Page 94 of The Session

“Is this Jean-Pierre Allard?”

“May I ask who’s speaking?” Allard replied.

“My name is Mark Greenley. I’m working with Summit Strategies, and I wanted to talk to you.”

“I’m not in a financial position to take another course right now. I’m sorry. Have a good day,” Allard replied.

“No, no,” Mark said quickly. “I’m not trying to sell you anything. I’m looking at your manuscript and wanted to talk to you about it.”

“If you’re an attorney,” Allard said, “please understand that I only made three copies: one for myself, one I sent to you, and one I gave to a friend. I had no economic interest in it. And if you’re thinking about trying to sue me, you’ll find that would be a waste of everyone’s time. Now, thank you. I have to go.”

“No, no. I’m not a lawyer. I liked it. I’m enjoying reading it. I wanted to talk to you about it,” Mark pleaded.

“Really?”

“Absolutely. I’m sitting here getting ready to take the Supernova exam and thumbing through this and wishing you were my tutor instead,” he explained.

“I appreciate that, Mr. Greenley. I’ve spent a lot of time with the material, trying to find the best ways to teach it.”

“So you actually teach it?”

“I did for many years. I incorporated it into my classroom. I had the highest graduation rate of any instructor in Port-au-Prince. I was quite proud of that. My students have gone on to study abroad at some of the most prestigious schools around the world, and I still talk to them.”

“That’s impressive,” Mark said, flipping through the stack of Summit Strategies publications sitting on the table. “So you think there is some value here?”

“I think Arnold Feingold is a brilliant man, and I think Max Lightman is very clever. I also think they’ve produced quite a lot—perhaps more than they actually had ideas for,” Allard said.

“Some people see what they created as a cult,” Mark probed.

“Who did you say you are?” Allard asked.

“Mark Greenley. I’m new to all this and trying to figure out what I think about it.”

Mark didn’t feel comfortable telling Allard who his father was, because that would bring up more assumptions and questions than he was prepared to deal with.

“I’ve thought a lot about that myself. I’ve never owned Tupperware, but I’m sure it was a pretty good product. The same for Amway. At least some of their products had to be good. And the people selling Amway and Tupperware were great. With Summit, I think there’s some value to what’s being sold, but to be quite honest, I haven’t been as impressed with the people selling it.”

“But there’s value there?” Mark asked.

“For most people, their education stops at eighteen, and for those who go on to college or get doctorates, it becomes very specialized. But if you think back to some of the most important lessons we learned as children on the playground in kindergarten, it wasn’t just math and reading. It was sharing, communication, and controlling our emotions. I think these are lessons we need to continue to learn, and I believe that’s what Mr. Lightman and Dr. Feingold understood. It’s not just that we should continue to learn how to be better people and have better communication skills; we should want to. When I look at my nieces as they watch TikTok and YouTube, it’s not just for makeup and gossip, as they call it—they’re trying to find out how to function as humans, trying to make sense of the world, and I don’t think all the answers they’re getting are particularly good. I would at least say that Feingold and Lightman were better than average, and the packaging was quite good,” Allard concluded.

“I was just in Haiti and a friend gave me the manuscript. Did the other one find its way to Summit?” Mark asked.

Allard gave a small laugh. “I used to go to their conferences quite regularly and gave the manuscript to someone there I thought I trusted. When I followed up, they said there wasn’t much interest. But then, a year later, one of my students showed me a textbook Summit Strategies had released with most of my work in it. I was a bit upset about it . . . but it occurred to me that I had been making use of their material, so I couldn’t complain too much.”

“That’s rough.”

Allard laughed again. “You could say I became a little less enthusiastic about Lightman and his people after that.”

“Well, I’m sorry to hear it,” Mark said.

“It is what it is, but as far as I know, the textbook wasn’t that successful. It needed to be more than that, and I don’t think they fully understood what I was trying to put into place.”

“And what was that?”

“Lightman made a point, and I agree with it. It’s not enough that you repeat something to somebody three times for them to get it; they have to think about it five times,” Allard explained. “First, you have to create a need for it, which will get them interested. Then you have to give them a reason for it, then make sure they understand the need. Later, you need to check that they still retain it, and finally, you need to make it important to them. But you can’t do all of that in the classroom—that’s what the activities are for, as part of something bigger. What I wanted to do was provide materials in every school, create programs for radio and television, and have the lessons follow the students, perhaps getting their parents to talk about them, to make it an experience that lasts beyond the school bell ringing.”

“Interesting,” Mark said.