Changing the world

Margaret Ledwith writes about changing the world in Participatory Practice, (2010) Policy Press :
We believe that the process of transformation often gets stuck at the personal, group or project stage… if you think participatively and ecologically, everything is interconnected and stuckness is a failure to make key connections for energy to flow in the system with the necessary feedback process. It is these processes that tip a system into a new way of being. We can engage in the dialogical, reflexive process within a community, but unless we extend that engagement to all who connect with the community, we are not opening up the valves for the process to become collective. We have to engage with communities of practice in ever-increasing cycles of reflection and action. …
From a practical perspective, there needs to be a commitment to continuous revolution, inner and outer. It involves linking people across systems, connecting with others.

Paulo Freire emphasised that transformative change begins in grassroots communities, and it is the powerless who, in liberating themselves, are the ones who liberate the powerful. Freire, P(1972) Pedagogy of the oppressed, Harmondsworth: Penguin.

Community development is people development: people developing the power and self-worth to use their skills and knowledge to create positive change. It is about transfer of power to those local leaders…
The work of the community practitioner is to create the context for developing the skills and knowledge for people to join together collectively to bring about change. As individual issues becomes shared, a group establishes a project, projects become organised under a community-wide umbrella, perhaps a community forum, this provides a level of organising that leads to alliances, and alliances unite as movements for change. This brings back full circle to participatory democracy. … So community development, while building grassroots groups which link together to form social movem,ents, still retains local collective power to participate in decisions that improve local well-being. In this constant local-global dynamic, participatory democracy sustains a way of life on earth as a flourishing, mutual ecosystem.

After having some ideas about the process of transformation through the key stage levels of changing ourselves, connecting with others and changing the world, we must compare it to Conductive Education and find the similarities between those elements and our everyday practice.

Connecting with others

Healthier people do seem to feel a greater emotional sense of connection and belonging, and that sense of meaning and connection is a vital part of health.

Skinner B.F.: Reflections on behaviourism and society, Englewood Cliffs 1978

Connecting collectively is central to community development process, and calls for us to work on number of levels at the same time. In our participatory practice, not only should we be engaging with individuals, groups and projects within the community, but also with the organisation and people who connect with community or impact on it. This is about bringing to the surface those hidden connections. Our work is about connecting people at all levels in all contexts, from community groups to movements for change. Not only does this heal alienation, but it also creates a common purpose for healthy world. Connections begin in less organised ways, and not only between groups, also not long period of time. Individuals represent, consciously or unconsciously, a wider society when connecting to other people who anyway also represent other groups of the society. A higher level when we consciously try to liaise with other groups of people – connecting collectively.

Changing +

The extent to which we human beings do not achieve our potential to be creative authors of our own vision is due to the tremendous set of socialised perceptions –Truths- which promote a limited consciousness and prevent the development of critical awareness of the natural phenomenon of which we are an integral part and the dynamic, dialectic interaction which defines the relationship with our environment. Our truths function, ultimately, to prevent our self actualisation as individuals and in groups.

Murphy B: Transforming ourselves, transforming the world: An open conspiracy for social change, 1999 London: Zed Books

However, there is more to it than this. If we are a microcosm of the whole, then we have to seek balance and well-being within ourselves, since our own consciousness is interrelated to what is outside ourselves. So it is not just about re-visioning ourselves in relation to the whole, it is being whole in ourselves, in relation to the different parts of ourselves and the community of which we are a part. It is about being critically reflexive and critically engaged in the world on an inner and outer dimension.
In these ways, I see a participatory worldview as not simply an approach to practice – it is a way of life. We can not engage people in our working relation in a mutual, equal way, only to be abusive or exploitative in other contexts of our lives. This is duplicitous and simply does not work. Our value base provides the foundation of practice. For example, the concept of dialogue cannot be applied to practice without a profound understanding of the way that values of respect, dignity and human worth enable it to become an engagement that is mutual and reciprocal, one based on corporation rather than competition, based on humility rather than arrogance. This may seem a simple idea, but consider the way that arrogance is part of every day life in the West, encouraged as a form of status in competitive, top-down world. And arrogance is a form of bullying, an acting out of superiority that reflects dominant power relations. In order to ensure that superiority is not unconsciously acted out in dialogue as a form of power over others, we pay attention to. A self-reflexive approach to self-consciousness helps us to go deeper into understanding of personal power: who am I, in my maleness, femaleness, in my profession, in my middle classness, in my Whiteness…and how is this experienced by those who are other. An understanding of the way we express our values in relationships is vital to the process of liberation.
Partnerships cannot be mutual unless all parties believe they have as much to learn from each other as they have to give. In this sense, Freire saw mutuality in horizontal relations; co-learners, co-teachers, co-researchers working as true partners in the process of liberation.

Changing

“Ultimately we must ask ourselves what kind of a society we wish to live in and what we are going to do to make our vision a reality…
To find the courage and power to question and act in the interest of a more democratic and just world.”

Darder A.: Reinventing Paulo Freire: Pedagogy of love
Boulder, CO and Oxford 2002

There are three key stages in the process of transformations: changing ourselves, connecting with others and changing the world.

In relation to changing the self, participation demands that we are part of the process; we can not set ourselves outside the process of change. Engaging in participatory practice is engaging in our own transformation. How can we help others to become authentic if we are not open to challenge and to change ourselves?

Changing can not be achieved without a unity of praxis in which theory, practice and change are integrated. If we are seeking balance and wholeness in community we need to hold a balance within ourselves, and be aware when the balance is challenged. We also need to understand the nature of relationship between ourselves and others. Self- reflection involves being aware of the relationship between our outer and our inner world.

Guide for fresh arrivals (conductors) to Britain

No, it is not that serious as the title suggests…

During my “snow break” – off from school because of the unusual weather condition throughout the UK – I have had a chance to brose around between old and new literature. Although I knew George Mikes’ name from the articles of George Faludy, I never read anything from him so I dig out some old “minibuses” as Mikes called his writings and read them. Even if many contents of his topics are out of date for now, Mikes’ sense of humour makes us to laugh. I thought to share this piece with the world of conductors (Hungarians and others) in order to introduce George Mikes who wrote numerous minibuses. His literature can ease conductors life on abroad.

The following chapter is from
How to be an Alien: A Handbook for Beginners and More Advanced Pupils (1946)

THE LANGUAGE

When I arrived in England I thought I knew English. After I'd been here
an hour I realized that I did not understand one word. In the first week
I picked up a tolerable working knowledge of the language and the next seven
years convinced me gradually but thoroughly that I would never know it
really well, let alone perfectly. This is sad. My only consolation being
that nobody speaks English perfectly.
Remember that those five hundred words an average Englishman uses are
far from being the whole vocabulary of the language. You may learn another
five hundred and another five thousand and yet another fifty thousand and
still you may come across a further fifty thousand you have never heard of
before, and nobody else either. If you live here long enough you will find
out to your greatest amazement that the adjective nice is not the only
adjective the language possesses, in spite of the fact that in the first
three years you do not need to learn or use any other adjectives. You can
say that the weather is nice, a restaurant is nice, Mr Soandso is nice, Mrs
Soandso's clothes are nice, you had a nice time, and all this will be very
nice. Then you have to decide on your accent. You will have your foreign
accent all right, but many people like to mix it with something else. I knew
a Polish Jew who had a strong Yiddish-Irish accent. People found it
fascinating though slightly exaggerated. The easiest way to give the
impression of having a good accent or no foreign accent at all is to hold an
unlit pipe in your mouth, to mutter between your teeth and finish all your
sentences with the question: 'isn't it?' People will not understand much,
but they are accustomed to that and they will get a most excellent
impression.
I have known quite a number of foreigners who tried hard to acquire an
Oxford accent. The advantage of this is that you give the idea of being
permanently in the company of Oxford dons and lecturers on medieval
numismatics; the disadvantage is that the permanent singing is rather a
strain on your throat and that it is a type of affection that even many
English people find it hard to keep up incessantly. You may fall out of it,
speak naturally, and then where are you? The Mayfair accent can be highly
recommended, too. The advantages of Mayfair English are that it unites the
affected air of the Oxford accent with the uncultured flavor of a
Half-educated professional hotel-dancer.
The most successful attempts, however, to put on a highly cultured air
have been made on the polysyllabic lines. Many foreigners who have learnt
Latin and Greek in school discover with amazement and satisfaction that the
English language has absorbed a huge amount of ancient Latin and Greek
expressions, and they realize that:
a) it is much easier to learn these expressions than the much simpler
English words;
(b) that these words as a rule are interminably long and make a simply
superb impression when talking to the greengrocer, the porter and the
insurance agent. Imagine, for instance, that the porter of the block of
flats where you live remarks sharply that you must not put your dustbin out
in front of your door before 7.30 a.m. Should you answer 'Please don't bully
me,' a loud and tiresome argument may follow, and certainly the porter will
be proved right, because you are sure to find a douse in your contract
(small print, of last page) that the porter is always right and you owe
absolute allegiance and unconditional obedience to him. Should you answer,
however, with these words: 1 repudiate your petulant expostulations,' the
argument will be closed at once, the porter will be proud of having such a
highly cultured man in the block, and from that day onwards you may, if you
please, get up at four o'clock in the morning and hang your dustbin out of
the window. But even in Curzon Street society, if you say, for instance,
that you are a tough guy they will consider you a vulgar, irritating and
objectionable person. Should you declare, however, that you are an
inquisitorial and peremptory homo sapiens, they will have no idea what you
mean, but they will feel in their bones that you must be something
wonderful. When you know all the long words it is advisable to start
learning some of the short ones, too. You should be careful when using these
endless words. An acquaintance of mine once was fortunate enough to discover
the most impressive word notalgia for back-ache. Mistakenly, however, he
declared in a large company: 'I have such a nostalgia.' 'Oh, you want to go
home to Nizhne-Novgorod?' asked his most sympathetic hostess. 'Not at all,'
he answered. 'I just cannot sit down.' . Finally, there are two important
points to remember:
1. Do not forget that it is much easier to write in English than to
speak English, because you can write without a foreign accent.
2. In a bus and in other public places it is more advisable to speak
softly in good German than to shout in abominable English.
Anyway, this whole language business is not at all easy. After spending
eight years in this country, the other day I was told by a very kind lady:
'But why do you complain? You really speak a most excellent accent without
the slightest English.'

A christmas tree

Trust
We NOT I
Us NOT Me
Ours NOT Mine
Secure NOT Insecure
Humble NOT Egotistical
Sharing NOT Self Centered


I have worked with X as a conductor. X has been a great friend and a mentor to me over the years. Her ability to lead has been an ispiration to me, and her natural ability to be able to relate to people at all levels help me hone my skills on how to communicate with others. Some people however, do not want to communicate. Let them not to.