Human to Human • Tenneson Woolf

May 1, 2021February 26, 2024

Welcome

Human to Human is both a daily blog and a podcast. Podcast episodes are monthly. The 2024 theme is Practicing For Peace. Listen here.

Human to Human, this blog, is journalling and learning in public, Monday through Thursday, in which I post current learnings that weave my poetry, my coaching, and my group process facilitation. Posts are 300-500 words, often with photos, intended to be read in five minutes and to inspire reflection, individually and communally, on varied aspects of participative leadership practices, insights, and human to human depth.

July 15, 2024July 15, 2024

A Pile of Connection; A Pile of Courage

Glad to have been with the 50 participants last Friday and Saturday. One of the participants named some core purpose during our World Cafe — “I love being a healer.” It came out of a conversation about what patients really want, and what’s possible?

Sometimes the shape is Circle. In a hotel ballroom. It’s hearth. to hold us. This particular hearth grew to include hard copy pictures of people that “inspire us to offer our best.”

Sometimes the shape is small tables. For cafe and other small group work. As I shared with the group, it’s a large group conversation held at small tables.

When I host and co-host groups like this, I so often relearn the core narrative and purpose. I relearn it because I witness it. I see it unfold in front of me.

The basics go something like this:

People want to learn.
People want to contribute.

So…,

Create a pile of connection.
What grows naturally out of that is a pile of courage.

And that brings us back to fulfillment

of a desire to learn
of a desire to contribute
of a desire to grow in craft
of a desire to grow as a community in craft

Pretty cool.

July 11, 2024July 11, 2024

Moved — A Poem of Claiming Transitions

Tenneson Woolf, Most Mornings, Moved, Prose, Claiming

In recent offering of my poetry, I shared that “most of my poetry is a response to a question that I’m wanting to understand or sometimes answer.”

This poem below is included in Most Mornings. “Moved” was a response to my questions about transitions. The kids getting older. Noting how things got different.

And then taking the personal to the universal. Naming that it is important for any of us to notice that we are meant to move our spirits, our souls. To be in transition. And to claim what inspires us, what we are “moved” to be.

Enjoy.

Moved

The kids are gone now.
Moved to their young-adult lives.
Partnered with people and with life.
Geographied more distantly.
Exploring life, as I”d always wished for them.

What once was semi-regular morning squeals of delight,
jumping on the bed,
has become periodic evening phone calls,
sharing questions or stories of learning from the day.

There comes a time,
when most of us need to face,
or confront,
or evolved,
who we are now moved to be.

July 10, 2024July 10, 2024

Such Richness

Oquirrh Lake, Daybreak, life lived richly

Such richness.

The way setting sun
offers last goodnight
to rippling creek.

The way mamma duck
guides five little ones.

Such richness.

To know simple delights
in this rich life.

July 9, 2024July 10, 2024

The Prep Is In The Details; The Prep Is In the Guiding Spirit

Worldlink Medical, Creating Empowered Practice

This is a week of touching a few last minute preparations. I’ll be hosting two days with a group of medical providers seeking to transform their business models. It’s away from insurance-based tightly defined protocol. It’s toward what I think of as added liberation and artistry in care. It’s good to be amongst the yearning that is participants sharing a few stories in advance. And it’s good to with with the local hosting team that is learning its way to formats of participation and engagement together rather than keynote deliveries.

So, I, and we the team, are tweaking last details. Questions for a cafe. Materials for a new teach on “connection is the business model.” Formats that deepen traditional panels and presentations to more animated group learning. Process for harvesting tool-kits, both at the layer of next step, and at the layer of guiding insight. In our case, all in support of empowered practice, empowered people. Clarity. Liberation. Artistry.

Yup. The prep is in the details. Know the plan. Integrate it well for a two-day format. And the prep is in the guiding spirit, doing the work under the work. To meet these people where they are in mind and heart. To invite them to go just a bit further.