A Gifts-Based Approach to Life
Creating Meaning in Life
Every person comes here as a gift and full of gifts. As we learn to identify and “try out” our gifts, other people become a sort of mirror, reflecting back to us their response to our gifts. As we find places with people that accept and appreciate our gifts, this creates a meaningful life. When our gifts are used in an appreciative context, they infuse our lives with richness and meaning; creating a sense of belonging and purpose. For each and every gift, there is a place that needs that gift.
clubEXPLORE
A sort of culmination of my learning and my work over the past 10 years working with adults with developmental disabilities, youth with disabilities, and at-risk youth. It is an amalgamation of many resources related to person centered planning and self determination; both of which are established as policy and practice in Michigan when providing services for individuals with developmental disabilities. As so often is the case with systems, the challenge is to move from Policy (compliance) to authentic Practice (quality).
Please go to the links below for more information on the wide variety resources and practices that are integral to the integrity underlying this approach. This is a reflection my own personal gifts based theory and praxis (understanding and embodiment) of my work; a matter of integrity.
Culture of Gentleness
I completed the requirements to become a State Certified Mentor for a Culture of Gentleness. I also spent 6 weeks in 8 group homes doing cultural assessment of a Culture of Gentleness through one on one interviews with staff and residents and through on-site observation to see if the required training of Gentle Teaching in order to create a Culture of Gentleness has actually changed the culture in group homes.
Are people, both residents and staff, regularly experiencing the feeling of being safe and valued so that they can learn to value others and become engaged in a meaningful life???
https://dbaronirvine.wordpress.com/2015/01/21/culture-of-gentleness/
- Center for Positive Living Support
- Gentle Teaching: Central Purpose
- Gentle Teaching: Four Pillars
- Gentle Teaching: Four Tools
- Gentle Teaching: Six Elements
- Gentle Teaching: Our Beliefs
Non Violent Communication
Based on the book and practice Non Violent Communication; a Language of Life by Rozenburg
Nonviolent Communication offers practical and powerful skills for compassionate giving and receiving. These skills are based in a consciousness of interdependence and the concept of “power with” instead of “power over” others.
NVC skills include:
- Differentiating observation from evaluation, being able to carefully observe what is happening free of evaluation, and to specify behaviors and conditions that are affecting us;
- Differentiating feeling from thinking, being able to identify and express internal feeling states in a way that does not imply judgment, criticism, or blame/punishment;
- Connecting with the universal human needs/values (e.g. sustenance, trust, understanding) in us that are being met or not met in relation to what is happening and how we are feeling; and,
- Requesting what we would like in a way that clearly and specifically states what we do want (rather than what we don’t want), and that is truly a request and not a demand (i.e. attempting to motivate, however subtly, out of fear, guilt, shame, obligation, etc. rather than out of willingness and compassionate giving). https://www.cnvc.org/learn/nvc-foundations
Based on the book of the same name and the global work of Marshall Rozenburg
The Center for Non-Violent Communication
Nonviolent Communication from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Appreciative Inquiry
Common appreciative questions include variations on the following:
- High point experiences: Describe a time in your life (during participation with GR Friends) when you felt alive and engaged.
- Valuing: What do you value most about yourself, this Meeting, and your place in this Meeting?
- Core life-giving factors: What are the core factors that give life to this Meeting?
What are the unique attributes of this Meeting, without which it would not be the same? - Wishes for/images of the future: What three wishes do you have to enhance the vitality of this Meeting? Imagine this Meeting five years from now, healthy and vibrant – what does it look like?
The 4-D Cycle: Discovery:
Appreciating and Valuing the Best of “What Is”
Dream: Envisioning “What Might Be”
Design: Dialoguing “What Should Be”
Destiny: Innovating “What Will Be”
(Cooperrider, David L. & Whitney, Diana (1999). Appreciative
Inquiry. In Holman, P.& Devane, T. (Eds.), Collaborating for
Change. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc)
Appreciative Inquiry is about the coevolutionary search for the best in people, their
organizations, and the relevant world around them. In its broadest focus, it involves
systematic discovery of what gives “life” to a living system when it is most alive, most
effective, and most constructively capable in economic, ecological, and human terms. AI
involves, in a central way, the art and practice of asking questions that strengthen a
system’s capacity to apprehend, anticipate, and heighten positive
potential.
For more information: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bx6CVC0HsUqyLVdaQlkwOGJUS0k/view?usp=sharing
Conflict Transformation
Person Centered Planning
I am a trained facilitator for MAPS and PATH person centered planning processes through the Inclusion Network and the Toronto Summer Institute on Inclusion
http://oasiscommunity.info/processes-for-life-planning/
- A summary of Person Centered Planning based on its original intent and purpose.
- Michigan’s Policy and Practice Guidelines in Michigan.
- Person Centered Planning Tools for group facilitation
- A Meaningful Life: discovering your gifts and contributing them
- BEAUTIFUL JUSTICE: the art of person centered planning
Self Determination
I was a local coordinator for Kent County for the Self Determination Peers project, a year long training series for Peer Mentors and Local Leaders including statewide and local trainings.
- Michigan’s Self Determination Policy and Practice
- Michigan Partners for Freedom
- Leadership Development: from consumer to contributor
Toronto Summer Institute on Inclusion
I attended the institute three times. Two of them were the general summer sessions. The other was a 5 day workshop on facilitating person centered planning through MAPS and PATH planning processes.
- Inclusion Network
- Inclusion Social Network
- Articles on Inclusion and Person Centered Planning written by its originators: John O’Brien, Jack Pierpoint, Connie Lyle O’Brien, Beth Mount
Make a Difference
This is an initiative based on the teaching of the Toronto Summer Institute on Inclusion. I was both a participant and a facilitator.
- Make a Difference: a guidebook for person-centered direct support
- Anne Mitchell provided training and consultation to Hope Network during 2009 and 2010. This consisted of monthly meetings with 12 partners consisting of one person served and one direct support staff. The PowerPoints that were used to learn authentic person centered planning are here:
Asset Based Community Development
This is a foundation component of the Toronto Summer Institute on Inclusion that goes hand in hand with Person Centered Planning.
- 12 Principles of Asset Based Community Development
- Asset Mapping Resource #1
- Asset Mapping Resource #2
- Abundant Community by John McKnight and Peter Block
The BASIC Institute
on structural inequality
focusing on racism, classism, and ableism
BASIC = Building Alliances, SustainingInstitutional Change:
An Allies for Change Social Justice Institute
Guideposts for Success
I was the local coordinator for this statewide grant to pilot MiConnections in schools in Kent County so that the initiative could go statewide. It is based on research from the US Department of Labor Disability Employment Policy; research based activities that improve outcomes for at risk youth and youth with disabilities.
Capacity Thinking
A way of thinking and seeing, a paradigm shift in perspective that opens up possibilities by seeing the gifts in all people and the possibilities in all situations.
https://dbaronirvine.wordpress.com/2013/08/19/guiding-principles/
- Capacity Thinking Chart: living under the rising sun
- Living with Open Hands
- Challenging Limiting Beliefs (scroll down)
Leadership Development
Leadership development was a large part of my work in transition where I worked in 27 schools in our county. I was the local coordinator for a statewide capacity building grant from the US Department of Labor Office of Disability Employment Policy. See Guideposts for Success above
- Leadership Demonstrated: Local, State, National
- Leadership Competencies
- On Leadership
- Consumer to Contributor: leadership in an age of consumption
- Leadership Development: the roots of change
Career Development & Research
Career development was a large part of my work in transition where I worked in 27 schools in our county. I was the local coordinator for a statewide capacity building grant from the US Department of Labor Office of Disability Employment Policy. See Guideposts for Success above. I am certified as a Global Career Development Facilitator and as an Employment Training Specialist. I have a Master of Management Degree with a focus in Career Development.
https://dbaronirvine.wordpress.com/2013/08/03/coaching-consulting/
- “A career is all of the productive and creative activity a person does throughout life (whether paid or unpaid). In this sense, life, work, and the person become a seamless, integrated whole. Too often career is thought of only as one’s “job”, a money-making activity done in isolation from the rest of one’s life. When thishappens, people tend to leave part of themselves at home while they are at work. They become a cog in the machine. Only that piece of self is allowed to be present that is necessary for the task. I have a difficult time splitting myself like this. I prefer to be fully present in every aspect of my life; whether family, spiritual, work, or leisure. I call it living an authentic, undivided life.” (by Ron Irvine; definition based on career research during certification for Global Career Development Facilitator through Ferris State University with curriculum from the National Career Development Association)
- Career Development Process, see Career Development though Experiential Learning