Curving Bridge

Today I registered the URL curvingbridge.com.

Curving Bridge is the current evolutionary point of several things that happened in my life last year. The first of those was that I went through a period of prolonged, intense anxiety, unlike anything I have previously experienced. I'm happy to say that treatment has been successful, and I am more or less back to my old self, but it was a shaky passage. I realized in the midst of it that I felt trapped and stifled, without direction.

The second thing that happened was that I started a meditation practice. I use the Simple Habit app, which provides a wide range of guided meditation offerings. Going through one series, I was challenged to identify the principles that I consider the most important, and what the best version of my life might look like. I've never been inclined to the idea of a "happy place," but I was surprised by the strength and clarity of the image that formed.

Finally, I spent most of the past year in a transitional role at my job. I spent a lot of time thinking about what I want to do and why I want to do it. I took in volumes of input on how organizations work, much of which has changed the way I think, and I know that I have barely scratched the surface.

At some point while all of this was happening, I drew a picture. I am no artist; it was a doodle meant to capture a momentary mood, but when I looked at it later, I was struck by how appropriate the image felt to my entire life. It was just a path leading through a field, with footbridge at the end over a stream, and the edge of the page meant that the end of the bridge was invisible.

Like my doodle, I don't know where this might go, but reserving this URL is an intention to turn all of these things into concrete action. To give those values a chance to show what they can do. To live the life I want. To use everything I am learning, and to make a difference with it.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Handling Meetings with Remote Attendees

This is the third session in my brown bag series. It's not an "agile" topic really, but it was one of the things people requested a session on.  I hoped that people would bring their questions and be willing to discuss them. There were four topics proposed, and some conversation although it was mostly people in the room. Here is the outline:  Day before, set up a Trello board as an option for people to raise topics and added a link to the invitation. Recruited a co-pilot who would watch the WebEx chat and bring up anything that came in through that.  Five minutes before the session, dial in to WebEx, start camera, ensure that screen sharing is set up and the projector is working.  Noon - official start time. 
Read more

Agile Transitions as Self-Sustaining Reaction

Weird confession time? I used to be a little dubious about the long-term role of coaches and even of Scrum Masters or equivalent in an Agile organization. Once you’ve taught people the rules, what else is there to do? People are smart, and Agile methods as a rule aren’t complicated. I wondered—how could it possibly take more than a year or so to get this thing going? Then I spent several years observing an Agile transition from its initial push phase through to a kind of equilibrium, and I have gained a different understanding of the roles and the process in such a transition. I’m going to call these roles Primary Agile, because their work centers on fostering agility— and nothing else . Agile transitions can be thought of as something like a chemical reaction. The system starts in one state, and by adding some ingredients and – most importantly – energy, the system changes into a different state. For most organizations, that end state is going to be very different from whe
Read more

Shu Ha Ri Skeptic

Last year it seemed like I couldn't turn around without hearing someone talking about shu ha ri and its applicability to Scrum (it was usually Scrum, probably because other Agile techniques are less ceremonial). There's a good summary here . Although I don't practice martial arts, I do meditate and practice yoga, which I feel gives me a way toward understanding how the idea is supposed to work. When you first start practicing, after all, it takes all of your attention just to get into the poses or to glimpse a moment of still attentiveness. Why you're supposed to do a specific pose or follow a particular sequence won't fit in there until you've been doing it for a while, until the physical part has become automatic. That said, something about that metaphorical connection, about the idea of "just do the Scrum ceremonies as prescribed, and why will come later" didn't sit well with me. After a fair amount of rumination I've finally identified wh
Read more