The Persistence of Visions
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The Persistence of Visions (Reflections on living from the classroom and elsewhere) by Nelson R. ―Buzz‖ Kellogg 2 Persistence of Visions (Reflections on living from the classroom and elsewhere) © 1999 Nelson R. Kellogg all rights reserved Do not copy or distribute without author‘s permission 3 The Persistence of Visions (Reflections on living from the classroom and elsewhere) Table of Contents Preface 6 Introduction Upward not Northward; Out of FlatlandAltogether 9 Part One On Gratitude 27 Chapter 1: Childhood and the Intimations of Gratitude 27 Chapter 2: Why Have We Forgotten Gratitude 44 Chapter 3: Beyond Childhood: cultivating an even deeper gratitude 66 Part Two Understanding Surrogates 89 Chapter 4: The Power of Surrogates 89 section i) Money Changes 90 section ii) The Invisible Hand meets the Pastoral Ideal 94 section iii) And Your Point Is? 99 Chapter 5: A World of Acceleration (or, why jump from a window?) 120 section i) A brief excursion by way of physics 121 section ii) Another brief excursion in accelerating acceleration: global free-market capitalism 131 section iii) Uncle Hilding: my first introduction to market capitalism 138 section iv) Why do people jump out of windows? 144 Chapter 6: The Great Divergence 175 section i) When skating on thin ice, just skate faster 177 section ii) Pay no attention to the man behind the screen 188 section iii) Can we ever go home again? 198 4 Part Three Deep Practice, Synthesis, and Envisioning (Thoughts on conversation, community, education, and what is worth doing) 209 Chapter 7: When Questions Come of Age 209 section i) A river runs through it (the stages of life) 209 section ii) When are we available for wisdom? 217 section iii) Keeping track of your life and telling stories 227 section iv) A note on mortality 236 Chapter 8: Holography, Deep Practice, and Synthesis: Thoughts on education 244 section i) Information, Knowledge, and Wisdom 244 section ii) On holography: A possible framework for envisioning 250 section iii) The romance of insight and the grand adventure of being human 264 Chapter 8, continued section iv) Why should we seek wisdom? 278 section v) What ARE we doing? The evolution of the university and the atrophy of synthesis 285 section vi) The future of education, formal and informal 298 section vii) The Conversational Community: Reading out from the university 322 5 6 Preface — On Reading this Book Over the years I have lost what used to be my writer‘s voice. Actually, my speaking voice and my writer‘s voice have essentially become one and the same. I write the way I speak and vice versa, and this is most evidently the case when I am writing about something about which I care deeply. Invariably when I give a manuscript to a friend to read, one of their first responses back to me is, ―Well, I can certainly hear your voice in it. Your presence is right there in it.‖ With this in mind, let me make a brief explanation of how this book is put together, and how it may help to read it. I believe in the power of stories. I believe that a story, told from the compassionate heart of experience and listened to with the understanding heart, can have deeper effect, deeper meaning, and ultimately even be more true, than the actual contents of its plot. Stories come in all varieties, and have been used throughout time and across cultures to convey the best wisdoms the teller has to offer. In contemporary society we tend to devalue stories if we seek advice or knowledge. We want the facts, and those analyzed. If we think we are being led out of our constructs of reason and facts by someone, we might dismiss what they have to say with the words, ―Oh, that‘s just a story!‖ I think we are on very slippery territory if we do not embrace the power of story if we truly seek wisdom. If we seek visions, stories are indispensable. Although I am not engaged in a work of fiction with this book, I still see what I do as essentially telling stories. I recently read a wonderful little essay by a storyteller, and I‘d like to quote from her here because her words are a wonderful example of the telling heart. The direct involvement in becoming the story makes it an experience, one that occurs at the moment of the telling. A story is not an explanation. It is lived between teller and listener; it resonates far beyond the content. The text alone, separated from the enlivening experience, can be analyzed, but the result is different. It is not a transformative event. In other words, genuine story manifests when it is heard in the moment, when the listener is drawn out of self-consciousness--the thinking mind held entranced by the 7 ongoing logic of the narrative--and becomes everything in the story. The meaning and the power of the story do not reside in the content alone; rather they unfold in the dynamic processes of listening/creating. The storytelling is potent because it is physical experience. The whole person is engaged in the making of meaning and story. Mind, body, and heart are synchronized and activated. The embodied listener is alert, with senses heightened, and naturally creates image and meaning from association, feeling, memory, dream, and a ceaseless source of archetypal symbols within. It is this holistic activity of listening, not the conceptual content of the text or plot alone, where true learning takes place. During the event, the inherent and natural wisdom of ear, eye, and heart are given voice. (from ―Through the Story‘s Terror,‖ by Laura Simms, Parabola, volume 23, no. 3, 1998, pp. 46, 47) The topics discussed in this book are at the core of my being. I care intensely about them, and these thoughts animate my life. In the telling of each section and chapter, I am quite literally speaking. I cannot say whether or not they will resonate for every reader, for different listeners respond to different tellers. Still, as I speak out what is in my heart and mind, I am also paying attention to the alertness, engagement, possible points of confusion, and even body language of an imaginary audience. That audience picture comes from somewhere, probably including from a lot of interwoven memories of actual audiences, but perhaps from other sources as well. As I let myself become a storyteller, it is the implicit dialogue that tells me if the deeper truths are resonating. Taking on this role, when I pay attention to the process, also tells me when enough is enough, when bridges need to be presented, and simply when to lighten up. It is with this awareness and sensibility that I try to write, and informs the overall structure of this book. Each chapter I see as a narrative, even when interspersed with digressions that may not appear of themselves to be very story like. I try to say what I need to say, and hope that each section has something of a narrative arc to it, or, in musical terms, a theme, a development, and a resolution, occurring within an experiential arc. For this reason, I have left out of the main text a lot of detail, quotes, data, sources, and even some telling 8 vignettes. It would be well and good to leave them out if the stories were for imaginal purposes only, but these reflections are meant to connect to what our lives are often about, and what we may wish to attend to instead. In order to do justice to any telling of the patterns of our lives, therefore, I owe it to the reader to provide grounding for these ruminations. The functions of the extensive ―Notes‖ at the end of each chapter, is much more than a bibliography. The ―Notes‖ do contain bibliographic sources, organized according to themes raised in the text. There are also a host of other examples, further digressions, and anecdotes with which I wrestled at times, considering that they should be part of the primary text. However, as I read through these ideas, I tried to keep the chapters in the story-telling voice. Anything that went beyond what seemed to constitute a good telling, within an experiential arc of active listening, I left off and pursued in the ―Chapter Notes.‖ My suggestion, therefore, would be to read the book in its large ―Parts,‖ or at least in chapters, and then to read the associated notes sections, not so much for data-buttressing, but rather as a companion text. This is only a suggestion. Of course you will decide how you wish to approach the writing. More importantly, you will decide if the writing is worthy, and if the telling compels. I am most grateful to share some thoughts with you. 9 Introduction — Upward Not Northward; Out of Flatland Altogether We must always follow somebody looking for truth, and we must always run away from anyone who finds it. - Andre Gide It is so difficult to find the beginning. Or, better: it is difficult to begin at the beginning. And not try to go further back. - Ludwig Wittgensteini This book is about promptings, questions, desires, and resolutions. It is about things that have happened while I was busy teaching, among other pursuits, but primarily while teaching. This book comes from paying attention to what feels authentic and what feels like a distraction. It comes from living with an extremely low tolerance for putting aside spiritual and intellectual dissonance, while just getting on with things, although there have been many times when I wished I could do just that.