Awareness before Economics (A Memorandum to Women) 
By Aura Camacho-Maas 

At http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9oQYXu2ktg the late Václav Havel, playwright and former Czech president, speaking at the 2009 Forum for Creative Europe, says: “The human being is a carrier of awareness, curiosity, of a desire for knowledge… In order to be human, a human being needs a spirit to live spiritually.”  He also adds: “Human kind cannot be without culture, because it is a part of human nature.  (Culture) co-creates a person’s identity…it is an environment for humanity’s self-identification.”

At http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQmz6Rbpnu0&feature=player_embedded#! Severn Suzuki “The Girl that Silenced the World for Five Minutes” in presenting environmental issues from a youth perspective at the 1992 United Nations summit says:  “My dad says you are what you do,  not what you say…what you do makes me cry at night… You say you love us but I challenge you, please, make your actions reflect your words.”  
 
On February 5, 2012 in a New York Times article, Sheryl K. Sandberg, Facebook’s Chief Operating Officer says: “In Facebook early days, women were first to upload photographs, joining groups and post to walls.”  She also says “women drive 62 percent of activity on Facebook in terms of status updates, messages and comment. Women also drive 71 percent of daily fan activity. Women have 8 percent more Facebook friends than men, on average, and spend more time on the site.”   To read more
go to http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/05/business/sheryl-sandberg-of-facebook-staying-on-message.html?WT.mc_id=BU-D-I-NYT-MOD-MOD-M240-ROS-0212-HDR&WT.mc_ev=click&WT.mc_c=179904

My point here is that in crisscrossing this information, there is a level of embedded truth.  It suggests humanity’s intractable social challenges.  It speaks of the incongruence of human words and actions and the need to identify and develop a cultural base that recognizes the content of the human spirit.  It invites humans to interconnect such content with their knowledge and action. In other words, it invites the integration of the human spirit, mind and body.  It shows how women are playing a key role as social media users, which I translate as one manifestation of their“creative feminine” ready to collaborate with the “creative masculine” and together innovate a human path into the future.   

Let me explain further what I mean.  
   
From contemplating the content of the above information I derive that the human world up to now under the rational, commanding, competitive qualities of the “creative masculine” has been exploring its curiosity about the world of matter.  I also gather the
importance of acknowledging the level of readiness “the creative masculine” has
brought to humanity, equipping it with know-how and with global communications
technologies its next social evolution can apply.  Examples of these are the advancements in the field of neuroscience with regard to the far-reaching implications of the human creative potential and the role consciousness plays in it, and the worldwide web, which already, as social media, has become a main instrument for humans to communicate the content of their heart and mind.    

In my contemplation I also see a miracle and beauty embedded in this process.  All the experience, the how-to knowledge, and the wisdom that the awareness of the masculine in human nature manifested in scientific, industrial, and lately communication
technologies, is now available to serve the awareness of its creative feminine
manifestation.   

Therefore it appears as if, by an evolutionary or divine design,- you choose - the rational,
commanding, competitive “creative masculine” and the intuitive, nurturing and collaborative “creative feminine” are meeting on a global scale and therefore
become something humans can now exercise together.  

Humans can use this opportunity to collectively better understand the nature of their common local and global challenges, and adapt tools and structures from the past to the innovations they create.     

Vaclav Havel says: “for a long time we had been lectured that being, or existence, precedes awareness and that the economic base is primary and (that) derived from it is a secondary level comprised of human rights and culture…in my view being does indeed precede awareness, but at the same time, awareness precedes being.  Teaching us that being precedes awareness must have been conceived in some state of awareness before it could become to be applied in the form of communism.” About this, as a basis, capitalism also puts the economic base before human rights and culture.

To break down such conditioning, humans must work on remembering again and again, that, as Mr. Havel puts it“what primarily connects humanity are certain spiritual values as they have been formed on the planet for centuries.”  

The fact that women are, according to Facebook statistics, pioneering the usage of social media, I take as a perfect example of the essential role they are to play in the next human era.  It goes along with the recent Dalai Lama’s statement that this time in human history is the age of women.  If the opportunity is grand, so is the responsibility that it carries. 
 
I am convinced it would be a great success for them as mothers, teachers, policy makers, corporate and social workers, ministers, counselors, and others to open up local and global dialogue about the content of spirit and its role in assisting humanity’s re-design of its social, economic and political structures to better reflect all that it has achieved over the  centuries in its quality of life.  Such dialogue, in education reform, for example, where women also outnumber men, is a perfect ground for them to entertain such dialogue with and among teachers, students, parents and others in the community. It is a practical way to recognize individual awareness, humanize the teacher/student relationship, help create a more inclusive and effective learning environment that seeds the ground for a more conscious citizenry whom, among other things, innovates and produces. 
 
The remaking of culture and self-identity is the job of all.  The recognition of the individual and collective spiritual content and aspirations is an essential component in the human affairs development path that has lacked.  Its inclusion gives a sound basis for the improvement of culture, human rights, economics, and politics everywhere.  

Are you an education stakeholder?

In a new paradigm can each one of us, of any age and walk of life, self-identify as an education stakeholder?  If so, where is our capacity to respond to the challenges the education sector present us?  What would be an initial step you are ready to take?  
 
Albert Einstein said "no problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it."  Can we acknowledge that our "doing" in education is grounded in 
principles and practices of the past and therefore not only ineffective but hurtful to all involved and with a devastating effect on the student and society's future?  
 
In a new paradigm can each one of us self-identify as an education stakeholder?  If so,
how are our capacities to respond (being responsible) going to manifest regarding the challenge the sector presents us?  Can we acknowledge that the answers lie in our heart and mind?  Can we acknowledge that our, heart and mind have allowed "us" to develop state of the art communications tools that now enable us to tap in and feed from the collective wisdom to reach our individual and community aspirations?

With this in mind, can we become multi-sector communities of learning and innovation at any level (local, national, international) and use such environment as a training ground for teachers and administrators?  Can we combine using private sector’s state of the art communications and management infrastructure to help organize and create a sustainable education process that is resonant to changing conditions?  Can existing summer and after school programs become the testing field for new tools and strategies the teachers in training develop, and can university education majors be the teachers’ assistants in these activities? 
 
Can institutions of higher education use this environment as a real-life laboratory whose valuable research findings would support the process and bring about new sector standards?  Can existing public educational entities transform themselves around this
process and become again viable as, for example, information  clearinghouses?

Aura Camacho-maas

An open Invitation

Dear Teachers, Parents; Students; School Administrators; Private, Public and Social Sector Officials; and others in the community, 

Can you imagine summer and after-school programs being the fruit of the labor of classroom teachers and college education majors who participate in and are supported by a collaborative community of innovation - formed by all kinds of individuals and institutions from public, private and social sectors - who come together, in mind and heart, to help organize the education process and infrastructure that fits today’s market realities?

Can you imagine hundreds of thousands of teachers being able to share their own stories and hear those of students, parents, schools administrators, policy makers and others in the community about their education experiences and perspectives? 

Can you imagine the teachers combining their own experience with other shared information and using this as a base to develop multidisciplinary educational tools that meet and engage the minds and hearts of their students in a realistic and relevant manner? 

Can you imagine policy makers and all sorts of other professionals in the private, public and social sectors feeling motivated to put their practices, experiences and their institutions’ infrastructures in alignment with the field research findings that their community of innovation invites? And, in the process of doing so, can you imagine the unintended effect of adding a more profound meaning to their work?

Can you imagine existing education institutions and interest groups being fueled by the innovation that this approach delivers and adapting changes accordingly to their operations and practices?  

Oh - What a movement this would be! 

Imagine using summer and after school time to work in laboratory-like environments, with the most disadvantaged and other students in changing communities under the guidance of trained and engaged educators testing prospective multidisciplinary quality academic materials and strategies.  

Imagine them transforming this mostly childcare time into powerful learning time connected with innovative school academic work.

Imagine teachers and college students being compensated as they train and address real education needs instead of working in unrelated jobs to make ends meet.  

Imagine youth juvenile delinquency and early pregnancy rates diminishing with the accompanying rise in social benefits and financial savings. 

Imagine teachers going back to their regular school classroom equipped with a renewed sense of trust and confidence in themselves, their superiors, their students and the community outside the school.

Imagine them equipped with new and tested classroom tools and strategies. 

Imagine them annually sharing their results and best practices to others in the sector. 

Imagine researchers being able to have at hand a real and sustainable environment from which to derive fresh knowledge and help determine the trends in the evolution of education.

Imagine private corporate officials, besides feeling helpful by putting their communications and management technologies to service the education process, being able to profit from getting knowledge workers with the attitudinal skills the global market demands.  

Today it is clear that the major challenges humanity faces are not solvable by any particular sector or interest group, and this is even truer in education.  Quality education is the responsibility of everyone in a community.  With teachers at the heart of it, communities of innovation are a way to create, support and maintain a fresh approach to the ever changing field of education.    

Aura Camacho-Maas