The Human Agenda

Message from Valedictorian - May 08 Life Connections Program

All praises for Allah the Most High and Exalted. All praise is for Allah the Glorious and the Powerful who is the only one who has the right to be worshipped and is the creator and originator of all things. All praises are for Allah who sent his slave Muhammad to lead us out of darkness in the light. Peace and blessings be upon him and his family and companions and all that follow their way until the Day of Judgment to proceed.

I would first like to say that it’s a great honor and mercy from my Lord to stand before you as valedictorian of Cohort 8. And this achievement really means something personally to me because it was a difficult task that I completed with honesty, integrity and hard work. And this is the example that I leave you with. Every time I’ve been able to speak I made it with intentions for good and to benefit the people so I would like to say that I’ve seen many seekers come into Life Connection looking for change, looking for a way to break the cycle of recidivism only to quit and walk away as a failure because they refuse to break away when their wrong is clear. Closed thinking, choosing only what’s self-gratifying.

Many of us call ourselves men of faith quoting scripture and have not proved anything. We’ve come together two days, reading poems, singing, laughing and grinning and cracking jokes, eating cake. But what we own to our families and society is not a laughing matter. Tattooing a name of a love on our body or putting their picture up in our cell is not loving them. We have the tools. It’s time to stop talking and put actions with it.

In closing I would like to thank everyone within these walls who helped me and supported my positive change and also the negative people whether staff or inmate because through suffering I learned from you patience ad humility and the drive to say never again. Thank you.

The Visitor

“We are all Visitors Here”
Reflections on the movie “The Visitor”
Mother’s Day 2008

“Where’s home?” That is one of my common first questions after an introduction. It invites the other person to reveal a bit about him or herself and start the process of discovery about each other. It is usually a safe question in my experience but also a question that expresses interest and appropriate curiosity. The question often serves as a bridge to further inquiry and exploring of common roots and diverse realities.

The movie “The Visitor” is a statement that we are all visitors in this place. It is a simple story with complicated twists and turns. Walter Vale is not at home in his life as a college professor. He is bored and almost zombie-like as he lectures in the one class he has been teaching without passion for over 20 years. Tarek, Syrian, is not at home since he is illegally living in New York struggling as a drummer in a small band. His girlfriend Zainab from Senegal is not at home but has found a bit of a home in the relationship with Tarek.

Mouna, Tarek’s Mother, is not at home in Michigan where she lives or New York when she comes to find out why her son has not called in over a week. Through an interesting series of events these four people begin to find home in the relationships with each other.

The movie reveals some painful realities about immigration and our legal system. It gives us a glimpse into the prison system with its sliding, slamming doors, windowed visiting areas and bureaucratic employees well trained to process the people who visit and the ones being held behind the walls. But for me, this movie was about visiting. We are all visitors here in the apartments and houses where we live and on this planet. But for a few moments or a few decades we find a place we call home and create a meaningful life.

Walter discovers home in relationships with people so very different than himself. Mouna finds a home in the arms of Walter. The brief time the four are connected is enough for me in this art form.

I shared the movie with my wife Ann on Mother’s Day. Our children and grandchildren are hundreds of miles away celebrating the festival with their children, doing their best to create “home” for our four grandchildren. This house in Kansas City is no longer their place of residence, but we trust it remains home whenever they can visit.

In a few minutes I will open a bottle of champagne purchased for this occasion. I will lift a glass and toast the mother of my three children. She is creating and nurturing a wonderful home where we live and on occasion share with others. I know we are just visitors here. But this evening, I want the feeling of home to last forever. Perhaps it can.

All But My Life by Gerda Weissmann Klein

“And so they talked on through the night, animated and happy. They faced what the morning would bring with the only weapon they had – their love for each other. Love is great, love is the foundation of nobility, it conquers obstacles and is a deep well of truth and strength. After hearing my parents talk that night I began to understand the greatness of their love. Their courage ignited within me a spark that continued to glow through the years of misery and defeat. The memory of their love – my only legacy – sustained my in happy and unhappy times in Poland, Germany, Czechoslovakia, France, Switzerland, England. It is still part o me here in America.”

Page 86 All But My Life: A Memoir by Gerda Weissmann Klein

We will be discussing this book in our Vital Conversation, May 14, 2008. 1 p.m. at Mid Continent Library, Antioch Branch

Preparing for A Coaching Conversation

Coaching Prep Form
The purpose of this form is to help you reflect on the time since our last coaching meeting and to help us focus our coaching conversation. Please fill out the form and complete the form in advance of our next coaching conversation. You may e-mail to me or just have it in front of you when we begin our conversation.

Name

Date of Next Call

Accomplished or Learned since last coaching conversation

Remains to Be Accomplished

High Points

Grateful for

Other Comments

Appreciative Coaching Intake Form

Client Information Form
Please fill out this form on line and return it to your coach.
Name
Address
City
State/Province
Postal Code
Country
Occupation
Company Home phone
Work phone
Work extension
Mobile phone
E-mail
2nd e-mail
Title
Marital status/children
Education
Certificates, workshops, etc.
How did you hear about me?

Your History
1. Describe your three greatest accomplishments to date.
2. What made these accomplishments stand out for you?
3. What have you incorporated into your current actions from your past accomplishments?
4. How could you use what you’ve learned from these accomplishments to assist you in making future changes?
5. What major transitions have you had in the past two years? (For example, new assignment, new residence, new relationship, etc.)
6. If you worked with a coach before or a similar one-on-one adult relationship (for example, tennis coach, piano teacher, therapist), what worked well for you?
7. If you have worked with a coach, and you are not currently, how did that relationship end?

Your Life
1. Who are or have been your major role models?
2. What attributes of these role models do you admire and want to emulate?
3. What are the five more positive things in your life?
4. What are five things you world like to change in your life that would make it even more satisfying, effective and joyful? (Examples include relationships, information, environment, job.)
5. Who are the key supportive people in your life and what do they provide for you?
6. On a scale of 1 to 10 (1 being least effective and 10 being most effective), rate the quality of your life. _____By what criteria did you rate yourself?
7. What percentage of the life you are leading is actually YOUR life?

Your Self Today
1. Life five adjectives that describe you at your best.
2. What prevents you from being at your best?
3. What energizes you?
4. What says your energy?
5. What are you learning and accepting about yourself at present?
6. In what ways do you currently spend time, that if you were to spend if differently, would yield great happiness and achievement?
7. What do you consume now, that if you didn’t, would allow you to be healthier? (For example, alcohol, caffeine, sugar.)
8. Could therapy effectively resolve some issue in your life now?

Your Potential
1. What is your personal and/or professional vision?
2. What would you life to contribute to the world?
3. What are you most wanting to achieve in the next three years?
4. What are you most wanting to achieve in the next six months?
5. How ready are to go for it?
6. Use the list below as thought starters for the goals above.
• Family/home
• Relationships
• Financial situation
• Leisure time
• Career or business
• Self-care
• Personal character
• Learning

Making It Happen
1. Why have you hired me?
2. What are three immediate changes you can make to get you off to a good start in our coaching?
3. How can I help you to be more effective in working toward your goals?
4. Here are ways coaching clients work with me. Which of these appeal to you? (Select as many as apply.)
• Brainstorming strategies together
• Support, encouragement, and validation
• Insight into who you are and your potential
• Painting a vision of what you can become or accomplish
• Exploring possibilities and build on past success
• Accountability; checking up on goals
• Suggesting or designing action steps that lead to greater effectiveness and joy
5. What approaches to change have you found less effective for you?
6. What responsibility do you have for ensuring that our relationship works well?
7. How will you know that your coaching experience has been effective?

Values and People

"Great Values without Great People are irrelevant."
Larry Boxman

Listening

"Being listened to feels so much like being loved that most people can't tell the difference."

No Country for Old Men

“No Country for Old Men” is the first movie I viewed in a theater since turning 63. I do not feel like an old man, but I do realize that more and more of our movers and shakers are indeed younger (some much younger) than I am. I also attended “Eggs and Enlightenment” breakfast group where other “old men” and a few women gather to listen and discuss important issues of the day. A visitor this morning reminded us that one of the roles of older persons is to share wisdom and discernment with those who are following us. In reflecting on my life, I have also concluded that past experiences of others have been a helpful resource for my personal and professional journey.

“No Country” is about many things. It is about greed, violence, temptation, cynicism, justice and a host of other realities, which are all part of the human adventure. It is dark and scary. Even when bad things do not happen I sat on the edge of my seat in anticipation of another bad thing about to happen. It is not a movie that I want to view over and over. But it is a movie that invited me to reflect on the role of “old men.” The Texas Sheriff Ed Bell (Tommy Lee Jones), who is close to retirement, gets involved in the investigation of a botched drug sale. Drugs and money is often a tragic recipe for violence and death. Sheriff Bell is reminded of his entire career, indeed his entire life as he seeks to discover what has happened and how to possibly carve our a bit of justice in the ugliness of the incident and its aftermath.

Sheriff Bell does uncover much of what has happened, although like this viewer, does not fully understand all the twists and turns. But, more importantly, in the process discovers much about himself and his past. His retirement may have been hastened by the events that took place and he seemed a bit like a fish out of water sitting drinking coffee and trying to find something to do in his life.

Old men are some of our best allies in the challenging adventure of living. I rejoice that I have a significant number of them in my life who listen to me and to share with me the stories that provide meaning and hope. I enjoyed watching this movie with my wife and another couple. We were all a bit confused as we exited the theater, but the dinner and conversation that followed were delightful, as usual.

“No Country for Old Men” was recognized as the best movie of the year at the recent Oscar show. The Coen Brothers are remarkable in creating a mood, capturing a space, and revealing incredible characters. Of all the characters in this movie, I am most drawn to old Sheriff Bell. I would love to have a few cups of coffee with him. I think I would even enjoy a horseback ride in Western Texas with him. I suspect that after a few hours together I would feel blest, challenged, and a bit wiser.

Vital Conversations - March Book

Vital Conversations are intentional gatherings of people to engage in dialog that will add value to the participants and to the world. In Vital Conversations we become co-creators of a better community. The Vital Conversations Book Club meets at 1 p.m. the Second Wednesday of each month at the Antioch Branch of the Mid Continent Public Library. We welcome all people to attend our conversations and celebrate the rich pluralism of the greater Kansas City area. The books will be available for check out through the Mid Continent Public Library.

March 12 Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace One School at a Time by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. In 1993 Greg Mortenson drifted into an impoverished Pakistan village in the Karakoram Mountains after a failed attempt to climb K2. Moved by the inhabitants’ kindness, he promised to return and build a school. “Three Cups of Tea” is the story of that promise and its extraordinary outcome. Over the next decade Mortenson build not just one but fifty-five schools – especially for girls – in the forbidding terrain that gave birth to the Taliban. His story is at once a riveting adventure and a testament to the power of the humanitarian spirit.

Molly Ann Nelson

He looks into her month old face
And sees his own life,
His own story,
His own love.

She looks at both of them
And sees the baby she once welcomed
Welcoming another.

I see the three of them
And my heart nearly explodes with love.
To see your wife
Adoring your son
Adoring your granddaughter
Is a most precious sight.

I wonder if Molly Ann
Will ever fully grasp
The miracle of this moment.
I do.