Center for Purposeful Leadership

Wednesday Wisdom (or Wit) from Heartland

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The Benefits of Poetry for Professionals
by John Coleman  | November 27, 2012

Wallace Stevens was one of America's greatest poets. The author of "The Emperor of Ice-Cream"and "The Idea of Order at Key West" was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1955 and offered a prestigious faculty position at Harvard University. Stevens turned it down. He didn't want to give up his position as Vice President of the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company.

This lyrically inclined insurance executive was far from alone in occupying the intersect of business and poetry. 

Wednesday Wisdom (or Wit) from Heartland

Innovation Anyone? 
The word innovation derives from the Latin word innovates, which is the noun form of innovare "to renew or change," stemming from in—"into" + novus—"new". 

Heartland programs are often considered an innovation or imagination super-boost. 

How are you allowing time for your imagination and innate innovation to emerge?

Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution.
Albert Einstein

Going forward, we are convinced, the world increasingly will be divided between high imagination-enabling countries, which encourage and enable the imagination and extras of their people, and low imagination-enabling countries, which suppress or simply fail to develop their people’s creative capacities and abilities to spark new ideas, start up new industries and nurture the own “extra.”  America has been the world’s leading high imagination-enabling country and now it needs to become hyper-high-imagination-enabling society.  
That Used to Be Us by Thomas Friedman and Michael Mandelbaum, 2011

US employers rate creativity/innovation among the top five skill that will increase in importance over

Martin Luther King

Lord, who can be trusted with power,
and who may act in your place?
Those with a passion for justice,
who speak the truth from their hearts;
who have let go of selfish interests
and grown beyond their own lives;
who see the wretched as their family
and the poor as their flesh and blood.
They alone are impartial
and worthy of the people's trust.
Their compassion lights up the whole earth,
and their kindness endures forever.

(A Book of Psalms, translations by Stephen Mitchell)

Thank you to Panhala

Web version: www.panhala.net/Archive <http://www.panhala.net/Archive/In_Memory_of_MLK.html>  

 

 

Wednesday Wisdom (or Wit) from Heartland

A friend sent this link not long ago. It's a light touch to a serious subject.

Follow the Frog

You don't have to go to the ends of the Earth to save the rainforest. Just Follow the Frog! The Rainforest Alliance is a nonprofit conservation organization that holds Charity Navigator's highest rating of Four Stars.

What's behind the green frog seal? Only farms that meet rigorous sustainability criteria earn the right to use the Rainforest Alliance Certified seal. These criteria address all of the three pillars of sustainability -- environmental protection, social equity and economic viability -- and farms are evaluated by independent, third-party auditors. Learn more about Rainforest Alliance Certificationand its impacts.

The Art of Opening the Circle to be in Essential Conversation

Continuing the journey around the Convening Wheel, we find ourselves at the 7^th Aspect, Essential Conversation, which allows for meaningful exchange in an atmosphere of trust and lays the groundwork for the 8^th Aspect, Creation, to be possible.

We are now ready for something new to emerge from the authentic engagement of the group.

• Margaret Wheatley says, “Conversation is how humans think together.” "Opening the circle," by allowing for reflections and comments from anyone in the group who feels compelled to speak, we can process what we have heard and allow something that is more than the sum of the parts to emerge. 
  
  Conversation is most powerful when personal story telling and deep listening are present.  It is also about surfacing all that arises out of the listening and sharing process in a mindful and respectful way:

- We can sense the “questions that lie beneath the questions” to let emerge what is essential.

- We can become aligned with what is at the Heart of the Matter as a collective group – expressing shared core values and vision. 

Wednesday Wisdom (or Wit) from Heartland

There are many ways to consider beginning a new year. The article below offers creative and generative ideas to consider.

5 Ways to Begin Designing Your Life in 2013

TIM BROWN, CEO at IDEO

Great designers don’t just do design, they live design. Like them, we can learn how to practice design thinking principles both at work and at home.

As you start designing your life in 2013, here are five ways to begin:

1. Be optimistic, collaborative, and generative.
There’s something wonderfully gratifying about creating something new, whether it’s an award-winning design or a home-cooked meal.

2. Think of life as a prototype.
Conduct experiments, make discoveries, change as needed. Any process can be re-examined and tweaked. Look for opportunities to turn a process into a project with a tangible outcome. 

3. Don't ask "what?" ask "why?"
Instead of accepting a given constraint, ask whether this is the right problem to be solving.

4. Demand divergent options.
Don’t settle for the first good idea that comes to mind or seize on the first promising solution presented to you. Explore divergent options—and then set a deadline so you know when to move on.

5. Once a day, deeply observe the ordinary.
Make it a rule that at least once a day you will stop and take a second look at some ordinary situation that you would normally look at only once (or not at all). Get out in the world and be inspired by people.

Happy designing!