Time, Change, and Complacency

Posted on September 10, 2012 by zoeweil
Image courtesy Edwin Barkdoll.

We dropped our son off at college a couple of weeks ago. After returning from the 16 hour round trip drive, my husband and I and our three dogs walked down to the ocean at sunset. At one point we were standing by a pool formed at low tide by a ring of rocks. I recalled that when my son was three years old, he waded and played in this pool, and I took a photo of him. Now my husband was taking a very different photo, and our son was in college. The mark of time was suddenly so stark.

But while the passage of time has altered his life, and ours, enormously, little seems to have changed on Patten Bay. The long-tailed ducks still come and congregate in the winter in chatty groups just offshore; the seals bask on the rocks and bark in summer. The loons call. The ospreys return in the spring, as do the herons. The grass and beach heather still grow in the same spots. And while the small rocks move and shift, the big ones stand as seemingly everlasting totems. The sun makes its arc, sometimes narrow, sometimes wide, depending on the season, but predictably, year after year.

And so it is easy to imagine that it will always be this way. The changes we make to the environment – unless they entail clear cuts or mountaintop removals – usually happen slowly. A housing development here. A new shopping center there. A new cottage on the shore. And only over time do we notice how much has changed; how the growth in our human population results in an inexorable encroachment on wilderness.

I’m lucky that the 16 years between the photo that I took of this pool when my son was three, and the photo my husband took a couple of weeks ago, present a generally unchanged landscape. But I remind myself not to be misled. The landscapes, here and across the globe, are changing. The water comes up higher as the seas rise. The oceans are acidifying, and the corals are dying. So many species of fish of are disappearing. It’s critical that we don’t let our inability to easily see visible changes blind us to the realities occurring all around us. If we love this earth, as I so dearly do, we must protect what we love and not become complacent.

~ Zoe

Zoe Weil, President, Institute for Humane Education
Author of Most Good, Least Harm, Above All, Be Kind, and The Power and Promise of Humane Education
My TEDxConejo talk: “Solutionaries”
My TEDxDirigo talk: “The World Becomes What You Teach“

Get tickets now for the October 13 NYC debut of my 1-woman show — My Ongoing Problems with Kindness: Confessions of MOGO Girl – at United Solo, the world’s largest solo theatre festival.

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Take the Plunge

Posted on October 12, 2011 by zoeweil
Unless it is very hot outside and the water very warm, I always find it tough entering a pond, lake, or ocean to swim. While most people I know just dive right in, I can take 15 minutes of slowly inching my way deeper before I get up the nerve to submerge. I go through all sorts of mental gymnastics, asking why am I doing this, do I really want to, and trying to convince myself that maybe up to my hips is far enough. Then I mildly berate myself for my cowardice, remind myself how good I’ll feel afterwards, and give myself a talking to about experiencing life in all its aspects. Eventually I take the plunge.

And so it was last weekend at Otter Bog. I had spent a couple of hours scraping out the accumulated poop and pee of who knows how many mice who’d made their home in the oven and cupboards in our cabin over numerous winters. To say it was a disgusting job is an understatement. I felt so gross. The pond, sparkling in the sun and reflecting the few puffy clouds overhead, beckoned. I’d get to swim by the big beaver lodge and alongside the heath. I’d clean off the mouse poop that had surely bedecked me despite the latex gloves I wore. My dog, Elsie, was already swimming in circles, just waiting for me to join her. But it still took forever for me to slowly, painstakingly, enter the cold September water.

Which is a metaphor for something, isn’t it? Change is hard, which is how I see going from a comfortable body temperature on a seventy-five degree, breezy day to entering a sixty-degree pond. And yet, stretching ourselves beyond our comfort zone, exploring and experiencing more of what life has to offer, is compelling. Life is dull without new experiences and opportunities.

And those opportunities are myriad. They reside in every choice we make: to eat something healthy and humane instead of the same old stuff offered in our mainstream culture; to volunteer where we are needed and feel the joy of giving instead of spending those two hours on Facebook; to learn something new that might change our life and choices for the better, instead of watching a reality show or American Idol or another sitcom; to donate money to a cause in which we believe, instead of buying a new pair of shoes or earrings; to mindfully put legs on a dream or vision instead of slipping into the rut of our daily norms.

Take the plunge. You’ll feel better afterwards.

For a humane world,

Zoe Weil, President, Institute for Humane Education
Author of Most Good, Least Harm, Above All, Be Kind, and The Power and Promise of Humane Education
My TEDx talk: “The World Becomes What You Teach“

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A Brief, Gorgeous Present

Posted on September 19, 2011 by zoeweil

In July, I wrote about my intention to get a tattoo, and on August 22, I found myself in a tattoo parlor with my 18-year-old son, watching a Star Trek episode on my laptop in order to endure the hour of pain as I did something so utterly and bizarrely out of character. As I’ve pondered for two weeks about what I wanted to write about the experience on my blog, I found that I would either need to write a chapter-length account, or just share a poem. I’ve chosen the latter, my ode to my new tattoo.

They say you become more of who you are as you age
(neural pathways so deeply etched it would take a deluge to shift them),
and boy is that true
as I try not to react to every trigger
even faster than the last.

So how can I explain a big tattoo on my back?
Me, of all people,
who swore I’d never,
ever,
get a tattoo.

Me with a coward’s tolerance to pain
(who can moan and complain about a paper cut and has to hum audibly when getting a shot)
under the gun for a godawful hour
to stain my skin
with a permanent mark

of transformation (there’s the rub)

A luna moth has alit on my spine,
a spine that caused me no end of grief for thirty years,
and then mysteriously stopped hurting;

A luna moth,
caterpillar dissolving into genetic goo
to emerge completely changed,
a reminder that this DNA does not mean
we’re stuck forever in our ever deepening ruts;

A luna moth who lives for one week,
(only to mate and reproduce, without even a digestive tract);
just joy and beauty for a brief, gorgeous present.

Imagine that.
A brief, gorgeous present
permanently etched on my back.

Zoe Weil, President, Institute for Humane Education
Author of Most Good, Least Harm, Above All, Be Kind, and The Power and Promise of Humane Education
My TEDx talk: “The World Becomes What You Teach”

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Do You Tune Out or Tune In to Atrocities?

Posted on August 15, 2011 by zoeweil

Zoe’s been busy with speaking & traveling and didn’t have time to write a blog post for today, so here’s a repost from 11/19/10. Enjoy!

I’ve always been struck by people saying that they don’t want to know about a particular atrocity or cruelty or problem in the world. It’s not uncommon to hear this from adults (though rarely from youth). I think the motivation to avoid new knowledge stems from people’s desire to live with integrity. That might sound like an odd statement, but if you learn something that calls into question choices you make, and you really don’t want to change, then you’ll be faced with the unpleasant experience of living without integrity. Better not to know. Ignorance is bliss after all.

But I’m struck by this head-in-the-sand behavior because it’s foreign to me. I’ve always wanted to know. Even if I am unready or unwilling to make a different choice, I’d rather know and live with my discomfort than not know. I’d rather have the opportunity to live more closely aligned with my values.

Over time, though, I’m beginning to understand the disinclination to know. I do get tired of all the bad news, of learning about more problems, of facing my own lack of integrity. This fatigue is helping me understand those people who say, “Don’t tell me about _______. I don’t want to know.” And understanding is a good thing. It helps me build bridges and offer smaller invitations. It helps me teach more wisely and carefully and inspire baby steps toward knowing. It keeps me from being self-righteous, and helps me maintain some humility.

Still, even when I get tired, I know there’s no other path for me. Maybe I’ll take a brief respite from the myriad books and videos that expose me to the grave and horrible problems in the world, but not for long. There’s work to do, and I don’t know how else to live with myself or to live in this imperfect world that needs our good work.

What about you?

Zoe Weil, President, Institute for Humane Education
Author of Most Good, Least Harm, Above All, Be Kind, and The Power and Promise of Humane Education
My TEDx talk: “The World Becomes What You Teach“

Image courtesy of Identity Photogr@phy via Creative Commons.

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Do You Tune Out or Tune in To Atrocities?

Posted on November 19, 2010 by zoeweil

I’ve always been struck by people saying that they don’t want to know about a particular atrocity or cruelty or problem in the world. It’s not uncommon to hear this from adults (though rarely from youth). I think the motivation to avoid new knowledge stems from people’s desire to live with integrity. That might sound like an odd statement, but if you learn something that calls into question choices you make, and you really don’t want to change, then you’ll be faced with the unpleasant experience of living without integrity. Better not to know. Ignorance is bliss after all.

But I’m struck by this head-in-the-sand behavior because it’s foreign to me. I’ve always wanted to know. Even if I am unready or unwilling to make a different choice, I’d rather know and live with my discomfort than not know. I’d rather have the opportunity to live more closely aligned with my values.

Over time, though, I’m beginning to understand the disinclination to know. I do get tired of all the bad news, of learning about more problems, of facing my own lack of integrity. This fatigue is helping me understand those people who say, “Don’t tell me about _______. I don’t want to know.” And understanding is a good thing. It helps me build bridges and offer smaller invitations. It helps me teach more wisely and carefully and inspire baby steps toward knowing. It keeps me from being self-righteous, and helps me maintain some humility.

Still, even when I get tired, I know there’s no other path for me. Maybe I’ll take a brief respite from the myriad books and videos that expose me to the grave and horrible problems in the world, but not for long. There’s work to do, and I don’t know how else to live with myself or to live in this imperfect world that needs our good work.

What about you?

Zoe Weil
Author of Most Good, Least Harm

Image courtesy of Identity Photogr@phy via Creative Commons.

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How Do We Change?

Posted on July 13, 2009 by zoeweil

Note: Zoe’s on vacation this week, so this is a repost that was originally posted 6/30/08.

Artist and changemaker Chris Jordan asks several questions in his fascinating presentation at the TED conference. Through his powerful photographs of human behavior and mass consumption, Jordan attempts to make our unconscious societal choices conscious so that we can change destructive and unhealthy behaviors and systems. Jordan’s captivating wall-sized photographs depict, in a compelling and often visually stunning manner, such mundane realities as the number of plastic cups we use on airplane flights in the U.S. each day or the number of people who die from smoking cigarettes every year. By making our societal choices accessible in this way, he invites viewers to reflect upon their own individual contributions (presumably both positive and negative) to the world. I consider Jordan’s work to be a spectacular example of humane education through art.

But what I found most compelling about this particular presentation was his question to the audience. How do we change?

It’s an old question with a long pedigree of distinguished and not-so-distinguished answers. Psychologists, philosophers, anthropologists, preachers, and advertisers alike have all sought to understand the forces that mold us, and then to mold us toward their own aims.

This is true for humane educators as well. The primary goal of humane education is to provide people with the knowledge, tools, and motivation to create a peaceful and humane world. Note that humane education seeks to do more than provide relevant information and skills; it must also instill desire to create a good world and motivate its recipients to be engaged changemakers. We humane educators are in the influence business, attempting to answer the question “How do we change?” so that we can help our students change themselves and the world for the better.

From my perspective as a humane educator, I believe that we change:

  • By emulating those who inspire us most (so humane educators must model a positive message as fully as possible)
  • Through daily practice and a commitment to live with integrity (so humane educators must provide maps for such a practice)
  • When the choices before us include convenient, healthy, and positive options (so humane educators must offer these and work toward their development)
  • When we are part of healthy systems and live in healthy situations (so humane educators must help create such systems and situations for our students)
  • With support from others who also strive to change for the better (so humane educators must provide such support)
  • By pursuing lifelong learning and wisdom (so humane educators must inspire others so that they are passionate about learning)
  • When we have hope (so humane educators must offer painful truths about current realities in ways that do not create despair but rather engender enthusiasm for new possibilities)

Our task as humane educators is to create change, and so we must seek to answer Jordan’s question so that our work has the greatest impact. I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas for answering this perennial question.

~ Zoe

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Creating Change/Changing Minds

Posted on May 13, 2009 by zoeweil

Here’s another quote from Joshua Ramo’s The Age of the Unthinkable:

“There is nothing more horrible than to walk that faulty line between new and old, seeing what the future holds, screaming about it in your art or your writing, and finding only mute incomprehension or dismissal in your audience.”

When I read this line, I put a bunch of exclamations next to it. This is how I often feel when I speak about humane education and the need for a paradigm shift about the very purpose of schooling. For many years I’ve been “screaming” about the need to change the way we think about education and about the necessity for humane education (which gives people the knowledge, tools, and inspiration to become conscious choicemakers and engaged changemakers for a peaceful, sustainable, and humane world) to not only solve our gravest challenges, but to prevent future problems from arising.

And while I’ve been “screaming,” No Child Left Behind was passed — a worthy vision so terribly misguided, that now we have even less time for relevant education for a changing world, and even more standardized tests that don’t promote critical or creative thinking.

I believe that Barack Obama understands this, but the fault line between new and old in terms of education is huge, and too many in Congress and our schools still do not really see what the future holds. So speak out. Let Barack Obama and Arne Duncan and your own senators and representatives and school boards and principals know what you think. If we “scream” together, if you join your school board, or change education from within as a teacher, we may soon find that mute incomprehension and dismissal change to full embrace of educational change.

~ Zoe

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For a Truly New and Better World, We Must Change Destructive Systems

Posted on January 19, 2009 by zoeweil

So much rides on tomorrow’s inauguration of Barack Obama as President of the United States. There are so many hopes wrapped up in the promise of his administration, but as we have already seen during the past two months since the election, many systems in government and society are flawed, and those flaws exacerbate individual frailty, making them even harder to overcome (see my post on the Stanford Prison Experiments and the book, The Lucifer Effect, for more on this). Governor Bill Richardson withdrew as potential Secretary of Commerce because of investigations of corruption; Tim Geithner, the nominee for Secretary of the Treasury, made a “mistake” on his taxes, resulting in a failure to pay $34,000 to the IRS; Rod Blagojevich has been accused of trying to sell Barack Obama’s vacated Senate seat for money or favors or both. I believe these men have fallen victim not only to their own lack of integrity and care, but also to systems that dramatically enable their failures.

I believe that Barack Obama has the potential to be a truly great president, to lead in ways that will restore, repair, renew, and build a better future. But despite my optimism and near-desperate hope, I know that he cannot achieve great change unless together we work to change the systems that at best promote inadequate solutions and at worst encourage corruption. These current systems will continually derail President Obama and all those working to solve the various problems that confront the U.S. and the world unless we change them.

Arne Duncan, the nominee for Secretary of Education, cannot fix our public education crises without our effort, our input, and our hard work. The faulty systems at play in public education will prevent real change, unless together we voice our ideas and our offer new systems, models, and approaches that work. This is a call to humane educators everywhere to take part in educational transformation.

Tom Vilsack, the nominee for Secretary of Agriculture, is unlikely to provide healthy, sustainable, and humane food to people unless the current systems that perpetuate factory farming, monoculture agriculture, rampant pesticide, antibiotic, and hormone use, poor use of water and soil resources, etc., are changed. Given the vested interests in the current agricultural approaches, and the USDA’s marriage to these systems, this will be virtually impossible to do unless we change the systems.

We can change systems, and tomorrow should mark not just the historic election of Barack Obama, not just an unprecedented gathering of supporters vesting him with all their hopes and dreams, but a commitment from all of us to learn, think, and act — to use what I have called the 3 Is: to Inquire, Introspect, and act with Integrity in order to engage ourselves fully in the true potential of President Obama’s administration. It will not be easy, because the faulty systems and our own frailties will work against even the greatest and most brilliant of changemakers. But we must commit ourselves to do our best.

Please don’t think of tomorrow as a day simply to celebrate a future that you hope will be better. Beyond a celebration, tomorrow is the day to dedicate your life, your work, and your passion for justice, peace, and restoration toward full engagement. Doing so can help ensure that we’ll all be celebrating each January for the next four years, because together we will have succeeded in helping President Obama do the job this country elected him to do.

Today is Martin Luther King, Jr. day. Dr. King had a dream. It’s been partially fulfilled. Now let’s make sure we work to fulfill the full promise of a healthy, peaceful future for all.

~ Zoe

Image courtesy of transplanted mountaineer via Creative Commons.

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We Begin Today

Posted on November 5, 2008 by zoeweil

Less than ten hours after Barack Obama has won the presidency of the United States, it is already a cliché to call this moment historic. There is so much I am feeling and thinking this morning, so much I could write about, and so much that smarter, wiser, more eloquent people than I have already said and will say in the coming days, but I cannot let this moment pass without saying something.

When President-elect Barack Obama spoke at Grant Park last night in Chicago, he said this:

“What began twenty-one months ago in the depths of winter must not end on this autumn night. This victory alone is not the change we seek – it is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. It cannot happen without you. So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism; of service and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other.”

Never in my lifetime have I heard a president call upon us to shoulder the vast responsibilities for solving our challenges. I know President Kennedy asked us to do this, but I was a baby then, and so this is a first for me and for most in the United States. I’ve been waiting for a morning like this all my life. I’ve been waiting for a leader to call upon our best qualities, to ask us to harness our talents and skills for a better nation and a better world, and to draw energy from our passion for justice, peace, and a humane, restored planet. I’ve been waiting for a leader who, rather than tear down solar panels on the White House roof, or tell me to go shop, or play upon my fears, instead calls upon my courage and perseverance with hope as my source of motivation.

If we are to heal this planet, help usher in peace, stop the exploitation and oppression of people and animals across our globe, transform outdated systems that don’t serve our economic interests, all of us will have to bring our greatest creativity, wisdom, compassion, and hard work to the task. Today we have a president-elect who will remind us of this and demand our participation. And young people in school this morning, and tomorrow, and for at least the next four years, will grow up knowing they have a role to play in perfecting this union.

With great hope for a better future,

~ Zoe

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The 7th Key to MOGO: Strive for Balance with Your Relationships

Posted on October 10, 2008 by zoeweil

When we choose to learn about the effects of our choices (on ourselves, other people, animals, and the environment), and when, as a result of our commitment to learning, we adopt the MOGO principle to do the most good and the least harm in relation to everyone, we inevitably make changes in our lives. We might change our shopping habits, our diet, our recreation and entertainment choices, our work, our parenting, our activism, and more. And our new choices – positive though they may be – may be imposed (to greater and lesser degrees) on our family members, associates, and friends. Or, if not imposed, our choices may certainly impact our loved ones.

It’s one thing to choose to change; it’s another to have unasked for change suddenly thrust upon you. And so, an individual in the process of using the 3 Is (Inquiry, Introspection, and Integrity) to make MOGO choices faces a quandary: How can we live with integrity and respect the different path our loved ones may be on?

In my upcoming book, Most Good, Least Harm: A Simple Principle for a Better World and a Meaningful Life, I describe 7 Keys to MOGO. The last key, and perhaps the one that knits the others together, is “Strive for Balance.” We will face both internal and external challenges in choosing a MOGO life — one of which is respecting the different perspectives of our friends and family. By compromising, accepting limitations, and striving to find a balance that preserves and strengthens our relationships while making new choices in our lives, we allow ourselves to embody MOGO more fully.

~ Zoe

Image courtesy of Brent and MariLynn.

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