[IAEP] reluctant/proactive leader

[Dr. Gerald Ardito]

Yama,

Thanks for your kind words.

Onward and upward!

Gerald


On Fri, Jan 21, 2011 at 11:22 AM, Yamandu Ploskonka <yamaplos at gmail.com>wrote:

>  WOW!
>
> you *are* a Courageous Leader! (not to be confused with a N k0rea title
> :-)
>
> which reminds me of an excerpt from Krishnamurti that I have had doing the
> rounds, precisely on how younger people have an easier time collaborating
> than so-called adults.  Because of its potential OT nature, I am copying it
> below the fold to mitigate offense - I put in bold the relevant part, to
> make the load lighter... :-)
>
> BTW, reading in between the lines, it turns out it was not that *you* were
> reluctant, but rather your teachers?  Nice of you to take up the blame. I
> feel so encouraged by your attitude, and much honored to learn from you
>
> Yama
>
>
> On 01/21/2011 10:04 AM, Dr. Gerald Ardito wrote:
>
> Yama,
>
> Your response actually gave me an idea.
> In the various situations in which I have worked, I have been able to
> develop students (even at ages 9 and 10) to be real leaders. Perhaps they
> are the way in to this dilemma.
> I will find a way to add them to this community.
> Perhaps, just as in the classroom, when teachers (and others) find the
> students participating so actively and responsibly, they will be called to
> join in?
>
> What do you think.
> Gerald
>
>
> one of my favorite blogs, framablog.org, had recently a version of this
> text by Krishnamurti.  Since great friends Padmanabha and Rama Rao run the
> Krishnamurti school in India, it all came together to make me wish to share
> this with y'all - the subject matter is something we all wonder a lot about:
> *the purpose of education, cooperation...*
>
> "
> One of the basic problems confronting the world is the problem of
> cooperation. What does the word "cooperation" mean? To cooperate is to do
> things together, to build together, to feel together, to have something in
> common so that we can freely work together.
>
> But people generally don't feel inclined to work together naturally,
> easily, happily; and so they are compelled to work together through various
> inducements: threat, fear, punishment, reward. This is the common practice
> throughout the world. Under tyrannical governments you are brutally forced
> to work together; if you don't "cooperate" you are liquidated or sent to a
> concentration camp. In the so-called civilized nations you are induced to
> work together through the concept of "my country," or for an ideology which
> has been very carefully worked out and widely propagated so that you accept
> it; or you work together to carry out a plan which somebody has drawn up, a
> blueprint for Utopia.
>
> So, it is the plan, the idea, the authority which induces people to work
> together. This is generally called cooperation, and in it there is always
> the implication of reward or punishment, which means that behind such
> "cooperation" there is fear. You are always working for something--for the
> country, for the king, for the party, for God or the Master, for peace, or
> to bring about this or that reform. Your idea of cooperation is to work
> together for a particular result. You have an ideal--to build a perfect
> school, or what you will--towards which you are working, therefore you say
> cooperation is necessary. All this implies authority, does it not? There is
> always someone who is supposed to know what is the right thing to do, and
> therefore you say, "We must cooperate in carrying it out."
>
> Now, I don't call that cooperation at all. That is not cooperation, it is a
> form of greed, a form of fear, compulsion. Behind it there is the threat
> that if you don't "cooperate" the government won't recognize you, or the
> Five Year Plan will fail, or you will be sent to a concentration camp, or
> your country will lose the war, or you may not go to heaven. There is always
> some form of inducement, and where there is inducement there cannot be real
> cooperation.
>
> Nor is it cooperation when you and I work together merely because we have
> mutually agreed to do something. In any such agreement what is important is
> the doing of that particular thing, not working together. You and I may
> agree to build a bridge, or construct a road, or plant some trees together,
> but in that agreement there is always the fear of disagreement, the fear
> that I may not do my share and let you do the whole thing.
>
> So it is not cooperation when we work together through any form of
> inducement, or by mere agreement, because behind all such effort there is
> the implication of gaining or avoiding something.
>
> To me, cooperation is entirely different. Cooperation is the fun of being
> and doing together--not necessarily doing something in particular. Do you
> understand? *Young children normally have a feeling for being and doing
> together. Haven't you noticed this? They will cooperate in anything. There
> is no question of agreement or disagreement, reward or punishment; they just
> want to help. They cooperate instinctively, for the fun of being and doing
> together.* But grown-up people destroy this natural, spontaneous spirit of
> cooperation in children by saying, "If you do this I will give you that; if
> you don't do this I won't let you go to the cinema," which introduces the
> corruptive element.
>
> So, real cooperation comes, not through merely agreeing to carry out some
> project together, but with the joy, the feeling of togetherness, if one may
> use that word; because in that feeling there is not the obstinacy of
> personal ideation, personal opinion.
>
> When you know such cooperation, you will also know when not to cooperate,
> which is equally important. Do you understand? It is necessary for all of us
> to awaken in ourselves this spirit of cooperation, for then it will not be a
> mere plan or agreement which causes us to work together, but an
> extraordinary feeling of togetherness, the sense of joy in being and doing
> together without any thought of reward or punishment. That is very
> important. But it is equally important to know when not to cooperate;
> because if we are not wise we may cooperate with the unwise, with ambitious
> leaders who have grandiose schemes, fantastic ideas, like Hitler and other
> tyrants down through the ages. So we must know when not to cooperate; and we
> can know this only when we know the joy of real cooperation.
>
> This is a very important question to talk over, because when it is
> suggested that we work together, your immediate response is likely to be,
> "What for? What shall we do together?" In other words, the thing to be done
> becomes more important than the feeling of being and doing together; and
> when the thing to be done--the plan, the concept, the ideological
> Utopia--assumes primary importance, then there is no real cooperation. Then
> it is only the idea that is binding us together; and if one idea can bind us
> together, another idea can divide us. So, what matters is to awaken in
> ourselves this spirit of cooperation, this feeling of joy in being and doing
> together, without any thought of reward or punishment. Most young people
> have it spontaneously, freely, if it is not corrupted by their elders.
> "
>
>
>
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