FootprintsintheWind.com

Why is community disorganizing law? Because the law we have at base is life. We must revere life, we must intensify life, increase the degree of living we do, and those around us do. This can be a soft gentle thing, like a caress on an elder’s hand, or a sitting quietly in the setting sunlight. It can be boisterous, as in a change the village kind of meeting.

The baseline law is living. Belonging. Engaging. In this law is love and sacredness.

:- Doug.

I do not fully know what Community Disorganizing is about. I want to keep exploring—with others.

:- Doug.

We do not have all the living we could have in nursing homes nor in Estate Plans, nor in Wills and Trusts and Estate Administration. Nor in death. This then needs us to disorganize.

:- Doug.

So much of what we experience in our society today is I-It and forgets that people are people. This is not simply being nice, but being truthful, recognizing the importance of life, and meeting the living being in front of us. Life is essential to this world. If it were not for life we would not have money. If it were not for life, we would not have society. If it were not for life we would not have business. If it were not for life, we would not have charities or organizations or governments or banks or real estate companies. This is not a way of saying the simply obvious but of saying the profound. If we have not life, or only a little of it, if we do not meet it, we have impoverished ourselves. Life and living it and those who are living it are the central realities.

:- Doug.

We can know them by their questions.

:- Doug.

We work to bring people to life.

:- Doug.

Why is sneezing more fun than blowing?

:- Doug.

This life…
a quickening of my step
a crinkling of your eye

:- Doug.

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1000

A baby’s smile
for me
G*d is

We disappear, baby and I
leaving only the smile
G*d is

Please pass it on.

© c 2010, Learning Works, Incorporated. All rights reserved. Easy reprint permissions: 574/291-0022, or by e-mail to mailto:Doug AT FootprintsInTheWind.com. Back issues available at http://www.FootprintsintheWind.com

The living we seek is not simply breathing but much larger, being connected with the !—the part of us universal, active, infinite, personal, and eternal. The heart, the real. This living comes to us as our voice, our self, our song, our message, and countless other ours, more deeply personal than myself. Immense and small, this living.

:- Doug.

The politicians these days do not know how to do their business. They may know what their business is, and in what direction they seek to go, but the broad bridge between is in the fog for them, so they slog through the slough the mud and the clutching shouting screaming to get where they want. But the fog is not in the air rather in their own eyes and hearts, and the way is clear: open.

:- Doug.

Life is dynamic
Life is moving
Its purpose is not rest
But meeting, living
Every now

:- Doug.

Into your skies
the blues between
are opening out
opening space
opening living
for us:
this day
this holy day

:- Doug.

Something flows between and among living persons. It is that juice we call life, but we experience as electric. So when we open ourselves to this current, what might happen? We cannot tell ahead, other than to know that it is the living of life, the life. Jump in the stream and play: float and splash and paddle, but whatever you do, do it with us, so that we all might live without holding back, giving all. Splashing alone in your own little puddle—this is not splashing, it is not experiencing the flood. Life is out there, in here. Live!

:- Doug.

The answer to How is Live! Meet! (Same thing.)

:- Doug.

Living is meeting who and what is within reach.

How does this apply to the person with dementia? If we meet the person, not dump him or her, we will be rewarded with living.

:- Doug.

Converse and live with us! This says much.

:- Doug.

The more we meet, the more we love.

:- Doug.

Perhaps, when we die, our soul does not go anyplace, but expands—toward filling all space and time.

:- Doug.

Raise the question that hints to be asked:
stand in the face and ask

:- Doug.

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 999

Ask not
What’s in it for me?
Ask
Who’s in it with me?

Please pass it on.

© c 2010, Learning Works, Incorporated. All rights reserved. Easy reprint permissions: 574/291-0022, or by e-mail to mailto:Doug AT FootprintsInTheWind.com. Back issues available at http://www.FootprintsintheWind.com

What could it mean to meet our elders and their wisdom, love and life?

We do not know, yet there is much to explore.

Our elders can complete our lives, our living. They have wisdom, love, perspective, life. We want to throw them away, ignore and avoid. But they are us, in a few moments. Their wisdom is not to be used, but met.

:- Doug.

There is something infinitely great and illimitable in us, and to name it is to take it away.

:- Doug.