Clare Consultation, LLCAn Elephant on Fire
From time to time, a bad habit bursts into flame. Most bad habits are, by definition, world views and behaviors that don’t necessarily play well. But, for the most part, they stay at a level low enough to be ignored. Chewing on fingernails, for example. Interrupting is another one. Some of these bad habits arise from social agreements about the worth of people that just aren’t fair – that erase dignity. And… Read More
Death, a Rainbow & Ethical Journalism
Yesterday, my little sister, Nancy Jones, posted another of her brilliant and honest posts as a frequent contributor to Daily Kos. Her writing was centered on her friend Zot Lynn Szurgot. On September 7, Zot, one of my sister’s nearest and dearest friends was killed on a Georgia highway when a semi ran a stop and plowed into her car. She was just through another good day on site for completing a solar… Read More
ONWARD
Whether an economic concoction or general energetic weirdness – or both – or neither – life has a way of throwing curve balls that, at their most random and intense, can knock any of us way off our game. So what’s up? Some of the more esoteric among us are in remarkable agreement that might be summarized: The energy is super intense these past months, and really weird. My prescient mentor,… Read More
Heeding Lessons from a Small Business
Last week I sat with the staff and management of a mountain town cafe – a group I’ve had the chance to work with as they have moved into the big center of transition. Without knowing it, this small organization and the people who sustain it are inspiring models of what showing up to change looks like. For 14 years, the Cafe Regis has served the community of Red Lodge, Montana as… Read More
Missing the People – A Protest in Support of my Trans- Friends
I am not a trans- person. I am a heterosexually identified person who presents to the world as a woman. My birth certificate inticates that I am female. Wierdly it also qualifies my infant form as “leg,” which I have come to understand as designation required by Jefferson County TX to indicate legitimacy status. Another thing I am is a person who has friends. All along the way these friendships have proven… Read More
Authority needs art to exist – and Art needs authority
It’s no secret I’m a fan of listening. Nor is it news that I’m interested in balance, in brilliance, and in the scaffolding these three can provide for rendering immediately practical the very best of our collective intelligence. It’s a tall order. it means listening to any “side” we reject reflexively as “not me.” But in my work I’m seeing nothing but evidence that the vastly most effective ideas and actions emerge… Read More
Slow Down. Learn. Wake Up and Do What ONLY YOU Can Do to Save the World.
Brussels is in lockdown following explosions that killed dozens last night. ISIS is claiming responsibility. This morning, The Dallas Morning News reported on a Frisco, TX football coach who resigned in January after threatening black and Latino athletes: “You see that rope over there, you see that tree back there? I’m going to hang you in that tree. I’m going to hang you by your toes.” And throughout the day, the most hostile presidential race in my… Read More
Paying Attention
Today a friend posted the notice above on her Facebook page. This friend is a communications and diversity specialist – a Chippewa/Cree woman nearing completion of her PhD as a scholar of decolonization. Another friend, a white Texan in Denver, posted the runoff results in Georgia’s 58th District. Park Cannon, a health advocate, has earned this Congressional seat, filling the post left vacant when Simone Bell, the first Black lesbian to serve in… Read More
A Promise in Stone
In this life of no guarantees – of too much hatred and violence – of 24-hour news headlines, fear, and double-speak. In these days of winter showing up everywhere in unusual ways while night follows day follows night, and decisions have come to seem more baffling than ever. Under this one sky, sharing this water, ground and air, love is what we have for certain. This is so. But, whatever you do,… Read More
Visual Data – Truth or Dare
For all you graphic data nerds out there (and I freely admit I stand among you), a few thoughts on statistics. Perhaps a good starting place – correlation. Correlation is the way fluctuations in measurement of separate variables or outcomes match up. Like the way we keep seeing cigarette smoking correlating highly with lung cancer. The problem with correlation – or perhaps better said, the inherent limitation – is that correlation alone may… Read More