What I learned this week

This week I attended a webinar by Mark Divine, author of The Way of the Seal and creator of SealFit and Unbeatable Mind coaching. I happened to run across his book on a free shelf here in Tzur Hadassah a few years ago and worked some of it, and I happen to have a student who is interested in Navy Seals.

The training was about leadership in times of VUCA - Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity. Hello 2020. (I've linked above. There's teaching, followed by a sales pitch, followed by Q & A.)

He said we can move from this to Vision, Understanding, something beginning with C maybe Communication, I'm going to choose Compassion and Agility. Let's go!

I have some reservations about the diversity of the organization and about learning from the military but I take my cue from Pirke Avot 4:1 - איזהו חכם - הלומד מכל אדם - Who is wise? One who learns from every person. Plus I actually love what this guy has to say. 

One of the most powerful things I learned in the session came from one of the questions, where a participant referred to the OODA Loop. OODA stands for Observe, Orient, Decide, Act. 

The terminology comes from the military and security field, but I find the concept immediately applicable to our current situation and the anxiety I see many around me facing.

I start at the beginning - what do I choose to observe. All week I have been observing many of my neighbors exercising, and today I saw a beautiful group of four elderly women exercising in the park. I observed two of my students who have done pretty much no assignments all year suddenly work on assignments this week successfully. I learned this years ago - what leaders pay attention to gets attention. It's in the Big Book in the story now titled Acceptance was the Answer where he talks about his magnifying mind. I choose what I pay attention to.

Next comes orient - how do I orient myself to what is happening around me? This is where bias and previous experience, even intergenerational experience comes in. I watch people around me orienting to what they see with anxiety. I watch my students orienting to an assignment with an "I can do" or "I can't do" attitude. There is no doubt that we are living in times of unprecedented difficulty. How do I orient myself to that? Our local rabbi is teaching us a course, "how did sages in times past respond to pandemics?" Guess what? There's a lot of wisdom out there to help us orient to this situation. How I orient is also based on my commitments - what is my vision? The Dalai Lama has been giving open talks about how to respond with compassion in uncertainty. 

Deciding and acting are then based on our observations and orientation. Mark Divine described how Navy Seals have a bias toward action. He described another loop - shoot, move, communicate. Now I'm not a fan of shoot, but I'm a fan of act. We have a saying in AA - "you can't think your way into right action, but you can act your way into right thinking." I have also learned - self-esteem comes from doing esteemable acts. This is why chores are so important right now (note to self - teach that unit on chores to 9th grade). And daily meditation. Mark Divine advocates it, AA advocates it, and I'm a huge fan. I've started doing a daily yoga nidra meditation (thanks Margo Helman).

Yesterday I also attended a huge teaching - the memorial service for my friend Rabbi RBO. Per (RBO's preferred pronoun) was a huge role model who throughout life achieved so much. It was amazing to see how per found per niche in the past 7 years of work with JQ International - an organization serving LGBTQ youth and adults from the orthodox community, and how that was the culmination of a lifetime of learning, growth and work. We have a word in Hebrew - assiyah - that doesn't translate well into English - it can be translated as action, activity or achievement but really, it's doing. In the doing is how we manifest who we are meant to be. I know we are human beings and not human doings, but there is something about מעשה ידינו the work of our hands here on earth, the ways we touch others. If you want to learn more about RBO, see this slide show from yesterday with some wonderful video interview parts. Per memory is a blessing and I was so inspired to be with over 100 people remembering per life.

Last night I attended an online class on optimal distance learning, but not before I had a fantastic day of online teaching with my 8th grade class. And I voted! Today's action involves my weekly Friday doing of writing letters to two Jewish men in prison through the Aleph Institute penpal program. As much as this pandemic sucks, it would be so much worse to be alone in prison without family and friends. So I've been doing this for 18 weeks and since their sentences are long, I hope to be doing this beyond when the pandemic ends. And it will end. And when it does we will still be in need of Vision, Understanding, Compassion and Agility. So let's pay attention to how we Observe, Orient, Decide and Act this week. Do what you love. Do what makes you feel good. Do what helps others.