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'What Are You Skating Towards?': Resolutions for 2012

The Tyee recently asked three thinkers about their resolutions for 2012. It turned out one aimed to unlock empathy, another to turn voice into action, and the third to finish life strong.
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The Tyee recently asked three thinkers about their resolutions for 2012. It turned out one aimed to unlock empathy, another to turn voice into action, and the third to finish life strong. Read on to learn more about the journey's of Shari Graydon, Mark Kingwell and Patrick O'Neill.

Shari Graydon: The Intersection of Voice and Agency

As a young child, Sharon Carstairs was sexually abused by a family friend who effectively silenced her by insisting that no one would believe her if she spoke about his violations.

But in the essay that she contributed to a book I edited earlier this year, Senator Carstairs describes how, in the face of her abuser's developing interest in her younger sister, she found her voice. The act of speaking up to protect another was a pivotal moment of agency that awakened her to the capacity she had to make change.

I've been skating towards the intersection of voice and agency for a long time now. As a columnist and occasional media commentator, I've had lots of opportunities to stand up and be heard, to comment on what I think is — or should be — going on in the world.

The news media's amplification of my words has occasionally given me a deeply satisfying sense of agency. . . When business executives reconsidered a destructive marketing campaign. . . When a hospital changed its policy on infant formula. . . When members of a marginalized group wrote heartfelt notes of appreciation for seeing their reality reflected in the news. . .

People afforded the opportunity to frame issues and highlight concerns through print, broadcast and online media wield more influence than those who don't. Their views often inform government decisions about how public money should be spent, and their profile helps to shape public perceptions about who is qualified to lead.

As a result, those without voice not only experience less agency, but are widely perceived to be less important, exacerbating their invisibility and powerlessness. No wonder — as Samara's recent research suggests — they're disinclined to vote.

This is a deepening problem with profound implications for Canada's future. Despite our country's reputation for equality, women's voices are outnumbered by a factor of 4 to 1 in Canadian news media, and those of visible and sexual minority groups, Aboriginal people, and people living with physical and mental disabilities are even harder to find.

This robs our public discourse of the ideas and analysis of some of our best and brightest minds. As a growing body of research makes clear, organizations able to access and integrate the talents and perspectives of diverse workers are more resilient and competitive. The problem-solving capacity of any group is significantly enhanced if members interpret the challenges faced from different perspectives.

The economic and social impacts of genuine equality — of ensuring that every citizen feels empowered to speak and act — benefit not just the individual but the whole, in ways that we can't remotely predict or fully measure. When Sharon Carstairs found her voice and exercised her agency, the difference she made went far beyond protecting her younger sister: it set her on a lifetime path of advocacy and public service. Imagine what might flow from a universal experience of the capacity to speak up and make change?

Mark Kingwell: The Relationship Between Democracy and Empathy

I can't skate very well, at least by Canadian standards, so I think I'm more groping and staggering towards something this coming year. It is the relationship between democracy and empathy — the idea, at least as old as Adam Smith, that we can't feel an obligation to another unless and until we see that person as vulnerable, as open to ourselves to pain and suffering. This seeing in turn requires a special capacity of the mind: moral imagination.

Philosophers have long believed that cultivating the moral imagination is best done through instruction and argument, but I wonder. My own personal experience suggests that narrative fiction, in all its forms (novels, plays, films, even good television) is where this actually happens — where we take up the position of another and, as it were, share in that person's "lover's argument with the world," to quote Robert Frost's epitaph.

My current worry is that this capacity to enrich political sensitivity through the exercise of narrative literacy is waning. That is, in the social-media era, where long-form narrative and sustained attention to the inwardness of an imagined person are no longer treasured, we may be headed towards an "empathy deficit," (some research by my University of Toronto colleague Keith Oatley, who is a novelist as well as a psychologist, indicates that this may indeed be occurring in younger people). Four hundred years ago Hobbes argued, somewhat notoriously, that there was only self-interest to be found in the human self. Even if he was right, we humans have always been able to temper that self-interest by noting its effects on others, the uneven distribution of happiness and comfort, and the value to everyone of cooperating. I hope, in our rush to embrace the pleasures of self-congratulation found in our recent round of gadgets, we do not damage that ability to mitigate self-interest with empathy.

In an age of instant validation of the self's fleeting desires, at least for those blessed by luck with a home in the developed world, we need more awareness of suffering, not less. The moral imagination is the one and only thing that can create that awareness — and then, perhaps, a world of real democratic possibility.

Patrick O'Neill: Fast Ice

"Do you know that disease and death must needs overtake us, no matter what we are doing?. . . What do you wish to be doing when it overtakes you?. . . If you have anything better to be doing when you are so overtaken, get to work on that."

- Epictetus

I'm skating towards oblivion. Sorry to say it but so are you.

Not only that, but we're all skating on fast ice.

That's the happy premise of my 400 words. With every stride the ice surface shrinks and the clock continues to tick away precious seconds, minutes, and days.

Even though we think we're skating alone, we are always accompanied by two unseen wingers — Death and Destiny.

Death, to the left of us, asks us the daily question: "Are you using the great gift of life?"

Destiny, on our right, asks: "Are you doing what you have come here to do?" These daily reflections guide me as I hurtle toward that inevitable encounter with mortality.

I'm 57 years old. I've skated hard through the first two periods of life: youth and adulthood. I've earned a degree, married well, built a business, raised a family, own a home. I've got some money in the bank, cars in the driveway and modest debts. A good life.

As I enter the third period — my eldership — I hear Epictetus' words about using time well. They motivate me to skate towards a life that is as meaningful and fulfilling as I can make it. I want to use the time I have to playing every shift like Sidney Crosby driving to the goal.

But what goal is worth driving towards?

What I'm discovering is my third period is less about outer accomplishments and more about my inner life. That's where wisdom resides and since I am entering my "wisdom years" it's probably a good place to skate.

In this period I intend to turn my eyes from the outer world and towards the heart. The Four-Chambered Heart explains cultural anthropologist Angeles Arrien, is full, open, clear and strong. This is where meaning is constructed. Life's most important decisions — personal matters, family, relationships, and business — are assembled in the heart first and are rationalized later.

Therefore I resolve to:

• Use my time pursuing only what I am full-hearted about in my life and work.

• Remain open to new ideas, people and experiences.

• Keep my relationships clear of obstruction by being honest and compassionate with the people I care about.

• Face aging with courage and dignity because it sure ain't for sissies.

That's what I'm skating towards, Al. It's good. I need the exercise.

Mark Kingwell is a professor of philosophy at the University of Toronto and the author of sixteen books, most recently, with Joshua Glenn and illustrator Seth, The Wage Slave's Glossary (Biblioasis, 2011).

Shari Graydon is the award-winning author of two media literacy books for youth, the catalyst of Informed Opinions, a project seeking to bridge the gender gap in public discourse, and the editor of I Feel Great About My Hands - and other unexpected joys of aging.

Patrick O'Neill leads Extraordinary Conversations Inc., a company committed to helping people and organizations change and grow. He has worked with thousands of people, hundreds of teams and organizations, and is acknowledged as a gifted teacher, mediator and mentor.



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