I’ve been thinking a lot about time lately.
Last week, for example, marked three months since my mom died.
I ask lots of questions about time because between my mother’s first and second stroke, time seemed to slow…down…somehow. Separate from the to-do’s of my day-to-day life, I was wholly focused on being present with her during those 80 days. Not only so that I could support her and my family plunged into the unknown, but so that I could also try to keep my commitments and honor my life as priorities shifted.
The point was, commodified time didn’t matter. Most important was my ability to respond, adapt, and find the “right” moments amidst changing circumstances. This is what I recently learned the Greeks call kairos. The period of my mother’s illness was not marked by what was chronological, but rather what was most vital. During that time, I was listening always for clarity about the next thing that needed action, rather than what day or time or deadline it was. During that time, I realized that immediacy or urgency if often a condition or perception that only exists in my brain, and in others’ as well.
In the global philanthropy and aid sector, we are ruled by chronological timelines attached to dollars, shaped by the fantasies that are project goals. Urgency surrounds us and yet we know that lasting, transformative change takes kairos time. Here’s how we describe this at Thousand Currents:
“Lasting change…is nonlinear, often unpredictable, and requires efforts at multiple levels. In order to accompany our partners responsibly through many cycles of change, we provide long-term support that follows mutually established goals and outcomes as opposed to an artificial timeframe. This long-term approach has enabled us to build trusting and respectful relationships with our partners that extend beyond the time-bound transaction of resources and results.”
Urgency is a tool of control, of maintaining the status quo, and is included as a characteristic of white supremacy culture within organizations, as described by anti-racism trainers Kenneth Jones and Tema Okun. I believe that urgency is something which our sector, our organizations, our teams, and our selves must resist in our work.
When there’s not enough time…
…we value structures more than relationships.
…we rely on hierarchical or positional power, rather than focusing on building collective power.
…we obsess with scale rather than context or depth.
…we have meetings to get things done, not dialogues to gain clarity on how and why.
…we spend our energy searching for “what works,” rather than exploring what’s possible.
…experimentation and reflection is rushed, if it happens at all.
…we rely on our assumptions and hegemonic ideas, rather than get curious about people’s actual lived experiences.
…we can’t afford the “luxury” of simply getting to know each other, let alone trust each other.
…we don’t connect the personal to the political and the professional.
…we default to “power over” rather than spend the effort to build an ethic of care within our organizational cultures.
…we strain to influence those in power, rather than listening to people who’ve had to build the survival skills to get around systems for generations.
For those who no longer want to be complicit with the silencing of popular knowledges and experiences by Eurocentrism, we need to understand how commodified time, created by consumer-driven, scarcity mindsets, inhibits our ability to learn and respond to a changing world. What can we learn from Indigenous circular, cyclical, liminal, and relational concepts of time?
There is a price paid when we are rushed, but it is not a price exacted from those with secure salaries and those taking relatively tiny political risks.
The good news is that time, whether chronos or kairos, is one resource that every person has in equal measure. Power differentials related to money may ever plague our sector. But we must start considering that social good organizations, because we are not the private sector or government, can do it differently. We are not beholden to elections or to profit maximization. We can slow…down…somehow and focus on what’s most important, what’s most sacred, and perhaps even more strategic – our connections to each other and our interdependence.
Partnerships based on this restored awareness of time means funders stop asking already-busy and stretched people, organizations, and movements to take on more labor than they absolutely need to. Partnerships are built slowly, with time and intention on creating shared understanding before there is any talk of results. We have more clarity up front about what information is needed (including correspondence, not just reporting) and we are ready to negotiate.
Funders and INGOs thinking they deserve information at our fingertips, all the time, is a educational and class privilege that we must release. Do you need to send that email with a question for your partner or can you look up the data yourself, placing respect for your partners’ time over your own desire to know more? It seems like a small thing, but it is an important example of the practice of partnership that builds trust and dismantles notions of “power over.”
No matter how much money you bring to the table, it’s about time we are all clear about why we are asking for our partners’ time, labor, and energy.
To be sure, with the climate crisis at hand, there is no longer any time to waste.
But if we can resist urgency, there is time to share. Our very survival may depend on it.
