Evan Eason
I’m definitely interested!
Thank you Thomas. This is very helpful!
Hi Zhenbao, You have a profound depth of knowledge. The Lakota healer/leader for the Sundance I attend credits Daoism for giving him the language to better express the teachings of his people. I was very close to attending CIIS for my doctorate, but they could not match the financial assistance I received elsewhere in the form of scholarships and teaching. I did face an uphill battle in integrating religion/spirituality into the program I attended. I look forward to your contributions to the program. Allen
Hi Kathleen, You are a rare person with many multiple intelligences to be able to go into the depths in all of these areas. My greatest mentor has 4 bookshelves with 400 books of amazing poetry. He asks guests to give him a 1-4 number for the shelf and 1-100 for the succession of books on each shelf. We always have meaningful moments and the best time! I am so looking forward to your contributions in the program.
I’m still pretty new to process thought, but I wonder if Whitehead might disagree with the idea of an ideal starting value to begin with. Is it possible that any of these four values were ever not present for us, even if small? I have personally found that it is difficult to step in one without implicating the others. LOL I think trust emerges anew in each moment (going forward and backwards), and that profound trust and understanding is most powerful when it emerges out of questioning and skepticism.
Aww, consciousness is incredibly complex. It is certainly a good question to ask how much concrescence our mind/body/spirit can tolerate. I believe Dr. McDaniel even eluded to taking as much in as we can without it moving us away from a place of beauty and kindness towards ourselves and others. Many of the indigenous healers I have worked with make it clear that a tremendous price/suffering/loneliness is associated with going into the depths of the spirit world.
Love William Blake! The lamb and especially the tyger comes back again and again in his poetry across the years.
One day I was forced to admit to myself that those people who strongly identify as atheists, rather than simply not believing in God, often live incredibly spiritual lives, sometimes much more so than the religious.
Hi Kathleen, This is beautiful! While I endorse the concept of creativity a million times over, I do see its limits. Defining something that is perhaps intentionally undefinable is problematic. There is a way of communication that includes lots of silence and interaction with humans, animals, plants, stars, etc. that is damaged by words. In the tradition I follow, they would say dance your prayers. I think indigenous and Buddhist ways of knowing (as well as some other Asian religions) understand just how empty words can be at times.
Hi Chris, I really appreciate this contribution. I do think there is a good case for humans being just as destructive as they are constructive, maybe even more destructive. For example, some large trees take away water and nutrients from the small trees around, which leads to their death. But the large tree only takes what it needs. It does not annihilate the whole forest like human groups often do when they are fervently greedy or against something. When humans so easily destroy the environment for so many other animals, plants, etc., there are real questions about what whether our supposed advanced consciousness is really all that impressive. There’s a part of me that hopes for the eventual extinction of homo sapiens so that other living beings can be a much large part of God’s vision. There will still be destruction and death, but not to the incredibly selfish and needless degree to which humans take it.
Hi Lynndal, Thanks so much for adding this to the conversation. Interbeing demonstrates deep understanding. For me, Thich Nhat Hanh and MLK are two of my greatest influences in life. I do want to make it clear that I believe Buddhism is demonstrates tremendous depth when it comes interbeing, interconnectedness, or interrelatedness; it has also been around since the 4th-5th century. I am forced to asked a really tough question of myself. Did those before the current superpower consumerism understand interrelatedness better than we do? The even harder question is if potentially the traditional Abrahamic book religions do not understand it at this level of depth without extensive interpretation to get there. I have profound admiration and respect for the many great Christian thinkers who got there.
Hi Zhenbao, Thank you for your thoughts. I would love to hear more about the “vision of a continuously developing ego, becoming more and more conscious of our interrelationship with all the other beings on earth and in the cosmos.” Twenty years ago, I would never even of thought of distinguishing between interconnectedness and interrelatedness. It is only through experience that I learned the value of All My Relations (Relatives). In fact, I said it for several years before really getting it. There something about saying it each time you enter a ceremony, after each prayer, and upon exiting a ceremony that changes the view of interrelationships. The prayers seem to flow towards the four leggeds, the winged peoples, etc. Of course, in the sweat lodge for example, having the rocks, fire, water, directions, tobacco, cedar, etc. also contributes. Allen