From Griffindor to Tatoonie: Searching for Good Ground in a Groundless World
Consider this part of our "stories" series of posts - a never-ending story perhaps ? We promise not to stretch it to far but the metaphor is doing some good. Stories we tell ourselves are the values, beliefs, rules and guidelines we rely on to navigate this challenging world. Whether they're conscious or not, whether you learned them the hard way, absorbed them in childhood everybody has a set of guidelines they follow for good or bad. Simply by living you must decide and by deciding you reveal your values. Now this is a thesis we've pursued here abstractly and concretely, at the level of society and at the level of the individual.
Values and the Candidates
Earlier we'd pointed to the Q&A at Saddleback Church (Welcome to Saddleback: the Candidates, Pastor Rick and Some Real Answers) as being interesting, informative and a valuable public service. Certainly learned more about both candidates than I'd known before, especially Johnboy. And the questions were thoughtful and insightful - the ones on leadership and personal values in particular. Only two commentators though really got to the true heart of the importance. One was an observation that the values a leader brings to the table are critically important. The other, by Dan Henninger of the WSJ, was an astute observation on why Pastor Rick started with those questions. And why it was probably unthinkable for something similar to have been done to Truman, Eisenhower....Reagan and even the first Bush. His argument was that we had a commons shared sense of core values and precepts that were so widely shared that it was unnecessary to explore them. In that I think he was correct.
But he stopped short of exploring the other side of the coin. Those core values developed as the result of shared experiences and were massively challenged in the '60s and early '70s when they were no longer as apparently valid in helping us cope with a changing world. Yet in revolting against the Establishment the babies got thrown out with the dirty bathwater and as a result we provoked a backlash from folks looking for old verities. And nothing much has replace them - instead we've had a multi-decade struggle with one thing after another being put forward, tested and generally rejected. So where do we go from here ?
We just finished putting up posts on the speeches at each of the two conventions, using our own set of mainly policy and substance filters, so our evaluations are fairly clear at this point. One thing we will point back to in McCain's speech was the heartfelt and deep-seated transformation from good-timin fighter jock to grounded, serious and spiritual man that his stay in the Hanoi Hilton made him. He was actually more complete and candid on that stage than during the interview. HIs values, their sources and prices are pretty clear and tested. Barry's appear to be more subtle and complex.
There are clearly vast differences between the two candidates in some of their values, though we think that their goals and standards are similar and, as we've argued at length with chapter and verse, they're a lot closer to seeing the same problems and wanting to proceed to the same solutions than any headline will tell you. In fact, and this is a very important sidebar, the substances of their proposals are so close IOHO that they are the smallest set of differences we've seen in four decades. Literally. Which is yet another way of coming full circle back to the values question because if they want to proceed in similar directions then how we get there becomes an important differentiator. As somebody astutely commented (Noonan ?) Johnboy is almost a throwback to the values of the Greatest Generation and IMHO we need more of that. At the same time, as we said at the beginning, this is more complex and nuanced world with escalating challenges to the left of us, to the right and in front and us with no choice but to ride on.
Values and the World
Let me quote from an enormously wiser person than myself...William James in the Preface to "The Will To Believe":
"If religious hypothesis about the universe be in order all, then the active faiths of individuals in them, freely expressing themselves in life, are the experimental tests by which they are verified, and the only means by which their truth or falsehood can be wrought out.
Religious history proves that one hypothesis after another has worked ill, has crumbled at contact with a widening knowledge of the world and has lapsed from the minds of men. Some articles of faith, however, have maintained themselves through every vicissitude, and possess even more vitality to-day than ever before....Meanwhile the freest competition of the various faiths with one another, and their open application to life by their several champions, are the most favorable conditions under which the survival of the fittest can proceed.
Religious fermentation is always a symptom of the intellectual vigor of a society; and it is only when they forget that they are hypothesis and put on rationalistic and authoritative pretensions that our faiths do harm. The most interesting and valuable things about a man are his ideals and over-beliefs. The same is true of nations and historic epochs; and the excesses of which the particular individuals and epochs are guilty are compensated in the total, and become profitable to mankind in the long run".
You may have to read that over a time or two...James takes little adjusting too. But he cuts right at the heart of things with brilliant but warm and human insights that are also practical and workable. His optimism that we'd resolve the questions he wrestled has been badly disappointed. If anything the wrestling is more vigorous, widespread and discombobulated than ever. Yet perhaps not. And James is not the first person in history to wrestle in that arena nor the last. In fact in the rest of this post we want to take voyage with several spiritual guides who provide their own learnings and suggestions.
From Griffindor to Tatoonie and Beyond
We start in the Griffindor common room with J.K. Rowling's Harvard commencement address, one of the best we've ever heard and Jamesian in being based on hard and difficult experience, if not in language. We stay at Harvard but move cross campus and back in time to hear Billy Graham talk about moral principles and ethical values in the modern world. We could have returned to Pastor Rick, who also spoke at Harvard and had very similar things to say but we pointed you at his works in our Saddleback post. Then we move forward in time and travel to NYC in location but spiritually to a remote location in Nova Scotia to partake of Bill Moyers interview of Pema Chodrun, a Buddhist Nun. Our final voyage is millenia into the uncertain future to listen as Charlie Rose interviews George Lucas on his art, his motives, his observations on life and the importance of myth and culture and why it's missing in modern life so far. We conclude with some pointers to very ancient wisdom.
As we take these various trips to different sources of values we hope you'll find that despite many surface differences all of these folks are wrestling with the same quandries that James raises, providing their own "hypothesis" as to answers and offerring up their own lives and experiences as the testbed for the results and consequences.
Welcome to Griffindor Commons
J.K. Rowling delivered the Class of '07 Commencement Address at Harvard and made a noble attempt to share her own best lessons from a life that had many hard ones in it. If you're not familiar with her history her early life was anything but smooth sailing but by pluck, perseverance, hard...hard work, discipline and talent she won on thru. And delivered a great entertainment that, IOHO, is also a great teaching manual on the principles one should conduct ones life on in a difficult world. Not to pre-empt Ms. Rowling too much but she starts with applauding the value of Failure as a way to truly find your ground (as Johnboy certainly shows us) and the ultimate value of Imagination - the ability to imagine something other than what's in front of your nose - to help steer toward the future. Clicking on the photo should take you to Part 1 of 3 of the address on YouTube. Each takes about 7 min. and it's time well spent IOHO.
Cross Campus to the Kennedy School 
Billy Graham has talked all over the world and spoken twice at the Kennedy school as well as at TED. His first Harvard talk was on "Religion, Morality and Poltiics" in 1982 while the second was on "Is God Relevant in the 21st Century ?" in 1999. Again clicking on the photo will take you to the '99 talk though it's from '82 due to technical issues with "clipping" the later one. He also spoke at TED on a similar topic and compressed it down to the normal 18 min limits ! His Harvard talk takes about 30 min for the speech and 90 for the Q&A but we think you'll enjoy it, learn something and find it helpful and challenging. Billy tackles head on what we think is the critical point of our times - Science may tell us How but has nothing to say about Life's greatest challenges: Evil, Suffering and Death. To wrestle with the Why one has to turn elsewhere. He starts by pointing out that coping with a rapidly changing world is nothing new in history and looks back to King David's reign and the shift to Iron technology. He makes his case in our opinion and draws many valuable lessons.
Mindful Steps to Good Ground
As part of his series on Faith and Reason Bill Moyers interviewd a NJ housewife turned Buddhist nun, Pema Chodron. You'll not only start with gaining some new understandings of Buddhism if your acquaintance is limited, Moyers certainly did. But you'll find that Pema is down-to-earth, practical, worldly, experienced and a grandmother among other things. If by this point you've noticed that our guest speakers are wrestling with similar challenges from different directions it should come as no surprise that Pema does as well. In her work making Buddhist insights and scriptures relevant to the modern world though she helps us find workable steps to actually implementing the goals and ideals. In fact that might be the key distinction one finds in Buddhism, what they call the "Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness" are really a practical set of guidelines and "workbooks" for accepting and managing Evil, Sufferring and Death. Clicking on the photo takes you the profile page where you can watch the video. A multi-part upload is also on YouTube as well if you have trouble.
A Galaxy Far, Far Away
George Lucas has established himself, more specifically his work, as central parts of modern culture. In this hour long interview with Rose you get the walk thru the whole trip from his early student days where he started as an anthropology major before stumbling into film to his efforts to push the technological boundaries to the cultural analysis built into all of his work. "American Graffiti" for example was, among other things, a portrait of American life and teen culture and the trials of growing up. But it was in Star Wars that he both surpassed himself and deliberately set out to create a new mythology. As he says we tell ourselves stories to help us learn about the world, to tell us who we are and to pass on the hard-learned lessons of the past to the next generation. And we've quite doing that and lost something vital to our society, it's health and well-being and it's future prospects. In almost those words too ! :) But there's a lot to listen to and hear in this interview so listen carefully. One of our favorite set of observations is his comments on the relationship between Science and the Humanities. See if you pick it up and agree.
A Few Final Thoughts
By this time we hope you've stopped and listened to each of our guest speakers and found entertainment, information and even, dare we say it, wisdom. And see a glimmer of truth in our main point which is, as James said, that our values are the most interesting and valuable thing about us. And as he implied, and we have IOHO, lost sight of and are being forced, willy-nilly, to re-focus on. Both of our candidates are highly principled people who have come to those principles by hard thought and tough experiences, some more than others admittedly. And while they appear to arrive at similar rules of conduct their approaches are vastly different. Yet neither they nor our guest speakers are the first to wrestle with these problems. Nor even the first to come up with similar definitions of the problems and approaches.
The Ancient Persians, according to Herodotus, taught their young to do three things in a proper education for a gentleman. "To Ride Well, To Shoot Straight and to Speak the Truth". In its' day, time and place that was the ancient version of a modern liberal arts education. Strangely enough you can find echoes in today's curriculums and in the standard curriculum taught in English public schools. Bu the roots are even more ancient and direct.
During the Middle Ages, drawing directly on Graeco-Roman sources the extent version of the liberal arts education was the Trivium and the Quadrivium designed to answer Lucas' Challenge. Which is How to do it (Science and Engineering), What to Do (Social Sciences, Professional Education) and Why (Humanities and Arts). Or you can journey to the other side of the world to China and find the educational curriculum of the gentlemen-scholars who ruled the Chinese Emprie for millenia and had it's roots in the Confucian Classics actually presented the same thing, though in different guises. There are many works that have come down to us of the Chinese Classics but two colletions are central: the Five Books and the Five Classics. And taken all together they too are concerned with "riding well, shooting straight and speaking the truth".
For a final point let us turn to another great master who's relevance is becoming clearer every day, Rudyard Kipling who knew life in all it's nooks, crannies and ugliness and still "carried on". And that English schoolboy classic If that becomes more insightful every day:
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream -- and not make dreams your master;
If you can think -- and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools;....
Comments
If "There are clearly vast differences between the two candidates in some of their values, though we think that their goals and standards are similar and, as we've argued at length with chapter and verse, they're a lot closer to seeing the same problems and wanting to proceed to the same solutions than any headline will tell you." is indeed true, then the question becomes one of decided the tie-breakers.
Character is one of these; an ability to get things done is another.
One's judgment of character is within the context of one's own character. I think, for the most part, that this qualitative, subjective assessment is what most people rely upon when their hand is on the voting lever.
I don't think there is sufficient consideration of the other tie-breaker, an ability to get things done. It's a tough business, this US Presidency. We need more thought and discussion about what's required to ride a tiger of this nature.
Posted by: James Drogan | September 10, 2008 09:50 AM