FullThought

Listening Famine

2011-01-06T12:00:00.000-08:00

I was reading in the paper this morning a story on the report issued by the presidential panel named to study the BP oil spill. They have concluded that the companies involved took a series of hazardous and time savings steps without consideration of the risks involved. They also surfaced a picture of company officials who failed to consult with one another on critical decisions.

Gillian Tett of The Financial Times writes in her 2009 book, Fools Gold, that our “entire financial system went wrong as a result of flawed incentives within banks and investment funds, as well as the rating agencies; warped regulatory structures; and a lack of oversight.” It turns out that the current global financial crisis is a story about people we thought were the smartest players in the industry. Their decisions turned out to be “remarkably naïve, reckless or, in some cases, downright stupid”, I quote Michiko Kakutani of The New York Times who reviewed Ms Tett’s book.

There appears to be a famine in our world. It is pervasive and it is having tragic and far reaching consequences. We need to name this famine and address it. It is a famine of listening.

This shouldn’t surprise us.

It’s not like the water that we seek in the big picture is flowing well close to home. If we aren’t listening or being listened to in our families, in our places of employment, in our churches, or in our neighborhoods, why do we think the large entities are better than we are?

When was the last time at home we asked each other about our hopes and dreams for the new year? Have we asked what are the challenges we are each facing in our unique journeys or in our journey of living together?

When were the voices of students, teachers or education researchers included in our education reform efforts?

How often does the top executive ask administrative assistants, who interface with large segments of customers and team members, how could we improve our product or our operations?

Listening is the path to improve relationships, inform decisions and effectively problem solve. If we are going to survive as a culture we need this skill, this orientation, just as badly as we need water in a rain drought. The good news about this famine is that we can begin to generate the very resource we need. In this case, we can be the change we want to see in the world as Mahatma Gandhi so wisely said. The change we need desperately is our willingness and ability to listen to each other.

To Tom, Asmund, Slow Moose, Wageble...and all our One People Friends

2010-09-12T08:23:00.000-07:00

“There are these rare moments when musicians play together…when their expression becomes as easy and graceful as friendship or love. This is when they give us a glimpse of what we might be, of our best selves, and of an impossible world in which you give everything you have to others, but lose nothing of yourself. Out in the real world there exist detailed plans, visionary projects for peaceable realms, all conflicts resolved, happiness for everyone, for ever – mirages for which people are prepared to die and kill: Christ’s kingdom on earth, the workers state, the ideal Islamic state. Only in music, and only on rare occasions, does the curtain actually lift on this dream of community, and it’s tantalizingly conjured, before fading away with the last notes.”

~ Ian McEwan

Remember Our Words

2010-09-08T12:43:00.000-07:00

I want to remember:
We all have the words.
The words are the guides
we can find a better way
we can move
we can shift our patterns.
Our patterns are beautiful,
let them out
let them free.

Too many voices have been silenced
the children, the women, the men's hearts.
I want to remember: this is about
what is lost in the silence
what kindness, what wisdom,
what thought and ideas have we silenced.

Let them out.
Let them free.

Dating Is Going To Be Hard

2010-06-23T06:50:00.000-07:00

I married a Red Indian Poet. Could be he was the love of my life. But there has to be dating even after the love of your life. He was grand. Deep. Thoughtful. Passionate. He is changing the world and when we were together I somehow felt I was a part of his force.

He loves our girl. He loves all his children. When it comes right down to it he loves all his ex wives and all of humanity.

But I saw the writing on the wall. And the writing said: he can love a girl, and he can love the whole of humanity but one more soul too close just doesn't work. Something in him isn't wired for that settled soul of intimacy that I crave. And the wall went on: better he love his girl and the rest of humanity than add one more too close soul to cage him in.

So dating has to happen.

I want the one who moves my soul and is determined to change the world in some way. I found an industry guy who helps 17 plants continue to spew toxins in our air and water and to stay within the bounds and blessing of our Environmental Protection Agencies.

I told him my sister was working in Portland to address the regulatory process overseeing the factory in her neighborhood that allows heavy toxins in their air. He told me the community organizing was led by professional outside entities not really from the neighborhood. He didn't know my sister so I explained that she did live in the neighborhood, she was just a mom who read a USA Today article that named her daughters' school as second in the nation in toxic air quality due to industry emissions.

I asked him what we should do with the toxic waste in our neighborhoods from these plants. He said the plants were there first. Maybe we should move the communities.

I said moving that many homes and families and schools and stores might not be realistic, couldn't we work with the plants and EPA's to move to cleaner technology? He said humanity has never been healthier or lived longer. He thought we should be happy and look the other way, that really we are pretty well off in the scheme of things. He doesn't think we need a revolution.

Must not be his children getting sick.

Dating is going to be hard.

Why Juvenile Justice Reform?...Why Now?

2010-06-09T12:47:00.000-07:00

As a social worker for the past 24 years I have watched as we have over built the strong arm of our law in response to drugs and violence in our cities. I can understand the fear that drove us here. I have looked in the eyes of children and adults who feel they need a drug as much or more than they need love, opportunity and hope. I have sat with children armed with guns. I have spoken to children on the run, fearful that the lack of place and meaning they feel at home somehow makes all the risks they take on the street worthwhile. This should scare us. We are losing these children and all their potential worth.

In the past we viewed parenting as if on a continuum between leniency and punishment. What we have learned is that neither end of that range offers the reality of what children need. To thrive in this culture of infinite choices and risks we must all develop complex internal realities capable of seeing vision, following dreams, developing patience and perseverance and making difficult decisions. This requires a sophisticated parenting that finds a lovely balance between support and inspiration on one hand and safety and accountability on the other.

Neither leniency nor punishment has proven to produce good outcomes.

And yet as a society we consistently deliver punishment as a response to our child development issues. We have over built our institutions of control and we have underdeveloped our public skill to hold children accountable in the context of relationships that demonstrate hope and support for their future.

It is important also that we see our current policy and practice through a historical lens. Our children certainly do. Data shows that African American, American Indian and Latino children are in our criminal justice system at the most disproportionate rates and receiving our most limited and restrictive sanctions. These are children who have to reconcile a painful, unsafe and often even violent history in our country and have the least faith in our hope for their future. We consistently give them our strongest arm and weakest support. This picture should not make sense to us; it is a recipe for disaster.

The solution is within our reach and our JDAI/DMC work can show us the way:
We need to engage all our children currently in the system in a wake up call to ensure they know they have a calling and a purpose as gifted, free, healthy, contributing members of our community.

We need to be certain our criteria for bringing children into the system or for sanctioning those already in are completely objective.

We need to examine every decision point in our juvenile justice system for bias that puts children of color at disadvantage.

We need to consciously and aggressively seek the voice and genius of those segments of our community who fear our system most, our African American, American Indian, Hmong, Latino and recent immigrant communities for they must be true partners in shaping a system they experience as just.

We must seek true cultural diversity at our policy tables as it is the variety of cultural perspectives and life experience in American that will bring unique world views to the table that will inform our responses to the challenges we find most baffling.

We need to prepare and orient these segments of the community to be full partners at the table.

We need to balance the role of law enforcement in our communities with a probation system that is not driven to sanction but rather driven by child development and family development approaches to their work. We can put high level social work supervision in our probation offices.

We need to inspire our partners in community based organizations to build “with” the communities they serve not “for” them.

We need to draw on the practices of restorative justice in our families, at all levels of the system and within our schools to find constructive responses to challenging behavior.

We need our JDAI/DMC work to be contagious. Let’s do the difficult work to reflect on the decisions point within our reach that are adding to the problem not constructing the solution. Then we can hold this progress up as examples for families, schools, business and all other segments of our community to inspire their own self reflection and action.

Visionary and Collaborative Leadership

2010-06-09T12:01:00.000-07:00

I have been thinking a lot about leadership recently. A few FullThought thoughts about visionary and collaborative leadership:

1) It's never about us. It's about our vision. What is our vision for the world that informs our work? How well can we clearly articulate our vision?

2) What are the assumptions that frame our vision?

3) Who are we? What are we ready for? What is unique about us that shows up in all we do?

4) We must know intimately the stories of those that inform and guide us. Who are these people? What are their stories? What are they telling us?

5) Our allies must be an ever expanding pool. Who shares our vision? Who is also working toward a common end? Who's skills and partnership do we need? What are the visions of our allies and how can we get behind them?

6)We must have a keen grasp of the forces that oppose us. There is wisdom in the point of view they bring to the table. Do we see and understand this wisdom?

7) Who is defending another vision? What is their vision? What are the assumptions that frame their vision?

8) What forces within us work against us? Are we facing fear or drawing unintentionally from ego?

9) We are stronger when we bring laughter, tears and hope on the journey.

10) Courage is not the absence of fear but rather strength in the face of fear.

Road to Revolutions: Women, Creativity and Leadership

2010-05-07T10:44:00.000-07:00

The challenges we face today in all aspects of our lives need to be met through significant shifts in the way we see and understand ourselves, our contexts, and the way we operate within them. This change will best be driven by open, humble and collaborative leadership.

I am joining forces with my incredibly talented friend and colleague, Mary Tinucci to offer a workshop for women looking for new ways to grow and live in the world; paths to heal the hurts that leadership roles provoke; and strategies to bring forth our visions. This workshop is for women leaders, entrepreneurs and for those creating new projects and visions.

Join us to:

EXPLORE...
the needs and capacity of "Self" in the role of leader.

FIND the BALANCE & SKILLS...
to hear collective voice without losing your vision.

LEARN & PRACTICE...
specific, creative and powerful strategies to move yourself, your project or your organization forward.

Dates: Four Thursdays May 27, June 3, 10, 17

Times: 6:00 - 8:30 pm

Location: 444 Lexington Pkwy S St. Paul, MN 55105

Registration Fee: $150

Register by May 20: send 50% payment to:
Laura LaBlanc
444 Lexington Pkwy S Unit 1
St. Paul, MN 55105

Balance Due First Session
Registration Limit: 10

For More Information: Laura LaBlanc (651)263-0739

Why FullThought? Why Now?

2010-04-19T09:05:00.000-07:00

I am in the process of maturing a business I call FullThought. I teach and practice decision making and problem solving tools for everyday life. Tools not based on bringing another expert to our table but rather ones that help us recognize that we have more wisdom in our current circles than we sometimes know. What we often lack are the tools to bring people together in a way that maximizes talent and contribution. The tools I use seem so ridiculously easy sometimes I struggle to find words for my great faith in where they will lead us. In almost daily conversations with myself and others I find myself addressing: Why FullThought? Why now?

One answer is that we don’t need to look far to see examples of partial thought in our current world. Our financial crisis is the result of partial thought.

Gillian Tett of The Financial Times writes in her book Fools Gold, that our “entire financial system went wrong as a result of flawed incentives within banks and investment funds, as well as the rating agencies; warped regulatory structures; and a lack of oversight.” It turns out that the current global financial crisis is a story about people we thought were the smartest players in the industry. Their decisions turned out to be “remarkably naïve, reckless or, in some cases, downright stupid”, I quote Michiko Kakutani of The New York Times who reviewed Ms Tett’s book.

In the 1960’s we began to do research about the impact school size has on our public education system. Early on researchers saw strong indicators that schools which housed more than 500 students had sharp increases in delinquency and poorer academic outcomes. Since that time it has been almost impossible to find public schools with fewer than 500 students. School size does not appear to be a factor in outcomes when we compare schools of 500-1000 students so we have determined that school size is not a variable. We live with a school system that needs major overhaul and yet we invest large sums of money in education reform that amounts to little more than rearranging the chairs on the deck of the titanic.

We continue to be a culture that feeds a billion dollar industry to incarcerate a larger segment of our population than any industrialized nation with little or no public debate about the impact, wellness and the return of these individuals to our community.

We continue to be a culture that is destroying the land, water and air we depend on for survival.

We continue to be a culture that sees “troop surges” and the war machine as our answer to building global stability.

FullThought is hoping to contribute to a quiet revolution that is going on around us. I believe that it is through simple practices of listening that we can begin to reshape the culture of our major decisions in this country. We must first begin in all the small conversations we find ourselves in daily, with our family, our children, our neighbors, our co-workers, the team that reports to us, and most importantly those that cause us the most challenge and discouragement.

FullThought provides simple practices to bring people together behind new visions for our lives and work. We teach we must first say clearly “What are we trying to get done?”. We teach the importance of clarifying the objectives that guide us. We name out loud the thoughtful and creative questions that confound us or inspire us. We encourage the widening of who is at the table in decisions making. We teach a process that draws from all voices and perspectives. We have witnessed countless times that these practices encourage deeper thought, relevant contribution and constructive actions.

We hope that those reading this blog will find useful tools for the revolutions you seek in your work and in your life.

Next Entry: Is White a culture too? The impact of white American culture on our professional and personal style of decision making

New levels of being, impact and ease

2010-01-18T08:04:00.000-08:00

The past two years now my lovely friend, Angelique, and I have taken time at New Years to have a heart to heart with ourselves and with each other about New Years resolutions. Of course we have several specifics, predictably ones about losing 5 or 10 pounds and being ready to escape the cover of winter clothes with a new firmer body when summer comes.

More important though has been this small tradition we are carving out to craft a command for ourselves about the internal landscape we are committed to living by. Last year we named New Patterns and New Possibilities. We toasted to this commitment all dressed up at a gala party hosted by my good friends the Thaos. We envisioned all new ways of approaching work, fun, relationships and every aspect of our lives. For me the most significant manifestation of this vision was selling my home of 20 years and buying a condiminium that I not only love but it costs me a fraction of what my house did. I now have new beautiful surroundings and the elbow room I need to keep my fledgling business, FullThought, alive.

This year we have set a new course: new levels of being, impact and ease.

One thing I am immediately doing with this internal guide and inspiration is to finalize the FullThought women's workhsop I have been imagining for a couple years. A time and place for women to explore the same reflection that Angelique and I now make our annual ritual. How do we frame our internal landscape in an outloud and deliberate way so that it becomes a living, breathing guide for our day to day work and our growth? It is about growing and birthing the women that we want to be. It is a remedy to the ease with which we get lost in the tasks and duties we preform. When we become goal oriented on external goals, the goals of our jobs and our family something of our genius is lost. It is a constant doing, doing, doing. But to what end? We intend to develop a process that gives voice and life to our internal contexts: Where do we come from? Who are we? What do we love? What do we not love? What and who do we want to be? What do I have to do to accomplish these things? What's my trade mark? What am I about that spills over in all I do?

Angelique and I have mutual friend we cross paths with in our juvenile justice corrections work. Her name is Cheryl. Recently we saw Cheryl in Atlanta and she said something to the whole group that hangs with us in a profound way. She said: "Don't ask what the world needs from you. Ask what brings you alive. What the world needs is more alive people."

Here's to new levels of being, impact and ease!

An Open Letter to St. Paul School Board

2009-09-23T07:54:00.000-07:00

In St. Paul we are faced once again and too soon with the task of identifying a leader who can artfully guide us out of a budget and educational crisis. I would like to challenge us to consider that if we seek high powered command leadership we are once again missing the point. The challenges we face today in education are challenges of relationship. They will be met through a paradigm shift driven by open, humble and collaborative leadership.

No Child Left Behind clearly is not working and I seriously wonder if any of the perennial reform efforts ultimately will succeed. Our intense focus on strategic planning, test preparation and measuring outcomes seems to miss the key point: that our true dilemma in American education is a long history of a crisis of relationship.

I am a fifth-generation white Minnesotan raising my biological daughter who is also a Dakota child; an inspiring and daunting privilege. I see our challenges in education both through the eyes of a native child and through the eyes of white America.

When we look at the data, it’s clear children of color carry the weight of our disappointment. 78 percent of white students in St. Paul Public Schools (SPPS) are proficient in reading skills compared with 51 percent of American Indian students, 46 percent of Hispanic students, 42 percent of Asian students, and 38 percent of African American students, according to current data on the SPPS web site. Clearly children come to school with varying levels of preparation, but what appears to be failing is not our ability to educate but rather our ability to engage segments of our community in a faith and excitement about their potential worth to us.

It's not Mr. Barrett's fault. He was my daughter's fifth-grade teacher at the American Indian Magnet in St. Paul. He's a Native American man with a gift that calls him to educate our children. He holds a masters degree in gifted and talented education. There is a calm, solid core to him; one that speaks of great things within him, of things that should matter to groups of people trying to live together as one nation. When do we start asking the Mr. Barretts what should happen in our classrooms, instead of giving him a host of lackluster, confining standards?

We need to hold crucial conversions on education across our communities; conversations brimming with voices of color. Education reform cannot be accomplished when large segments of our community don't trust our vision for their future and when we fail to provide an educational context in which they thrive. We seem to be throwing a flurry of tasks at a crisis of relationship. In my experience this seldom produces the outcomes we seek.

The cultural wisdom of Native America, African America, Hispanic America, Asian America, and European American, along with other cultures, can help us find the real genius that is this country. Let's commit ourselves to channel the collective cultural wisdom of this great nation into good, candid, non-defensive conversations about what is missing in our current approach to education. It is through listening that we’ll find wisdom. It is through listening that we’ll mend damaged relationships.

Let's begin in groups, small and large, to talk about classroom content that is relevant and inspiring. And let's fearlessly correct the patterns of disengagement and disrespect that grow within so many of our children. Let’s be certain all children know they bring a history and a creative genius to the table. The children will then be engaged, stay in school and graduate.

These conversations are absolutely imperative for change. We might not know at this moment how the new paradigm ultimately will look. To some, it might appear more like a cultural revolution than simply a new educational pathway. But revolution is not new to this nation, and has proven to be a great gift.

If we don't figure this out, the children will be unmoved by our well-intentioned hard work that values downloading skills into their heads over the sweet, essential brilliance of cultural history and relevance.

September 11

2009-09-16T08:46:00.000-07:00

As the events of September 11, 2001 unfolded for many of us the core of our safety and understanding of America was challenged. For me it was also a moment in my life that I saw vividly the work at home in America that is long over due. As I watched and heard the story unfold that day I was dropping off my daughter at kindergarten and driving to my office. Like many of us I had more questions than answers.

Once in the office I gathered with others around computer terminals as the buildings one by one collapsed and we all struggled to understand the enormity of what was happening. We did not know how many people were trapped and dying. We did not know if there would be further attacks in other cities. In my ignorance I worried that the stock exchange was in the World Trade Center and imagined a world the next morning where everything I knew was no longer functioning. I pictured a stock market inoperable, banks and businesses closed, and government systems struggling to respond.

I had been fairly self sufficient for 20 years at this point in my life. I had been employed, earned a paycheck, had a mortgage and paid my bills. As a matter of fact these were defining institutions that named me and shaped my days. I was good at the treadmill. I was good at living within the system.

Suddenly I had a glimpse of America without our economic systems functioning and I began to picture surviving in the new terrain. What I instantly knew was that what mattered now was not the task and accomplishment that I thought I was supposed to be so good at but rather simply and practically the quality of the relationships that surrounded me. For some reason I pictured myself walking, I don’t know exactly why I did not picture getting in my car for at least part of the journey to wherever I was going, but visions and epiphanies are what they are, certainly not always rational.

I pictured myself walking with my 5 year daughter’s hand in my hand. I believe we were headed to collect with family if possible. Like many American families we are spread around the United States and even the world. Or perhaps we were headed to Pine Ridge Reservation where terrorists would have little interest or gather little resource. Pine Ridge is most likely where my daughter’s father would be going as well. It is where the man our family prays with lives. It is one of the poorest areas of our country and yet it is where I now imagined refuge for my daughter and I.

As we walked I imagined us walking initially through our predominantly white neighborhood. Here I have been deliberate to make connections with my neighbors since the birth of my daughter. We wanted her to be surrounded by people who knew her and would befriend her and look out for her. I pictured walking to my neighbors’ houses and finding people overwhelmed by task and planning. While I did not imagine being turned away, I remember a sense of not fitting. I imagined people so busy trying to make contact with relatives around the country and plans for next steps that there was not room for my daughter and me in the frantic moment. We kept moving.

In passing through an African American neighborhood just north of us, I pictured us walking to the door of the house of strangers and felt the chilly reception I believed we deserved:“what have you done for us?”. Here was a community struggling with high crime, high rates of incarceration, early death and poverty. What had my efforts and success with all the American social and economic systems ever done to bring relief to those already living in this version of chaos in our city that we have allowed for so long?

As I moved towards Hmong homes, families socialized not in America but in an entirely different world view, I found another response. I pictured the door opening at many Hmong homes and I would be welcomed with the words, “We are glad you have come, we are better with you than with out you.” I imagined the same reception in Lower Sioux or Pine Ridge where we had relationships. In the Dakota way, we pray Mitakyue Oyasin "we are all related".

Of course each one of these visions over simplifies what I might really encounter in those circumstances. And yet still it was defining to me. For a moment I was able to rise above everything I defined myself by, individual accomplishment, self-sufficiency, and personal goals and see the critical essence of relationship and interdependence.

And suddenly I recognized the crisis of America has never been a crisis of not “doing” enough. It has been a crisis of relationship. Who is safe, who is not safe and how are we doing living together as humans is the real work of our generation. If we are good at building tall buildings and enormous planes, but we as a human race are going to fly our planes into our buildings, we are not long for this earth. What we need to learn is understanding and co-existence.

Fortunately the world I know did not dismantle on September 12. However the person I am changed. I still concern myself with the necessary tasks of all the systems that surround me however those systems no longer define me. I work every day to define myself by the quality of the human relationships that I encounter, open and tend. I now see more clearly that all my individual accomplishments mean little if I am not able to articulate to those around me their value to me and my desire to be something of value to them. Often I disappoint myself more than I celebrate this journey. I stumble sometimes as I find getting something done or protecting the carpet in my living room still hold a power in the forefront of my consciousness over the people in my life.

I have also become committed to work that helps us understand that all these systems that work so well for many of us have failed many others long before 9-11. There are huge barriers to the health and well-being of many of our friends, neighbors and others who live in America with us. This is particularly glaring along lines of race and the historic lines that slavery and the genocide of the Indian nations created.

This needs to be addressed not only because the ideals of American justice promise that it will be but because these are huge segments of our community and we will collectively benefit from their genius and partnership when we bring them more fully into the American social contract.

New Patterns and New Possibilitites

2009-08-26T21:00:00.000-07:00

Sometimes new patterns are thrust on us. Sometimes we carve them out. The best I understand our job seems to be to weave the curious and chaotic ramblings of the universe into something uniquely ours. 2 years ago early on a Friday morning I found myself on the receiving end of a push from the universe, complete with a short, unimaginative letter from the agency I had been with for 14 years, and a box of what was thought to be the prized possessions from my office.

I took the opportunity to launch my own consulting business. It actually had been forming in my heart and head for several years and had even been legally set up six months earlier. My business is about teaching focused conversation as a decision making tool or a problem solving tool. I am faced daily with the task of not only explaining what I have to offer, but also it's place in our businesses, in our families and in our world of change. Then there is the job of selling that FullThought is the place to go once you have determined conversation is something you might pay for. It often feels like an uphill climb.

Recently I sold my house and bought a lovely condominium. I closed my mortgage, cut my taxes in half, and reduced my energy bill to give my new business better room to breath and grow.

Now I am launching this blog as a place for me to find my voice in this work, to struggle out loud when all else fails, and hopefully to celebrate a few successes.

As a social worker I was often charged with translating hopes, visions and strategies into funding proposals. I have grown accustomed to the practice of clearly identifying measures of success so that when we get one year out from the launch of an effort we have benchmarks to read our progress. In that spirit...

Dear Universe, we are working hard, here's where we hope we are going:

we'd like FullThought to become a useful tool in our times;
we'd like to see FullThought elevate understanding and unheard voices in many settings;
I'd like to make an honest living at this, enough to cover our basic expenses including health care (passing Obama's health care reform Act would count);
FullThought would like to bring opportunity to others as well;
a book on FullThought on the New York Times best seller list would make it easier to explain what FullThought is;
my daughter would love a trip to the UK.

That would be a successful year! Thank you for listening.