Week 4 Comment to Tim Edinger on "Being the Board"

Tim Edinger's Week 4 Blog Response

I connected most with the chapter 10 - Being the Board. I feel that is how I live my life for the most part. I don’t like to blame others. Everything that I do is because of a choice I made. I think that you could even take it a step further and not get angry for things that are out of your control. I now that my wife sometimes gets upset about certain situations, while I am not bothered - which upsets her even more. One time we went KFC with our family and some friends. The place was very busy and it only had three people were working. We had to wait for a much longer time than we normally would have. My wife felt that we should get a discount or something extra. I told her that they only had three people working and were working as hard and fast as they could. We didn’t need to be anywhere and could wait. I told here we could relax and spend some time talking with our friends while we waited. She felt that they could be more prepared and could have called in extra workers. I told her we didn’t know their situation - there could have been a sickness, gone to a funeral, or a number of other reasons why they only had three people. I felt there was no sense in getting upset with three people that were working as hard as they could to ensure everyone got their orders as quick as possible.

I also had a poem emailed to me that had a similar theme. It talks about someone getting cut off in traffic. The driver who gets cutoff is very upset and is yelling some choice words their way. At the end of the story we find out that the person who cut them off was upset and just left the hospital where a loved one had just passed away. There is no way we can no the situation or actions of others, so there is not sense that we get upset. I try to give people the benefit of the doubt. I try to be the “board.”

My Response

Thank you your insights. I commute daily in and out of NYC where the traffic is intense, as are some of the people. One day I was attempted to be "cut off" off by a driver as I was waiting on an exit ramp for over 15 minutes. It enraged me because I had been patiently waiting, so I decided not to let her in. She then rolled down her window in tears, and pointed to her infant in the back seat whom she was rushing to the hospital. I felt horrible. There are many stories and reasons behind the actions of others.

week 4-Chapter 10, Being the Board

“Being the Board” is an invaluable lesson. It means you must be accountable for your place in the world, not as victim, but realize your place in it, as a whole, as life moves around you. Zander also talks about relationships and blame, “when I blame you, I seek to establish that I’m in the right” and he goes on further to explain that one loses their own power when you seek to blame. I have found this to be very accurate. When you point fingers at others, you take the responsibility off of yourself, thus shutting the door to a deeper self-awareness. If however, you take responsibility for looking at things objectively, or perhaps from another person’s perspective, you might learn a valuable insight about yourself and how you interact in the world.

Zander also discusses the uselessness of anger, and blame for things beyond our control. This has been a valuable lesson for me on my sometimes very traffic lased commute in and out of NYC daily. I used to be enraged by the traffic, and now I’ve let go of any of that anger realizing I’m wasting my precious energy on something completely out of my hands. Another incredible insight, “grace comes from owning the risks we take in a world by and large immune to our control.” My risk in the situation is knowing that NYC traffic is intense, yet I choose to commute in it daily.

It has been a real gift reading this book, as it’s been therapeutic as well as deeply insightful, with suggestions and tricks on how to stay mindful and present in a modern world.

Week 4 - Dream Job

My dream job would be one just like the one I have, only one with an adequate arts budget, and one that values the arts a bit more. I haven’t received arts materials in three semesters, and have shelling out the supplies on my own time and budget, with the hopes of being reimbursed. I also dream of cart filled with Macbooks, fully equip with the latest version of Adobe CS , where I could show students how to create online portfolios, digital video, and sound compositions.

Taking it even one step further, I dream of a paperless school in which every student gets his or her own laptop and completes work online via blogger, experiments with various web 2.0 tools, and integrates the latest technologies into course work (not unlike what we have learned how to do at Fullsail).