An environment of respect must be the context for our complex reality to occur as well as the way to work towards an even more respectful environment for everyone. Good basket weaving learning and action cannot happen in an environment lacking respect for all of it's elements. The teacher and student must respect one another, themselves, the materials, the process, and its product. Many of the thoughts about writing Lamott shares support this emphasis on respect, for example, "you have to respect the qualities that make them [your characters] who they are" (p. 108).
Respect for the present is awe in presence. This would be a weaver's respect for everything all combined together into what they are doing, one another, the materials, the process, etc. Lamott effectively describes this as a way to deal with reality that is one of the greatest, most helpful experiential skills I want to help share with others. On page 102 Lamott says this:
To be engrossed by something outside ourselves is a powerful antidote for the rational mind, the mind that so frequently has its head up its own ass - seeing things in a such a narrow and darkly narcissistic way that it presents a colo-rectal theology, offering hope to no one.
When I am feeling beaten-up and no good, to look at something like the squirrel Lamott did or a crow or whatever, and when I really consider it as a respectable fellow being, I feel more grounded in reality and more open to hope. This is something I do want to share with others, especially young people.
Emily,
ReplyDeleteYour basket weaving analogy is beautiful. The picture it created for me is a powerful one that shows developing readers and writers are on their own unique and beautiful journeys to literacy. There are a lot of moving parts in this developmental process and the success does not mean that the parts move always move in the same sequence or timeframe for everyone.
I caught up on some of your previous posts and I wanted to tell you that your comment about how perfectionism can get in the way of the joy and beauty that occurs in the process resonated with me. Lamott’s chapter on perfectionism is terrific and she reminded me that “clutter and mess show us that life is being lived”. I think about that line a lot this fall and always when I step into my house.
Susan
Its amazing what can happen when pieces of things are woven together and what they can make. Yarn can make a warm sweater, and to make that yarn there needs to be fibers that are woven together. Learners are given the pieces to put together what they have learned. But sometimes putting those pieces together is not always easy for every student in every area. They need be be shown their pieces or yarn and how that can ben woven into sometime amazing. Its amazing to me some of the work students have the ablility to produce when they take everything they have learned and combine it into one.
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