Diving in on this as I get ready to retreat  to the cold and clarity  
of my temple in the mountains. The spoon imagery is suggestive of  
choice and non choice. Lets say I am helpful spoon  ( choice) as  
opposed to a non helpful spoon ( spoon fed, spoon feeding, no choice)  
assisting in the learning of lets say ; the neighbour hoods of  
knowledge and knowing.  The next image is one where I am being spooned  
by the control of who has the handle of my spoon???  Unless I hold my  
own handle so to speak then being a spoon provokes interesting  
discourse with self. Some times the metaphor , I suggest, becomes  
exclusional if it assumes that others share the same perspective.   
Imagery like language is in the eyes of the beholder. However if  
imagery is offered  in an inclusionary sense of suggestion that this  
is where I am in this neighbourhood of ours where are you? We are free  
to be spoons or spooned??? Does that make sense or am I loosing it?

My love to all, be safe in this universal neighbourhood of ours.  On  
new year eve as normal we start  our three days of Goma fire for world  
peace. In these times where every where we look we see suffering and  
war peace appears not to hold much sway with the hearts of men..  
however there is always hope and as long as that exists, I will keep  
praying.
Je Kan





Quoting "Alan Rayner (BU)" <[log in to unmask]>:

> Dear Brian,
>
> I'm still trying to find ways, using words, to help people feel the   
> difference between rationalistic and inclusional ways of being,   
> which links in turn to the difference between working as a 'training  
>  instructor' who dictates precisely how to do something, without   
> question, and an 'educational facilitator', who opens up creative   
> possibility for learning through enquiry, gathering knowledge and   
> evolving understanding. Whereas the former is prescriptive and sets   
> a curriculum that sustains the objective status quo by blocking   
> enquiry and creative possibility - i.e. as an 'executive obstacle'   
> that repetitively makes others do things as performing objects, the   
> latter is transformational, a responsive receptacle that views   
> others as like themselves, to be creatively encouraged.
>
> In my original message to a different group, I included a dream I   
> had some years ago, which features the transformation from executive  
>  obstacle (the forceful doer) to responsive receptacle (helpful   
> spoon). I'm pasting this below.
>
> As a responsive receptacle, I ask myself the question, 'How may I   
> respond receptively in this situation?', not 'What do I do about   
> this thing?' And in my sense of 'self as neighbourhood' in common   
> space with others, yet also with my uniquely situated local   
> identity, a responsive receptacle is how I feel and experience   
> loving influence (inflow).
>
> Warmest
>
> Alan
> ------------------------------------------------------
>
> At the opening of the dream I am Chairman of Bath University Estates  
>  Management Committee, or some such body, inspecting the campus   
> grounds on a cold, grey, damp day in early spring. A young woman is   
> driving a motorized lawn mower, cutting broad swathes through the   
> damp grass near the lake. I think that the conditions for lawn   
> mowing aren’t perfect, but suppose it is necessary. I take over the   
> machine and continue cutting the grass, but the mower gets stuck   
> near the lake where there are some particularly thick stalks. I get   
> down to inspect the stalks and realize that they are bamboo shoots   
> and I will have to cut them manually. I cut them with a chopper, by   
> which time they have grown into hazel tree trunks and I have to   
> deliver several blows. There is a gathering of onlookers and I feel   
> obliged to chop off their hands, which they offer to me without   
> protestation. One of the onlookers is a former mycological research   
> colleague, and I feel great reluctance to cut off his hand. I also   
> fear for his and others’ safety in view of the inevitable blood loss  
>  - how can I be sure that the flow will cease and the wounds heal   
> over? Nonetheless I do the job and am awed by the ease with which I   
> slice through the arm and the beauty of the cut surface, which   
> reminds me of a ripe fruit. I worry that the loss of a hand will be   
> crippling. But my colleague points out that in place of a hand there  
>  has grown a spoon, which will be very helpful.
>
>
>   ----- Original Message -----
>   From: Brian wakeman
>   To: [log in to unmask]
>   Sent: Monday, December 17, 2007 2:33 PM
>   Subject: Re: AA Thread 2 07-08 How do i~we explain our educational  
>  influences in learning to improve our educational influences as   
> practitioner-researchers within the social and other formations that  
>  dynamically include us?
>
>
>   Hello Alan,
>
>   I'm puzzled by your comment:
>    As educators, do we think of ourselves as
>   'Responsive Receptacles' and/or as 'Executive Obstacles' as we enter the
>   'classroom'? How do these perceptions influence our way of being with
>   students?
>
>
>   I've retired from teaching young people, and now work with PGCE   
> trainees both in their classrooms, and in seminars. I'm also working  
>  with two adult watercolourists groups...................
>
>
>
>   but ............I don't recall feeling a "responsive receptacle",   
> nor do I think  of myself as "executive obstacle".
>
>
>
>   What prompted you to characterize these two metaphors?
>
>
>
>   Advent greetings
>
>
>
>
>
>   Brian
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>   <font face="comic sans ms">Brian E. Wakeman</font>
>   <font face="Comic Sans MS">Education adviser</font>
>   <font face="Comic Sans MS">Dunstable</font>
>   <font face="Comic Sans MS">Beds</font>
>
>
>
>
>   ----- Original Message ----
>   From: Alan Rayner (BU) <[log in to unmask]>
>   To: [log in to unmask]
>   Sent: Sunday, 16 December, 2007 4:40:07 PM
>   Subject: Re: AA Thread 2 07-08 How do i~we explain our educational  
>  influences in learning to improve our educational influences as   
> practitioner-researchers within the social and other formations that  
>  dynamically include us?
>
>   Dear Jack and All,
>
>   Here is a thought that I shared with our 'inclusional discussion group'
>   yesterday, but seems to me to be relevant to how as educators we understand
>   and enhance our influence. As educators, do we think of ourselves as
>   'Responsive Receptacles' and/or as 'Executive Obstacles' as we enter the
>   'classroom'? How do these perceptions influence our way of being with
>   students?
>
>   Warmest
>
>   Alan
>
>   --------------------------------------
>
>   Dear All,
>
>   This morning I woke up with a couple of phrases resounding around, relating
>   to the conversations about the nature of genes as non-objects,   
> hierarchy and
>   lowerarchy, sailboat and powerboat management, and an article Timo  
>  and I are
>   currently preparing regarding 'A Copernican Revolution in the   
> Psychological,
>   Environmental and Evolutionary Meaning of Self' (see attached   
> summary, which
>   also doubles up as summary for my forthcoming 'ICE melting' talk.
>
>   The phrases relate to the distinction between inclusional and rationalistic
>   perceptions of 'Self' (whereby the inclusional can accommodate and  
>  transform
>   [through spatial inclusion], but the rationalistic cannot recognise the
>   inclusional).
>
>   The phrases also relate to a question, which is being used in a current
>   advertising campaign in the UK: Where Do They Get Their Energy   
> From?   To my
>   mind this is perhaps the most fundamental question to be asked in the
>   development of a truly 'inclusional ecology'. The rationalistic
>   self-portrait will derive energy from somewhere locally internalized or
>   externalized - an 'internal or external executive FORCE'. The inclusional
>   self-imagination will channel energy from everywhere (i.e. non-locally)
>   through a local focus or 'receptive space'. Whereas the rationalistic self
>   portrait therefore imposes discontinuity between organism and world,
>   blocking off material content from spatial context, the inclusional
>   imagination will accept spatial continuity throughout.
>
>   From here we can recognise that inclusionally, 'self' is, like all other
>   locally appearing forms in the cosmos, a dynamically informed responsive
>   receptacle of inductive space, whereas, rationalistically the 'self' is
>   regarded as a whole, material object that does things to other things, i.e.
>   an executive obstacle.
>
>
>   Sadly, we seem rationalistically to have unreasonably (i.e. there is no
>   sound reason or evidential basis for it) populated the world with executive
>   obstacles, not responsive receptacles, and whilst that situation obtains,
>   cruelty and conflict will tend to preclude compassion and care in spite of
>   ourselves and our planetary home. We cannot find the holey grail when
>   looking for definite objects and trying to do things about and to them.
>
>
>   ----- Original Message -----
>   From: "Jack Whitehead" <[log in to unmask]>
>   To: <[log in to unmask]>
>   Sent: Wednesday, December 05, 2007 10:32 AM
>   Subject: Re: AA Thread 2 07-08 How do i~we explain our educational
>   influences in learning to improve our educational influences as
>   practitioner-researchers within the social and other formations that
>   dynamically include us?
>
>
>   Here are a couple of thoughts for our second thread of December 07.
>
>   The first thought is that some of the practitioner-researchers on this list
>   have taken to calling our
>   explanations of our educational influences in learning, our living
>   educational theories. We have
>   established an Educational Journal of Living Theories with a statement of
>   commitment and scope
>   at:
>
>   http://www.ejolts.net/
>
>   Moira Laidlaw is Chair of the Editorial Board and the first issue is in
>   preparation. You can see the
>   format we are using at the above url and you may wish to submit your more
>   extensive writings
>   around our second thread to JOLTS.
>
>   The second thought is that if you enter:
>
>   http://www.inclusional-research.org/
>
>   you can participate in the Inclusional Research Forum and Learning Space:
>
>   "Evolving Co-creatively, Beyond Conflict.
>
>   A space to encourage our understanding of space in the fluid flow   
> of nature.
>
>   Is it possible to understand what gets in the way of human understanding?
>
>   That is the question we are asking ourselves as we invite you to   
> participate
>   in the development
>   and communication of a natural awareness that we call 'inclusionality'.
>
>   We think that inclusional understanding , a natural capability that can be
>   're-awakened' in all of
>   us, can radically transform the way we think, feel and behave, enabling us
>   to live more
>   harmoniously in sustainable dynamic relationship with our living space and
>   one another."
>
>   When asked recently in another e-forum how he would describe inclusionality
>   to a friend, Alan
>   responded:
>
>   "For me, inclusionality means knowing how wonderful it feels to be aware of
>   receptive, loving influence everywhere, and how terrible it is to deny
>   this."
>
>   Love Jack.
>
>
>



Rev Je Kan Adler-Collins.
Associate Professor of Nursing,
Health Promotion Centre.
Fukuoka Prefectural University Faculty of Nursing
Tagawa City,
Fukuoka Prefecture,
Japan.
8258585