A dedication to the enduring memory of Marit Eikaas Haavimb
On November 8, 2024 our dear Marit left the body that she had inhabited for over 62 years.
In many respects, Marit has been the heart and soul of the CMM Institute bringing a quality of presence, openness, creativity, and love to each meeting, each event, every project, and every conversation she participated in. Her presence called forth “the better angels of our nature” as she embodied CMM in her interactions and relationships with others. Her vision for helping young children develop relational skills and abilities that enable them to thrive in a complex, multi-dimensional world led to the creation of CosmoKidz and CosmoTweenz. Her vison expanded to include CosmoTeenz and now CosmoParents, and yet-to-be future developments of our Cosmo line of activities. Among other places, her legacy will continue through all things Cosmo.
As she lived in relationship with her health challenges, she continued to live with extraordinary grace, presence, and generosity and continued to bless us with her gifts of deep listening, deep engaging and deep wisdom.
A group of CMMi Stewards met in December 2023 to honor Marit while she was still with us. We shared stories about Marit’s gifts and how they show us in our relationships. It was no surprise that Marit said:
“Everyone should be in a space where they were made special. And I want all of you to think that you are me now and that all that is true about me is also true about you.”
In preparation for this dedication, I had some additional conversations with people from the CMM Institute about their relationships with Marit. This dedication is a collection of stories and poems people shared about the many ways Marit has enriched our lives, individually and collectively. Our conversations were emergent, but my questions included:
- How did she touch you?
- How is she still with you?
- What are the memories that stand out?
- And in what ways does she still live with you?
A poem by Arthur Jensen
Marit and Grace
From west or east, north or south,
the winds blow and I know it is you
coming to refresh my soul with your grace, your gifts, your presence.
Sometimes this wind shows itself in the form of an email response, a Zoom call,
a passing comment in a Stewards’ meeting—
but always, always, always its effect is the same:
that reset for the soul and unexpected blessing.
Inspired by your incurable curiosity, your generosity of spirit,
your enduring belief in the good that we are capable of.
Thank you, Marit, for standing alongside me and wondering together where the next turn leads,
showing me that the meaning is in the looking for it,
the looking after it, and the looking at it.
Thank you, Marit.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you—for the sharing and showing of grace.
Eerika Hedman-Phillips
You asked me a question on the learning exchange call and I remember it had such an impact that I think I started crying. I think you were kind of tired and I don’t even remember what the question was—but I remember that there was something so deep, so big, and reachable in that moment. And obviously, there were many moments after that. I think you have the gift of just holding the space.
And you said something in the beginning that everyone should feel special. That really resonated because that’s how I always felt with you—the generosity, the support, the love, the kindness, the gentle sort of holding. That’s always been there for me and I’m always very thankful for you.
Erin Kreeger
You’re present with us all the time. Like when I think about you, I think about looking up into a beautiful night sky with all of those stars—the kind that you look at and they’re just twinkling. They are just so full of the kind of energy that makes you want to touch into yourself, into the world. Touch into the mystery. Your generosity and your grace—it really does fill us every day. The twinkle that you have. You teach us so much. And I’ve felt this particular gift this past year where, being in this place that you know that I am—where my risk of recurrence of cancer is so high—it makes every day better and easier and full of more of the delight in the present moment that you bring into everything that you do.
Kim Pearce—A poem for Marit’s 62nd birthday.
Marit and Kim laughed when Marit didn’t know the year she was born and thus the first line of the poem.
You may not remember the year you were born, but we know from whence you come…
Star stuff.
Did you know you are a North Star—brightest in the constellation?
A fixed point to help us find our way.
When we see the star Polaris, it is 680 light years away.
And yet it still orients us to the north.
The star of Marit transcends many light years too.
And although it has always brightly shined,
it is now set ablaze.
Vin Jensen
It’s hard to find the words. When I think of you Marit, I think of you as the kindest, most compassionate provocateur that I have ever known. Because you provoke love in everybody—and that’s the gift from you I am most grateful for and always will be. Thank you and I love you.
Jan Elliott –A poem by Raymond Carver: Late Fragment
“And did you get what you wanted from this life?
Even so? I did.
And what did you want? To call myself Beloved?
To feel myself beloved on the earth.”
And that is you, Marit.
IleneWasserman
Marit and I would visit regularly on zoom. One time we decided to imagine we were visiting and having an art day. We each brought our art supplies and drew something. This visit in particular stays with me as it was the invitation to move from knowing and doing to being and expressing without words.
Mark, my husband, and I visited Marit on our way back from Morocco in 2023. He described her as kind and gentle. She went so far out of her way and brought forth such an energy at a time when she was going through so much. I recall anticipating that we would be visiting her at rest, but instead we ran all around Oslo in the snow. It was all we could do to keep up with her!
Abby
from notes Ilene made as they talked
Marit gave me her microphone and she is always there. She helped me see I could let others see something in me—the softer, sensitive part of me. She helped me embrace those parts of me—that they could be more powerful and meaningful. Marit held true to her voice—in relationship to a more traditional academic voice. Others may have different ways of being or ideas of how you should do something. But she made me feel like I could feel more confident showing up the ways I wanted to. Many mementos on my desk remind me of Marit every day.
Barbara McKay
Marit met my husband and was paying such close attention to the ideas he was offering. And as she was paying more attention, he got more animated. I was interested in just watching the way that he got really excited about territory that was technically unfamiliar to him. On the way home, he just said, “Gosh, you said that woman’s extraordinary.” He said it was just one of the easiest conversations he’d had—trying to think about how you generate money when actually the purpose of the institute wasn’t really that. That wasn’t the highest context. And it was just really striking. Really striking.
Robyn Penman
I had the most extraordinary intimate experience working with Marit on her chapter for our book on A Cosmopolitan Sensibility. In some ways her chapter title captured her remarkable qualities, “The art of holding incompleteness and complexity with a cosmopolitan sensibility”. Marit practiced this art with everyone and, if you have read this far, you will appreciate how extraordinarily well she did it, how much she gave us in the doing, and how much we loved her for her gracious giving. Perhaps the ending of her chapter says it all:
To practice a cosmopolitan sensibility is the art of recognizing beauty in what is broken. Not to mend, rather to transcend. To transcend is to be present, with love, compassion and kindness, to what is in the chaotic, complex and beautiful dance between inside and outside, and that thin layer of skin that divides us. Embracing now. “Look for the spaces that surround us every obstacle. Walk there.”
Rik Span
(warm noise & some secret sauce from the grooves beyond the graves)
blue light boogie
in the shades
where no one looks or listens
we keep on playing silence
not everything gets known
blood flows into and out of our hearts
to feed our bodies and souls
no time to pause
and we’re still in the flow
and there in the unknown stories
we can’t get lost
because we had found each other
long before
in even simpler language:
Love ya
(and through your grace : goes for the whole band on board, we know we jam to the same heartbeat)
Rik
Soundtrack: Blue Light Boogie
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHAYpDEcM3Q
Taj Mahal (album Dancing The Blues)
Ilene continues
I would certainly say my life is better for knowing Marit, and the things I have learned about how to position myself in conversations—with grace, peacefulness, calmness and patience is something that I’ve observed and will incorporate into all my tricky moments.
This is about an attitude of preparedness before you go into a conversation and the posture of tranquility captured Marit so beautifully. It is about taking a breath, calming your body, preparing your mind, and going into a conversation with potential appreciation. It is a beautiful description of Marit — a serene calmness that’s actually infectious.
More than one person used the term “infectious.”
When I was thinking about Marit, I think about someone that glides with calmness and sereneness —like a head teacher in my school I always imagined was on roller skates because she seemed to seamlessly glide across the room.
I think there was something about the way she approached her life, and the way she approached relationships, that embodied this CMM notion of appreciation—seeing these wonderful moments, these moments of grace. That’s what she represented for me.
The CMM Institute is poorer without her, so we have to make sure that she’s always there.
Marit and I would meet on Zoom regularly, and she gave me permission to record our Zooms. As I revisited some of those conversations, I echo the essence of inquiry that Marit modeled. These questions emerged:
- How do we listen?
- How do you listen differently?
- How do you listen differently when you trust somebody?
- How do we make more trust in the world?
Towards the end, Marit wrote to the CMM community
“I AM strong and I do love life and I have so many meaningful conversations and ideas and feel so heard and loved (amongst others, by you lot)—I am carried in the most remarkable way throughout this journey! Thank you for all your loving thoughts and prayers that you keep sending my way. They continue to be part of that boat I am resting in, or that fish-net that catches me when I lean back and allow love to treat my beaten body and spirited and hurting soul.
“It is kind of strange, throwing out old notes and teachings and presentations and inspirations that I have collected over the years, thinking they may come to use again, or I will write something or whatever. I am down to killing my darlings now. A slow process of grief and relief; that too. Both-and. And for sure—my notes are of no interest or importance to anyone else. In many ways it feels like shedding old and no-longer-usable stuff. It is time. They have done their work. Knowledge and competence is always a process of being in development and renewal anyway, isn’t it? It is whether we are able to apply that knowledge and those competencies here and now—in our daily lives—that matters. What is now left are circles in water and the impact of butterfly wings on the other side of the world. This idea fills my imagination with awe and wonder and gratitude for having been granted the gift of a human body, spirit and soul for so many years already!”
Your butterfly wings are felt here. We love you we miss you and the story continues….
This dedication punctuates a moment — a turning point in the stories we will continue to tell about Marit. Like the ripples she created in our personal and professional lives, her impact endures in the relationships she nurtured and the values she embodied.
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