Taking Responsibility

Yesterday, Bill Hudson in the Pagosa Daily Post wrote about being called a “naysayer” by the mayor.

I paused to pick over Bill’s paragraph “The problems we face are not going to be solved in Town Council meetings or in PAWSD board meetings or in BOCC meetings. But we can all play our parts, in our own small ways.” It’s a logical statement and one that many of us know to be true.

Different interest groups or separate boards are not going to fix the bigger picture, “each in small little ways”. The politics of separation and division don’t get us there. The problems are awaiting community-wide leadership, vision and a plan.

As Bill notes, “the whole planet is in a struggle.”

Our Pagosa Springs community is facing an awesome array of challenges: insufficient funds which plague County government, the vacant storefronts downtown, the shifting of the commercial heart of town away from the downtown core to the uptown sprawl, the crumbling Town sewer system, the crumbling water systems, lack of jobs and lack of affordable housing. Opportunity to learn is abundant.

Its fascinating -- how will we learn to work together?

I’m trying to be a writer. I’ve enjoyed writing several stories in the Pagosa Daily Post over the past year. But, there is a book inside of me and I’ve been wanting to get it out for a couple of years now. I’ve never written a book and don’t know how.

A good friend wisely pointed me to the classic “Bird by Bird -- Some Instructions on Writing and Life” by Anne Lamott. The title of the book comes from the author’s childhood. Her father was also an author. Anne Lamott’s ten year old brother had put off for three months a major book report on birds which was now due the next morning. The brother was at the kitchen table with piles of unopened books and in tears over the enormity of the task. The father sat down, put his arm around him and said “Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.”

I love books like this. A story or information that I’m deeply interested in and buried along side of it some operating instructions for life.

Anne Lamott notes that if you are having trouble completing stories as a writer, “it may be that there is nothing at their center about which you care passionately. You need to put yourself at their center; you and what you believe to be true or right. The core, ethical concepts in which you most passionately believe are the language in which you are writing.”

“Telling these truths is your job. You have nothing else to tell us. But needless to say, you can’t tell them in a sentence or a paragraph; the truth doesn’t come out in bumper stickers.”

Further on in the book, Lamott continues with “We are all in danger now and have a new everything to face, and there is no point gathering an audience and demanding its attention unless you have something to say that is important and constructive.”

“The issue now is how to take care of one another. Some of us are interested in any light you might be able to shed on this, and we will pay a great deal extra if you can make us laugh about it.” (Anne Lamott in “Bird by Bird”).

Once upon a time, in a galaxy far, far away, there lived a community of people who worked together for the shared common good. There was a common vision of the best of what their lives could be. There was a vision and leadership to provide for the next generation.

Back here on our planet, for the better part of 5000 years, human beings have been able to operate with a degree of “success” by forming opposing groups of people and destroying the others. It has always been us against them.

In classical Greece, ruling caesars were removed from office by actual assassination. Modern evolution now has us resort to “character assassination” of community leaders that we don’t like.

What if we found out that in July 2008 we could now learn how to empower our leaders? Yes, some of us still think that the solution to every problem is to “throw the bums out”. I’ve tried that approach myself. But self destruction of our own community leadership is not a solution……it is self destruction. Time to learn partnership.

Is it possible to guide and encourage and support our community leaders to build vision and unity? Kind of like shifting from “nay saying” to “way finding”.

My favorite teacher, author and speaker Caroline Myss talks about a higher level of human interaction. “Service through empowering another person changes the situation. Because at this point you have to negotiate power.”

“To be of service to another person, that says,
‘I’m going to empower you now by telling you that you have gifts that you haven’t touched and I am going to help you develop those gifts….because you were born to develop those gifts. I am going to serve you in that way. And I can see that you don’t have the courage to do that. I am going to mentor you. Because I know how to bring that out in you.’”

“Now, that is an act of service a lot of people simply can’t do. It’s too much for them. Their soul does not yet have the stamina to empower or mentor another person. They still have to do power plays because they still don’t know how to survive in the physical world.” (Caroline Myss; YouTube; “Soul Service”)

“Taking responsibility” means I know that, ultimately, in this democracy within which our small town exists, I am in charge. The buck stops here. I take responsibility.

Not that there is anything special with me. All of us are each, individually, in charge of our Pagosa Springs. Or, at least, those of us that say “I am responsible” are in charge of the future.

The old politics of “us versus them” does not work any more. Notice how since we’ve declared a “war” against terrorism that our world has become less safe? Remember the 1980’s when we declared a war against drugs? How did that work out? How about the war on poverty?

What would it take for the leaders of our community to all sit down and agree on a common vision for the future? What would it take for each of us to declare, personally, that we are each the community leader? Yes, I am talking about you.