First there was I.Q. And then there was E.Q., measuring emotional intelligence, riffing off of Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences. Some have posited S.Q., or Spiritual Intelligence.  Others claim S.Q. as the measure of Social Intelligence, including Daniel Goleman, who’s cornered the market on “intelligences” with his whole string of books, the newest addition being “ecological intelligence.” Social intelligence considers how well an individual is biologically and chemically set to interact and form relationships with others.

Alright: I have one to contribute to the fray: community intelligence, or C.Q..

What if the “power" that we mean when we say “wielding power”—currently done by lording it over other humans, other species, or the earth, and inherently based on an idea of self as other/separate from whatever the self has power over—what if we instead understood that “power” as the exact same substance we speak of when we speak of channeling creative energy—whatever force it is that surrounds/suffuses us when we feel in “flow” the way athletes, artists and Jedi masters do. What if “wielding power” was re-cast to mean: channeling that force productively and creatively—being in flow.

Being powerful is then re-defined as being full of and connected to this universal power/spirit/energy; it has nothing- NOTHING- any more to do with the amount of resources or people one has at or under one’s command. You thus literally cannot be powerful and simultaneously exploit an Other (a person, animal, piece of nature) because it contradicts the state of oneness (connection, flow) that defines being power-full.

In the last six months I've had a number of inquiries from folks curious about my role as The Book Doula. "I have this idea..." they venture. Many of their premises have been fantastic! But: is there a book there? And: are you the person best suited to write it?

I could make a pretty penny by promising everyone who asks that a few hours of my time will transform that idea into an irresistable proposal that a highbrow agent will snap right up and that will lead to a handsome contract with a major publisher...

Dear World:

Greetings from the original Book Doula.

I took that title for myself as I completed Van Jones' book in the first months of 2008. At the time I was busy--you know, helping write a New York Times bestselling book, and then without a moment's break, launching into the collaboration on another book (the marvelous HOOPING with Christabel Zamor), and directly after that, beginning the worldchanging Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard. Somewhere along the way I made up my business cards, featuring the book-bearing stork, and bought the URLs bookdoula.com and thebookdoula.com. 

It was only after this last labor was complete, in January 2010, that I turned my attention to my brand: the Book Doula. Lo and behold, in December 2009 a woman put together a website at bookdoula dot biz. She also started a twitter feed as the book doula, and even made a youtube video called the book doula.

Well, Dr. Liz Alexander of Austin Texas, I wish you well. You go on "birthing brilliance" and I will go on DELIVERING BOOKS THAT CHANGE THE WORLD, working with the highest caliber thinkers and innovators.

I suppose there's room for the both of us.

But: I was here first. 

would all words were wielded so powerfully--

The inner green shading represents the proposed safe operating space for nine planetary systems. The red wedges represent an estimate of the current position for each variable. The boundaries in three systems (rate of biodiversity loss, climate change and human interference with the nitrogen cycle), have already been exceeded.

An excerpt from the excellent, supervetted piece in Nature:

...we propose a framework based on 'planetary boundaries'. These boundaries define the safe operating space for humanity .... Many subsystems of Earth react in a nonlinear, often abrupt, way, and are particularly sensitive around threshold levels of certain key variables. If these thresholds are crossed, then important subsystems, such as a monsoon system, could shift into a new state, often with deleterious or potentially even disastrous consequences for humans...

Old dogs--and huge industries--can learn new tricks!

 If you haven't heard, my current gig is helping another visionary named Annie Leonard write her first book, The Story of Stuff (Free Press/Simon & Schuster, 2010).

The book is based on her super successful online film of the same name, which traces consumer "goods" through all their life stages, from the extraction of natural resources, into the factories where toxic chemicals are often used, then into retail stores and people's shopping carts, until they eventually wind up at the dump. Her conclusion: this system is not sustainable, since we're running out of raw materials like water and trees, poisoning our bodies and the planet with those toxic chemicals, and running out of space to dump all our trash.

The film took off in a big way, with millions of folks tuning in, leading to the film's translation into a whole bunch of languages. Although the message is intended for folks of all ages, the simple language that Annie uses to describe the situation and the endearing stick figures created by Free Range Studios made it a big hit with parents and teachers. Annie manages to stay very cool, upbeat, and not overtly political in telling the Story, which is why it's appealed to people across the poltical spectrum.

And then, last Monday, an education reporter from the New York Times did a front-page piece on the film.

Since then it's exploded in several thousands of blogs as well as in mainstream media, with the right-wing claiming Annie (aka "Marx with a ponytail) is "telling American children that they shouldn't be proud of their country" and "romanticizing poor countries."

Here's a tiny selection of the buzz:

So here's a funny thing. I didn't so much like Eat, Pray, Love. But I just heard Elizabeth Gilbert do a TED talk on the artistic genius that "gets assigned to your case," and it resonated for me both as a writer, and as an occasional hoopdancer... The Ole moments are few and far between, yet I've definitely seen the genius, the Allah, whathaveyou, working through so many artists I know and have known, in so many disciplines. This goes out to you: