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"Birds of a feather .
. . ."
Naropa University Convocation
August 29, 2007
Thomas B. Coburn
Three epigraphs:
1. "All composite things pass away.
Work out your own liberation with diligence."
—The last words of the Buddha
2. "Transitions are like doorways. When we
open a door, we think we know what we will find on the other side, but we can
never be sure. We do not know with certainty whether we will find a friend or
an enemy, an obstacle or an opportunity. Without actually opening the door and
walking through, we have no way of knowing. When we face such a door, we feel
uncertain, vulnerable, exposed. Our usual strategies do not hold. We are in
no-man's land. Transitions make us uncomfortable, and they are often accompanied
by some degree of pain, but at the same time, they open us to new
possibilities."
—Judith Lief,
Naropa trustee and former president
Making
Friends with Death
3. "As my Zen teacher Bernie Glassman says, 'I'm addicted
to myself.' Funny thing about being addicted to oneself- it's hard to see that
'self' is not the key to enlightenment. Just the apparent opposite–community is the key to enlightenment. You are the key to me."
—Mark Miller, Associate
Dean of Undergraduate Education
It is once again
my great pleasure and honor to welcome you all—trustees, faculty, staff,
students and friends—to this opening of the school year, Naropa's 34th.
In the early years of Naropa, Chogyam Trungpa, Rinpoche, Naropa's founder, said
that Naropa was "a hundred year project," which, if we take him literally,
means we're now a third of the way there. Those of you who have been here for
many years have seen the extraordinary growth as his vision has taken root, and
even those of us who have been here a shorter time are able to see the ways in
which the labors of many are nurturing and continually transforming the institution.
A single example is the way in which the faculty's deliberations that began the
day after 9/11 have now produced a fully accredited Peace Studies program. It
is hard for me to imagine a better symbol of Naropa's aspirations to change the
world for the better. The energy that is abroad in our midst will, of course,
continue to manifest in a great variety of ways, and I suspect that Rinpoche
did not actually mean literally one hundred years. Rather, I suspect he meant
it in the same spirit as the building of Camelot took place, as I noted four
years ago in my inauguration address: "They are building still, seeing the city
is built to music, therefore never built at all and therefore built forever."
That's us, building still–and building forever.
As we pause here at the
beginning of the year, let me begin with a personal story. A little over a
year ago, I received an email from a former student from whom I hadn't heard
since she graduated from college 28 years ago. The email said: "Dr. Coburn, I
don't know if you remember me, but I was a biology major who took an elective
course on Asian religions from you my senior spring. I wanted to write to say
that this past summer, in an art museum on Martha's Vineyard, I finally figured
out what it was that I was trying to say in that term paper I wrote for you 28
years ago!" She then went on to tell me the details of that specific insight. I share this story not because it shows anything distinctive about my own
teaching–I know that every faculty member who has taught for a while and takes their
profession seriously has a similar story. Rather I recount this story because
of the way it points to the deep mystery that lies at the heart of the teaching
and the learning that we do together. In raising up that mystery, I do not for
a moment wish to deny the reality of transformative learning that happens on a
shorter time cycle: students don't always have to wait 28 years to get it! Nor
do I wish to ignore the importance of our documenting the outcomes of our
contemplative kind of education more thoroughly. Educational assessment is in
the air, in Washington, DC, in national accreditation bodies, and in virtually
every school and university in the country. We at Naropa are not exempt from
this trend, so the assessment work that we have begun under Suzanne Benally's leadership will be quickening, especially in anticipation of our next
re-accreditation visit two years hence. We will learn a lot in the course of
this self-examination, and we must also deepen our understanding of our alumni,
the carriers of the long-term effects of a Naropa education. Here, too, we
will learn a lot.
But for the moment I
want to reflect on the mystery that lies at the heart of teaching and learning
at Naropa, in the transactions between faculty and students, between students
and staff, between faculty and staff, between students and students. Let me offer
three reflections.
First, I want to
pause over the results of an informal survey I did some years ago, when I asked
faculty why they stay at Naropa. To a person, they answered: Because of the
students. Who, then, are these students?
Part of our recent
efforts to understand ourselves better has entailed participating in formal national
surveys, to learn how our students are similar to and different from those at
other institutions. Here are some selective results from last year's
administration of the HERI (Higher Education Research Institute) questionnaire
to our entering undergraduates that I think are generalizable to Naropa
students as a whole.
- Under reasons for going
to college:
- 82% of Naropa students
said gaining general education and appreciation of ideas was very important. The
national norm was 67%.
- 75% of Naropa students
said becoming a more cultured person was very important. The national norm was
46%.
- 98 % of Naropa students
said learning more about subjects of interest was very important. The national
norm was 79%.
- 45% of Naropa
students expected to participate in volunteer or community service work. The
national norm was 30%.
- 34% of Naropa students
anticipated they would participate in student protests or demonstrations. The
national norm was 8%.
- Under educational objectives
considered essential or very important:
- 40% of Naropa students
cited becoming accomplished in one of the performing arts. The national norm
was 19%.
- 56% of Naropa students
cited creating artistic work as essential or very important. The national norm
was 22%.
- 57% of Naropa students
cited influencing the political structure. The national norm was 25%.
- 81% of Naropa students
cited influencing social values. The national norm was 44%.
- 54% of Naropa students
cited becoming a community leader as essential or very important. The national
norm was 35%.
- 87% of Naropa students
cited helping others who are in difficulty. The national norm was 67%.
- 50% of Naropa students
cited helping to promote racial understanding. The national norm was 37%.
- 57% of Naropa students cited
involvement in programs to clean up the environment. The national norm was
25%.
- 87% of Naropa students cited
improving understanding of other countries and cultures. The national norm was
54%.
In comparison with
students elsewhere, Naropa students rated themselves significantly higher in
academic ability, creativity, artistic ability, writing ability,
self-understanding, understanding of others and spirituality.
Do you know these
students? I do, and here at the beginning of the school year I think it is
fitting for us to pause to appreciate the unusual qualities and gifts our
students bring as their input into the mystery of teaching and learning.
This brief sketch is
not, of course, the complete story, and there are various measures on which
Naropa students rank lower than national averages, such as interest in
mathematics. Last week we administered this year's HERI survey to our entering
students, and, when they become available, we will be discussing the results in
various faculty and staff settings. For now, I would simply ask us to marvel
at the real uniqueness and distinctiveness of our students as we begin our work
with them. Could I ask students who are present please to rise? [applause]
My second point is to
note that, in many ways, where we are right now, here at the beginning of the
school year, is a microcosm of where Naropa is as a whole, institutionally. We
are in transition. Judy Lief, former president and current trustee of Naropa,
captures the qualities of transitions nicely in the quotation that in the
second epigraph at the beginning of this talk. Transitions are scary, even as
they open out onto new opportunities. In exploring these phenomena, I am
struck here by the two meanings of the word "apprehension." On the one hand,
it refers to "anticipation of adversity, dread or fear of coming evil." It is
utterly natural that, as we stand poised on the edge of the year ahead, we are
a bit nervous, worried about what may come our way, individually or in a
particular course, or in discharging our professional responsibilities. We
don't know what lies ahead for us, individually or institutionally. But, on
the other hand, "apprehension" means "the faculty or act of understanding, esp.
intuitive understanding; perception on a direct and immediate level." It is in
these liminal, transitional moments that we see more clearly and crisply, when
a fresh perspective becomes open to us, whether those moments occur at the
beginning of the academic year or in the longer range trajectory of
institutional change and growth.
In the face of these
transitional times, two facts of university life give me cause for optimism. One is that we are in the midst of a very robust strategic planning process.
At present it currently involves nearly a hundred faculty, staff and students
at work in eleven action committees. There remain additional opportunities to
become involved in this work and if you are interested, please send an e-mail
to stratplan@naropa.edu. The
significance of this work lies in its positioning us as agents in moving
through the transitions that are inevitably upon us, given the tumultuous,
challenging nature of life in the 21st century. We are agents, not
patients or fatalists, in working out our institutional destiny, embodying the
overt choice-making that the Buddha saw as central to what it means to be human.
My second cause for optimism is that the Council of Elders, a gathering of
trusted faculty and staff, and now a student, which last year increasingly took
its seat as a source of wisdom for the university, will be offering "listening
circles" for faculty and staff throughout the year. Building on the very
positive response that these circles elicited last year, this expanded initiative
will provide a context for individuals to delve deeply into the implications of
our being in transition, individually and collectively. Please stay tuned for
further communication from the Council of Elders.
Through all of these
transitions, I am buoyed up by a wonderful line from the Dalai Lama, who has
known more than his share of transitions. When I first met him 25 years ago at
Syracuse University, at the end of his talk, he took several questions from
the audience and then he received one that asked: "Your Holiness, I see from
your remarks and response to previous questions that you are a hopeful man. Can you tell me, please, what is the basis of hope?" His Holiness paused for a
moment, looked off into space and then came back with that marvelous smile and
twinkle in his eyes and said: "Hope is the basis of hope." It is this same
posture toward the world that I think Emily Dickenson had in mind when she
wrote: "Hope is the thing with feathers, That perches in the soul, And sings
the tune without the words, And never stops at all, And sweetest in the gale is
heard; And sore must be the storm That could abash the little bird That kept so
many warm."
My final point is a
reflection on the way in which we are all in this together, implicated in one
another's lives. Mark Miller captured this wonderfully last week in his
remarks for entering B. A. students on the relationship between the contemplative
education and diversity seminars, of which the key lines appear in your
program. This provocative formulation reminds me of what Pema Chodron, one of
Trungpa, Rinpoche's foremost students, has said about life within the abbey
where she makes her home. Many people, she says, project onto life in the
abbey a naïve romanticism, imagining that all must be sweetness and light, with
happy, cheerful, like-minded people, their days bathed in meditation and
savoring the natural beauty. On the contrary, she says, monastic life is hard,
in large part because you can't get away from the people you have been thrown
together with. They and their foibles become unavoidable. They are, so to
speak, continually in your face.
No doubt we will be
reminded of this from time to time in the course of the year ahead, albeit in a
more diluted form than what happens in monastic life. It is for this reason,
Mark wisely observed, that diversity work is so central to our life together,
helping us work constructively through the points of difference as they become
apparent to us.
The promise here is
huge, so I will close with another story, this one a great vision of what this
kind of communal contemplative quest can produce. This is the vision of the
great 12th century Sufi poet, Farid ud-Din Attar, in his fable, The
Conference of the Birds. The story tells of how a vast number of birds, of
different species and different dispositions, were invited to journey forth to
meet their king, who is called the Simurgh. Many of them make excuses about
why they can't make the journey–family obligations, business deals, illness
and the like. But a hardy band does set out and comes across many hardships, both physical and emotional. Many fall by the wayside, but finally thirty birds arrive in the
hall of the Simurgh. The story concludes this way:
"Then the Chamberlain,
having tested them, opened the door; and as he drew aside a hundred curtains,
one after another, a new world beyond the veil was revealed. Now was the light
of lights manifested, and all of them sat down on . . . the seat of the Majesty
and Glory. They were given a writing which they were told to read through; and
reading this, and pondering, they were able to understand their state. When
they were completely at peace and detached from all things they became aware
that the Simurgh was there with them, and a new life began for them in the
Simurgh. All that they had done previously was washed away. The sun of majesty
sent forth his rays, and in the reflection of each other's faces these thirty
birds (Persian: si-murgh) of the outer world, contemplated the face of
the Simurgh of the inner world. This so astonished them that they did not know
if they were still themselves or if they had become the Simurgh. At last, in a
state of contemplation, they realized that they were the Simurgh and that the
Simurgh was the thirty birds. When they gazed at the Simurgh, they saw that it
was truly the Simurgh who was there, and when they turned their eyes toward
themselves they saw that they themselves were the Simurgh. And perceiving both at once, themselves and Him, they realized that they and the Simurgh were one and the same
being. No one in the world has ever heard of anything to equal it."
And so, my non-feathered
friends, let us set out on the journey that lies ahead of us this year, during
which we will discover a lot about ourselves and about each other. It will
doubtless be filled with obstacles and transitions of various sorts, but also
with a promise quite unlike anything we have seen before. It is a joy to be
with you and to welcome you on this journey.
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