Harvest of Peace Volunteer Acknowledgements

Bettina Hetz captures a thought that someone volunteers during our Saturday afternoon session about relocation.

Bettina Hetz captures a thought that someone volunteers during our Saturday afternoon session about relocation.

These Volunteer Ackowledgements were presented by Abbey Pleviak, our Center Volunteer Coordinator, Office Manager, and Registrar, at Harvest of Peace Saturday, September 19. They have been altered slightly for readability!  Some extra information that wasn’t spoken by Abbey has been included in italics.

Good Morning, Everyone!  I’m delighted to have this opportunity to present to you our Harvest of Peace Volunteer acknowledgements. 

Although I’m currently in my fourth year working for the Portland Shambhala Center, this is my first year presenting these volunteer notes.  Over these last years, I’ve probably asked you for volunteer help more than a few times!  – Unless you’re new to our Center.  If that’s the case – then welcome!  And this is fair warning, I’ll be asking you to volunteer –soon!

In fact, this year, our Governing Council, who except for our Center Director Lisa Stanley, are all volunteers, by the way, have approved three additional hours a week for me to focus on Volunteer Development in particular, so you all can expect to be hearing more from me about volunteering in these coming months as we actively develop this vital part of our Center Culture.

Our Volunteers do so much!  Did you know, that every year, our Center runs 30-40 programs, has around 13 community events, 60 group meetings, 28 Vajrayana practice periods, 52 flower arranging sessions, and around 360 community practice events?  Our organization is vibrant, rich in activity, almost completely volunteer run – except for our three part-time support staff, and we’re growing bigger by the minute! 

Generosity and Compassion in Action are core values in Shambhala that manifest in our Volunteering, which gives us potent opportunities to practice using our body, speech, and mind for the benefit of society.

We have something like 200 volunteers at our Center and possibly more, so while I couldn’t possibly recognize everyone during the 10 minutes I’ve been allotted, it is customary at Harvest of Peace to recognize and appreciate those who have newly entered or are exiting a Volunteer Role, so here we go!  If I get something wrong or omit someone who should be recognized, I apologize in advance and invite you to correct me later on.  Also, please hold applause till the very end, and we can recognize everyone all together!

In Practice and Education:

Jay Stevens stepped down as Way of Shambhala Education Coordinator; Linda Pardun stepped into that role.

New program staff include Kimberly Windstar, David Cook, Nick Urban, and we’re delighted Tabitha Pearson is active again as a program staffer.

Kristen Mullen stepped into the position of Meditation Coordinator.  Lee Scher had stepped out of that role.

Janie Paige stepped into the role of Community Practice Coordinator and Doug Dunlap is now coordinating the Shrineroom ROTA.  Kim Crossman had previously held both roles. 

By the way, Janie and I are now working on a Community Practice Training Retreat that will most likely be in November – keep your eyes peeled and your ears pricked for that – it’s going to be lots of fun and provide us many low-stress opportunities to practice the roles of umdze, host, gatekeeper, and hospitality, so that we can support those 360 community practice sessions I mentioned earlier, where we provide many, many people every year with first-time meditation instruction. 

Someone new to our Community Practice Team, who has recently begun umdze-ing is Raj Arockiasamy.  Raj just moved here from Boston via San Francisco, and we’re very lucky to have him!

A new Mahayana Practice role has just been instituted – Jan Rogerson will be coordinating Bodhisattva Practice Days, which start the 4th Mon in Oct in the morning –going forward these will happen every 2nd and 4th Monday.

In the area of Vajrayana Practice, Brian Landever has taken over from Jack Bodner the position of Vajrayana Practice Coordinator. (Shastri Rayna let us know that Brian and Mariela were married Harvest of Peace Day! – which garnered much delight from those assembled!  Congratulations Brian and Mariela!!) 

Other Vajrayana roles have been taken on by Ray Sten, who is now coordinating Padmasambhava Feasts and Milarepa Day.   Bruce Dodds and Timaree Bierle-Dodds are our new Werma Feast Coordinators. 

Also in the area of P&E, we have a new Assistant Registrar – Deborah Kuprunas!  who is also assisting me in the Office, and has been such a great help!  She’s also active with our Ikebana Team, and has taken a seat on our Shambhala Dharma Arts Council!  Dayan Morgan-Sylvaen has also joined the Arts Council and has been doing some wonderful writing for the group!

Other news in the realm of Dharma Arts:

After four years of service to the Shambhala Dharma Arts Council, first as the Chair of the Council and then as a Council Member, Caitlin Bargenquast will be stepping down from the Dharma Arts Council on Shambhala Day.  I am now our acting Chair of the Council.  Amy Aycrigg this year, stepped off the Dharma Arts Council also after four years of service.  She is still very active organizing our Center flower arranging.  This year, our flowers have been created by: Bev Zeien, Jan Rogerson, Willa Rabinovich, Elizabeth Craig, Caitlin Bargenquast, Mary Ruskusky, Deborah Kuprunas, David Cook, Anandi Gefroh, Amy Aycrigg, Jude Cope, Anne Emmett, Mariela Noriega, Brian Landever, and Bill Kimbro.

Amy Aycrigg has also stepped down as Community Care Point Person, which gives me a nice segue into the area of Societal Health and Wellbeing.

Mark Douglass has stepped down as our Family Council Chair, but continues to support events for Shambhala families.  Heather Shaw, a new member is helping to plan events for families, along with Kendra Ward, also a new member. 

Ruth Hampton, after returning from a long retreat at Gampo Abbey has started up the Heart of Recovery Group, supported by Gardner Murphy.  This group is having its year anniversary soon, and Ruth will be on a panel about Gambling Addiction next week.

Corey Adkins, in addition to being our Council Secretary, also took over running the Young Meditators Group, when Rebecca Jamieson stepped down after coordinating that group for many years.  Corey has recently taken on a position as International Co-Director of Ziji Collective, Shambhala’s international youth group.   New facilitators for our local YMG are: David Cook, Nick Urban (who also recently moved here from California via New York), and Stephen Jensen, who has been active with the YMG for quite a few years.

We have some volunteers who recently started assisting another of our popular groups – the Queer Dharma Group.  New Member Kate Williams is now supporting that group as is Margaret Bell.  Jude Cope, who recently moved here from Virginia, is also helping with the group, and she is also master minding our potluck today!

David Engelbrecht has created two new groups that fit under the rubric of SHWB – the Meditation Warriors Book Group, which meets two times a month, and a brand new Social Action Group called Warriors in the World, which is now in its beginning organizational planning stages.  If you are interested in becoming involved with that new group, please chat with David during the potluck, or send him an email.

David, by the way, is also our Membership Coordinator, and our online scheduling person – which means he inputs all the information for all our events into our online calendar, so he holds some big jobs around here and makes a lot happen!

Speaking of our Membership Team, it has really grown in its scope and action in the last few years, and is comprised of David, Carol Lieberman, and Pat Maurer.  New members on the team are Michele Caulkins and Ted Bryan.  They are planning whiz-bang Halloween party, by the way, so start thinking of your costume – there will be a contest!  If you don’t know what to be, consider coming as one of the Shambhala Dignities – Tiger, Lion, Garuda, or Dragon!  If you’d like to make a cultural offering for the party, please let me know!  I’ll be MCing  this year!

Carol Lieberman, by the way, is also part of our Finance Team and also manages our stellar Bookstore.  You may have noticed that the bookstore expanded this year and the library moved into the Annex.  That move was made possible by the work of Laurie Wulf who created a shelf in the hall outside the shrineroom, added shelving to the library, and also created bookstands for the bookstore.  Gardner Murphy painted the new library.  And the books were moved by: Librarian Chris Barnett, and volunteers: Deborah Kuprunas, Cindy Craig, Amina Kirby, Norman Hamilton, Ann Sihler, and Ted Bryan.  By the way, there are a massive amount of magazines being given away in the library right now, so please have a look and take a heap!  You have just until Halloween to take magazines – after that they’ll be gone.

I’ve mentioned Ted Bryan a few times and also want to let you know that he is one of our Drala Housekeepers, who keeps the Center spiffy. Linda Pardun is also on that team, and Darryl Justice has retired from the Housekeeping Team.  Ted Bryan has also joined the Kasung recently.

Another notable addition to the Kasung is our Rusung Dan Rubin!  He returns to the position after receiving advanced training in awareness and protection from his twins Charlie and Ella (who just turned 3 and half and who along with their mother Vaness Rubin brought in some excitement and joy to the latter part of the morning)!  Bruce and Timaree – who also recently moved here – have also joined our local Kasung.  And we’re very happy to have them here!

And last but certainly not least, I want to recognize our Finance Team!  We have a brand new Chagdzo Jack Bodner – who holds the view of richness at our Center.  We also have a new bookkeeper, Maralena Murphy.  Jack and Maralena are taking over responsibilities that were held by Alice Price, who while she recently stepped down as Finance Director, continues to support finance projects.  I already mentioned that Carol Lieberman is on our finance team, but she’s so great, she’s worth mentioning again!  Jack wants to me to also recognize that I’m on the finance team – so there you go!

We also have a new committee dedicated to organizing our Nyida Days, and we have a new team dedicated to our Center Relocation, but I won’t say anything about that – we’ll be talking about that later!

We do so much around here!  And it all happens because of you – our volunteers!  Thank you all for all you do!  This is a good time for applause! (Our Volunteers were given a standing ovation by those assembled!)

As I mentioned, in these coming months, we’re going to be looking further into developing volunteering at our Center.  To do that, we’re going to be gathering information from our current volunteers.  We want to know what makes you feel inspired to do what you do and what makes you feel appreciated for your work.  As well, we want to know more about what you do – both to help us improve the way we’re doing things around here, and also so we can provide more resources for our future volunteers.    

As I’ve said, this is all happening because of you, so as your Volunteer Coordinator, I look forward to learning more about how it’s all happening!  In fact, in order to gather all this information, I think I’m going to need a new Volunteer Team!  If you have any inspiration around a Volunteer Team, or are ready to give me feedback about your volunteer experience, please be in touch with me!

And very, very last of all, may I please see a show of hands from people here today who have volunteered or are currently volunteering for the Shambhala Center?  Wonderful!  That’s pretty much all of us!   Now, if you didn’t raise your hand, and you’re feeling left out, don’t worry, there’s plenty to do today!  — Especially for the potluck and the clean up.  Please consider yourself warmly invited to jump right in and help out!  And if you want to help, but don’t know what to do, just ask someone who looks like they know!  They’ll be happy to help you to help out!  Because that’s what we do here!   Thank you!

I neglected to recognize everyone who contributed to the success of our Harvest of Peace Celebration this year.  Jason Bray coordinated and MCed.  Rusung Rubin and squad members Bettina Hetz, Kristen Mullen, Timaree Bierle-Dodds, Bruce Dodds, Kimberley Jensen and Janie Paige held the space.  John Smith facilitated technology so that we could hear the address from the Sakyong.  David Engelbrecht, Lisa Stanley, and Bettina Hetz assisted with our New Member Oaths.  Our new members who were recognized were: Nick Urban, Que Evans, Jude Cope, and Kate Williams.  Lisa Stanley and Bettina Hetz led the Member Town Hall about Center Relocation.  Corey Adkins offered our Generosity Practice for the Pledge Drive.  Chip Gambill and Mary Ellen Grace assisted with the Pledge Cards and gave  other Shrineroom Assistance.  Jack Bodner and the whole Governing Council did lots of behind-the-scenes work.  Jude Cope masterminded the potluck. Many people brought delicious and enticing food to share!  Nora Nichols and Deborah Kuprunas were all-around helpers all day!  Ruth Hampton was a kitchen champion!  Bill Kimbro took care of all the extra seating!  And many, many people spontaneously helped out where they saw need! 

Thank you, everyone, for such a joyous community celebration of Harvest of Peace this year!  If you have any photos to share of the day, please send them along to [email protected]!

—  Abbey Pleviak

2 thoughts on “Harvest of Peace Volunteer Acknowledgements

  1. Great to see all of this in one place, Abbey! REALLY impressive!

    I need to point out that the Pub Team is a group of volunteers that do a lot for the center — but doesn’t do such a hot job making it’s contribution visible, since our job is to make everyone else’s activities visible.

    David Engelbrecht manages the Center’s calendar and works with a huge number of people to make sure that the calendar is useful and accurate.

    Bill Kimbro and Nancy Smith are primarily responsible for the Weekly Newsletter — gathering all the little pieces, making sure they are accurate, and making them look right. They do that every week of the year! And Bill produces the monthly newsletter with extra detail about our upcoming programs.

    YOU Abbey produce virtually all of the flyers for the Shambhala Center, which give people a reminder to take home with them about a program that they are thinking about.

    Jason Bray sometimes steps in with help and gives us good advise on publicity and communications issues.

    Jay Stewart, Nancy Smith, David Engelbrecht and I did a study of how calendaring works at 7 different Shambhala Centers (including Portland). We’ve shared that with the people we interviewed and the Center Leadership Hub on the Shambhala Network.

    I continue to serve on the “Steering IT in the Mandala” standing committee, which oversees technology and its ramifications from an international perspective.

    Thanks to Bill, Nancy, David, and Abbey!

    • Hi John!

      Thank you for these additions and corrections! If anyone else has any additions, or corrections, please feel welcome to comment here on the blog.

      I have one, in fact — Deborah Kuprunas made our last batch of flyers and has been keeping them updated as part of her Office Assistance-ship!

      cheers! Abbey

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