What's God Got to Do With It? - Rowe Camp and Conference ...

[Pages:13]IDEAS ? POLITICS ? RELATIONSHIPS ? ART ? WRITING ? SPIRITUALITY ? YOUTH

CeThne ter Post A Journal of UU Rowe Center Volume 26 No.2 ? Spring/Summer 2015

SPECIAL SECTION

What's God Got to Do With It?

Joanna Macy, Mary Catherine Bateson, Starhawk and others reflect on their spiritual journeys

ALSO INSIDE THIS ISSUE

Charles Eisenstein

Fear of a Living Planet

Chris Martenson

The Great Unraveling

Ralph Nader

Letter to Environmentalists

Joyce and Barry Vissell

How to Love

Catherine Ann Jones

The Bliss of Not Knowing

AND MORE!

w w w. r o w e c e n t e r. o r g

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IDEAS

The Center Post ? Spring/Summer 2015

CHARLES EISENSTEIN

FEAR of a LIVING PLANET

Does the concept of a living planet uplift and inspire you, or is it a disturbing example of woo-woo nonsense that distracts us from practical, science-based policies?

The scientifically-oriented nuts-and-bolts environmental activist will roll his or her eyes upon hearing phrases like "The planet is a living being." From there it is a short step to sentiments like, "Love will heal the world," "What we need most is a shift in consciousness," and "Let's get in touch with our indigenous soul." What's wrong with such ideas? The skeptics make a potent argument. Not only are these ideas delusional, they say, but to voice them is a

C HA R LE S E I S E N S T EI N has written several books, most recently The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know is Possible and Sacred Economics. A speaker and writer focusing on themes of human culture and identity, he has a degree in mathematics and philosophy from Yale, lived a decade in Taiwan as a translator, and has been a college instructor, yoga teacher, and construction worker. He currently writes and speaks full-time. He lives in Pennsylvania with his wife and four children.

strategic error that opens environmentalism to accusations of flakiness. By invoking unscientific concepts, by prattling on about the "heart" or spirit or the sacred, we will be dismissed as naive, fuzzy-headed, irrational, hysterical, over-emotional hippies. What we need, they say, is more data, more logic, more numbers, better arguments, and more practical solutions framed in language acceptable to policy-makers and the public.

I think that argument is

mistaken. By shying away from the idea of a living planet, we rob environmentalism of its authentic motive force, engender paralysis rather than action, and implicitly endorse the worldview that enables our destruction of the planet.

The Psychology of Contempt

To see that, let's start by observing that the objection to "Earth is alive" isn't primarily a scientific objection. After



all, science can easily affirm or deny Earth's aliveness depending on what definition of life is being used. No, we are dealing with an emotional perception here, one that goes beyond "alive" to affirm that Earth is sentient, conscious, even sacred. That is what upsets the critics. Furthermore, the derisiveness of the criticism, encoded in words like "hippie" or "flake," also shows that more than an intellectual difference of opinion is at stake. Usually, derision comes from insecurity or fear. "Judgment," says Marshall Rosenberg, "is the tragic expression of an unmet need."

What are they afraid of? (And I--the voice of the derisive critic lives in me as well.) Could it be that the contempt comes in part from a fear that one is, oneself, "naive, irrational, and over-emotional?" Could the target of the derision be the projection of an insecurity lurking within? Is there a part of ourselves that we disown and project, in distorted form, onto others--an innocent, trusting, childlike part?

The fear of being emotional, irrational, or hysterical is very close to a fear of the inner feminine; the exclusion of the fuzzy, the ill-defined, and the emotionally-perceived dimensions of our activism in favor of the linear, rational, and evidence-based mirrors the domination over, and marginalization of, the feminine from our social choice-making. Part of our resistance to the notion of Earth as a living being could be the patriarchal mind feeling threatened by feminine ways

of knowing and choosing. But that's still pretty theoretical, so let me share a little of my own introspection.

When I apprehend concepts such as "Earth is alive," or "All things are sacred," or "The universe and everything in it bears sentience, purpose, and life," there is always an emotion involved; in no case is my rejection or acceptance the result of pure ratiocination. Either I embrace them with a feeling of eager, tender hope, or I reject them with a feeling of wariness, along the lines of "It is too good to be true," or "I'm nobody's fool." Sometimes, beyond wariness, I feel a hot flash of anger, as if I had been violated or betrayed. Why?

That wariness is deeply connected to the contempt I've described. The derision of the cynic comes from a wound of crushed idealism and betrayed hopes. We received it on a cultural level when the Age of Aquarius morphed into the Age of Reagan, and on an individual level as well when our childish perception of a living, personal universe in which we are destined to grow into magnificent creators gave way to an adulthood of deferred dreams and lowered expectations. Anything that exposes this wound will trigger our protective instincts. One such protection is cynicism, which rejects and derides as foolish, naive, or irrational anything that affirms the magic and idealism of youth.

Our perceived worldview has cut us off, often quite brutally, from intimate connection with the rest of life and with the rest of matter. The

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child hugs a tree and thinks he feels the hug and imagines the tree is his friend, only to learn that no, I'm sorry, the tree is just a bunch of woody cells with no central nervous system and therefore cannot possibly have the qualities of beingness that humans have. The child imagines that just as she looks out on the world, the world looks back at her, only to learn that no, I'm sorry, the world consists of a jumble of insensate stuff, a random melee of subatomic particles, and that intelligence and purpose reside in human beings alone. Science (as we have known it) renders us alone in an alien universe. At the same time, it crowns us as its lords and masters, for if sentience and purpose inhere in us alone, there is nothing stopping us from engineering the world as we see fit. There is no desire to listen for, no larger process to participate in, no consciousness to respect.

"The Earth isn't really alive" is part of that ideological cutoff. Isn't that the same cutoff that enables us to despoil the planet?

The wounded child interjects, "But what if it is true? What if the universe really is just as science describes?" What if, as the biologist Jacques Monod put it, we are alone in "an alien world. A world that is deaf to man's music, just as indifferent to his hopes as to his suffering or his crimes"? Such is the wail of the separate self. It is loneliness and separation disguised as an empirical question.

What Moves the Environmentalist?

Most people reading this probably consider themselves to be environmentalists; certainly most people think it is important to create a society

that leaves a livable planet to future generations. What is it, exactly, that makes us into environmentalists? If we answer that, we might know how to turn others into environmentalists as well, and to deepen the commitment of those who already identify as such.

I don't know about you, but I didn't become an environmentalist because someone made a rational argument that convinced me that the planet was in danger. I became an environmentalist out of love and pain: Love for the world and its beauty and the grief of seeing it destroyed. It was only because I was in touch with these feelings that I had the ears to listen to evidence and reason and the eyes to see what is happening to our world. I believe that this love and this grief are latent in every human being. When they awaken, that person becomes an environmentalist.

Now, I am not saying that a rational, evidence-based analysis of the situation and possible solutions is unimportant. It's just that it will be compelling only with the animating spirit of reverence for our planet, born of the felt connection to the beauty and pain around us.

Our present economic and industrial systems can function only to the extent that we insulate ourselves from our love and our pain. We insulate ourselves geographically by pushing the worst degradation onto faraway places. We insulate ourselves economically by using money to avoid the immediate consequences of that degradation, pushing it onto the world's poor. We insulate ourselves perceptually by learning not to see or recognize the stress of the land and water around us and by forgetting

what healthy forests, healthy streams, and healthy skies look like. And we insulate ourselves ideologically by our trust in technological fixes and justifications like, "Well, we need fracking for energy independence, and besides it's not that bad," or "After all, this forest isn't in an ecologically critical area."

The most potent form of ideological insulation, though, is the belief that the world isn't really in pain, that nothing worse is happening than the manipulation of matter by machines, and that therefore as long as we can engineer some substitute for "ecosystem services," there need be no limit to what we do to nature. Absent any inherent purpose or intelligence, the Earth is here for us to use. Look around this planet. See the results of that ideology writ large.

The Love of Life

The idea that our planet is alive, and further, that every mountain, river, lake and forest is a living being, even a sentient, purposive, sacred being, is therefore not a soppy emotional distraction from the environmental problems at hand; to the contrary, it disposes us to feel more, to care more, and to do more. No longer can we hide from our grief and love behind the ideology that the world is just a pile of stuff to be used instrumentally for our own ends. True, that ideology is perfectly consistent with cutting carbon emissions, and consistent as well with any environmental argument that invokes our survival as the primary basis for policymaking. A lot of environmental activism depends on appeals to survival anxiety. "We have to change

our ways, or else!" Appealing to fear and selfish interest, in general, is a natural tactic for anyone coming from a belief that the planet has no intrinsic value, no value beyond its utility. What other reason to preserve it is there, when it has no intrinsic value?

It should be no surprise that this tactic has failed. When environmentalists cite the potential economic losses from climate change, they implicitly endorse economic gain and loss as a basis for environmental decision-making. Doubtless they are imagining that they must "speak the language" of the power elite, who supposedly don't understand anything but money, but this strategy backfires when, as is the norm, financial self-interest and ecological sustainability are opposed. Similarly, calls to preserve the rainforests because of the value of the medicines that may one day be derived from its species imply that, if only we can invent synthetic alternatives to whatever the forest might bear, we needn't preserve the rainforest after all. Even appealing to the wellbeing of one's grandchildren harbors a similar trap: If that is your first concern, then what about environmental issues that only affect people in far-away lands, or that don't tangibly harm any human being at all? The clubbing of baby seals, the extinction of the river dolphin, the deafening of whales with sonar... it is hard to construct a compelling argument that any of these threaten the measurable well-being of future generations. Are we then to sacrifice these beings of little utility?

Besides, did anyone ever become a committed environmentalist because of all the money we'll save? Because of all the benefits

we'll receive? I am willing to bet that even the survival of the species or the wellbeing of your grandchildren isn't the real motive for your environmentalism. You are not an environmentalist because you are afraid of what will happen if you don't act. You are an environmentalist because you love our planet. To call others into environmentalism, we should therefore appeal to the same love in them. It is not only ineffectual but also insulting to offer someone a venal reason to act ecologically when we ourselves are doing it for love.

Nonetheless, environmental campaigning relies heavily on scare tactics. Fear might stimulate a few gestures of activism, but it does not sustain long-term commitment. It strengthens the habits of selfprotection, but what we need is to strengthen the habits of service.

Why then do so many of us name "fear that we won't have a livable planet" as the motive for our activism? I think it is to make that activism acceptable within the ideological framework I have described that takes an instrumentalist view of the planet. When we embrace what I believe is the true motive--love for this Earth--we veer close to the territory that the cynic derides. What is it to make "rational" choices, after all? Is it ever really rational to choose from love? In particular, is it rational to love something that isn't even alive?

But the truth is, we love the Earth for what it is, not merely for what it provides.

This article is adapted from one that appeared originally in Kosmos magazine.

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POLITICS

The Center Post ? Spring/Summer 2015

CHRIS MARTENSON

The Approaching

G R E AT U N R AV E L I N G

Perhaps the largest predicament we face is that infinite economic growth on a finite planet is an impossibility, and yet that's exactly what our monetary and banking systems require.

Not merely because the bankers and politicians want it -- which they do -- but because that's how the system itself is designed. When you loan money into existence, you get an exponential increase of that money over time. Actually, you get an exponential increase in debt, too, only at a faster pace, which translates into larger quantities.

For as long as debts are growing at an exponential pace, everything is fine with the world, the economy hums along, politicians get re-elected, and the big banks churn out profits year after year. However, when the debt growth stops, financial panic sets in, the banking system threatens collapse, and the fiscal and monetary authorities pull out all the stops in their efforts to prevent these various ills from getting any worse.

What the political and banking folks are desperately seeking to prevent is nothing less than a Great Unraveling.

Their task is impossible. The Great Unraveling will be a set of related economic and financial crises that end up taking inflated expectations and reducing them to match reality. Perhaps this process will take years, or maybe it will take decades, or maybe it will take months. Nobody knows. But the longer that final process of accounting is delayed, the wider the gap between expectations and reality. Greece has merely exposed the flaw in the system of money that requires endless, perpetual exponential expansion. Sooner or later it hits a limit, and

that limit has been reached. Pretending otherwise is a game we'll leave for the entrenched defenders of the status quo.

Who's Next?

The economic and financial crises are not going to strike everywhere at once, or in equal amounts. Some places will be struck first and hardest, with the only predictable pattern being that the weaker nations and companies will be hit first from the outside in.

The trouble always starts on the edges. We see junk bonds falling before higher quality grades. Poor companies sink before better ones. Weaker countries fall into chaos before stronger ones.

Even within a given country, some areas will fare far better than others.

The trouble has already begun in Greece, obviously, but under more normal times the events in Venezuela, Puer-



CH R I S M AR T EN S O N earned a Ph.D. from Duke and a MBA from Cornell. He worked in the world of corporate finance and strategy for 10 years and is an accomplished speaker and author who has presented the "Peak Prosperity" material at the U.N., U.K. Parliament, in Las Vegas, to corporations and audiences the world over. Dr. Martenson spent six years researching and creating the video version of the Crash Course, which has been viewed more than 2.5 million times. His Crash Course book was published by Wiley in 2011.

to Rico, Brazil, and Portugal would be getting a lot more attention. The core of the problem is that these countries took on too much debt and now cannot possibly pay it all back. Compounding the problem was borrowing in US dollars, which removes a lot of maneuvering room because a country cannot simply print up the money to pay off the debt.

Eventually straightforward logic and simple math will be performed on other larger economies and the same conclusions will surface. What cannot be paid back, won't be paid back.

Japan cannot ever possibly pay off its debts. Somebody is going to have to take losses. Argentina is a mess.

Portugal is not currently in crisis but with debt-to-GDP of 129% it won't take much for it to enter the same path towards public recognition of its own math problems. Ireland at 123% and Italy at 132% debt-to-GDP are also in line.

Welcome to the next phase of this mega-drama, where it becomes impossible to completely ignore simple math and basic logic, despite the best efforts of the press, politicians, and other powerful entities.

The Great Unraveling then is really nothing more than a bunch of unrealistic hopes and dreams being forced, kicking and screaming, into alignment with reality. But the way it will play out is with what the people of Venezuela would tell you is a period of immense wealth destruction. A time when a Bolivar sinks from 46 cents of purchasing power to half a cent.

The truth, however, is that the wealth of the people of Venezuela was not destroyed; it was merely transferred. Actual wealth, unlike paper claims on wealth, cannot be printed up, nor is it easily destroyed. But it does get transferred all the time, and every single QE (quantitative easing) effort by the central banks has done exactly that.

The Coming Wealth Transfer

The good news about wealth transfers is that with a little forethought you can be on the right side of the line -- towards which wealth is transferred -- when the time comes.

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History is full of periods when wellmeaning but self-interested leadership tried to cover up past mistakes with a combination of money printing and refusing to acknowledge those past mistakes, exactly as is happening today. We have loads of history to study on the matter. Consider the Weimar Germany experience. A set of bad decisions, a prior war, and a punitive reparations treaty all combined to create a period when printing more and more money made sense to those in power. And so they did, with much applause from seated politicians and most of the populace too. At least for a while. But you know how that all turned out: Vast fortunes were lost, savings were entirely wiped out, and the moment is still referred to by many as a period of great wealth destruction. And, indeed, many experienced it that way, as people in Venezuela are today.

But the truth is that wealth was not destroyed; it was transferred. It passed from the unwary to the alert, and it did so in enormous and magnificent amounts. It's true that the money claims against true wealth were destroyed as the money spiraled down an inflationary hole, but money and debt are not wealth; they are merely claims on wealth. Real wealth is factories and farms, buildings and houses, raw land and minerals and water and food. There were just as many of these things before the Weimar hyperinflation as there were afterwards. That is, the amount of real wealth was fairly consistent throughout. But who owned it changed a lot.

And this is the hidden part of money printing -- the inevitable destructive events are always presented to us as if they were some form of natural disaster, unseen and unforeseeable, an unavoidable accident that just happened.

But they are neither unforeseeable nor unavoidable. When too many claims are piled up against too little real wealth, a resettlement is inevitable. The only question is whether it comes about in the form of an inflationary destruction, as in Venezuela today, or in a deflationary bust, more in the fashion of Greece today.

Either way the perceived value that

people think they hold just evaporates, like morning mist. Because we cannot yet pick which way the tower will fall -- into deflation or inflation -- it is best to be poised for either. If I had to pick, I would say that the world will see a mix of both deflationary and inflationary outcomes over the next two years. Deflation will happen if the pile of debts topples faster than authorities can print up new money and get it into the hands of the same people/entities that borrowed all that debt. Inflation will happen if it is people's faith in the national currency that declines more quickly.

Inflation will probably strike: ? South America ? Mexico ? Japan (eventually, and horrifically) ? China (this is a 50/50 toss up) ? Eastern Europe ? Russia ? Greece (after reverting to the Drachma) ? Africa Deflation will probably strike: ? U.S.A. ? Northern Europe ? Canada ? Australia For those countries that experience deflation first the second act will be inflation -- if not hyper-inflation, as the central banks panic and really begin to print in earnest. The reason I expect this, rather than a scenario of just letting the deflation run its course and burn itself out, is because deflation of the sort we are talking about here -- with over four decades of too much borrowing to erase -- will destroy institutions, careers and countries. Nobody in power ever has the stomach for those sorts of things. The summary is this; we are still printing and borrowing enormous amounts of money and credit, but the world is not growing any larger in response. The pressure is building. Nobody knows when all of that money and credit will have to be "trued up" against the amount of real stuff out there, but it will. It always does.

On Being Prepared

It's critical that you read widely,

consume multiple points of view, and accept pretty much nothing at face value that comes from the defenders of the status quo. The truth is always more complex, nuanced, and hidden than most people believe.

For example, U.S. interests in Ukraine are not centered on democracy, for the situation in Ukraine is but a much more complex amalgam of old fault lines and new energy and emerging geopolitical power realities that involve Russia and China.

Knowing how access to energy supplies has always shaped history, combined with an understanding of Europe's permanent energy shortfalls, gives us a workable map of the Ukraine conflict that allows us to mentally and even physically prepare for the possibility that the conflict gets worse and spreads before it recedes.

Or we might note that economic growth as practiced in the past relied on equivalent surges in cheap oil supplies that no longer apply. Today we can either have stagnant or falling supplies of cheap oil or we can have growing supplies of expensive oil, but we cannot have growing supplies of cheap oil. Those days are gone.

This gives us a workable map of the future which centers on the idea that the



growth rates of the past are a thing of the past. With that knowledge we then can assess the likelihood of success for the central banks that are busily printing up vast quantities of new claims on future economic growth.

If that growth arrives, there will be relative stability in the financial markets. If not, there will be disappointment, if not outright chaos at some point.

Still, here we are in 2015, when the very idea that endless economic growth is an illogical impossibility of the most obvious sort remains a fringe view. Odd, but true.

Everyone should be asking themselves exactly what they would be doing differently today if they knew for certain that the next wave of financial and economic disruptions were going to arrive in their country next month.

How would your answer change if the crisis were known to be coming in one year?

What if it was going to be two years? What changes in your answer? Anything?

It is time to prepare.

This piece is adapted from one that appeared on the blog site . blog.

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The Center Post ? Spring/Summer 2015

POLITICS

RALPH NADER

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How to C HA N GE C ON GR ESS on CL I M AT E C HA N G E

This letter was sent three times to Al Gore, George Soros, and venture capitalist Thomas Sever, without receiving a reply:

In light of your efforts to educate and galvanize the public regarding the urgencies of climate change and the increasingly documented necessity for action we, the undersigned environmentalists, wish to propose a new major initiative focused on members of Congress.

The adoption of a comprehensive energy conversion program requires the kind of grassroots and local/ state efforts that have been growing around the country. But it is also clear that without Congress on board, our national legislature will continue to be an instrument of the vested fossil fuel interests perpetrating the status quo that stops these changes and obfuscates the reality connecting widely supported greater energy efficiency and lower ground-level pollution with reduced greenhouse gases.

Currently, despite mounting studies and visible worldwide evidence of human-made climate change, Congress, as a whole, operates in an eerie bubble, as if oblivious to the consequences for the people and communities it purports to represent. Those who are concerned about climate change on Capitol Hill too often surrender to the futility of taking any action in the face of the obstructive power of the rejectionists. The defeatism is palpable, notwithstanding the recent all-night stand on the Senate floor by 30 Democratic senators and the one-minute floor addresses some members of Congress are making about the perils of inaction on climate issues. Meanwhile, climate change deniers rarely get challenged for outlandish and irresponsible claims that warnings about climate change are exaggerated, part of a "hoax," nothing more than "fear mongering," or based on "unsound science." The result is that too many outside advocates and environmental groups have practically given up for any action on the Hill. This is a selfinflicted retreat that nullifies much of their good efforts.

We cannot allow a legislative stalemate to continue to justify civic resignation and inaction in addressing this greatest of threats to our country's and world's environmental future. As you know well, the knowledge sufficient for action is here; the technologies and capital necessary to transition to a clean energy system are available and in many cases cost-competitive at the consumer interface. And the obligations to posterity are undeniable.

R AL P H N AD ER has launched three major presidential campaigns and founded more than 100 civic organizations that have affected auto safety, tax reform, atomic-power regulation, occupational safety, the tobacco industry, clean air and water, food and drug safety, access to health care, civil rights, open government, congressional ethics, and much more. He is a tireless advocate for ending the destruction of civil liberties, the economically draining corporate welfare state, the relentless perpetuation of America's wars, sovereignty-shredding trade agreements, and the unpunished crimes of Wall Street against Main Street. He has written many bestsellers, including Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State; The Seventeen Traditions; The Good Fight; and the landmark Unsafe at Any Speed.

What is lacking is the kind of focused pressure on Congress that's necessary to overcome the corporate special interests and their political allies in Washington that have blocked every significant attempt to rescue our country and the planet from the existential threat that looms ahead. Apart from some credible efforts around elections and targeted but limited policies, the environmental movement has not managed to leverage its grassroots power to overcome or even perturb the Congress's intolerable institutional gridlock.

We believe that an effective way to crack this inertia would be to create a new congressional climate action lobby, staffed by first-rate professionals with the drive, requisite skills, and singular daily focus on Congress. The idea would be to build a team sizeable enough -- perhaps as many as 100 people working daily on the Hill alone -- to sustain a consistent presence around every member's office. An array of strategies and tactics would be used to hold members accountable to the impacts of climate change on their districts. Efforts would be made to mobilize a diverse range of constituencies (including businesses, residents, and farmers suffering the consequences of drought and other extreme weather events), public health professionals, scientists, national security experts and other eminent leaders to pressure individual members of Congress. In addition to providing improved capacity toward congressional accountability, the initiative would help shape, promote, and publicize congressional hearings and debates, and eventually drive momentum toward far-reaching legislation, while expanding and intensifying other congressionally mandated policies, including regulatory oversight, procurement and new initiatives designed to accelerate the spread of renewables and efficiency standards, and reduce our addiction to fossil fuels.

These activists will be skilled at generating newsworthy material and framing cutting-edge media cov-

erage that helps marginalize the climate deniers and strengthens the resolve of already concurring members of Congress and their staffers. With bold vision and leadership, such an effort could create the type of atmosphere in which climate change rises from the back benches to become a priority for congressional leaders confident that the country is ready for significant strides forward.

Currently, there are astonishingly too few lobbyists working full time in Congress in this way. The most effective advocates on any issue are those who have money and continually engage in personal advocacy with members and their staff -- here in Washington and back home. Given the magnitude of the threat posed by climate change, such an operation should rival the scale and effectiveness of groups such as the NRA and AIPAC. It should be possible to do so with an initial annual budget of $20 million.

Despite suggestions to the contrary, we believe a majority of Americans would rise to the call to dismiss the naysayers and drive Congress to action. Many leaders, outside of Washington, from a variety of sectors who have already spoken out about the urgency of the issue, could be constantly mobilized to focus on individual members, including articulate celebrities and a wide circle of elders and persuaders from both parties.

Of course, here in Washington, D.C. there are environmental groups (including our own) that deal with climate change policies that arise in the regulatory agencies and Congress. But there are also the many daily brushfires that consume so much time and energy. A new group would enter the picture without any historical baggage or other matters pulling it in various directions. Its mandate would effectively draw a spotlight on members of Congress and amplify the efforts of existing grassroots campaigns. It also would be poised to take legitimate advantage of new developments -- including extreme weather events that shock the nation and underscore the urgency of the issue.

Rarely in our country's history have we seen the need -- as well as the reliable potential -- for this type of strategically designed initiative. Given the stakes, the annual budget is modest and achievable with your leadership. If successful, it could catalyze the kind of dynamic that we all know is crucial to liberate the energies of our country over a matter of such economic, social, and environmental magnitude.

Sincerely, Ralph Nader and colleagues

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ARTS

SHAUN MCNIFF

FAIL BETTER!

"In a dark time, the eye begins to see."

--Theodore Roethke

Liberating creativity is all about creating with the shadow. When I first started introducing people to how art furthers healing and social transformation, I viewed myself as evoking the positive aspects of creative activity. I often encountered a reluctance to participate: "No way am I going to do that." And if people did start to work, they were guarded. At first I thought the discomfort came from something I did, which may have been partly true, but experience has shown that the source of ten-

S H A U N M CN I F F has written the forthcoming Imagination in Action: Secrets for Unleashing Creative Expression. An exhibiting painter, his life work has been freeing the artist in every person. He is the first University Professor of Lesley University, where he established the first Expressive Arts Therapy graduate training program, from which the discipline of Expressive Arts Therapy emerged. An Honorary Life Member of the American Art Therapy Association, he has published many other books, including Art Heals: How Creativity Cures the Soul and Trust the Process: An Artist's Guide to Letting Go.

sion was already there smoldering, and I ignited it.

"Tension is beneficial," Heraclitus of Ephesus said. It activates, communicates, and gets things moving. The word "agitate" derives from the Latin agito, agitare -- to move, drive, urge forward. A certain agitation enhances creative expression, like the washing machines in our homes. Things have to be broken down, dissolved, softened, and stirred up so that they can change and be made anew.

As someone whose life work is involved with the arts and health, I have been able to see how this ability of art to engage the difficult materials, appreciate their place, and do something with them as affirmations of life offers a practical model for how healing and creative change happen in personal and social realms. The process may not cure the angst, yet it brings relief and satisfaction in a reliable way. Throughout history, from shamanism to Greek

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tragedy and on to Frida Kahlo and the moaning piano in "The Weary Blues" of Langston Hughes, the arts are replete with models for transforming pain and difficulties into soulful expressions.

As Samuel Beckett put it in Worstward Ho: "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better."

This piece is adapted from Shaun McNiff's forthcoming book Imagination in Action: Secrets for Unleashing Creative Expression (Shambhala).

C AT H E R I N E A N N J O N E S

Learning to Be COMFORTABLE in the UNKNOWN

Learning to be comfortable with the unknown, with not knowing, is an integral part of the inner journey. You can move forward even in the state of unknowing, trusting the inner process that when it is time to know, knowing will come. The invisibles will be there to light the way. Meanwhile, even if all is not yet clear, muster the courage to remain in uncertainty while trusting the inner process.

Many years ago, I was in the middle of an acting engagement in which I was playing the female lead in a revival of an old Sidney Kingsley play,

CATHER I NE ANN J O NE S is a writer whose books include The Way of Story: The Craft & Soul of Writing and Heal Your Self with Writing (winner of the Nautilus Book Award) and whose films include The Christmas Wife, Unlikely Angel, and the TV series Touched by an Angel. Her 10 plays have been produced in and outside of New York City. She holds a graduate degree in depth psychology and archetypal mythology from Pacifica Graduate Institute and has been a Fulbright Research Scholar studying shamanism in India. She teaches internationally and works as a writing consultant.

The Patriots. After the stage run of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Great Performances decided to film it for PBS television. Even though this was all very good, something had changed in me during the run of the show, and I knew it was time to stop acting.There was no outer reason, only a clear inner feeling. So, trusting this inner voice, I finished the stage

and television job, and then simply stopped acting. There was a three-month period when I had no idea what was next. I meditated and trusted that when it was time to know, knowing would come.

Then I was invited to be a bridesmaid at a friend's wedding just outside of New York City and to spend the weekend there with the couple and their

close friends. Among the guests and trusted, an ally appeared to

was an astrologer whom I had guide. Later, too, I realized how

never met. As we had time, he my years as an actor were in-

offered to look at my chart.

valuable in order to later write

Knowing nothing about me

plays and

or what livelihood I had, he told me that he saw an acting career but that writing would be much more important. I

CwoSSafioeltSulphtlpteoeorrrmeifynsb:WeeeTnrArhtitn1e"inn8TCg-Jh2r,o"ea0nf.Wtesaanyd

movies. When asked if I miss acting, I say, "No, the difference now is that I

laughed and realized

play all the

that somehow I had

roles as I create

known this all along, as I had them." All the parts of one's

always written but had never life make sense in retrospect.

considered it as a possible

livelihood. He said I would do This piece is adapted from Heal

even better as a writer. Grate- Yourself with Writing (Divine

fully, I took this advice and

Arts, 2013) by Catherine Ann

never looked back. As I waited Jones.

page 8

R E L AT I O N S H I P S

The Center Post ? Spring/Summer 2015



JOYCE V ISSELL

Find Out What's Important to HER

Barry loves me by doing simple things that are really important to me, and not necessarily to him.

It's very important to me to have the kitchen clean before we go to sleep. My Swedish mother once advised me to always do the dishes before I go to sleep, so I don't start the new day with yesterday's dirty dishes. I took her words to heart, and cannot go to sleep until the kitchen is all tidy. Sometimes we are so tired after working all

day, Barry looks at the mess in the kitchen and sighs. I know he could easily go to sleep and deal with it in the morning, but he looks at me and knows how I feel without even talking about it. As tired as we are, we tackle the kitchen together and, by the end, we both have a good feeling about it. And each morning it is very nice to start the day with a clean, organized kitchen.

I also have the same feeling about our bedroom. I want the bedroom to be neat with all

BARRY VISSELL

Find Out What HE Really Wants and Needs

You may think the man you love is completely up front with what he wants and needs from you. Sorry to burst your bubble, but he is most often not. First of all, he often doesn't know what he wants and needs. Or he may mix up the two, wanting one thing but needing something else.

One very common example is sex. How often have I wanted sex with Joyce, but really needed acceptance or comfort. Joyce loves me by

gently asking me what I really want and need.

You may recognize that your man is unhappy, or even depressed. You may ask him what he wants or needs and he responds with "I don't know." It takes loving patience to sit in front of him and give him permission to want and need. He may not have ever gotten this permission from his parents, or worse, he may have been told what he wants and needs by them. His own wants and needs may have been ignored, rejected or even ridiculed.

Dad: "You want art lessons? Art is for sissies! I don't want anyone calling my son a sissy!"

Mom: "You need me to hold you? I don't have time for that. Besides, you're not a baby anymore."

So you can see, telling your man what he wants or needs is not a good idea. However, gently asking can be quite helpful.

Sometimes it's hard for me to identify what I need. A little while ago, I was on a very difficult phone call with someone who was angry and blaming

me. Even though it was obvious to me that she was much more angry at her father and her husband (I knew some of the details), she kept projecting it onto me. I apologized for my part and invited her to go deeper, but she refused. I got off that phone call feeling shaken and walked through the house to the kitchen. Joyce was standing near the entrance to the kitchen. She took one look at me and knew something was wrong. Unbelievably, I walked right past her with hardly a glance, and began busying my-

self in the kitchen. She could have easily felt brushed off, but instead came quietly up to me and gently wrapped her arms around me and I melted into her loving embrace.

It can be a huge challenge for a man to recognize and then admit his need for love. For many years, the word "need" to me was a four letter word as bad as some other bad four letter words. It implied pathetic weakness. I was strong, independent, self-sufficient and secure that I didn't need anyone. It took me

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page 9

the clothes put away. Again, I know that Barry could easily be at peace with putting his clothes away once a week. But I feel our bedroom is a sacred place where we sleep, make love, and I say my prayers in the morning. I feel much better when it is kept neat. Barry's office, supply closets, and the garage are another matter. I try not to look, and only once a year insist on bringing a little order to those areas.

Sometimes I think it must be so hard to live with my idiosyncrasies. I can't sleep unless the window is open. Even on cold nights, when the tempera-

JVoisysceellawndillBparrersyent "Couples oWnhtohleenPeastsh,"toMay 22-25.

tures in Santa Cruz fall below thirty degrees, I still crank open the window. Barry occasionally sighs from his side of the bed away from the window, but also realizes it's non-negotiable. I crave fresh air. If Barry books a hotel for us, he knows to ask if the room has windows that can be opened. Some hotels don't, so he goes on to the next hotel on the list. Once we were working in Canada in the winter and the temperatures were below zero. When we

were getting ready for bed, Barry looked at me with pleading eyes. "Only a little bit," was my reply. Though the window was only open a fraction of an inch, I still had my fresh air. Most other people that night slept with the heat on and their windows closed. Barry tolerates this because he knows how important it is to me. It's worth it to him to pile on more blankets knowing how much the fresh air means to me. His sacrifice feels so loving to me.

JOY CE VI S S ELL, R . N., M.S., is a nurse/therapist and B A RRY VI S S ELL, M.D., is a medical doctor and psychiatrist. It's been said that their main medicine is unconditional love. Marianne Williamson has written, "I can't think of anything more important to the healing of our society than a connection between spirituality, relationship, and parenthood. Bravo to the Vissells for helping us find the way." Ram Dass describes the Vissells as a couple who live the yoga of love and devotion. They have been deeply in love for 50 years and have raised three children. Since 1972, they have been counseling, healing, and teaching internationally and have written six books on relationship, parenting, and personal growth, including The Shared Heart and Models of Love. They are co-founders and directors of the non-profit Shared Heart Foundation.

These excerpts are adapted from the Vissells' forthcoming books To Really Love a Woman and To Really Love a Man. Although their writings refer mostly to heterosexual women and men, they note that "gays and lesbians will find a wealth of information for same-sexed relationships. Our focus, after all, is how to deeply love another person, whether it be a man or a woman."

Ilove spending time in nature with Joyce, especially on overnight river trips. The wildness of nature feeds our relationship. The busyness of life falls away as we settle into a rhythm based on the simplest of things: the direction of the wind, a level protected spot to set up our tent, the different moods and sounds of the river, the temperature letting us know how much we need to wear, and the solitude letting us know if we need to wear clothes at all. Nature allows us to see one another in a new and fresher way....You love your man by encouraging him to really get outdoors. More than mowing the lawn (which I love to do!), or pruning the trees (which I also love to do!), encourage him to get away in nature. Especially if he spends most of his time indoors, you give him a great gift by inspiring him to receive from our great Earth mother. Go with him sometimes and enjoy nature together, but also allow him to experience solitude in the great outdoors, where he can reclaim his inner pioneer or explorer. -- B.V.

having an affair with Joyce's best friend three years after we were married, and Joyce's leaving the marriage, to finally crack open my shell of resistance. I soon discovered that the child inside me was not only still alive and kicking, but also needed Joyce's love. It was rarely safe for me to need love as a child, so I formed a protective shell around that little boy's need for love, and hid it away even from me. The rediscovery of that little boy and his need for love was a cornerstone for a whole new life, and a deeper relationship with my beloved.

Ilove Barry by sharing his vision or at least trying it on for size. When we were both 27 years old, we had been married for five years. Up till then, I had financially supported Barry through medical school even while I was in graduate school. Then he did a year of psychiatry residency in Portland, Oregon, while I worked in the department of child psychiatry. I had a great job teaching medical students how to interview children and evaluate them for psychiatric problems. I liked working with the medical students, who were all younger than me, but I really loved being with the children. I felt completely natural with children and, in a short time, just by playing with them, a child would open up to me. I felt shy and insecure

around people who were older than me. Toward the end of Barry's first year of

residency, the psychiatry program changed from being human-centered to being drugcentered in its approach to patients. One day, Barry came to me and said, "I can't continue with this residency. It goes against who I am. I have a vision of the two of us helping people in a deeper way."

I could understand why he wanted to leave. He only needed one year of residency to get an MD license and this felt like a good vision for him. What I couldn't see was myself joining him. How could I do this work with him when I was afraid of most adults? I gave him my blessing for his vision, but said that I was simply too afraid to join him.

Barry lovingly and gently assured me that his vision definitely included me as well. I knew that only my fear was standing in my way. So I agreed to try his vision on for size. I maintained that if it didn't work for me, I would go back to working with children. Barry was so happy that I was willing to support his vision.

It took nine years to bring that vision, which eventually became my vision as well, into fruition. During those nine years we traveled and studied, had two of our three children, and studied some more while our babies slept. For the past 40 years, we have been living the vision that Barry had during his residency. I am so grateful that I pushed past my fear and tried it on for size. -- J.V.

page 10

The Center Post ? Spring/Summer 2015

R E L AT I O N S H I P S

WA LT E R C U D N O H U F S K Y

WpJproaaeyrlsoteeenunrtstsCM"auGnuddseninoGceh,rruAaafrntsitkdo,ykFnisaudnnCsd,(aaARmngapdec:shLT6eohl-v1rGee3eif)bo,D"sroaGMnyrsawayonilfdl 22-25.

What Are GRANDPARENTS Good For?

Why is it important for grandparents to have a close bond with their grandchildren, and vice-versa?

Grandparents have lifederived wisdom to pass along, and grandchildren need many models for how to be in the world.

We elders also have a genuine need to share our wisdom. My now 98-year-old mother Gertrude has 39 grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She recently wished to give them something for the holidays and was stressed because she had no ideas. We encouraged her: "Of course you have a gift! Tell them your stories!" My sister and I interviewed her over several days, writing down her life stories and gentle lessons. Everyone loved receiving them! We continue to work on the expanded story of how she raised nine children.

It's important to let your

WALTER CUDNOHUFSKY, a landscape architect and author of several books, has taught a popular ten-month watercolor class for adults since 2007 and also conducts occassional watercolor classes for children.

grandchildren know you love them, that you are rooting for them, because in some ways their lives may be harder than ours.

A recent PBS documentary, "Being Mortal," includes a family whose grandfather comes home to die. He asks his 10-year-old grandson if he had ever talked about death and then said, "I want you to know I am not afraid of dying. All living things die. I think it is important you know that." The grandson asks, "Are you disappointed that you will miss out on things?" The conversation to follow is short, simple, and beautiful.

There are many ways to share your understanding of

life with your grandchildren. The process of thinking about those messages may be helpful for us elders. Children learn through imitation. The under-

LIFE LESSONS from GREAT-GRANDMOTHER GERTRUDE

When asked what advice do I offer young people now, I say, "Gosh I don't know what to say, times are so different." But then I do go back to these memories and what was important for me.

What comes to mind is simple. Family and friends are so important, so choose friends wisely. Get good at doing something you like, learn it well, and pass it along. It is very satisfying to create things and also a pleasure to teach.

Cooperation and families are so important, so be kind and polite and people will treat you the

same way. It is important especially today to eat good food to stay healthy. Do your best to avoid starting bad habits. If my growing up has taught me anything, it's that one must find joy in the small things.

Make family meals important and celebrate holidays and family traditions.

Take care of each other! Most of all, stay in school, because education is important for a good life, especially today.

--Great-Grandmother Gertrude Cudnohufsky (Walter's mother), New Years 2015

standings are delivered through our actions, interactions, and by simply being together.

These messages can be simple; they need not be profound or pre-planned. In fact, they may have potential to imbed in the grandchildren's memory if they are spontaneous and from the heart. Susan, my wife, plans age-specific gifts, often books. On occasion, and after an initial reading, she has joined her grandchildren in play-acting the story.

Many grandparents tell us they have difficulty finding time to spend with their grandchildren, confirming our own experience. There are so many things competing for the grandchildren's attention: cell phones, computers, sports, lessons. While these are new

ways to be connected, we all prefer to have quality time through face-to-face meetings which are not always easy to arrange because of distance or schedules.

A long-standing tradition of mine is the writing of very personal and brief letters to individual family members on birthdays, holidays, and anniversaries. When of appropriate age, we include our grandchildren. The letter is always about them and their specific character. We tell them what we see in them and how that particular attribute is valued in the world. It is often about what we hope for them, and never about what they should do!

As a birthday present, we recently decided to give a book of fables to our nine-year-old

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YOUTH

grandson. I created a new fable using details from our grandson's life, so he could more easily identify.

Art and music have always played an important role in our times together, especially under the skilled guidance of Rachel, the music-focused mother of our local grandchildren. We have been playing, drawing and painting with them since they were little. We attend their violin recitals and they attend my local choral concerts. The grandchildren often give us the superb gift of a mini-concert.

One of the memorable moments from the last Rowe Generations Camp was when grandparents and grandchildren did a joint thumb-print art project. Each grandparent and grandchild stood up together and told a brief story about the family of animals they had created. It seems uncommon for grandparents and grandchildren to make something from scratch together. Some of the grandparents attending had a discovery: they were capable of making art and singing.

I have long believed that it is important to contrive situations where this interaction can happen. We cannot depend totally on spontaneity. Rather than diminishing the experience, careful contrivance can actually enhance it.

Not only did everyone leave last year's camp with new projects they could do together, they also left knowing how, and possibly with the courage to create things on their own. Adults, no matter how old, need creative expression as much as children do! And one of the things grandchildren can do for their grandparents is to remind them of the more open and innocent way in which they once saw the world, inspiring grandparents to tap into uplifting emotions yet again.

COLEEN MURPHY

DEAR ROWE CAMP

A Long-Overdue Thank You Note

Dear Rowe Camp, I miss you! I think that's why it's taken me so long to write, and why I'm drawn to a cutesy format as a bit of a crutch. I hope you'll forgive me on both counts. Actually, I'm confident that you will, seeing as how unconditional acceptance is one of your core values, so let me begin by thanking you for that.

Thank you for the opportunity to spend three weeks every year with people who believe that all of us are worthy of love and respect. That belief, and the bold articulation of it, binds us together while freeing us to grow more fully into our truest selves, and, well, it's beautiful. It's also hard as hell sometimes to live up to, as it can require some serious stretching on everyone's part. Being at camp called me to be my most honest self, and to listen for that self in others, resulting in my growing both tougher and more tender during my time there. Again, thank you.

Thank you for having long, complicated, nuanced ways of examining the joys and challenges of choosing to live in community. During the 15 years I spent directing Senior High camp, I lost track of how many times I would be approached by someone during the year, asking me what it was like to work at "that camp with no rules." After a few years, I learned to be less defensive (thank you for that, too!) and more of a listener, asking these people what rules they thought might be necessary, before launching into a description of the Senior High Camp behavior standards, what they include, what they don't, and why.

Sometimes these conversations would get messy and I would lose my cool. Cool is often where some honesty has been hiding out, though, and so thank you for providing the context in which I have blurted out, "I don't care whether they sleep at night or in the daytime, or what they wear or how they cut their hair, what I care about is that they respect themselves and each other because that's how we're going to make real change in the world!" Uh... you know?! Thank you.

Thank you for trusting people, and especially trusting youth. Thank you for knowing (and always reminding me) that every voice adds value to the discussion. Thank you for seeing that another world is possible. Thank you for teaching me that I can always grow. Thank you for knowing that

At Senior High Camp (August 2-22), young people make responsible choices, balancing freedom with

radical self-expression. We welcome diversity as part

of our strength, including the LGBTQ community and people

of color. Teenagers engage in a variety of planned and self-

directed activities, including dancing, cooking, art-making,

sports, and nature skills. Participants engage in educational

workshops about social justice, sexual health, and guidance

about the difficult choices that are part of being a teenager.

A staff of dedicated young adults offers support and guid-

ance. Share your summer with Senior High Camp 2015 and

learn something new about yourself! We still have a few

spaces left, but don't wait!

you, too, must always be ready to grow and change and listen. Last year when I visited Senior High Camp and saw the gender-neutral restrooms in the rec hall, I was profoundly impressed and moved. Thank you for working hard to be increasingly welcoming of trans and non-binary people.

My sons grew up on the edges of Senior High Camp, and have gone through sessions of Young People's Camp and Junior High as part of their paths. This year, they will both be at Senior High Camp and I am so proud and happy and excited for them. It would be dishonest to say that I parent fearlessly, but I strive to parent (and live) in a way that is not ruled by fear. A thing about having kids, though: Sometimes it's terrifying. Thank you for your patience with me during my anxious parent moments, and thank you for consistently hiring staff who are kind and compassionate and funny and cool and think deep thoughts and also have first-aid training and are secure enough in their own personhood to speak up when they have concerns for campers' well-being.

Camp, you gave me so much! Memories, yes, and also tools, skills, lessons that I use every day out here in the wider world, and in my home. I treasure these gifts and look forward to our mutual continued growth.

Love, Coleen Murphy

Unplug, Unwind, and Understand

The Rowe Center

WORKSHOPS RETREATS SUMMER CAMPS

MAY 8-10

Imagination in Action

Secrets for Unleashing Your Natural Creativity

SHAUN MCNIFF

Discover practical methods for breaking through creative obstacles, trusting your own truth, and sharing it with the world.

M A Y 2 2 - 2 5 (Friday - Monday)

Generations Camp

Three Days of Joyous Music, Art, Fun, and Love for Grandparents

and Grandkids (Ages 6-13)

WALTER CUDNOHUFSKY

& RACHEL GIBSON

JUNE 12-14

Adventures in Sound-Play

Spontaneous Music-Making for Everyone!

PAUL WINTER

Reclaim your natural birthright to express yourself and experience joy through sound-play!

MAY 8-10

Engaging the Realms of Enchantment

A Faery Seership Experience

ORION FOXWOOD

"Orion is smart, savvy, funny and down to earth, with great wisdom." --Margot Adler

M A Y 2 2 - 2 5 (Friday-Monday)

Restoring the Soul after War

A Memorial Day Retreat for People in Military Service, Veterans, and Those Who Love Them

EDWARD TICK & KATE DAHLSTEDT

This retreat honors the original spirit and meaning of Memorial Day and is for all people who wish to heal the effect of war on themselves, their families, and our nation.

JUNE 12-14

Eclectic Wellness Bootcamp

Take Charge of Your Health Without Firing Your Doctor

TERRY-ANYA HAYES

Kickstart your wellbeing with a mix of habits, foods, and practices that nourish, nurture, and heal.

MAY 15 - 17

Getting It Done

How to Restore and Repair Our Wounded Democracy

RALPH NADER

Spend a very special weekend strategizing for change with America's Public Citizen # 1.

M A Y 2 2 - 2 5 (Friday -Monday)

Couples on the Path to Wholeness

JOYCE & BARRY VISSELL

Imagine your relationship expressing the true depths of your love and commitment. If you are in love, this retreat is an opportunity to rise even higher. If you are in crisis, this retreat is an opportunity for healing on the deepest level.

MAY 31-JUNE 14

Earth Activist Training

STARHAWK & CHARLES WILLIAMS

This two-week Earth Activist Training (EAT) program can set your life on a new path, help you transform your neighborhood, and show you how to save the planet. Fulfills requirements for Permaculture Design Certificate.

JUNE 5-7

Bedside Singing for the Dying

KATHY LEO, WITH MARY CAY BRASS & PETER AMIDON

Hospice choirs are springing up all over the country, many of them modeled on the Hallowell Choir. Learn to help ease the final transition, anointing the dying person with voices in harmony.

YOUTH CAMPS

J U N E 2 8 - J U LY 1 8 J U LY 1 9 - AU G U S T 1

Junior High Camp (ages 13-15) FULLILS!TWOANITLYIN! G Transitions Camp (ages 11-13)

JULY 19-JULY 25 Young People's Camp- YPC1 (ages 8-10)

JULY 26-AUGUST 1 YPC 2 (ages 9-11)

AUGUST 2-AUGUST 22 Senior High Camp (ages 16-19)

ADULT COMMUNITY RETREATS

JUNE 14-20

AUGUST 23-28

AUGUST 29-SEPTEMBER 3 AUGUST 29-SEPTEMBER 3

SEPTEMBER 4-7

SEPTEMBER 11-13

Skill Set: A New Retreat for Emerging Adults (Ages 20-24)

Kindred Spirits: A Community Supporting Healing and Self-Discovery

WomenCircles: Priestesses of Peace

Woman Soul: A Community of Sacred Trust

Labor Day Retreat for Gay, Bisexual, and Questioning Men

Members and Friends Vacation Retreat

SEPTEMBER 18-20

Farming The Forest

Foraging for Wild Mushrooms and Cultivating Gourmet Mushrooms,

Ginseng, Ramps, and More!

KEN MUDGE & DAVID FISCHER

This introduction to foraging and forest farming will thrill your inner hunter-gatherer!

OCTOBER 2-4

The Healing Voice

Liberation through the Ecstasy of Chant

JILL PURCE

Liberate your voice, your heart, and your mind in an uplifiting exploration of breathing, mantra and sonic meditations, sacred chants, and shamanic ceremony.

SEPTEMBER 25-27

The Growing Storm

The Work That Reconnects Accompanied by Rilke's Poetry

JOANNA MACY & ANITA BARROWS

Bring your hearts and senses vividly alive through the beauty of nature, a prescient early Twentieth Century poet, and two modern champions of sanity, peace, and compassion.

O C T O B E R 4 - 9 (Sunday - Friday)

Healing Family and Ancestors

Ritual and Resonance

JILL PURCE

Find the keys that set yourself, your family, and future generations free; transform clamorous ancestors into benign allies and powerful guides!

S E P T E M B E R 1 7 - 2 0 (Thursday -Sunday)

Approaching That More Beautiful World Our

Hearts Know Is Possible

CHARLES EISENSTEIN

"One of the up-and-coming great minds of our time." --David Korten

SEPTEMBER 18-20

The Way of Story

The Craft and Soul of Writing

CATHERINE ANN JONES

"Catherine Ann Jones is in possession of a powerful talent... Nothing is more rare in my opinion." --Norman Mailer

SEPTEMBER 27-OCTOBER 1

(Sunday-Thursday)

Autumn Work Week

FRIENDS OF ROWE

OCTOBER 2-4

Healing the Soul from War

A Training Retreat for CareProviders of Veterans

EDWARD TICK & KATE DAHLSTEDT

Learn to use Soldier's Heart's innovative--and successful--model for our veterans' healing and homecoming.

OCTOBER 9-11

Composing a Life of Wonder, Creativity, and Beauty

MARY CATHERINE BATESON

Recreate your life as a vibrant composition, characterized by harmony, grace, continuity, and change!

O C T O B E R 9 - 1 2 (Friday-Monday)

Building a Vocal Community?

Singing in the African-American Tradition

YSAYE BARNWELL

Reserve quickly: This workshop is a whole lot of fun and sells out early!

OCTOBER 16-18

Time Travel 101

JEAN HOUSTON

"Jean Houston's mind should be considered a national treasure." --R. Buckminster Fuller

OCTOBER 16-18

Shamanic Wisdom for Living--and Dying--Well

CHRISTINA PRATT

"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"--Mary Oliver

OCTOBER 23-25

The Gift of Isis

A Weekend for Women on New Paths to Desire and Intimacy

GINA OGDEN

Through sacred ceremony and a supportive circle of women, heal the past and celebrate your unique sexual self--body, mind, heart, and spirit.

OCTOBER 23-25

Fundraising in Difficult Times

KIM KLEIN

We all know the best way to raise money is to ask for it. But what is the best way to ask?

OCTOBER 30-NOVEMBER 1

Reading the Forested Landscape

TOM WESSELS

Learn to see the forest for the trees--once you spend a weekend in the woods with this passionate and gifted teacher, you won't look at a forest the same way.

May?November 2015

? 413-339-4954 22 Kings Highway, Rowe, MA 01367

1 hour from Brattleboro ? 3 hours from Boston ? 1? hours from Albany 2 hours from Hartford ? 4 hours from NYC

page 14

The Center Post ? Spring/Summer 2015

Seven SPIRITUAL

JOURNEYS

Spiritual journeys can take many forms. In this special interview section of The Center Post, we've asked seven notable conference presenters -- Mary Catherine Bateson, Kathy Leo, Joanna Macy, Christina Pratt, Jill Purce, Starhawk, and Chelsea Wakefield -- to share accounts of their own spiritual evolution, in faith traditions that range from the conventional to the un-

conventional, with God and without. If you know these people already, some of what you discover here may surprise you; if any of these teachers are new to you, their revelations about their personal spiritual journeys may serve as an introduction, and an invitation to know them better. We hope their reflections on their spiritual journeys help you in contemplating your own.

Spiritual journeys often benefit from spiritual guidance. Here at The Rowe Center we're pleased to offer

our new Spiritual Guidance Training Program, which commences this fall. (Please see page 21.) Dr. Wakefield, one of our interviewees, is the director, working with a team of distinguished faculty members. We encourage you to learn more about our Spiritual Guidance program on the Rowe website, and we invite you to share the rich and revelatory journeys of our interview subjects -- each a spiritual guide in her own right -- in the pages that follow.

"What We Crave Is That Deep Sacred Community"

An interview with JOANNA MACY

Joanna Macy, Ph.D., is a scholar of Buddhism, general systems theory, and deep ecology, and the root teacher of The Work That Reconnects, known worldwide for empowering activists in social and ecological justice. She has published many books, including Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We're in Without Going Crazy (with Chris Johnstone); her memoir, Widening Circles; and translations of Rainer Maria Rilke's poetry.

Macy is descended from Congregationalist and Presbyterian

ministers and was a devoted Christian as an adolescent, even preaching at age 17 in rural churches as part of a traveling group called Youth Caravan. She studied religion at Wellesley, majoring in Biblical history. As she began to question and seek new answers in her spiritual journey, in 1965 her path led her to India while working for the Peace Corps, where she encountered Buddhism, and later to Sri Lanka and Tibet. In the 1970s, she began academic study of Buddhism at Syracuse University, merging it with her work in systems theory.

For Macy, religious scholarship has combined with personal mystical experiences, meditation practice, raising a family, world travel, writing, teaching, and social activist work.

T H E R O W E C E N T E R : In your memoir Widening Circles, you define "grace" as the experience of being supported by a

power greater than your own. Do you feel that your spiritual journey has been shaped mostly through personal seeking and effort, or have you had the sense that it's mostly been an experience of grace?

J O A N N A M A C Y: It definitely has been for me a journey of receiving, more than putting out; of taking in, absorbing, integrating. I'd be tempted to say it's been a journey into reciprocity -- the reciprocity of being part of the universe. That, in itself, is quite a shift from the individualistic view assumed by the mainstream in the West. I see it as an opening to grace. The web of life, the sacred intelligence at the heart of the natural world, seems to work through us -- it has to work through us, at this point of sustained emergency and the breakdown of natural systems, as well as the

breakdown of cultures. But it also involves a lot of work on one's own part to sustain the grace. The universe depends on us to make that effort to receive and respond, and that receiving and responding is a spiritual emotion. That's the essential feedback loop.

R . C . : You describe working in Deep Time, extending the realization of interconnectedness temporally and praying to those in the future, asking them to help us be faithful in the urgent work we need to do in saving the planet. What is the role of prayer in your life, and how do you think of prayer?

J . M . : It's prayer to the future ones, and to the ancestors as well. The past generations and future generations in a very real way coexist with us; the ancestors' blood flows in our veins, and the future

ones are present in our ovaries and gonads and DNA. So we can pray to them, speak for them, do role plays, engage with them, and we experience them. Intuitively and imaginatively, the ancestors and future ones are going to help those of us in this generation -- I think of this generation as everyone alive now -- because ours is the weak link; we're very much in danger of wiping out the whole story.

For me, a lot of prayer also is praise and thanksgiving. At this point in my life, the natural world is so alive for me. I walk around the block and smell blossoming jasmine and see crocuses, and I can't help saying, "Thank you, thank you, do you know how gorgeous you are?"

Responsiveness to natural and human beauty is prayer. My root tradition of Christi-

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anity always began services with prayer and thanksgiving, and certainly Native Americans do. The Work That Reconnects begins with gratitude.

R . C . : When did you first encounter the poetry of Rilke, and how did it affect you earlier in your spiritual journey?

J . M . : I encountered it 60 years ago. I was in Germany with two of my three children. On a snowy day, I simply walked into a bookstore and saw this little volume on the table. I picked it up, and it was Rilke's Book of Hours. I turned to the second poem there: "I live my life in widening circles / that reach out across the world....I circle around God, around the primordial tower. / I've been circling for thousands of years / and I still don't know: am I a falcon, / a storm, or a great song?" At that moment my sense of my life was that I felt I should have been on a straight path, like the Pilgrim in Pilgrim's Progress. I'd been doing this and that, I left my early faith because it felt claustrophobic, and when I read that Rilke poem I realized I'm not lost, I'm just living my life in widening circles.

R . C . : How has Rilke's poetry helped to sustain your spiritual journey through the past six decades?

J . M . : Rilke's poetry has been a marvelous fountain of beauty and meaning for me -- his utter treasuring of the gift of life, even in the darkness, and not insisting on a happy ending. He's seen the suffering of the First World War, he's aware of the destructive nature of the 20th century and the suffering to come. He has a strong intuition that things may come to an end, but that's no reason to stop praising this world and the great mystery of it. What says it all for me

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is the last sonnet in Sonnets to Orpheus, where he writes of letting this darkness be a bell tower and you become as a bell, and as you ring what batters you becomes your strength. In our times, how that can happen is that the breakdown of systems can be a vehicle to help us realize the interconnectedness of all life. What we crave is that deep sacred community.

R . C . : On the last page of your memoir you write, "The widening circles of my life have not had as their center the Big Papa God of my preacher forebears. I walked out on that belief when I was twenty. What authority now holds me in orbit?" At the time, you suggested "love." That was 15 years ago. What is your sense now of God -- what does that word mean to you?

J . M . : I would say, "The sacred intelligence of the universe." I see each one of us as a vehicle for this sacred intelligence. And we express that not only in praise and thanksgiving but also in grief; I'd be unable to bubble with praise and thanksgiving if I had not almost drowned in my grief and outrage at what's happening in the world. But when you see yourself and all other beings, you see the whole show with fresh eyes. You awaken what in Buddhism is called bodhicitta, the motivation to act for the sake of the whole. And you discover the bodhisattva in yourself, the one who knows there is no private salvation, because we awaken together. Then it's a matter of

going forth and giving back the gift.

"Wonder and Trust are the Basis of Faith"

An interview with MARY CATHERINE

BATESON

Mary Catherine Bateson, Ph.D., is a writer, a cultural anthropologist, and a visiting scholar at Boston College. Her books include With a Daughter's Eye: A Memoir of Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson; the bestselling Composing a Life; and Composing a Further Life: The Age of Active Wisdom. Her family background offers a robust example of religious pluralism: Her grandfather William Bateson was a biologist who read the Bible aloud so his sons "would not be empty-headed atheists"; her father, the anthropologist Gregory Bateson, defined spiritual words such as "wisdom" and "sacred" and "love" in terms of systems theory and died in a Zen hospice; her mother, the anthropologist Margaret Mead, was Episcopalian. Mary Catherine was raised in the Episcopal church and now is a Roman Catholic who has had significant cultural contact with Judaism and Islam.

T H E R O W E C E N T E R : Many people today identify as "spiritual, not religious," and they're sampling from diverse faiths and practices. Viewed from the perspective of your own spiritual journey, how can people engage authentically with a variety of religious traditions without succumbing to spiritual dilettantism?

MARY CATHERINE

B AT E S O N : My feeling about the religion-spirituality issue is that I wouldn't be much interested in religion without

spirituality, except as social convention. I also think that there probably are people whose spiritual life is entirely solitary, but my own spirituality involves engagement with other people, and ideally that is what religion is about -- a shared spirituality. I also feel, though, that the labels omit the fact that any real religion is a path of development, not a state. It's when you've signed on a dotted line and that's it, that religions tend to become caricatures of themselves. My feeling about the religions of the world is that I can learn something from any of one of them. Another way they become caricatures is when there's too much effort toward uniformity.

R . C . : You've written about life as an ongoing, improvisational art. Can forming a spiritual life be ongoing and improvisational as well, and do you feel that you've done that?

M . C . B . : Yes. Roman Catholicism, of course, is not particularly improvisational. I've done a good deal of experimenting. I have had a lot of experience of Islam, having lived in the Islamic world; I've spent time with different kinds of Christian communities. There is a sense in which -- I've never thought of it in quite this way before, till just now -- but a great deal of meditation and prayer that's personal is improvisational, sort of like sitting down with a musical instrument and finding your way to an improvised piece of music. If you're going to have dense gatherings that involve a lot of people, there will be elements of formality -- Quaker meetings are formal and Catholic masses are formal, but that doesn't mean that the same thing is happening inwardly for each person. People have different styles, and they have different stages of develop-

ment -- you have to include that, too.

R . C . : In many cultures, spirituality has been considered a special province of elders, of those in the second half of life -- the wisdom years. You're writing and teaching about the fact that many of us now have unprecedented opportunities for extended years in the second half of life. What are the implications for spirituality, and how have you experienced them yourself?

M . C . B . : I'd like first to address the idea that spirituality becomes more important in later years. I think it changes through time. There's spirituality in infancy -- I often talk about the sense of wonder and basic trust as the beginnings of spirituality, quite early in life. One of the interesting things about later life is that for many people it may be the first time they look over their whole life and find meaning. It may be a time of complete freedom and leisure, and certainly both in Western society and in traditional societies a time of spiritual deepening -- in some societies you can't become a priest or shaman until you have passed the age of reproduction. That's particularly true of women. But that's not true everywhere. My own story is complicated by the fact that I dropped out for a while, or thought I did, and I came back. I feel that I'm continuing to discover...there's so much to learn from a tradition as rich as the Catholic tradition, and a huge amount to learn about oneself.

R . C . : As a woman and a practicing Roman Catholic, what are your thoughts about Pope Francis?

M . C . B . : Along with many people I was very excited about the Second Vatican Council and Pope John XXIII, but it is not surprising that

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