RAVE Reviews (Book)
Working Paper:Becoming the Change (Chapter)
Author: Joy Evans Peterson
Connecting Heart to Heart
Gig Harbor, WA United States
04/17/2003
Annotation: Becoming the Change
RAVE Reviews is a book about the principles of good parenting and healthy families applied to organizations. Organizations are simply larger human systems and the same simple principles and values apply. RAVE stands for Respect, Appreciate, Validate, and Empower. When people are treated with these values, it produces the Oomph Factor; Spirit, voluntary effort, focused energy, inspired endeavor. It is the stuff of life, the energy core around which to design a shared life on an increasingly small planet; the raw material, the energetic DNA of effort, relationships, and community.
Appreciative Inquiry operates from the premise that the creation of a better future rests on a foundation built on the best of the past. Positive change comes from focusing on the positive elements that brought us to this point in time. The best of the past is discovered by inquiring into the most treasured moments of each individual’s distinctive experience and then shared with the community as a whole. The evolution of history has its ancient roots in storytelling. Conversation around the campfire was the primary means for passing along traditions and wisdom to succeeding generations…preserving what still serves and planting the seeds of change. Current permutations; the water cooler or email have not really diminished the usefulness of the informal communication network.
In the constant search for better organizations, there is one immutable factor?it is not possible to create an organization more enlightened than those who inhabit it. The buck stops there?or rather here?with me. The search for a better organization begins with me. If I do the inner work of becoming a more enlightened person, a more appreciative person, and others commit to embark on the same journey, can the organization not reflect it?
The Seeds of Change
It is in the nature of things to constantly change, slowly or suddenly, things do change. Whether or not I choose to be the author of the change is up to me individually and us collectively. Unless I intentionally direct the energy for change, and align it in the service of my unique life purpose, I am a pawn in my own story, whatever it is. There is in humankind an internal imperative demanding continual growth. In responding to that call, I am required at some point in time, to step into my own power, to resign from playing the assigned part in my old story – my past history – to take ownership and responsibility for authoring my new story; who I choose to become now and in the future.
The quality of my life in the present and ultimately, is measured in the quality of my relationships…both with myself and with others. It is not possible to create relationships or organizations, that are healthier and more satisfying than my relationship to my own self. I cannot ask for more appreciation and respect from the important others in my life, than I have for myself. Nor can I treat others more appreciatively and respectfully than I treat myself. No one will, or can, love and value me in greater measure than my caring and respect for myself. It is not possible, and even if it were, in the absence of self-esteem, I would be unable to acknowledge and receive it.
If it is my intention to direct the energy for change in service of a better relationship, organization or world, I must make myself a better person first. I cannot demand from others what I am unwilling to do myself. Gandhi said “I must become the change I wish to see.” I cannot journey to another place without leaving the beloved, restrictive, familiar behind. The journey involves adventure and risk, and embarking on an adventure requires facing the fears that hold me hostage to the known.
Unmasking the Shadow
Fear and ego are the real enemies, in the individual, in relationships, and in the workplace. The shadow selves are constant companions on the human journey. They are the stalkers, the whisperers in the night, the footsteps in the darkness of the soul, who would constantly remind of limitations, failures, regrets, guises. These are the captors who would victimize and bind to persona, helplessness and apathy. But when the courage is found to claim them, then I, and only I, also have the power to banish them, to emancipate, to shine light into the darkness and discover the integrity and pursue fiercely the purpose for which I am uniquely designed.
In the tapestry of the future, there are brilliantly colored threads each individual holds, to weave into the evolving masterpiece of life. There are people only I will touch to heal and inspire, there are tasks only I must perform, there is wisdom only I am able to impart. It is my primary duty to become all I have the potential to be, to enlighten myself? to speak my own truth, to sing my own melody, to choreograph the dance of my own life. Perhaps when I speak and sing and dance it with conviction and joy, I will awaken and support others to do it too. When enough of us become passionate about the song and dance of our lives, our organizations, our institutions, and our world will reflect it, after all, they are both crafted by and composed of us!
Resource Files:
Becoming the Change (doc )
RAVE Reviews Foreward (doc )
RAVE Reviews Purpose Statement (doc )
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