This site has moved.

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your interest in this site - we have moved, rolling all our work into one site at www.reinventinglife.org. The rl group blog has moved to the Personal Life Menu under retreats.

The new site gives you lots of opportunity for increased interaction in the forum - accessed after signing in by clicking on the discussion link in the top right of the page.

See you there,
Alana

Just because it is lovely

Hi everyone - this is really enjoyable.
Alana

How to decide your focus?

Hi all,

One of our members writes, "It would be easy to apply, but my greatest challenge is to figure out szeeseswhat I want to work on... health, spirituality, being with my perfect match, ways to become more prosperous... Would love some feedback."

We all approach problem solving differently - so I can only explain how I recommend we do it for the retreat - but I am not an advocate of splitting our lives into parts and then problems solving them. I guess the bottom line is this - how can we ever hope to enjoy a sense of wholeness and wonder at the whole, if we continue to use the scientific model and focus on the parts?

So what do I do when I go through a visioning (usually twice a year in January and September)? I start by putting a picture of myself in the middle (the shot above shows my current vision chart - up in my office where it becomes a backdrop to my life). Then I put all the segments I need to consider around my face (or a picture that represents my dream life) and go from there. I personally use a portable white board material so I can erase and redraw easily as I go, and its big, 2'X3' at least so that it has to be up on the wall - big enough that it relates to me and doesn't get lost in a pile on my desk. I work on it a bit, and then go on to other things. Eventually it sort of "settles" and becomes a backdrop for a while until I find I need to add to it because things have shifted.

Let me give an example from the list above - you might start by putting the list in order:

• health, - are you unhealthy? if so, this is a priority, if not it slips in the order of things
  
• spirituality, - does your life lack peace? If so then this becomes at least a backdrop
  
• being with my perfect match, - It has been my experience that this one tends to be a top priority whether or not we put it at the top - there is likely no greater gift to life than a good match. However if we are at peace, have baggage, etc we may choose to X this from the list altogether.
• ways to become more prosperous - again the degree of focus would be determined by the degree of pain. If we are poor or in more debt than we are comfortable with then perhaps this becomes a priority.

OK - now basic problem solving would have us list potential strategies and this is not a bad thing - use the diagnose step to see what others have done. BUT BEFORE YOU WANT TO MOVE INTO ACTION YOU WANT TO MEDITATE, SLEEP ON IT, etc - what ever terms you use for yourself to let it lie in your subconscious for later action. Until you are good at the PAR cycle and practice there is a great likelihood that you may move too fast, not letting your inner spirit have the chance to talk that it needs.

Besides the next retreat is less than a month away - getting your map started and some early diagnosis work done is a nice beginning to that retreat.

Love to you all,
Alana

Setting up Profiles

Hi all,

One of our members asked where to find and set up your profiles (always nice to have a picture or avatar, etc.). Do you come through a page marked Dashboard? If so, and if your name is over in the top right hand corner there should be a link under it to "edit your profile." If not let me know and you and I can see together how to make these changes.

Alana

Starting each day with song

Hi everyone,

On my last flight from Europe to the US I watched "Enchanted." I have no shame that the only kind of entertainment that I find, well, entertaining are things that leave me feeling upbeat and happy. In one scene the cinderella like character begins to convince the man whose attitude about life has soured that he could look at things in an upbeat way. She does this through singing (and of course the whole world joins in as you can see here and here).

On our HomeLife blog I will go on a bit about the song that Margie made up for our new puppy. This morning finds me singing it to her and having my spirits SOAR, leading me to this post, hoping all of you get a chance to enjoy singing today.

Lots of love,
Alana

PAR as PersonalGrowth: A case study begins

Hi everyone,

As I lead retreats I use the cycle of PAR as the model for personal growth. Why? Well why I really like the flow of alchemy, PAR is quicker and more appropriate for use as a method for discussion as you interject actions to help put your new phase of life in place as you go.

I am a good case study for how this works right now and thought I would use myself to exemplify how this can work - then others who will be retreating with me can jump in if they wish with their story, their diagnosis work, etc as a basis for what goes on in June. (By the way there are still spaces left for the retreat and anyone interested can email TraceseaS@yahoo.com for information).

Diagnosis is the first PAR step. About four months ago my friend Alice took the time to make up a mock flier for "the James Group" outlining how others should employ this mythical group of consultants because we help them solve problems. It was her way of pushing me in the direction of consulting on a larger scale, something on which I was not at all focused at the time. This gift from God propelled me to what has become an almost daily adventure in a n uphill learning curve.

I believe that there is nothing in the world that someone has not already done - so when we want to reinvent our lives it is best to start by researching what is already out there. What has caught my attention is the question of how the internet is changing the world of education - with tons of redundant information being uploaded everyday, much of it of very high quality, there is little reason for the creation of content to be much of the work of an academic.

This leaves people like me in the position of facilitator of knowledge management and learning - and since facilitation is something I like to do I am on safe ground. However I have needed to catch up on Web 2.0 and all the implied changes that go with it. This diagnosis stage has finally slowed down to a level where I think I am ready to develop what I have learned into a business plan/website design, thus moving me on to the ACT part of the cycle. Before I go there, I will capture my ideas both here and on my DoctorateLife blog.

For those of you who want to join in:
Write a short blog on the context for your life growth, and then go off and research what others have done, what else is out there, that will propel new ideas. Come back here when you are ready and we'll go the next steps together!

All the best,
Alana

Action and meausurement steps

Hi everyone,

I am frequently focused on the use of diagnosis step in PAR. Today my mind runs instead to the action and measurement steps. How is it that we put out actions towards our goals out in the world in such a way as to let others measure them? More specifically how can the internet help?

A few ideas weave together here: first distributed learning. According to one of my favorite theories, people really learn by cobbling together whatever comes their way that helps them understand and develop the skills they need. This has been called by some distributed learning it may lead to the disintegration of classrooms.

A second idea in this weave is that people love to share -in fact there is a great buzz to putting our ideas out there in cyberspace - hence blogs, moblogs, etc.

The final fiber in this thread is the need for measurement after we take action - we need feedback. As an example, as I write, book proposals, blogs, articles and chapters I need (crave actually) feedback - (if you haven't commented on a blog in a long time then please do so today). As you use PAR for whatever type of reinvention you are working on you need measurement feedback as well - why not consider using the internet to get it?

Below is a list of popular websites where you can upload your ideas/action/etc and then receive feedback - if you are lucky from the general public and (if not so lucky as all that) by emailing family and friends to go have a look. Chances are they will be curious and do so. As an example my first video got 58 views and one comment.

In case you are intrigued you may want to try:

1. Taking pictures of your notes, your actions, your projects in progress and uploading the to www.flickr.com.
2. You may want to start a group of followers on Twitter, each of you watching out to make sure that the others follow through on daily or weekly commitments.
3. You may want to start or join a group on google, yahoo, etc. to allow you to share your interests and ask others to help you measure your relative success.

What I do is use them all - in some sort of mystic rotation as to what I feel like at the moment. As you can tell today I am blogging. Tomorrow I have plans to take another video and see whether and how I can attract more viewers.

What I do know is that the strength of my ideas is directly proportional to the degree I put myself out in the world. Taking action and measuring the consequences of those actions is a major part of the process of growth and development.

I would love to hear that you have made a commitment to focus energy on the action/measurement side of the equation for the next couple of weeks. Just a small bit of time each day will allow you to reap amazing rewards.

All the best,
Alana

Distributed learning - diagnosis step

Hi everyone,

As I prepare to travel to the US to meet people, organize a new retreat and discuss participatory action research (PAR) with doctoral students, I am musing on how the educational side of my life merges with the diagnosis step in our personal PAR work. Bear with me for a minute and let me see if I can make some sense of these ideas and that they might be useful to you.

Let me make a few assumptions:

1. You want to make some changes in your life (let me use the ubiquitous lose weight as an example).
2. The first step is diagnosis (how many who have lost weight feel like you know all about it because you have done it so many times before?)
3. So what you have to do is diagnose what would be new to you? A question you might ask is, "Who is saying something (about your topic) that I have not heard before?

Now the principles of distributed learning come in. The world wide web is a fantastic place, and held among it are nodes (or gathering places) of information. Flickr is a node for pictures (but not just photos, pictures of peoples notes, diagrams for books, all types of things). Slideshow.com is node for presentations, as YouTube is for videos. All the major companies like Google, yahoo, MSN have groups - you can search to see if there are groups in the area you want to research.

All the time what you want on your radar is the new, then when you hear something you follow it up, make your own decisions, craft your own plan.

Before you know it your ideas are re-energized and you are ready to move into some kind of action.

In the last few weeks I have been on a diagnosis binge. Every morning for a couple of hours I found myslef researching what was new in education - this is where I came up with these ideas. But i also came up with an idea for some consulting business I want to do. I put it into action last night as I asked some friends if they were interested in working with me on these ideas. Tomorrow I go see a man who might be a prospective client. We'll see how it goes.

The important factors here are that new information is energizing because it helps us focus on potential and there is something in the human spirit that loves potential.

I hope these ideas inspire and that this finds all of you following your potential.
All the best,
Alana

Let's talk about Twitter

What the world needs now is.....
well part of the answer to this phrase is deeper connections with other people (love sweet love).

I know that it is about a year old - but Twitter is really hitting fast in our part of the world. I have to say that there has not been a new tool that has caught my attention like Twitter. it gives me a buzz to know my friend with the pink hat is getting her computer fixed or working in her garden. It helps my connectedness to my work to know that a professor whose insights I value has a new slide show up on the web. It may even help the sale of my book if I get a video or pdcast done and then mention it in Twitter - who knows how fun and connections can spread.

What does this have to do with our reinventing life group? Why not consider all being on and following each other in Twitter - then setting the intention of Twittering regularly about how we are doing with our designs, our actions etc. Using the four PAR steps we would measure our success faster and find this as a tool to get our reflections started.

So for anyone who wants to drop in with a Tweet - I am alanajames on Twitter!

All the best,
Alana