Photosynthesis

When I was a kid, I thought plants were made of soil and water.  That's all you give them to grow, right?  I figured that the plant uses water and nutrients from the soil to make the bark and the trunk and the branches and the leaves.

Many years later, I learned about photosynthesis in school.  But it didn't click immediately.

Then one day, I was looking at some trees and thinking.  If the branches and leaves and trunk of the tree are made purely of stuff that comes out of the ground, then you would expect to see a large hole or depression around every tree.  It's simple conservation of matter.  You can't make stuff out of nothing.  So, if the material in the tree is coming out of the ground, then the more tree there is, the less ground you'd have.

Then I got it.

The stuff that makes up the tree isn't coming from the ground.  Yes, the tree gets some nutrients and water from the ground but the bulk of the material that makes up the tree is actually from the air.  That's photosynthesis.  It's using light energy to take carbon dioxide from the air and water from the ground to make carbohydrates.  It's turning air and water into plants -- into the wood and the bark and the leaves and the fruits.  And it happens all the time.

How awesome is that?!

The costs of 'free'

What is the cost of a free item?

• the thoughts/attention, effort and time spent to
• use it
• decide where to store it
• worry about losing it
• find it if it's lost
• decide whether or not to keep it and then how to transport or dispose of it during a move
• the space it takes to store it
• the time and effort it takes to maintain it
• the loss of neatness to clutter...

It's not really free, is it?

Self check out

A couple of weeks ago, my local branch of the public library started aggressively promoting their self check out machines.  I've used self check out before, but when there are library staff around, I prefer going to the counter to check out my books.  It's not like I have big conversations with the staff or anything.  I just give them my book, then they ask for my library card, they scan everything, ask me if I need anything else, I say no, they give me my receipt and my books and I say thank you and go.  That's it. 

During their self check out promotion blitz, staff directed all patrons to check the books out themselves using self check out.  Out of habit, I still went to the counter.  They had a self check out machine set up there too.  When I got to the front of the line, the librarian directed me step by step on how to use the machine to check my books out myself.  I got the message.

So at my most recent trip to the library, I used self check out.  It's very simple.  It's quick.  But I didn't like it.  I missed the little dialog with the staff. the little thank you and good bye, the acknowledgement of my presence and patronage of their library.  With self check out, I just go in and out.  No one acknowledges that I came, nor do I acknowledge anyone else.  It's almost like I wasn't there.

It just doesn't sit right with me.  There we are, all these people, sharing a common space and a common interest in books but everyone is in their own world.  And one of the few points of contact between individual worlds, i.e. the check out counter, has been removed.

I can see the benefit of self-serve options in situations when it's not practical to employ someone to serve customers.  For example, vending machines allow us to buy things at odd hours and in locations where it wouldn't pay to have an employee at the cashier.  Zipcar makes renting cars from many different locations at any time of day possible through their self-serve model.  But in a library, the staff have to be there anyways.  And the patrons are there too.  If everyone is in the same place at the same time, what does it hurt to have them interact a bit?

I just miss getting my books checked out at the counter.

Attention leaks

After sehri this morning, I prayed a few raka'ahs of tahajjud and sat to make du'a.  I was trying to take advantage of the last third of the night, when prayers are more likely to be answered.  But I struggled.  I kept getting tempted to open my computer -- to look at what, I don't really know.  But I could barely sit still.  I actually walked to my computer and then walked myself back to my prayer mat a couple of times.

Later in the day, I prayed at the Pickering Islamic Centre.  It's a beautiful masjid.  One of my favourites.  And I found it so much easier to pray.  And to focus.  And still my mind.  It was amazing.

It was as if my attention was water in a dam and distractions like my computer were leaks in that dam, allowing my attention to trickle away.  When I was at the masjid, I could focus.  The dam held.  There were no leaks.  Now I just need to figure out how to plug those leaks when they appear.  Because Pickering is a long way to go to focus and pray.

Effort and impact

It took me a long time to learn this, but I've found that there is a relationship between effort and impact.  It's not always linear but it's generally positive.  The more effort you put into something, the better the final product is and the greater its impact.

Now I see it in even the simplest of things.  For example, there are many ways to deliver a message.  You can send it in an email, you can say it over the phone or you can meet someone and say it in person.  It takes more effort to meet someone in person than it does to make a phone call and more effort to make a phone call than it does to send an email.  Likewise, even when the words are the same, the impact of the message is related to the effort used to deliver it.

Hajj memories

As the crowds grow in Mecca this week, I'm remembering my own hajj five years ago. 

It was...amazing.  All of it.  The crowds, the beautiful masjid, the kaabah, all the people gathered together by a common purpose.  Just the people amazed me.  Walking together in rivers flowing to and from the sacred mosque in rhythm with the daily prayers.  Millions of people standing together to pray and saying ameen together and bowing together and prostrating together...amazing.  I remember the feel of the cool marble floor beneath my feet, the sound of the adhan echoing through the city, the sight of the sky changing colour as the sun rose after Fajr prayer.  Absolutely amazing.

It was trying as well.  The waits.  So much waiting.  Waiting for the bus to arrive, waiting for everyone to get on, waiting for the luggage to get loaded, waiting for the bus to move, waiting to get off the bus.  And the people were a trial as well.  I kept thinking of the verse in the Qur'an "And we have created some of you as a trial for others: will ye have patience?" (25:20).  Yes, the patience.  Lots of patience.

It wasn't just patience to endure the long waits.  It was the patience of not getting angry when things didn't go the way we wanted -- when it seemed that someone did something to wrong us.  It was the patience of not complaining about things that were not in our control.  It was the patience to understand people from different places and cultures and environments as they behaved in different ways in shared buses, tents, streets and sacred spaces.

It was the brotherhood and sisterhood.  Giving and receiving cups of zamzam water to and from strangers.  Conversing in gestures, for lack of a common language.  Sharing meals.  Holding hands.  Pushing wheelchairs.  Praying side by side.  Smiling.

Amazing.

Counting -- and missing what counts

Albert Einstein once said "Everything that can be counted does not necessarily count; everything that counts cannot necessarily be counted."

I find that's particularly true for community work.

Funders are always looking for numbers -- number of meetings, number of attendees, number of volunteer hours, number of partner agencies, number of actions, etc.  But these numbers may have little correlation to the amount of benefit that comes out of a community project.  How do you measure inspiration or a sense of belonging?  How do you measure increased confidence or trust or strengthened relationships?  Is an hour spent listening to the troubles of one youth less valuable than an hour spent running a workshop attended by 10?

A project may look great in the numbers and yet have little real impact with people on the ground.  With the right incentives (e.g. food, bus tokens, honoraria), people will attend meetings or fill out surveys or do actions on a checklist.  There are ways to get good numbers.  But in this quest for numbers and focus on counting, we risk losing the immeasurable things that really count.

We don't have to, though.  I believe it is possible to get both good numbers and real impact.  But our focus must stay on the people.

Sincerity speaks through our actions.  If we're looking for good numbers, people can feel it.  If we're looking to make a difference, people can feel it too.   We must only be sincere in our intents and let the numbers fall where they may.