I love this post and feel it’s truly important to keep challenging one’s self. I’m taking a mother/daughter knitting class and I’m going to do a meditation retreat in April in Austin with Deepak Chopra at the Crossings. Both of these things require an immense amount of me stepping away from the PowerPoint and into the end of a knitting needle or meditation mat and that’s much harder than I thought! Sitting still and not clicking!

I jumped right in. I talked about all the benefits of what would be, in essence, a consumer discussion forum as is found everywhere on the Web. We can influence the conversation. We can shape our point of view. Essentially, what I learned from reading your book!

Then the fear arose. I was surprised that it came from a faculty member. He said, “But what if they put negative things on it? How do we control it?” Wow. What happened to academic freedom and all that sort of thing I thought these folks stood for?

My response was, “Great! We can address those negative, and probably misinformed, comments right on the spot. And we give those people a place to vent. At least they’ll feel that someone listened to them.” The faculty member seemed to accept that, albeit grudgingly. No one else chimed in so I think the suggestion is still alive.