For the full member meeting on Monday, March 25 the Servant Leadership Program held a special meeting at River Rock Coffee in St. Peter to connect students with community members who were engaged with similar ideas of service through vocation. Tamika, the owner, founded the coffee shop eleven years ago with the intention to change the world in the small way she could, through the everyday food that sustains us. She saw an opportunity to bring her passion for healthy, intentionally-sourced soul sustenance to engage the community in thoughtful decision-making. Meeting with SLP was just another example of the role she sees she can play in St. Peter as an educator, supporter, and creator of intentional community as she strives to live out the concept of right livelihood, a synthesis of values and life work. Not only does she educate her staff and her customers about where their food and drinks originate and how they are produced, but River Rock also has close relationships with their local providers, which allows them to support area farmers.
While at River Rock, the SLP practiced mindful eating with a couple of decadent desserts baked that morning by the talented staff. SLP mindfully ate “hermits”—whole wheat chocolate chip cookies, so named for their unique shape—and slices of orange chocolate bundt cake; each student methodically chewing their food slowly, contemplating each and every bite. The students were also instructed to chew the coffee or hand-squeezed lemonade that was provided for the exercise; all in order to appreciate the full eating experience, acknowledging the hands that grow, sell, create, and give and savoring the freshness and richness of organic and local ingredients. After the mindful eating, everyone grouped up and was given a poster board and markers. On these poster boards, we reflected on the connection between the words “power,” “capacity,” “connection,” and “change, and drew illustrations to visually depict these relationships.
The reading for Monday focused on power and how society conditions us to accept certain power dynamics, which can be undermined by the free thinker by transforming a world of “power over” to one of “power to.” “Power over” relationships valorize dominance whereas “power to” relationships emphasize the power of a community coming together to accomplish a goal. Traditional “power over” vocabulary conveys a sense of rigid hierarchy, oppression, and control whereas “power to” denotes collaboration, passion, and empowerment of individuals in a community. Thinking about these ideas in the context of a real-world business environment, River Rock, for example, was inspiring because we were able to see theory in action. The respect and passion the staff felt for each other and their work was powerful to see because it showed a the positive effects of initiating a power shift. The small coffee shop sees the possibility to create change by adopting a “power to” model, where they are able to support local farmers, the community, and each other by emphasizing the need for reliance, appreciation, and intention in daily decision-making.
–Rebecca Hare & Mandy Schlauderaff
Rebecca and Mandy,
I like how you mentioned the importance of noticing how many hands have touched our food. I think that is something we often forget about. We often just shove a piece of food into our mouths without thinking about how long it took for that food to be made or how many ingredients were needed. I think another important thing to take away from our visit to River Rock is the importance of how the way food is made affects how our bodies receive it. Tamika gave the example of putting an angry chicken into our body is bound to make us sick. Food is more satisfying when it is made out of natural means and done in a just way.