My Corrupted Heart - A Letter Written a Lifetime Ago

It took me a long time to sort things out in here. And just before I emerged from my thoughts, I passed through the darkest places I have been. Dark in that I pushed past the extent of my own insecurities, my own pettiness, the last vestiges of my selfish sense of love for you. I am not sure how I persevered, as the pain was so engrossing, so self-pitying, I was tempted to languish there, to lay in wait for you, to hurt you in proportion to the distorted image of my suffering. Instead, I resolved to break the pattern of my love logic and look at my heart and my feeling for you from a different perspective. Immediately, I was struck by the constricted thing I had called my heart.
From the moment I had met you, I felt what I knew to be love for you. Your face, your gestures, you kindness all called to me. When I eventually reached out to you and you returned my affection, I knew I was in love and that nothing before had felt warmer or so engrossing. And when you asked for all my heart, I thought I had given it to you openely and faithfully. But it wasn't my heart that I had given you - it was the sense of the love I felt from you wrapped haphazardly in the barbed-wire of my shallow, selfish needs. I am sure that you must have felt the love buried there at times, not even my worst insecurites could completely stifle it. This thing I buried in the cavity of my chest, and thought of as my heart.
As we travelled, as we embraced, as we laughed and cried, I pulled you closer ripping you open with the promise of the love beneath that you deserved. And as you bled, I believed it was you that had wounded me. I compounded that delusion by making you believe it was your fault, your lack of commitment that separated our hearts. I am so, so sorry.
I can blame my history, I guess, for this pathetic concept of love. If there had ever been a functioning heart there, it was most likely beaten out of me before my first failed attempts at intimacy and love. But that is no excuse, as I always knew that my relationships were not doomed by my tragic choice of partners. I knew it was me and my selfish, stunted desires. I probably had no business touching your belly, kissing your forehead all those years ago. Despite my issues, you gave your love to me. A testament to the beautiful soul I tried to embrace so awkwardly.
I should have loved your need for privacy, your concern for the real obstacles the world confronted us with. Instead of respecting you, I let that weed-like wire wrap itself tighter around my love, the barbs biting both ways, piercing me, tearing you apart, all in the name of my martyrdom. I did the impossible, I took your unconditional love and impaled it on my own pity and insecurity. I see that now.
But I have done that which I could never do, I have cut that wire and released my love for you. It is no longer tangled with my needs, my desperate desire to keep you, my vain attempts to possess you. I must confess it hurt, pulling those prongs from my heart, but it also feels good in a way I never expected. I am no longer worried about my heart, just warming myself with a true love for you that is not confined by my ego or my expectations for your return. The thought of another man cupping your breast, even being held closely in there by you no longer rips me apart. The pain has been replaced by a genuine hope that you are loved as you deserve to be.
I hope you feel that now, that you understand that no matter what happens to you, you are deeply and truly loved, no matter how far we move apart, no matter how many years between a conversation. I hope you close your eyes at night and know that my love is with you, tenderly watching over you as if I was there, perched on an elbow marvelling in your beauty. I pray that you feel this, no matter what difficulties you face, regardless how alone you might feel. At any moment, know that my thoughts are with you, and that my new heart is warmed by the thought of you smiling. This love is yours, always.
I won't blame you if you doubt the sincerity of this note, or my intentions. Until you do, I can only content myself with this new feeling. My memories of you no longer haunt me as losses or squandered love. I smile and appreciate the experiences, knowing how lucky I was then and that you must have a few nice thoughts too. My self-induced trauma is gone, I am happy.
Yours,
Michael

Planting Seeds

I have thought a lot lately about seeds, particularly planting them. Not in a literal sense, but in a figurative, grateful way. When you teach for a living it is hard sometimes to recognize your value and the difference you make. I didn't realize this difficulty until someone asked me why I had taken up woodworking. I hadn't thought about it until that point - why woodworking? The answer came surprisingly easy, because I could see the result! It was a peculiar pleasure to put forth effort and see an immediate result. It was also clear to me that my profession did not always offer such rapid and clear feedback. This of course put me on a path to examine the fruits of my labor, the effects of a lifetime of unseen work.
I sat one afternoon and mused on my impact on the world. I knew that it was generally accepted that as a teacher, I made a difference, but how? I started to recall the feedback I received from students who had returned or who I had bumped into (physically and virtually) through the years. One very odd and poignant pattern emerged: If I could have recalled every word uttered to that student, the thing that stuck with her would not have been on my top 100 anticipated aphorisms. You never know how one word, one gentle admonition, one encouragement can impact a life. You would have to know where that human "is" at the moment of interchange to understand how your intended gesture is not only conceptualized at the moment, but incubated for later reflection as well. Students have quoted me saying things I honestly don't think I said - and I never contradict them.
Sadly, I suppose, there are also negative contributions we make to their development that we probably never hear about. I do hear about the negative impact of other teachers all the time. I am not sure we can ever be sure what we say is received and stored with the same effect as we desire, but I am sure that I can do a better job reaching more students than I currently do. My goal is to make sure there are no invisible students in any of my classes.
This past January, I was invited to deliver the keynote address at an ESL conference in Amman, Jordan. It took me a long time to develop the speech that was to be on motivating learning and learners. I didn't procrastinate, it just didn't crystallize until hours before my speech. I ended up talking about "knuckleheads, the choir, and those in the middle." It was well received.
My premise was that these were the three types of students in a classroom, and motivation was different for each group. All three are challenging, and need a distinct approach. I began with the choir - those eager students who always have their hands up, ready to participate, hanging on every word. The danger with this group is to eventually take them for granted and to ignore them for the sake of the others. How do you keep them motivated when you are constantly looking past their frenetically waved hands to the other students? I suggest that you connect with them outside of class, acknowledging them in the hallways, at lunch, in public. They can make great peer teachers if you can shift their goals from your attention to the welfare of their classmates. And finally, I think you need to find creative ways to give them the attention they desire: a note after class, asking them to assist you with some basic classroom chores, emailing if appropriate, nominating them for recognition, etc. It is truly a shame when we marginalize these students in our attempts at egalitarian education.
In my hours of contemplation, I am often most concerned for the middle group of students who escape my detection when I am about my business of teaching. They are invisible by design - they want to escape detection. They will quietly, happily let me ramble on forever mistakenly thinking everyone is on the same page. Not long ago, I decided that I would "penetrate the gloom of their anonymity!" Their silence and withdrawn affect hurt them in the long run. Yes, they weren't put on the spot and embarrassed, but they were also never challenged and rewarded. It is my contention that we have to pull them up into the sun and engage them. For after all, many of these students don't stay in the middle, they either slide in with the knuckleheads or step up to the choir. I find I have a say in this valence.
I began to recognize and interact with all of these students, from calling role to gently teasing and encouraging them. I also worked hard to reward them and to support them when they took risks. I learned everything I could about them to help them relate their world and interests to my subject matter. My few successes here were my most rewarding.
I saved the knuckleheads for last, probably because I had much more expertise there, being a CRK (contrite reformed knucklehead) myself. I also told the audience that success with this group was seldom actualized at the moment, that the best you can hope to do is plant seeds with these students that will take root later and blossom. Not a great answer for a frustrated teacher here and now. I have found that often, these students need to be challenged creatively. I have also found that I could disarm them very effectively by interacting with them graciously outside fo the classroom, one-on-one. The classroom was their battlefield, they were naked and vulnerable outside it. Most importantly, I have vowed never to give up on these students, despite the poor feedback I receive in the lifetime of my relationship with them. I have learned this lesson from the few teachers who never gave up on me - I wish I could tell them now, what those small, kind gestures eventually taught me - perhaps I will.
So, I am now in the business of "seeing" my students and planting seeds. Not always rewarding at the moment, but my soul knows the eventual reward for my efforts, and God's grace that I have always felt when things worked well comforts me in my new found patience.

Leadership Axiom #2

You Cannot be Better than the System You are in!
When I used to visit potential work sites, I focused on what would be "beneath" me (terrible choice of words), i.e., those I would supervise. Now I look above! I have learned that without the support of my supervisors, and more importantly, a logical system, I cannot achieve much. I don't need to have a great relationship with those I report to, but I do need to have an honest, consistent working relationship with these decision makers and decision supporters.
Too often, I think, we focus on our personal, idiographic relationships with our supervisors. Hindsight has shown me this is not a necessary antecedent to a good working relationship. I have had a supervisor that I did not respect personally, but she supported our mutual goals and decisions unilaterally. She didn't always make sure I got credit for what I had accomplished, but she never left me hanging in the wind, thrown under a bus (sorry, passive aggressive memories of my first graduate professor who worshipped Orwell and railed against the literary use of "prepackaged phrases"). We accomplished a lot together, and that was really all that mattered.
I have also worked in environments with a great deal of good people, but they were connected by capricious, self-serving systems. Virtue and valor acquiesced to the navigation of the labile vagaries of a corrupt enterprise. Many eventually retreated into their own spheres of efficacy, and removed themselves from much of the surrounding environment. Others battled hopelessly against a sea of ambiguity, eventually giving up, feeling beaten up and betrayed by nothing. I was one of these combatants - however, I would flee the battlefield (change jobs) before the inevitable surrender.
After contemplating these phenomena for several years, I have settled on a new concept, a new focus: Heroic Systems vs Heroic Individuals. I realized that the most productive periods in my life have been when I worked actively and enthusiastically within a healthy, consistent system. My efforts were magnified by those of other and vice versa. No matter how difficult things became, the unity of the group gave me solace that we would survive and eventually accomplish our goals (i.e., then can kill us but they can't eat us). I no longer want to be a hero or a martyr, just another caring, committed individual who improves the lives of other by creating the right system.
This system is demanding though - it loathes ego (especially my kind), often disdains personal recognition, and requires a great deal of acquiescence. Academic Freedom is often one of its first causalities, or I should say the self-serving perversion of Academic Freedom. In order to build a good system, a heroic one, individuals have to give up selfish, discordant, mercurial "rights." We all have to sit together and decide what is best for the system and act accordingly. I have learned from quality control concepts that a group of individuals reacting immediately to variation in a process actually create more variation than if they had let the process run unabated. It amazes me to this day that professionals who acknowledge the rigorous discipline of their own fields, ironically posit that they should be able to act independently in their classrooms, and that that course is best for students. Very incongruent, if not hypocritical.
This has been a hard lesson for me, as building and then imposing a communally developed system on myself is difficult. But I have seen the virtue of consistency and transparency, particularly when working with at-risk and underpresented students. Time and time again, they have told me they just want to "know the rules, and to have them consistently applied." I was shocked when I first heard these complaints, many aimed at more liberal colleagues. The students didn't respect or trust inconsistent treatment, even if it was temporarily favorable to them.
So, I am no longer longing to tilt at windmills, battling the evil empires I find myself in. I am no longer the lone hero, sacrificing for the benefit of my poor, downtrodden students. I am responsible to help build a consistent, equitable system that serves us all. And although this may not be as fun on a daily basis, I am sure it will be far more rewarding on graduation days when I see more familiar faces beaming broadly as they climb up the stage, reveling in their own achievement and loving the system that helped them achieve it.

Working With The UN in Jordan

I hadn't worked with international aid agencies since my days in Yemen, some twenty plus years ago. While there, I interacted with several international entities, and my experiences weren’t very positive. As a matter of fact, If it had been for these respected groups, I never would have worked internationally again.
I was living in an Eritrean refugee camp, teaching English, helping another Peace Corps Volunteer build a school, and doing some medical work (mostly rehydration therapy). One agency had put the camp doctor into a difficult position with the local Yemenis, and he was eventually arrested and deported leaving me to do healthcare (I had a medical book). They then had the wonderful idea of buying the refugees a refrigerated truck so that these fishermen could catch fish and take them to market. The agency never coordinated with the Yemeni government, and the truck never got licensed. It sat in the middle of the camp for the two years I was there as a defacto jungle gym for the kids.
The second group I had to work with was more vexing however. The office in the capital was staffed by some European party animals that interacted mostly at expat parties. They seldom visited the camp, and occasionally sent some directive that was ignored. One such order was that I was to remove myself from the camp, as I did not have their clearance. The elders told me to just wait, and that the folks in the main office would soon forget - they did, probably the effects of alcohol and drugs. It really left a bad taste in my mouth watching these esteemed agencies ignore or manipulate the refugees they pretended to serve. I chalked it up to my naiveté and went about my business.
It would be a few decades before my faith in international aid agencies would be restored. It happened when I visited two Palestinian refugee camps; one in Jerusalem, one in Jordan.
Working with a US philanthropic organization, I contacted officials in Jerusalem and Amman offering to provide their schools with free educational resources. I was amazed at the cooperation I received, and at the level of caring and expertise of the people I worked with. Yeah, the bureaucracy was probably as convoluted as those I had previously experienced, but this organization - The United Nations Relief Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) knew how to put the right people "on the ground" where it counted. From the lower level administration to the supervisors and most of the local teachers, I worked with some of the most committed and talented people I have ever met.
The situation in Palestine and Jordan is not pleasant, and the conditions these people work in are far from ideal. Yet their positive nature and real desire to help students transcends their circumstances. At every school and site I visited, I met scores of teachers and administrators I would be proud to work with anywhere. I didn't see the prevalent dissatisfaction and disaffection I experience in so many schools here in the US, nor did I see the self-serving ideologies that have developed amongst the teacher groups here in America. I did see people making very meager salaries, doing a great deal of work, focusing on the welfare of their students. Very humbling indeed.
I worked with a few key administrators who were fantastic. They were very passionate about their work, and I could see the effect their enthusiasm had on the teachers they worked with. Most importantly, they treated the teachers with dignity and respect, something I have not always enjoyed from my superiors. I have had many long discussions about teaching and philosophy with these folks and have been very amazed. Despite the fact that they are grossly under compensated, God got it right when he put them into their roles!
Before you protest, I am not romanticizing these educators, administrators, or the organization either. There were some who were detached, unhappy, maybe even a bit dissident. There might have been a few administrators that weren’t always helpful, but that was the exception not the rule. The difference is that they didn't come to infect the larger groups - they were ignored and minimized. The worst experience I had doing hundreds of hours of workshops was silence from a handful of teachers. My typical experience was working with excited, intelligent, and informed educators who were willing to process their experiences and entertain new possibilities to improve their pedagogy. An ideal place for someone like me.
I can't express my respect for these teachers and supervisors, nor my admiration for the work they do facing bleak circumstances. I can say that I am very proud to be associated with them, and that I pray that my two daughters find these kind of leaders as they continue their education.

Hero

I bet you never recognize your heroes the first time you lay eyes on them. They don’t have letters on their chests, are most often cape-less, and they never ever emerge from burning buildings with puppies draped over their elbow. I certainly didn’t know I was meeting the most heroic man I have ever met twenty four years ago at a summer staff meeting. I didn’t feel it in his handshake, his demeanor, his softly stated introduction. As a matter of fact, it was quite a bit later that I realized he alone had redefined my notion of heroes and ethics and integrity.
I met Don in 1987 at a meeting for new part-time faculty at the University of Akron. It was the summer I was returning from Jamaica to stumble on a teaching gig, working with developmental students teaching them reading and study skills. There were four or five of us there that day, perhaps the typical assortment of oddballs necessary to fill out a rota of reading and study skills courses – given that there were very few “pure” paths to such an endeavor. Who, after all, pines to grow up to teach people how to study? There was me (the temporarily nested sojourner soon to light off again), a displaced jazz singer, a few spouses of newly relocated businessmen, and Don who was perhaps retreating from the steadily deteriorating public school system. I liked him immediately.
I have to say, I am sure my first impression of Don was a very curious one to say the least. He was not a tall man, was very slight weighing a hundred pounds soaking wet if he had a few rocks in his pockets, and frankly wore clothes I thought were somewhat colorful and dated. He spoke slowly and carefully, and quickly established himself as my new jeopardy source on all things Ohio. But there was also something very large in that small, ornately draped frame. A subtle, steel strong dignity that belied his steady, composed demeanor – I suspected there had been pain and history there, and that his sense of decorum and deportment had been forged fairly.
Don and I had very different philosophies and approaches to education, to say the least. I was very creative, energetic, willing to explore and try new things. Don was very conservative, opting to plod diligently through a disciplined process, quietly and methodically. As teachers, I was sure I was entertaining, engrossing even , and that Don was steady but probably boring. In hindsight, I was all over the map accomplishing very little, and he was slowly and surely improving students’ skill sets and self-esteem – the job we were all hired for in the first place.
It wasn’t until I saw Don tutoring that I began to detect that big red and yellow S softly materializing on his chest. I suppose I should pause here and establish a basic set of criteria for hero status. A hero does things you cannot do, not things you will not do. A hero is reliable and constant, and lives his convictions. And most importantly, a hero goes about his business quietly, without any fanfare. Don is indeed a hero – for I cannot sit for hours with a frustrated, struggling student pounding away at apparently simple concepts. I cannot disguise my impatience, my selfish need to move on, to abate my boredom. Don doesn’t have to disguise or hide and such weaknesses – he doesn’t have them. He is the most patient, caring, and empathetic educator I have ever met. I have never seen his limits tested in this regard and that still amazes me nearly a quarter of a century later. Even Batman got a little testy with Robin now and again.
Don also personifies reliability and constancy. I have never seen him angry, nor have I seen him be cruel or disrespectful to anyone. All I have seen, is a caring man working hard to help students many people overlook. When President Proenza appears on television inviting the community to send its young adults to pursue their dreams here, Don keeps him honest. For if those students fail to be admitted directly into the school of engineering or business, and need a hand up, Don is there. His job isn’t glamorous or even deemed necessary by everyone around campus, but if he wasn’t here, the school would be a lesser place. If you don’t believe me, take a walk across campus one day with Don. You will be stopped several times by adoring and grateful students who you probably wouldn’t have met if we hadn’t met Don. This legion of students – at-risk, non-traditional, learning disabled, reluctant, simply wouldn’t be here. They are his legacy. A hero’s legacy indeed.
I am very honored and proud to count Don as my friend.

Leadership Axiom #1

I hope it isn't too presumptuous to offer my insights into leadership, but I have been around the block as it were, supervising people since 1979 (my first gig was running an underground construction crew for a few years while in college). I have since studied leadership theories and philosophies, and have had the occasion to teach some classes. I will offer, in modest installments, some of the important lessons I have learned, if for nothing else, to keep them codified in my own constellation of tools. So, for this inaugural installment, I will begin with my first leadership lesson, at least in terms of starting a new position at a new place:
Beware Those Who Come to You First!
This has been an important lesson for me in that it is very counter intuitive, and I have started off a few assignments in a hole due to my ignorance of its effects. Often, the folks that get to you first have a reason for doing so. Some are just plain helpful, and in this case, there is little danger. Others however, have different motivations: some have exhausted all other avenues of communication and influence, others have negative and/or biased affiliations, and some want commitments or agendas satisfied. In better words, avoid engaging in any commitment, affiliation, or decision too soon in the relationship!
Over and over again, I have seen this dynamic play itself out, even to the extent that other employees would warn me that a "certain person" would be first in line to meet me. I have not become cynical at all about these approaches, I have simply become cautious about engaging in any type of obligation or promise, even if that offer appears to be helpful to me. On the flip side of this issue, I have also learned to seek out those who don't come forward, cautiously though. They too can have their reasons for avoiding a new leader.

Learning to CARE

A week or so ago, well into my fifth decade, it occurred to me in an instant how I learned to care for others, and how my life began to turn towards a career in education and development. I had never put these pieces together before, but had often entertained fleeting inquiries as to how I had landed on the path I have found myself on. I guess I didn't fret too much, given that it is the right path for me.
I was sitting in a Board of Trustees meeting, having presented a short report on my recent trip to Jordan the night before. I had concluded my remarks by telling them that our work in teacher training (particularly in increasing student engagement) was a critical goal of the United Nations (one of my sponsors), and that helping students find their voice and allowing them to exercise it was the first key towards societal democratization. Changing the power relations in a classroom was the grassroots equivalent of a successful, peaceful revolution.
They enjoyed the presentation, and I got a lot of very positive feedback the rest of the evening. When I returned the second day to do a different update, I was startled by the comments a VP made related to the initiatives I was involved with. To that point, I had found him reasonable and collaborative - he mystified me with his unsolicited declaration. When a board member mentioned that we might want to cite international education in our mission statement if we were to continue to work towards these new goals, he spoke up and took the room by surprise. He announced that he was against helping others around the world when there were so many destitute students right here in our area. He elaborated the point for a bit, then stopped. I felt quite a few pair of eyes on me, almost as if it was a challenge aimed at me (I don't think it was). I thought for a moment, as two primary responses emerged. The first was simple and pragmatic: we weren't voting on anything, nor was the group likely to thwart any of my goals related to international education. In addition, the school had only funded a small percent of my trip. That led me to leave his rebuke languishing on the board floor. The second level of response hit me like the proverbial brick - I realized at that moment how incorrect his premise was, just how naively pedantic and myopic such sentiments were (I had heard versions of this argument my whole adult life, especially after folks learned I had served in the Peace Corps). I was back again in my sixth grade classroom in 1971. I remember being so motivated and excited to collect money for CARE and Unicef to help poor children around the world. I gave every cent I had, and found more. I didn't let the others know how much I was giving, but my teacher knew and nodded approvingly. That was the start of my own salvation, my own path to helping myself by helping others. For if my friend at the board meeting had seen me then, he would have recognized the same kid he now endeavors to help here 40 years later.
I knew things were terrible at home, I knew I wasn't like the other kids, that we weren't like the other families - after all, that had been my ninth school in six years. I am sure kindly people had tried to help me and my family, and had probably tried to point out my situation. This had no effect on my psyche, nor did it help me cope with the anarchy I lived through each evening returning from school. We had food stamps, reduced lunches, free toys at Christmas, government food, etc. It made no impact on my sensibilities at all - having the ability to reach out and make a difference in someone's life 10,000 miles away, albeit anonymously, did! My life changed from that moment.
I learned that people needed to learn to read and write in Jamaica, then that they needed to learn to read and write here. I learned that students in the third world faced tremendous obstacles in pursing their educational dreams, and I learned the same about students here. I have learned so much about helping others, and in the process, have made some minor steps helping myself. I have been very blessed.
By helping others, by seeing their predicaments, by trying to help them overcome their circumstances, I gradually began to allow myself the same opportunity. And as I reflected and dealt with my past (not exactly past as it haunted me for a long time)I learned how to communicate with others dealing with their own versions of hell and calamity. I have also found that they in turn help me, and that makes all the difference. I emerged a better man for dropping a few silver dollars in a large Pringle-looking can with a slot in the lid, 40 years ago.
I thought about telling him this at that meeting. About making a plea about reaching out all over the world in small and quiet ways, here and abroad. I thought about telling him how the kids he suffers over (quite genuinely I think)would feel about themselves if given the chance to make measured, selfless gestures on behalf of strangers anywhere in the world. How they would feel for that moment, knowing that they had contributed to a larger community of humans connecting despite their regionality or ideology. I wonder if he would understand the efficacy that is born there. I decided not to say anything.
Others defended the concept of internationalizing the college and curriculum, and I sat quiet. Some even came to me afterward offering apologies. I had not been offended, nor did I bear him any ill will. I was grateful for the rare moment of insight into my own life, and was assured that the revelation would help me in my continued desire to help others here and elsewhere. Perhaps though, I will forward him this post.