Back to School: Everything Starts with an Idea
Students may have said I was breaking all the rules of what I call "Mountain Modesty" over the past several days. They may have perceived my story as bragging about myself, and I was a bit. But, mostly, I was trying to describe how every achievement begins as an idea. Recently, one of my ideas -- first hatched in 2004 -- manifested as the published 3-page essay in a new book called, What the Best Law Teachers Do , by Michael Hunter Schwartz, Gerald F. Hess, and Sophie M. Sparrow (Harvard U. Press 2013). Hang with me here for a moment. You will like this less conventional way of thinking about how an idea goes from beginning to full execution. Yogis who talk about the energetic system of chakras will tell you that every idea moves through six of the seven chakras to manifestation. The "Third Eye" chakra -- located between the eyes in the middle of the forehead -- represents where, in the mind's eye, we think up ideas. The next step in th...