Subject: [discourses] Discourse I-11 (Wed.) summary & assignment


Note: 
The next call is the last one in the cycle.  You should have received a
separate email letting you know about upcoming Discourse II and Discourse I
calls.  We invite you to take a look at it.  Usually, there are some people
on the call who are clear they've gotten value, but aren't sure they should
continue with the Discourse II call cycle or whether to repeat the Discourse
I cycle.  We will do a piece of work on call I-12 that will let you settle
that for yourself.
 
SUMMARY:
We delved deeper into bringing distinctions from the realm of living beings
(biology) to the realm of long-lived networks of conversations (discourses).
Most of us have already picked up tons of distinctions about living
creatures and the kinds of things that they do and how stable arrangements
can exist. Most of us haven't looked much at stable networks of
conversations and the kinds of ways that these networks are held together.
By bringing our already available distinctions involving living creatures to
this strange realm of discourses we can learn a lot about discourses. 
 
Walt Joyce has written a lot of material about discourses.  He has a whole
section on the discourse "resources," from which I've included an extract
below. This is a discourse we all care deeply about and already have lots to
say about. Walt gets at a level underneath, and we will all have our
reactions when reading this.

I strongly recommend a particular relationship to this material, in
particular, that you treat it neither as gospel nor as simply some other
guy's opinion about something you already have plenty of opinions about.
Rather, that you look from what this piece of text reveals about your
already-relationship to resources. On earlier calls we've talked about the
need to develop our capacity to belong to a conversation, being willing to
return yourself to a conversation after you notice you've taken yourself
away. We've suggested that developing this capacity is critical to
interacting powerfully with a discourse you care about. 
 
ASSIGNMENT:
Observe, in your life, the activity of the discourse "resources." Notice
when you are being the discourse biologist, and when you're being the
"subject" and when you are being both. Notice where you add make-wrongs, and
leave those at the door, and continue to look at what is happening.   You're
welcome to pick those make-wrongs back up on your way out.  Come to the next
call prepared to share about what you discovered. 
 
Bert Speelpenning
http://foundationforlearning.org
 
 
(source: Walt Joyce.  Extract)
The Discourse Resources:
Who's Got What and How Long Will It Last?

As educated people we think we know about resources. We may not know about
their quantity and location and yet we probably think we know what the
resources are. It is a good bet that we can only name a few and in practice
we probably would not recognize many resources when we see them. At least
this would likely be so at the conscious level. 

At the unconscious level, we know a lot about resources that we never
consciously let on about. Our actions correlate with a much deeper
understanding than our conscious mind can acknowledge. There is wisdom in
connecting our conscious awareness and knowledge with the unconscious; with
this connection we may find that we have been duped by ourselves and the
discourses. 

Let's look at what we know and what we know that we know: We know that there
are natural resources such as petroleum, useful geological resources, and
water. On a personal level, we might think of money as a resource. Possibly
if pressed, we might name other resources which might well occur as things
we take for granted or do not care about - which is further proof of the
work of discourses. It might even be useful to inquire in why we don't care
about them, or pretend not to care, when our actions indicate that we are
avid consumers of other kinds of resources. These observations should at
least raise some suspicions. 

The discourse "resources" trains us to think in certain ways and has us
instruct each other according to the intent of the discourse. This
particular discourse points to things of all kinds and tells us these are
things we can draw upon or draw some value out of. The message is clear: we
are to draw upon the value, contents, or function of a wide assortment of
things and that other people are to do the same. Furthermore, what we draw
from these things can be used to solve problems and it is very important
that we solve problems, for if ever we were to run out of problems to solve,
this or other discourses would replenish our supply. 

The world into which we were born knows about resources, and resources exist
because we know them as such. Natural resources such as water were not
physically created by the discourse but our relationship to them as
something to draw upon and possibly share with others (i.e., the phenomenon
of resource), applied to anything including water, came from the discourse,
for which no better name seems to arise than 'resource.' 

Words too are resources. Although we do not much consciously think about
them at all, let alone as resources, we know that we use them to capture,
hold, contain, and convey meaning, if nothing else. We use words for our
purposes, or rather for the purposes of our discourses, and yet in
conjunction with the discourses, we adopt words to new purposes. Another
kind of resource is 'problems,' whether welcomed or not. There appears to be
quite a supply of problems - inexhaustible, it would seem. Possibly, the
resource called "problems" exists to ensure the demand for "resources,"
courtesy of the discourse called "resources."
 
The discourse resources instructs us that there is such a thing as a
resource; many discourses either promote the existence of what they govern
or deny it, where the promotion or denial refers not to the discourse but
its topic. Can we imagine a life in which people are not run by the
discourse resources? Whatever problems arise from resources and our
relationship to them (that of being a resource) will have to be dealt with
some other way than extricating ourselves from the discourse. 

The discourse resources instructs people in relationship. The discourse says
that people including oneself and things of every kind are to be drawn upon,
as if from a faucet. In other words, the discourse says that everything can
be drawn from or drawn upon and that makes those things a resource. The
discourse further says that this is the way one is to relate to people,
things, and oneself. In other words, the discourse tells us that resources
are really a relationship to things, people, self, and life itself. The rule
of the discourse says that some of these aspects are not to be said among
people; people are not to tolerate some of these thoughts and yet they are
still governed by them. 

We live our lives on the basis that there is not enough.  There is not
enough time.  Not enough money.  Not enough space.  Not enough peace of
mind.  Not enough food.  Not enough water.  Not enough sleep.  Not enough
love.  And on and on.  We wake up into it and go to sleep into it.  It
sounds like an endless litany of shortages.  Scarcity is a constant source
of worry, conflict, strife, tension, fantasy, attachments, and a host of
other things that make up a huge part of that which to us is constant and
familiar: our world as we know it.

Even when our personal stash of various resources - money,food, time - is
plentiful, we are driven by scarcity.  We know that personally what is
plentiful could become scarce for us.  The resources we control might be
dissipated, devalued, diluted, destroyed, or confiscated.  Even though such
an experience doesn't happen very often for us in reality, it is happening
constantly in the world of our worries, concerns, obsessions, and
compulsions.

It always seems as if "more" is the solution to all of life's problems. More
sleep.  More time.  More money.  More friends.  More luxury.  More space.
More love.  More peace of mind.

We've all heard of the "haves" and the "have nots."  To that list, we might
add, "the wish-they-hads," the "have-too-muches," and the "won't haves." The
trouble is most people we know are in every single category above. There is
no way out, not even by becoming a "won't have." It is all about how you
frame your perception and the mood you are in for seeing things. Whichever
category you are in at any time that you provide an answer, they really all
come from the same place: scarcity.

Inside scarcity, we must hoard what we have and manipulate to acquire more
or even to hold on to what we possess.  After all, what is at stake is the
resolution of life's problems.  As long as life seems to supply us with
problems, then we will need to use our resources to solve them, since it is
inherent in a 'problem' that we are uncomfortable with its lack of
resolution and driven in a way that we hope will 'fix' it.

Werner Erhard said there are three things that make people nutty: time, sex
and money.  All three are resources; that is to say, we relate to them as
resources and that is what makes anything a resource.  Should it really
surprise us that our relationship to resources (best seen in our
relationship to money) shows up fully in our relationship with people?