Thanksgiving in Bhutan: Happiness, Deathlessness & Hope

Thanksgiving in Bhutan: Happiness, Deathlessness & Hope

 

Thanksgiving morning in Thimphu I awoke to the news of the violence Mumbai. Just hours before the terrorist attacks took place I was speaking with Bhutanese youth from radio station Kuzoo about how the world crises we face present us with an opportunity to move towards a new consciousness where we are more connected and teachers have a crucial role to play and must be filled with optimism. The magnitude and scale of the attacks in Mumbai is shocking and it makes my heart ache but I have to remind myself that the best thing about impermanence is that it gives me hope that things can be better. When I go to school tomorrow morning and see my students for the first time since the attacks all I can do is tell them that the more misguided the more compassion we have to have—the terrorists are victims too and we must not lose faith in humanity and continue to have hope.

 

I traveled to Bhutan to give a presentation on Educational Practice at the Fourth Annual Gross National Happiness Conference. More than thirty years ago, the Fourth King, His Majesty Jigme Singye Wangchuk, felt that his country’s success should be evaluated by the degree to which its citizens are happy. Essentially, gross national happiness (GNH) is more important than gross national product (GNP). The four “pillars” of GNH include: environmental conservation, socio-economic development, preservation and promotion of cultural heritage and good governance.

 

I would be lying if I said that Gross National Happiness is alive and kicking in Bhutan but I would also be lying if I said it was just a catch phrase to attract foreign tourists. The truth is most Bhutanese are unfamiliar with GNH even though it is grounded in Buddhist philosophy and Bhutanese culture. Some of the researchers at the Center for Bhutan Studies (the organizers of the conference) told me that even though many Bhutanese are unfamiliar with GNH it doesn’t matter because the majority of them live the values embedded in GNH. Regardless, GNH as an actual policy hasn’t really been operationalized since the King first espoused the idea.

 

The first GNH conference was held in Bhutan in 2004 and it focused on the purpose and meaning of life. Since then, two additional conferences have been held, one in Canada and another in Thailand. Close to 80 researchers and presenters from more than 25 countries gathered in Thimphu for a multi-layered discourse centered on the theme of “Practice and Measurement” and translating GNH into real policy. The idea is that if you can’t measure it then it doesn’t exist so a bulk of the conference involved economists going over indicators and indexes to measure and account for well-being. But “happiness” and “well-being” are elusive, complex phenomena and it seemed that any attempt to quantify them would be imperfect. Still, a lot is being done in this field. In November of 2007 the European Council held “Beyond GDP” and Nicholas Sarkozy has commissioned Amartya Sen and Joseph Stiglitz to measure “quality of life” and their report will come out in April of 2009. Last Spring, I read a book by Richard Layard, an economist and Professor at the London School of Economics entitled “Happiness as Science” and even though I can see how he isn’t well received in academic circles he has done a lot of work advising the UK government.

 

My contribution to the conference focused on GNH as practice. It is crucial to focus on measurement but I feel that one of the dangers in all of this quantification is that the actual practice can be lost. I shared how as a teacher, inspired by the values embedded in GNH, I attempted to practice them in the classroom through creating educational activities that promote GNH philosophy. In the education portion of the conference I was actually the only presenter that had ever taught in a K-12 classroom. It reminded me of my experience when I was interning at UNESCO’s International Bureau of Education last summer in Geneva. IBE basically advises countries on what to teach and how to teach yet none of the researchers had ever actually taught! I showed the films my students have made for “Project Happiness,” lesson plans I’ve crafted on how ethics relates to happiness and student work. Education is much more than imparting knowledge and skills and the values embedded in Gross National Happiness can promote an ethical, ecological outlook that has the potential to make our world a better place for all its inhabitants. The values of compassion, patience, tolerance, forgiveness, contentment, harmony and social responsibility must be taught in schools and modeled by teachers and administration must make this a priority. Much to my surprise the presentation went better than I could have ever expected and it has rippled out in ways I never imagined and it seems like it will continue to ripple. I have so much more to learn and honestly have no idea of what I’m doing most of the time but for some reason mindful educational development consultants came to speak to me, Bhutanese youth interviewed me for their local radio station, and educators from all over the world want to start dialoging on how we can translate GNH into a classroom practice.  Personally, I think it has to start with training teachers. I don’t know where this all will lead but I’ve learned that it is best not to ask questions and just sit back and enjoy the ride. You just never know where life will take you!  

 

This fall, Bhutan celebrates 100 years of monarchy with the coronation of the fifth King. His Majesty King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuk is exactly 12 days older than me. The foreign delegates to the conference were invited to a lunch at the Royal Banquet Hall given by the King. Each one of us was formally presented to the King and then we all sat down to lunch. Maybe it was because I was wearing a bright orange Indian outfit but much to my surprise (and everyone else’s envy) the King sat in the seat right next to me! I have to admit I was nervous at first but he was so gracious and spoke to me at great length about education in Bhutan. He said that it was very important for teachers to give individualized attention and know that each child is different. I asked him how Bhutan can modernize its educational system without compromising local wisdom. I also asked him about the conflict I see with Western educational models that stress the individual and how this directly conflicts with the Buddhist teaching of no-self which is an issue for Bhutan’s majority Buddhist population. He didn’t have a clear answer to my questions and said that education is very important and that these are critical questions that the Bhutanese government had to address. Initially, curriculum was imported from India just to get something out there and thankfully the government is currently in the process of revamping curriculum. The King spent one year at Wheaton College in Massachusetts but they asked him to leave because he didn’t perform well academically. He also spent a year at Oxford but he has no formal degree. But he doesn’t need a degree, he needs to learn how to be King and it seems as if his people love him—I’ve never seen anything like it! When I asked him if he saw himself as a global promoter of GNH he told me that he just wants to travel around his country and really get to know his people and he doesn’t see himself traveling abroad much in the next few years. During my short time in Bhutan I experienced the deep love most Bhutanese citizens have for both their King and their country. I have a Bhutanese student in New Delhi and he always tells me that he cannot wait to return to Bhutan. Many Bhutanese I spoke with that spent time studying outside of Bhutan told me how much they missed their country when they were away.

 

Last Spring, this tiny Himalayan nation with a population of about 650,000 became the world’s youngest democracy. The current King’s father who was also universally loved by most of his people decreed the drafting of a constitution and the creation of a democracy. In the past decade the fourth King began stepping back from decision making positions and in November of 2001 commanded the drafting of a Constitution. The construction of the constitution was absolutely fascinating! Constitutions of other countries were studied by the Constitution Drafting Committee and His Majesty the King discussed the draft with a representative of every Bhutanese family in this country the size of Switzerland. Still, many academics feel that Bhutan is only a democracy in name and there is a Nepali minority that doesn’t seem to have much of a voice along with non-Buddhists.  Even so, I spoke with a few Nepali-Bhutanese that are from the southern part of the country and all of them still shared in their love for Bhutan. Bhutan is a complex place and in my week here I’ve only scratched the surface. 

 

Exactly two weeks before I came to Bhutan I attended dharma teachings with Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche (the Bhutanese Lama, writer and film maker responsible for “The Cup” and “Travelers and Magicians”). When the teachings ended I told him I was traveling to Bhutan for the GNH conference and he shared his skepticism about GNH with me. In Bhutan I had the chance to speak with Sonam Kinga, a member of the National Council and the actor who plays the monk in “Travelers and Magicians” and he shared some of Khyentse Norbu’s sentiments. I met a young Bhutanese woman whose teacher is Khyentse Norbu and she told me that he wanted the Center for Bhutan Studies which is headed by a very sharp gentleman, Dasho Karma Ura, to organize a GNH conference just for monks. I think this would be an excellent idea because the monks could really play more of an engaged role in society, the type of role my beloved teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh, advocates. An Oxford trained Western economist that closely advises the Bhutanese government told me that there are plans to have monks work as school teachers and the monks are beginning to recognize the need to espouse human values that are not so Buddhist specific.

 

The Prime Minister, Lyonchhen Jigmi Y Thinley, gave the keynote address at the conference and he posed some challenging questions in his opening remarks: “How does one go about persuading people to adopt a new ethical paradigm that rejects consumerism? Is it enough for us to know how to measure happiness and to hope that this will influence policy making? How do we as academics, thinkers, scientists, leaders and concerned citizens change our own way of life and behavior?” I don’t have any clear answers to the Prime Minister’s questions but I know that change can only occur when we begin asking the right questions and change must begin with ourselves. Clearly, the old way hasn’t served our society well—we are faced with numerous crisis (food, financial, fuel, environmental etc.) Next year’s conference will be in Southern Brazil, from November 5-9. The website www.grossnationalhappiness.com was launched in Bhutan during the conference. If I am able to attend it will be great to see all of my Brazilian friends! Between now and then I hope there will be more answers to some of the Prime Minister’s questions.

 

It is important not to romanticize GNH. Like any place Bhutan has many problems and in my week here I haven’t even begun to tackle the complexity of issues this country faces. Many rural Bhutanese want to move to Thimphu because materially speaking it is better off and this shows a complete absence of GNH. Annually, Thimphu residents earn an average of Nu. 320,000 (47 = about $1 USD) compared to Nu. 20,000 in Wangduephodrang.

 

In his closing address, the editor of Bhutan’s National Newspaper, Kuensel, Kinley Dorji said: “GNH must be radically reinterpreted as a responsibility. Gross National Happiness is not a promise of happiness. Happiness is an individual pursuit. GNH is a mandate of the state, a responsibility of the government, to create the right environment for our citizens to seek happiness…For Bhutan democracy is not the goal. It is a path to good governance which is a pillar of Gross National Happiness…but where do democracy and GNH meet? …For Bhutan, GNH must be the skillful means of survival.”  Discussing where democracy and GNH meet is a crucial conversation that needs to take place. There are talks about gathering the world’s top thinkers on this subject in the next year.

 

Both during and after the conference I was able to do some sight seeing and as usual tried to learn as much as I could. If I had the time and energy this email would be 100 pages long but I’m composing it on my flight home just so I don’t forget the essence of what I’ve experienced in the past week. Bhutan was first opened up to tourists in 1961 and its early history is steeped in Buddhist tradition. The country is known as “Druk Yul” which means “land of the thunder dragon,” to its inhabitants since the 13th century. The official language is Dzongkha which is similar to Tibetan (though they fought wars with the Tibetans in the past).  Not too far from the beautiful dzong (fort-monastery) where the lovely film “Little Buddha” was shot there is a path that leads to Tibet and takes only one day. The people call themselves Drukpa, and their religion is the Drukpa Kagyupa lineage of Mahayana Buddhism. 

 

I visited many dzongs (there are 2,007 in the country) including the famous Tiger’s Nest, also known as Taktshang, where Padma Sambhava is said to have flown to the site of the monastery on the back of a tigress. He then meditated in a cave there for three months. The dzong is perched on the side of a cliff, 900m above the Paro Valley. The original dzong was destroyed in a fire in 1998 and was rebuilt only a few years back. The climb up is breathtaking and I spent most of my time climbing to the dzong chanting the mantras for Padma Sambhava which I learned this summer from the nuns I taught English to in Ladakh. Well, the cave in which Padma Sambhava meditated is still in tact and luckily I was able to just sit and meditate there for quite some time and receive a blessed necklace which I am wearing right now with Padma Sambhava’s picture on it from one of the monks.

 

There is a small meditation hall I was able to sit in where one of his consorts, Yeshe Tsogyal, practiced. Speaking of female dharma practitioners I unfortunately was unable to make it to Bumthang where a spiritual institute, the Pema Choling Anam Shaydra, seeks to empower anims (nuns). I was pleasantly pleased with the confidence Bhutanese women seemed to exude. The Bhutanese women I spoke to told me there is no such thing as dowry in Bhutan, no arranged marriages and women were encouraged to be educated. While this is refreshing news, in a documentary on Bhutan entitled, “The Middle Path” Kuensel Editor, Kinley Dorji, said that in the past an attractive Bhutanese woman was one who was a good worker and a good mother but since television was introduced to Bhutanese society many young Bhutanese girls think they are fat and unattractive if they don’t look like the women on TV. (One of the popular cartoon characters in Bhutan is a young girl named Meena!) There was a lot of discussion about how TV has adversely affected society since it only came to Bhutan in 1999. The Fourth King has multiple wives and polygamy is still practiced in Bhutan. I asked a young woman about polygamy and she just laughed and said with a smile, “It’s no big deal and it just teaches you not to take life to seriously.” This is an attitude we could all learn from time to time!

 

I came to Bhutan with the Middle School Principal at the American Embassy School, Dr. Barbara Sirotin (Barb is amazing, she was a former Superintendent in a few districts in the US and former Principal at the International School in Bangkok) and the Coordinator of our Indian Studies Program, Sharon Lowen (Sharon is one of India’s most famous classical Indian dancers and those of you that live in Delhi see her in the social pages every week). Barbara, Sharon and I chaired the Peace & Activism Task Force I launched at the American Embassy School last year and they have been great supporters of my commitment to promote an ethical, ecological, humanistic approach to education and all of my crazy ideas. Sharon also brought her 92 year old mother with us who is just amazing. I now have a “Bubbie” (I think that means grandma in Yiddish) to add to my global, spiritual family! I really love spending time with dynamic elders because they have so much to teach me, are great role models and mentors and they pass on such great life advice. Some of my favorite advice from this trip included: “Don’t be afraid to jump without a parachute.” “Don’t be bitter because only you suffer.” “Don’t trade the now for security in the future.” I also met so many wonderful, incredibly interesting individuals at the conference I know I will continue to stay in touch with.

 

At 28, I was the youngest foreign presenter at the conference and as crazy as it sounds I’ve spent most of my time in Bhutan with my “Bubbie,” Sharon’s mother. At 92, Ethel Lowen just might be the most amazing woman I’ve ever met. I’ve learned more from Ethel in the past eight days than I learned from anyone in my entire life and I can only hope to emulate her unique zest for life and love of learning as I age. My second day in Bhutan I actually found my first white hair and before meeting Ethel I may have pulled it out but instead I embraced it and combed it in front instead of hiding it behind the rest of my hair. In a lovely piece on “Dynamic Aging” she discusses what she learned about mindfulness from my beloved teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh. Much of what she writes incorporates the attitude necessary in order to live the values of GNH.

 

Ethel writes: “My way has been awareness of the connectedness of the human race, shared understanding of the joy and brevity of our trip on the planet. I have followed this mantra:  to not harm anymore, to not harm the planet, to not allow oneself to be harmed. The sentient state of awareness I first learned in New Delhi, at IIC (the Indian International Centre), during a lecture in the garden by Thich Nhat Hanh, a Vietnamese Buddhist monk. His simple lesson involved a huge basket of oranges brought in and distributed to the men and women in the group. The questioning began: How did these oranges get here?  Who planted their seeds? Who watered them? Who plucked them? How did they get to the city? Which hands passed them on and on till it reached our hands? How many journeys has this orange taken before it was peeled and eaten? How does a tiny seed grow and eventually fuse with our bodies and our histories? Throughout our lives we will eat many oranges. As a child we may experience the delight of the newness of its taste. We may not understand how it became an orange but we can enjoy it. As we grow into maturity, we can lose this awe and delight if we are not mindful of what we are doing. We must bring that orange back into focus again. And how do we shut out all of the noise of our daily lives while eating this orange? We hold it in our hands, and remember its history; focus on what connects us to the human experience of growing and eating oranges. We use this simple act of peeling and tasting a sweet slice of an orange, as a way of remembering that we are human. Like this orange, we are a part of a life cycle, and we pass through many hands and hearts to become who we are. And if we can do this with a simple orange, perhaps we can learn to do this in other areas of our lives, increasing the joy and peace obtained by the simple acts in life. And if we do this often enough, then the very last orange we eat in this life, will be the very sweetest, ripest, and will fill us with the greatest contentment as we pass pieces of it to the child sitting beside us, taking a first bite of life.”

 

Two months ago, at a retreat in Dehradun, my dear teacher (Thich Nhat Hanh) spoke in a very liberating way about “deathlessness”. He said: “I will never die. I see my continuation in my students, in my books, in the trees and in all of nature and humanity.” A few days after this retreat in Dehradun, he gave an inspiring talk at Gandhi Smriti on the eve of Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday. He spoke about how we must strive to see the continuation of Gandhi in each of us and notice his presence in all aspects of life. Doing this will inspire us and give us hope. I’m so very thankful for this time in Bhutan, it has been such a sacred gift because amidst all of the horrific violence that has occurred in Mumbai. I’ve been able to see the “continuation,” the “deathlessness” of Gandhi here and it gives me hope. GNH echoes much of what Gandhi stood for and even though they have a long way to go it seems as if the Bhutanese government is committed to a path that seems very much in line with Gandhian ideals.

 

Bhutan is a nation steeped in Tantric Buddhism. When I was visiting Tiger’s Nest I noticed on the altar that offerings of whisky and wine were made. I asked the monk why alcohol was being offered (even though having studied some Tantra I knew why) and he said that when alcohol is offered to a Bodhisattva a Bodhisattva can transform it into nectar. Tantra is all about transformation so it seems only fitting that this tiny Himalayan nation can inspire us with a philosophy to transform our own lives and as result transform the world.

 

Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings continuously remind me that there are always conditions of happiness even in times of great tragedy. In fact, in these times of despair people reach out for no reason. Seeing my Indian features many Bhutanese have reached out to me, giving their condolences for the atrocious violence that has occurred in my ancestral homeland.

 

No matter what we must have courageous spirits. Maybe I’m too idealistic (I guess that’s why I’m a school teacher) but I’m not going to stop believing that things can get better.  So, as we deal with India’s own 9/11 let us remember Gandhiji and his commitment to peace. May we look for his continuation in others but most importantly within ourselves. Like Bodhisattvas may we take the pain we feel about the bloodshed in Mumbai and transform it into compassion and do whatever we can to promote peace and happiness and partake in acts of kindness.

 

Tomorrow morning at 8:35 am New Delhi time we will hold a moment of silence for the victims in Mumbai. I will then lead my students through a compassion meditation. Please join in and share in our prayers.

 

On Tuesday evening, December 2nd, an embodiment of peace and Gandhian ideals, Satish Kumar, will be speaking at the American Embassy School at 7pm. He will also be meeting with High School students in the afternoon. If you need more information about this event just send me an email or call me at AES. Gene Harrell and I are organizing his visit.

 

In Peace and Love,

 

Meena

 

“If we are peaceful, if we are happy, we can blossom like a flower, and everyone in our family, our entire society, will benefit from our peace.”- Thich Nhat Hanh

 

 

 

Why I Love My Job…

Dear Ms. Srinivasan,
Thank you for the gust of fresh air I so sorely needed during these last six months. I can’t quite believe that time has gone ahead of me. I am currently in a strange limbo, where nothing could be real, but is so vast that I couldn’t possibly have imagined any of it. How are you? Ladakh and England sounded amazing, and I felt like I had gone there myself, after reading your emails. I’m living in Sri Lanka right now, and I’m going to the British School in Colombo. When I think about who I was in June, I’m amazed that I could have decided to take charge of the future so meticulously. We are still staying in our apartment in Colombo, which is tiny. My father is a Consultant for NGOs and is working with CARE Colombo at the moment, and will soon join Oxfam, because the lifestyle in Kenya wasn’t appropriate for a family. Rachel is trying to bridge the enormous gap between AES and the British School, since this is her final year. She’s thinking about taking a gap year, has to learn several new subjects in the next four months, but is handling life so admirably. Looking back, it’s clear that New Delhi prepared us to view the world through rose-tinted glasses; the kind that take you through life with so positive an outlook that you can’t help but embrace all adversity as part of the grand experience the world hands you. 
School here is lovely, but the lack of resources, compared to AES, is explicit. We have to sign up for all extra-curriculars outside school, have to use the British Council library, and couldn’t dream of having access to relief organizations through which students can do service. Teachers are very different. The most interesting is definitely Mr. Leridon. He’s French, and his accent is delightfully stereotypical. He went to Boston University, then Harvard, Yale, Tufts, Oxford, and the University of Paris. He is the first insane person I’ve ever met. He always imagines he’s Napoleon (which I don’t find objectionable, since I find it’s useful to pretend I’m Cicero sometimes), and actually gives people detention or doesn’t grade their essays if they criticize France; something that is difficult, since we’re learning the French Revolution. He also told the geography teacher he loved her, but was very upset when she didn’t visit him in the ICU when he got dengue. He walks to school every day to reduce the greehouse effect, but uses the most shocking stacks of paper every class. The IB system is definitely a lot of work. What makes up for the huge shock to one’s system from changing lifestyles, is the wonderful sense of humanity and compassion that is present everywhere in Colombo. I love how engaged and committed the most random strangers are when you have a problem, or even just smile at them. All the people in my year are friendly. Most of them follow the Advanced-Level system, and think the IB is mad. They hardly have any homework, but have to study incredibly hard for the exams that are coming up. Even the IB students put sports and extra curriculars before academics, and classwork is hardly given any kind of priority. So many people here drink and do drugs! Although it doesn’t change their attitude towards me, I can’t relate to them with much depth. I miss everyone there. How is Challenge 20/20? It’s brilliant that you’re going to Bhutan. What exactly are the proceedings of the conferences there? My classmates didn’t really get Gross National Happiness, and the teachers think it’s a phony lax system of governance. But then again, society here has become so desensitized as a result of the ongoing war. Speaking of which, I experienced the first LTTE bombing last week! At midnight, there was a citywide blackout. The LTTE aircraft then flew over Colombo, and we saw them bomb several buildings. It’s bizarre and horrifying, the realization that you could be in one of those houses under attack. Our neighbors were oddly detached – all they did was complain about the powercut, and seemed oblivious to the nightmare of gunfire! It seems as though the war will only end with the death of the generation that is instilling this much agony and chaos. I don’t blame the LTTE for protesting against the ethnic discrimination that’s still present, but they are can only be considered terrorists, not freedom fighters, in how they’re responsible for the deaths of so many civilians. It’s easy to see why people here have let go of a value for life, though I could never do so.
The Alice Walker letter was amazingly significant, as I’m reading the Color Purple in English class right now. The narrative is painfully bare and heartrending in its honesty. The protagonist is so vulnerable that she makes you want to fight for her in any way you can. Of the president-elect, I want to say so much, and I feel so thrilled that the world, which has been inordinately ransacked and upturned, is being given the chance to correct itself. It feels almost wrong to pin that much hope on one person. What was the AES pre-election atmosphere like? I was also curious about the yogathon, and how Project Happiness worked.
For the moment, I still want a castle in France (Chateau de Chenonceau), and I want to be a historian, and to have written for TIME or Newsweek. I also want to speak Latin, and play tennis well, and be an orator. I’ve learned that there’s no such thing as a glass ceiling, or a paved way, but I can walk hand in hand with a brightness that I’ve created for myself.
With lots of love, 
(A Fabulous Student of Mine)

Project Happiness @ AES

Below is an email I just sent out to my friends…

Dear Friends,

I hope this message finds you in good spirits! I wanted to share some exciting news! The American Embassy School is one of five schools in the world participating in “Project Happiness” which is an initiative supported by the Dalai Lama Foundation that seeks to inspire and empower young people to create greater happiness in themselves and in the world. When you get a chance check out: http://projecthappiness.com/tv/en/school_109.jsp and click on media and you will be able to watch films my students have made about “happiness.” Last March, when His Holiness was giving his teachings in Delhi I was fortunate enough to meet with some Board Members of the Foundation and they told me about Project Happiness.

I leave for Bhutan on November 22nd to attend the Fourth Annual Gross National Happiness Conference in Thimpu and will be there for 8 days. At the conference, I’ll be sharing some of my thoughts on what an Ethical, Ecological, Spiritual approach to education may entail and some of the educational activities I’ve crafted for my students (including showing the films they have made for Project Happiness). I will send out a full report once the conference ends. Yay! Thanksgiving in Bhutan!

As usual, all in Delhi is both exciting and busy! Many of you know that Ven. Thich Nhat Hanh was in India for 37 days and I was lucky enough to spend close to 20 days in his presence including two life changing retreats (lots to share about this in the next months). Tomorrow we will have our first “Day of Mindfulness” since Thay’s visit at Teen Murti House (Nehru’s residence). This weekend Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche, the Bhutanese Lama, film maker and writer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khyentse_Norbu) will be giving a teaching and on Monday there will be a talk on how climate change is affecting the “Third Pole” with Dr. John Stanley, Dr. Vandana Siva and Mrs. Sunita Naraian (Rajiv Mehrotra will be moderating). I’m also very pleased to announce that on December 2^nd Satish Kumar will be visiting the American Embassy School and my colleague Gene and I have put together an exciting program—our students can’t wait to meet him and there will be an open event for adults in the evening. For more information just send me an email if you are not on my cultural event list. We are also very happy that our trip to take students from AES to Bija Vidya Peeth (http://www.navdanya.org/bija/index.htm) has been rescheduled for mid-February (it was cancelled in October due to all the bombings). I believe we might be the first student group to visit the farm/ecological learning center in Dehradun and my colleague Gene and I are very excited about this!  

I’ll be in Pune (Osho Ashram), Aurangabad, and Bodhgaya (two courses at the Roots Institute) from December 18 – January 5 and will hopefully see many of you before then. Below is a beautiful letter written by Alice Walker to Barack Obama. Our Democrats Abroad celebrations last week in Delhi were unforgettable and inspirational! Sending all of you love, light and warmth from New Delhi!

With All My Heart,

Meena

 

 

 

Open Letter to Barack Obama from Alice Walker

Nov. 5, 2008

 

 

Dear Brother Obama,

 

You have no idea, really, of how profound this moment is for us. Us being the black people of the Southern United States. You think you know, because you are thoughtful, and you have studied our history. But seeing you deliver the torch so many others before you carried, year after year, decade after decade, century after century, only to be struck down before igniting the flame of justice and of law, is almost more than the heart can bear. And yet, this observation is not intended to burden you, for you are of a different time, and, indeed, because of all the relay runners before you, North America is a different place. It is really only to say: Well done. We knew, through all the generations, that you were with us, in us, the best of the spirit of Africa and of the Americas. Knowing this, that you would actually appear, someday, was part of our strength. Seeing you take your rightful place, based solely on your wisdom, stamina and character, is a balm for the weary warriors of hope, previously only sung about.

 

I would advise you to remember that you did not create the disaster that the world is experiencing, and you alone are not responsible for bringing the world back to balance. A primary responsibility that you do have, however, is to cultivate happiness in your own life. To make a schedule that permits sufficient time of rest and play with your gorgeous wife and lovely daughters. And so on. One gathers that your family is large. We are used to seeing men in the White House soon become juiceless and as white-haired as the building; we notice their wives and children looking strained and stressed. They soon have smiles so lacking in joy that they remind us of scissors. This is no way to lead. Nor does your family deserve this fate. One way of thinking about all this is: It is so bad now that there is no excuse not to relax. From your happy, relaxed state, you can model real success, which is all that so many people in the world really want. They may buy endless cars and houses and furs and gobble up all the attention and space they can manage, or barely manage, but this is because it is not yet clear to them that success is truly an inside job. That it is within the reach of almost everyone.

 

I would further advise you not to take on other people’s enemies. Most damage that others do to us is out of fear, humiliation and pain. Those feelings occur in all of us, not just in those of us who profess a certain religious or racial devotion. We must learn actually not to have enemies, but only confused adversaries who are ourselves in disguise. It is understood by all that you are commander in chief of the United States and are sworn to protect our beloved country; this we understand, completely. However, as my mother used to say, quoting a Bible with which I often fought, “hate the sin, but love the sinner.” There must be no more crushing of whole communities, no more torture, no more dehumanizing as a means of ruling a people’s spirit. This has already happened to people of color, poor people, women, children. We see where this leads, where it has led.

 

A good model of how to “work with the enemy” internally is presented by the Dalai Lama, in his endless caretaking of his soul as he confronts the Chinese government that invaded Tibet. Because, finally, it is the soul that must be preserved, if one is to remain a credible leader. All else might be lost; but when the soul dies, the connection to earth, to peoples, to animals, to rivers, to mountain ranges, purple and majestic, also dies. And your smile, with which we watch you do gracious battle with unjust characterizations, distortions and lies, is that expression of healthy self-worth, spirit and soul, that, kept happy and free and relaxed, can find an answering smile in all of us, lighting our way, and brightening the world.

 

We are the ones we have been waiting for.

 

In Peace and Joy,

Alice Walker

Stream of Consciousness from Israel

Just got this from a dear friend…

The following is brief excerpt from a note I sent to a friend this morning – thought you might enjoy a little stream of consciouseness from Israel:
 
“a light rain is falling on Jerusalem carrying a tinge of cold contrasting to the sun of the Northern Galilee.  Driving by the Syrian border yesterday, a small, well-appointed chocolate factory is being operated by an Argentinian woman – on land in contention, chocolates . . .
 
breathing deeply, sometimes it is hard to supress a smile . . . . the contrasts between beauty and struggle, stillness and confusion . . . looked at broadly, a philosophical narrative of how all dissolves into a whole, and in deep stillness this truth is penetrating . . . traveling here one can feel an underlying anxiety and unsettleness at times . . . in the mountains, the ancient town of Safed is filled with artists . . . going through this village and discovering five centuries of contemplation, the ancient seat of kabbalitic practice, an open door with a wall of stillness powerfully pouring out as young men bow slowly as they silently recite scripture, in rapture . . . absorbed!”

Martian Child – Favorite Scene

I’ve always had a crush on John Cusack. I saw the beautiful film “Martian Child” last night. If you haven’t seen it you must. Here is the dialogue from my favorite scene where David (John Cusack) is talking to his adopted son Dennis:

“But right now, you and me here, put together entirely of atoms, sitting on this round rock with a core of liquid iron, held down by this force that seems to trouble you, called gravity, all the while spinning around the sun at 67,000 miles an hour and whizzing through the milky way at 600,000 miles an hour in a universe that very well may be chasing its own tail at the speed of light; And amidst all this frantic activity, fully cognizant of our own eminent demise – which is our own pretty way of saying we all know we’re gonna die – We reach out to one another. Sometimes for the sake of entity, sometimes for reasons you’re not old enough to understand yet, but a lot of the time we just reach out and expect nothing in return. Isn’t that strange? Isn’t that weird? Isn’t that weird enough?”

Hope, Inspiration and the Sacred in Southwest England

“We need a nobler economics that is not afraid to discuss spirit and conscience, moral purpose and the meaning of life, an economics that aims to educate and elevate people.” E.F. Schumacher

All of a sudden everything seems ripe in life and the past few weeks I’ve spent studying at Schumacher College (an International Center for Ecological Studies http://www.schumachercollege.org.uk/) with the founders of The Forum on Religion and Ecology, Professors John Grim and Mary Evelyn Tucker (http://www.environment.harvard.edu/religion/main.html), while living in the magical town of Totnes (http://totnes.transitionnetwork.org/) have been absolutely mind blowing! I’ve felt inspired before but never like this! My teachers, John and Mary, are the most brilliant, thoughtful and simply remarkable couple I have ever come across. We should all be so blessed to find partnership that is such a beautiful blend of the spirit and an engagement with ideas that matter. The two of them challenged my notions of “heart” in academia and the work they are doing at Yale (they both hold joint appointments at the Divinity School and the School of Forestry and Environmental Science) is something I didn’t expect to be happening in the Ivy League and it has reminded me of the dangers in making generalizations. They were married thirty years ago by their “Guru,” cultural historian/eco-theologian, Father Thomas Berry (see attached articles for more information about Berry and his ideas). They gifted me a copy of his book, “The Great Work” and Berry’s writing spoke to me like prophetic poetry, I can’t believe I never heard of him before! Mary is an exceptionally inquiring, fierce academic and John is a special combination of sharpness and sensitivity producing an unparalleled educational experience that both touched and transformed my mind, heart and soul. The entire Schumacher community shares in the belief that there is a sacredness to all life and being with fellow enthusiasts that get excited about ideas that have the potential to transform our world for the better created one of the most deeply profound, intellectually stimulating and truly magical experiences of my life. Wow!

Yes, our world is facing multiple crises but in the past weeks I’ve realized that these crises present an opportunity for us to really evolve and make changes that will enable us to be more creative, inventive and connected. What an exciting time to be alive! I believe that last week Al Gore called for the US to end its use of fossil fuels for electricity by 2018. Whether we want to believe it or not, climate change is going to really change things. The good news is that it will force us to become more community oriented (especially when it comes to our food consumption and the necessity to buy local) and all of my experiences have shown me that the lack of community and connection to our environment, fellow humans and non humans contribute to unhappiness and at the end of the day we all just want to be happy. So, instead of being depressed about the crises we face I’m actually very hopeful about us moving towards a new consciousness where we shift from an anthropocentric world-view towards an anthropocosmic way of being. Especially since there are so many amazing people out there that are really making a difference in the world and it is just so very inspiring.

I don’t know anything and have such a long way to go as an educator but in June a dear friend of mine sent me an email titled, “Potentiality vs. Action” and urged me to start synthesizing my readings and reflections and share them with the community so on Tuesday, August 12^th at 4pm in the Hall of Peace at the American Embassy School I hope to start a conversation about ecology, activism, ethics, nondual philosophy and education with anyone interested. I gave this presentation at Schumacher as well and will attempt to incorporate some of what I learned there. If you don’t have easy access to AES and can make it on August 12^th let me know and I will leave your names with the guards at Gate 2 so you can enter easily. There will be refreshments as well but I want to stress that this is a “work in progress.”

Gosh, I can’t believe how much I’ve learned and been exposed to in the past weeks—permaculture, appreciative inquiry, green faith, transition towns, community supported agriculture, gaia theory, holistic science and so, so much more. I’ve been introduced and have reconnected with the works of so many brilliant thinkers (James Lovelock, David Abram, Arne Ness and Pierre Tielhard de Chardin are just a few) and have met some of the most special change agents in the world (including Helena Norberg-Hodge whose book on Ladakh had a strong influence on me)! Even amidst the precarious state of our planet my heart remains filled with so much hope, my eyes are filled with tears of joy and I am just so very grateful to feel this unique sense of empowerment as we face the “great work” we have ahead of us.

Schumacher College was founded in the early 1990s by one of my mentors, Satish Kumar (http://www.schumachercollege.org.uk/staff/satish-kumar). The college runs numerous courses relating to the environment and sustainability and those who attend courses participate in cooking meals for all members of the college community, cleaning and gardening which gives the educational institution a Gandhian feel.  I first heard of the college after I met Satish-ji in November of 2006 in Delhi and I never thought that less than two years later I’d get a scholarship to study here. After meeting Satish-ji I read Schumacher’s essay “Buddhist Economics” right away and it really resonated with me and I discovered Resurgence magazine which embodies all I believe in. I couldn’t believe I never heard of Schumacher during my time in college and graduate school! Well, the college was named after EF Schumacher because he encompasses the ideals and values of the institution (http://www.schumacher.org.uk/about_efschumacher.htm). I have a copy of his seminal work, “Small is Beautiful, Economics as if People Mattered” if any of you want to borrow it. There is also a lot about him available on the web.

My time here has been so very special and I hope to return to Schumacher some day. I’m just now remembering that Ramu-ji once told me that he thought I would teach at Schumacher at some point in the future, crazy! Well, I’ve never been in an environment with so many like-minded people and even though we all come from different backgrounds it was like I found “my people”! I was the same age as the children of most of my course participants but we shared in a cross-generational bond that was so very special. Wow! It is like I found my tribe! It was so powerful to be in a space of individuals that simultaneously intellectualize and empathize with the goal of taking real action. The other members of the course are some of the most brilliant, interesting, compassionate individuals I ever met. Some of my classmates included one of the world’s leading etymologists and butterfly experts, a pioneer in Costa Rica’s eco-tourism, a South African Bishop, a Zoologist, the Head of an Australian Catholic Environmental Center, and one of the organizers of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution.  My classmates taught me so much and moved my heart in so many ways. In fact, one of my classmates introduced me to Genesis Farm (http://www.genesisfarm.org/) an Ecological learning center in New Jersey! This 63-year-old British woman wrote her dissertation on the Farm and Community Supported Agriculture. I can’t believe I never heard of the farm while I was growing up in New Jersey and look forward to visiting when I come the United States next summer, it will be my first trip to the USA in more than 3 years! I’ve visited so many ashrams, houses of dharma and spiritual communities in the world but at Schumacher I really felt at home.  They have the most amazing library and DVD/VHS collection—I really felt like a kid in a candy store! Some regard Schumacher as a place where academic types come to be awakened but I am VERY FAR from being an academic. I’m just a simple school teacher that loves learning and wants to make the most out of my time on earth and everyone else I met at Schumacher felt the same way—we don’t want to waste our lives. We all shared in feeling the sacredness of all life, this feeling has called us to action and this is why we all felt like soul mates regardless of age, nationality and spiritual/religious orientation. The staff at Schumacher instantly became part of my global spiritual family. I especially connected with the head chef. Aside from Pilot Baba, he is the only person I know to have actually camped out in a cave near Badri Nath in order to meet Babaji (those of you that have read Autobiography of a Yogi know who Babaji is).  I just loved spending time with him having satsang as we cooked in the kitchen. The food at Schumacher is all vegetarian and it is the tastiest, most delicious food I’ve eaten in my entire life! I definitely indulged a little too much…especially after a week in Turkey and Greece with my family where my main activity seemed to be eating!

Schumacher College is based in the Dartington Hall Estate which is owned by the Dartington Hall Trust. The Trust was founded in 1925 by Dorothy and Leonard Elmhirst. The couple was inspired by the work of the Indian poet, educationalist and social reformer, Rabindranath Tagore and they bought the Estate in order to revitalize this rural area by providing quality education, employment and cultural activities. While I was at Schumacher Dartington was hosting the annual “Way With Words Literature Festival” (http://www.wayswithwords.co.uk/festivals/dartington-hall-10). Karen Armstrong was among the many noted authors at the event! The Elmhirsts established the Dartington Hall School, one of the first progressive schools in the country, in which local children and children from a wide variety of countries and backgrounds were educated in an atmosphere of free inquiry. The school was closed in 1989 and at that time the Trust began plans to set up Schumacher College in the Old Postern. An absolutely amazing woman, Mary Bartlett, who has lived on the estate for more than 40 years gave us a tour of the gorgeous Dartington Hall gardens. Mary is a total renaissance woman—she authors children’s books, hosts a television show about biodynamic gardening, is a historian and at 62 she might be the most active, energetic, lively older woman I’ve ever met. I can only hope to have a similar zest for life when I am her age! The closest major town is Totnes which has a fascinating alternative culture. Totnes is the UK’s first transition town.  Transition towns are communities that work together to actively address the twin challenges of peak oil and climate change. I will speak more about Transition Towns on August 12^th.  Schumacher has bikes for its students and it felt so wonderful to be able to cycle all around town (especially since I almost got hit by a bus when I was cycling home from school in Delhi last fall and haven’t ridden my bicycle much since then). Shops in Totnes include organic clothing, vegetarian cuisine, many tea shops and a great market. They even have their own local currency, the Totnes Pound to help promote the local economy!

A three-hour walk from Schumacher there is a Center for Contemporary Buddhist Enquiry (http://www.sharphamtrust.org/pages.php?id=32) on a gorgeous vineyard in an area called Sharpham. When I was in Ladakh I met a Swiss woman that told me I had to try and track down John Peacock, a very well known Buddhist teacher, while I was in Totnes. Peacock often teaches at the Sharpham Centre for Contemporary Buddhist Enquiry but he actually lives in Birmingham. I managed to attend the Sharpham Trust’s annual picnic, met with the lead tutor there, Steve Palmer and attended a meditation session he led. Steve was a Tibetan Buddhist Monk for 17 years (he is now married) and we had such an unbelievably special discussion about “being happy with being more, not having more” and the relationship between sunyata and ahimsa. He also gave me some great advice about my interest in crafting an ethical, ecological, spiritual approach to education.  On my way to Sharpham I met two women also on their way to the picnic. One of the women was a blind devout Christian and we had such a beautiful chat about prayer (Ramu-ji often said, “praying deeply and with sincerity is not to play it safe, rather I think it helps us accept what is happening with greater insight”) and it was one of those moments where I was able to really understand an individual’s faith, but not necessarily their religion if that makes any sense.

When I arrived at Schumacher College the first person I saw was Satish-ji who greeted me with a warm hug. I was able to spend a lot of time with him which was very important to me since after Ramu-ji’s passing Satish-ji is the only person who I feel a strong connection to that really embodies everything I believe in. We talked about education and meaningful curriculum and I got to ask him some questions I had about grace, faith and peace as it relates to activism. I feel so blessed to know him. Satish-ji is in the process of trying to establish a Tagore Center at Schumacher.  He had many incredibly interesting visitors during my time at the college. I got to meet a close friend of his that now works at the Ford Foundation that actually used to teach Indian Studies at the American Embassy School more than 20 years ago!!!! We just couldn’t believe it when Satish-ji introduced us! I also met a dear friend of Satshi-ji’s, Bunker Roy (http://www.unesco.org/courier/2000_03/uk/dossier/txt02.htm) . Bunker founded the Barefoot College (http://www.barefootcollege.org/) a unique institution that encourages practical knowledge and the value of the village community. I am hoping to visit the college outside of Jaipur soon! The Delhi based artist whom many of you know, Shakti Maira, also gave a lovely talk about “beauty.” I found his talk especially interesting because “What is beauty?” is one of the essential questions of the 10^th grade History course I teach. Oh, just so you know, Satish-ji will be teaching a course at Navdanya’s farm in Dehradun in November and he will also speak at the American Embassy School again.

During my third night at Schumacher I attended a talk that was open to the town of Totnes given by Starhawk (http://www.starhawk.org/) one of the pioneers in contemporary earth-based spirituality and earth activist training. Before the talk began I said to myself I had to try and meet Helena Norberg-Hodge the author of “Ancient Futures, Learning from Ladakh” while I was in Totnes because the organization she founded, The International Society for Ecology and Culture (http://www.isec.org.uk/) is in Totnes. Towards the end of the talk the woman sitting behind me asked a question. When I turned around I noticed that the woman sitting next to her was Helena Norberg-Hodge!!! Can you believe it? She was sitting right behind me! When the talk ended I turned to Helena and said “Jullay.” We had a great chat about Ladakh, sustainability and education after Starhawk’s talk over chai and cookies. She was not supposed to be at the talk that night she was supposed to already be in Ladakh but her husband was having visa issues so her departure was delayed. She is also rarely in Totnes so it is quite a “coincidence” (Lex, the blind, devout Christian woman I met as I was walking to Sharpham would call coincidences “god-incidences”) that I met her while I was in the UK and I may see her again at the Gross National Happiness conference in Bhutan. The universe does seem to work in mysterious ways and my faith in Goethe’s words on commitment and providence  (http://www.goethesociety.org/pages/quotescom.html) only strengthened during my time at Schumacher. This quote is actually on the folder given to all course participants when they arrive!

The course I took was called “Sacred Activism.” In January not even a week after I returned from Bali I was having dinner with my dear friend Swati and she urged me to take a look at the courses being offered at Schumacher. That very night I went home and checked out the course offerings and when I looked at the title “Sacred Activism” I just knew I had to take this course. I don’t think I chose to be a teacher, teaching chose me if that makes any sense and to me teaching is not a job, it is a sacred task and I was in desperate need of a language to be able to articulate what this means and what I feel in my heart. The first week of my course was initially supposed to be taught by Andrew Harvey who I am dying to meet but at the last minute he pulled out and Starhawk stepped in.  I came to the first week with an open mind and no expectations and had never heard of Starhawk before but she taught me so much and I’ve been so steeped in Buddhist thought and nondual philosophy that it was good to be exposed to something new but at the same time complementary. I never heard of permaculture before and Starhawk primarily teaches permaculture courses.  I found the whole concept of permaculture absolutely fascinating.  She also gave me guidance on how to launch a direct action campaign which is something I haven’t done since I started a successful movement to get rid of styrofoam lunch trays when I was in the fifth grade.

I also connected with a very special scientist and deep ecology educator, Dr. Stephan Harding. (Rukmini, Stephan sends you a huge hug!) Stephan helped me re-discover my love for Gaia (the name the Ancient Greeks gave the Greek Goddess that personified the Earth). He has recently published a beautiful book, “Animate Earth” where he discusses the fact that the earth is alive and a self-regulating system. (See this lecture given by James Lovelock for more background on Gaia Theory http://www.unu.edu/unupress/lecture1.html) This probably isn’t anything new to many of us who regularly commune with nature but I had no idea there was a whole school of thought devoted to the idea that the Earth, Gaia is alive! Attached are some exercises from his book that I plan on using with my students so they can begin to “know” Gaia. Stephan has guest taught at the Rishi Valley (Krishnamurti inspired) school in India many times and I think our meeting is just another sign that I have to visit Rishi Valley! Well, I realized that like many of you I have most certainly been “Gaia-ed” (awakened to the fact that the Earth is alive) and this is why the deep ecology movement resonates with me. Meeting Stephan and being introduced to Gaia theory (see attached article for more information) has helped me have courage to be more vocal about “feeling” Gaia and all of her love. Only when we have deep affection and love for the Earth will we do our best to protect her and not look at nature in a utilitarian fashion. I have a LONG way to go—His Holiness reminds us to try our best to do as much as we can and I need to try A LOT harder.

Stephan writes, “If you have been trained, as I have been, to see the world as a machine and to see yourself as not much more than a thinking, emotionally detached data-collecting robot, then to personify the world in this way takes a great deal of courage. As I wrote his book, the unspoken scientific taboo against speaking of the world as a psyche exerted its influence on me and tried its best to make me write nothing more than straightforward popular science. A strange vulnerability, an insecurity, sometimes plagues me as I attempted to speak of the Earth and of the living beings that inhabit her not merely as objects, but as subjects, as feelingful beings, but in the end a still, small voice persuaded me of the urgency of the task. In quiet moments in my study, or outdoors, this deeper voice convinced me that the prospects are bleak unless we can once again relate to the Earth not as a thing or as a machine, but as a strange creature that improvises its own unfolding in the cosmos through the ongoing creativity of evolution and self-transformation. As you notice the tension between these different voices, I ask you to remember the difficulty of the task and to consider yourself a conspirator in the effort to find a new language for breathing life back into our experience of the Earth, who for the last 400 years has been treated as if she were a dead lump of rock with a few insignificant and rather irksome life forms and traditional cultures clinging to her ragged surface. And now the title of the book reveals its double meaning, for ‘animate’ is both an adjective and a verb. The adjective tells us that the Earth is animate—alive; the verb urges us to find ways of speaking and acting that allows us to continuously re-animate the Earth so that we bring her back to life as a sensitive and sentient Being—even, if you will, as a person in the widest and wildest sense of the word. It is time to rediscover Gaia, for Gaia is Earth personified.” (Animate Earth, Science, Intuition and Gaia,  p. 39)

We are moving towards mass extinction. I don’t know if we realize just how serious climate change and the ecological crisis we face is.  Science alone is not changing people. I’m not a Marxist but our economic growth model and capitalism is driving us to the edge. Until Martin Luther King’s prophetic, spiritual voice the civil rights movement did not have fire but he had a dream that things could be different. I’m not a scholar but economics, science and policy are not going to save us from our destructive selves. We need a different approach and it is crucial that we all have the courage to rediscover Gaia and breathe life back into our beautiful, blessed, beloved Mother Earth. I have hope that more of us will become awakened to the special, spiritual voice of nature. I dream that we move towards a new consciousness that births a greater sensibility about how we treat all of nature’s creations.

Thomas Berry writes that the “glory of the human has brought the desolation of the earth and the desolation of the earth is the destiny of the human.” This destiny, our “great work” is to “carry out the transition from a period of human devastation of the Earth to a period when humans would be present to the planet in a mutually beneficial manner.” I believe that educational institutions must play a crucial role in carrying out this “great work” and we must guide our students toward an intimate relationship with the Earth. We must teach our children that “the universe is a communion of subjects not a collection of objects.” If we do not at least make an earnest attempt to do this then I believe we have failed as educators.

In our final circle as I stood up to speak when it was my turn to give my closing remarks I was overcome with emotion and felt so grateful for being in the space of such special people. I tried to speak but I couldn’t say more than “thank you.” I started to cry and lost all composure. I was literally paralyzed and this has never happened to me in public before. But as I cried something magical happened. One by one, every single person in the room silently stood up, gathered around and held me. As I stood in the center of this sacred circle, crying like a child, the Bishop placed his hand on my head and we all prayed for strength to carry out this “great work” of protecting all of the Earth’s children:

To the children

To all the children

To the children who swim beneath

The waves of the sea, to those who live in

The soils of the Earth, to the children of the flowers

In the meadows and the trees in the forest, to

All those children who roam over the land

And the winged ones who fly with the winds,

To the human children too, that all the children

May go together into the future in the full

Diversity of their regional communities.

As I was being held by Christians, Agnostics, Atheists and those like myself that like to subscribe to “I just am” from all over the world as we sincerely prayed for everyone to realize the sacredness of all life Gaia “spoke.”  She said, “I love you. Together we are going to make it.”

I think Pierre Teilhard de Chardin once wrote something along the lines of: “If I lose my faith in God, if I lose my faith in Jesus, I will never lose my faith in the world.” Berry drew a lot of inspiration from the work of Teilhard de Chardin and writes, “We cannot doubt that we too have been given the intellectual vision, the spiritual insight, and even the physical resources we need for carrying out the transition that is demanded of these times.” We are entering a “moment of grace” and such moments “are privileged moments.”

How can we not have hope? 

With Love,

Meena

Sacred Activism Week One Notes

Schumacher College was established in 1991 and people from over 80 countries have come to take courses and the college is a part of the Dartington Hall Trust. EF Schumacher encompasses the values of the college. Education about living in a new way. Taking care of the environment you live in and making everyone feel like they belong.

What serves life will stand. What does not will fall. The power is in our hands. Love changes all.

Earth my body. Water my blood. Air my breathe. Fire my spirit.

Butterfly soup – Louis Armstrong (interdependence)

Sacred activism is to take action in the service of what we love most and we do it with the support of our own spiritual practice and community of spiritually inclined.

Spirit is that which gives the breath of life to everything we do just as our breath connects us to life spirituality connects us to everything else.

The word spirituality is taboo because it often implies religion, dogma, split from body, belief in things you cannot prove or a split between spirituality and engagement in the world.

Underlying oneness of the fabric of life

SATISH KUMAR EVENING TALK

Gandhiji is a sacred activist

Life is sacred, death is absence not the end

Everything present is sacred, sacred comes from sacrifice. Life sacrifices to maintain other life, food for other life. Life feeds life and sustains life. Tree sacrifices leaves for fertility, feeds soil so soil feeds roots. Life maintains life and this is why all life is sacred. Sacred activism is not diminishing or destroying our opponent or what we are opposing. Gandhi – without hating the sinner you can hate the sin. Maintain life and feed life. Nonviolent action is courageous and brave and you overcome fear. Salt march is an example of sacred activism. There is no “I’m right, your wrong.” MLK Jr. “I don’t have to like you but I love you.”

We are driven by fear (resources are running out) play on the fear, you have to be an environmentalist and the end is coming…doom and gloom this is not sacred activism. Sacred activism is when you arouse reverence, respect and love of nature. The earth is not our slave. The word nature comes from birth, natal = birth. Nature à birth. Whatever is born is nature. The moment we feel connectivity with all beings then we are involved in a shift towards sacred activism. From ownership we must shift to relationship. Nature does not belong to us, we belong to nature. Anthropocentricà intrinsic value, tree is not good because it gives you something it is good because it is a tree. No separation between human and non human life. Because we are all nature we are all born. Francis Bacon – separates us from nature. All living beings have equal value. Rivers, trees, forests, humans are equal. Nonviolence to nature. Respect for animals and nonhuman. Rocks are just essential for well being for earth as animals (mountains). Rocks are alive and nature spirit in the same way there is active spirit. Rocks and mountains have a geological time scale but they are born. Cycle of life is eternal. Form transforms but does not disexist. Nothing is unchanging

Intimate = atman (one moment)

Ultimate = paramatman (time span)

Atman is web of relationships of paramatman, microcosm of macrocosm

Self is made of paramatman, elements of time and consciousness

Existing only in relation, there is no intimate without the ultimate

Love intimate self but you can only love intimate self if you love the ultimate which is entire existence

Nondual dance between the intimate and the ultimate

Individual = indivisible which is not separate

Everything is related , problem not with individual but with individualism (ism)

All things in the universe have their place with in the dance of right proportion and balance

Education = knowledge and experience

Rainbow warrior it all comes down to attitude

Bertrand Russell – Nuclear Protest

Alliance for a new humanity – Deepak Chopra

CAT in Wales, center for technology

Starhawk – earth based spirituality, earth activist training

Story of the earth we would be in the melodrama, exciting moment to be alive. Facing multiple crisis. Jim Hansen leading climate change scientist…beyond the point of no return. Not hopeless and just give up. We have a very short window of opportunity. Comfort ourselves as we slide into the apocalypse “I told you so.”

What are we going to do? Nuclear energy is not a good solution for climate change. Where do we find hope, inspiration and help in the moment of crisis? We find it in deep connection with the earth. Deep scientific and spiritual idea that the earth is alive, conscious. We are a part of the fabric of earth life.  Move into the realms of faith…scientists will not allow placing consciousness into earth if it isn’t part of the universe then where did it come from? Nature will survive but we wont…

Crisis allows us to evolve and spur into different kinds of life to allow us to be more creative, inventive and connected. Look to the sun (solar power) network and cooperate.  Look to the four elements for climate change. Air = change our thinking need to look at relationships and patterns. Wind power (erei, energy return on energy invested) conservation, rebuilding community and reconnecting communities. More food that nourishes our body. Ore time to build relationships. More time to sing and deepen our connection to the earth.

As the crickets soft autumn hum is to us so are we to the trees as are they to the rocks and hills – Gary Snyder

We are the rising sun, we are the change, we are the ones we are waiting for, we are dawning.

Inner compass = love, serenity, passion, follow your bliss.

Edge of chaos – bar name

Genesis farms

My heart is moved by all I cannot save. So much has been destroyed. I have to cast my lot with those who age after age perversely with a extraordinary power reconstitute the world.  – Adrienne Rich

Gaia – The Earth as a living personality imbued with personality

Animate Earth, the earth has a soul

The state of the Earth

Drivers of Global change

Endless lust for economic growth is destroying us

Global biodiversity is very important for maintaining a climate

Habitat fragmentation is the main driver of destruction of the world

We are bringing about the fastest and most severe 6 greatest extinction

Hockey sticks climate graph

A crisis of world view, there is something wrong with the way we see the world, there has to be otherwise we wouldn’t be waging a war on nature

The scientific revolution – a few mistakes were made

“the book of the universe is written in the language of mathematics.” – Galileo, all that counts is what can be quantified. 1564-1642

there are other ways of knowing the world that are equally as valid.

I have described the earth and the whole visible universe in the manner of a machine – Descartes 1596-1650 there is no soul in nature, before Descartes nature had a soul and was intelligent only soul is in humans and it is rational and mathematical spit it up in its parts to understand

Francis Bacon – we should establish and extend power and dominion of the human race itself over the universe. Re integrate this with wisdom

The world is a dead machine and we can exploit it, Descartes struck a deal with the theologians. You have your souls science will take matter

Anima Mundi = the soul of the world, it is latin but formulated by the greeks

Psyche cosmo – plato

 The world is a mind, to know your psyche go inside

The psyche cosmos dreams, wishes just like us

Can we reintegrate the soul of the world into our world view?

Our culture developed aberration, other cultures are primitive

We are suffering form a very deep psychological disease

Gaia – the earth was first born of primordial chaos

Infiltrate science with animistic thinking

Jung –  Jungian mandala, anima mundi tries to speak to us through intuition, thinking, feeling and sensing

Anima mundi deliberately repressed by western culture and if we repress it we can never eliminate it

Where you are weakest that is where your growth is

James lovelock – gaia’ed gives us a sense of being embedded in this creature, inside this great sentient being

Lyn Margulis

Gaia – mainstream view in the 1960s living, self regulating planet

Biota – sum of all living creatures on earth, bacteria, fungi, animals, plants

Nonliving – abiotic, rocks atmosphere water etc. non living sets the agenda and the biota adapts to conditions set by biota

Biota and abiotic environment, biota impacts abiota. Without life there would be no water on the planet. Water reacts with rocks at the bottom of the ocean

William Golding

Atoms and molecules have personality

Cybernetics –

Volcanic eruptions à CO2 in atmosphere risesà Temp of Gaia increases à Rainfall increases à biologically assisted silicate weathering à CO 2 decreases

Permaculture   - system of design, system for observing analyzing and applying human creativity to systems and making conscious choices on how you create

Began by two Australians in the 1970s when they were running around the rainforest of Tazmania asking questions of how to make agriculture work like the rainforest. Rainforest sustains itself, could we grow food in the same way. Later permaculture expanded from agriculture…permanent agriculture à permanent culture

“We are a circle within a circle with no beginning and never ending.”

Three Basic Ethics of Permaculture

Earth Care

People Care

Fair Share (share surplus)

Set of Principles

Interconnection and Relation at the center—deep spiritual heart of the sacred, design relationships, what purpose will “it” serve. In nature everything is in communication so to design we begin with observation. We use thoughtful, protracted observation over time

Pattern

Balance

            Waste is food

            Solar is budget

Equilibrium and disturbance

Cycles

            Birth, growth, death and regeneration

            Self-constraining cycles

            Self-reinforcing cycles

Cooperation/competition/co-evolutions

            Diversity equals resilience

            Edge: the place of greatest dynamism

                        Creativity/stress/vulnerability

            Everything gardens—everything creates its favored environment

How we work as Nature Working

Begin with observation

Design relationships

            Integrate rather than separate

            From pattern to detail

            Connection and flows

            Relative location

            Timing—succession

            More is different

            Diversity and edge

                        Redundancy for security

            Self-constraining and self-reinforcing cycles

Do more with less

            Stacking functions

            Least change for greatest effect

            On-site, local, renewable resources

            Close loops!

            Minimal use of resources, including our own

Make mistakes, carefully

            Small and slow solutions, with observation

            Accept feedback/monitor progress

            Natives first, then proven exotics, then exotics with monitoring

            The problem is the solution

Create sustainable abundance

            Catch and store energy

            Obtain a yield

            Creativity is an unlimited resource

www.starhawk.org

www.Earthactivisttraining.org

human energy and labor is denigrated, makes you a peasant and lower order person and this goes back to philosophical splits (man vs. women, dark vs. light, spirit vs. matter etc.)

The power of community DVD about Cuba

Imaginal cells…organizing principle when butterfly soup comes around

in nature, diversity means resilience

Gaia’s Garden

Transition Town Movement

What is activism?

Take action

Fight for something you love or believe in

Many different ways to be an activist?

Committed to taking action in the service of what you love or believe

Change the world in line with your values and ideas

Appreciative inquiry

-       we can learn a lot by looking at what has gone right

-       active listening

-       connecting with universe, microcosm and macrocosm together

-       if I am peaceful then world is peaceful

-       if I am fearful, I connect with negative and not positive

-       paradigm in which we view things

-       trust myself

-       harmony with everything is important

-       being peaceful within

-       sense of community spirit

-       inspirational leader

-       hearts are open

-       components of joy, illuminating moment – connection to others and the environment, nonduality, meeting new knowledge, learning , understand something

-       Aha, space, realization, empowerment, ripeness, appreciation of creativity (co-inspiration)

-       Visible alternative

-       Act in a local way

-       Don’t think in a deficit mode

-       Ripeness

-       Peace is not always calm it can be tumultuous, full of energy and dynamic change. Conflict is creativity

There are those who want to set fire to the world we are in danger there is only time to work slowly there is no time not to love. Deena Metzger

Campaign Planning and Strategy

Transition towns, education, end of suburbia

Direct action campaign

-       Investigation or research

-       Education

-       Mobilization

-       Negotiation

-       Action

-       Transformation

De-legitamizing the institution you are contesting, when you turn to violence you lose your claim to legitimacy

Why are you even protesting? That is victory because you got them to education

Transition town – proactive direct action, local currency, food not bombs in SF, city repair (Oregon)

Difference between positive direct action and charity?

Sacred Activism – Week Two Notes

Rational and the spiritual = magic moment, think of Mozart

Don’t start labeling, meditating or reading

Faith vs. science

Earth as a system

Ideas in our head translate it back to make a difference

Be happy with being, more not having more (Earth Charter)

I am a bit of life – Dick

Mosquito

Life way instead of religion

Giving

Religion as it moves us

Steeped in the Abrahamic tradition

Dangerous, new ideas change our life

Academic, not disengaged, recover the engaged intellectual

Engagement of ideas that matter

Deeper sensibility of where we are acting from

sacredness to life

vibrancy, spiritual dimensions

200 years of the industrial revolution has brought us towards mass extinction

understanding of systems, long range thinking bio diesel, food crisis

we have got to act for change with urgency, religions can be a network to bring about change

sacred is the sense of that which is enduring in different cultures

activism – how we act

Renewal Film – religious based environment action

Websites – five years to construct

Religions are necessary but not sufficient

800 scholars and environmentalists, collaborative engagement

how does advaita relate to modern problems, this is a journey

we don’t have to talk about our critical state, most people are aware

science and policy are necessary but not sufficient, certain segment of scientific community believe we cannot do this without other disciplines and spiritual, cultural component

millennium assessment on human behavior, new partnering of science with humanities, remarkable new opening, environmental history, philosophy, mary oliver, environmental literature

jared diamond = collapse

religion (spirituality, ethics, cultural values) that have shaped society, gaining traction in environmental studies departments

emerging alliance of religion and ecology is a field and a force

upaya – skillful means

syncretic – Shinto, Buddhist interaction in Japan

identifying cultural values which have formed civilizations are a component of environmental concerns

deeper than ethics for the solution

Humanity, Ecology and Activism

Bridge at the Edge of the World book

Scientific facts alone are not changing people, our economic growth model and capitalism is driving us over the edge. I’m not a Marxist. We need different approached, poetry art and the worlds religions

Religions and sustainability, sustaining way of being as people feel collapse makes their spirit collapse, despair depression, religions offer how do we sustain ourselves, regenerate the energy for this kind of work.

I am not going to be a banker, I want to make a difference. This is inspiring.

Religions have always changed, change and continuity is part of the dynamics of these traditions.

Promise and problems: religions have affected human behavior, consciousness and values for millennium. Constraining but also liberative. Prophetic and transformational (film, amazing grace, quakers)

Until MLK that movement did not have fire. I have a dream, things can be different. Consciousness and energetic shift.

How can human action be drawn forward with a dream and possibility of a sustainable future?

Narrativity is anchored in cosmology.

Building the earth.

China and India bring us into the future.  Religion to bear from questions of environmental concern. Religions have something crucial to say about environmental behavior (Thomas Berry)

Intrareligious dialogue focused on religious issues.

Nature religions and native religions (on going project)

This work is the beginning rather than the conclusion

Major foundations did not know what we were talking about

LSE no ecology dept

If we have the answers in our traditions then why are there these problems?

Solipsistic

Transformation of consciousness needed to heal the world religions are necessary but not sufficient

Religions need science and economics, education, policy

What are the responsibilities and work that need to be taken

Approaches to the study of religion and ecology = scholars reached back into the tradition to bring about rituals, texts where communities had interacted with the environment and embedded them in the tradition. Retrieval is very key.

Orthodox tradition, abiding

Are teachings so monolithic? What is the nature of change and continuity?

Re-evalutaion after retrieval. Scholars are re-evaluating  text for contemporary character. Reconstruction, are we together, sacred comes in, change alter in order to meet contemporary challenge.

Definition of religion – define terms at the start of a talk

Historical presence – theology vs. history of religion

Greening of seminary’s

Grassroots religious environmentalism

Inviting, teasing

Religion and ecology – matter , matters

Think before action

Dharmic ecology, strategy matters

It is not just stewardship but who we are as humans on this earth

Toward a New Consciousness: Values to Sustain Human and Natural Communities.

Thomas Berry: Glory of the humans has brought the desolation of the earth, desolation of the earth is the destiny of the human.

 

Creating Conditions for the Realization of the Unconditional (Shunyamurti)

The other day a student reacted to the idea that we should be working to save the world by insisting that he didn’t give a damn about the world and he only wanted to straighten out his own life. This attitude is far too limited to allow success, even in its own terms. It may therefore be useful to clarify Sat Yoga position.

There are two primary reasons to be dedicated to saving the world. The first reason is operational. The very act of dedicating one’s life to that project will impel the emergence of the greatest compassion and wisdom from within one’s being. This emergence and unification of the highest qualities of our essential nature will transform the ego.

Clearly, God does not need your ego’s help to save the world that God created, a world that includes you only as a short lived, egocentric, pathetic animal. And if God wants this world destroyed once and for all, no ego has the power to contest that. It is for your own sake that the effort to save the world should be undertaken. The consciousness that so dedicates itself will thus become detached from its egocentricity and will come to function effortlessly as a vehicle for the Supreme Self. One will have created the conditions for the realization of the Unconditioned Essence to fully blossom.

The second reason, even more primary, is that the world we are dedicated to saving is, in fact, the Self. Since there is only the Self and nothing else, what the egoic mind perceives as the myriad of planetary life forms are but the expression of One Self. To save the world is to save oneself. In the act of recognizing the world as the Self, the ultimate liberation is realized instantaneously.

In short, one must dedicate oneself to saving the world as the same time that it is clearly understood that there is no world to save.

This is very different from an apathetic attitude toward the world and having a concern only for the transformation of one’s own existence, which is still an egoic desire, and is based on the dualistic illusion that there is in fact an egoic entity requiring enlightenment. No such entity ever existed, except as a fantasy floating in pure consciousness.

Since the world is your projection, the act of saving it resolves the projection, along with all its attendant conflicts and patterns of suffering. The retraction of the projection retrieves consciousness from ignorance and illusion and returns it to its source, which is Atman. Simultaneously, Atman is recognized as Brahman, the Supreme Real, and the entire universe is resolved into the Zero Point. This is the salvation all are seeking. Since every being is a dream within a larger dream, and every dream is interconnected with every other, the salvation of one contributes to the liberation of all.

So please help everyone out, including yourself, by saving our non-existent world.”

MEENA in Japanese means beauty wave, beauty apple (that your offer to god) and beauty, how and why it occurred

Another level of enchantment…

Telling stories…when you go for a job interview you are going to have to tell your story, what is your story

Fellow enthusiasts

SHAKTI’S Talk

Quality of people that collect that are feeling, thinking and concerned about the world. Feel very positive about everything.

Beauty – fortunately never let go of art making, world of the artist is perplexing

Everything is connected

Beauty may be one of the missing links to the problems we face, ecological, ethical, social, value problems

Beauty may be part of the answer in a profound way

Beauty means so many different things, the term is used loosely

What are we talking about? Beauty and aesthetics are part of the system that makes inner and outer relationships occur

What is beauty? Shakti sees beauty as an experience. I feel beauty when I look at this flower. Beauty is experiential. Four levels: 1) sensory 2) feeling/emotional (pleasurable, joyful, connected so the experience of beauty has certain attributes), 3) reason about beauty  4) consciousness , awareness, bliss, ananda

Experience of beauty of deep profound beauty connects us with a kind of bliss or joy and this is deeply stirring

Characterize this great experience of beauty (pleasure, gladness, wellness, joy, delight, spaciousness, timelessness, wholeness, integration)

All of these point to all great traditions in the world have

There are certain ideas that need to come up. Harmony comes up. Harmony within the elements of the object being pereceived. Harmony within me. Balance, proportionality, rhythm (chandomaya, meter) life is a movement and there is a certain kind of rhythmic pattern, Shakespeare and meter, structure of bach’s music, brain patterning music affects. Harmony, balance, proportionality and rhythm are relational.

See beauty as an experience not a property of an object and fundamentally it is about relationality.

Beautiful economics

Absence of harmony, proportionality

Beauty is when the quality of relationships are in wellness goodness balance and harmony

Time to revive or bring beauty back into focus

Beauty dialogues – series of discussions with scientists, ecologists, economists and artists

Holistic – life is a webbed networked phenomenon and make the process work and we need new ways to work with and be part of this process

What can be learnt about the relational values or qualities between harmony, balance and proportionality from nature? They sing beauty.

Reexamine the major classical traditions?

What is wisdom?

Synchronicity, make beauty happen within them

Beauty in nature is adaptive or a movement toward a system of delight, joy and bliss

Explore whether meditation is at heart an aesthetic practice that increases the qualities of beauty.

The purpose of art caused a temporary break in our normal stream of consciousness and arrest our attention to help us grow and move towards transformation

Bliss itself is transformative

Abhinavagupta – beauty is the opening to the divine

Deep spiritual sense are awe and wonder

Activate on wonder to meet beauty this is a source of transformation for the human

What mitigates against wonder is our superficial sensibility of our society

Harmony and beauty is something we yearn for

The edge of chaos

Struggling with horticultural movement without attention placed to locality. Place things in their context!!! If you are not conscious of the localization of many natural phenomenon and processes

We are part of nature but we do violence to nature that others species don’t

Beauty is when things are dynamic, beauty around children because they have a dynamic energy

What will you do to activate beauty? I hope I am doing it all the time.

TUTORIAL WITH MARY

Value of face time

Retrieval, re-evaluation and reconstruction very useful framework

Ecological spirituality conflicts with Christianity

Whitehead

Father Thomas Barry

 Now 93, “Evening Thoughts” historian of Europe, Phd on Vicco Italian philosopher of History. Studied religions of Asia and influences by Confucian. Set up history of religions program at Fordham. After 60 he began writing the Universe story. Religion in the 21^st century. 1988 he wrote a book called the Dream of the Earth that Sierra Club published. In 1978 he wrote a short essay called the New Story which is the “New Story” We are between story. We have a scientific evolutionary story and Genesis and creation stories in the world religions. We are schizophrenic with these stories. We need a new story for our time. Creation stories give us a set of values. Differentiation, subjectivity (the inner nature of reality), communion. Everything is unique and a connection. The universe gives us a set of principles. Humans were part of the evolutionary process. We come out of 13.7 billion years of evolution. Geo, bio historical beings and this changes our sense of who we are. Consciousness is not unique in human. Self organizing dynamics. We have a great work for our time. Eco-zoic era. We have damaged the earth.  

Shifting from Anthropocentric world view to a Life centered view

Blossomed 

Science new contract with Sustainability

SATISH TALK

According to Hindu ecology there is no one personal god in heaven somewhere. The Sanskrit line is isha vas midam sarvam. All existence is imbibed by the sacred and the divine. Creation and creator are the same there is no separate. As the dance and the dancer cannot be separate. Image of creation is the dancing siva natraj. If the dancer is not there the dance cannot be there, the dancer is in the dance. The creator is in the creation there is no separation. In dartmoor everything is sacred and divine. Sitting under a tree is my prayer. God is active. Sacred activism. God is active all the time. Creativity, creation are all present every moment in everything. mantra is nature, religion is nature, god is nature, divinity is nature there is no dualism. Nature is therefore I am. Nature human separation is a dualism. Nature word comes from birth so what is born is nature. We are very species oriented that all species serve us. Thomas berry talks about the earth community. We are nature and what we do to nature we do it to ourself.

You are, therefore I am.

I think therefore I am , we don’t exist because of our thoughts.

I am made of all the elements, teachers, ancestors etc. if you take all these things away what you have left is emptiness.

The only thing is the key word. We are all related.

All my relations – native americans

The moment we feel the relationship and the oneness then we will not destroy.

I am an environmentalist not out of fear but out of love of nature.

I love and what I love I cannot destroy. If you don’t love and utilitarian view, protect what is useful. We have to go beyond. Intrinsic value of all living beings.

You love the tree because you value it. you love someone because of their intrinsic value not because they give you something. That power and force of love is essential foundation of any sacred activism.

When Satish went to the LSE  - no study of ecology

Oicos becomes eco nomos becomes nomy logos becomes logy

Oicos means home

Home is a place of relationship

Nomos means management

Logos means knowledge

How can you manage the home without without knowing the home?

Half baked bread is worse then baked bread

Money is only a measure of our activities

When money is the end everything else the means

Ecology is a spiritual quality

We are in a web of relationships

When you act out of wholeness, wonder, awe and mystery

After science there is a poetry , Einstein had a poetry about him and poetry transcends analytical measurement science

We cannot separate imagination and poetry from science

Sacred activism includes awe, wonder and mystery and you will not have burn out

Sense of awe and wonder about nature

Some things you can’t explain but you just feel

Bring holistic perspective of complementary we can find greater joy in our experience

Wisdom to discern what is the right place etc. great teachers of time are here to help us

Right proportion and balance

Ecological sustainable paradigm shift

Can money be saved in the future?

JFK – what is created by humans can be saved by humans

We need to decouple, delink money with power, prestige and status

We need to create a parallel money system. Local money like totnes pound for exchange and if you build a small, resilient local money slowly national money may disappear

Transformation of money systems urgently

Economic renaissance – Schumacher society in the US

Some students are paralyzed by the problem

Peace only comes when you trust (Pakistan and food story)

I just am

No money then creativity and imagination come. When you don’t find food spiritual opportunity to sleep under the stars and fast.

Every person is a special kind of artist

Dormant creativity water it and it will grow and flourish

Peace often seen as absence of war but it is a way of life, a way of being a way of relating, trusting, peace is when we say all shall be well. Peace is not a treaty.

Peace begins with yourself, have you made peace with yourself

Accept yourself as you are make peace with yourself

Then make peace with nature, nature is for our use

Respect and relationship

When you have peace with nature then you can have peace with humans and this can extend relationship

Peace is a positive way of life

Faith is an extension of trust, vishwas is trust shradda is faith

Faith is to accept the limit of the rational mind and transcend from rational thought and go into the sphere of the unknown and yet trust there is a coherence in the universe.

Faith goes beyond definition, profound recognition the universe is going towards coherence

Grace is gratitude comes from grace grace and attitude is a grateful attitude grace is delightful acceptance that it happened because it happened not because I did it, you are so gracious you do not impose your ego on your actions, that is humility

Tuesday, July 22^nd

Dimensions of Religion (Ninian Smart)

Religion is approached from a whole variety of ways

Deep spiritual significance (Thomas Berry)

DIMENSIONS (how do we reconfigure with ecological basis?) Earth Mass in New York

Experiential/Personal – (an inner, heart experience) an approach to the study of religion that emphasizes the individual inner experience, as well as the language and metaphors used to describe personal experience. This approach involves psychology of religion and anthropology of religion as interpretations of experience. How do we tell what belongs to the experience and what belongs to the interpretation e.g. Freud’s secondary revision of dreams. What distinguishes a numinous experience from a mystical experience?

Social/Political – an approach which explores the communal and group aspects of religion. The interactive character of religion and society make us aware that religions helps to bind communities and communities in turn shape religions. Power and authority flow from the dynamics of religion which can bestow status, cast aspersions and doubt on individuals or doubt on the individuals or groups, or lead to the establishment of elite groups within societies. The reverence and awe associated with social formation and political power raise questions about the function and manipulation of religion, as well as its capacity to inspire order and coherence among inchoate and potentially chaotic groups.

Ritual – an approach which inquires into the meaning of formal and informal actions in religion. Rituals are not seen as static events but actions which take place in meaningful settings and at significant times. Often awareness of the process of ritual is lost in the celebration of spectacular events. Questions concerning the preparation prior to such an event, the purpose, and the means for attaining the intended goal open important aspects of ritual. Roles, relationships, and transformations provide sets of additional questions for interpreting the ritual act.

Mythic/Historic – a way of studying religion that focuses on a people’s sacred stories. These ancient, yet ever-changing, stories transmit personal and social identity, and a means of entry into such deep issues as life, death, food, and sacrifice. Myths themselves are often seen as the means for evoking spiritual presences that psychologically nourish, challenge, heal and transform individuals and groups. Myths are frequently seen as in tension with history. That is, myth is understood as positing timeless truths, whereas history is concerned with the changing character of human interaction. This involves us in questions about the meaning of symbols, the language of symbols, and the systems of symbolic thought that are distinctive to ethnic and cultural expressions. We need to situate our questions both within specific traditions and to inquire using the categories of thought of the people being questioned.

Source of Religious Inspiration/Revelation – a study of the foundational resources of a religious tradition. That is, where does meaning com from? What is the source of the deepest values which move a community? Rather than the values themselves this approach asks about the primal wellspring of life, the root of meaning, and the spirit that renews and transforms life. Where do we meet the sacred? Prayer and Scripture, nature, interior.

Ethical – this approach to the study of religion attempts to understand the principles, ideas, and experiences that inform individuals and groups about appropriate actions. Often the terms ethics and morals are used interchangeably, through some distinguish morals as the concern for the rightness or wrongness of specific actions, and ethics as the system of thought for determining right or wrong. Ethics serve to correlate moral values with myths, experiences, and doctrines. This method of study, namely ethics, raises questions about the normative and evaluative positions from which one interprets religious.  Do we need religion for morality? Faith and Reason—Ethics primarily dealt with humans and now we are trying to expand that out to include nature. Rational philosophy has hijacked the source of ethics.

Cosmological – a study of religion which inquires into the story of the cosmos, the fit of the human in that universe, and the ways in which these understandings are transmitted to individuals and groups. Ironically, although the larger context of meaning and understanding this conceptual tool of cosmology may remain hidden for broad segments of a people known only through symbols and metaphors drawn from local realities.

Christianity and Ecology – Thematic and Topical Considerations

Incarnation

– Jesus of Nazareth, hesed/mercy, healer, rabbi-teacher, mystical Sermon on the the Mount

-       Messiah/Christ

-       Prophet and “days of the Lord” social justice

Logos Christology

-       Redeemer, Cosmic Christ of Paul’s Epistles (1^st Corinthians, Ephesians, Colossians) John’s Gospel

Sacrament

-       matter seen as capable of holding or transmitting the sacred

-       ritual practice as participation in the mystical body (Paul’s Epistle 1^st Corinthians)

Mystical Participation

-       Galatians 2;20, I John 3:2m II Peter 1:4, II Corinthians 12:2-4

-       Greek Orthodox Hesychasts (yoga), Pseudo-Dionysius (Platonic “divine rays of darkness”), Maximus the Confessor

-       Ascetic Desert Fathers, Francis of Assisi, Victorines

-       Catherine of Sienna, Devotio Moderna, Meister Exckhart, Hildegaard von Bingen

Eschaton

- end of time, edge of creation, end that draws us forward, Kingdom of Heaven, Promise

Inquiring minds…

Eco-literacy

Homonization

Challenge and possibilities of Cosmology, can we make a transitional cosmology from an anthropocentric world view to a nature view, reconstructed lucifer

Opposites to ecological ethics, move beyond anthropocentrism and ecocentrism, worship a creator god

We believe in life before death – Christian Aid Slogan UK

Church giving a lead in ethical investments

Giving rights to the nonhuman world, Spain has voted for rights for primate cousins

Until Christian church sorts out issues with sexuality and patriarchy how can it sort out ecological problems

Care, stewardship,

Recreating Ritual to promote Ecological values in Christianity

Creator, redeemer, Sustainer

Jesus the Nazreth, the Christ connected with the Jewish idea of Messiah

His teachings have concern for the poor, teaches in parables

When I go, the spirit will lead

Action, vision, sustenance, tradition, knowledge

Christian Environmentalists connect Spirit with Sustainability

Enthusiastic – filled with the Divine

Baptism

Water in early Christianity is chaos, death

Dying to something and being born as well

Reconstructed

Networks, flows of energy

Baptism is a community of believers

Reconstruct it to community of life

Being baptized into the community of life

Extending respect and responsibility into the community of life and now this is an ethical dimension

Focus should be the relation of the child to the community, respect and responsibility of the community

God parents – a part of the community of life is also a witness, is also a god parent

Get parents to plant a tree when the child is baptized and as the child grows the water from the baptism used to nurture the plant

God parents choose a form of life the child is related to

I baptize you in the name is the creator, redeemer and sustainer

The priest is the cosmological connection with all things

Water is because of life and life is because of water

Introduce Mother of God, Mary   

We reconstructed the ritual of Baptism to include an ecological element. We chose Baptism because we felt it was important to start with the beginning of life. The Baptism

Ritual is the point of entry for most people

Baptism has an ongoing role in life, responsibility to the community of life

Affection. We won’t save it unless we love it.

In new jersey and take that season instead of lent the eco-season. The season of creation.

Green faith in NJ

Larger vision

Participation

Responsibility = an ability to respond

Intellectualize and Empathize

Ubuntu Philosophy

Wednesday, July 23 – Confucianism and Daoism

Karl Yaspers Axial Age

Confucian History

Understand it as a spiritual, ethical tradition

Confucious is a transmitter, cosmology is muted but teachings about the human

Botanical and human cultivation

Mencius – child crawling towards a well, basic human goods

We are seeded and the cultivation of the human is to bring forth these seeds

Human’s lost their authenticity and then nature loses their authenticity

Early Confucians – classical period 500 BCE

Confucias (humaneness, relatedness, always in two), Mencius (human nature is good, education), Hsun Tzu (human nature is in need of reform, ritual, laws (legalism)

Human nature is good, how do we be become more fully human over a life time in this world

Han Confucian (same time as Roman Empire)

Co-relationship, co-relation with the vibrant and alive elements of the universe

Correlative, comology with resonating forces of the human

Empire had this sense of harmony

Interpenetrating, interaction

Buddhism, Daoism and Confucianism all interact

Virtue is seen in the human and also in the natural world

Humans complete heaven and earth

T’ung Cheng-shu

Confucianism becomes a political system

Early yin/yang cosmology integrated into virtue ethics—correspondences

T’ang period–Long interval of Buddhism

Neo-Confucianism 10^th – 20^th Centuries

High culture and civilization—art, philosophy, urbanism and trade

Integration of cosmology and ethics, Tai-Chi, yin yang, five agents

Chu His, Chao Tuni, Cheng brothers later Wang Yang Ming

Spread to Korea and Japan and Vietnam

Important for Civil Service Exams

New Confucians 20^th century to present

-       Response to devastation of China 19^th/20^th century

-       Internal rebellions and corruption

-       External imperialism/Europeans and Japanese

-       Destruction of Confucianism

-       Reconstruction, especially in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Tu Weiming

Anthropocosmic – heaven, earth, human

Confucianism/Neo-Confucianism

Family Regulations

Order in the family will influence order in the state

Beginning of education lies in the family

Family closeness and ties primary, loyalty and lineage are central

Filial piety—hsiao—root of humanity—ien

a.     respect and care for parents as the source of life

b.     honor one’s parent’s name through behavior

c.      respect the body as a gift

d.     revere one’s elders and one ancestors

e.     importance of male heir to carry on family name

Social Ordering

Human relationships are key, role of morality, ritual and education

Individual in relation to the group—sense of belonging; obligations and “rights”

Five relations

1.     ruler-minister

2.     husband – wife

3.     parent – child

4.     older brother – younger

5.     friend – friend

hierarchy and loyalty to superiors important; mutual reciprocity essential significance of ritual (propriety)

(ceremonies of music)

a.     personal (daily life)

b.     communal (rites of passage)

c.      religious (pattern)

d.     political/state (civil religion)

Philosophy of Education

Assumes  human nature is essentially good (Mencius)

Value of learning as a process of oral cultivation and enrichment

Importance of the teacher, contribution of scholarship; model of sage personality

Goal of moral behavior

–      practice of righteousness

–      contribute to society

–      sharpening of moral intuition

–      basis of civil society

Political Theory

Mandate of Heaven – moral ruler has right to rule (can lose this through corruption)

Ruler as moral force – like the pole star

Ministers and advisors as check on ruler – many ranks of ministers

All government officials were trained in Confucian classics

Examination system as entry to civil service; exams were based on the classics

Importance of statecraft and managing bureaucracy – key to China’s long-term survival

Cosmological Integration

The Triad of Heaven, Earth, and Humans

Humanism with a large frame of reference; Heaven is not alike a Western God

a.     for Confucius and Mencius – Heaven (will, personal presence, mandate)

b.     for Han Confucians – elaborate systems of correspondence between human and natural world

c.      for Neo-Confucians –Great Ultimate –T’ai chi, connection to larger natural order

1.     In part this was a response to Buddhist’s metaphysical sophistication

2.     Neo-Confucians wished to affirm change not critique it or withdraw from it as they felt the Buddhists had

SELECTIONS FROM CONFUCIAN TEXTS

The Great Learning – The ancients who wished clearly to exemplify illustrious virtue throughout the world would first set up good government in their states. Wishing to govern well their states, they would first regulate their families. Wishing to regulate their families, they would first cultivate their persons. Wishing to cultivate their persons, they would first rectify their minds. Wishing to rectify their minds, they would first seek sincerity in their thoughts. Wishing for sincerity in their thoughts, they would first extend their knowledge. The extension of knowledge lay in the investigation of things. (p. 115)

The Doctrine of the Mean – Only people who posses absolute sincerity can give full development to their nature. Able to give full development to others, they can give full development to the nature of others. Able to give full development to the nature of all beings, they can assist the transforming and nourishing powers of Heaven and earth, they may, with Heaven and earth for a triad. (p. 120-121)

Chu His on Jen (Humaneness)

Whenever and wherever humaneness flows and operates, righteousness will be fully righteousness and decorum and wisdom will be fully decorum and wisdom. it is like the ten thousand things being stored and preserved. There is not a moment of cessation in such an operation for in all of these things there is the spirit of life. Take, for example, such things as seeds of grain or the pits of peach and apricot. When sown, they will grow. They are not dead things. For this reason they are called jen (the word jen means both “pit” and “humaneness”). This shows that jen implies the spirit of life. (p. 501)

Chang Tsai’s Western Inscription – Heaven is my father and earth is my mother and even such a small creature as I finds an intimate place in their midst. Therefore, that which extends throughout the universe I regard as my body and that which directs the universe I regard as my nature. All people are my brothers and sisters, and all things are my companions. Respect the aged…Show affection toward the orphaned and the weak. The sage identifies his character with that of Heaven and earth and the virtuous person is the best [among the children of Heaven and earth]. Even those who are tired and infirm, crippled or sick, those who have not brothers or children, wives or husbands, are all my brothers who are in distress and have not one to turn to. (p. 469)

All quotations from Wm. Theodore deBarry, ed. Sources of Chinese Tradition. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960). Changed slightly to reflect the inclusive language implicit in the Chinese characters themselves.

China’s response to environmental crisis can be solved through indigenous thought

34 cities over a million in China

deep longing of the human spirit for meaning

Chinese Academy of Social Science

Ethics have to come from writing, indigenous

CHALLENGES TO PROMISE

loss of cosmology vs. live in universe

anthropocentrism vs. anthropocosmic

individualism vs. relatedness

materialism/mechanism/dualism vs. chi, aliveness, matter-energy, vital force

Axial Age civilizations

Multi form, multi cultural, multi religious community that has a gaia sensibility

Earth

Micro-macrocosm relationship

Philosophical, religious and meditative Daoism

Difficulties when you imprint religious terms on the west

Confucianism – you cultivate yourself to give back to the world

Daoism = indigenous tradition of China

Daoism borrows organizational features of Buddhism

Buddhism borrows the language of Daoism to describe itself

True dao cannot be spoken about. Those that speak about the dao do not know the dao. Paradoxical character of life. We cannot commodify the dao

The view of life is organic, holistic

Dao = road, path

As we create a planetary community we are inheriting these interactive distinct world religions, incredibly complex historical traditions, not a syncretic

STEFAN’S TALK

Deep Ecology and Arne Ness

Tremendously important person

When he was 6 he was taken to a cabin in a mountain in Norway

He saw the mountain and was completely taken by qualities in this mountain

The mountain was generous, had magnificence

And decided to devote his life through understanding those qualities

His mom said, that you can’t build a cabin that is arctic tundra

Age of 27 he became professor

Read great texts of western culture and Gandhi

At age of 60 he retired to devote himself to deep ecology

The mountain had come into the room

Arne is the mountain and the mountain is him

When you fall in love with a place your life becomes service to this greater personality, animate earth

The mountain was a psychological being

Western culture has to take this question on board

The facts of climate change will not change our behavior

We need to talk about values

Deep ecology, there is a ecology that is deeper, level

Realm of values how do we live in relation to the facts that science has taught us about the earth

Ecosophy = wisdom of home, there is no ecosophy

Everyone develops their own ecosophy

Pluralistic

Ecosophy T – you need the earth to do it

The grandeur cannot be articulated

SELF REALIZATION!!!

May all beings realize their full potential

To become wise ecologically you need a place to understand

Three aspects of deep

-       deep experience, radical connectedness with the earth

-       put your deep experience to work (ground it)m deep questioning, how are we living our lives in relation to that deep experience. Do I need to buy myself a new iPod? Methodology

-       deep commitment to bring about change in a peaceful and democratic way and you act and this feeds back to a deeper experience and cycle continues

Name of the mountain, take in the glow when you meet him. What he found there we have to find if we have any chance of surviving as a civilization.

Depth of being with the mountain, simplicity

Simple in means and rich in ends, simplicity is the true richness

Our culture wants our experience to be shallow so we have no commitment except to ourselves and we don’t question so we buy more stuff and we become more fragmented

Leopold, founding fathers of the modern environmental movement

Neither the wolf nor the mountain

More than human powers disagreed

Sand company almanac

We humans are plain members of the biotic community, we are like the microbes in the soil

A thing is right when it preserves the integrity, stability, of the biotic community of life

EVENING TALK WITH MARY EVELYN TUCKER and JOHN GRIM

At Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies and Yale School of Divinity – Science and Spirituality

How to bring ecology to the heart of spiritual traditions or bring spiritual traditions to the heart of ecology

Effort to build an academic field in which the study of religion and ecology takes place in both

Joint degree in Religion and Ecology

Developing a religion and ecology group, secondary school teacher workshops

Building the academic field

Eco-zoic age, this historical time in which a deeper affection and understanding of the earth is coming towards us

Being, thinking and feeling in the world

Thomas Berry, blessing from his studies. Lifted up the worlds religions for their spiritual depth. Library of 10,000 books.

Profoundly influenced by China, deBerry (Columbia)

There was an inheritance of the worlds religions into our present context, how do we meet these challenges of modernity

These traditions need to be brought into confluence with the environment

Cultural values, cosmology’s, world views, orient humans towards nature these values and ethics could contribute to a broader sense of an emerging planetary community for env protection but deeper spirit

Problems and promise of religion

No human community has to face the scale of the crises so Berry invites to the great work in one century 2-6 billion people.

Macrophase species microphase wisdom

We stopped process of natural selection

Arising huge sensibility in human heart that this is a spiritual issue, human issue. Something at stake if life disappears before us

The wake up call at the museum, 4 of 6 ornithology had their birds extinct

Watching for the edge of extinction or become the advocates of life

Complex dance

This moment is a moral moment

Sense of a spiritual feeling for nature

Allies for a sustainable future

Gus beth, towards a new consciousness bridge at the edge of the world

Working with scientists doesn’t change human behavior

We need new approaches

Critiquing economic growth capitalism from academia

Science, policy economics is necessary not sufficient, religion is necessary not sufficient

Dialogue with science committee is essential

Religious communities are late, need humility, not silver bullet but they are partners

Problems – fundamentalism, dogma, violence, persecution

Promise –  large numbers of people affected by these traditions, billion hindu, Confucianism, islam, Christianity, Hinduism

Spiritual, ethical component must be synergized with the work of sustainability

We need a language to speak about the magnificence and complexity that we are partners, not even stewards of.

The promise is that change has taken place through a prophetic voice.

Apartheid society

His I have a dream speech (MLK) electric moment

I have a dream, prophetic spiritual voice has entered in changes of values and consciousness

Sacred, magnificent earth not going to dissapear without voice of the spiritual qualities of nature

Approach to the study of religion and ecology emerged. Retrieval projects,

Genesis, human is given dominion over the earth

Retrieval, re-evaluation, reconstruction

The ontology of humans, being ness of humans, who we are

Ecojustice issues, poor being affected by the climate

Buddhist philosophy

Conceptual ideas that nourish and feed sacred activism

We need to be nourished at several levels

Dependent origination – all reality is contingent, there is no abiding self

Inter-relational character of all reality

Woodcutter and the family of the woodcutter

Tradition has depth of resources

Northern traditions many buddhas, Buddha nature develops

All reality is Buddha nature

Bodhisattva

Who renounces going away into enlightenment until all sentient beings are saved

We live in the midst of this gaia-en tradition

Environmental and ecological activity is a compassionate activism

Ordination of trees

India and china want their fridge and electricity and car

Pollution, water land loss issues frightening

Suggest, hope the traditions of these great civilizations could be activated based on these traditions

Korea, enormous concern about the environment

Environmental ethics based on our tradition

China is one of the most complex and worrisome places

We in china must draw on Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism not will be solved by technofix. This is an issue of culture and consciousness

Ecological civilization for the planet

Vice minister for the environment

Schumacher is a beacon of the sensibility, eco-design, sustainability, sensibility and we are at a moment of birthing a multi cultural, multi religious planetary civilization and this is the great work we are called to.

Language, awe, wonder, upaya (skillful means)

Phenomenology of nature

Glory of the human, desolation….what will bring us through this bottleneck

Paradox – concern with the transition—post-humanism

No longer focus on the culture of humanity but embed ourselves in the culture of nature

A new culture, transcending the notion of culture so we are embedded in nature to conform natural law

Anthropocosmic – embedded the human in daily, season natural cycles with ritual, sacrament of the holy in bread, wine nature etc.

Part of a larger whole

A reconstruction of these traditions and this will be a long process

New symbolic consciousness

Activating this connection, art, religion and culture can play a huge role

Renewalproject.org

Energy audit

Renewable energy of the human through spiritual practice

Earth Mass – Paul Winter plays

Seasons of creation

Faithless materialists?

No longer willing to let us get away with it.

Materialist matter matters

Global/local

Glocal

Anthropocosmic view give inspiration

Tension between hope and inspiration

The new story

Earth charter – we are part of a vast evolving universe. Earth itself if alive with a myriad community of life

Draw energy from this

Draw hope from earth is live we are birthing a new sensibility about that.

Mircea Eliade

Tu Weiming Tu

Indigenous Traditions

-       15 years ago written paper long step from a paper to speak

What would be your understanding of what indigenous traditions contribute to our concern for a transformation of conscious that is needed to meet the environmental crisis?

 Indeterminacy

We can’t understand and bundle native traditions together

Going at native traditions with openness and ambiguity

Stories that are associated with places in the aboriginal Australians

Created their world through stories and song

Biosphere (take without intimate connection) people vs. ecosystem people

Ecosystem people live on the land, biosphere people globalization folks

Biodiversity you must have local action

We still don’t know how many species are on the earth, 15 million, ponderable guess

Every place is unique and special

Indigenous traditions have their connection to the system, to the place

Problem for the biosphere people want everything to be the same

All places are fundamentally different

Particular names for Indigenous peoples

Searching for language

When we study indigenous peoples as community not individual

Dimensions  - experiential

Mystical and numinous (magical)

Genesis farms, prayer of the 4 directions

Mystical relationship with the land  

Diamond – collapse

Life is hard for indigenous peoples

Loving local relationship

Diversity of indigenous peoples

At least 200 million, 600 million if Tibetans, Kurds and Zulus

6000 spoken  languages

4-5000 are indigenous languages

definite link between cultural diversity and biological diversity

highest biological diversity on the globe overlaps with indigenous cultural diversity

from 1960 shift, push to discover new resources and materials

romanticized notion of indigenous people and connection to the environment and if they do not protect environment then it is ok to mistreat (Jared Diamond, “Collapse”)

why this close relationship between indigenous and biodiversity?

Ifeway as a concept for this close connection of peoples, land and biodiversity

Lifeway = seamless relationship between human, more than human and the land

Religion and the spiritual not separate realities even though they can be distinguished

Lifeway as an alternative term for religion

Cosmology-economy-ecology

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955)

Cosmogenesis

Christie

Noosphere

The role of cosmology in our thinking about ecology

The individual and our place in the larger world

Our placement in the larger universe

Placing ourselves in the emergence of the universe

De Chardin is born in France from Catholic religious life and he goes into the Jesuit order

he makes a very clear decision and studies theology or science and many of his Jesuit advisors tell him to study science

in 1910 he is studying in Hastings and the whole concept of evolution opens to him

deep experience in a place

he returns to France and is involved in WWI

now he is immersed in geological studies and he begins his first writings that speculate about the nature/origin of the universe

he is no longer interested in the book of Genesis

understanding of Genesis in the emerging story of the universe = cosmogenesis

he leaves France for China and the rest of his life he is in exile

involved in some of the most important geological finds of his time

20 volumes of scientifics work 14 volumes of religious writing none of which were published but only after he died did his writings become published

his thought influenced Thomas Berry

de chardin – his concern is to evoke the mystique needed to fulfill the destinies of the universe

that had been prepared over billions of years through evolution galactic, geological, biological systems and now to their highest degree in human consciousness

situated himself in the larger story

Darwin = 1859

Evolution interacting with ecology

Evolutionary origin and development of the universe

De chardin’s cosmology – universe in movement, cosmogenesis and this universe is increasingly expressing itself homonization

De Chardin picks up this term as the human shaping the earth, human is shaping evolution. Having been shaped by evolution is now shaping evolution

Simultaneously evoking mystique and embedded in the discord

He is so awake and attentive

Moments of grace, evolutionary moments where the pressures are so intense an abrupt transition takes place

Vitgenstein

The concern for the human as the conscious mode of the universe and the culmination of the evolutionary process

The universe conscious of itself

The mainstream of human is not where we are placed

Evolution is not conscious so if humans are conscious where are we in the revolutionary stream

Conscious mode of culmination of the universe

Where is consciousness in the stream?

Nousphere – mind sphere, consciousness in the evolutionary process as it is moving through spheres

Consciousness is in matter

Lithosphere

Consciousness = sacred dimension of the universe he saw Christianity as having moved towards a redemptive understanding of Jesus and he wanted to move it from redemptive back to creation, back to cosmology

If we move back to creation, Christ is consciousness

Matter and spirit, the great dualism in the west

Matter and spirit are one but they manifest themselves in unique ways

Matter is everything physical

He was concerned with the activation of energy, effort needed to sustain the evolutionary process

The human phenomenon/phenomenon of man –

Response to the purposeless, dead universe

Activate a zest for life in the human

Any advance in knowledge is essential to the earth process

Scientific act advances evolutionary movement

Science is a mystical communion with the deeper process of the universe

Deep unitive experience with the matter spirit dynamic

If I lose my faith in God, lose my faith in Jesus I would never lose my faith in the world. – Jesuit

Thomas berry raised a question – the glory of the human has become the desolation of the earth and the desolation of the earth has increasingly become the destiny of the human.

His question is, if we have brought this desolation about what way does your work contribute to that desolation stop that desolation and contribute to the life of the earth

Berry looks as cosmogenesis and we need to extend his thinking and his understanding evolution as humans, to pull ourselves out of the earth community is a mistake. De Chardin’s anthropocentrism is a mistake

Extend the consciousness from the very beginning to the entire earth community

We credit ourselves with our technological prowess as being extremely creative but we cannot create even a single blade of grass

Berry disagrees with this idea of the human building the earth

His vision was largely rooted towards human advancement and progress

Deep Affectivity of the natural world- affection

Eco-zoic – there is an age where we will have this love

Xenezoic juxtaposed with eco-zoic

What we need is a scientific engagement for the betterment of the natural world and nurture the biosphere

Academic communities exclusive advancement of the human

Solipsism, self orientation

The Great story – Thomas Berry

We don’t understand the earth as a sacred reality, the universe is a communion of subjects not a collection of objects

He is like a mosaic, a monk and priest out of the catholic tradition, geologian, writer,

Their values are rooted into a cosmology and the direction in which human affairs should go

Cosmology has given us a power but we don’t understand the earth as a sacred reality

Plants can make organic out of inorganic material

Moment of grace, invention of sexuality

The new story

The earth is the center of our consciousness and god is not out of this picture

Developed an alienation from the natural world

Extractive, industrial economy based on use of resources that are limited and do not renew is the disaster

The idea of a millennium that is 1000 years that will occur when the human condition is surmounted but it didn’t come and western christians have yearned for it

How to escape the commercial enterprise

Needed time to think and discovered himself in monastery

Went to china

Personal context with which to think – History

Missionary in a much larger sense

Teilhard de Chardin

Story is a basic orientation towards the universe

Riverdale Center Study of Religions

Penetrate into the essence of religious traditions

Feel this wisdom, birthing of the great work, a vision, a new sensibility of the universe and our connection to it

The divine is manifested in all

Nothing is itself without everything else

The greatest failure of western civilization comes with the type of jurisprudence in America that gave all rights to humans and this is an inadequate way of understanding the earth.

200 million tons of chemicals each year

not to see the stars is a soul loss

recovery of the sense of the sacred, catastrophic events strikes the sense there is a power greater than the human

fear of the lord is necessary to develop reverence

tufu

a new language enable us to discuss the task to be done to prevent the total trashing of the earth which is our life boat

come home to yourself

creating our music art and educating our children about their relationship to their region

we need the sun, the moon, the stars, the rivers and the mountains and this evokes the world of mystery, the sacred, awe

universe is a sacred liturgy

reading Thomas berry is a great liberation

we have to dream of a better future because it is the dream that creates

children go in the future as a single sacred community, children of the birds, elements,

the child awakens to a universe the mind of the child to a a world of wonder, imagination

it takes a universe to education a child

part of the original universe, stardust

stand up for nature, listen to nature, great work ahead

 

 

Manifesto: 
The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

by Wendell Berry

One of the articles in Reclaiming Politics (IC#30)
Fall/Winter 1991, Page 62
Copyright (c)1991, 1996 by Context Institute | To order this issue …


Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.
And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.
When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.

So, friends, every day do something
that won’t compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion – put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn’t go. Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

 

Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front” from The Country of Marriage, copyright © 1973 by Wendell Berry, reprinted by permission of Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc.

Thomas Berry and a New Creation Story

by Majorie Hope and James Young

Marjorie Hope and James Young are associate professors of sociology at Wilmington College in Ohio. Their books include The South African Churches in a Revolutionary Situation and The Faces of Homelessness. This article appeared in the Christian Century, August 16-23, 1989, p. 750. Copyright by the Christian Century Foundation and used by permission. Current articles and subscription information can be found at www.christiancentury.org. This material was prepared for Religion Online by Ted & Winnie Brock.

 

 

Yet despite all these developments a Yale study has found that in America, the more a person participates in religious services, the less concern he or she is likely to have for nature. Many people of faith are calling religious groups to confront the attitudes that have fostered a progressive devastation of our planet, and to fulfill the biblical mandate to assume stewardship over the natural world.

Is stewardship enough? Do we need a more profound identity with the natural world, one that sees human and other earthly beings as members of a single community? This is the view of Thomas Berry, a Passionist priest who calls himself a geologian, a prominent spokesperson of what is often termed the eco-spiritual movement.

Christians need a new cosmology, a new creation story, says Berry. We must understand the universe as something both psychic-spiritual and material-physical. Human beings are integral to it — indeed, the human is “that being in whom the universe reflects upon and celebrates itself in a special mode of conscious self-awareness.”

“We have lost our sense of courtesy toward the earth and its inhabitants, our sense of gratitude, our willingness to recognize the sacred character of habitat, our capacity for the awesome, for the numinous quality of every earthly reality,” he writes. Berry believes that the capacity for intensive sharing with the natural world lies within us, but has become repressed by an addiction to “progress.” We have arrogantly assumed control over other creatures, deluding ourselves with the notion that we know best what is good for the earth and ourselves. Ultimately, custody of the earth belongs to the entire earth community.

Such ideas do not always sit well with traditional Christians, nor with the followers of the other two principal Semitic religions, Islam and Judaism. Yet Father Berry does not fit the common image of a radical nonconformist. He is a soft-spoken, retiring person with a gentle smile, bright eyes and disheveled, whitening hair. Those who sit in his plant-filled sun veranda overlooking the Hudson find their eyes drawn to the majestic red oak outside the window. This great tree has endured more than 400 years of nature’s buffets, and has withstood even human-made disasters, like the massive tremors from a gas tank explosion that uprooted a neighbor oak several years ago. To Berry it stands as a symbol of hope. Indeed, he chose to dedicate his book The Dream of the Earth to “the Great Red Oak beneath whose sheltering branches this book was written.”

The Riverdale Center for Religious Research, which Berry founded in 1970, is his present home. He calls it a place for “studying the dynamics of the planet earth and the role fulfilled by humans within the functioning of the universe.” Situated across from the Palisades, it is a fitting place to contemplate the fate of the earth, and to meet with scientists, educators, environmentalists and people of many faiths from all over the world. He speaks often at conferences, and although he sometimes looks frail, he finds it difficult to say No. He seems, at age 74, to be propelled by a sense of urgency.

Berry has always felt an affinity with fellow earth-creatures. Throughout his boyhood years in Greensboro, North Carolina, he often roamed the hills, delighting in the flowing streams, the singing birds and the meadows. “Even at the age of eight,” he recalls, “I saw that development was damaging nature.”

Early on he decided that monastery life would provide the best environment for contemplation and writing. He spent ten years in various Passionist monasteries, pursued his doctorate in history at Catholic University, then spent a year studying Chinese in Peking. Later he became chaplain with NATO in Germany, traveled in Europe, North Africa and the Middle East, and went to England to meet Christopher Dawson, the distinguished historian of cultures. Berry taught Japanese and Chinese history at Seton Hall University, helped found an interuniversity faculty seminar on Oriental thought and religion at Columbia University and an Asian Institute at St. John’s, established Fordham’s history of religions program, became an adviser to Global Education Associates and served as president of the American Teilhard Association. Throughout these years he has furthered his studies of the American Indian world. His knowledge of Sanskrit and Chinese has enabled him to delve even deeper into the classics of the Eastern religious traditions.

As the ecological crisis deepened, Berry became convinced that it is not enough to seek technological solutions. An effective response requires a more profound change in our vision, developed in a religious context. Western religious traditions, however, are too distant from this new sense of the universe, he says. Indeed, Christianity has encouraged our alienation from the natural world. The Bible’s emphasis on a transcendent, personal, monotheistic deity has diminished our sense of divinity in nature. Especially since the 16th century,, Christianity has focused on redemption and paid relatively little attention to creation experience. Although a general sensitivity to the natural world persisted in Christian consciousness up through the Middle Ages (witness the medieval bestiaries) , gradually nature slipped out of that consciousness. Classica1 Christian theology stressed the spiritual nature of humans as against the physical nature of other beings. It considered the natural world to be an object, without subjectivity or rights, and certainly not as participating with humans in a single earth community. Other factors inhibiting the church from developing a new understanding of creation are the patriarchal nature of the ecclesiastical establishment and the expectation of a millennial period in which human strife will be overcome and superseded by a reign of peace and justice.

Berry began to recognize how powerfully religion shapes cultures when he read Dawson’s Religion and Progress. Eric Voegelin’s writings deepened his understanding of how the Bible generated a sense of direction and purpose in Western history. This sense of direction has its creative side, says Berry, but it has also helped erode spontaneous sharing with the natural world, entranced people with the idea of progress, and given them a compulsion to control natural processes. Now we regard scientific technology with the same reverence that classical culture had for religious worldviews. We are consumed by a mystique of management.

Other important Western philosophers who influenced Berry include Thomas Aquinas and Giambattista Vico. From Aquinas he learned that God from the beginning intended integrity and harmony for the total cosmic order. Berry’s idea that we need a planetary socialism — indeed, an ultimate universal socialism — is based on Aquinas’s statement that because the divine goodness “could not be adequately represented by one creature alone, he [God] produced many and diverse creatures, that what was wanting to one in the representation of the divine might be supplied by another.” Vico’s view of history as a developmental process, involving the age of the gods, the age of the heroes and the age of humans, each age characterized by a distinctive type of consciousness, excited Berry. From this he proposed that humans have moved through five stages of cultural development: the tribal-shamanic, neolithic, classical, scientific-technological, and now the emerging ecological period.

The works of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, a professional paleontologist as well as Jesuit philosopher, also exerted a formative influence. Teilhard’s importance, Berry believes, lies in his comprehensive vision of the universe as a psychic-spiritual as well as a physical-material process, his perception of the human as the consciousness of the universe, and his shifting of the focus of Western religious concern from redemption to creation. Fundamental to Teilbard’s cosmic perspective is his appreciation of the mystical quality of the scientific venture.

But Berry finds Teilhard’s framework limited for an ecological outlook. Teilhard, he says, fails to comprehend the destructive impact of modem civilization. Fascinated with “progress,” he inherited an imperialistic attitude toward human-earth relations. That the most advanced Christian thinker of the century with a scientific background could not see the conflict in those relations is another sign of the inadequacies of our spiritual traditions, says Berry. The challenge now is to illuminate the way into the great age of the Earth community.

Berry’s conception of that community is sweeping. He is influenced by philosophers ranging from Confucius to Thoreau, Whitehead and Bergson, by poet-visionaries extending from Dante to Blake and Chief Seattle, by ecologists from Rachel Carson and Norman Myers to Anne and Paul Erlich, and by scientists from Ilya Prigogine to James Lovelock and Brian Swimme. And he is entranced with the mystery of the universe, the “impulse whereby the primordial fireball flared forth in its enormous energy, a fireball that contained in itself all that would ever emerge into being, a fireball that was the present in its primordial form, as the present is the fireball in its explicated form.”

Berry points out that today, many scientists have also become enchanted with that mystery. He quotes physicist Brian Swimme: “The universe shivers with wonder in the depths of the human,” and points out that this sense of an emergent universe identical with ourselves gives new meaning to the Chinese sense of forming one body with all things. Physicists, contrasting this view with an anthropocentric worldview, express it in terms of the anthropic principle — the human is seen as a mode of being of the universe as well as a distinctive being in the universe.

Scientific inquiries have produced a certain atrophy in our responses, Berry says. Even when we recognize our family relations with all beings, we have forgotten the language needed to speak to them. “We find ourselves in an autistic situation.” Berry describes a dream of the earth in which “we renew our human participation in the grand liturgy of the universe.”

He suggests that the earth dreams itself into existence in the immense variety of its manifestations. This variety is established by genetic codings. Our bonding with the universe, like that of other creatures, is primarily determined through our genetic coding. But humans also need cultural coding, conducted by education, by which we insert ourselves consciously into the renewing processes of the natural world — and in a sense invent ourselves. The enormous power accrued through our cultural coding spells danger — and also opportunity.

In the beginning Was the dream, says Berry. The new cultural coding that we need will emerge from the revelatory vh sion that comes in the special moments we describe as “dream.”

What changes in our institutions will we need if we are to get from here to there? Berry’s essays on economics, technology, bioregionalism, education and planetary socialism, many of which are incorporated in The Dream of the Earth, provide significant insights on this point. For Berry, the economics of our technological society “is dedicated to the role of moving the greatest amount of natural resources, with the greatest possible efficiency, through the consumer society, to the waste heap that is not the source of new life by way of fertilizing the fields and farms, but a waste heap that is dead-end at best and often enough a toxic source of further death. To increase the speed and volume of this activity is the basic norm of ‘progress.’ ” But economics should be seen not simply as a study of marketing, gross national product, trade deficits, budgetary deficits and the like. It is also a religious issue, because both economics and religion are threatened by the disruption of the natural world. “If the water is polluted, it can neither be drunk nor used for baptism. Both in its physical reality and in its psychic symbolism, it is a source not of life, but of death.” Hence the ethical imperative to go beyond questioning the industrial economy itself. As it stands today, that economy is not sustainable.

Berry’s ideas for a more functional economy are strongly influenced by those of naturalist Aldo Leopold, who outlined in his essay “A Land Ethic” principles that should guide human-earth relationships. British economist E. F. Schumacher, especially his essay praising Buddhist economics, has also influenced Berry. Schumacher’s vision of an economics devoted not to consumption but to attaining given ends with the minimum means, and his promotion of what he calls appropriate technologies (such as implements that local farmers and manufacturers can fashion and/or maintain themselves) , are fundamental, to Berry’s vision of a context for re-inhabiting the earth.

His proposal calls for local patterns of production, distribution and technologies appropriate to our habitat, appropriate lifestyles and appropriate human-earth relations. A model of this is the concept of bio-regions, which Berry defines as “identifiable geographical regions with mutually supporting life-systems that are relatively self-sustaining.” Bio-regionalism is based on an ecological vision; it is more than environmentalism, which remains an anthropocentric attempt to repair humans’ surroundings. Natural communities should form a context for. every aspect of life say bio-regionalists. Their economies should be labor intensive rather than energy intensive; produce more durable goods to reduce waste; use local materials in building; consume locally grown foods; engage in organic farming; utilize organic garbage; depend on perennial polyculture, aqua-culture and permaculture; favor trains as well as human-powered machines such as bicycles; employ solar power and other on-site modes of producing energy; and in various ways operate on self-nourishing, self-healing, self-governing principles. No bioregion, of course, can be fully self-sustaining. There will be a growing need for global cooperation. But breaking nations down into appropriate bioregional communities could promote peace.

In moving toward this paradigm, we need not forego all our technological advances, says Berry. On the contrary, we shall need science and technology more than ever. However, our new technologies must harmonize with nature, which is not always benign, but is consistently creative in the larger patterns of its actions.

As for education, Berry observes that today colleges rarely offer a program for understanding the marvelous story of the universe in its numinous and psychic as well as scientific dimensions, together with our role in creating the next phases of the story. Even humanistic studies in a core curriculum fail to kindle the energies needed for a more vital human mode of being. Berry proposes his own set of six courses, created on the premise that the earth community itself is the primary educator. They range from study of the evolutionary phases of a functional cosmology to the various phases of human cultural development, the emerging ecological age, and the identification of values. These courses should provide students in professional, general and business education an appreciation for the dynamics of the planet — an appreciation which is desperately needed today.

Berry sees hope in the outcropping of movements and modes of perception that suggest an awakening. He points to the growth of bio-regionalism, “green” political organizations, and confrontations by activist ecological groups such as Greenpeace and Earth First! He talks about shifts of consciousness revealed in New Age thinkers, countercultural writers and feminist, antipatriarchal movements. On the international level he is encouraged by shifts within the World Bank (such as the hiring of Herman Daly) toward more ecologically viable programs; the spread of vital information through organizations like the World Resources Institute and the Worldwatch Institute and through various United Nations programs; world conferences on the future of the living species; and even stirrings among national and multinational business corporations.

A number of theologians and other intellectuals have criticized Berry’s thought. Some say he exaggerates the extent to which the Bible justifies an exploitative approach toward the natural world. Others claim that college students would find’ his proposed curriculum too distant from their own experience, or that the challenges we face are more complex than rediscovering an integral relationship with the earth, and inevitably involve specific personal and political questions about our own communities. Berry does not repudiate all such criticisms. He listens, sometimes adapts, sometimes replies. But even many of his critics admire his realism, sweeping synthesis, imaginative insights and courage in confronting the narrowness of traditional theology. This prophetic writer challenges all of us. Is the human species viable, or are we careening toward self-destruction, carrying with us our fellow earthlings? Can we move from an anthropocentric to a biocentric vision? How can we help activate the intercommunion of all living and nonliving members of the earth community in the emerging ecological period?

Biologist Paul Ehrlich has declared that to look simply to technology for a solution would be a “lethal mistake,” and that “scientific analysis points, curiously, toward a need for a quasi-religious transformation of contemporary cultures.” But Berry goes further. It is not enough to attempt to transform contemporary culture, he says. We must move beyond the humanistic ideals that have shaped our cultural traditions and invent, or reinvent, a sustainable human culture by descending into our instinctive resources. There we shall find again the guidance and the energy for renewing the primordial community of all beings

Our educational institutions need to see their purpose not as training personnel for exploiting the earth but as guiding students toward an intimate relationship with the Earth. For it is the planet itself that brings us into being, sustains in life, and delights us with ts wonders. In this context we might conder the intellectual, political, and economic 

Grace in Ladakh :)

“There is a Ladakhi saying, ‘The greatest courage is the courage to be happy.’ It takes great courage when you are suffering to see beyond your suffering to the clear relations between things, to the laws that cause and govern your suffering; it takes great courage to be ruthless with one’s griefs.” – Andrew Harvey, “A Journey in Ladakh” pg. 104

 

Six years ago, when I was living in Brazil I saw the Pan Nalin film “Samsara” (http://samsara.indiatimes.com/reviews.html) which was filmed in Ladakh. I was enthralled by the scenery and could not believe that such a beautiful place existed! Never in my wildest dreams did I think that I would end up spending an extended period of time in Ladakh. I tried to learn as much as I could during my time here and hopefully this email will be useful to those of you that have yet to visit this very, very, very special place. Not only has my time here been just so wonderful but it has also strengthened my understanding of nonduality and the interdependent nature of reality.

 

The Chinese Philosopher and founder of Taoism, Lao Tzu, wrote in the Tao Te Ching, “A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving.” I came across this quote a few hours before I boarded my plane for Ladakh. It was quite appropriate since this was the first time I had ever booked a one way ticket anywhere and the least amount of planning I had ever done for any trip. I felt comfortable doing this because in my heart I just knew I had to be in Ladakh. So, armed with my backpack, a few books and a sense of adventure I arrived in Ladakh with no clue and what transpired in the past weeks was more than I could have ever imagined or planned. It’s funny, I thought I would spend most of my time here cycling and trekking but instead I ended up visiting schools and NGOs, teaching and living in one of Ladakh’s oldest Buddhist Nunneries, jamming with a Japanese Buddhist monk that claims to be an incarnation of Hendrix and connecting with some of the most amazing and inspirational people I’ve ever met. I still can’t believe all that has happened in the past three weeks, it feels like a dream and I am so very happy and grateful! I’m just now reminded of one of the first things someone (actually it was Bandana) told me when I moved to Delhi, it was the famous saying, “How do you make God laugh? Tell Him your plans.”

 

Ladakh is the highest region in India (the capital, Leh is at an altitude of about 11,000 feet). It is bordered by Tibet and China on one side and Pakistan on the other and due to its strategic location the military presence is strong. Ladakh comes from “La-Tags” which in Tibetan means “land of high mountain passes.” It was opened up to tourists in the mid 1970s and in July and August there are actually more tourists here than Ladakhis! Ladakh accounts for more than 70% of Jammu and Kashmir’s land mass but makes up about 150,000 of the state’s approximately 8.5 million population. The flight into Leh from Delhi is remarkable and when I got off the plane and looked at the mountains I was in complete awe with the breathtakingly beautiful landscape and the bright blue sky. Words cannot articulate the sense of amazement, wonder and bliss I felt just being in these glorious mountains. The climate can be described as a “mountain desert” and in the summer (when it is not covered in snow) the scenery consists of lush green valleys amidst mountains of brown, beige and what looks to me like gold in the sunlight. A favorite past time of mine while here is to notice how the shadows of clouds change the colors of the mountains ever so slightly.

 

Apparently the Buddhism of Ladakh is identical with that of Tibet and the monasteries or Gompas only differ in size. There are more than 250 Gompas belonging to the various sects of Tibetan Buddhism (Kagyupa, Gelugpa, Nyingmapa and Sakyapa) in Ladakh and they were built in remote locations so monks could isolate themselves to engage further in the meditative process. I visited some of the more famous Gompas including Likir, Alchi, Lamayuru, Sankar and Rizong. My favorite Gompa though is in Temisgam and few tourists make it out there. I was lucky enough to spend time with the Gompa care taker when I was there. He had actually spent some time in Washington DC at the Smithsonian on a fellowship in the early 80s! I also rented a mountain bike and spent one day cycling to the Shey, Thikse and Spituk Gompas from Leh which was lots of fun but I did this on my third day in Ladakh and towards the end of the 70 km ride the altitude kicked in and it was pretty scary—all of a sudden I couldn’t breathe! I had to get off my bicycle and walk my bike back to Leh for the last few kilometers. I also wasn’t smart about re-hydrating and when you are that high up with such strong sun you HAVE to drink lots of water! Cycling on the Manali-Leh highway is not as glorious as I imagined. In fact, there is heavy traffic and lots of pollution and spending an extended amount of time on that highway on a bicycle or any moving vehicle is not something I would want to do!

 

While in Leh I stayed in upper Changspa, which is a peaceful area not too far from the Main Market (at times the traffic and pollution in the Main Market is intense and the increasing car pollution in Leh really concerns me). There are many affordable guest houses here and I liked being close to the Shanti Stupa, which is my favorite place in Ladakh. I spent my mornings doing my practices in the peaceful temple near the Stupa, which was built by a Japanese monk, Ven. Gyomyo Nakamura (www.indiamart.com/worldbuddhistcentre), and inaugurated by the Dalai Lama in 1985. One morning as I was doing my prostrations a monk tapped me on the shoulder and invited me to join him for tea when I finished my practice. Well the monk happened to be Ven. Gyomyo Nakamura himself! We engaged in a little small talk and then out of nowhere he brings a CD player with rock music playing, a book of songs and laughingly tells me he plays guitar better than Eric Clapton and is the incarnation of Hendrix! After finishing tea he took me to his room which doubles as a make shift recording studio on the side of the temple! I couldn’t believe it! We spent most of the day jamming and I was having so much fun! Well actually he was jamming and I was enjoying making a fool of myself. Ven. Gyomyo Nakamura was a pretty serious rock star in Japan in the 70s and came to India in 1976 on a spiritual quest and met one of the Dalai Lama’s teachers in Dharamsala in ’76 became a monk, came to Ladakh and built the Shanti Stupa. He stopped playing music when he became a monk but when the Tsunami struck Asia a few years back he traveled to Tamil Nadu to do relief work and he was having difficulty connecting with those there so he started playing music again and realized that music has a way of opening our hearts and bringing people together in indescribable ways. I’d have to agree. Even though I lack serious musical talent (which many of you know that came to my recital last November) I am just so happy when I am singing and some of my most powerful spiritual experiences involve music. Well, Gyomyo writes songs infused with Buddhist philosophy but his songs are set to Blues, American Rock, Latin Jazz and even Reggae. He has this one song “Salvation” and as he played his electric guitar I accompanied him on keyboard (I had to do very little and was working with only a few notes) and we sang our hearts out! I just couldn’t believe I was getting down to Reggae music with a Japanese monk that speaks fluent Hindi in a temple in Ladakh by a beautiful Stupa! We also sang some Beatles tunes and tons of his own compositions and took breaks to have South Indian coffee which he made just for me (I didn’t have the heart to tell him that even though I’m South Indian I’m not too big on coffee). Well, the lyrics of his music are just so wonderful and about peace, love, compassion, non-attachment, and reality etc. but he has this thick Japanese accent so when he sings it is just too cute! I had to really concentrate when he spoke too. For five minutes I was totally confused when he was talking because I thought he meant “nachos” (I guess I am really craving Mexican food) when really he meant “Nazis” and another time he was talking about “maps” and I thought he meant “mops!” He has a temple in Delhi and I’m headed there for lunch with him and some Indologists right when I return in East of Kailash! In fact, he is releasing a CD in July and I am going to try and arrange for him to perform at the American Embassy School and do whatever I can to promote his music. I think my students will get a kick out of seeing this monk get down with his electric guitar. He had some of the most amazing stories about India too and told me about when he met J. Krishnamurti and Osho in the late 70s and traveling by train to Tamil Nadu from Delhi for 40 hours! We also had a great discussion about “Sunyata” (often translated as “emptiness” but really means that everything arises contingently and we are only “empty” of independent existence), which ended up being the reoccurring theme of my time in Ladakh. Well, he said that most Indian people don’t have difficulty understanding “Sunyata” because “suni” means zero but zero really isn’t nothing, rather zero represents potentiality, it has the potential of many. If you add a one it becomes 10 and an 8 it becomes 108 etc. I’ve attached a photo of him after we jammed to this email.

 

Well, culturally, Ladakh is essentially Tibetan. In fact, a friend that has spent a lot of time in Tibet told me before I left that Ladakh was “Tibet without the Chinese.” While Ladakh does feel very Tibetan there is a definite Muslim population and in 1989 Leh experienced serious communal tensions and most Ladakhis I spoke to said that even though things have gotten better relations are still strained. Still, the time I spent in Ladakh has provided me with a living example of a society that really, truly understands interdependence and nonduality. In fact, I’m told that the Ladakhi language places a great emphasis on relativity. Unfortunately, even though development has brought some good advances to Ladakh it has also contributed to a breakdown of culture. I had many conversations with Ladakhis that expressed concern about how the younger generation is losing the value of living in an ethical, ecological, spiritual manner.  Sometimes I feel like India is adopting all of the wrong things from the West and forgetting what makes her so special.

 

I connected with another very special monk while here. Chogyal is Ladakhi but he spent time studying in Dharamsala in the Dalai Lama’s monastery, has traveled extensively throughout the world, comes from a family of Amchis (Tibetan Medicine Doctors) and ran away to the monastery when he was 7! He started the Ladakh Heart Foundation to educate Ladakhis about cardiovascular disease and prevention (www.ladakhheart.com) and it is just so amazing what he has done. His Holiness helped provide a lot of support and funding for the foundation too. We met quite by chance and I knew we would become good friends when one of the first things he mentioned was “Ethics for The New Millennium” which is a lovely book written by the Dalai Lama. If you haven’t read it yet you MUST! (In the document I have attached to this email, “Ladakh Reading” I have included the most important passages from this book and all of the reading I did while here so if you don’t have time to read the book you can just go through the passages here and get the gist of it.) It was so wonderful for me to be able to talk seriously to someone about sunyata, “nature of mind,” tonglen, dependent origination, the integrative power of prostration practice, universal responsibility and humanism! I also wanted to spend time with Ladakhis as much as possible and not hang out with other travelers because then I may not learn as much while I am here. When I asked Chogyal what all those years in the monastery have taught him he said “It is really quite simple…when I go to bed at night I ask myself ‘How have I helped other people today?’ This is what it all comes down to.” I feel very blessed to have met Chogyal and he went out of his way to help me get my Tara, Manjusri, Padmasambhava, and Avalokiteswara blessed by monks (we had special sutras placed in each one). He also helped me pick out a beautiful Chorten, which I had been wanting to get for awhile for my meditation room. The Chorten is special to me because it symbolizes the five elements and we also had that blessed by monks as well. When he comes to Delhi I am going to try and have him visit with our Tuesday Sangha and speak to my students as a model of activism! He is just so selfless and giving and meeting him showed me just how far I have to go. He even lent me his laptop while I was in Leh (I didn’t even ask) so I could get work done on some of my ongoing projects. I feel lucky to have met yet another brother in dharma to inspire me and keep me going!

 

During my first two days in Ladakh I just took it easy to make sure I adjusted to the altitude and I was able to finish reading Andrew Harvey’s “A Journey in Ladakh” and Helena Norberg-Hodge’s “Ancient Futures, Learning From Ladakh.” I would highly recommend reading both books if you plan on traveling to Ladakh. Harvey’s book did come across as a little self-serving at times but there were some excellent passages. In fact, I have attached a document to this email, which includes interesting excerpts from all of the books I’ve read during my time in Ladakh. “A Journey in Ladakh” is divided into three sections: “The Beginning” which provides some background about Harvey and his interest in Ladakh, “An Exploration” which details his travels throughout the region and the various experiences he has and “To the Rinpoche” which discusses his study with Thuksey Rinpoche and what he learns about Buddhism. “To the Rinpoche” was my favorite part of the book. In fact, when I visited the Shey Gompa (which used to be the capital of Ladakh before Leh) I did a puja there and asked the monk about Thuksey Rinpoche but in my inadequate Hindi all I could understand was that he had passed away many years ago, which makes sense since Harvey’s book was published in 1983.

 

“Ancient Futures, Learning From Ladakh” is a must read for anyone that would like to engage in mindful, meaningful travel in the region. I am so lucky that my dear dharma friend Dhyan lent me the book right before I came here. A linguist by training, Helena Norberg-Hodge was the first Westerner to really master the Ladakhi language. This book is also broken up into three parts. The first, “Tradition” gives historical background to the region and describes in depth traditional Ladakhi culture, values and beliefs. Part Two, “Change,” describes how Ladakh changed when it was opened up to tourists and how “development” has affected the region. One of the most interesting chapters was entitled, “From Lama to Engineer” and Chogyal and I discussed a lot about how nowadays the engineer is more valued than the monk. The third section, “Looking Ahead” discusses the complexities surrounding development and I found one chapter, “Counter-Development” most interesting because she advocates a more humane definition of progress which is very much in line with the ideas of EF Schumacher (Buddhist Economics), Satish Kumar and all supporters of the GNH (Gross National Happiness) movement. A documentary based on the book was made which I both watched and purchased. I plan on making a lesson for my Indian Studies course based on the book and documentary and would be more than happy to lend the documentary to any of you. I purchased a few extra copies of the book as well that I would be happy to lend. I have a student that is obsessed with Ladakh and I picked up a copy for him as well.  According to Norberg-Hodge what we can learn from Ladakh is the importance of being in relation with our environment and the importance of understanding both impermanence and lack of attachment. She directs the Ladakh Project and the International Society for Ecology and Agriculture (ISEC, http://www.isec.org.uk/), which has its headquarters in Totnes, United Kingdom that is where I will be in a few weeks! What a coincidence!  ISEC also set up the Women’s Alliance of Ladakh, which I visited quite a few times during my stay in Leh. They show the documentary, “Ancient Futures” at 3pm on Tuesdays and Fridays. The purpose of the Women’s Alliance of Ladakh is to raise the status of rural women and also strengthen local culture and agriculture. There is a program called the “Ladakh Farm Project” where you can spend a few months living with a Ladakhi family and working on their farm. The Director of the Women’s Alliance was also kind enough to arrange a special showing of an excellent documentary called “The Corporation” (://www.thecorporation.com/) for me. I saw “The Corporation” 5 years ago at the Film Forum when I was living in New York City and have been trying to track it down ever since. The film was the first time I was introduced to Vandana Siva and I can’t believe that of all places I saw the film again in Ladakh! Now I just need to track down a copy for myself!

 

There are many, many NGOs doing exciting and innovative things in Ladakh. (http://reachladakh.com/Non_Governmental_Organisations.htm is an excellent resource that I only discovered a few days ago.) On my second day in Leh I went on a heritage walk through the old town and learned about a German NGO the Tibet Heritage Fund (http://www.tibetheritagefund.org/). The Tibet Heritage Fund works with Ladakhis to conserve and upgrade old Leh to make it livable again. My guide told me that if it wasn’t for the West and tourism then none of these beautiful ancient structures would be preserved. Polythene is banned in Ladakh (yay!) and there is a cool store called Dzomsa (there are three in Leh) where you can fill up your water bottles with drinking water for only 7 INR and buy eco-friendly, locally made products. There is also a store called the “Ecological Shop” near the Dzomsa close to the main market.

 

On my third night in Leh by complete chance I met Cynthia Hunt who started Health Inc (www.health-inc.org). Once of my amazing students, Andrew, told me about Cynthia and her organization before I left for Ladakh. Andrew’s mother is involved in a lot of charity work in Delhi and his father is the Deputy High Commissioner at the Canadian High Commission. Andrew’s family spent a lot of time with Cynthia during their visit to Ladakh in June of 2007 and the Canadian Government also provides some funding for Health Inc. Cynthia has been living in Ladakh for more than 20 years and I would describe her as “hard core.” We had a good discussion about education and she told me about some interesting cross cultural lessons and projects she has done with fourth graders in Canada about the sacredness of food and reducing consumption. She is currently running a project that builds a more inclusive playground for children with disabilities. I found this very interesting because the project I was working on when I was at UNESCO’s International Bureau of Education last summer in Geneva was dedicated to “inclusive education” but I only focused on aspects of inclusive education in the classroom and making sure playground facilities were also accessible and inclusive was something I didn’t even think about! We are going to try and set something up where she can bring some young Ladakhis to my Indian Studies class to talk about “development” in Ladakh. I also connected with one of the Director’s of the dZi Foundation (http://www.dzifoundation.org/) and they do a lot of great development work in the Himalayan Region.

 

I also managed to visit SECMOL (Students’ Educational and Cultural Movement of Ladakh, (http://www.secmol.org/) which was founded in 1988 with the goal of promoting educational reform in Ladakh. The campus is outside of Leh in Phey, which is about a 15 minute ride by car/bus. The campus is as ecologically sustainable as possible. They use solar energy in many different ways; compositing toilets and they of course separate their garbage. While in Ladakh I am also trying to scout out a trip for my students during our “Classroom Without Walls” for October of 2009 and with the help of SECMOL, which already hosts and organizes a few student groups from the United States hopefully we can make it happen. The founder, Sonam Wangchuk is one of Ladakh’s most prominent education reformers (http://www.theearthheroes.com/sonamWangchuk.html) and is married to a lovely American woman that has been in Ladakh for about sixteen years. Recently he has come under fire regarding his controversial views on Ladakhi language and identity and he is now actually working in Nepal.

 

During one of my first few days in Leh I met a young Ladakhi social worker who told me about one of Ladakh’s oldest Buddhist Nunneries in Rizong about 75 km from Leh. I had never visited a nunnery before and being a woman and a dharma practitioner I thought it would be interesting to check it out. When I arrived at the Chulichan Nunnery I met with the Head Nun and discovered that the girls were without an English teacher. In my broken Hindi I managed to communicate that I was a teacher traveling through Ladakh with no fixed plans and before I knew it I had volunteered to return to Chulichan to teach the girls. An excellent resource I only discovered yesterday for those of you interested in teaching English to Buddhist monks and nuns in Ladakh is http://www.beautifulworld.org.uk/. Check it out and pass the website along!

On the way back to Leh I stopped at the Lotsava Model School in Temisgam where I met with the Principal and actually taught a yoga class. Communication for me was tough since I don’t know any Ladakhi aside from “Jullay” (a universal greeting which seems to mean, “hello,” “thank you,” and “goodbye”) and my Hindi is atrocious. I really, really, really need to focus and learn Hindi, it is pathetic! I am pathetic! I don’t know how much the students really understood of what I taught them but they seemed more relaxed and if anything were excited to get out of the classroom!

 

When I was back in Leh Chogyal was nice enough to take me to a stationary store so I could purchase notebooks and pencils for the girls at the nunnery. I also wanted to buy the girls some English story books but was having no luck finding any and what I really needed were bilingual Ladakhi and English books. All of a sudden in walks one of Chogyal’s good friends and one of Ladakh’s leading Educationists, Chetan Angchok (he is also a very talented artist). Chetan is a government school teacher at the primary level but he spent five years teaching at SECMOL and he and Chogyal are trying to get an FM radio station to Leh to talk about activism and social service in Ladakh. I mentioned that I am a teacher and I was leaving to teach English at a nunnery in Rizong the next day and I needed to buy some good story books for the girls. Talk about everything working out like magic and the power of grace—Chetan has a ton of bilingual Ladakhi-English story books that were created by Cynthia Hunt’s NGO Health Inc. that he had been meaning to donate to either a nunnery or monastery. He also needed to get to Likir which is on the way to the nunnery in Rizong so we planned that I would pick him up the next day, he would bring the bilingual books and we would chat about education in Ladakh and visit schools on the way to Likir and after dropping him off I would then proceed to Rizong.

 

The next morning just as I was ready to leave my guest house for the nunnery the craziest thing happened. I ran into my college roommate that I had not seen or spoken to since we graduated almost exactly 6 years ago right before I left for Brazil which is actually where her family is from. She was in Leh with her younger sister to attend a wedding and they had just arrived from Delhi and were staying in the same guest house. If I left 10 minutes earlier we would have completely missed each other. When I was in Tiruvanammalai with my dear friends Barbara and Bandana I asked them to tell me what some of the most important things they have learned in life were…here were two very special, amazing, older women that I admired and naturally I wanted life advice! Well, one of the things Barbara told me was that she felt it was important to always end things well (whenever possible).  Probably the only person in the world where I hadn’t ended things well with was my college roommate and it was as if the universe was calling out to me saying, “Here is your chance!” We were both stunned and in shock. I told my ride to wait and have chai and we both sat down and talked and even though we had both changed so much in the past six years it felt great to clear the air and apologize for how things ended between us, gave each other a huge hug and I got into the car and left. I couldn’t believe it, the only person I had unfinished business with in my entire life and we see each other in Ladakh! The universe definitely does work in mysterious ways—talk about grace!

 

On the way to Likir Chetan expressed his frustrations with the Ladakhi educational system. They have a really stupid policy that requires teachers to transfer to a new school every three years. Apparently this policy only exists in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. He also told me that for the most part in all Ladakhi classrooms there are no activities, no interaction and everything is rote. There is also a big gap between policy makers and implementation and no clear vision for Ladakhi education. We stopped at a government school in Sneymo which is where Chetan is from. I visited classes and when I tried to ask high school students how they know when they learn something they had no answer for me. Chetan even translated to make sure they understood the question but they had no idea!

 

Chogyal told me that I am lucky to have been born and raised in the West because I am able to take the best of both the East and West and I do feel incredibly lucky to have had a bicultural experience. Last year I read an irritating article by Jumpa Lahiri and she said that a bicultural upbringing is ultimately flawed but I couldn’t disagree more! I have been living in India for more than two years now and I feel very grateful for being both Indian and American. What I value most is the Western education I received which enabled me at a young age to not only be able to answer the question of “How do you know when you have learned something?” but to also question the status quo (not that Indian schools don’t do that—obviously Tagore, Gandhiji, Krishnamurti and Aurobindo did not advocate rote learning but it seems to me like the majority of students in India are masters at memorizing and most of the Indian schools I visited have exhibited that to me).  I feel like my Western upbringing has also has given me a lot of freedom and fearlessness as a woman that I may not have received in India. At the same time I also value and am proud of my connection to India, the home of some of the richest cultural and spiritual traditions. I really do believe that incorporating “I am Thou” into all aspects of our lives can change the world for the better but in order for that to happen our thinking has to evolve to a place of nondual thought and that starts with teaching young people about interdependence.

 

The time I spent at the nunnery was probably the most powerful experience of my life thus far. I came to teach these young Buddhist nuns but they taught me more than I could ever teach them. When I arrived with the bilingual books, notebooks and pencils the girls were so excited! It was like I was Santa Claus bringing the girls Christmas presents! A few came to my room right away and started reading the books and asking me questions. They were so eager to learn and loved story books. Since I was only going to be there for a week I thought it would be an interesting and empowering learning activity if I worked with the girls to help them write their own stories/biographies. I am now working on putting their stories along with their pictures into a book where I have also included history about the nunnery. At the moment the nunnery has no publication and is in dire need of funds so it is my hope that this book can help them with fundraising and also give some background for the many well intentioned tourists that visit the nunnery over the summer. I have attached a text version of the book and a photo of the girls to this email. Once I return to Delhi I will use Microsoft Publisher to create the book and I am hoping that a friend that is taking a group of American students to Ladakh at the end of June can take the books to the nunnery for me. If not, if any of you plan on visiting Ladakh soon let me know so I can send the books with you. The girls wrote such beautiful things and if you have a chance do read what they wrote. I know it sounds ridiculous but what surprised me most was that even though these girls were nuns they were just like regular girls. Most of the girls think John Abraham (Bollywood Actor) is hot (who doesn’t?) and they love Hindi pop music and just being silly! Sometimes I felt like I was back in Middle School at a slumber party when I was at the nunnery! They would often ask me what Bollywood stars I liked and what Hindi songs I knew. I was there for a huge celebration for their Rinpoche’s birthday and on our way back from the celebration which was held at a nearby monastery we sang Bollywood songs and giggled profusely. Chogyal told me that life in the monastery is a lot like the movie “The Cup” which is a film about young Buddhist monks that are obsessed with soccer and the World Cup (for more information about the film check out http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0201840/). It is a really cute film and I have a copy that I would be happy to lend any of you. He also told me that just like in “The Cup” the young monks would often sneak around pictures of girls etc. Still, even though these young nuns are like regular girls for most of them their goal is to help other people and just be happy. They seem to have got it all figured out at such a young age! I was certainly not thinking about those things when I was their age.

 

All of the girls at the Chulichan Nunnery (Chuli means apricot in Ladakhi and the nunnery has many apricot trees) are very poor and quite a few are orphans or have one parent. Some of the older girls came to the nunnery by choice but some of the younger girls were taken to the nunnery because their families had no other option so in a way the nunnery also serves as a social service institution. All of the girls except for two read below a fourth grade level and some are in their twenties! There is a great disparity between Buddhist Monasteries and Nunneries and these girls actually pray to be reborn as monks!  Their Rinpoche is Jangtse Choeje (http://www.beautifulworld.org.uk/rinpocheint.htm) who is quite strict and very well known in the Western World. The most disturbing thing is that during my time at the nunnery I discovered that one of the monks in charge of looking after the nunnery is actually stealing from the nuns! Even though the girls have next to nothing and sleep four to a tiny room with ants they are all generally very, very happy. They were so kind, warm and caring and being around them showed me just how far I have to go.  

 

Some of the younger girls were very fascinated with my long hair. When the girls join the nunnery their heads are shaved. I tried my best to always keep my hair tied up when I was there and when the girls would tell me how beautiful my hair was I would tell them what a pain it is to have long hair. Every time I would finish my bath and come out of the bath house with my long wet hair the youngest nun, Tenzin Dachen, who is seven, absolutely adorable and incredibly naughty would run up to me and plead to play with my long hair and the older nuns would yell at her in Ladakhi. Even when I would work with Tenzin Dachen one on one with her reading she would sneakily snuggle up to me and try to take my hair down! This cutie pie was really something!

 

In the evening I would go on walks with the “little nuns” and we would often sing mantras to Guru Rinpoche (Padmasambhava) who I feel a strong connection to. I also taught them “You are my Sunshine…” but changed the words to “You are my Buddha” and as we would climb up the mountains and sing I felt so happy and close to the girls like they really were my dharma sisters. But the life of a nun is very, very hard and it is something I could never, ever, ever do and even though I shared in their discipline, devotion and desire for Truth I realized for the first time that I am also very attached to many, many, many “worldly things.” I don’t necessarily feel bad about my attachments but have just acknowledged them—I like wearing bright colors, funky jewelry and my long hair and while I’m sure I could do without these things and manage to be happy I like having them. 

 

I spent a lot of time with one of the older nuns named Tuni. I asked Tuni why she wanted to be a nun and she said that the “life of a nun is very simple.” She told me that when she was 15 (she is now 19) she told her mom she wanted to become a nun and her mother told her not to go but Tuni wouldn’t stop crying and so eventually her mother gave in. A few of the other older nuns had similar stories to tell me. The younger nuns seem to have just accepted that they are at Chulichan and they make the most of it. For the most part everyone is always smiling and there is a lot of laughter. In the afternoons we would all roll around in the grass and play in the gardens (the girls play kabbadi!) and the nunnery is a family and the girls all lookout for and care for each other. The nunnery is basically self sufficient and the girls grow all of the vegetables for both the nunnery and the Rizong monastery.

 

For me, the morning and evening pujas were my favorite. We would all gather in the prayer room and I had to fight back tears as the girls sang prayers in Tibetan, their eyes closed filled with unflinching devotion. It was just so very beautiful. At night after dinner as I walked to my room I would look up at the star filled sky and just felt so grateful to be at the nunnery and spend time with these very special girls. I couldn’t believe it, here I was at one of the oldest nunneries in Ladakh, definitely not something I expected to happen.

 

Unfortunately I got sick while I was at the nunnery. I was boiling water that came down from the mountains but it was very, very hot, the Ladakhi sun is brutal and I didn’t enjoy drinking warm, boiled water all the time. So on my fourth day I drank what I was told to be spring water but apparently it wasn’t. The nunnery is very simple and the only toilets are compost toilets which were far from my room and this made getting sick even more challenging. There was also a really bad ant and flea problem which made sleeping challenging because the ants (there were really, really huge ones) would always crawl all over me but I just tried to concentrate on my breath and managed to sleep each night. I would wake up every morning with more ant/flea bites but I would get bit again and again by ants and fleas if it meant experiencing puja with the “little nuns.” By the fifth day though I was in pretty bad shape and was seriously dehydrated. I forgot to take electrolytes and my pack of emergency travel medicine which I had left in a bag at my guest house in Leh. I figured it had been two years and I was fully acclimated to India and wouldn’t need to take these things with me but no matter what I have an American stomach and my body just can’t handle certain things. The sun was also incredibly intense. It was clear that I had to get back to Leh and luckily managed to get a ride back and after re-hydrating and taking some medicine I was fine. The entire nunnery came to send me off, presented me with another katak (white scarf) to add to my collection and as each girl gave me a hug we shouted, “H-U-G, hug!” Little Tenzin Dachen carried my back pack all the way down to the road and some of the girls yelled in Ladakhi accented English, “Don’t forget us Didi (older sister)!” and tried to give me a pack of chapatis/rotis to take with me. How could I ever forget them? These girls are so innocent, so warm, so kind, so special, so genuine, so spiritual. I can only dream of being half the woman these girls will grow to be. My eyes filled up with tears as I left the nunnery. I didn’t want to leave but my body couldn’t handle it and I knew I had to get back to Leh and rest. The time I spent there opened up my heart and mind in ways I just could never imagine and I feel so blessed to have spent time at the nunnery.

 

Probably the best advice I have ever been given is to “think with the end in mind.” We are all going to die. This is fact. I think it is important to think about death. Not in a morbid, frightening way but in a liberating, practical way that can actually be very empowering! It surprises me that we don’t think about death more given the fact that we are all going to die. I began reading the spiritual classic by Sogyal Rinpoche “The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying” six months ago but saved most of it to finish during my time in Ladakh. The book is filled with so much you need to read every page very closely and literally meditate on every line. Without a doubt this is the most important book I’ve ever read and regardless of your religious/spiritual beliefs I think anyone will gain something from this book (important passages attached to this email as well). In the fall of 2005 I was lucky enough to attend a two day teaching on death and dying with a Tantric teacher which pretty much described everything Sogyal Rinpoche writes about but it was great to read this book now because in the past 3 years I had lost touch with some of the teachings, ideas and practices. I teach a class on death and dying in my Psychology course and we watch excerpts from the beautiful documentary the “Tibetan Book of the Dead” which is narrated by Leonard Cohen and filmed in Ladakh! My land lady is borrowing it at the moment but I would be happy to lend it to any of you when I return to Delhi. (I made my poor parents watch the documentary before I left for India. They are such good sports and I am very lucky to have parents that support me in every crazy thing I’ve done!) Anywayz, the point Sogyal Rinpoche is trying to make is that only when you really understand the impermanence of things do you begin to truly live. Imagine how differently you would go about living your life if you knew this was your last day? Sogyal Rinpoche writes: “Taking life seriously does not mean spending our whole lives meditating in a cave but we should get out of 9 to 5 tangled existence where we live without any view of the deeper meaning of life…Perhaps the deepest reason why we are afraid of death is because we do not know who we are. We believe in a personal, unique, and separate identity; but if we dare to examine it, we find that this identity depends entirely on an endless collection of things to prop it up: our name, our “biography,” our partners, our family, home, job, friends, credit cards…It is their fragile and transient support that we rely on for our security. So when they are all taken away, will we have any idea of who we really are?” In Appendix Three of the Book there are two stories about individuals and how they approached death and dying. These stories were very powerful and moving, brought tears to my eyes and definitely worth reading.

 

I also read Joanna Macy’s “Mutual Causality in Buddhism and General Systems Theory” which was first introduced to me by a Swiss Psychedelic Warrior turned Dharma Practitioner that I met in Dharamsala in the Spring of 2007. He also introduced me to the “deep ecology” movement. I had been saving this book since it is incredibly dense. Even though it is super academic it helped me really make sense of “no-self” and I think I’ve finally come to my own strong understanding of anatman vs. atman which is something I’ve peen pondering for the past 6 years.   Essentially Macy draws parallels between the Buddhist teaching of Dependent Co-Arising (“the existence of both self and world are seen in terms of mutually conditioning psycho-physical events, which arise and pass away, interdependently” p. 26) and Systems Theory (which grew “out of the effort to understand phenomena displaying a multiplicity of variables—and to understand them not by analyzing the variables as separate entities but by attending to the interaction of these variables” p. 91). Basically it all boils down to interdependence and important passages from the book are attached to this email as well.

 

I am using the Dalai Lama’s “Ethics for The New Millennium” in the Positive Psychology unit of my Psychology course next year so my students can take part in “Project Happiness.” I re-read the book while in Ladakh and began thinking about lesson plans based on the book. I think His Holiness puts forth a practical guide for how we should conduct our lives in an ethical fashion regardless of religious/spiritual tradition. To me, the Dalai Lama is basically advocating for us to adopt an “I am Thou” mentality to ensure our happiness and the happiness of all sentient beings. The most important passages from his book are attached to this email.

 

While the Ladakhi people do seem to have a special sense of joy and this joy is infectious (I think I might have started getting wrinkles from smiling and laughing so much!) Ladakh is not without its problems and Choygal told me that recently there have been suicides which is almost unheard of in Ladakh. He feels that this has to do with the break down of the traditional family structure that has come with modernization and a loss of values. The family structure and understanding of impermanence in many ways has given Ladakhis their security and stability and this is also tied to their connection with the land which is increasingly being lost. Most Ladakhis depend on tourism for survival in the new economy and this brings with it a whole set of problems that Norberg-Hodge tackles in “Ancient Futures.”

 

Another very interesting aspect of Ladakhi society is that women hold a very high position and in the past the practice of polyandry was very common and brothers often shared one wife which I found fascinating! Many Ladakhis I spoke with still mentioned the high position women hold and how they make most decisions and I noticed that all of the older Ladakhi women I met were very confident.

 

Whether you call it Sunyata, Dependent Co-Arising, or Dependent Origination my time here has reaffirmed the importance of nondual philosophy and “I am Thou.”  Most Ladakhis I met seem to have a clear understanding of this. Unlike Delhi where the first thing someone asks me is “where do you live” so they can “place” me, the Ladakhis seem to act out of genuine concern and affection and I believe this is because they understand that “Our own pulse beats in every strangers’ throat” (Barbara Deming). When we are firmly anchored in this understanding then it is difficult for circumstances to shake us and it makes it easy to have the courage to always be happy. When we understand self as process and the interdependent, interconnected nature of all things then in the ultimate scheme of things there is no reason to have fear or worry about anything. It has only taken me six years of meditating and studying Indian Philosophy (actually probably thousands of life times) to really understand that but now it is just a matter of really, truly living it…Challenging (will probably take a few more thousand lifetimes) but something for us all to strive for!

 

In “Ancient Futures, Learning From Ladakh” it says: “When you think of a tree, you tend to think of it as a distinct, clearly defined object, and on a certain level it is. But on a more important level, the tree has no independent existence; rather, it dissolves into a web of relationships. The rain that falls on its leaves, the wind that causes it to sway, the soil that supports it—all form part of the tree. Ultimately, if you think about it, everything in the universe helps make the tree what it is. It cannot be isolated; its nature changes from moment to moment—it is never the same. This is what we mean when we say that things are ‘empty,’ that they have no independent existence.” (p. 73)

 

Many of the Ladakhis I met seemed to have innate knowledge of this idea of interdependence and I feel like the whole world would be a better place if we all adopted this attitude. We wouldn’t harm others or our environment and it is this understanding of interdependence that forms the foundation for a secular, ethical discipline based on love and compassion that can change our world. Unless our thinking evolves to a state where we are deeply in touch with these human elements I don’t know how much “real progress” our society can make.

 

Last night was the full moon (which was amazingly beautiful under the Ladakhi sky) and I gathered with the eclectic group of friends I’ve made in the past weeks for dinner in Leh. We shared in laughter and great discussion and I just felt so very grateful for my time here.  Oh, I gave Chang a second chance while in Leh and it is still as nasty as I remembered—how can people drink that stuff? It tastes like spoiled milk! I also drank my fill of butter tea at the nunnery but never really took to it but yak cheese is something I really enjoyed

 

I head off on retreat for a few days before returning to my life in Delhi. I will be in Delhi for a little more than a week working on revamping some of my courses and trying to create “Peace and Activism” curriculum.  Thanks to a very dear dharma friend www.iamthou.com will soon be a reality. This dear friend created the domain for me by surprise and basically set it up because he thought I would need it in the future. Some people are just so amazing and supportive and inspire me to continue to work hard. Right now it is up and running and there is a really cool piece of my friend’s art work that reminds me of yogic anatomy. My hope is to begin uploading lesson plans (which all use the Understanding by Design Framework) on the site and eventually it can serve as a tool/resource for educators and dharma practitioners and perhaps eventually grow into something more. I’m still working on trying to translate “nondual philosophy” into an educational philosophy (if any of you attended the Lam Rim teaching last Spring in Delhi please let me know…some of my Ladakhi friends told me that this teaching may be helpful with formulating a nondual educational philosophy) which has to be done if this school that teaches young people to live in an ethical, ecological, spiritual (human) manner ever becomes a reality. Hopefully I will have that worked out in the next year but the more I learn and discover the more I feel like there is to learn! It is challenging to work on this project while still trying to juggle all the other things going on in my life but it makes everything very exciting and I know one day it will all come together. Oh well, you just never know what the future holds so perhaps it is best not to plan too much I received an email a few days ago from some of my amazing students about their plans to promote “Peace and Activism” at AES and they have started making a film with hopes of it creating a ripple effect among high school students around the world! These kids are just awesome.

 

After my week or so in Delhi I am then off to Istanbul to meet my family for vacation (if any of you have any Istanbul travel tips please pass them along), followed by a few days in Greece and then I head to England for the last two weeks of my summer break and hopefully I will be able to connect with all of my London friends but the schedule is very, very tight Two days before I left for Ladakh I found out that I got the scholarship I applied for to study at Schumacher College this summer. Satish Kumar will be at Schumacher when I am there and I am really looking forward to seeing him and all that I will learn. Satishji really embodies everything I believe in and it will be so wonderful to be in his space. When I first found out about this course on “Ecology and Activism” I was so excited I started jumping up and down in my apartment and I am so happy it all worked out because I feel like there is something really important for me to learn there and pass on to my students, friends and family.

 

Even though I know none of you have made it to the end of this incredibly copious email if I don’t write these ridiculous things then I will never record anything down and many of you have told me (including our dear Ramuji) I have to because so much is always happening in my life but I have never been good journaling so these crazy emails will have to suffice. Well, enjoy the rest of your summer! I feel blessed to know all of you and if any of you plan on heading to Ladakh soon let me know and I will help you out in any way I can. My time here has been so very special and I’m frustrated with my inability to articulate just how important this trip has been there is so much more I learned about Ladakh and from Ladakh but if I don’t stop writing now I may never will!

 

Jullay!

 

With Lots of Love and Deep Gratitude,

 

Meena

 

“It is not enough to be compassionate. You must act. There are two aspects to action. One is to overcome the distortions and afflictions of your own mind, that is, in terms of calming and eventually dispelling anger. This is action out of compassion. The other is more social, more public. When something needs to be done in the world to rectify the wrongs, if one is really concerned with benefiting others, one needs to be engaged, involved.” – His Holiness the Dalai Lama (from the main page of Chogyal’s website for the Ladakh Heart Foundation)

 

 

Buddha Purnima :)

What follows is an email I recently sent to friends followed by the notes I’ve taken from various talks

 “Whether we know it or not, we transmit the presence of everyone we have ever known, as though by being in each other’s presence we exchange our cells, pass on some life force and then we go on carrying that other person in our body, not unlike the springtime when certain plants in fields we walk through attach their seeds in the form of small burrs to our socks, our pants, our caps, as if to say, “Go on, take us with you, carry us to root in another place”…This is why it is important who we become, because we pass it on.” – Natalie Goldberg, “Long Quiet Highway”

Tonight was the annual Buddha Purnima (full moon) celebration at Sanskriti Kendra (www.sanskritifoundation.org, one of my most favorite places in Delhi) commemorating the birth anniversary of Lord Buddha. On nights like this I just feel so blessed to be alive and to have met so many special people whose presence I “carry with me.” The above excerpt from Goldberg’s book, “Long Quiet Highway” illustrates an aspect of what not only nonduality but life means to me.  

For some crazy reason the organizers of this very special event asked me to speak about some of my experiences as an educator/dharma practitioner and my attempts (not always successful) to charge the classroom with an “awakening” quality and approach teaching as spiritual practice. I felt pretty ridiculous speaking at such a large and important event because I have such a LONG way to go as both a teacher and a dharma practitioner so I spent most of my time sharing the insights my students had when I led them through a Metta Bhavana practice and that seemed to resonate really well with everyone. Well, if any of you are incredibly bored and have nothing better to do there will be a short interview with me on NDTV at 7, 8, and 9am and 6, 7 and 8pm about incorporating mindfulness and genuineness in the classroom—this is the last things I expected when I left the news industry!  Also, a wonderful artist friend of mine took pictures of the event and I will send them out once I get them. Well, as I was speaking I just felt so happy to have my global, spiritual family and was inspired to send this message to all of you.

Like last year’s blissful celebration this evening dedicated to the dharma was filled with love, hope and joy and it is in the spirit of the Buddha’s birthday that I “pass on” some of the happenings of the past weeks.

What follows are the essence of some of the teachings, talks, themes and experiences of the past two weeks. I have my notes from all of the talks mentioned here and the past few philosophy group sessions available if any of you want them though they may only be discernable to me

Last week I had the opportunity to hear the 22-year-old Gyalwa Karmapa (you should know there is controversy surrounding the recognition of the 17th Karmapa but the Karmapa I heard speak is recognized by His Holiness the Dalai Lama) speak on “Impermanence” in Tibetan. He was on his way to the United States for the first time and was quite busy preparing for the trip and said he didn’t have time to prepare anything and instead spoke from the heart.  Naturally, a lot was lost in the translation but essentially he discussed how impermanence is not a philosophical concept, it is reality and we must try not to cling to the illusion of the absence of impermanence. We need to address how we fabricate the illusion of permanence. A dear Tibetan Buddhist Nun once told me, “True dharma practice is countering delusion.”  What I gained from the talk was the importance of not feeling burdened or handicapped by impermanence and being prepared to handle impermanence in a constructive way. Obviously all phenomenon are subject to impermanence but to throw our hands up and not act is unwise. For example, to say, “The cyclone in Myanmar is too big, there is nothing I can do” is not the answer. As dharma practitioners we make a resolve to benefit each and every being and not acting would go against that resolve so we must try to do whatever we can and no act is too small—like remembering to turn off the lights!Indulging in the illusion of permanence can also breed laziness and the preciousness of life is diminished with the illusion of permanence. 

The day after I heard the Karmapa speak I had the wonderful opportunity to attend a teaching given by a teacher of Pema Choedron, Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. His lineage is very close to that of Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche.  He is a very high Tibetan lama and talented artist who has been living in Colorado for the last 20 years. He is married to an American woman and has a unique ability to relate to both cultures.  Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche talked about how in order for the dharma to be accessible to all it has to employ common sense. If it is complicated and difficult to understand then Truth cannot be accessible and applicable. The Buddhist teachings reveal common sense. So what is dharma and how is it common sense? Well, according to Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche all sentient beings desire happiness and dharma is when you acknowledge this to yourself and that you are not different from other sentient beings—we are all the same and we all want to be happy.  So when you add to somebody’s happiness and try to live “I am Thou” then that is dharma, that is virtue. What brings us happiness is doing good in the world and adding to the happiness of many beings. If one’s capacity is to serve 100 and one limits to serve only oneself then they are not giving a full chance to their potential. Since we are no different from sentient beings we should not harm others. He also discussed the importance of practicing the Four Immeasurables (equanimity, love, compassion and joy). 

This past weekend I was having some work done on my apartment which provided me with the opportunity to stay at home and finally watch the keynote address Dr. Robert Svoboda gave at a conference I attended in Rishikesh in late February, “Where Science Meets Consciousness.” I arrived a day late to the conference and missed this amazing talk but was luckily able to get a recording of it. Dr. Svoboda is one of the most engaging speakers I have ever come across. I was first introduced to his work in the Spring of 2005 when I was studying with an Ayurvedic Doctor and have read many of his books. It was an honor to finally meet him! Svoboda discussed how human beings are constantly taken over by delusions all the time and it is vital that we keep our consciousnesses clear.  He mentioned a book I am dying to read, “Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds” by Charles Mackay. (I’ll just add it to my exhaustive reading list!) The crazy thing is that the book was written more than 100 years ago but from what Svoboda said so much of it is applicable today, the whole idea of “thought pollution” causing us to move in this herd mentality where we destroy our environment and fellow humans.  According to Svoboda there is no spirituality if you don’t establish a healthy relationship between yourself and the animal, vegetable and mineral kingdom. Awareness in the Indian vidya (knowledge) is that an individual human being is acting as a vessel for universal awareness and the human being is meant to express this awareness and consciousness in the external world.  The danger we face today is that so many of us are divorced from the environment and believe the idea that we are different from the environment. He also discussed how consumerism is a very dangerous mind virus. Essentially, ayurveda and yoga are not separate from the reality of all in the world, they enable us to be better balanced and integrated so we can expand that into the environment. Svoboda also spoke about the importance of having a good relationship with the five elements and only then will prana (life force) flow properly because it is prana that supports life and well-being.Today our consciousness must be alert enough to have the viveka (discrimination) to know when answering the cell phone or checking email is useful and when it is not useful.  It is this awareness that will help us facilitate our lives more effectively.Life is a very useful thing that gives you the opportunity to connect your awareness with the supreme reality from a stable place. The Sanskrit definition of health is to be well established in oneself and this can only occur when the body (doshas) is balanced and mind is happy. When the mind is delusional and body is imbalanced we are nowhere near health and the scary thing is it seems like most people fall into this category. Similarly, in Goenkaji’s address to the United Nations on “Peace” which I also watched when I was having work done on my apartment he talks about how peace in the world is only possible when we are peaceful within. We also make right decisions when our mind is calm and this can only happen when we achieve a state of balance and for me that type of balance can only be cultivated with meditation practice.

A few days ago a dear dharma friend in Delhi sent me a message raising the question of what “right action” means in a natural world in peril by human actions. Last Friday I attended a talk at the Tushita Center given by Professor Anita Sharma of Delhi University. She spoke mostly about Engaged Buddhism (during the past few decades many Buddhist have been re-examining the teachings finding a basis for social action) which I feel is the answer to what “right action” means today. A more inclusive term that my dear dharma friend has come up with is “Social Mindfulness.” Professor Sharma discussed His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Thich Nhat Hanh, Sulak Sivaraska, Master Cheng Yen (Taiwan), Master Hsing Yun (Taiwan), Master Sheng Yen (Taiwan). I actually met Sulak Sivaraska last June at a Spiritual Ecology Conference in London. When I asked him for some practical advice as an educator he said, “I’m going to quote Auden and not the Buddha. A good teacher must be happy.” This is probably one of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever been given!

Professor Sharma focused on the activities of Tzuchi in Taiwan and Sarvodaya (uplift for all) Shramadana Sangamaya in Sri Lanka because the activities of these two organizations are very different. Tzuchi is actually registered as an NGO in Taiwan and it focuses on improving society from within the system through charity activities, international relief work, education (Tzuchi University), bone marrow transplants and preserving the environment (introducing reusable chopsticks). Sarvodaya Shramadana Sangamaya places an emphasis on Buddhist Economics, Local Economy, Gandhianism. According to Sharma, both organizations seek to humanize society and employ the principle of “right livelihood.” I am hoping to visit the Sarvodaya Shramadana Sangamaya next winter in Sri Lanka. Thich Nhat Hanh will be coming to India from September 26^th until the end of October and I recently found out at an organizational meeting for his visit that some of his students have purchased land to eventually build a community like “Plum Village” in Dehradun—how exciting! The themes of Thay’s visit are “Dalit Buddhism” and “Mindfulness in Education.” I can’t believe I will get a chance to meet him this Fall! Oh, I just heard from the Center for Bhutan Studies and now the Gross National Happiness Conference is slated for end of October, early November.  As soon as I get details I will pass them along.

Last week the Elementary School Principal sent me an article about a potential guest speaker for a “Peace and Activism” initiative we are trying to launch at the American Embassy School. The words of Elias Chacour, an international peace and reconciliation figure who has devoted himself to the often hard-pressed, long-awaited resolution between Middle Eastern Arabs and Jews exemplifies the essence of what we aim to teach our students.  Chacour says, “Faith does not only mean faith in God. It’s easy to have faith in God. It’s much more difficult to have faith in your neighbor. It’s much more difficult to believe your neighbor is the most beautiful thing God has created, without an inner conviction that you can make a difference in this world…How much do we believe in each other and do we believe in the goodness that is in every human being?” he asks.  I honestly think that the only way the world is going to become a better place is if our thinking evolves to a place of nonduality and it begins with young people. This is why I teach—so students strive to live “I am Thou.” 

What began as a small idea resulting from a random meeting with a very special Lama and an American activist/dharma practitioner while I was in Rishikesh has now resulted in the creation of a K-12 task force committed to promoting efficacy and empathy among our students. I can’t believe all that is happened in the past two weeks—every division principal is on the task force along with some of the most inspiring educators and the most amazing students I’ve come across.  At the end of our last meeting my boss said, “Beyond raising funds let us raise peoples consciousness.” I never expected so many people to come together and start “thinking big.” We have also connected with the Dalai Lama foundation (quite coincidentally) and The Missing Peace Project.

Just two days ago my Superintendent (he also is the one that introduced me to the Natalie Goldberg quote at the top of this email) sent me an email about a 10th grade Social Studies class at the International School of Estonia committed to changing the world by Monday. During their study of human rights abuses these 10th graders were particularly shocked at the today’s crimes being committed by the government in Sudan.  The students read a quote by Steve Jobs, “The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones that do.”Given only 7 days, what can one person, one group do to make some changes to make the world better? In one week the students: 1.) Thoroughly researched the conflict in Darfur 2.) Made an exhibit in the assembly area to promote awareness 3.) Collected signatures on a petition to the UN and governments to censor Sudan and to require that Sudan hand over ICC indicted suspects for crimes against humanity. 4.) Met with the ambassadors of Norway, Spain, Portugal, Sweden and the United States to ask questions, raise awareness, and ask the ambassadors to forward the petition to their governments.5.) Made a FACEBOOK entry called “Change the World by Monday.”6.) Raised money and bought a Website entitled: “changetheworldbymonday.com.” I plan on having my students next year join the 52 week campaign (52 schools taking at least one week a year) “to change the world.” 

This time of year is always very sentimental for me because I say goodbye to some very special students and colleagues.  My students continually amaze me and give me hope and my colleagues are a constant source of inspiration. One of my colleagues and fellow dharma practitioners, Lauren Alderfer, has written a book entitled, “Teaching as a Spiritual Practice.” A teacher I studied with once said, “books are only useful if they are made use of in some way, simply reading isn’t good enough” and I have tried to “make use” of Lauren’s book.Sadly, she is leaving my school this year but I feel blessed to have met her and read her book—it has enabled me to integrate my spiritual life and professional life in a very effective, meaningful way. I am incredibly lucky to be able to “carry her in me” as I continue to teach and come in contact with hundreds of students every year.  

Lauren writes: “Cultivating an attitude of inquiry can be the first bold step on a journey. While it may be the first step of a journey, it also keeps the journey alive. Continually desire to know more, discover the unknown, or uncover what lies beneath the surface takes courage. Commitment to the journey of discovery follows. It becomes a life’s journey and we become life long learners on the path.”

I leave for Ladakh in less than 10 days for about a month. Only a few more farewell gatherings to go, there seems to be another every day! I hate goodbyes. I cry at all of these gatherings but I guess it would be worse if I never felt anything but I know I am going to be a wreck at graduation I have no fixed plans for Ladakh and am just open to whatever adventures may come my way. A special friend lent me a beautiful book “Ancient Futures, Learning From Ladakh” by Helena Norberg-Hodge that she picked up in Dharamsala a few years ago. I started reading it yesterday and literally had to pry myself away from the book.  This morning as I was teaching my ninth graders my boss came to my classroom and gave me a copy of Andrew Harvey’s book on Ladakh. I spent all evening yesterday going to almost every bookstore in Delhi to try and track this book down (it is out of print) and feel so lucky to have gotten a copy of this book! I really want to read it because Harvey is one of the main teachers of the “Activism” course I am taking this summer at Schumacher College and he was born in Tamil Nadu where my ancestors are from! Many of you know I had planned on doing the Kailash Mansarovar yatra this summer but my Tibet plans have been postponed because the Chinese government is not permitting foreign entry. This Tibet disappointment seems to have turned into a blessing in disguise and I look forward to all that awaits me in Ladakh.

Thank you all for your friendship. In our philosophy group a few weeks ago Professor Makarand Paranjpe talked about how humans are communicative beings and it is through the act of communication that we become one, this act is advaita (nonduality). I am so grateful for the meaningful exchanges I’ve had with all of you and feel blessed that the universe has sent you all into my life. It is all of you that keep me going. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Together we can be crazy enough to change the world for the better. Please know that I will be taking you all with me to Ladakh and “carry you to root in another place.”

With Metta and Maitri,

Meena

A few days ago a lovely young woman I met at a yoga conference sent me the following prayer from St. Theresa:

May today there be peace within.

May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be.


May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.

May you use those gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you.

May you be content knowing you are a child of God.

Let this presence settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.

It is there for each and every one of us.

DR. SVOBODA – KEYNOTE ADDRESS NOTES

Vata is not stable

When in India, learn not to listen

Extraordinary popular delusions and the madness of crowds, charles mckay

Human’s beings taken over by delusions all the time and keep our consciousnesses clear so we are not taken over by delusions

When people get enthusiastic about something their awarenesses get dragged along, economic delusions

Science and the akashic field

Morality in science, scientists focus on knowing things just for the use of knowing them regardless of benefit

Like the corpse we will end up without prana at any moment, no regrets

There is no spirituality if you don’t establish a healthy relationship between yourself and the animal, vegetable and mineral kingdom…awareness in the Indian vidya that individual human being is not an individual acting as vessel for universal awareness

The human being meant to express this awareness and consciousness in the external world good report between the external and internal panda brahmanda

The universe will cooperate

Universe not cooperating with us now, ecological awareness of thoughts you put out into the universe is what will come back to you

Modern science believes singularity and from that universe expanded—expansion is matter India—expansion of consciousness

What effect will anything we do have on consciousness dharma is a path worthy to be followed, everybody has their svadharma their own path

Paying attention to become more stimulated not paying attention to how the prana moves in the body

Benares is the most intense place on the planet

I was saved—you never know what could happen

Only when good relationship with 5 elements will prana flow properly

Prana supports life and well being

Getting a hold of shakti is not the problem establishing a relationship with the shakti is the problem

Consciousness to be alert enough to have the viveka to have it functioning as much as possible cell phone is useful and not useful, email, eating

Being able to determine hita hitam sukham know what is useful and not useful to determine what is useful and not useful

What is going to facilitate our life more effectively

Life is a very useful thing gives you the opportunity to connect your awareness with the supreme reality from a stable place

Allows a point of reference, body

Body is that which deteriorates (Sanskrit def) still make use of it while it is deteriorating point of reference that employs the earth element to create stability

No reason not to creat stability within yourself

Disturbance everywhere that is when you feel more stable to generate the earth element

What can we do to make our environment improve

As development approaches and accelerates only a certain amount of land and the development takes over land and more tress are chopped down and removed

Planting trees, get to know tree consciousness

There is an awareness in every living thing

Divorced form the environment divorced from the idea that you and the environment are not different from one another

Direct result of what has to be done to put food into themselves, food is another commodity

Focus when everything is going on, very easy to focus

 

The ability to use consciousness effectively focus the prana

Ray kurtzwail

Encouraging us to be more disconnected to our bodies

Moving away from any rapport between the body and the mind

When doshas (body) are balanced and mind is happy – healthy well established in him or herself

Mind is delusional and body is imbalanced no where near health

Thought pollution that encourages us to move in herd mentality—extraordinary popular delusions. Unuseful direction

More people are not thinking we are influenced, much less awareness of

Ayurveda and yoga are not separate from the reality of all in the world, better balanced and integrated and to expand that into the environment

Ganga is the earthly incarnation of the milky way

The more things you have the less satisfaction, consumerism is a very dangerous mind virus

To take and consume—what effect does this have on a nation

Pursuit of wealth for its own ends is not useful in the long run, it does not follow the dharma

Only way there will be balance in your body is if there is balance with you and the environment

Remain calm…always!

Rasa = juice

When you worship hanuman you worship the prana within and externally

Vignana bhairava, many ways to position consciousness

Books are only useful if they are made use of in some way, simply reading isn’t good enough

Find a way from discouraging your mind from becoming obstructed

Tantric worship is about purifying the 5 elements

Ayurveda, we should have a satisfying experience of life only satisfying for us if it is satisfying for others as well

Darshana, not only means sight but philosophy

Believing is seeing…

We must try to do something, the plant kingdom will support us…long ago they had a conference in the forest, what will we do when everyone moves to the cities, last year more than 50% people in the world live in urban environments. Urban environments are not real, exists because there are other places where food is grown

To encourage human beings to appreciate the fact only through the natural environment that we can maintain ourselves

Knowledge is our impression. Construct of our brains that makes us think we are seeing what we are seeing purpose of allowing us to believe there is a continuity in the experience outside us

Calmness in our prana

If you want your awarenss to move in the direction of relatively encumbered awareness

Move in the direction of reconnecting with external environment, we are not normal any more, how long will we persist if we keep doing things

God willing there will continue to be researchers and scientists

Change your attention to something else—take awareness away from the pathology the pathology loses its vitality

Stupid to pray for anything in yourself…pray for everyone

Practical to turn your attention away from you, better perspective on others than yourself

Putting the awareness on something better

Goenkaji – Inner Peace for World Peace

 

Religion is religion only when it unites

Conversion from misery to happiness, bondage to liberation, cruelty to compassion, impurity of the mind to the purity

Enlightened beings have given a technique for peace

No peace in the individual there cannot be real peace in the world

Observing mind and matter within ourselves

 

Interview

When the mind is confused you make wrong decisions

 Vipassana helps dissolve the ego to help others

 Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche , Sunder Nagar May 14^th

Tonight I had the wonderful opportunity to attend a teaching given by the teacher of Pema Choedron, Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. His lineage is very close to that of Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche.  He is a very high TIbetan lama who has been living in Colorado for the last 20 years, is married to an American woman and truly straddles both cultures. 

What follows are my notes…

Be contemplative and introspective or be a dynamic source of light

India has shown Tibetans grace…

ysDegeneration of family structure

Buddha Dharma and wisdom…Buddha enabled dharma accessible to all and everyone became encouraged

Common sense, simple reasoning

Common sense cannot be complicated and difficult to understand if it is then truth is not as accessible and applicable

Buddhist teachings revealed common sense, difficult to practice in that way in its reasoning is irrefutable

Once reasoning makes an impression as a truth to oneself that truth cannot be altered and made into something different, dharma or virtue is really more or less common sense

What is dharma and how is it common sense?

We are all sentient beings and we desire happiness all the time…it is with that desire that we reach for our mothers breast

We always wanted happiness, poor, rich, privileged or not one is not different from human beings in this way

Always we exhibited some symptoms of human mind and sentient mind which is a desire for happiness

With that desire we drank milk instead of refusing it

Young or adult, man or woman, all cultures we are no different we continuously carry our lives for desire, for happiness

Dream is shadow of day life

Desire for happiness continues, when we can acknowledge this this is what makes us human and bounds us, this is what makes us living beings—desire

Inatimate objects do not have the desire for happiness

As consciousness this is innate quality we are all the same

Dharma is when you acknowledge this to yourself and you are not different from other sentient beings, we are all the same

One with mind, innate wish for happiness is present

When we can’t acknowledge that on top of that acknowledgement

Add to somebody’s happiness that is dharma, that is virtue, all beings desire happiness

You acknowledge “I am thou” and you help someone in that need of happiness to receive that happiness in their lives that is dharma or virtue

It breeds happiness and satisfaction to someone who longs for satisfaction

That cause is positive virtue, seed that ripens in this life immediate positive feedback and results this is what dharma or virtue is

Verified, someone in their own right of happiness you are able to contribute to the individual

Kind person and generous person executive to the effect

One makes a positive action

Mind is not tangible not destroyed continues in an illusory way happiness is not too far out of reach there has to be a cause to make effects different, causes from previous lives

What is crucial is to do good in the world and add to many peoples and beings happiness

That is what brings us happiness

If one’s capacity is to serve 100 and one limits to serve oneself they are not giving full chance to one’s potential

Because of ones own lack of vision and openness

Giving birth to one’s own good nature

Happiness is deep satisfaction, helping many others changing surroundings of your life and existence

Potential gives birth to ones appropriate outreach more and more freedom inside, sense of peace

Mental disturbance is true dharma and virtue is to serve others, searching as oneself to be happy

So what is adharm as a sentient we would want to be free from pain

Other human beings understand each other through signs

Know of others experience, all beings free from suffering

We are no different from sentient beings therefore not to do harm to others, causes pain to others is a virtue

If one causes pain to others that is violent it is unjust because one who does not want pain wishes to be happy

Adharm sows negative seeds

Nonvirtue should be avoided based on this reasoning based on reasoning which is irrefutable

Self reflection, contemplative, examining ones own mind

Positive do that positive thing

Take yourself as an example do not harm others or accumulate unwholesome acts shun away from it do accumulate helpful, wholesome acts

Stay away from passion, ignorance, jealousy, pride

Accumulate wholesome acts, engage in compassionate acts

Naturally tame ones mind and this is where you find freedom

Restraining from negative acts and engaging in positive acts, how you feel this wish for happiness, how you connect with that personally

Working for happiness without knowing what you are working for isn’t good

Wish for ALL beings to be happy

Enjoy happiness of others as if it is your happiness, be happy within, no trace of jealousy, spread this to all wish them more happiness

Space has no boundaries, unlimited

Practice of four immeasurables, higher birth in next life

Vegetarianism is right, meat is wrong

Confusion we live in today still doesn’t alter truth

Simple teachings from head to heart

Teachings accessibility for people from different socio economic status

Feel sympathy for their pain or hurt

Karmapa Talk Notes May 13^th

On his way abroad for the first time, busy with preparation for that trip. Only 21. Unprepared to give a talk so talks from his feelings and experiences which is more sensible and natural. Embrace things that are worthwhile and things that are not worthwhile leave them aside

Talk on impermanence…in thinking about and talking about impermanence there is nothing to talk about it is what is happening around us all the time

2008 just began drastic changes illustrate impermanence, tremendous increase in basic needs (food prices), fluctuation in economics are expressions in the truth of change, china earthquake cyclone in Myanmar

expression and realities make us all feel anxiety and anxiousness. Knowing everything is impermanent, clinging to the illusion of the absence of impermanence

go hand in hand along with impermanence, unpredictability impermanent, luxury be ahead of impermanence

Tibet political situation is very critical and unexpected, participated in march 10^th ceremony

Ones mind is not prepared to accommodate what is really happening, one’s mind is really involved multitude of ways impermanence occurs

Unpredictability, mind lost in own state of chlostrophoby

One must take interest in values of impermanence and be prepared for unpredictability

It is not easy….in Tibet unauspicious way of thinking if you entertain thoughts of death…does not serve as preparation

Preparation for impermanence is not clairvoyance

Every day ordinary life we constantly face impermanence and develop different understandings, prepare to handle impermanence in a constructive way

As we live our lives we live by habitual fixation of permanence of things and need to address how we fabricate illusion of permanence…practical and relative reality of building a house. Illusion on the preciousness of the house is unrealistic, hope beyond what the house is made move, house of permanence, house lasts beyond. What one forgets is what one is preparing for and what wealth and houses become more valuable than life in it is built

The preciousness of life is diminished with the illusion of permanence

Plans contingent to the reality of impermanence

Indulging in illusion of impermanence breeds laziness, action

Distorted fixation of clinging and grasping to the point of unreasonability and one sidedness

Each thing has two sides, peripheral view of both sides

Illusion of permanence, impermanence occurs everywhere irrespectively

Death occurs every moment of one’s life

Truth of impermanence and inevitability of death accept both sides with confidence

Wisdom within us is our true nature, over come ignorance

Clouds analogy. Sun is clouded, cloud veiled sun but to the sun the cloud does not veil it. In the same vain conditioning veils our wisdom. Day time is light, night time is dark if your fixation say time can be dark and you can only see the darkness of daylight and darkness of night pursue the morning of the light

Relative reality, real meaning of the darkness of the day

To be more aware of impermanence in each day you can see how you born and die each day, every  morning you are born

Saying we are impermanent does not mean we give up because of impermanence

Impermanence is not a philosophical concept, it is reality illusion fail to take into account truth

All phenomenon is subject to impermanence, cyclone , earthquake

Unwise to say these are natural scale and these things are too big and there is nothing we can do

People made solemn resolve to benefit each and every being then not acting would go against that

Those who can make a difference for others

Maintain resolve and watch active expressions of those resolves, decrease degree of pain

Don’t feel burdened or handicapped by impermanence, not crippling affect

Terrible things are impermanent but so are good things

Having ignorance about the realities of things bring one even more suffering, positive attitudes to practical solutions not fixated

 

 

Somewhere Over the Rainbow

Who doesn’t love this song?

Somewhere over the rainbow
Way up high
There’s a land that I heard of
Once in a lullaby

Somewhere over the rainbow
Skies are blue
And the dreams that you dare to dream
Really do come true

Some day I’ll wish upon a star
And wake up where the clouds are far behind me
Where troubles melt like lemondrops
Away above the chimney tops
That’s where you’ll find me

Somewhere over the rainbow
Bluebirds fly
Birds fly over the rainbow
Why then, oh why can’t I?
Some day I’ll wish upon a star
And wake up where the clouds are far behind me
Where troubles melt like lemondrops
Away above the chimney tops
That’s where you’ll find me

Somewhere over the rainbow
Bluebirds fly
Birds fly over the rainbow
Why then, oh why can’t I?

If happy little bluebirds fly
Beyond the rainbow
Why, oh why can’t I?

Tell Him

A good friend of mine in college played this song by Lauryn Hill every night before he went to bed. It was his way of communing with the Divine. As much as I subscribe to nondual thought the play of bakti hits me deep in my heart.

TELL HIM

Let me be patient let me be kind
Make me unselfish without being blind
Though I may suffer I’ll envy it not
And endure what comes
Cause he’s all that I got and
tell him…

Tell him I need him 
Tell him I love him 
And it’ll be alright
Telll himmm be alright be alright
Tell him tell him I need him
Tell him I love him
It’ll be alright

Now I may have faith to make mountains fall
But if I lack love then I am nothin’ at all
I can give away everything I possess
But left without love then I have no happiness
I know I’m imperfect 
& not without sin 
But now that I’m older all childish things end
and tell him…

Tell him I need him 
Tell him I love him 
And it’ll be alright
Telll himmm be alright be alright
Tell him tell him I need him
Tell him I love him
It’ll be alright

I’ll never be jealous
And I won’t be too proud
Cause love is not boastful
Oooh and love is not loud
Tell him I need him
Tell him I love him
Everything’s gonna be alright 
Now I may have wisdom and knowledge on Earth
But if I speak wrong then what is it worth?
See what we now know is nothing compared
to the love that was shown when our lives were spared
and tell him…

Tell him I need him 
Tell him I love him 
And it’ll be alright

Tell him tell him I need him
Tell him I love him
It’ll be alright