Once a year Conversation Cafes and co-hosts organize a week when everyone, everywhere is invited to sit down in small groups to consider together the most important questions in the world today. We live in challenging and complex times. No one knows THE answer, but everyone holds a piece of the answer. You can say your piece during Conversation Week. We, and the world, will be all listening.
I like leaders who get the job done. Barack or Clinton? I don’t know. If I have to chose now I would vote for Clinton. But I don’t know why and I sort of believe I should know why. This is a slip brain decision. You know, like those people whose corpus callosum - the connection bet the two side of the brain - has been severed. If you make a person with this condition read a good joke with a patch on his right eye he or she may start laughing without knowing why, and when asked why invent that she saw something funny through the window.
May be the world should have leader people really know why they need them.
“There are many persons ready to do what is right because in their hearts they know it is right. But, they hesitate, waiting for the other fellow to make the first move— and he, in turn, waits for you. The minute a person whose word means a great deal dares to take the open-hearted and courageous way, many others follow.” -Marian Anderson
We each need to develop self-direction — inner guidance — and not keep searching for the person or party to follow. The time has arrived for “thoughtful action and responding” rather than reacting and feeling overwhelmed by each crisis that presents itself. WE are the leadership the world needs now, and governments should exist as tools through which We The People accomplish what is good For All The People.
The best idea at our table was “collaborative leadership” - that expecting one person to embody all qualities needed is a 20th century (and before) idea. A well facilitated, focused, respectful team can find solutions to problems that are beyond what any individual can do. Lincoln put his opponents on his cabinet “a team of rivals” to generate the ideas needed for his times. Could we run not just a prez and vp but a cabinet?
We need the leaders with inspiration and imagination to take us into a promising future. This can be anyone looking forward. We need people with their eyes on what may be, and their feet rooted in what is, and their hands lifting each other. We can do this together. Let’s keep talking
I don’t think we need ‘leadership’ per se - we need to lead ourselves. We need to figure out what we need(if we don’t already know), rather than being ‘told’ what we need like we are children. The world needs it’s caring citizens to speak out and not politicians with ‘hidden agendas’ of seeking power, money and recognition.
Case in point, George W Bush has convinced many that this ‘war on terrorism’ is necessary through the use of lies about the facts - to the distinct disadvantage of mankind. This politician has used fear to serve his own selfish needs. Clearly NOT the kind of leadership anyone needs.
War is called for by ‘leaders’ and fought (and suffered) by the people. This is a pattern of betrayal by those in power that fills recorded history and will fill the history of the future if we do not define our own needs clearly and logically. We need an awareness of our psychological frailties that exceeds those who use their knowledge of psychology to our disadvantage.
If we place power in the hands of ‘politicians’ we need to always ask “why” with the expectation of an honestly truthful answer and not let these people off the hook when they lie.
Interesting that Obama and Hillary spend time bashing each other rather than focusing on real issues. They are in the same party yet launch ad hominem attacks on each other. Any such behavior should disqualify these contestants.
On a further note:
All these questions posed seem to point in the same direction and are really one question overall-
How can we make the world a better place for all?
-Let us examine our political/economic structure for the elements that are barriers.
War, commercialism and consumerism, and religion to the extent that it dictates policies are key problems we face. Politics on such an uneven playing field hardly seems democratic thus making voting a stereotyped behavior rather than a conscious decision based in fact.
I wave the flag of EARTH, there is no pride for me in being Canadian when much of the rest of the world suffers. There is no satisfaction in possessions - should I have a roof, a computer and tenderloin when others have no roof, have no idea what a computer is and their restaurant is other people’s trash? At our current rate there will be no one to wave ‘the flag of earth’. Will aliens find earth in the future and say “Wow! This civilization destroyed itself! How myopic…”
Barack Obama! The guy is an inspiration — this generation’s JFK.
And I fear that, as with JFK, he might be a little TOO revolutionary and end up the same way..
I like leaders who get the job done. Barack or Clinton? I don’t know. If I have to chose now I would vote for Clinton. But I don’t know why and I sort of believe I should know why. This is a slip brain decision. You know, like those people whose corpus callosum - the connection bet the two side of the brain - has been severed. If you make a person with this condition read a good joke with a patch on his right eye he or she may start laughing without knowing why, and when asked why invent that she saw something funny through the window.
May be the world should have leader people really know why they need them.
“There are many persons ready to do what is right because in their hearts they know it is right. But, they hesitate, waiting for the other fellow to make the first move— and he, in turn, waits for you. The minute a person whose word means a great deal dares to take the open-hearted and courageous way, many others follow.” -Marian Anderson
We each need to develop self-direction — inner guidance — and not keep searching for the person or party to follow. The time has arrived for “thoughtful action and responding” rather than reacting and feeling overwhelmed by each crisis that presents itself. WE are the leadership the world needs now, and governments should exist as tools through which We The People accomplish what is good For All The People.
The best idea at our table was “collaborative leadership” - that expecting one person to embody all qualities needed is a 20th century (and before) idea. A well facilitated, focused, respectful team can find solutions to problems that are beyond what any individual can do. Lincoln put his opponents on his cabinet “a team of rivals” to generate the ideas needed for his times. Could we run not just a prez and vp but a cabinet?
We need the leaders with inspiration and imagination to take us into a promising future. This can be anyone looking forward. We need people with their eyes on what may be, and their feet rooted in what is, and their hands lifting each other. We can do this together. Let’s keep talking
British Columbia, Canada
I don’t think we need ‘leadership’ per se - we need to lead ourselves. We need to figure out what we need(if we don’t already know), rather than being ‘told’ what we need like we are children. The world needs it’s caring citizens to speak out and not politicians with ‘hidden agendas’ of seeking power, money and recognition.
Case in point, George W Bush has convinced many that this ‘war on terrorism’ is necessary through the use of lies about the facts - to the distinct disadvantage of mankind. This politician has used fear to serve his own selfish needs. Clearly NOT the kind of leadership anyone needs.
War is called for by ‘leaders’ and fought (and suffered) by the people. This is a pattern of betrayal by those in power that fills recorded history and will fill the history of the future if we do not define our own needs clearly and logically. We need an awareness of our psychological frailties that exceeds those who use their knowledge of psychology to our disadvantage.
If we place power in the hands of ‘politicians’ we need to always ask “why” with the expectation of an honestly truthful answer and not let these people off the hook when they lie.
Interesting that Obama and Hillary spend time bashing each other rather than focusing on real issues. They are in the same party yet launch ad hominem attacks on each other. Any such behavior should disqualify these contestants.
On a further note:
All these questions posed seem to point in the same direction and are really one question overall-
How can we make the world a better place for all?
-Let us examine our political/economic structure for the elements that are barriers.
War, commercialism and consumerism, and religion to the extent that it dictates policies are key problems we face. Politics on such an uneven playing field hardly seems democratic thus making voting a stereotyped behavior rather than a conscious decision based in fact.
I wave the flag of EARTH, there is no pride for me in being Canadian when much of the rest of the world suffers. There is no satisfaction in possessions - should I have a roof, a computer and tenderloin when others have no roof, have no idea what a computer is and their restaurant is other people’s trash? At our current rate there will be no one to wave ‘the flag of earth’. Will aliens find earth in the future and say “Wow! This civilization destroyed itself! How myopic…”