Teens: Leaders of the New World, part 2 of an interview with Dr. Shanon Brooks

In part 1 of our interview with Dr. Shanon Brooks, which posted Wednesday, February 17, 2010, he explained what he felt were the most important elements of a Leadership Education model.  Referencing this information and choosing to implement his suggestions can only further enhance your family’s Leadership Education experience.  Dr. Brooks is also the owner of the seminar series Face to Face with Greatness, which teaches in depth seminars on Leadership Education and incorporating its methodologies into your life.  One of the great things about them, is that they are geared towards all walks of life; and are dedicated to building a responsible American citizenry.  If you click on the link above, you will be taken to his website where you can find a seminar near you.  If there isn’t one near you, you can always contact Dr. Brooks at shanon@facetofacewithgreatness.com to host !  For those living in the Southern California area, if you click here, you will be able to see the details of the upcoming Face to Face With Greatness seminar series #1, that is being hosted in Temecula, CA on April 9-10, 2010.

Welcome back, Dr. Brooks.  You know as much as I love to tease you, I can honestly say that I love to be mentored by you as well….well, most of the time!  Your consistent, hard work over the years has certainly paid off.    When you begin to talk about history, it is interesting, engaging and thought provoking.  I know that many people ask, “Where do I begin?”

I also happen to know that the feeling of “overwhelm” is pretty daunting.  You are offering classes right now  that  are geared to busy people that would like to begin “somewhere.”  Would you mind telling us about them?

It used to be commonplace for a large portion of American households to own a set of Great Books.  This way, people could read and at least comprehend the great works of history; based on segments that were found in this wonderful set of literature.  Today, it is not at all uncommon, when you are fortunate to come upon a set, to be the first to actually crack the pages open.  It has been proven over and over again, that when people know history they are very difficult to enslave.

What we do in the Great Books Courses, is take a three week period of time, where the students read and then we discuss what we’ve read.  It really is beneficial because you have the opportunity to write a bit as well; but there isn’t the pressure of a full blown college commitment.  I invite you to research the Great Books a bit, as they are amazing.  They represent 3,000 years of continuous thought, took 8 years to produce and represent 400,000 man hours of research on each topic!

The idea is to take them volume by volume and study them together so that we all benefit from their wealth.

I know that for the $75.00 investment in each class, you simply can’t parallel the value.  My family has benefitted tremendously from this opportunity and continues to do so.  The non-threatening environment, group discussion and accessibility of you as the mentor, make them, in my personal opinion worth four or five times as much.

And you really don’t have the chance to get overwhelmed!  They’re three weeks in duration.  You can simply take the little break and move on to the next one!  Also, the intimate class size of 15 people is really rare.  You have a winner, that’s for sure.

Well, I appreciate that.  I love what I do and enjoy walking this path and process with the students.  It’s always beneficial to glean again and again from these works.

We so appreciate your willingness to do it.  Liberty and Freedom are depending on it.

Will you talk for a minute about why you feel community is so vitally important?

I would love to.  Right now, I’m covering the country on this very issue.  Sadly, our nation is in a decline.  No government agency or hall of government can fix this.  The people residing there no longer have the capacity and the world knowledge that is needed to solve our problems.  In fact, the only way to solve this problem, is to work on yourself, your marriage, your family, your community.  When community, which is a vital microcosm can work and be strengthened, it becomes the saving grace of a nation.  We, as a people, have got to stop looking to someone else to save us. From community, flow the qualified individuals to run our governments.  Until we start stepping up, it’s unrealistic to expect something better than the people to represent them!  After all, it’s from communities that these people come!

You simply can’t blame the people in government today for poor performance.  They are nothing more than a reflection of us. We need to take the responsibility on ourselves and hold ourselves accountable for putting them in office.

Our communities have to to with everything.  We think of our society as disconnected from the state and federal governments.  When we feel that we are no longer responsible for keeping them from getting out of control, then that is ludicrous!  If every man or woman, in later life , would prepare themselves to be qualified to run or prepare to run for office; we would, at the very least, have a responsible electorate.

That is certainly a lot to think about.  Thank you.

Your keynote address at the Southern California Thomas Jefferson Education Forum, on April 24, 2010, is entitled Teens: Leaders of the New World.

Would you care to expound on this a bit?  I mean, we always hear that “everyone is going to grow up and take their place in society.”

And that statement, Teri, is a bunch of bunk!   Over the next 30 years, I believe that we’re going to be facing a world that none of us understand. It will be a world experiencing both a 4th and a 1st turning. That world has new rules, new requirements, and it will require completely different strategies.

I really firmly believe that the young people of today are the only ones that can lead in this new world.

The world that both we and our parents grew up in is fairly similar.  The world that our kids are growing up in, is completely different.

Subsequently, kids today are very different. I am seeing 20-somethings getting married, shirking concerns for designer labels, money, and material possessions.  They are embracing grounded value systems, family and quality relationships.

This new world to which I am referring, will be led by very specific young people that know who they are, and what they do as human beings.

Their focus is already geared that way rather than towards being some corporate robot.

I firmly believe that my job, for the rest of my life is to help these young people know how to lead into a 1st turning. In doing this, they will be able to give us what the Founders gave us during their first turning.  It will be a unique opportunity within the next 30 years, to establish the liberty and abundance that the founders gave us over 200 years ago.

That opportunity only comes along every 10-15 generations….and here we are.

Thank you for taking the time to be here with us for the past two “days.”  We are really looking forward to having you here again in Southern California.

I’m really looking forward to coming.  And Teri?

Yes, Dr. Brooks?

About the alien picture…

I’m really grateful for your influence, Shanon, but don’t press me…

Good bye for now, then.

Dr. Brooks?  I really don’t say this often enough…YOU HONESTLY “ROCK SOCKS”, my friend!  Thank you for your time!

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How You Can Know What “the Truth” Really Is, an interview with Dr. Shanon Brooks, part 1

On April 24, 2010 from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., The Fourth Annual Thomas Jefferson Education Forum will take place at The Goldy S. Lewis Center in Rancho Cucamonga, CA.  You can register by downloading a form here on Tommymom.com, or you can go to www.fatjef.com.

Descriptions of breakouts are available there, and will also be available by the end of this week, here at Tommymom.com.  Don’t hesitate to register, and also remember that there is a concurrent youth conference.  The cost of a ticket includes lunch!

This is a great opportunity to hear Dr. Shanon Brooks, a pioneer in the Thomas Jefferson Leadership Education field.

We are privileged to begin a two part interview with him today, that will conclude on Friday.

No…I didn’t forget to announce the winners of the Valentine “Feel the Love” giveaway!  Read to the bottom to find out who the lucky recipients are!  And THANK YOU to each of you that took the time to leave comments…

Each and every one is read and appreciated.

Hey, Dr. Brooks!…Thanks so much for joining us here today.  It is always a privilege.  I promise…no alien shots.

Good!  I hope that photo is gone forever.

Let’s not get carried away, okay?  I don’t want to make promises that can’t be kept.

Great.

Seriously…( am I ever 100% serious with YOU, Dr. Brooks?!)  I want to know what brought YOU to Leadership Education?

Man, Teri, that’s actually a great question.  One that I’m not sure many people could answer.

It was an evolving process, actually.  In the late 1980’s, I was a college student in Phoenix, Arizona.  I had recently gotten out of the military and decided to go to school.  I was 28 at the time.  I was attending paralegal school and working for a law firm.  It was a fairly new job.

I was actually the “juice boy.”  I kept the refrigerator stocked, sharpened pencils, and was occasionally the receptionist.

In a pinch one day, they sent me downtown to the law library, loved what I brought back in the way of research, and this instantly became my new job!  It was great…

I got paid $10.00 an hour and they billed it out at $200.00 an hour!

During this time, I had a chance meeting with destiny.  I went to a meeting with Cleon Skousen.  It was amazing.

He was doing multiple meetings in Phoenix; I heard him that one night, and called in sick for the rest of the week so that I could follow him around!

This is where I got exposed to “The Making of America” and “The 5,000 Year Leap”

I became a volunteer for him. The position was actually called a shire.  I would go into homes, do adult education and cottage meetings on The 5,000 Year Leap.  Then I attended a 7 day seminar on “The Majesty of God’s Law”, which is now out of print.

One thing led to another, and around 1989, Youth for America was underway and Oliver DeMille was the director.  The next year, I became the director and Oliver became one of the top speakers.

It was at this time that I relocated and went to work for Cleon Skousen.  I actually worked for Bill Doughty and Cleon was in charge.  There was some great mentoring going on and I was very privileged at that time.  Cleon, Bill, Glen Kimber and the Reverend Don Sills all became my mentors.  We were working under Meadeau View Institute and the Center for Constitutional Studies. (ICE)

During this time, I was teaching like crazy and on the road all of the time.  I’m getting intense training, going to SUU full time, holding down a full time job, and working up at the conference center.

Bill offered to take me on the road, so I was going to school full time and on the road 15 days a month.

Oliver and I continued to do YFA together, and in 1992 made the decision to start a university. The semester we started, I was teaching at George Wythe and in my senior year at SUU!

This was 20 years ago.

Can you tell me what your favorite aspect of Leadership Education is?

That’s easy.  The Four Phases.  Any mentor equipped with the Four Phases, that knows them backwards and forwards, has permission to spend their time being inspired themselves.  In turn, this inspires the student, which allows you to then practice what Leadership Education is all about.

The Four Phases help you to know where a person is, and you can go from there.

If you don’t know the Phases and The Seven Keys, you don’t know what to do.

It is manipulative arts vs. cooperative arts as discussed by Mortimer Adler.

Will you give us an example?

Sure.

The manipulative arts are like a cobbler.  You need materials.  You take a hide, you cut it, you sew it, polish it…

you took natural resources and created a product that is a shoe.

The problem occurs when we take the manipulative arts and try to use them on people, when the purpose of education is for a person to reach their full potential.

The cooperative arts (those are The Seven Keys); can be likened to a farmer or a midwife.

They don’t mess with the nature of what is going on.

They spend all of their time fully understanding the nature and then they cooperate with it.

When kernels of corn are thrown into a hostile environment, some will die, some will be stomped into less than optimum soil, etc.

However, give those same kernels warmth, optimum light and water, a possible greenhouse, and nuture of a natural process…

The corn plant will naturally reach its full potential.

Our job is to understand the Phases and the Keys so well, that we can take whatever gets thrown at us and turn it into lemonade.

We are here to encourage and inspire, not to meddle and fix.

You need to know the phases and keys, so that you can know what the truth really is.

Wow.  You always have such a knack for bringing Leadership Education down to what really matters in a very organic, focused way.   This, in turn, leaves so much room for inspiration and epiphanies. Thanks.

On Friday, we’re going to hear more from Dr. Brooks about his keynote address for the FATJEF, “Teens: Leaders of the New World”, his classes tailored for busy, sometimes overwhelmed people, why the Great Books are…well, “Great” and why community is so vitally important.

I hope you’ll join us.  ~You’ll be glad you did!

The WINNERS of the Valentine’s “Feel The Love” contest are (drum roll, please…) Amy Maus and Tammie Blackmore!  (profuse applause!)

Amy is receiving a copy of TJEd for Teens, autographed by Dr. Brooks,( a noteworthy prize for any fortunate winner), and Tammie is receiving a  three flower design couture headband, created by Lisa of Modbaby.  This great contributor will be spotlighted next month in yet another giveaway, so stay tuned!   Keep those comments comin’!

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What a Liberal Arts Education Can Do For You

I met Amber Mitchell online.

( Geez, it sounds like we’re those cheap, tawdry night time websurf babes!)

So sorry, Amber!…

Let me rephrase that…

I really met her on a conference call, and got to know her a bit better online.

She is delightful…

Upbeat, cheerful, with a great sense of humor.

When she sent me her picture, she wanted to know if she would be an alien like Dr. Brooks?

That, my friends, is an elite privilege, reserved solely for him…

which translates into: “I would really like to continue this blogging gig…

so that picture won’t be showing up again…

for awhile.

She has four children, ranging from 2-9 years of age.

Amber has known about Leadership Education for 3 ½ yrs.

Her greatest Leadership Education strength:

The ability to help others recognize that they, too, can be successful at Leadership Education…

and to encourage them to go for it.

Her weakness:

Realizing when to push ahead and when to let nature take its course.

She’s very grateful for, and inspired by, all the wonderful examples of Leadership Education she’s found nationwide as our community has expanded from coast to coast.

(I’m grateful that she was so willing to whip this up in all of her “free time”…

so that we could gain further insight into why your own Liberal Arts Education is so very important!)

What have I learned from taking the Liberal Arts classes?

I have learned more about myself and what my weaknesses are. More than anything else, in taking the Liberal Arts classes offered by Face to Face with Greatness Seminars, I have learned what my strengths are.

I have learned that I need to know more about world history and human nature so I can facilitate and encourage learning and change in myself and others.

I must know how some of the greatest minds in western history inspired people; in order to be able to inspire and share my quest for important knowledge with others, my children included.

I need to encourage them to seek their own education, no matter how hard.

I am striving to learn how to balance my study time along with my other daily responsibilities.

It would be so easy to say, “I will get to this later when my kids are older, I have more time, money, etc.”

However, I have grown in my understanding as to why I need a great Liberal Arts Education.

As I pursue an education in the Great Books of the Western World, I have started to realize exactly just how much ordinary people are capable of doing.

I have begun to see that I am capable of learning difficult concepts and have started developing faith in the process of learning.

I know that it helps me immensely to have the insights that Dr. Brooks and others in my class share about the readings we study.

It gives me an understanding of another’s viewpoint or interpretation of the reading; whether or not I agree with it.

I plan on taking as many liberal arts classes as I can in my personal journey towards a leadership education.

Amber Mitchell

Tri-Cities, WA

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Just who IS Dr. Shanon Brooks?

Dr. Shanon Brooks is coming to Southern California on Monday.

He begins, what we refer to in our house, as a “whirlwind tour” on Wednesday, November 11.

It lasts until Saturday, November 21.

With multiple appearances each day.

That’s a lot of whirling.

Trust me on this.

He will be speaking about teaching vs. educating, the tenants of freedom and how to perpetuate them, what an American is,  and a lot of other really interesting things.

You’re going to have to trust me on this as well.

You won’t be nodding off or fighting sleep.

But since I’ve already been privileged to hear portions of both lectures, I am speaking with confidence.

Listening to him beats watching television…

Any day.

I’m hoping that you’re hanging on every word today, as the members of our family consider themselves to be extremely fortunate to be associated with Dr. Brooks and his family.

He’s the “lucky” winner of the first profile spot on Tommymom.com!

I’m not certain he and I are sharing the “lucky” sentiment.

You may hold your applause for later. Possibly until after you’ve heard him yourself.

Because of his near rock star fame…okay, that could be a slight exaggeration…

Several of you are asking, “Just who IS Dr. Shanon Brooks… really?

I, Tommymom moderator, and personal friend, am going to attempt to answer this now-pressing question for all of you. Hey, it’s a rough job, but someone’s got to do it.

1.  He’s a fabulous, over-the-top, excellent, hard-to-exceed-this-level-of-commitment, mentor.

Who gets pretty passionate about the principles he’s sharing…

Or, it could be that seriously green wall that’s doing something in this particular case…

In any regard, he’s somewhat rare, in that he’s not only broad-based in his acquisition of knowledge, but is also deep.

A true leadership education, by the way.

Don’t try this at home. He would actually love for  you to experience the opportunity of  acquiring this type of knowledge from home, and mentors classes where you can do it!

Please click on the Face to Face With Greatness button on this website for further reference.  Just understand that his website is currently under construction…

You won’t be bonding with these people from “the dental office” much longer…pardon our virtual dust…

FABULOUS things to come…

Shanon’s been studying and when I called, Bill Gate’s line was busy.

Sons #1 and #2 are two of the fortunate mentees. They think he’s the “BOMB”.

Do you see the beauty in this? They are often the slang, pop cultural balance to his PhD in Constitutional Law...along with the other two degrees he’s sporting.

Just a quick inquisition…

When was the last time you even read The Constitution, much less acquired a PhD in its “law”?

Exactly.

Moving right along…

Did I mention he is passionate about mentoring and the entire learning process?

I love, love, love to dialogue with him.

My husband claims that when he and I do this, people are often running for cover… Perhaps a slight misunderstanding on my husband’s part.

You will always know where you stand with Dr. Brooks.

And he will always stand.

For a return to the American tradition of loving marriages.

For families.

He and his wife, Julia, have six beautiful children. Guess what? They’re all being mentored in the style of a Leadership Education. Shocking, eh? I mean, who does this guy think he is;

practicing what he preaches?  There has simply got to be something wrong with him!

He’s committed.

To old fashioned values and principles.  He’s seen here “going to see a man about a horse.”

Scratch that.  He’s ON the horse…

In the great outdoors; of which he is an avid fan.

He farms.

He does manual labor.

For real.

He’s deeply committed to friendship…

With the man who wrote this book and has personally mentored Shanon for over 20 years.

Wow.

He puts his money where his mouth is, by rising insanely early each and every day, to study the principles of this country.

And what it took to make it great.

And what it will take for all of us to continue to enjoy our freedoms.

Never mind about the thousands of great classics he has read and studied from the world over.

Is he for real?

Painfully so, at times.

But I love him for it.  The honesty can be somewhat brutal where I am personally concerned, but I know that I am always the better for it.

And it’s always done in love.

You won’t walk away unchanged. His love for this country and people would be hard to parallel.

After all, look what he is doing for us.

Whirling.

For 10 days.

Is he for real?

I don’t know.

You be the judge.

Perhaps he simply walks amongst us.

Right now, I can type this with confidence, because his hands are at “10 and 2″, as he drives here to serve me and you; and he knows nothing about these “slightly irreverent” pictures.

I feel a “dialogue” coming on!

Hope you make the effort to catch a “whirl”….I promise you’ll never be the same!

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