How Do You Teach?

I was sitting on the stoop this morning. I must have been about 4:30. Couldn’t sleep. Just thinking about a lot of stuff. That’s all I am allowed to do. The unexpected prospect of surgery to correct a hernia that suddenly popped out–pun intended–from nowhere isn’t sitting well with me. And that’s almost all I’m doing, sitting. My angelic boss has grounded me from all heavy lifting and power walking until I see the doctor next week. It has taken me almost two months to get back to walking five miles after being knocked for a loop and kept off the streets for three months by powerful antibiotics. Now, I’m down again for a while. Luckily, however, I’ve done all the heavy building stuff Susan’s screened-in back porch. All I have left is light stuff: putting up the screening, the fan, and some trim.

So, having to stoop to meditating on the stoop this morning, I was thinking about a conversation I had with a professor shortly after I had just presented a session dealing with forging a classroom community at a management conference a few weeks ago. The professor, who had not attended the session, came up to me and started talking. He had read my conference paper. In the course of our conversation in which he probed me, he asked, “How do you teach?”

My answer was simple, but not the one he was looking for, “To make a difference in someone’s life.”

“No,” he parried, seeking his answer. “What do you do? What techniques do you apply.”

“My primary method is to be spiritual.”

He kept pressing, “That doesn’t answer my question.”

“Sure I did.”

“What’s your pedagogy.”

There was that god-awful word. “I just told you. We each are what we feel and how we perceive, and everything we do flows from those feeling and perceptions. To me, being spiritual is not about knowing a lot about my discipline or knowing and using as lot of teaching techniques. It’s about caring a lot. That’s what gives me purpose, meaning and guidance: to show the trust and respect I have for each student, to offer my presence, be there to help each student help him- or herself, to be kind, to be supportive, to be encouraging, to be understanding, to believe.”

I paused and deliberately continued at a slower pace for emphasis. “That way I can make a difference in ….”

“Difference?” he interrupted. “Come on, do you really think you can make a difference, a real difference?”

“Yes,” I answered.

“How can you say that?”

“Because I am difference. Because I feel it. Because I know it. Because I do it. If you know that your one and only life will– not just can, will–make a difference in someone else’s life, you will become that difference. Your effort is your attitude.”

He looked at me a bit incredulously as I went on. “You will do whatever it takes to make a difference,” I explained, “and you will make a difference to someone in some way at some time. That I guarantee.”

“Just you? What kind of difference can just you make?” There was a tragic defensive disbelief in his voice and on his face.

“A lot.” I told him that the rabbis teach us that when Moses tapped the shore of the Red Sea with his staff, the waters did not roll back. And when he tapped the water with his staff, nothing happened. And when he held his hands aloft, nothing happened. But when the first newly-freed Hebrew, filled with overflowing faith, walked into the swirling waters, then the Red Sea parted and Israel was saved. The miracle of the Red Sea, the rabbis say, was not the parting of the water, but the faith of that first Hebrew who walked in. Only then did the others follow. That first Hebrew had faith and he became that faith, and he gave that faith to all around him.

“I’ve read a ton of student journals and evaluations, and I’ve had students come up to me, a virtual stranger, to talk of the most personal things. I can only conclude what lives in me thrives around me. The primary root of my determination to make a difference is in me,” I explained. “I am my feelings.”

I told him that I won’t be cynicism, annoyance, despondence or resignation incarnate. I won’t open my doors and windows to anything but fresh air. “My most powerful technique is an everyday loving heart for each and every student. That’s the only way I can I can prevent myself from being numb, distant, and cold to their needs, their fears, their vulnerabilities, all of which have an impact on their attitudes and performances. Unless I’m spiritual, I have no reason to look, much less see; to hear, much less listen, to understand, much less be understanding. Unless I am respectful and accepting, what need would I have to nurture?”

I went on to tell him that we teachers must be about something greater than ourselves. We can’t be self-centered. We must see the miracle in each student. Then, and only then, can we be who we exist to be: makers of difference, workers of miracles, and transformers. If we can value ourselves and each student, if we can accept sincerely, if we can understand kindly, if we can whisper softly, if we can encourage gently, if we can smile supportingly, if we can soften our hearts, if we can walk peacefully, we’ll make each student, if not the whole campus, better as we go. And, then, we’ll each make a difference by helping that other person help him/herself become the person he or she is capable of becoming.

“To help each student believe and become that belief. That’s how I teach.”

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

Elisha

I asked a non-traditional student the other day in an e-mail, what’s the good of all her learning, of all her recognitions and awards and achievements, if we teachers don’t help her discover the value of her life, the value of values, of her uniqueness, her personal dignity, and all that of each other? The essence of an education is not to stuff her full of facts or to have her spew those facts back on some exam or paper or to get a grade or to acquire a piece of paper or to be showered with accolades, but to help her start discovering her own uniqueness, to help her believe she has something to contribute, to help her fight the battle to be just her, to help her learn the art of being fully human, to help her start developing her own unique potential into a unique actual, to help her take herself into a world she could only dream was in her, and then especially to show her how to share it so others can do the same.

We teachers, I told her, are in the people business. And so, we should see each student as a “sacred one,” as some one created in the “image of God,” as an individual with dignity, as someone with a life no less complex, complicated, and mysterious as my own, as someone who has a purpose in life, as someone who has a unique gift or special talent to give to others. We should know that each student is worthy of our faith, hope, belief, and love simply because he or she is a human being.

Those words took on a face and a voice this first week of the semester that has sent me on an indescribable high from which there is no coming down. As I bounced up the stairs, the soundtrack from REMEMBER THE TITANS was playing in my boombox, I saw Elisia (not her real name). She was standing by the classroom door waiting. I hadn’t seen her for a while. She was one of those who desperately needed reaching whom I had failed to reach. So I thought.

Last time I saw Elisia, she was an angry pit bull wanting to rip out my throat. Now, she was smiling at me, and cheerily and delicately waving her hand at me. She had a piece of paper in her hand. With her “if you think it’ll help someone,” permission, our conversation went something like this:

“I want you to make room for me. I’ll sit on the floor if all the seats are taken.”

I smiled in amazement, hoping against hope at what I was going to hear. “Me? You sure? We didn’t part exactly as friends.”

“I apologize for all those nasty words. Yes. I thought about it for a long while. It’s gotta be this way. I owe you. I disrespected you big time in front of everybody.”

“You disrespected yourself. You owe you.”

“Yeah, but for a long while I blamed you for failing me. I was real angry with you and poor-mouthed you to anyone and every time I could. Boy, you should have read the letter I wrote.”

“I can imagine. Raked me over the coals?”

“A heap of big, white hot coals. I used every curse word I knew and then some in that letter. Now I realize that I had screwed up and failed myself and was angry at myself for doing that. You reached out to me and I slapped it away. You paid me no mind and kept reaching to the very last day even after I called you a piece of shit for everyone to hear. I never could figure out why until lately.”

“What happened?”

“Lots of stuff. I guess letting myself get hit one time too many or one being handed around once too much or one drunk too many or one high to many. One more dream of thinking I could be a Kim. Once more looking at some of your ‘Words of the Day.” It all build up until I just got tired of being joyless. I want to find joy and bring joy. That story of Kim and your pinky nail really got to me. I so wanted to be another Kim. I scared me. I so wanted to be like her and was so scared that I couldn’t. It was easier not trying and pushing you away. I couldn’t stop thinking of her and I couldn’t get those ‘Words of the Day’ out of my head, and man I tried to. But, they kept tuggin’ at me. I kept asking why am I doing this to myself, why am I letting others do all that bad stuff to me. What did you see? You know I never handed in my final journal. Lucky I didn’t. I kept goin’ back to one page where I wrote the words down: ‘fences are great for fields; they suck when it comes to your spirit.’ Time I became my own bulldozer and to tear down my fences and free up my spirit. I don’t want to behave this way anymore. Help me help me! Make room for me. You really don’t have a choice, you know.”

Elisia wasn’t talking with amy beseeching question marks. She was issuing a command. “I won’t give you any slack,” I obediently warned her.

She nodded and then grabbed my right hand. “Not asking for none.

“And when you start tearing down your fences?”

“I’ll find that gold I know is there. Never been without barbwire fences. I know it won’t be easy. I have to change my ways. I’m scared and excited and curious about this. I don’t know what I really am able to do and I don’t know who I’ll find, but I know what and who I am looking for.”

“What? Who?”

“The right choices. Me, the real me. Joy. Gold inside like Kim said in her letter to you. I’m tired of being sad. I don’t want to just knock around and be knocked around anymore by me or anyone else. I don’t want to be knocked down no longer. I don’t want to be fenced in. I know I’m not shit like I and everyone been saying. I want to find me and the joy in being me. I’m choosing now a ‘No.’ I’m choosing not to behave this way and not believe this way and not be treated this way anymore. I got rid of my supposed boyfriend who always hit on me, no more being passed around his friends, no more bottles and smokes, got some good upliftin’ friends, real supporting friends, now I need you.

“You want to. But, are you ready?”

“I’m ready.”

“Why me?”

“Remember Kim told you keep your pinky nail polished so to remind you to be there to help someone become who they can be. Well, I’m reminding you about being reminded. Today I’m that person. Make room for a second chance. I’m not taking a ‘no.’ You can’t say no, you know. I’m going into that class even if you don’t put me on the roll. I’m staying’. There’s no getting rid of me.”

She had me and knew it. I took a deep breath, a real deep breath. You can’t imagine how I felt and still feel when I heard that something I had said or done or written ultimately had a role and will have a greater role in helping Elisia seek out her sense of dignity and help her motivate herself to develop her unique potential.

“I know. The pinky nail. Second chance. Glad to have you. I always have room for a second chance.”

As I opened the classroom door, I warned Elisia with a stern, but loving tone, “Now, you know what to expect. You’ve been through this before. You’re a leader now and I expect you to help others.”

She laughed, grabbed my hand, and gently squeezed it. “Me? A leader? Out in front showing the way? That’ll be some change.”

“That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it.”

She stop smiling, “Yeah. Sure is.” Then, the smile reappeared, “Let’s go make magic.”

As we entered the classroom fittingly to the tune, “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough,” ringing out from the boombox.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

Meditating Before Class

If you are uneasy with the word, “meditate,” try “focus.” A rose is a rose…. Use whatever words you want to describe how you center your mind, body, and spirit. I find meditating for about fifteen minutes before I leave my office for the classroom helps me transform what is about to happen within those four walls called a classroom into something to be cherished rather than merely endured.

I have so many thoughts racing through and crossing my mind. So much of it is distracting and confusing noise, static, and confusion that shout at the top of their voice to command our attention. Most of them, however loud their screams, aren’t really very imortant or meaningful. If you listen just to the noise and focus only on the confusion, it can really bring you down. It pays to remember, to be reminded, again and again, that the noise and confusion are not what it is all about.

Thich Nhat Hanh says we each are what we feel, believe, and perceive. Our feelings and perception are a part of us; we are them. If I believe, I am that belief. If I care, I am that caring. If I am hopeful, I am that hope. If I understand, I am that understanding. If I want to make a difference, I am that difference. The primary root of who I am is in me. And, what lives in me thrives in me; what thrives in me, thrives around me. So meditating before class is partly a filtering out and inviting in process. I mediate before each class in order to tune myself into the right frequency and tune the static out; I meditate to turn down the volume; I mediate in order to discard and to savor. When I savor I enjoy the moment. I don’t worry about what is next; I don’t agonize about what I can’t control; I marvel at the possibilities of what I can do; I pay heed to what is. After all, the more earnestly you savor life, the more you will find to savor. In

I’m not content to let the moments of the present day slip silently and uselessly away. My purpose is to fill each moment with life, meaning, richness, reason, value, and an expectation for possibilities of what might occur. And, I find that what I experience is fed by my thoughts and feelings. As I succeed to give each day a purpose, my day is transformed from merely one to be endured into one that will always be cherished, and a time when possibilities become occurances and occurances can become miracles.

Now what do I mean by meditation, well, let me categorize what I do and why into a few words:

STOP: I just sit there and do something. I put on the brakes, halt the blurring of the rushing by, and close my eyes to calm down and notice and see sharply. I slow my thinking. I give myself what I call a brief, deep “power rest.” It a way away from shallow looking to deep seeing, away from mere hearing to acute listening. It’s the way to understanding.

BREATHE: I consciously breathe. I pull a soothing and cleansing breath smoothly and slowly up through my body, and push out the poisons of anxiety, impatience, distraction, doubts, worries, fears, concerns, hesitation, equivocation, reservations, “other-placeness,” fear with each exhale. It’s an opening of my window to suck in fresh, invigorating air and vent out heavy, stale air. It’s using my superfund to clean up some careless pollution. It’s a serum to neutralize all my toxins. As I inhale, I say, “I’m breathing in. Calm.” As I exhale, I say, “I’m breathing out. Wonderful.” I feel like I’m in the movie, The Karate Kid: breathe in, breathe out. I focus on the movement of my chest, the sensation in my lungs, the peaceful and lifting effect it has on my mind, body, and soul. And slowly, I am conscious that “I am alive.”

BEAUTY: There is beauty and wonder in every direction, if you’ll simply take the opportunity to see it. Every day, every situation, every person you encounter brings something that will add richness to life. Each moment holds the prospect of a new experience. Eagerly drink in all of those experiences, for in them you will find the fertile substance of life. As I just told some people at a conference presentation, we so easily proclaim what’s wrong and so easily ignore what’s right.

PLACE: I choose which thoughts I keep, which one I build upon, and which ones I put aside or discard. It’s a choice that makes an enormous difference. All this important because the thoughts and feelings to which I hold tightly are the ones that usually become real. The ones I focus on usually become my reality. So, of all the thoughts that race across my mind today, I pick the ones I want and hold tight on to them. I give life to them, let them to grow stronger, give them influence. I take myself into a positive place.

PURPOSE: I once again get to the place I want to imagine by closing my eyes, picturing each student, and restating my purpose to myself aloud: “I want to be a person who is there to help another help him/herself become the person he or she is capable of becoming.” Those wordsMy purpose is my motive, my motivation. It’s my force. It’s the source of my energy. It makes me the custodian of myself and active partner in whatever is going to happen. But, I meditate so I don’t just utter these words to myself to tell me what I am about to do must be about who I am about. I have to feel my purpose; taste my “why,” imagine my vision, speak my deep desire. It gives me the courage to go beyond mere wishing and saying “I want” to actually making choices, and then onto acting on those choices.

INTENTION: Intention is not just something I do; it’s an energy I draw on. The shape I give teaching is the shape of my teaching. I find that whenever I focus and whatever I focus on commands and engages my best and most productive and most mindful energy. So, during that fifteen minutes before I head for each class, with eyes’closed, there’s a mental focus, a spiritual stillness, an emotional intention that make me available to achievement.

ZONE: I get in a zone. I get and stay focused. I free up my heart and soul by not letting my mind or soul run wildly free. I don’t picture myself anywhere but in that classroom. The hard part of zoning is when your eyes are open, and to know and acknowledge when you’re about to ramble, to drift off, to go to another place, to say “Halt” to yourself, to bring your mindfulness back to where you are and what you’re doing.

POSITIVE: My food for thought does not include any spiritual junk food. No negatives! Negatives don’t need my help. They do just fine on their own. But, they’re a place for poverty and ugliness. I am looking for a place to find richness and beauty. Negatives starve. I’m seeking nourishment. Negatives sadden. I want joy. Negatives destroy. I am looking to construct. Negatives deprive. I want to arrive and thrive. I am positive that with positives I can build, create, love, appreciate, encourage, grow. I can’t do that unless I consciously banish destructive whining and complaining, irks and pains.

SMILE: As I brethe, am positive, get in the zone, see and feel beauty, find the right place, reaffirm my purpose and intention, I can’t help but smile. Smiling is something about which I have shared; it is something I always do. Why? Simple. When I smile, I see only smiling people around me. If I were to sneer, I would see only sneering people around me. A smile creates a cool and soothing breeze. A smile helps me enjoy myself on my route. Have you noticed that when you smile, you feel awake and aware? My smile affirms my joy, my aliveness, my gentleness, my mindfulness. My smile has a better chance of bringing happiness to those I encounter than does a dour look. It’s a gift that doesn’t empty my wallet. A smile says, “I’m here because I want to, not because I have to. I am all here for you.”

WORD: I ask myself, “What are you saying to yourself? What are you saying to others?” Words can limit my thinking, or they can expand my horizons. Words can bring on discouragement and despair, or they can provide the encouragement to do great things. One of the quickest and easiest ways to improve my world is to improve the words you use when thinking to myself or speaking to others. I always have the power to choose my words, so it makes sense to choose the best, most positively powerful ones. I have a focus word or a power word or a mindful word each time I go to class, or wake up in the morning for that matter. For me that word is usually “love.” It can be “belief,” or “hope” or “faith.” Silently I say that word as I head for class, as I’m in class, as I’m leaving class. And as I repeat that word, I become that word; I live that word. Repetition of that word is, I find, extraordinarily powerful for creating continuous awareness and mindfulness.

LISTEN: I listen to my body. I listen to my soul. I listen to my gut. I listen to my conscience. I listen intently. With an intensity, I pay attention to the clues I’m giving myself. So many of our difficulties come from the fact that we don’t pay attention to the clues we’re giving ourselves. So, I take inventory by being aware if my stomach is tight or relaxed, is my throat dry or wet, if my brain is focused or chattering, if my palms are sweaty or not, if my legs are numb or not.

EXTEND: I extend myself beyond myself. I just wrote the words for the day on the black board yesterday, “The more you want guarantees, the less secure you feel.” Inner power is a state of being. It’s a confidence that you can handle whatever comes in life. You get that power by reaching beyond your usual comfort zone to expand your comfort zone so that what winded you at first became easier until if feels like nothing. Then, it become everything–and it’s time to extend further and farther.

CHILL: I don’t push myself. I don’t get self-conscious. I don’t try so hard I lose it and am lost. I just relax. I just go with the flow, let things happen, and let things meet me where I am. It’s all about preparation and biding time, and being prepared and waiting for the time.

Thinking all these thoughts, feeling all these feelings, don’t make them so. What good is all that power in the car’s engine if all you do is idle and rev. No, you’ve got to put it in gear, engage the engine, if you want to move. It’s the doing that makes my thoughts and feeling so. When I start living and feeling the essence of these words before class, when I start putting myself in gear, I’m ready for whatever may come. Then, I leave my chair, turn on my boom-box, pick up whatever I need to carry, and dance to class with a smile.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

What A Humble Day!

Well, it’s the end of the semester. Those very uneducational final grades are almost in. Tomorrow afternoon, Susan and I fly to San Francisco for a bunch of grand-daughter spoiling days. But, I’m already soaring higher than any plane can fly. Some students gave me a gift two days ago that left me breathless and silent. From now on, each time I take a sip of coffee on campus I will be reminded that there is nothing, nothing, that can energize you more, that can lift you higher, that can give you deeper satisfaction, that can give you a greater sense of service, that can make a greater difference, that can give you a greater sense of accomplishment than knowing you’re lifting another and making a difference in another’s life.

Whatever I had done was not one of those occasional sweeping or grand moments. From evaluation after evaluation, the students revealed that it was the unexpected, almost matter-of-fact little things that had mattered and had such a great impact. It’s the things that you don’t think about that they think about, that you think don’t mean much that mean so much. And strangely, those things are a resource at your fingertips that don’t take much energy or time, that never get used up, that grow as you use them, that even grow stronger and brighter as you draw from them: a slight smile, a little gesture, a bubble of enthusiasm, a momentary twinkle, a single jump for joy, a few seconds of time, a glimmer of light, a morsel of patience, a word of encouragement, a wink of faith, a small gesture of love, a small act of kindness, a bit of sensitivity, a slight caring touch, a small hand. It’s the caring and loving human touch that so often proves to be far more than a mere touch.

Sure, we should dream big dreams, but the payoff of big dreams come in the every day moments, simple moments, almost unthinking moments, almost imperceptible moments, and easily forgotten moments. No, there is nothing common about what on the surface appears so commonplace. There is nothing usual in what seems so usual. It’s humbling when you realize that all these little things make such a big difference, when you understand that these ordinary moments are special treasures of untold value, when you see how truly glorious, memorable, and magnificent each is. And when you do, it’s impossible not to put such incredible power into such valuable service. And then, and only then, will you be gilting each day into a golden, glistening day of difference, change, growth, and transformation for both another and you.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

More on “I’d Like To, But I Don’t Have Tenure.”

Oh, did I open a lot more than a can of worms. Feels more like a bunch of cases. Flames have been spewing out from my computer. It’s a wonder the smoke alarms weren’t set off and firemen weren’t axing their way into my newly repaired house. That wasn’t the all of it. Not only was I being roasted alive, I had to duck schools of red herrings thrown at me. There were so many straw men erected, I almost thought Halloween was upon us.

Without caring to learn who I was and what I might have done before I had tenure or who I was and what I continue to do after I had received tenure, not that any of that is particularly relevant, I was assaulted with accusations of being cavalier, self-righteous, aloof, uncaring, unrealistic, misunderstanding, ignorant, unloving, insensitive, unsupportive, arrogant, and worse.

My fingers are going stiff from responding to individual messages. Tenure, which has been denigrated to little more than job guarantee in the name of academic freedom, is an emotional hot potato, isn’t it. Well, I can’t sleep. I’m already in deep, hot water. What does a few more feet maater. So, I’d like to put together some of my statements as clarification of what I was driving at.

I raised this issue of tenure because the untenured faculty too often are treated as or see themselves as, and act out, in the words of several untenured e-colleagues, “a frightened second class” or “a silent abused underclass.” These attitudes, which are not in the minority, reflect a fundamental distrust that permeates academia. Few feel sufficiently safe and secure to speak out, to be honest, to follow their vision, to experiment, to risk mistake, to risk getting on someone’s wrong side. So, I put myself on the line out of a concern for these classy colleagues who are anything but second class. I want everyone to take off the emperor’s clothes and lay bare some truths.

Remember, that I was once there. I remember suddenly becoming visible when I transformed from A.B.D. to Ph.D. I remember how suddenly I was valued when I received tenure. I remember the pressures to stop leading the protest against the Vietnam war and leading to integrate the school beyond tokenism long before I had tenure. I remember how I was denied promotion, though I had tenure, because all that I did on campus with curriculum and programs was deemed by my friends and colleagues “unprofessional.” I remember the costs I had to pay for not being a “yes man.” I know that demands often are made on faculty for which there is insufficient financial support or release time. I am well aware that faculty and administration often speak out of one side of their mouths and act from the other. I understand we each have to decide how much we’re willing to pay to maintain our integrity. I realize that the more mouths we each have to feed, the harder the decision, the easier the rationalization. I am sensitive to the fact that Washington, D.C., has nothing on campus power politics. I know that Ph.D. doesn’t necessarily translate into cordiality, respectfulness, trustworthiness, and collegiality.

And, as I told a few people, I was being honest, respectfully honest. I was not judging. I know how honesty and compassion can clash, but my words were not meant to injure. Trust and respect often require candor, and healthy relationships have to invite, accept and withstand hard truths. If, however, my words are taken as tough, I hope they’re seen in the spirit they were offered: in the spirit of tough love. I wasn’t trying to dress up windows. I wasn’t trying to keep the emperor dressed. I wasn’t trying to coddle with go along to get along advise. If I was trying to do any of those things, that would make me what too many of us currently are: an enabler.

I know that candor is risky since it isn’t always as comfortable and convenient and safe as disguise. One of the purposes of candor, respectful honesty, however, is to create and sustain both awareness and understanding. Another is to reduce inner conflict and stress. If we are going to make choices, if we are going to assume responsibility for our choices, we should be honest about the choices confronting us and the choices we are making, about what the choices we make say about us, about what the choices we make may be doing to us, about the choices we are asking others to make, about the consequences of those choices, and about the roles we’re modeling to those around us by the choices we make.

You know, it’s pretty hard to help others with their struggles if we’ve given in to ours; it’s hard to ask others to look forward if you feel you have to look back over your shoulder in order to protect your back; it’s hard to help others see challenge as an opportunity if you treat challenge as a barrier; it’s hard to ask others to stand up and stand out if you’re inclined to sit down and be quiet; it’s hard to urge others to be fearless or come to terms with their fear if you’re fearful; it’s hard to ask for authenticity if you’re in hiding; it’s hard to ask others to maintain self-control when you’ve handed control over to others; it’s hard to develop character, which I believe is critical in education, if you’re willing to compromise yours.

A lot of what I’m saying is about self-control. Far too often, almost always, the pursuit of tenure and the other of regalia of academia result in a loss of self control. That is, we do what others expect and demand of us, or what we are convinced others expect and demand. Yet, we each need self control. It’s the ultimate mark of leadership. We need it to protect ourselves from “followship;” we need it to protect ourselves against manipulation and intimidation of the cultural pressures exerted by others–it’s called “the system”–who are around us; we need it to make our own decisions; we need it to set our own goals; we need it to determine our own value system; we need it to focus on who we are capable of becoming and focus out who we don’t want to become; we need it so others don’t stand in the way; we need it to be imaginative and creative; we need it to set and manage our own purpose; we need it to set our eyes on our own vision; we need it to overcome obstacles; we need it to use challenges as opportunities; we need it for inner peace. That is the one area where it all stops with you alone. If you don’t have self-control, it’s nobody’s fault but your own. If you don’t have it, someone else has control over you and you do their biding for their purposes to achieve their goals. When you can exercise control over yourself, you bite the sweet, lush fruit of your own spirit; you have the final decision that will define your life, your purpose, your vision. It’s the only way to decide how you’re going to live the only life you have to live.

My colleague, Pat Burns, sent me some bedtime reading that once again reminded me that our worries, frights, anxieties, and depressions over such things as getting tenure are not about tenure. Behind our understandable concern with keeping our job, behind our willingness to compromise ourselves is deep, inner fear. There’s no getting away from it no matter how hard we try. In this reading, the author argues that it’s not the system we should focus on. It’s not someone else we should focus on. We should focus on ourselves. In this case, the truth is that so very few like the tenure debasing system, so many submit to it, so many want to change the submissive system, and so few in the system are willing to look at themselves and are willing to change–which is essential if the system is to change at all.

As I told a few people, I think I was extraordinarily helpful by being honest and asking my colleagues and others to stop rationalizing or offering excuses. If nothing else, we have to be honest with ourselves. We have to work on ourselves, not on the system. You may not have control over the system, you certainly can’t control others, but you can control how you respond to it and to them. We have to acknowledge and recognize our fears, our faults, our weaknesses, our egos, our insecurities instead of the faults of someone else or something called “the system.” That is not to validate the system. That is to recognize that we are the system, and as we change the system commensurately changes.

No, it’s not tenure that’s the issue. I’m not opposed to tenure. And, as someone accused me of doing, I am certainly not promoting submissiveness. Nor am I urging a manning of the barricades or storming of the Bastille. I am saddened by how so many allow so many others to use tenure as a bludgeon. The enemy is not the system. The enemy is, as Pogo said, us. It is we who misuse and abuse tenure; it is we who allow ourselves to be abused. Our fear is the reason we’re giving others permission to push our fear button. All the time anyone of us plays the blame game by saying: “it’s their fault” we’re stuck to the tar baby. Only when we can responsibly ask ourselves: “Why am I scared when I think about tenure” do we begin or, at least, have the opportunity to unstick ourselves. Only then will their control weaken. Only then will our self-control strengthen. Only then will the power we have given to fear begin to wane. When we gather the strength to recognize our fears instead of some vague institutional fault, when we exercise the courage to admit to our fears instead of blaming others, when we have the perseverance to dig out the source of our fear, do we have a chance to come to terms with and overcome fear’s strangle hold. No, it’s not really tenure. It’s us on both sides. But, it is easier and safer to blame than assume responsibility. I’m not sure, though, as another e-colleague told me, the deluding or lying to yourself is really more comforting.

There are two real tragedies in all this. One is how easily we forget, how easily we lose sympathy and understanding and sensitivity, how easily “we” the once controlled become like the controlling “them” once we get tenure, how the bludgeoned becomes the bludgeoner, abetting the system to perpetuate the system, doing unto those who come after us what those who went before us did to us.

If you look around, you’ll see the second tragedy in all of this. You’ll rarely see metamorphosing post-tenure breakouts happening inside or outside the classroom. We delude ourselves into thinking that once we get tenure, once we’ve learned and gotten accustomed to achieving by silently going along, we’re so easily going to rock the boat in the face of pressures to achieve the other academic milestones of promotion, merit pay, appointments, sabbaticals, grants, awards, post-tenure review, etc. Most of us don’t.

On so many campuses there is talk of a learning community and yet the pursuit of and the granting process of tenure is so “uncommunity;” it is so often seen as and used as a weapon. When we each decide to work to be in true community with each other, when achievement and character do not clash, when there is collegiality, when we replace the adversarily “us v. them” with a mutually supportive and encouraging “we,” when we kick out divisive jealousy and haughty ego, when we get rid of the “they’re out to get me” attitude, when there is a web of strong connections, when there is sensitivity and awareness and mindfulness of others and yourself, when there is mutual support and encouragement, when we can be trusting and trustful, when there is respect for others and yourself, when there is love for others and yourself, there is no fear. And, when there is no fear, the quest for tenure and all the subsequent of academic medals is no longer fearsome.

If you say that will never happen, you’re right. You won’t put in an ounce of effort or a second of time for it to come to pass. If you say, “we can do that,” you right. And, you might do whatever it takes for it to alter the academic culture. As for me, I can assure you, that if ever the mistake is made to appoint me to my college’s Tenure & Promotion Committee, I will put my money where by mouth is; I will not, as I have not in the past before and after getting tenure, stay quiet in the still night.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–