Signing Out for Now

It seems impossible that I am back in Wisconsin after such an amazing journey. But it's definitely time. My ATM card stopped working, my daughter is a week away from delivering her baby and I waited until Europe to catch the norovirus. Sometimes I'm not too bright but when all the signs are indicating a clear message, I try to PAY ATTENTION! Ironic that I was quite well all throughout India and Africa and never had a delayed flight until Friday night's cancelled one from Chicago to Milwaukee! So I'm home a few days early and the monumental task of sorting through all the valuable data I collected awaits. I'm both excited and terrified by the work ahead. Wish me luck and I welcome any insights you might have to share as you read my blogs and related them to your own life experience. Thank you for your many comments along the way and hopefully your continued interest in understanding and practicing servant leadership!

These kids and those like them all over the world deserve better than what we are currently giving them. The motivation for service is in their eyes, and as I work to interpret and translate this journey into some useful contribution to the work of servant leaders, they are the ones who will keep me honest!

Service to Country

My last set of interviews were as eye opening and surprising as any, five US military offices posted in Heidelberg, Germany. I met with two Lt. Colonels, a Major, a Colonel and a Sargent First Class-two woman and three men. Major John Nguyen was my first, and a real surprise when I found out that he and his family had immigrated from Vietnam at the end of the war. Long story short, he enlisted in the US Army to pay back the gift he felt the US had given his family and him--nothing less than freedom.

My final interview was with a very talented leader named Lt. Colonel Jennifer Humphries who is in charge of the Behavioral Health Unit at the US Military Medical Center in Heidelberg and a social worker by training. Service for both of these individuals meant devotion to country, preservation of our freedom and more immediately the folks they served every day as leaders.

Across the five interviews, I picked up very consistent messaging about servant leadership in the military: 1. Dignity and Respect: Every one deserves it and leaders must model it 2. Investment in leadership development from the beginning: You never know when the formal leader will be missing in action, so everyone must be trained and feel prepared to step in and lead 3. Letting go of ego: The minute it's about you, is the instant you put someone else in harms way 4. Two way trust: Trust is only as strong as the line up and down-hesitation due to lack of trust is not sustainable 5. Providing "top cover": If you want people to take risks, they must know that they are in a safe environment to due so and that their leader has their back. 6. Clear goals, defined boundaries and freedom to move within creates an environment for innovation 7. Continuous feedback and learning: It doesn't matter what your rank, mistakes are learning opportunities immediately and onward. I'm so very grateful for the generosity of time and talent provided and have gained a deepened respect for our Armed Forces and the quality of people leading our national defense and security.

Instrument of Peace

Leaving Africa was difficult. Every time I am here, I feel grounded and at home in a way not experienced elsewhere. Maybe it's the raw connection to nature, the direct contact with those who live so simply and clearly in relation to work, family and survival, and the deep commitment-that is ever present- to serve and create a better life for those in need. Or maybe I'm just really convinced that as the cradle of mankind, Africa is every human's homeland, which makes it all the more unbelievable that white supremacy, extremism and prejudice remain such dominant forces in the world. Leaving Africa on a hopeful note, I discovered that St. Francis's Prayer of Peace is universally applied throughout India (as a Hindu prayer) and in Africa (as a song in Swahili): Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love. Where there is injury, pardon. Where there is doubt, faith. Where there is despair, hope. Where there is darkness, light. Where there is sadness, joy. Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console; to be understood, as to understand; to be loved, as to love. For it is in giving that we receive. It is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

In serving we are transformed; letting go of our selfishness and our misguided thoughts, to be born to a higher consciousness and greater purpose. It sounds pretty lofty, but really is fairly simple, one step at a time.....both Gandhi and Mandela, and all the amazing leaders I have interviewed started somewhere.

The Struggle

Nelson Mandela is a hero, martyr, father to his nation, former president, freedom fighter and an enigma. He spent his life in service to the "struggle" for freedom and equality that began with a commitment to non violence as a vehicle for change. He eventually, however, came to the conclusion that the oppressors would never give way their power and privilege with exclusively non violent measures. He had shifted to military training and tactics when arrested for sabotage and placed in the prison on Robben Island, off the shores of Cape Town. For twenty seven years, he did hard labor in the lime quarry-not for any purpose other than humiliation and backbreaking toil to destroy the spirit in addition to the body. Black prisoners were given sub, sub standard food, clothing and sleeping arrangements over the sub standard conditions for "coloreds" (mixed race) and Indians, following the twisted rationale of Apartheid.

When released in 1990, he successfully led the ANC in negotiations to a multi-racial democracy, ending Apartheid and shepherding in an era of reconciliation and equality for all South Africans. He found a way to forgive and expected others to as well, returning to his roots as a follower of Gandhi's Satyagraha (non-violent resistance) introduced almost a century earlier in South Africa, and denouncing subsequent ANC terrorist activities that injured civilians in the 80's. Service such as his is complex and even confusing to fully understand. The transformation over his life time from freedom fighter, non-violent activist, paramilitary trainer, political prisoner, peace negotiator and revered 'Tata" (Xhosa for father) demonstrates again that humans are certainly capable of great sacrifice and inspiration while at the same time subject to frailty and failings. Gandhi often reminded his followers that he was but a common man with a simple goal. Mandela likewise never desired deification, only fair and equal treatment for his fellow flawed human beings.

It appears that not only is service transformational but the process of transformation involves acts of service to self and others in an imperfect, non-linear and very human manner.

Sustainability

South Africa is such a complex society. The diversity in landscape along with the people is breathtakingly beautiful. Everyone has an opinion about life after Apartheid, but most agree that the government is struggling to change a system that went quickly from oppression when Apartheid ended, to attempts to right past wrongs through social welfare that was not sustainable. It seems that what is on everyone's mind here is how to improve opportunity through education and employment--instead of providing handouts, promoting hand-ups. The country, like so many other African nations is filled with NGO's attempting to partner with local communities to do this work as well. I interviewed one such leader, Paul Durant, Director of the South African branch of Habitat for Humanity here in Capetown.

Paul is another example of a young entrepreneur who made it big in the IT business, but found the chase after money and things to be unsatisfying. He was born to a privileged life in South Africa and migrated to the UK for schooling and business. The gap between rich and poor in both places was a wake up call that his life needed to be about something else. Upon volunteering with Habitat and other NGO's he discovered a different type of satisfaction that occurred concurrently with it a spiritual awakening. Now he leads the South African arm of Habitat in Capetown.

He is attempting to shift the focus of Habitat from home building alone (handout) to community development in partnership with other agencies that can meet the needs of any given community (hand-up) including the training and development of local community councils, enabling them to take over the sustainability of aid provided once the NGOs move on. Paul is attempting to develop the people in his office in much the same way. Once again, I discovered the true merit of a Servant Leader is being smart enough and invested enough to work yourself out of a job!

Apartheid, Corruption and Redemption

Corruption comes in many forms: ideas, practices, policies and personifications. South Africa is a conundrum of the first order, with a history of white European hegemony and current political realities infected by corruption and bankrupt ideology. As Wikepedia describes "in 20th-century political science, the concept of hegemony is central to cultural hegemony, a philosophic and sociologic explanation of how, by the manipulation of the societal value system, one social class dominates the other social classes of a society, with a world view justifying the status quo of bourgeois hegemony". What the Afrikaans perpetrated on the native Africans, immigrant Indians and so-called "coloreds" during Apartheid was horrific and seemingly unforgivable- people categorized as subhuman and treated with less respect and dignity than that of cattle. Unlike Rwanda, truth and reconciliation has been an uphill battle here, perhaps because Apartheid was carefully and fully realized for over fifty years and was institutionalized so completely into the culture, rather than the swift and unimaginable genocide of Rwanda of one tribe pitted against another with white supremacists pulling the strings in the background. In any case, the current rule of the ANC (African National Congress)seems a far cry from what Nelson Mandela desired. Corruption is recognized as problematic be you black or white, with short term pocket filling rationalized as deserved rather than investment in long term vision for a sustainable future. I don't suggest that I understand the complexities, only that deep complex evolution to an enlightened and equal future remains elusive. Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu played critical roles in the peaceful and mostly non-violent transition to a democratic society, but as they have entered their golden years, successors of their merit are sorely needed.

The irony here in Capetown is represented in the beautiful upscale suburbs juxtaposed against township slums with a population of over one million.

Education and healthcare seem to have taken a backseat to social welfare programs that offer short term benefit, but lack long term results. Redemption is somewhat recognizable in a rich diversity that appears to be working on the surface-black, white, Indian, Muslim, Christian, and on and on- a crazy quilt of interaction characterized by a willingness to talk about the present day issues--- but still looking for more....

Letting Go

My father passed away 26 years ago and upon his death I asked for a birthstone ring that he wore for as long as I could remember. It was on the hand that I often held as a little girl. Shortly after his death I took the ring to a jeweler and had the gold melted and reshaped into a ring that I could wear as a remembrance of him and our shared November birthdays over the years. I remember him as a gentle, loving, sensitive father and leader who had a wicked sense of humor. I lost the citrine stone in that ring about six months ago and have been perseverating about it ever sense. About 15 years ago I visited Ireland for the first time-the traditional discover your roots trip-and felt very connected to the beauty of the people and land as well as the golden tones of Jameson Irish Whiskey. While there, I purchased a gold medallion that was a replica of a druid worship stone combining the ancient circular patterns of continuity of the druid spirits with the first Christian symbol of a cross marking the impact of St. Patrick's arrival about 400 AD. For me this symbolized my homeland and a universal spirituality that spoke to my belief system. I have worn that necklace virtually every day and night sense. While walking to the Waterfront here in Cape Town yesterday, that necklace was ripped off my neck by a young robber. I was really upset at loosing this precious object until I started thinking of some of the lessons learned on this journey. The particular lesson that kept coming to me was the one about "letting go". The ring is not my father and the medallion is not my heritage. The problem with possessions is that we want to protect them and hang on at all costs. The same can be said for money, fame, and power-many of the causes of toxic leadership. And what about ideas and perceptions to which we form attachments:prejudice, narrow mindedness,singular interpretations? I am reminded once again that focusing on the small stuff gets in the way of focusing on the right stuff and that letting go is the only way to let new insight come. What might you be holding on to that is holding you back?