Blind Spot

Everyday, I must ask myself, demand of myself:

What is my Source?

”The best in art and life comes from a center – something urgent and powerful, an idea or emotion that insists on its being. From that insistence, a shape emerges and creates its structure out of passion. If you begin with a structure, you have to make up the passion, and that’s very hard to do.” (Roger Rosenblatt)

“The success of an intervention depends on the interior condition of the intervener.”

THE BLIND SPOT

From what Source do our actions emerge? Most of us do not know…

THIS is our blind spot! Individually and collectively…

“The blind spot is the place from which our attention and intention originates. It is the place from which we operate when we do something.”

“We have never systematically looked at the leaders’ work from the blank canvas perspective. The question we have left unasked is: ‘What sources are leaders actually operating from?’

“I first began noticing this blind spot when talking with the late CEO of Hanover Insurance, Bill O’Brien. He told me that his greatest insight after years of conducting organizational learning projects and facilitating corporate change is that the success of an intervention depends on the interior condition of the intervener.

“That observation struck a chord. Bill helped me understand that what counts is not only what leaders do and how they do it but their ‘interior condition,’ the inner place from which they operate or the source from which all of their actions originate.

The Holy is the Broken

The Crack Where the Light Gets In.

“Leonard Cohen said the song represented absolute surrender in a situation you cannot fix or dominate, that sometimes it means saying, ‘I don’t fucking know what’s going on, but it can still be beautiful.’” (Colin Frangicetto about the song Hallelujah)

Love is not a victory march

It’s a cold and it’s a broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah

It’s not a cry you can hear at night

It’s not somebody who has seen the light

It’s a cold and it’s a broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah

I did my best, it wasn’t much

I couldn’t feel, so I tried to touch

I’ve told the truth, I didn’t come to fool you

And even though it all went wrong

I’ll stand before the Lord of Song

With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah

(lyrics from Leonard Cohen’s song, Hallelujah)

For 13 years, I’ve been writing the deepest thoughts of my heart, trying to find a voice for what was making less and less sense. I’m finding that the deeper I go, the more honest I become, the more clarity I seek; the more words escape me, the harder it is to write. I feel sort of like Cohen when he said about writing the song Hallelujah that during the five years it took to write the song, he found himself on his knees on the floor beating his head against the floor crying, “I can never finish this song!”

I think that “sense-making” is our way of polishing and domesticating what we are given. We have been conditioned to think that things are only useful to us if we can make sense of them. So rather than immersing ourselves into the struggle, into the pain, into the shadows, the darkness, the realities of life; we pull back, we protect ourselves from the discomfort of life’s realities, and we pretend to “make sense” of things. We whitewash the broken fences of our lives. And we turn from that which does not give us comfort and security and certainty; our gods of the age.

Ubuntu

In the Spirit of Ubuntu
umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu: a person is a person through other persons

I am . . . because we are

‎”What every single human being longs for, at the deepest level, is to be seen for who they are.” (Sarita Chawla)

“The Quaker teacher Douglas Steele was fond of saying that the ancient human question ‘Who am I?’ leads inevitably to the equally important question ‘Whose am I?’ – for there is no selfhood outside of relationship.” (Parker Palmer, Let Your Life Speak)

“Everybody is half-dead. Everybody avoids everybody, all over the place, in most situations, most all the time. I know; I’m one of those ‘everybodys.’ And, to me, it’s terrible. And so all I’m trying to do, all the time, is just open people up so they…let themselves be open to somebody else. That is all. That’s it.” -Nina Simone

“Neighbors, coworkers, and even family members can live side by side for years without learning much about each other’s lives. As a result, we lose something of great value, for the more we know about another’s story, the harder it is to hate or harm that person.” (Parker Palmer, A Hidden Wholeness, p. 123)

Comfort, Security, Certainty

Facing our gods

... for what we are worshiping we are becoming."
"That which dominates our imaginations and our thoughts will determine our lives, and character."
(Ralph Waldo Emerson)

god of comfort

god of security

god of certainty

(An All American Trinity)

“But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes you are
You're gonna have to serve somebody
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody” (Bob Dylan)

Humans have a tendency to worship… worship something… worship anything that is ultimate or of supreme value in one’s life. Although we are often unaware or deceive ourselves, it is not hard to tell what it is that we worship, if we pay attention. What is it that occupies our thoughts, attention, time, energy? What is the focus of our desire. What is the object of our lust?

FACING OUR MANY VERY SUBTLE GODS

We call ourselves a culture and religion of one, and only one, God. But I propose that we may be one of the most pluralistic cultures in the world when it comes to our gods.

But here is the thing; our gods are smarter than we are, they are cunning and sly like a fox.

My gods, that I’m beginning to see, are largely hidden neatly beneath the surface of my life, out of sight… out of mind…

“A person will worship something — have no doubt about that. We may think our tribute is paid in secret in the dark recesses of our hearts — but it will come out. That which dominates our imaginations and our thoughts will determine our lives, and character. Therefore, it behooves us to be careful what we worship, for what we are worshiping we are becoming.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

Opinionation

and we think we know...

"Each of us creates a picture of our world by connecting a dozen or so of the trillions of dots that would need to be connected to make a 'true' portrait of the universe." -- Sam Keen

Check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rrG5Nppaew 

People that have the answers may not be facing reality in their own lives. Having the answers allows us to turn away from ourselves and others, put on the façade of certainty, and walk away. Certainty is a comfortable thing; sort of a god to many people. But considering the puniness of the human mind, the sliver of human knowledge, the tiny grains of wisdom, our answers are dust in the wind.

Considering the vastness of the universe, the billions of galaxies, the eternity of time, the complexity of our puny minds . . . and we think we know? We think we have the answers? We are quick to speak and slow to listen (slow to learn). And we think we know? Not only know, but know for sure???