Monday, 5 November 2012

MC Tools--5

Reality Rhymes

We are sharing some tools to support personal growth, relationship health, organizational development, and overall effectiveness for mission/aid workers. Hopefully you will find them to be creative, useful, and at times even fun. They are some of our favourites.
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These items build upon the 12 tools for “Running Well and Resting Well” that we included as a chapter in Doing Member Care Well (2002). More tools and guidelines specifically for team building are included in our “Tools for Team Viability” article, in the member care book we edited in 1992.
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 What can we learn from rhymes? Plenty! What are some of your favourites? And how to use them in member care contexts? Here are three rhymes that we really like.
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The Elf-Man
John Kendric Bangs
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I met a little Elf-man, once,
Down where the lilies blow.
I asked him why he was so small
And why he didn't grow.
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He slightly frowned, and with his eye
He looked me through and through.
"I'm quite as big for me," said he,
"As you are big for you."
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(possible use: diversity, seeing life in new ways)
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Foreign Lands
Robert Louis Stevenson
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Up into the cherry tree
Who should climb but little me?
I held the trunk with both my hands
And looked abroad in foreign lands.
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I saw the next door garden lie,
Adorned with flowers, before my eye,
And many pleasant places more
That I had never seen before.
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I saw the dimpling river pass
And be the sky's blue looking-glass;
The dusty roads go up and down
With people tramping in to town.
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If I could find a higher tree
Farther and farther I should see,
To where the grown-up river slips
Into the sea among the ships,
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To where the roads on either hand
Lead onward into fairy land,
Where all the children dine at five,
And all the playthings come alive.
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(possible use: aspirations, exploring the world, etc.)
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He Bebido
Anonymous, South American
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He bebido
Paisajes y paisajes:
Pampa, cielo, y mar.
Ahora solo quiero
Las islas de tus ojos chiquitos
Para anclar.
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I have travelled in life far and wide:
drinking deeply of the plains, seas, and skies.
Now all I yearn for is to abide:
anchoring in the islands of your eyes.
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(possible use: sojourns, coming home, relationships, etc.)