Last week marked the one year anniversary of this blog.

Thank you to all my readers – loyalists who read every post, as well as the infrequent visitors who  drop in read one and run. Each of you is important to me.

In celebration, I moved it from under my name – kenhomer.wordpress.com – to its new home – collaborativeconversations.wordpress.com.

Over the next few weeks I’ll be devoting my time to making the Collaborative Conversations blog a more useful resource for those whose work involves creating and stewarding collaborative conversations. I recently  developed a series of workshops on The Foundations of Collaboration and I plan to feature that work over there along with some of the slides I’ve developed to accompany the courses. Please stay tuned for more info.

This first year has been a great learning process for me. My visitorship for the entire year is just over 6,500. Modest by most blog standards, minuscule by others, but more than enough to make me grateful. These visits also humble me and make me think deeply about what it is that I can pass on to 6,500 people that is useful and valuable.

So, what have I learned and what is ahead?

I learned that it is very challenging to create a new post every week.

I learned that I write in fits and starts with a sudden burst of several posts pouring through followed by dry spells.

I learned that the hunger out there for good information about how to collaborate is very deep and mostly unsatisfied.

I learned that I can not please everyone and that sometimes what I write will be misunderstood no matter how I try to be clear.

I learned that when I look back over what I write that it usually has its own organic unfolding which is not always as strategic as I would like it to be.

I also learned that people care deeply – this is more a reaffirmation of previous knowledge coming through a different medium.

And I learned a few things about the technical side of blogging too. Last May I was introduced to twitter and discovered that micro-blogging is actually much more interesting then it appears at first – I am still learning my way into this new medium. I actually think that the discipline of 140 characters is great practice for writing longer blog pieces.

For now, I just want to say thank you to all my readers. I hope to provide you with plenty of reasons to return in the coming year.

With gratitude,

Ken

I am on my way to Washington, DC to present three workshops at the CACDA (Community Anti-drug Coalitions of America) National Leadership Forum. I am very excited to be to sharing the stage with Peter Block, as well as with my pal LaDonna Coy, who has one of the best minds in the prevention field.

My workshops will focus on Accessing the Wisdom of Crowds, and Coping With Wicked Messes. Thanks to LaDonna’s encouragement and expertise, both of these workshops will soon be making their debut as online courses. Stay tuned for more on how you can participate in them.

Rumor has it that Rep John Lewis may be among the attendees. I have no idea if I will have a chance to meet this great man, but today a friend on Facebook alerted me to this remarkable video showing him forgiving a man who literally beat the hell of Lewis during the early days of the Civil Rights movement in the South. I have to admit, this got me pretty choked up. When a man like Elwin Wilson overcomes a lifetime of hatred and makes public amends, I find my faith in humanity a little more restored.

And here is a follow up…

Happy Inauguration Day!

This Land Was Made for You and Me

As we head into a New Year filled with promise and peril, it seems apropos to pause and get a little perspective on just where we are. The following six minute video could be among the most thought provoking films ever made.

Happy New Year – Let us remember not only where we are, and who we are, but also, who we are capable of becoming.

Until my friend Karen Jandorf alerted me to its existence, I had no idea what the Season of Non-Violence was. 

Begun in 1977 to commemorate the deaths of Mahatma Gandhi (January 30th) and Martin Luther King, Jr, (April 4th) this 64 day period invites us to reflect on how non-violent participation in the world can lead to its (and our) healing.

Karen has expanded the 64 day reflection period into 365 days of deep looking. She has created a daily mailing with an evocative quote, poem or short story and very often a practice to accompany it as you carry it throughout your day. Usually it takes less than 30 seconds to read and generally the impact of the reading lasts far into the day – sometimes striking deeply resonant chords that are timeless.

If you’d like to add a little non-violent time to each of your days, you can subscribe to her mailings here.

Here are a couple of my recent favorites from Karen’s daily missives:

Most human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted.

~ Aldous Huxley

Practice
Every once in awhile I am shocked at the number of privileges I assume as given: that I have enough food and clean drinking water, my health, freedom of speech, that I can own property, democracy, that our children can get an education… even some of my relationships.

Today I wake up from the illusion that anything in my life can be taken for granted.

Great work is done by people who are not afraid to be great.

~ Fernando Flores

Practice
Great kindness is shown by people who are not afraid to be kind.

Great love is given by people who are not afraid to be loving.

Great acts are performed by people who are not afraid to take action.

Today I am not afraid.

Today is the Winter Solstice.

The word solstice first appeared c.1250, and is from O.Fr. solstice, from L. solstitium “point at which the sun seems to stand still,” from sol “sun” (see sol) + pp. stem of sistere “to come to a stop, make stand still” (ref: online etymology dictionary.) Today the Sun has reached its furthest declination and will be directly overhead if you are standing at the Tropic of Capricorn, it is one of the oldest days of celebration in human memory.

Tonight is also the first night of Chanukah, the Festival of Lights which commemorates both the story of  the Maccabees victory over Antiochus IV – a tyrant who had slaughtered the Jews, sacked their temple and outlawed their religion in the Second Century BCE – and the miracle of one night’s worth of oil lasting for the full eight nights of the Festival when the Maccabees were able to once more observe their tradition in the Temple of their ancestors.

People being denied their rights – to worship as they see fit, to have access to basic necessities, to live lives of dignity, to be free of political persecution and prejudice based on their skin color, their beliefs, their gender, their sexual orientation, or whatever the characteristics assessed as unacceptable by those occupying the positions of power and privilege in a given culture may be – is a long running theme in the story we tell ourselves about who we are.

Likewise, the theme of an oppressed people rising up and winning victories against overwhelming odds, and of a small light burning longer and more brightly than anyone ever thought possible, is equally well-woven in the make up of our collective being. 

The movie below was shot entirely on a cell phone – itself a minor miracle. The subject matter is well known to all of us. On this, the longest, darkest night of the year, it serves as a vivid testimonial to the old Chinese proverb that it is better to light a single candle than to curse the darkness.

May the little bit of oil in each of us burn far longer and more brightly than we think possible.

I  first read one of Mark Nepo’s Weekly Reflections back on April 11th, 2000, when a close friend forwarded it on to me. Intrigued by his writing, I signed up for his weekly mailings. I had faithfully read his words ever since – though truth be told, sometimes I save three or four up and read them all at once. Mark consistently delivers a wealth of wisdom in his poems and stories. I found myself quite touched by this one

Of Course You Can Come

Mark Nepo

When a friend’s brother-in-law passed away, her sister had a call while preparing for the funeral. It was a Jewish woman living 300 miles away who asked if she could attend the funeral. Her sister was taken aback, not by the request, but by the surprise of how far her husband’s life had reached. She said, “Of course you can come, but please, tell me why you want to?”

The Jewish woman spoke with a tremble through a thick German-Yiddish accent, “I read in his obituary that he was one of the first three soldiers to liberate Dachau at the end of the war.” There was a pause, “I was a little girl then, weighing only 28 pounds, naked and limping. I was shot in the foot for taking some water to drink.” There was another pause, “And when those three soldiers entered the camp, we were all stunned. And seeing us children, naked and starving, they took off their shirts and covered us.” Now they both fell into a deep silence. The Jewish woman continued, “I always wanted to thank them, but never knew who they were.” And so the little girl from Dachau drove 300 miles to stand at the dead soldier’s grave and to embrace her widow.

How are we to understand a story like this? Does it tell us that acts of kindness and the gratitude they engender outlast decades and oceans and continents? Does it tell us that kindness like the song of a blood red bird will be answered long after the bird has died? Does it tell us that the smallest effort to restore dignity can save a soul from degradation? Yes. Yes. And yes. Like the one bead of light, after weeks of light, that causes a flower to finally open, the bead of kindness that is compelled from us, against all reservation, will open others to themselves more than we may ever know.
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These reflections are excerpts from several books, including a new book of poems, Surviving Has Made Me Crazy, CavanKerry Press, and a new book of spiritual non-fiction, Facing the Lion, Being the Lion: Inner Courage and Where It Lives, Red Wheel/Conari Press. For more info, please visit www.MarkNepo.com .

In the next two weeks the Peoples of the World will celebrate the Winter Solstice, Chanukah, Christmas,  Kwanzza and the turning of the New Year as it is observed by the Gregorian Calendar. This time of year is often referred to as The Season of Peace, though these days peace seems to be elusive indeed for an increasing number of the world’s people. 

Here are two short poems that seem to be very apt for this time of year:

Song

There are those who are
Setting fire to the World.
We are in danger.
There is time
Only to work slowly.
There is no time
Not to love.

~Deena Metzger

Try To Love The World

Do not try
To change the world.
You will fail.
Try to love the world.
Lo, the world is changed,
Changed forever.

~ Sri Chinmoy

May whatever Holy-Days you are observing and celebrating be filled with the light of wisdom and the warmth of compassion and may we all love each other and the world just a little bit more in the coming year.

In Peace,

Ken

Love is among my favorite themes for exploration.

I have been intrigued with the claim by Chilean biologist Humberto Maturana that “love is the only emotion which increases intelligence.” In the following short video (<10 minutes) Clay Shirky makes some wonderful observations that support Maturana’s claim, among them: 

• We now have a set of tools for aggregating things that people care about in ways that increase both their scope and longevity, that were unpredictable even a decade ago. 

• The coordinating tools we now have, and I’m not talking about anything fancy here, I’m talking about mailing lists usenet and weblogs and wikis, turn love into a renewal building material.

• If you ask yourself not what is the business model, but rather, do the people who like it take care of each other, it turns out to be the better predictor of longevity.

There are many other juicy nuggets in here – as there always are when Clay speaks.

The Beatles were only partially right. You do need love, but more you need coordinating tools. As Shirky says: “With love you can get a birthday party together. Add coordinating tools and you can write an operating system.”

How are you and the people in your life using coordinating and aggregating tools to support what you love? 

How intentional have you been about this up until now?

After watching this video, what new ideas do you have for doing big things for love?

About a week ago someone sent me a youtube video of a very moving and uplifting version of the Leiber and Stoller classic Stand By Me. As the video unfolds a succession of musicians from around the world blend their voices and instruments into a seamless audio/visual experience that left me wanting to hear it again and again.

Mark Johnson, the man behind this video, has a larger vision that’s perhaps even more inspiring – Peace Through Music. If you have 20 minutes to look at this Bill Moyers interview you can see the whole Stand By Me video, a part of One Love, and learn what went into the many years it took to make them, as well as catch a glimpse of ancient power shining brightly through the dross of a troubled world.