Today’s dispatch is Role Clarity. Originally dispatched on 27 July 2015
Hola,
If you’re not aware of my obsession regarding languages, you quite clearly haven’t been paying attention.
A few Dispatches ago I mentioned that a friend had regaled me with some prime examples of “Cop-speak”, inter alia:
…A Policeman in court uttered “ Members rushed into the bedroom and shot the deceased who was alive at the time”…
Another friend often regales me with examples of “Facilitator-speak”:
…You’re invited to this one day event for internal and external organisational and leadership development consultants. If you are interested in role and role clarity in all aspects of life, working systemically and mastering the unspoken language of leadership this experientially designed day with horses could be just what you’ve been looking for…
I can see clearly now…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrHxhQPOO2c
As one gets older there is an increasing incidence of “what if” and “if only” moments.
If only I had had the opportunity to take part in such an experientially designed day with horses, I wouldn’t have muddled during more than half a century without role clarity.
Alas, as my parents used to say: “Als hadden komt, is hebben te laat” (meaning: It is too late, when you use the verb conjugation ‘Had ’)
In amongst my parent’s photo albums there is a photo of a little boy sitting astride a horse in front of a gaucho. That little boy was I. Our home looked out on the edges of“el campo”, since well and truly swallowed up by urban expansion. Not far out, arrieros (drovers) plied their business bringing beef to the abattoirs.
Las penas y las vaquitas se van por la misma senda… las penas son de nosotros las vaquitas son ajenas… (sorrows and cattle follow the same trail, the sorrows are ours, the cattle belong to another) El arriero va:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPbw34Ju_o4
Our milk, bread and ice were delivered by horse and cart (with the horses firmly in front of the carts). Los arrieros, la lechera, and el panadero’s days with horses had not been experientially designed. None the less all had role clarity.
When Wendy was a little girl she use to ride her pony to school. Her days with her pony had not been experientially designed, but all the same, role clarity she did possess.
How different might the circumstances of Remote Aboriginal Australia be, had the perpetrators of the Intervention experienced an experientially designed day with horses?
Had they systemically mastered the unspoken language of leadership? Oh, if only!
Less than half a century ago most people in Yuendumu had role clarity. Stockmen still plied their trade on horseback. Every morning four unlicensed drivers would set off in all cardinal directions with four unregistered tractor & trailers with gangs of uninsured volunteer youth to gather loads of mulga firewood that were distributed around the camps. None were wearing bright yellow luminescent safety jackets. More recently the feral horse population around Yuendumu had exploded. More than one thousand horses were shot from helicopters. Apart from some token consultations, I believe Warlpiri people had no role in the cull. Old people often go without firewood. The most common contemporary role for Warlpiri people is as clients.
A few months ago a Dispatch featured Patrick Davies’ Rocky old Road:
And all they can take has been stolen…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFAdylvx34c
Often we have thought that all they can take has been stolen (stolen languages, stolen children, stolen liberty, stolen land, stolen futures) only to become aware of yet another theft: Stolen roles!
All the tricks that are tried are not new
They’re just wrapped in gift wrapping paper
And handed as favours to you
So is our soon to be opened $7.6M Police Complex such a Gift Horse? Am I being ungrateful by looking in its mouth?
And no you can’t take all that you’re given
Oft times it means selling your soul
I think it is a Trojan Horse!
Chau,
Frank
PS-An experientially designed day with horses…. Mexican style….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UV49Y9EEHr8