Leafing through some old papers recently, I realized that I've been engaged in a single project for almost 20 years, nearly a third of my life.
I remember the moment I took it on. A friend and I had started a company to sell hands-on science teaching services and we were giving a workshop in the classroom of a livewire teacher in a middle school in Jamaica Plain, Boston. All around the room were tanks of pond water full of life; we were impressed. But she asked a hard question: how do I get my students to ask questions?
I could tell she did a better than average job at that, her whole set-up and the kids we met spoke to that, but her question nagged at me, and indeed expanded to apply people generally: why aren't we, all of us, looking for and having personal discoveries more than we do? And how could we get better at it? And what woud it mean if we were?
Just back from visiting my grandchildren, one three years old, the other three months, I'm awed by the drive to learn and to master active in each of them. It's a sign of their livingness and a vehicle for the prospering of their personalities going forward. I want that same hopefulness regarding the rewarding richness of the world and our ability to find ways to engage with it, I want that expectancy for myself, for everyone of my generation, for everyone.
So now, as I've wrapped up the most recent phase of my (obsessive) project, and look forward to retirement in a few years, I was the question: what next for me?
The answer is to take everything I've discovered over the years (decades) and begin the work of sharing it. As a person who enjoys solitary thought, I'm going to be challenged to take the initiative in offering what I've learned (while still learning more.)
Below, there's a short Q&A script that I put together as an 'elevator pitch.' It makes reference at the end to things yet to come--cards, videos, calendars--but it helps me make real to myself what I'm going to be up to next.
I confess I'm daunted, but I'm also determined. Wish me well.
_________
What do you do?
I was a teacher of science, now a teacher of ESL, and in transition to being a teacher of Convex.
Convex?
Conversation of Exploration. It’s a practice informed by a set of principles that I believe can change the world for the better because it provides something essential to the flourishing of individuals and communities.
It’s also a project, to take Convex worldwide: Convex sessions with people of all ages and backgrounds happening all the time everywhere.
What is Convex exactly?
You can think of it as similar, in terms of discipline, to working out or to meditation, but complementary to those activities in terms of its other and outward-orientation.
Who started this?
Conversation and exploration are common and natural of course, but I combined the two in a special format to help my students improve their functional faculty for seeking and making discoveries, that is, their explorer-mind.
And how big is Convex?
Right now Convex is in its outreach phase, but the vision is to make Convex a worldwide movement.
What is a Convex session?
A Convex session is some number of people spending some definite time together ‘looking, thinking and linking’ regarding some particular thing prepared ahead of time for sharing. To borrow the words of Kay Ryan about her ideal poems, a Convex session is ‘free, large, and playful.’
What kind of particular thing?
A single or specific object, occurrence, process, person or place, a commission, proposition, or encounter: any of these, considered in themselves or an expression or representation thereof, can be the chosen focus of a Convex session.
‘Looking, thinking, linking’: do these mean something different in Convex than they normally mean?
No, in the sense that individually these are activities people have engaged in from time immemorial, but yes, in the sense that, joined together as a specially designed routine of exercises and challenges that make particulars into portals, they are a powerful program of practice for enhancing our ability to engage with whatever and whomever is around and ahead of us.
Where can I find out more?
Here’s my card with the website where the full Convex program is laid out. There are links to videos where the program is explained and demonstrated. There’s also news about recent and upcoming Convex events.
Convex enhances the wellbeing of everyone; that’s why I champion it and teach it, and why I’d like to teach you. Are you interested?
I remember the moment I took it on. A friend and I had started a company to sell hands-on science teaching services and we were giving a workshop in the classroom of a livewire teacher in a middle school in Jamaica Plain, Boston. All around the room were tanks of pond water full of life; we were impressed. But she asked a hard question: how do I get my students to ask questions?
I could tell she did a better than average job at that, her whole set-up and the kids we met spoke to that, but her question nagged at me, and indeed expanded to apply people generally: why aren't we, all of us, looking for and having personal discoveries more than we do? And how could we get better at it? And what woud it mean if we were?
Just back from visiting my grandchildren, one three years old, the other three months, I'm awed by the drive to learn and to master active in each of them. It's a sign of their livingness and a vehicle for the prospering of their personalities going forward. I want that same hopefulness regarding the rewarding richness of the world and our ability to find ways to engage with it, I want that expectancy for myself, for everyone of my generation, for everyone.
So now, as I've wrapped up the most recent phase of my (obsessive) project, and look forward to retirement in a few years, I was the question: what next for me?
The answer is to take everything I've discovered over the years (decades) and begin the work of sharing it. As a person who enjoys solitary thought, I'm going to be challenged to take the initiative in offering what I've learned (while still learning more.)
Below, there's a short Q&A script that I put together as an 'elevator pitch.' It makes reference at the end to things yet to come--cards, videos, calendars--but it helps me make real to myself what I'm going to be up to next.
I confess I'm daunted, but I'm also determined. Wish me well.
_________
What do you do?
I was a teacher of science, now a teacher of ESL, and in transition to being a teacher of Convex.
Convex?
Conversation of Exploration. It’s a practice informed by a set of principles that I believe can change the world for the better because it provides something essential to the flourishing of individuals and communities.
It’s also a project, to take Convex worldwide: Convex sessions with people of all ages and backgrounds happening all the time everywhere.
What is Convex exactly?
You can think of it as similar, in terms of discipline, to working out or to meditation, but complementary to those activities in terms of its other and outward-orientation.
Who started this?
Conversation and exploration are common and natural of course, but I combined the two in a special format to help my students improve their functional faculty for seeking and making discoveries, that is, their explorer-mind.
And how big is Convex?
Right now Convex is in its outreach phase, but the vision is to make Convex a worldwide movement.
What is a Convex session?
A Convex session is some number of people spending some definite time together ‘looking, thinking and linking’ regarding some particular thing prepared ahead of time for sharing. To borrow the words of Kay Ryan about her ideal poems, a Convex session is ‘free, large, and playful.’
What kind of particular thing?
A single or specific object, occurrence, process, person or place, a commission, proposition, or encounter: any of these, considered in themselves or an expression or representation thereof, can be the chosen focus of a Convex session.
‘Looking, thinking, linking’: do these mean something different in Convex than they normally mean?
No, in the sense that individually these are activities people have engaged in from time immemorial, but yes, in the sense that, joined together as a specially designed routine of exercises and challenges that make particulars into portals, they are a powerful program of practice for enhancing our ability to engage with whatever and whomever is around and ahead of us.
Where can I find out more?
Here’s my card with the website where the full Convex program is laid out. There are links to videos where the program is explained and demonstrated. There’s also news about recent and upcoming Convex events.
Convex enhances the wellbeing of everyone; that’s why I champion it and teach it, and why I’d like to teach you. Are you interested?
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