Joshua_tree_sign_2 - Returning from Joshua TreeI’m back at “work” from my “vision quest” in Joshua Tree National Monument. I promised to share some of the experience. This one was a big one for me, my seventh with a group, my sixth with Chayim Barton and Brian Winkler, two gifted group leaders. The experiences are cumulative, and now spiral into my life as a central orientation.

I went into the desert this time holding my intent as a question—“What am I to contribute to my communities these next years?” I sought a vision about how to respond to the many changes all of us are facing. I intended to ask for guidance about my own purpose and direction as I more fully embrace an elder role. These are not simple questions.

I have discovered it takes time to appreciate what happens in sacred time such as this, for it takes place at a deep, cellular level as well as in my thoughts and journals. This one is “working me” as we say in our Pathwalkers group (a deep dialogue circle of peer consultants that I have been with for six years.)

The format of the vision quest, however, IS quite simple.

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As the rain and winds ripped trees down in our backyard and beside the Grove in our first serious winter storm, I left the VizThink web-conference exhilarated and thinking a lot about visual analogies and metaphors. My reflection was sparked by a question moderator Tom Crawford passed along from one of the 53 people participating. “What role does the third dimension play in your Storymaps?”

I illustrated my answer with the tablet sketch below. Let me elaborate.

Vizmetaphor_2 - Srategizing with Visual Metaphors

 

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I was going through my back e-mails and came across a link from Lisa Kimball of Group Jazz (also the Organizational Development Network Board) to an amazing little video called Did You Know, created by a high school education project in Colorado with the help of Xplane. It’s a powerful example of how simple graphics can communicate a staggering amount of information, as well as pose some sense-shaking challenges to conventional wisdom.

Didyouknow - Did You Know 2.0
and…

Didyouknow2 - Did You Know 2.0

I just completely a 40-page illustrated retrospective on my learning from an initial year and half exploring Second Life. I’ve focused on 12 themes that have posed the most interesting questions and learning in this new medium, which increasingly represents an integrated experience in self-organizing, web 2.0 phenomena, all embedded in a 3D dynamic environment. The paper is too long to include here, but you can down load it by clicking on this link. I would love to hear your comments and reactions here, however. The picture below is my Second Life self, Sunseed Bardeen, contemplating all this in my Deimos studio.

Download SecondLifeRetrospective.pdf (2518.2K)

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