Learning Together. Building Community.

I recently talked with Aaron Enyetu, who arrived here from Uganda just a few months ago. Aaron has worked both as a volunteer in the community-building work of the Baha’i community, and as a professional for Kimanya Ngeyo, an organization based in Jinja that promotes the empowerment of rural people to participate meaningfully in the development of their communities, families and themselves. One of the organization’s areas of focus is sustainable organic farming methods. Eager

Black history is not just some polite tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr. during February. Black history is our history, American history. Native American history is our history. Our story. We—this generation—we have inherited all of this legacy. We come from enslaved people and we come from those who enslaved them. We are the ones whose land was stolen and we are the ones who stole it. We are the ones who were lynched and we are the ones who lynched them. We are the people wh

Here’s what I’m learning: When we’re learning something new—when we enter new territory—it’s uncomfortable. As far as I can tell, it’s always uncomfortable. I keep thinking it will get easier, and it does… this new territory becomes familiar, known, more comfortable. But then I turn a corner and I’m in a different new territory. Once again, I don’t know how things work, I don’t know the lay of the land, I’m just feeling my way through. Slowly I’m getting accustomed to the fee

Grace Reed’s article on Solving Homelessness talks about how effective the village model is for getting people off the streets and back into stable lives. A village… It also takes a village to raise a child. I was sharing all this with a friend the other night and suddenly we both realized—it takes a village to do anything! We think we are independent. We think our success is our own. And so we look at those who struggle and say, “Pull yourself up by your bootstraps.” But we

My daughter turned 18 last March. This fall she headed off to college and has embarked on her own life adventure. As I look back, I realize… I didn’t raise a child; we raised ourselves together. These past 18 years have been a learning journey on which we have traveled side by side. Very early on, I discovered that when I tried to focus on her and guiding her behavior, I failed miserably. But when I focused on fixing my own behavior, my daughter did just fine. It took me awhi

I made a mistake. And it was horrible. Actually, it was a constellation of mistakes, because there never is just one. But I realized something, finally, after all these years… It wasn’t the mistake that made it horrible, it was how I beat myself up about the mistake. I’ve been re-reading John Heider’s The Tao of Leadership and came across a passage about simply observing: The wise leader pays respectful attention to all behavior. Thus the group becomes open to more and more p

We’ve just finished a series on consultation and how it can be a powerful tool for learning together and building community. Now we’ll be focusing on learning itself. We’ll be exploring learning from all angles—individual learning, learning in groups, learning in the family, learning as a human race. We live in urgent times. Humanity is at a turning point. We have the ability to change our trajectory from one of conflict and environmental catastrophe to one of collaboration a

Interview with Rose High Bear Inspired by a vision to write the story of Martin High Bear’s life, Rose High Bear ended up buying a video camera instead, and recording the wisdom of this Lakota medicine man, who happened to be her husband. She and her team have been recording elders ever since, to preserve the rich treasure of their knowledge and wisdom and share it with the world. An elder herself, Rose still holds herself accountable to her own grandparents as she pursues th

This article is part of a series on “Learning About Learning.” Have you ever felt overwhelmed at the beginning of a project? Or frustrated trying to explain something to a new team member? Beginnings are not easy, especially for those of us who get our energy from completing things. But beginnings are precious; they hold an essential but fleeting treasure—the ability to see things with fresh eyes. I was walking down the street one day and ahead of me was a two-year-old with h

About a year and a half ago, I set an intention for myself to facilitate learning within groups and between groups. Suddenly all kinds of opportunities opened up to do just that—for clients, for community groups, for groups of individuals and even in my own family. Some of these opportunities showed up in the Baha’i community where there is a veritable ocean of written guidance: books, letters, statements, study materials. The challenge I found myself facing was how to comple

This whole Prosperity Project started when I read The Prosperity of Humankind and realized that unless we include every single human being on the planet in this vision of prosperity, we won’t have peace, justice or well-being for anyone.  As a writer, I realized I could paint a picture of what this looks like when we’re doing it. So I started interviewing people who had a unique perspective on prosperity and explored some of the deeper meanings of the concept. Each person I t

Last fall I set an intention to “facilitate learning within groups and between groups.” Since then, I’ve served on an elected body in my community, wrote a user manual for a team of tool-makers, coached a high school student who started a robotics club at her former elementary school, created various presentations and tools, and helped individuals find and use tools for their work. So what have I learned about learning so far? Make it visual A picture is worth a thousands wor

Knowledge is one of humanity’s most precious treasures. Yet throughout history, it’s been a treasure reserved for the elites of human society. Today, the tools for generating and applying knowledge generally reside in the universities and research facilities of “developed” nations. But this approach just intensifies the vast gap between the “haves” and the “have nots”. What would happen if these tools were available to all people everywhere—from the African farmer to the Illi

Interview with Ryan Redman School can be stressful: tests, assignments, structure, after-school activities, deadlines, homework… There’s not much that kids actually have control over—most of the time parents and teachers decide what they do and when. Ryan Redman gets it. He created Flourish Foundation to help kids—and adults—learn that the thing they can control is how they respond. With weekly lessons in mindfulness, Ryan and his team are helping public school students in ce

Interview with Donna Maxey Donna Maxey is the founder of Race Talks, a conversation series that gives people a safe place to talk about racial issues and learn from each other. Her own experiences make her uniquely qualified to lead these discussions with compassion, understanding, and clear-sighted vision. From growing up in the thriving Black community of Albina, which was later displaced to make way for a freeway; to teaching children (and adults) of all ages, Donna has ex

Interview with Ona Porter Ona Porter believes in people: if you give them the right tools, they’ll thrive. She’s been an advocate and an educator in one form or another from Texas to the Caribbean and now in New Mexico. Her organization, Prosperity WORKS!, helps low-income families lift themselves out of poverty by saving to purchase an asset (a house, a college education, or a business).  What these people have achieved is just incredible. Here’s Ona to tell the story… Prosp

Jo Noren is a gifted gardener. Having retired from teaching kindergarten, she’s now able to combine her love for gardening with her love for teaching by assisting with the school garden at Mary Woodward Elementary School. Amazingly, this public school has a two-acre garden. The property is owned by the city of Tigard, but the school has full use of it. And use it, they do! Jo and her colleague, Nancy Ross, are the Garden Coordinators for the school. They work with the teacher

Interview with Kristina Golmohammadi Kristina is a teaching artist with the Center for Arts Education in New York City. She uses theater to teach creative thinking skills, social studies and even English as a second language. She truly has a gift. She loves her students to their core and she calls forth from them insights and qualities they didn’t know they had. Not only that, she also walks beside them and demands the same thing of herself. Here is her story... Back home in