Notice that as soon as something around you changes, you change in response to it. You respond all the time to your environment. A lot of the time you are completely aware of these changes. In Solution Focus we make this natural process of change work for us.*
Rayyya Ghul

 [I]f anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile.**
Jesus of Nazareth

Margaret Mead would keep her hate mail and
use the anger she felt when rereading it in order
to regain her energy when tired;
She was using the letter-writer’s criticism and threat
for being an agent rather than victim.

Contrast this with a university student demanding safe space,
Effectively remaining a victim when
really they are less fragile than they know:
I was feeling bombarded by a lot of viewpoints
that really go against my dearly and closely held beliefs.^

Jesus’ words perhaps have the appearance of
encouraging victimisation,
But on closer examination, we see the victimised
taking the initiative and becoming an agent,
Calling out wrongdoing with goodness –
For instance, a Roman soldier demanding a Hebrew
carry their pack for one mile
would likely get into trouble if they accepted the
offer of a second mile.

Of goodness, Iris Murdoch writes:
[Good’s] existence is the unmistakable sign
that we are spirit creatures,
attracted by excellence and made for the good.^^

Agency uncovers talents,
Notices energies,
Reaches towards values …
Employing them for the good.

*Rayya Ghul’s The Power of the Next Small Step;
**Matthew 5:39b-41;
Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt’s The Coddling of the American Mind;
^^Iris Murdoch’s The Sovereignty of Good.

Persons of tomorrow, though fully alive as individuals, are also at home in their relationships. Capacities such as loyalty, partnership, friendship, empathy, solidarity, support, nurturance and followership, are necessary ingredients for thriving in the 21st century.*
Maureen O’Hara and Graham Lancaster

Yes, we must continue to read and write and cipher, but we also need to embrace an education for liberating the ability to imagine, to dream, and expand the limits of the possible. … Perhaps I will find it in the future.**
Jean Houston

I’m all for someone knowing who they are,
It’s what my work is all about,
But knowing who we are only makes sense in community,
And community may well be how we come to know
who we are.

However, in the West it seems that
we are living in the age of individualism and
celebrity, and
when we do find each other can
be in the form of “us versus them,”
But this is not the future, and
it is not why we have struggled for so long
only to arrive here, now.

Agnes Varda declared,
There is only one age: alive,^
Which I borrow the style of when I suggest
there is only one future: us.

People from the future know this and
live towards this today:
Only that day dawns to which we are awake.^^

*Maureen O’Hara and Graham Lancaster’s Dancing at the Edge;
**Jean Houston’s A Mythic Life;
^Austin Kleon’s blog: A quote a day;
^^Henry David Thoreau, from Krista Tippett’s Becoming Wise.

Many people live half-lives, turning the rheostat down to a very dim version of what and what they really are.*
Jean Houston

The stakes in good work are necessarily high. Our competence maybe at stake in ordinary, unthinking work, but in good words that is a heartfelt expression of ourselves, we necessarily put our identities to hazard.
David Whyte

We want magic,
But when we discover that magic is
really about turning up,
Staying longer,
Paying attention,
Failing,
Learning,
Trying again –
With no guarantees –
Then we may be tempted to search out
a more convenient path,
BUT:
Inconvenient!
That’s great news …
because it means that most other people
can’t be bothered.
It’s valuable because the very inconvenience of it
makes it scarce.
The stuff that matters is almost always inconvenient.
If it’s not, you might be mistaken about what matters.^

The thing you really want to do
is likely to be inconvenient,
But that’s why we love it;
We see how it matters to you so much that
nothing will stop you.

And because it’s scarce,
It matters to us.

*Jean Houston’s A Mythic Life;
**David Whyte’s Crossing the Unknown Sea;
^Seth Godin’s blog: Inconvenient!

There is something in every one of you that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in yourself. It is the only true guide you will ever need.*
Howard Thurman

Bring it into the breath. Breathe that calling.**
Robert Dilts

You will recognise the genuine when you
come upon it:
Not only will you be good or
successful at being this person
with these skills, you will also
be and do these things
intuitively, and, as a result
you will grow, whilst also
meeting a deep need;
These signs do not milepost
the fake life.

We haven’t arrived,
Life finds us either moving towards
the genuine or the fake, but,
When we find our direction,
The truly wonderful thing is
what the genuine me and genuine you
brings to others.

*Brian McLaren’s God Unbound;
**Stephen Gilligan and Robert Dilts’ The Hero’s Journey,

What I actually saw as my problem is actually a crucial resource.*
Stephen Gilligan

I am reminded of a time
before I identified my talents and abilities,
When some with whom I worked, and
one in particular, were
critical of the way I saw and thought and
behaved.

It turned out what they wanted me to rein back on
what turned out to be my talents, but
what I needed to do was to
use them more adeptly and wisely.

This became my journey, so
when I read Kenneth White’s words,
I sense that he is writing about the kind of
simplicity that lies on the far side of complexity,
My slow journey in the same direction:
religion and philosophy
what I’d learned in churches and schools
were all too heavy
for this travelling life
all that remains to me was poetry
as unobtrusive as breathing
a poetry like the wind
and the maple leaf
that I spoke to myself
moving over the land.**

What I do is not for everyone, and
I am more than content in that, but
what matters most is that
some know it is for them.

*Stephen Gilligan and Robert Dilts’ The Hero’s Journey;
**Philip Newell’s Sacred Earth, Sacred Soul.

After all, a life without a cause is a life without affect.*
Paulo Coelho

*Paulo Coelho’s Aleph.

The Generative Self work suggests that you can do this by integrating the three minds – somatic, cognitive, and the field – to forge a higher state of consciousness.*
Stephen Gilligan

Being creative is not only about thinking: it is about feeling. … Feeling, hunches, subconscious perceptions and intuitions can all play a central part in creative work, and not only in the arts.**
Ken Robinson.

A generative life is a
deeper
life;
It does not lie around on the surface of the
ordinary and everyday.

It is openness and connection that brings us to our generative self:
Openness of mind, of heart, of actions towards all:
Perhaps that was the real quest of this adventure,
the infinite quest for connection with
everything, everyone, everywhere, always –
the quest to let down my barriers,
let go of my agendas and expectations,
and simply open to who and what may come.^

This deeper life equates to
the hero’s journey,
Our protagonist leaving their ordinary existence
for a special world,
Discovering their life not only has an everyday plane,
But also a mythical level through which they see
themselves and everything in a transcending way:
I find … that when we’re in mythic
or spiritual levels of consciousness,
we become citizens of a larger universe
with regard to perception, time, space,
dimensionality, and possibility.^^

What are you going to make?

*Stephen Gilligan and Robert Dilts’ The Hero’s Journey;
**Ken Robinson’s Out of Our Minds;
^Brian McLaren’s God Unbound;
^^Jean Houston’s A Mythic Life.

Essence is not a place or time, an insight or state of mind. It’s the deepest part of our nature, an actual presence that is innate and inborn.*
Jean Houston

entelechy, a Greek word meaning the dynamic purpose that drives us toward realising our essential self*
Jean Houston

There they are again,
Embodied in Jean Houston’s
essence and entelechy:
Theory U’s two inseparable questions –
Who is my True Self?, and
What is my Contribution?;
Also, Joseph Campbell’s equally indivisible
personal and social myths.

We are more than we know,
Makers of beauty and usefulness;
Though we may say we may claim
we are no-one with nothing to bring,
Only surviving a hard life,
It may be exactly here we find our response
To the two questions:
But true healing and transformation
come from being able to sponsor the wound,
Sponsor the demon,
sponsor the shadow.**

Your story and my story –
There’s more to write,
As we turn our attention and imagination
towards our reality:
The problem out writers face isn’t writing.
It’s consciousness.
Attention.
Noticing.^

Carl Jung leaves us with this encouragement
to pay attention:
I am not what happened to me.
I am what I choose to become.^^

So I pursue the purpose in my dream
to help people notice who they are
and what they have, and I become
a whisperer.

*Jean Houston’s A Mythic Life;
**Robert Dilts; Stephen Gilligan and Robert Dilts’ The Hero’s Journey;
^Verlyn Klinkenborg’s Several short sentences about writing;
^^Ken Robinson’s Out of Our Mind.

If you’re serious about changing yourself and your life, you must change your environment.*
Ben Hardy

Influence is itself a watery word: … “The action or fact of flowing in; inflowing, inflow, influx, said of the action of water or other fluids, and of immaterial things.”**
Robert Macfarlane

An environment can be
a person, an idea, a role, a place, a narrative, a group, an influencer, a book, and more –
When we appreciate how environments
are places of influence, then
it makes sense to choose carefully and wisely.

The best environments are completely
interactive and mutual –
We must be careful around those that are not,
Especially when we are that environment
to others.

*Ben Hardy’s Personality Isn’t Permanent;
**Robert Macfarlane’s Landmarks.

Time is where eternity unfolds. The contemplative has always recognised the morning as the time to welcome the new day with a sense of creative expectation and openhandedness.*
John O’Donohue

[I]t is essential to put yourself in the unconditional service of the future possibility that is wanting to emerge. Viewed from this angle, presencing is about dialogue with the future possibility that wants to emerge.**
Otto Scharmer

At around 6.45am each morning,
I begin gathering thoughts and ideas from
many people and places,
Sifting and mixing the past, the present and
the future, cooking up
an anticipation and expectation of
what might be possible,
Something I can bring to another as a gift today.

When you dance on the edge of infinity,
there’s always enough …
because you aren’t taking opportunity
from anyone else, you’re creating it.^

*John O’Donohue’s Benedictus;
**Otto Scharmer’s Theory U;
^Seth Godin’s The Song of Significance.