Being on your own

After reading the section in the conclusion talking about becoming aware of both our power and our love, it made me think about the first time I started at Dominican University of California as a freshmen.  I took related this to the statement "our first step in learning to walk on our own two feet" (129).  I noticed how Kahane said that we need (129).  I felt like this related to when I was a freshmen because I would always wonder why I would go to class and what are the benefits of it.  The teachers I had mostly read off of slides that they presented at class.  I thought about advantage and disadvantage of going to class.  Since our lectures were already posted online, I felt like the disadvantage of going to class is that our lecture and basically our whole class is online. At that time I didn't see an advantage to going to class because I could have just learned the material on my own and also attendance did not count.  This made me think of how Kahane said that we have simplistic and mistaken drives in our lives.

Moving on to this semester I thought about the second part of this passage when Kahane stated that "we must learn to live with the permanent reality, outside and within ourselves" (129).  I related to this as how serious this school year means to me.  This helped me realize what I should be doing in school as well as real life.  This helped me realize that we need to be able to perform actions in our lives that help us in our lives externally and internally.  This means that we need to be able to perform actions that help us gain something mentally and physically.  For example, going to class is a way that helps us gain something mentally.  This has helped me realize that I need to start being more serious in my life instead of joking around all the time.  Reading this passage made me realize everything in life cannot always be turned into a joke or something fun.  I found out in my life there is a need to be more serious than ever.

Change is change, no matter where it comes from.

Kahane grew with a privileged life and most likely group with in a loving and powerful environment. He probably did not have to go through as much hardships as someone else who wants to bring about change. But does the successful living of his parents and his life of privilege make his words any less meaningful? Do his actions have less of an impact? Is his drive to bring about change any less significant because he has never experienced any food insecurities or living insecurities? Kahane may not have lived through what he writes about, but he definitely knows there needs to be change. A person should not be judged by their social status but rather by their actions. Kahane may not have gone through the hardships of unjust foods, but his devotion to changing it, despite the way he lived, is somewhat admirable. His concepts and ideas should not be judged for his upbringing, but by the actions he has taken in order to set his ideas in motion. “The movement from power to love enables actors to see more clearly the system that they are part of and their role in it. “If your not part of the problem, you can’t be part of the solution” (125). In my mind, this read “if you’ve never had any of the problems, there’s no way you could possibly help”. This interpretation most likely came from my newfound knowledge about Kahane and I disagree with it. There is no guideline or pre-requisites to want change in something you believe is wrong. Kahane clearly sees a system producing bad results and wants change. Though Kahane has the will, he still needs companions to bring about his vision. In order to walk the path he chose, he would need others walking with him. It is a path one cannot walk alone. “How can we learn to walk with power and love? The way is long, terrain, is rough, there is no path, and there is no map. We need companions on this journey, but no one else can make a way for use. We must use both our legs; we must put one food in front of the other. We must step forward” (140).

Fluidity and Moving Forward...

Everyone has had struggle in their lives. As days go by we always have to overcome those struggles and as we learned we have power and love to help us through. I know that my issues on a daily basis are nothing compared to those who have real troubles, such as the miners who were stuck underground for two months. This is real pain. I have nothing like that happening to me, or even a real fear in my life. Power and love relate to that because it takes the power of people, prayers and passion to help find those who are in scary circumstances and love to recover from the trauma. "Walk Together"(p.127) in a group to change a situation as a whole we don't like. "vital challenges we face cannot be addressed effectively by any one leader or organization or sector, and so we need to build our capacity for co-creation.(p. 127) There are many saying relating to this very thing such as strength in numbers. We know through experience that things workout better when numerous helpers are passionate. So lets create the numbers and make people aware of how our planet is fading. We can turn around the unhappy progression we are making and turn it into something we are proud of. Like in Cuba. That is a perfect example. I can make this apart of my life by talking to everyone, creating that awareness and making people see what i do. Also by changing what I buy or where i buy it. I know this change is possible. We just need to learn to walk again. "We must use both of our legs; we must put one foot in front of the other. We mus step forward." (p.140)

The Power in the People, of Privilege

Adam Kahane does come from a place of privilege. This is obvious from the kinds of trips he has made based on his stories from the book, the kinds of connections he has had with many different political and business leaders from around the world, and the fact that he has book published by his won company, Reos Partnerships. I believe that just because he comes from a place of power and privilege does not mean that his ideals for social change are invalid. He has the means of power, the means to achieve any goal he would like, the money and the networking; and by understanding that this world is more than just himself, that there is a need for social change, he has tried to incorporate his power with love.

Throughout the book he has reasserted the importance of balancing power and love: “We need to be able to prevent ourselves from going so far with our power that we lose touch with our love, or so far with our love that we lose touch with our power. This requires building up our awareness of and openness to feedback about how we are exercising our power and our love and with what results” (Kahane 130). These are wise words, and I definitely have feedback about the book. This book personally is not for me. Kahane did not connect to me strongly throughout the book because I could not relate to him. I could sympathize with his beliefs in social change, but we have nothing in common besides this. The fact that he is going around the world, talking to different companies, political figures and businessmen about social change and working with their groups shows me that there is not much empowerment of the disempowered. The disempowered are the poor in rich and poor countries, those who are uneducated and those who have circumstances that are not given attention to. A positive social change in this economically polarized society comes when a person of power shares their wealth with the disempowered, knowing that their inter-connected lives will become more prosperous through a dialectical and equitable relationship between each other. I do not think that this book is directly trying to do that; instead it is addressing other intellectuals and people of privilege with concepts and ideas. This book is not necessarily accessible to the everyday person because it is written in academic English, and it is a book where one has to have an interest for “a theory and practice of social change”, which a lot of people do not know the meaning of. It is for people who would want to learn about the theory and practice of social change from a book. I personally was not interested in the book, and many college students like me (not all but many) would not have read this if it was not assigned.

Even if this book did not relate to me, I cannot leave out its merits. A Filipino leader in the United Farm Workers’ movement named Philip Vera Cruz once said: “a movement must be a struggle at all fronts”. Kahane is included in this movement, whether it is for human/environmental/animal rights, education, healthcare, equity, sovereignty or simply balancing people with concepts of power and love. Kahane is someone who shares a vision universal to all those who believe in a greater good, those who believe in positive social change. His front just happens to be for the privileged. His work for social change is a stepping stone, and I believe the next step is to connect with poor communities and not only write journals and books about them, but to actually help people in these communities to publish their own books, come up with their own writings and let them tell their stories. Kahane seems like a nice guy, but I have had enough of his voice. We have all heard enough of the privileged; their voice has always dominated society. It is time for people like Kahane to fund the storytelling of the disempowered.

Fresh Start, Open Heart

"The first part of this work was co-sensing: immersing ourselves together in the complexity of our current and emerging reality. This required us to venture beyond the comfortable boundaries of our everyday world-- our habitual places and relationships and thoughts-- to see afresh what was happening and was possible." (105)

This was the same with the majority of us at the beginning of this school year with this class. Many of us never harvested before, gleaned, or even ate an organic tomato before. Our class comes from unique backgrounds to begin with. Some richer, some poorer. Some fully enriched cultured, some culture-deprived. Whether we knew it at the time or not, this class gave us all an open opportunity for a fresh start at bettering both ourselves and others. We learned what separates real, healthy food from "healthy" food. We also learned the true meanings of power and love and how it is indeed important to keep the very difficult but long desired balance between the two. Some people admitted times of high weakness with letting their own love be overruled by power. In other cases, others admitted to times when they or someone of significant to them have allowed the power get to their head and forgot to love. We showed ourselves, raw and bare, and instead of being ridiculed or objectified, we were applauded for our bravery for such reveals and candid words. We agreed as a whole before this class, hardly ay of us even knew what "gleaning" meant. To some people it might have given license to mock for we sounded ignorant, but it only meant we wanted to explore more and better our minds.

Additionally, when David came to visit our class, I chose to reveal I have gone to food banks for my own need of food. Others admitted to never needing a food bank in comparison. It showed a new side of me, as well possibly opened others' eyes on such an issue. Needing to go to a food bank for food is not just a special segment for "Oprah". It is some people's real life, including my own. I do not typically reveal this fact about me, but this time, it felt needed to be said.

This class at first was just chosen because I needed a colloquium and it fit my schedule preferences the best. It ended up being one of the decisions I made in life that possibly helped me out more than I could ever fully realize. It has expanded my own horizons and pushed me from my own comfort, and I am pretty sure that I am not alone. It is never too late for a fresh start as long as you keep an open, kind heart.

Richie Rich

I remember as a kid I used to watch this movie called “Richie Rich.” It was about a kid who had a very wealthy family and he grew up with a privileged life. However, he always wanted to know what it was like to live like a “normal” kid. He wanted to play with kids his age and play sports, like baseball, because he never had any real friends. As the movie went on, he came to understand that friends and family were more important than anything. The reason I bring up Richie is because he is similar to Adam Kahane in many ways. Like Richie, Kahane lived a privileged life and he saw that there was more to living a life of “privilege.” Kahane understands the meaning of family and friendship; he understands love. With money, many will argue that it brings power and combined with his love, he is at a balance.

Like every movie, Richie found himself against the “bad guy” that was trying to take the Rich (the last name not an adjective) family fortune. Alone, he couldn’t take the tyrant down but with the help of friends and the willingness for them to help; they were able to bring him down. Kahane has an understanding that can bring about change. He knows that he cannot change the world by himself. According to Kahane, it is generally agreed that “the complex and vital challenges we face cannot be addressed effectively by any one leader or organization or sector, and so we need to bring our capacity for co-creation” (127).

In this class, we are bringing people together for a common cause: food justice. We all need to come together as one in order to make a difference. It doesn’t matter if you’re rich, poor, black, white, purple, living justly, or just living. A voice of a privileged man is the same as a poor man as long as they understand that there must be balance between power and love along with unity in the community to make real positive changes. I am continuing to do my part in this class with the SL logs, gleaning, and blog posts that allow me to make my voice heard. I assume that anyone reading this cannot picture me, cannot judge me, cannot know anything about me. I am a voice. I am a part of a system where I am one of Richie Rich’s friends and I’m here to take down the tyrant of unjust foods.

...Privileged?

Change is inevitable and that’s a reality no matter what your living situation is. And if all things point to one conclusion it’s that change is difficult for everyone, but we all have the power to accept our separate realities. Consensus is valid only to the extent to which each individual asserts his own relation to the extent of the facts and retains his individuality (49). Being in a privileged home doesn’t make you impervious or irrelevant to the issues of the world, but rather allows more time to stop and reflect on such issues and find ways to help the situation. Difficult living conditions don’t entitle you to having full knowledge of your situation, because you aren’t given that amount of time to reflect. The point that this book was trying to make is that as a society we are creators. We create everything that there is in the world: wars, peace, news, entertainment, emotions and everything else that leads to the way the social world works today. It’s through these conditions that social classes began as well as many of the world’s problems. To say that status changes any of that, you would have to neglect the fact that status was born from these principles of social behavior. We are creators, because as a race we have a mentality in which we want commodities that we may otherwise not possess- technology is the best proof of that. Despite being creators of so much, I believe that we will never be able to harness those efforts, because as a race we are also ambitious. That ambition leads some people to want more of a resource than they actually need, and that will lead others to lack resources to acquire what they need. As for my living conditions, they are very similar to Kahane’s but I don’t feel like my opinions would be invalid because of that. To attempt imitating a lifestyle that is less privilege than my own would be like shooting myself in the leg to prove that a bullet hurts.

As We Move Forward

‘Power and Love” allow us to explore the meaning of “love” and “power” on so many levels. I have gained a better understanding of the two words and have noticed that more of the things we do in our everyday life requires either one or the other or most times, a combination. The more effort and passion you put into learning the more you can get out of it, which is a powerful tool that leads you to success. I guess this example is also at the internal level, because you are at a constant battle with yourself as you reflect on the reasons why you decide to do something like going to college. The mental battle may be as simple as forcing yourself to get out of bed. Although by the end of the book we gain new insights on how to apply our new skills of power and love, we still cannot fully understand how two qualities that are at two different ends of the spectrum are necessary for things to work. The author answers this question by saying that, “The duality and unity of power and love constitute a mystery that we can approach and appreciate but cannot solve” (138).

As individuals and as a group in this class, we should follow the motto: “In order to keep moving – and especially to lead such movement – we can and must make, and keep on making, only one simple choice: what is our next step? (140). We must set up goals and figure out our destination, which gives us a greater purpose to achieving the movement. even if those goals and destination points change, we can always learn from those experiences and make changes from there on.

Fear Factor

Power and love, are definitely essential to our daily lives, and absolutely necessary to making any change to our lives, or any instances in our daily lives that we want to change—including the world around us. However, in order to bring power and love together to “walk” successfully with power and love balanced simultaneously; we need to step beyond the boundary of fear before that boundary line. As Kahane quotes leadership author, Margaret Wheatley: “fear is fundamental to being human, and so we can expect that we’ll feel afraid at times, perhaps even frequently. We can withdraw or distract or numb ourselves. Or we can recognize this fear, and then step forward anyway...” (132). What we need to do is recognize the fear standing in front of us, in order to move past and place our power and love in place to work together.
On Kahane’s position: although Kahane came from a well established background and was very privileged, he was able to put himself and his background beyond that, and create a hunger for power and love by people throughout the world in his actions, as well as in this book, “Power and Love”. He was probably very afraid to put out this book, because he thought people would respond negatively, or nothing would come of it. He still published and wrote the book, by using the power and love to send out his ideas and become successful.
I can also empathize with this same type of ideal of pushing fear aside, and using my own power and love to create something successful, in relation to this colloquium class. At first, I was very hesitant and afraid to join the class, as I didn’t know what to expect in taking a Nutrition and Philosophy class. I never really paid attention to the things I ate in detail, and definitely did not think I was spiritual or in the right mind set to take a Philosophy class. I honestly, liked the topic most out of the other choices (It was also the only Monday/Wednesday class). I had my own power and love for myself to take this course, and try something new for a change. It turned out prosperous, as I gained a knowledge of not only healthy foods, but also a more open mind set for change. I was not going to let fear stand in my way.
Kahane’s “Power and Love,” steps beyond the boundaries of fear, and moves forward about teaching the lesson of the balance of power and love. It has already been established that power and love need to come together to make any change or take a big step. Both collaborate, as Kahane’s book points out, but pushing past fear first is one major step, that is often failed to be mentioned. Beyond fear, is just one long journey to lead to success with both power and love. This can only be accomplished by pushing past the boundary of fear, “stepping forward” (140).