Thursday 5 February 2015

The moment to show up



A theme that, happily, seems to have tipped into common-ish currency at the moment is that The Moments Matter.  The importance of moments is not new news. Nor, alas, is it new news that people can find this difficult in practice:  liking to make sense of things, our minds are active in seeking/creating the patterns that lend us the warm glow of understanding.  And we plan - of course we do - for tomorrow, next week, next year.

Two days ago I shipped Child1 off to take her part in the children’s chorus of a touring professional musical production.   She’s stepping up and stepping out.  I’m a proud Mum.  Not because of what she is doing – I’m delighted for her that she’s doing something she loves.  But because when she found out there were auditions, she said yes to the experience. And she showed up.  On dress rehearsal day, feeling nervous, not sure what would happen, worried she’d make mistakes, she showed up again. First night – showed up. Press night – smiled even more; showed up.
 
Like Child2 and many children, before anxiety prevents, she’ll keep showing up, in the moment. That’s really something to celebrate.


As we get older, we may need to unlearn a few things in order to retune our capacity for moments, to nurture our ability to live more momentously.  A recent sell-out  at the Royal Society for Arts and Manufacture (RSA) was Frederic Laloux, author of Reinventing Organisations, concerning how to become a soulful organisation.  Soulfulness in organisations, with standing room only. What a moment.  On YouTube you can hear his views, including a comment on lack of soul in education.

And so to another find through the RSA: STEAM Co.  This organisation wants to get Arts into relationship with the STEM curriculum, helping children nurture their creativity in a less boxed way.  And, thanks to STEAM Co, I have a copy of Seth Godin’s What to Do When It’s Your Turn (and it’s always your turn).  I’m lending it to my daughter next, although she may need it less than me.  To quote from Godin’s text, "What’s better – finding out that everything is OK (you got an A) or learning something?. . . The prevailing system of the educational-industrial complex puts the fear of a ‘C’ in us. . . What if instead, we decided to opt into a different path, the path of always learning?

And have you heard of the School for Health and Care Radicals?  It’s another ‘show up, choose the moment’ thing, although its intentions are for transformation (one moment at a time).
 
I could go on, because the voices are becoming many and louder.  The interest is in what might choicefully be considered and done, moment by moment, in service of a sustainable and beneficial future.

A quote from poet Mary Oliver sits by my desk: "To pay attention. This is our endless and proper work."  Combining that with Godin’s instruction that ‘it’s always your turn’ could make for an interesting and generative, possibly momentous, 2015.



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