedly Black and Unapologetically Christian", really said. I found a blog, Truth about Trinity, and a YouTube channel for Trinity Chicago, that provided more context beyond the snippets that have been broadcast and rebroadcast in the major media.

Indeed, as the snippets show, Wright has been critical of the U.S. in some of his sermons, but I seem to remember Jesus reportedly being critical of the ruling political, economic and social powers of his time, and that securing the freedom of speech - especially critical speech - was one of the goals of the founding fathers of this country.

In the snippets being aired on many television stations, Wright is quoted as saying

"We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye...and now we are indignant, because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought back into our own front yards. America's chickens are coming home to roost."

In a fuller snippet of his sermon, these criticisms are accompanied by an advocacy of a "God of love and justice".

Wright's sermon starts out with a reference to Psalm 137,

8 O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction,
       happy is he who repays you
       for what you have done to us-

9 he who seizes your infants
       and dashes them against the rocks.

He notes how this psalm represents "a move from paying tithes to payback ... from worship to war" culminating in "the cycle of violence and the cycle of hatred". Although I would not have chosen the incendiary language he uses, the only fact I would dispute is his claim that "we never batted an eye": there are - and have been - many Americans, of all races, religions and nationalities, who have objected strongly to the excesses and extremes of the American government.

In another now infamous sermon, Wright is quoted as saying

"The government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color" and "[t]he government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people... God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme".

Slate has recently provided a helpful AIDS Conspiracy Handbook, which leaves me very skeptical about Wright's claim regarding the government inventing HIV for genocide, but I firmly agree with his claims that our government has supported illegal drug smuggling in the past, currently "boasts" the highest incarceration rate in the world, and many states have passed "three strikes laws" ... which were advocated by former president Bill Clinton (leading me to wonder how former first lady Hillary Clinton feels - or felt - about this issue).

I want to close by revisiting - and reapplying - some of the thoughts and feelings I wrote about in reaction to Hurricane Katrina, One World: Disasters and Responses:

I'm also reminded of Oriah Mountain Dreamer's ideas about "us and them" in response to the 9/11 attacks in the US, and how it applies more generally to suffering and our responses to it.

I ask, "How can I BE the peace I want to see in the world, today?" Not, how can I CREATE the peace- but how can I BE it- because it becomes clearer and clearer to me that violence and war are not just "out there" but also inside me.

She goes on to suggest that we can either try to identify and empathize with others, or seek to differentiate others from ourselves; essentially choosing to view others as "us" or "them".  She gives examples about substituting "some of us" for "them" or "they" as we think about what others have done (and I would extend this to what others are going through).  In her audiobook "Your Heart's Prayer", she further extends this from "some of us" to "sometimes I".

Although I would not choose the same vocabulary as Reverend Wright, if I substitute "I am angry at America" for "God damn America", and accept Oriah's invitation, I am willing to admit that "Sometimes I am angry at America for killing innocent people... sometimes I am angry at America for treating our citizens as less than human. Sometimes I am angry at America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme."

Continuing on withs my earlier rumination:

I believe that most people, placed in similar circumstances, will tend to have similar responses, with respect to their feelings, thoughts, actions and reactions.  I also believe that people can learn new, possibly "unnatural", ways of feeling, thinking and acting (Scott Peck, in "The Road Less Traveled", points out that it is natural to defecate in one's pants, but most of us learn new behaviors in this dimension of life). Oriah Mountain Dreamer, in her poem, "The Invitation", says:

I want to know if you have touched the centre of your own sorrow
if you have been opened by life’s betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I can empathize with the suffering and the responses to that suffering in the wake of hurricanes, tsunamis, military invasions and diseases. I hope that these events will create openings and opportunities for people to rise to meet their challenges in a loving and compassionate way.

Returning to Obama, and noting another connection with transdisciplinarity, in the face of mounting challenges, I will finish with this excerpt from his speech, which exemplifies an audacity of hope about working together to form a more perfect union to meet these challenges:

I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for our children and our grandchildren.

Amen.

Dark Nights of the Soul

Maureen McHugh, a science fiction writer (who also enjoys "not science fiction" books), has written about the challenges of writing novels (and battling cancer) on her blog, No Feeling of Falling. She augmented her words - which unfold with exquisite openness and vulnerability - with a graphical depiction of the soul work involved in rising to meet these challenges, which is inevitably preceded by a descent of some kind. The image, appropriately entitled Dark Night of the Soul, is shown above; it first appeared in a post entitled Episode 1: Begin Anew, which offers a wonderful perspective from which to view new challenges.

Yogi sent me a link to this image, after a recent guest presentation I gave at a UW Tacoma course on Social Networks, taught by Ankur Teredesai [the presentation was on how proactive displays bridge gaps between online social networks and shared physical spaces]. Yogi had encountered the image in yet another course, on Interaction Design, an area which also offers a set of challenges, though the image and the ideas it represents were more related to our broader conversation after the class about work, soul, passion and happiness. I wanted to continue that rumination here, because it brought to mind (and heart) a few strands of inspiration I've encountered elsewhere.

David Whyte, in his book, The Heart Aroused: Poetry and the Preservation of Soul in Corporate America, invokes the epic poem of Beowulf - in which the hero descends into a deep well to battle a monster, Grendel, who has been attacking King Hrothgar's men, and then descends again to battle Grendel's mother - to illustrate some of his insights and experiences into creativity in the workplace. Whyte notes that:

[H]uman existence is half light and half dark, and our creative possibilities seem strangely linked to that part of us we keep in the dark.

and goes on to share the steps he sees in the story - and throughout work (and life) - that are required for unleashing our creativity:

• dropping beneath the surface
• disclosure and vulnerability
• disappearance and return

Whyte draws an analogy between Beowulf's battle with Grendel mother and each of our individual battles with the mother of all vulnerabilities: "the deep physical shame that we are not enough, will never be enough, and can never measure up".

He finishes the chapter with a quote from The Man Watching, by the German poet, Rainer Maria Rilke:

Winning does not tempt that man.
This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively,
by constantly greater beings.

Or, perhaps, one might say, by facing, repeatedly, darker and darker nights of the soul.

In an earlier post on an unfolding series of peak and pit experiences, I'd written about how inspired I was by Dan Oestreich's insights into and applications of Otto Scharmer's ideas about "Theory U". I want to repeat - again - what Dan had to say:

We all want to know where the point of transformation lies. I would say it is in “no space,” the place we come to after exhausting everything we know…and everything we are, a point of pure meditation. The current theory base, exemplified by Oscar Scharmer’s “Theory U”, suggests exactly this process of emptying ourselves of everything known so that we can listen to a best future Self, a source of deep intuitive wisdom... Scharmer describes the bottom of the U as where we touch a larger field that goes beyond our present awareness, a place of new insight and new consciousness that enables us to solve the problems we have been stuck by using our current, more limited awareness.

I also want to include a larger version of the image Scharmer uses to illustrate Theory U, as it closely relates to the image of the Dark Night of the Soul I started with at the beginning of this post:

I still have not read Theory U (yet), but revisiting this image reveals another dimension of connection (for me (and my work)), with respect to the inspiring ideas of co-sensing, co-presencing and co-creating - not to mention open mind, open heart and open will - so I've ordered a copy of the book.

Meanwhile, based on what Dan has written (and what I've experienced), I suspect the process of descending and rising from the depths of our selves and our work is an ongoing educational journey ... leading through a series of dark nights of the soul(s) ... and, hopefully, some bright days, as well.

Oh, I almost forgot to add that the image also reminds me of stories I've heard about "thesis hill", a visual representation that Roger Schank (my academic "grandfather") employs - or employed - in his meetings with graduate students. Thesis hill, as I understand it, was depicted using an inverse geometric representation - climbing a hill vs. descending into darkness - but in my experience, and in the experience of many people I know (including many of Roger's former students - my "uncles" and "aunts"), working on a Ph.D. thesis often requires persevering through many dark nights of the soul ... and Rilke's quote about repeated, decisive defeats by greater (or, at least, more powerful) beings is one of the best, short verbal characterizations of graduate school - and especially, a thesis defense - that I've encountered ... rivaling the visual characterization of the Dark Night of the Soul. And, I suppose, writing a science fiction novel has many characteristics in common with writing a Ph.D. [scientific] thesis, just with varying intentions - and interpretations - with respect to the relative use of fact and fiction.

[Update, 2008-04-01: I just stumbled upon this relevant quote - from one of my heroes, who certainly had keen insights into darkness and souls - on Aaditeshwar Seth's home page:

"Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand."

- George Orwell, 1946.]

Locked-in Syndrome: Diving Bells, Butterflies, Freedoms and Families

Amy and I recently saw The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (or, more properly, Le Scaphandre et le Papillon), during an unexpected extended layover in San Francisco. The movie is about the late Jean-Dominique Bauby, former editor of the fashion magazine Elle, who at age 43 suffered a stroke that left him paralyzed except for his left eye, after which he continued to suffer for the next 12 years from locked-in syndrome - aware and awake, but unable to communicate. Fortunately (at least for viewers and readers), a dedicated speech therapist (Henriette) was able to open up a new communication channel for him - through repeatedly reciting a frequency-sorted version of the alphabet and watching for him to blink his eye when she reached the desired letter - and a dedicated transcriber (Claude) was able to navigate this channel with him to help him get his story out. And that story is a powerful one, touching on the challenges he faced in dealing with his highly constrained condition, and its effects on his opportunities - past, present and future.

The diving bell in the title is an allusion to the restrictions imposed by his physical condition, while the butterfly refers to the relative freedom of his mental and imaginative capacities that he appreciated - and indulged - all the more after the stroke. What struck me most about the film was that we all suffer some degree of locked-in syndrome - unable (or, perhaps more often, unwilling) to communicate effectively with the people around us. I do not mean to imply for a moment that most of us suffer anything close to the incredible challenges Bauby faced, but the movie did offer me an opportunity to reflect on how often I underutilize communication channels in my own life (this blog notwithstanding).

I remember one time, at the beginning of a surgical procedure, I had been given anesthesia, but it had not yet taken [full] effect before someone started inserting a tube down my throat. I tried to alert the medical staff to the pain I was feeling during this part of the procedure, but was unable to move or talk, and the fear I felt about being so incapable of communicating my predicament was at least as painful as the insertion itself. This was a far more dramatic example of feeling locked-in than most of my experiences, in which I am able to communicate, but unable to effectively convey something I am thinking or feeling to another person ... or situations in which I consciously or unconsciously choose not to communicate at all.

Bauby, of course, could have also chosen not to communicate. It required far more effort for him - and for the people with whom he was communicating - than it typically does for me (and presumably, however ponderous my writing and speaking may be, for the people with whom I communicate), and his willingness to make that effort to not only communicate with the people around him in his activities of daily living but to dictate a book about his experience is inspiring. I was reminded of a Richard Bach quote,

Argue for your limitations and sure enough, they're yours

as well as the lyrics to the Eagles song, Already Gone [video],

So oftentimes it happens that we live our lives in chains
and we never even know we have the key.

Another aspect of the film that moved me was Bauby's relationship with his children ... and their mother (Celine, to whom he was not married). After his stroke, his ability to interact with them was extremely limited, illustrated by a picnic on the beach, during which they play the word game hangman. Amy and I were watching the film on the eve of my "homecoming" - after having commuted nearly every week from Seattle to Palo Alto (or other business-related destinations) for 16 months - and so the lost opportunities for enjoying time with his children was especially poignant ... as was his continued underappreciation for Celine.

Bauby's relationship with his father was also very poignant (for me). Early in the movie, while Bauby is shaving his father (Papinou), his father expresses how proud he is of his son, which brought back memories of my own father expressing pride and approval - as best he could - for his son ... as well as more painful memories of him not expressing pride or approval ... for his son or himself. [In writing this, I'm struck by how my father suffered from a form of locked-in syndrome, tightly bottling up his emotions, which eventually started leaking out in various ways, shapes and forms.]  In my last conversation with him before he died - in 1996 - I was talking with him about the three job offers I had as I was nearing the completion of my Ph.D. One would have enabled me to continue working text-based information extraction; a second would have enabled me to work in the related area of speech interfaces; the third, which seemed both the most promising and the most challenging - what he called "the big job" - would have enabled me to work on something completely different. His last words to me were "Take the big job. You can do it!" I did take that big job - I felt the fear and did it anyway - but I never saw him [alive] again. Although I have many memories of episodes in which I did not receive much-desired approval (from him ... and other authority figures in my life), I'm glad to have the most recent - and lasting - memory be an example of explicit and enthusiastic approval.

During the shaving scene in the film, Bauby expands on this theme, noting "We all are children. We all need approval." Andrea Gronvall expands this theme even further, in her Chicago Reader review:

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly inter-twines the need for validation—which is tied to the impulse to create—and the inevitability of isolation and death. Locked in, Jean-Dominique Bauby wrote a luminous treatise on life and love, leaving behind a work of art that says “I was here and I mattered.” [Director Julian] Schnabel honors that impulse with this mature, resonant portrait of an artist.

This need for approval ... for validation ... for appreciation ... for mattering ... is something I continually struggle with. As I noted in an earlier post on living without a goal, and mattering without being useful:

I can't honestly say I'm entirely willing to release my attachment to others' [expressions of] appreciation at this moment -- despite the opportunities for practicing such detachment currently being offered me -- but I'm at least willing to re-open the question of whether and how I matter ... and if it is possible to matter without being [acknowledged as] useful to others.

And so I guess I'm still in the question ... perhaps locked-in to the question ... and in the current context, I'm wondering whether the answer - or the key - lies along the path of the butterflies.

Altered States, Alienated Majesty, the Vigor of Wild Virtue and the Magnetic Attraction of Awakened People

I awoke yesterday morning, still feeling in a somewhat altered state, ruminating on Andrew Zolli's observation of the magnetic attraction of awakened people that permeates Pop!Tech. When I logged in, I found an email notifying me of a comment posted on a blog entry I wrote years ago, on Self-Reliance vs. Interdependence: Inherence, Adherence and Coherence. The comment offered me an opportunity to re-read, reflect on and reaffirm some of the particularly appealing concepts and terms I'd gleaned from Ralph Waldo Emerson's inspirational book:

• alienated majesty (hearing others speak truths we ourselves had earlier discovered, but rejected),
• the vigor of wild virtue (uncivilized, spontaneous, instinctual aboriginal strength)
• the corpse of memory (our concern with being consistent, lest we violate expectations and disappoint others)

All of these resonate all the more strongly with me during this post-Pop!Tech period. Many of the conversations at Pop!Tech helped me better recognize the alienated majesty within me (a developing self struggling with self-development), as well as the alienated majesty of the invisible and voiceless people who are struggling in many developing regions of the world. The wild virtue exposed and expressed through many of the presentations and performances (Vanessa German comes foremost to mind) was, well, invigorating. And as for the corpse of memory, well, I find myself increasingly fearful that Pop!Tech has permanently altered my state, that I won't be able to snap back to "normal", and that if I proceed much further along the path that seems to be silently - or, perhaps, not so silently - drawing me, I may well violate expectations and disappoint others.

There's a part of me that wants to go back to sleep ... reminding me of a Rumi poem:

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don't go back to sleep.

You must ask for what you really want.
Don't go back to sleep.

People are going back and forth across the doorsill
where the two worlds touch.

The door is round and open.
Don't go back to sleep.

I was also reminded of Oriah Mountain Dreamer's observations in her audiotape, Your Heart's Prayer - which I'd earlier projected onto the practice of unfolding through blogging - about people who come into contact with spiritually enlightened individuals, such as Mahatma Ghandi or Mother Teresa, likening the experience to what happens when two tuning forks coming into proximity of each other: the strong vibration of the spiritually enlightened person transmits energy to any other person that comes near.

I felt like I was walking in a sea of vibrating tuning forks at Pop!Tech - so maybe, in addition to my earlier observation of combined high IQ and high EQ among people at Pop!Tech (Pop!Techies?), I should add high SQ (spiritual intelligence) to the mix. It seemed like everyone was in a highly awakened state ... and I wonder whether that represents an alteration of normality for others, or whether it is their normal state ... or perhaps [only] their normal state at Pop!Tech ... or simply another example of my seeing what I want to see.

I'm not sure what "normal" is anymore - for me ... reminding me of earlier periods when I identified strongly with the character of Phaedrus in Robert Pirsig's book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance ... which I suppose is apt, given that I'm increasingly inquiring into values.

Pop!Tech 2007: An Expanded Vocabulary (and Perspective)

OK, in my last entry on Pop!Tech, I wrote that I would only be posting one more “highlights” entry … but I just had to include one more … in part because I am afraid that however much I might condense my 47 pages of notes (in a Word document), no one will ever have the stamina to read my “detailed” posts – I’m not even sure I’ll have the stamina to compost* them [*compost = compose & post] – especially given the amazing wealth of information and insights offered in the stream of blog posts Ethan Zuckerman wrote during the conference itself (how does he do that?!)  … and also, in part, because I bought a spare battery for my MacBook – a device used by what I estimate to be 75% of the Pop!Tech population – before the trip, so I have some more laptop time on this flight, and I’m so pumped – activated, perhaps – after the conference, I just can’t bring myself to relax and watch the Harry Potter movie.

So, anyway, I’m going to expend a little more battery power and spend one more post with just a quick list of some of the new terms and concepts that jumped out at me throughout the event (modeled loosely on Amazon.com's Statistically Improbable Phrase feature). Note that these are not intended as a summary of the talks, just some semi-random sparks of surprise intermingled with some terms and concepts that stick out for me.

[Update: in case I never get around to fully composting my own notes, I've decided to add a few more notes to some of the items below - making for quite the rambling rumination - and simply link to Ethan Zuckerman's posts about each of the presenters.]

• Consumerism at scale (Chris Jordan, artist)
• Cities as consensual hallucinations (Christian Nold, University College London)
• The powerful motivating force of a full body experience in seeing an inspiring presentation (which she, perhaps unwittingly, was passing on to me, and perhaps others); "Who am I? A middle-class white girl from Pittsburgh. What can I do?" (Jessica Flannery, co-founder of Kiva.org)
• Affordability is not an economic problem, it’s an engineering and design problem; three key features of the design revolution: affordability, divisibility, expandability; with business as usual, the UN Millennium Goals on hunger and poverty will never be reached, e.g., progress on reducing the number of people in sub-Saharan Africa living on less than $1/day over ten years: 44.6% → 44%
  (Paul Polak, International Development Enterprises & D-rev)
• Making manufacturing like agriculture (Adrian Bowyer, RepRap)
• When relationships are ambiguous, divergent understanding can be costly; hence indirect speech acts, e.g., “If you could pass the guacamole, that would be awesome”; any maitre 'd can be bribed (Steven Pinker, author of The Stuff of Thought)
• The double tsunami of estrogen & progesterone each month creates 25% fluctuations in brain symapses in teen girl brains; depression is twice as likely in girls as boys after after onset of puberty; the brain area associated with sexual pursuit is 2 - 2.5 times larger in human males then females, even at 8 weeks in the womb (Louann Brizendine, author of The Female Brain)
• Right brain aspects are a more fundamental part of what makes us human; democratization of self-realization; three key aspects of modern economies are abundance, Asia and automation; a good speech always has 3 key elements: brevity, levity and repetition; a picture is worth a thousand words, but a metaphor is worth a thousand pictures (Daniel Pink, author of A Whole New Mind)
• Any life form – human or robotic – must feel and convey emotions, become aware of itself and its environment, and learn and develop over time (Caleb Chung, creator of Pleo)
• Harvesting power from ambient radio frequency signals (John Shearer, “creative instigator” behind Powercast)
• What can we do right now with what we already have? create a portable light source that is simple, reliable, durable, lightweight, adaptable, self-sufficient, self-contained and shippable; Challenge: can a project like portable light allow us to look at the cellphone in an entirely new way (Sheila Kennedy, Portable Light)
• Four features of a potential threat required for our brain to detect them: Personal, Abrupt, Immoral & Now (PAIN); global warming is a threat because it fails to raise the brain’s alarms (Dan Gilbert, author of Stumbling on Happiness)
• I’m on speaking terms with my inner tortoise; speed yoga, drive-thru funeral; 1-minute bedtime stories (Carl Honore, author of In Praise of Slowness)
• Contextual storytelling platforms; most audacious (& participatory) experiment at Pop!Tech: show photos and captions, evoke stories from audience (Jonathan Harris, artist & designer)
• A young girl in South Africa is more likely to be raped than she is likely to learn to read; “There is no evidence HIV is the cause of AIDS” President Thabo Mbeki (2000); literacy & training guidelines don’t connect to reality; prevention messages have no cultural relevance; well-intentioned donors often provide solutions no one wants; 40% of HIV+ patients stop taking antiretroviral (ARV) drugs within 2 years (Zinhle Thabethe & Krista Dong, iTEACH Program) [side note: I find it ironic that Zinhle's talk at last year's Pop!Tech was entitled "We are not the same", given that the dissimilarities in perspectives and approaches expressed in Zinhle and Krista's presentation and those expressed in the following presentation in the session, by Jeff and Paul, were striking]
  [Wow! Katrin Verclas has posted a video interview - taken with a Nokia N95 - on Mobileactive.org, wherein Zinhle and Krista describe the challenges they face ... and how mobile phones might offer innovative and effective solutions. I'll include a syndicated copy at the bottom. Thanks, Katrin!]
• How can we understand why people are behaving in ways that will lead to their death? Information-Motivation-Behavioral Skills Model of Health Behavior; [side note: Louann Brezidine asked a question about why power was not a part of the equation]; using interactive technology to promote HIV treatment adherence (Jeff Fisher & Paul Shuber, University of Connecticut Center for Health, Intervention and Prevention)
• There are 120,000 kinds of rice, but only 400 breeds of dog; climate change and food security:
  2-3 C degree increase is predicted for 2070-2100 vs. 1900-2000 (Cary Fowler, Global Crop Diversity Trust)
• One out of 5 Africans is Nigerian; Nigerian satellites will provide tele-everything, e.g., tele-medicine, tele-education, etc. (Robert Boroffice, Nigerian Space Agency)
• 45% of global oil has already been consumed; 90% of oil is consumed for transportation; how long can mobility = freedom? China’s one-child policy will leave 40M men with no potential wives by 2050 (Chris Luebkeman, Drivers Of Change)
• Oceans comprise 99% of the earth, from a 3D perspective; "we've declared war on the fish, and we've won"; sharks have declined 95% in 10 years in Northeast Atlantic and will become extinct in our lifetime; bottom trawling removes 98% of the coral on the ocean floor; "Fatality is the sum of our dismissals" (Claire Nouvian, BLOOM Association)
• The sea has an inverted food pyramid compared to land animals (Eric Sala, UCSD)
• There are no more groundfish – or ground fishermen – between Camden and Canada (Ted Ames, Local Fisheries Knowledge project)
• The skin is a human sensory homunculus; nurturing (touch and warmth) is more important than nourishment (milk) to baby monkeys; humans are self-decorating apes who have been highlighting features, especially those that are sexually attractive, for over 5000 years; stripped of our skin, we really are all alike (Nina Jablonski, author of Skin: A Natural History)
• Anyone can fly - it all depends on how you define the temporality; being lost is really where it’s at; anthropology of the stunt; de-familiarization; trying to bring the turbulence of the world inside (Elizabeth Streb, Extreme Action Activist)
• Living a skater ethos with a representational disability, representation of projected narrative, disability-based utilitarianism, counter-transference, peripheral fluctuation, inverse peripheral fluctuation; underlying sociology of public space (Bill Shannon, extreme laid-back skater, choreographer and dancer)
• Founded first not-for-profit pharmaceutical company in the US; developing drugs for invisible, voiceless people; created a drug to treat Kala-azur, which kills 1M invisible, voiceless people a year, that costs $10 vs. $300; a proof of concept that we can use the world’s most advanced technologies to benefit humanity; how you work is just as important as what you do; the how will determine the magnitude of your impact; we can only break silos by putting yourself in places you’re so uncomfortable you can barely stand it; If you know more can be done, how can you not do it? You have to begin with very human actions, if you want to end with a very human impact (Victoria Hale, Institute for OneWorld Health)
• Synthetic biology, open-source biology, radical affordability, radical social change; 1-3M people die every year of Malaria; 90% are children; 300-500M are currently infected; malaria reduces GDP of afflicted countries by up 50% (Jay Keasling, Keasling Laboratory / Amyris Biotechnologies)
• If you want to find and follow your passions, you have to take some risks at some point (John Legend, musician, Show Me Campaign)
• Islam hasn’t changed; what has changed is that it has become visible in the west (John Esposito, Georgetown University) [side note: Ethan posted a single entry about the moderator and the following three speakers in this session]
• In the Arab world, you can say anything you want about the Arab world, just not about your own country; Google Earth is banned in Bahrain, after it showed that 60-70% of the land in Bahrain is controlled by the King; it is also banned in Tunisia, after it revealed the locations of secret prisons  (Daoud Kuttab, Arab Media Internet Network)
• I’ve spent half my life as a non-Muslim, half my life as a Muslim: I’m part of the “we” for both halves; things done in the name of democracy – not in my name; things done in the name of Islam – not in my name (Sarah Joseph, Emel magazine)
• On July 11, 1995, 80,000 Muslims were killed in one day; we understand better than anyone in the world what it means to be under attack by terrorists; you have a surplus in technology products, we have a surplus in spiritual products, so we should do an exchange; biggest problem is Max Weber’s concept of charisma - "a certain quality of an individual personality, by virtue of which he is set apart from ordinary men and treated as endowed with supernatural, superhuman, or at least specifically exceptional powers or qualities"; let us fight for the Holy Peace, not the Holy War (Mustafa Ceric, Grand Mufti of Bosnia)
• The key to confronting terrorism is to prevent failed states, by increasing health care, reducing poverty and instituting the rule of law (Charles Swift, former USN Lt. Cmdr who sued his commander-in-chief and won the acquittal of Salim Hamdan, Osama bin Laden's driver)
• Women are bellwethers for the health of society; war has two sides, the front line, dominated by men, guns, tanks, etc., and the backline, the purview of women trying to keep life going in the midst of war; the Iraq war is like waking someone up after a coma after 35 years, and asking them what kind of democracy do you want to have (vs. what do you want to eat)? in 1994, 500,000 women were raped in 100 days in Rwanda, which now has a legislature with 49% women (Zainab Salbi, Women for Women International)
• Green jobs, not jails; green-collared jobs; fight poverty and pollution at the same time; Is this new green wave going to lift all boats, or are we going to have eco-apartheid? Is there a way to connect the work that most needs doing with the people who most need work? (Van Jones, Green For All)
• What sets Americans apart from the rest of the world is their frequent use of “sorry” and “thank you” (Mustafa Ceric, over lunch)
• Thank you. I’m sorry for what we’re doing in Iraq (what I wish I’d said, over lunch)

Throughout the conference, I was repeatedly reminded of two books I’ve read – and blogged about – Blessed Unrest and Stumbling on Happiness. Many aspects of Paul Hawken’s insights into the problems of environmental, social, economic and political justice – and the mostly small, local solutions to them – were broadened and/or deepened by several of the speakers. Many of the insights offered by Dan Gilbert - who was at the conference - into how and why we remember the past and project it into the future help illuminate the challenges we face – individually and collectively – in achieving positive human impact. Both of these books, along with The End of Poverty, by Jeffrey Sachs, would provide very helpful background material for anyone wanting to better understand issues raised throughout the conference.

[Addendum]

I'm going to [re-]close this post with a Rumi poem shared by Zainab Salbi:

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I'll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase "each other" doesn't make any sense.

One more thing: here's the syndicated copy of Katrin Verclas' video interview of Zinhle Thabethe and Krista Dong (from blip.tv) I mentioned above:

Pop!Tech 2007: Continuous Partial Conversations: No Ordinary Moments … Or People

In my last post on Pop!Tech, I expressed the personal human impact the conference had on me – an extended and expansive whole body experience. Before delving into my more detailed notes of the event, I want to spend one more blog post – and more of my laptop battery power – on some [more] of the highlights.

I’d noted the high EQ (and IQ) of all the speakers and other participants at the conference. I think this was largely responsible for the fact that I did not have any ordinary conversations throughout the entire event … and I had lots of conversations. Whether sitting down for a meal, getting a drink, or even waiting in line for a bathroom, every conversation went deep almost immediately. I overheard occasional references to topics I typically consider rather superficial – e.g., sports (we were, of course, in Maine, which is Red Sox country, at a time the team is in the championships) and the weather (it did rain pretty hard for a period of time) – but nearly every conversation turned to matters of [more] significant import and impact at or near their very outset.

Andrew Zolli referred to Pop!Tech as a conversation, and the event was structured to allow some time for questions and comments from the audience after nearly every group of presentations. Several of the Q&A sessions had a very conversational feel to them … but all of them were, of course, constrained by time, and thus often seemed like partial conversations. When I combine these partial conversations with the partial conversations I had with people (offstage) at different times and places, what emerges for me is a notion of continuous partial conversation … perhaps akin to the continuous partial attention I heard – and wrote about – at Foo Camp.

I was reminded, repeatedly, of the notion of “no ordinary moments” articulated by Dan Millman in his book The Way of the Peaceful Warrior. There were, indeed, no ordinary moments, just as there were no ordinary conversations … and no ordinary conversation participants (otherwise known as people). In reflecting on this, I recognize that there really are no ordinary people – at Pop!Tech or elsewhere – however ordinary some people may seem at some times and places. In most times and places, I’m not willing to take the time to see past the superficial ordinariness I project onto most people. There was something special about the culture cultivated at Pop!Tech (I now see why Andrew refers to himself as the Pop!Tech curator rather than chairperson or organizer) that helped me – and perhaps others – take more time to appreciate the other people at the event. The people at Pop!Tech were, of course, special – and in many cases, especially those on stage, it was easier for me (and, I imagine, others) – to see that specialness, but I do believe everyone is special.

Ironically, or perhaps synchronistically, I was a bit slow to respond to Pop!Tech’s initial request for a bio to use on their speakers page (and my hastily taken and sent digital photo is not one of the better shots of me), so they composed one for me that I’d like to think is mostly on-target … and includes the following sentence:

Joe McCarthy thinks we all could take advantage of more opportunities to share valuable insights and experiences with each other.

Ahem … so once again, I find myself preaching what I want to practice. I just hope I can carry this perspective back with me … and apply it more often … and in more places … to extend the deep, continuous partial conversations … and a deeper appreciation for the people I encounter … in every moment.

Namaste.

[And, unlike several of the speakers, who emphasized their pragmatism and downplayed or denied their idealism, I herewith acknowledge that I am a card-carrying idealist … in case that’s not obvious.]

Pop!Tech 2007: A Whole Body Experience

Wow. I don’t know where to begin … or where it will end. I’m writing this on a flight back from the most amazing conference I’ve ever experienced (and I’ve experienced lots of conferences). I estimate the average combined IQ and EQ level among the people at Pop!Tech 2007 as perhaps the highest I’ve ever encountered at any event I’ve ever attended. The only conferences that come close are my recent experiences at Foo Camp and at ETech 2007.

Andrew Zolli, the curator of Pop!Tech, talked about the “intellectual crack cocaine of thought leadership” that permeates the event, and I certainly felt that. However, when Jessica Flannery described having a “full body experience” during a talk she attended by Muhammad Yunus, founder of Grameen Bank and co-recipient (with the Bank) of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize – which catalyzed her resolve to make a difference, and led to her co-creation of the Internet micro-lending web site kiva.org – I felt that she had articulated a more apt characterization of [my experience of] Pop!Tech (though I prefer to substitute “whole” for “full” in my description).

I’d mentioned “goosebump moments” in my earlier post on Blessed Unrest. I experienced higher GMPH (Goosebump Moments Per Hour) than at any other conference I’ve attended. I was thoroughly intellectually stimulated throughout the 3 ½ days, but the key differentiator for me was wave after wave of emotional stimulation, as speaker after speaker shared their stories of overcoming personal, professional and societal obstacles to achieve significant positive human impact. In some cases the impact is primarily a raising of awareness about important issues facing humanity, in others, the impact was actions taken on the ground to design, develop and deliver solutions to very human problems.

Some of these awareness-raising and solution-delivery examples involved some kind of technology (the “tech” in Pop!Tech), but I came away with a new answer to one of the questions posed to all attendees at the conference as part of "The Nokia Interview" I mentioned in my earlier post on our pre-conference Pop!Tech session on empowerment.

Q: “What is the most powerful but underappreciated tool for changing the future?”

Now, given that I work for Nokia, and gave a presentation at our pre-conference session entitled “Empowering People through Mobile Technologies in Developing Regions”, which highlighted some of the ways that Nokia is facilitating the empowerment mentioned in the title, I had been reading, thinking, writing and talking a lot about how mobile phones – and their supporting infrastructure(s) – are tools for changing the future. However, I think that they are a tool that is fairly well appreciated, at least among the people attending Pop!Tech (… er, and hopefully a little more appreciated by some, after my presentation ☺). However, by the end of conference, having been exposed to so many examples of the importance of people being willing to attend to the very human problems in person, I believe the most underappreciated tool for changing the future is physical presence.

A: “Our physical presence, attention and actions – our whole selves”

I believe technologies – and especially mobile technologies – can serve to empower people in significant ways, but they can only be of service if they are connecting the people who are on the ground confronting the problems to the resources (digital and/or physical) that can help them in their endeavors. Sure, we can use electronic mail, electronic voting, electronic petitions, SMS, smart mobs and other forms of digital activism, and these can have some positive effect, but to really achieve significant human impact, we need more physical activism – people showing up, getting involved, dealing with the messiness otherwise known as the human condition in its diverse manifestations throughout the physical world.

So, having had a spiritual, intellectual and emotional awakening as a result this and other steps (e.g., the Africa sessions at Foo Camp and the Communities & Technologies 2007 conference), what am I going to do about it? I am not able – or, at least, not willing – to answer that (yet). The courage of the people sharing their stories – many of who had [similar?] fears, uncertainties and doubts about what they should, could, or would do – helps stoke my courage, helps me recognize my fears, uncertainties and doubts, and helps me think (and write) more clearly – or, at least, more elaborately – about what I can or will do.

For the short term, I made a number of contacts with people who are on the ground, up close and personally involved in delivering solutions in developing regions. I will be seeking to extend the kind of facilitation of empowerment I talked about in my session to some of these people and their projects. I will also seek a way to visit one or more of these places, so I can at least better appreciate the problems and opportunities for solutions. Oh, and I’ll also post some of my notes from the conference – probably strung out over a few separate entries, and over a period of time.

Over the longer term, well, I just don’t know yet … or at least I’m not willing to recognize or acknowledge it yet.

Oriah and Buber, I and Thou: Bringing All Of Who I Am to Blogging

I’ve been listening nearly exclusively to (and occasionally blogging about) David Whyte’s inspiring words in his audiobook, Clear Mind, Wild Heart, on my iPod for the past several months. Having finished my sixth cycle through [my rip of] his 6 CD set, I decided to listen to Oriah Mountain Dreamer’s audiobook, Your Heart’s Prayer  … which was inspired, in no small part, by David Whyte.

I have written before of how Oriah has inspired me. This evening, on the flight from San Jose to Seattle, I listened to a segment that helped me understand why it is I participate in the blogosphere. Oriah was talking about Martin Buber, and his book I And Thou, which she says is “about all of life really being about bringing yourself into full relationship with the other.” She goes on to elaborate in a way that I map directly onto my experience with reading and writing blogs:

When you engage in a creative act, you bring yourself into relationship with that form, and if you give yourself completely to that process – you bring all of who you are to it – what happens is that you are changed, and a work is created – it could be an object, it could be a piece of music [Ed.: it could be a blog post] – but something is created, which to the receptive beholder, will give them the opportunity to have a direct experience of the form.

So when you write a piece of music [write a blog post] – let’s say if you’re a composer [a blogger] – and you bring yourself entirely to something that is larger than you, and you hold none of yourself back, you create a piece of music [blog post], which someone who listens to it [reads it], if they too bring all of themselves to it, they are able to directly experience that which is larger than themselves in their own way – it will be different than perhaps the composer [blogger] did  – but there will be a similarity in terms of what they engage with.

So my job – your job – as human beings, is to bring all of who we are to every moment.

I know this because the easiest place for me to do this, in some ways – and it’s not always easy, but the place where I feel compelled to do this, I should say – is when I write. There’s something about writing, for me, which compels me to try to include all of it … to hold nothing back … and I’m changed in the process of writing.

The other thing that happens is I produce a book [blog post] that other people come to and get something out of that I never could possibly anticipate. …

All I can do is bring all of who I am to that writing, and then that allows the opportunity for something else to come in, when someone else, who is a receptive beholder, uses that work … and that’s not me, it’s something that’s larger than me that comes through this.

… whatever I am, and whoever I am, all I can do is offer that, and feeling inadequate is not a reason not to offer that.

I often feel inadequate, in all my affairs, and the practice of blogging helps me feel the inadequacy and write anyway (invoking the wisdom of yet another inspiring author, Susan Jeffers, and her invitation to Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway). One of the many gifts I received at CHI 2007 this week was learning that a number of people enjoy reading my blog (at least on occasion). I never check my logs [well, I did once, when I signed up for syndication via Newstex], and I never check for references to my blog at Technorati, so the only way I learn that anyone has read my blog is when someone posts a comment, sends an email, or sends a trackback ping from their own blog ... or says something to me in person.

There’s a part of me that is embarrassed about enjoying learning that other people enjoy reading my blog – after all, that would be an example of taking something personally (and thus, in opposition to Don Miguel Ruiz’ second agreement, to which I generally like to subscribe). And, in fact, in the passage quoted above, Oriah even says, in effect, it’s not [entirely] about me, it’s [also] about the reader. However, she also emphasizes the interconnectedness among us, and so if blogging is bringing myself into full relationship with the other[s], well, then, I guess I won’t try to deny the joy I feel when I learn about instances of such interconnectedness … or, might I even say, interrelativity.

I usually refrain from using second person references in my blog, but I’ll make an exception here, to thank those of you at the conference (and at other places and times) who offered the warm encouragement I need to unfold.