Learning journey – from the Shire to the Shambhala Institute

June 26, 2005

Global Village Square and power of questions and conversations:
On Monday me and Alan hopped on a shuttle bus and journeyed to Halifax. The landscape in Nova Scotia is flat and green. For miles and miles, hours and hours all one sees are young forests and lakes…Despite my love for extreme landscapes, mountains, I always end up in flat geographies, I wonder what that means…
Halifax is a mellow city with a small center, with a constant breeze from the sea. We had half a day there which I spent walking around, visiting bookshops and getting a sense of the city. While in Halifax, I noticed that I had not missed being in the city…and I wasn’t as excited as Alan to visit the Irish pub at night. My time at Shire is an experiment about being away from the city culture and if I can do it for three months, I might be able to do it for a life time…so often I am checking with myself about this.
On Tuesday we moved to Mount St. Vincent University to attend the Global Village Square that was offered by the Shambhala Institute. (The Shambhala Institute is a nonprofit, organization based in Halifax. It creates powerful learning environments that support the deeper understanding, strength, and skills leaders need to catalyze and sustain positive change in today's complex world. The Institute is committed to joining vision and practicality, and to addressing the tough challenges facing organizations, communities, and societies. www.shambhalainstitute.org) Every summer they organize a one week gathering that is called “Authentic Leadership Summer Program” where a very diverse group of thinkers, developers, organizational change consultants and above all social change agents gather around powerful questions. Questions around development, sustainability, leadership, social change. Program is designed in a way that everyone is a learner and teacher in a very interactive and reflective environment in which both individual and collective learning take place. The underlying thread of the event, space and people gathered is the core question: how can I use my leadership and what kind of leader do I need to be to create a better world?
Global Village Square was an intergenerational gathering of two days that took place before the core program started. There were about 70 people from 30 different countries and backgrounds, ages ranging from 13 to 82. What connected us all was the passion and willingness to explore ways of being, working and living authentically; serving the greater good in our local communities and in the global community as leaders of compassion. There were also 6 grassroots projects from different parts of the world presented as to ground our questions and challenges. There were no speakers or gurus to teach; rather it was a journey into our collective wisdom through genuine dialogue. A hosting team of three, including Tim (who generously sponsored us, the Shire volunteers to attend this gathering) designed a flow for two days that combined Open Space Technology(1) principles with Council Circle(2) practice and World Café(3) . This flow allowed us to work on our personal questions and challenges around our leadership as well as to offer collective wisdom to the questions and challenges of the social projects that were presented.
These kind of gatherings, which I have also been before, could be very intense and overwhelming…at times it feels like mere talking…there is the anticipation of something meaningful to emerge and the anxiety of being able to carry ‘it’ into our day to day lives, rather than leaving ‘it’ as a ‘save-the-world-feel-good-self-gratification-bullshit’...walk the talk and keep your integrity and it’s not always easy, is it? It is a core RESPONSIBILITY…
Well, good news is that when people gather around something they are passionate about and the container and the conditions are created for them to have genuine and quality conversations (there is something about being truly heard, about talking and listening from your heart, or center), something powerful almost always happen, at least in my experience…both for the individuals as long as they are open to one another and for the learning community. Because cross-pollination happens naturally, seeds of inspiration are planted in one another. David Bohm, the quantum physicist, explains this process beautifully:
"...awakening...the process of dialogue itself as a free flow of meaning among all the
participants. In the beginning, people were expressing fixed positions, which they were
tending to defend, but later it became clear that to maintain the feeling of friendship in
the group was much more important than to hold any position. Such friendship has an
impersonal quality in the sense that its establishment does not depend on a close personal relationship between participants. A new kind of mind thus beings to come into being which is based on the development of a common meaning that is constantly transforming in the process of the dialogue. People are no longer primarily in opposition, nor can they be said to be interacting, rather they are participating in this pool of common meaning which is capable of constant development and change. In this development the group has no pre-established purpose, though at each moment a purpose that is free to change may reveal itself. The group thus begins to engage in a new dynamic relationship in which no speaker is excluded, and in which no particular content is excluded. Thus far we have only begun to explore the possibilities of dialogue in the sense indicated here, but going further along these lines would open up the possibility of transforming not only the relationship between people, but even more, the very nature of consciousness in which these relationships arise."
So, this is what I mean by the power of conversation or dialogue…listening without an agenda and without being fixed to strong opinions and beliefs…listening to the common meaning that emerges through the exchange…
Well, global village square did not close only with nice memories…the project teams that came with questions and challenges all went through a shift in their thinking and approaches and went back home more empowered and heartened. Some people put the seeds of future cooperation. As for me, I’ve deepened some of my questions around my future work/life design, and I looked at some of my fears closer. And got inspired tons!

One funny thing is that people at the gathering started calling us (the Shire volunteers) the Hobbits! I think I am warming up to the idea of being a benevolent hobbit...

Back to the Shire…
My head was still buzzing with questions when we came back…it was great to come back after four intense days in Halifax…I must have been really loaded because I spent the last three days just floating around, painting mandalas and socializing with the other hobbits…

I grew up without being aware of the notion of asking questions. I guess I am not over the edge if I make the generalisation that questions are not encouraged in Turkish culture. The first time I was given a space to ask questions that matter, I did not know how to do it. That was quite a blow for me…and I started exploring the power of questions slowly since then.
Wow, if one asks the right question (I don’t mean that there are wrong questions, by right I mean the appropriate question for the particular time and space and situation), one can see a whole new world, a different perspective, a broader horizon. A powerful question almost carries the power of the answer within itself. And the possibilities…
I love the ‘sitting with the question’ notion. Some questions and mostly powerful questions don’t come with easy and quick answers. They are really meant to be sit with, taken in and let them be marinated for a while. They take time, because one learns and explores through working with them…and these deep questions can’t be dealt with the intellect, they resonate with some deeper knowing in our being. They just remind us what we already know somewhere deep inside…
So right now I am sitting with the following questions that are fundamental for me at this point in my life
…how do I leap from ideas and dreams into action?
…how do I create a safe, nourishing space for myself to function without compromising my well being? What does that safe space look like?
…how much am I willing to sacrifice to commit to the work I am called to do?
…how can I live most sustainably as a human being and invite others to live sustainably?
…how can I invite others in to the work that I am willing to step in?

having asked so many how questions, let me tell you something ironic. I started reading a book by Peter Block called “the answer to how is yes”. Block claims that “asking how” questions actually is a reflection of our doubts and fears and it is an assumption of not knowing and looking for answers outside of ourselves. He even claims that when we start with the how question, we are actually deceiving ourselves and just looking for excuses not to get into action…now, that was an interesting thought for me and there was an aha moment…because I’ve realized that I’ve been obsessively stuck in the ‘HOW’ question for a long time…How to start a learning center in Turkey? How, how, how…? I guess it was just a reflection of my fears and insecurities around it…there are more important questions…
so, watch your ‘how’ questions, friends…

It is almost midnight here at the Shire…the best thing to do now is to go to the balcony, stand under the star painted sky and watch the fireflies’ twinkling lights, real magic…

your benevolent hobbit

[1] Open Space Technology is a self-organizing meeting methodology that is based on participants’ passion and responsibility to create an agenda around a topic that matters.
[2] The age-old practice of gathering in a circle to listen and be heard is integrated with modern study of group dynamics to find expression as a profound and accessible community-making practice: Council Circle Council's basic intention to listen and speak spontaneously and from the heart greatly improves listening, authentic expression and honest, non-violent exploration of differences. With roots in Native American culture, the spirit of Council Circle can be recognized in many ancient cultures from African tribes to Greek governance to the great tradition of Islam.
[3] The World Café is a living network of conversations around questions that matter. It is an easy to use method for fostering collaborative dialogue, particularly in large groups. It is simultaneously, a provocative metaphor enabling us to notice the often invisible webs of conversation and social learning which lie at the heart of our capacity to share knowledge and shape the future together.