Weltgeist Deep within an essay On the Art of Thinking for Oneself, Schopenhauer has four novels to recommend his readers. Of course, they are each in a different language… He also gives us objective, measurable standards to judge the artistic merit of a novel. Schopenhauer looks at how much a novel deals with the inner life — the more it deals with the inner life of the protagonist, the more artistic a novel becomes because it’s the inner world that excites our interest – not the outer world of representation. Schopenhauer’s recommended reading list: 1) Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne (https://amzn.to/3toq2zW) 2) Julie, ou la Nouvelle Héloïse by Jean-Jacques Rousseau (https://amzn.to/36EeKxK) 3) Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (https://amzn.to/3pPkGvw) 4) Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes (https://amzn.to/3aBNKQO)
Teaching and Learning
Walking for Peace with Satish Kumar
UPLIFT How the Simple act of Walking can bring us Inner Peace. Satish Kumar commemorates the 50th Anniversary of his Peace Walk from India to Washington D.C. with a 50 mile walk along the River Thames to Oxford for the Resurgence 50 ‘One Earth, One Humanity, One Future’ event. http://www.resurgence.org
Satish Kumar – films to inspire the change-makers of the future
Fern Smith
30th April 2015 (theecologist.org)
Satish Kumar, peace walkA landmark 6-part documentary series is planned with Satish Kumar – peace and environment activist, religious philosopher, teacher, writer and broadcaster.
The Resurgence Trust is joining forces with Emergence in association with Schumacher College, Culture Colony and Volcano Theatre to make a landmark documentary series with Satish Kumar, editor-in-chief of Resurgence & Ecologist magazine and The Ecologist website.
Why? Because we live in extreme times, yet we lack the political leadership we need to bring our planet back from the brink of ecological, social and economic crisis. Many of us feel isolated or disempowered in the face of this.
But the message at the heart of Satish’s powerful teaching is that individuals can change the world for the better. Satish is a living example of ‘being the change you want to see in the world’.
Born in India in 1936, he became a Jain Monk aged nine, joined the Gandhian land reform movement aged eighteen, and in his twenties made an 8,000-mile, penniless Peace Walk from Delhi to all the nuclear weapons capitals of the world.
After settling in the UK, he became Editor of Resurgence Magazine championing ecology, art and spirituality, and then founder of Schumacher College, the worlds leading college for activists and change-makers, now celebrating its 25th anniversary.
Satish Kumar – activist and change-maker
As Tony Juniper, Former Director Friends of the Earth, puts it, “Satish Kumar is one of the greatest thinkers and doers of our age.
“He combines a rare kind of personal energy with a fearsome intellect and a deeply philosophical perspective with the kind of real world pragmatism necessary for achieving real change. His contribution has been and continues to be immense.”
As a result of his teaching and writing Satish has changed countless lives. He has given two TED Talks (Whitechapel and Exeter), been the subject of a BBC documentary Earth Pilgrim, and featured on Desert Island Discs.
But never before has there been an in depth record of his life, work and teaching that deeply interrogates all that he stands for. Satish is a speaker who shines with debate and challenge as he enters his 79th year at the peak of his powers and learning.
In these films, we will challenge him to communicate his philosophy as never before to a wider audience. This series of films will represent an invaluable resource for years to come – a document, a legacy, a gift to inspire the change-makers of the future.
“Satish remains resolutely unworldly – in the best possible way!” says Jonathon Porritt founder of Forum For the Future. “What most people describe as ‘the real world’ is to him a world of pain, deception and devastation.
“Happily, there is another world in the making, and Satish stands at the heart of that all-important endeavour.”
Bringing alternative ideas to the mainstream
To ensure rigour of debate, we have chosen as our interviewer Jane Davidson, former Minister for Environment and Sustainability in Wales and the woman behind the radical One Planet One Wales initiative.
Jane will tackle Satish on ways of bringing his ‘alternative’ ideas firmly into the mainstream. The two of them together will really dig into the issues of ecology, economy, spirituality, education, business, optimism and activism making this a unique and important series.
These six hour-long films will be filmed over six days in summer 2015 and released in 2016 – Satish’s 80th year and the 50th Anniversary of Resurgence.
Supporting the film
Emergence is raising the production costs for the films by crowd funding via the website Indiegogo. The campaign runs from Monday 27th April to Friday 29th May and has 33 days to raise the £33,000 needed to make the documentary series.
We are seeking support from the Resurgence & Ecologist community to make this documentary project possible.
As an investor in the project you will be able to choose from a range of benefits including having your very own copy of the entire series, signed books, the chance to attend a live recording and meet Satish himself, or even to become a co-producer.
To watch a short film about the project, find out more about the campaign, pre-order your copy of the films or bag one of the exciting perks on offer visit our crowdfunding campaign page.
Fern Smith is a performer, teacher, therapist and founder of Emergence – an arts and sustainability collective based in Wales. “We make art with one agenda: to change the world.”
Satish Kumar – Being an Earth Pilgrim Trailer from Philip Ralph on Vimeo.
“The Faces at Braga” by David Whyte
13 Monday Oct 2014 (wordverseuniverse.wordpress.com)
The Faces at Braga
In monastery darkness
by the light of one flashlight,
the old shrine room waits in silence.
While beside the door
we see the terrible figure,
fierce eyes demanding, “Will you step through?”
And the old monk leads us,
bent back nudging blackness
prayer beads in the hand that beckons.
We light the butter lamps
and bow, eyes blinking in the
pungent smoke, look up without a word,
see faces in meditation,
a hundred faces carved above,
eye lines wrinkled in the handheld light.
Such love in solid wood—
taken from the hillsides and carved in silence,
they have the vibrant stillness of those who made them.
Engulfed by the past
they have been neglected, but through
smoke and darkness they are like the flowers
we have seen growing
through the dust of eroded slopes,
their slowly opening faces turned toward the mountain.
Carved in devotion
their eyes have softened through age
and their mouths curve through delight of the carver’s hand.
If only our own faces
would allow the invisible carver’s hand
to bring the deep grain of love to the surface.
If only we knew
as the carver knew, how the flaws
in the wood led his searching chisel to the very core,
we would smile too
and not need faces immobilized
by fear and the weight of things undone.
When we fight with our failing
we ignore the entrance to the shrine itself
and wrestle with the guardian, fierce figure on the side of good.
And as we fight
our eyes are hooded with grief
and our mouths are dry with pain.
If only we could give ourselves
to the blows of the carver’s hands,
the lines in our faces would be the trace lines of rivers
feeding the sea
where voices meet, praising the features
of the mountain and the cloud and the sky.
Our faces would fall away
until we, growing younger toward death
everyday, would gather all our flaws in celebration
to merge with them perfectly,
impossibly, wedded to our essence,
full of silence from the carver’s hands.
_______________
David Whyte, currently living in the US (he is of English and Irish background), is a poet and writer-philosopher engaging the various issues his diverse life experiences have opened up to him. (A concise biography can be accessed at davidwhyte dot com.)
“The Faces at Braga” originally appeared in the poet’s collection, Where Many Rivers Meet. I have encountered it in his recent (2009) book, The Three Marriages: Reimagining Work, Self and Relationship, where it appears as the Poetic Conclusion: Or What Really Happened in the Mountain Temple in the chapter titled, “Alone in the Struggle: Turning to Face the World”.
The Poet and The Mystic: A Transformational Dialogue between David Whyte and Thomas Huebl
Mobius Executive Leadership The Poet and The Mystic: A Transformational Dialogue between David Whyte and Thomas Huebl was recorded at their first meeting at the annual gathering of the Next Practice Institute sponsored by Mobius Executive Leadership in June of 2017.
The death of the universe — and what it means for life
(Ted.com)
The universe started with a bang — but how will it end? With astonishing visuals, cosmologist and TED Fellow Katie Mack takes us to the theoretical end of everything, some trillions of years in the future, in a profound meditation on existence, wonder and the legacy of humanity within the immensity of time and space.
This talk was presented at an official TED conference, and was featured by our editors on the home page.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Stone (Thobar Phádraig)
Written and read by David Whyte
The face in the stone is a mirror looking into you.
You have gazed into the moving waters,
you have seen the slow light, in the sky
above Lough Inagh, beneath you, streams have flowed,
and rivers of earth have moved beneath your feet,
but you have never looked into the immovability
of stone like this, the way it holds you, gives you
not a way forward but a doorway in, staunches
your need to leave, becomes faithful by going nowhere,
something that wants you to stay here and look back,
be weathered by what comes to you, like the way you too
have travelled from so far away to be here, once reluctant
and now as solid and as here and as willing
to be touched as everything you have found.
THE GOOD NEWS!
Recently, the COVID lockdown began to be lifted.
Now, we’re pleased to report that many businesses are coming back:
The race track is running again.
The diving school’s success is making a big splash.
The portable toilet service is ready to go.
The trash collector says business is picking up.
The sausage maker has gotten through the wurst.
The cookie company is rolling in dough.
The bakery says bread orders are rising.
The dentist’s office is open wide.
The joint is jumping at the knee replacement therapy clinic.
Wheelchair production is ramping up.
The pot dispensary is reporting high demand.
The allergist’s increased business is nothing to sneeze at.
The motorcycle dealer is getting it in gear.
The wheels are turning again at the bicycle shop.
Stargazing tours at the observatory are looking up.
The tobacconist is finally up to snuff.
Radiator sales are heating up.
The poker lounge is finally seeing bettor days.
The insect exterminator reports an uptick in calls.
At the diner, flapjacks are selling like hotcakes.
Things are perking along at the coffee bar.
The furniture re-upholsterer is recovering nicely.
The lamp company’s future is looking brighter.
The florist’s business is coming up roses.
Sales of playground equipment are on the upswing.
The lawn-and-garden service is raking in the profits.
The garlic grower reports that product turnover is strong.
Things are really hopping at the rabbit farm.
The janitorial service is cleaning up.
The hair stylist is ready to roll.
It’s thumbs-up at the nail salon.
The beekeeping business is buzzing.
Sales at the candy shop are sweeter than ever.
The hobby shop reports that drone sales are going up.
Trampoline sales have bounced back.
Business at the target range is going great guns.
At the lion safari park, attendance has roared back.
Applications for glider pilot lessons are soaring.
The music store notes that things are humming along.
Volleyball sales have spiked.
New mattress orders are springing up everywhere.
Real estate sales are gaining ground.
The space exploration company’s shares are skyrocketing.
Things are “all right” again at Republican Party headquarters.
Business at the beer bar is chugging along.
The pool table company is racking up orders.
Reservations at the strip club are taking off.
The water pump company is doing well.
And the explosives expert reports that business is booming!
(Courtesy of Janet Cornwell, H.W., m., and her brother)
David Whyte – The Bell and the Blackbird
Vanessa Able (thedewdrop.org)
“Either way
takes courage,
either way wants you
to be nothing
but that self that
is no self at all,”
– David Whyte
Meditators at a temple might sometimes be aided by the sound of a bell ringing at intervals throughout the meditation session. The bell, which is often cast to be bigger than a person, can be housed in its own structure and is rung in the spirit of awakening, to reverberate all around the temple grounds as a gentle call to awakening. By the same token, David Whyte’s poem proposes the sound of the blackbird, the sound of nature or of something quite ordinary, as an alternative, another path to the monastic life. He is reassuring the reader of their radiance, of their courage, and that their deepest spiritual path doesn’t necessarily lead through an institution – that the approach is really ‘the meeting itself, without any meeting at all.’
The Bell and the Blackbird
The sound of a bell
Still reverberating,
or a blackbird calling
from a corner of the field,
asking you to wake
into this life,
or inviting you deeper
into the one that waits.
Either way
takes courage,
either way wants you
to be nothing
but that self that
is no self at all,
wants you to walk
to the place
where you find
you already know
how to give
every last thing
away.
The approach
that is also
the meeting
itself,
without any
meeting
at all.
That radiance
you have always
carried with you
as you walk
both alone
and completely
accompanied
in friendship
by every corner
of the world
crying
Allelujah.
David Whyte
From: The Bell and the Blackbird
The Teacher Called Suffering | Eckhart Tolle Teachings
Eckhart Tolle Excerpted from Eckhart’s retreat in Norway in the fall of 2015. An exploration of the uniquely human phenomenon of self-relating and the suffering that egoic patterns can create. Subscribe to find greater fulfillment in life: http://bit.ly/EckhartYT Want to watch and hear more of Eckhart’s Teachings? Become a member today and join our growing YouTube community! http://bit.ly/ETmembership Interested in diving deeper into Eckhart Tolle’s work? Enjoy a FREE 10-DAY TRIAL to Eckhart Tolle Now: http://bit.ly/ET10Day