It was at this time a year ago that I made the trip to Keene, New Hampshire to teach my final weekend Change Models class of the semester at Antioch New England. Just a few days prior, the entire region had been rocked by an ice storm for the ages. When the storm hit I was in Maine. Driving home the next day I heard reports about the worst damage being concentrated in western Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire. All that had slipped my mind when I got up early on Sunday morning to drive to Keene. It came rushing back when I got off of Route 2 heading north and the world turned dark and quiet. Everything in sight was cocooned in ice. Trees sagged. Homes along the roadside for miles were without lights. Businesses were shuttered. The awesome force of nature really began to sink in.
Archive for December, 2009
Claiming Nonindependence
What’s the Word?
In the wee hours of the morning, I came across an amazing new project Seth Godin’s been working on.� He pulled together 60 thinkers from around the world to answer the question “What Matters Now?” and created an e-book with their responses. Each person took a single word (sleep, re-capitalism, enrichment, nobody, meaning, ease, etc.) and used it to frame a short piece describing what they’re thinking about and working on for the coming year. And he’s hoping it will spread far and wide.
I thought I’d pass along a few short excerpts from this amazing piece.
One thing Elizabeth Gilbert describes in writing on the topic of ease:
“My radical suggestion? Cease participation, if only for one day this year – if only to make sure that we don’t lose forever the rare and vanishing human talent of appreciating ease.”
Young at Heart
There is a lot of conversation in our sector about the generations…the boomers, the x’s, the y’s, the millenials now all working together. Someone recently mentioned they read that four generations can now be found in our organizations. This phenomenon is often presented as a problem to be overcome rather than an opportunity to be seized. In fact, combining the openness and technological know-how of youth with the patience and experience of older folks may finally be just the right ingredients for real social transformation.
As the founding Executive Director of IISC and the matriarch ( I am widowed) of my family, I am continually enriched and enlivened by the young people in my life. I have always found my children to be among the most interesting people I know; Kristen Hughes, Joe Hughes, Brendan Hughes, Christa Scharfenberg, David Scharfenberg.
Women and Facilitative Leadership
Yesterday, I was honored to lead a workshop on Facilitative Leadership for 500 women at the 5th Annual Massachusetts Conference for Women. Hosted by the MA Commission on the Status of Women, this mega-gathering attracted over 5,000 diverse women from corporate, government, non-profit, and social change sectors. The vibe was electric and eclectic – with a mix of executives, teachers, job-seekers, entrepreneurs, students, philanthropists, stay-at-home moms and many others. It was a day of focus on issues “that matter most to women, including personal finance, business, entrepreneurship, health and work/life balance”.
My 60 minute session, “The Practice of Facilitative Leadership”, was what we at IISC would call an “experience” of our flagship, 3-day, course. Up front, we acknowledged that, in this shifting socio-historical global context — anyone who claims to lead is merely improvising her way through unprecedented waters along with the rest of us.
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