During a Holy Currencies Workshop last week, I offered suggestions on how to transform a linear goal-driven program to feed the hungry into a relational-focus ministry that might lead to greater sustainability for this project. One participant kept responding to every suggestion with a “we can’t do that” rebuttal. After my fifth suggestion, I finally realized that this participant has a different “brain.” Her brain was wired for living with limits and scarcity.
My brain is wired like a sustainist. I see limits as opportunities for creativity. I see an unemployed person as a resource of time and energy. I always look for ways to do more with less. I see wastes as resources. I see leftover as signs of abundance. The first place I go to when I am faced with an obstacle is not “we can’t do that” but “what are other creative ways we can follow to do this better?”
My friend, Lucky Lynch, had told me in more than one occasion, “What you are trying to do in your training programs is nothing short of brain surgery.” She is referring to some of the tools I created, such as Respectful Communication Guidelines and Mutual Invitation. These tools might look simple, but when practiced regularly, we are changing the way people think. Over time, people learn to think in inclusive ways.
Nicholas Carr, in his book, The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains, reported a number of experiments that demonstrated how repeated physical actions, such as learning to play a musical instrument, can rewire our brains. Not only that, he also reported an experiment that demonstrated “purely mental activity can also alter our neural circuitry, sometimes in far-reaching ways.” (P. 32) The experiment, conducted by Pascual-Leone of the National Insititutes of Health, went like this:
Pascual-Leone recruited people who had no experience playing a piano, and he taught them how to play a simple melody consisting of a short series of notes. He then split the participants into two groups. He had the members of one group practice the melody on a keyboard for two hours a day over the next five days. He had the members of the other group sit in front of a keyboard for the same amount of time but only imagine playing the song –without ever touching the keys. . . . Pascual-Leone mapped the brain activity of all the participants before, during, and after the test. He found that people who had only imagined playing the notes exhibited precisely the same changes in their brains as those who had actually pressed the keys. (P. 33)
How can we move more people in our community to think like a sustainist? Besides finding opportunities for people to experience physically and emotionally how a sustainist approaches work, we can try using imagination.
As Christians move toward the beginning of Advent – a season of anticipation of the coming of Christ (Christmas), Christians are asked to be alert and stay awake. The key image of our role in creation is that of a steward who is put in charge of a household while the owner is away. Because we don’t know when the owner will return, as stewards, we are challenged to stay alert because at any moment, we might need to account for how we have nurtured and sustained that which has been put in our charge. This Advent challenge is asking us to rewire our brain from thinking that we are owners to just being stewards of this earth.
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Now, imagine that you are only stewards who are only put in charge of what you have for the time being. And every moment of everyday, you are to stay alert as if you are to give account for what you have done to create a sustainable future for the next generation. What would life be like? How would you make decisions in what you buy, sell, give and accept? What would you do with the properties and resources over which you have influence and control? Imagine each step, each decision with your mind and then, even better, implement these steps in reality when the opportunities come.
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Reflection Questions for 1st Sunday of Advent (Year B) Isaiah 64:1-9 Psalm 80:1-7, 16-18 1 Corinthians 1:3-9 Mark 13:24-37 |
Eric H. F. Law
Kaleidoscope Institute
For competent leadership in a diverse changing world
www.kscopeinstitute.org
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Come to Los Angeles in 2012 to study with The Sustainist, the first two opportunities: February 27–March 2, 2012 |
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