-------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 10 Dec 2007 00:20:06 EST To: •••@••.••• From: Jim Fadiman Subject: Re: Spiritual Transformation, Evolution, and Culture http://cyberjournal.org/show_archives/?id=1362 Richard, that was not only beautifully written, but original, profound and wise. thank you. I'd like to see that, taken as a short article, published. thank you for passing it on to your list. ------- Thanks Jim, I too was pleased with how that piece turned out. As usual, I just type, and try to keep up with the train of thought that comes from who knows where. I referred to this process as 'soul searching', and it might also be called 'listening to the internal voice' -- or even 'channelling' (if I wasn't happy taking credit for the result). But I will take credit, as that gives my little ego the flattery it requires to keep it at the keyboard grindstone. Do you have any suggestions as to an appropriate journal or periodical for that material, edited into article form? best wishes, richard -------------------------------------------------------- From: "Butler Crittenden, Ph.D." <> To: "Richard K. Moore" <•••@••.•••> Subject: Re: Spiritual Transformation, Evolution, and Culture Date: Sun, 9 Dec 2007 22:13:45 -0800 Nicely put. I still don't think there have been any "wise cultures" in any holistic sense, but clearly there have been wiser cultures from which we can learn and draw components. As to the Soviets, let us not forget that the Whites were firing live bullets at the Reds well into the 1930s, and the build-up of paranoia and evil there is at least partly due to the US and other fascist nations refusing to accept the revolution and support the experiment in any way -- other to help build up the Soviet military and industrial state in case we wanted to set them in motion against the Germans. But if minor quarrel aside, your tri-partite division of religion is pure genius. And they way you bring the better aspects of the first two into line with the gnostics is also powerful. And your final point: My story, and I'm sticking to it, is that I don't have a spiritual agenda, stands on its own after all the rest. Regards, Butler -------- Hi Butler, Thanks for your observations, which I'm sure you don't mind me sharing here. I do share your nuanced view of the Soviet experience, even though I made only that one passing negative reference. I'm glad that the 'three schools of thought' made sense to you. I was amazed at how that thinking crystallized on the screen. The ideas had been swirling in my mind for some time, as a cloud of new and disconnected observations, and the points Richard Flyer brought up acted somehow as a condensing agent, bringing the cloud into coherence. I do find it hard to understand why you think there have been 'no wise cultures in a holistic sense'. Either you have reached interpretations that I don't understand, or could you be unfamiliar with the literature around hunter-gatherer societies? I say this because whenever I've delved into a good treatment of such a society, with lots of details about the culture, accompanied perhaps by a sensible commentary by a sensitive anthropologist who has lived with the society and learned the language, I have seen evidence of a culture in which people relate to themselves and their environment wisely and holistically. I know you are well read in the social sciences, so what am I missing, or where am I going off track? confused, richard -------------------------------------------------------- From: "John Bunzl" <•••@••.•••> To: <•••@••.•••> Subject: Re: Spiritual Transformation, Evolution, and Culture Date: Mon, 10 Dec 2007 11:33:19 -0000 Hi Richard, Friends, I agree that the word "spiritual" can cause difficulties. Nevertheless, I think what Richard Flyer may be pointing to is what Ken Wilber (Integral thinking), Don Beck (Spiral Dynamics Integral) and others have also been pointing to for some time. This is that we are held back by the fact that humanity, for the most part, finds itself at a level of consciousness or at a "mode of thinking" (or what others might call a level of collective spiritual development) which prevents us from solving our problems. This is very much in tune with Einstein's famous truism that "we will not solve our problems using the same thinking that created them". Whatever we call this mental, cultural or spiritual stage at which we are stuck, my experience in working for global cooperation (<http://www.simpol.org>) over the past nearly ten years is that what Wilber, Beck (Flyer?) and others are pointing to is true. My version of this blockage, as I experience it in my everyday activism, is that we are collectively stuck because the vast majority of us still tend to think in "either/or" terms instead of in "both/and" terms. Wilber would say we still think in "rational" terms rather than in "centauric" terms. Spiral Dynamics would say that culturally we are stuck predominantly at the "green" (i.e. mean green meme) level and need to transcend and include green into a new higher levels or modes (i.e. which are called yellow and turquoise). But all of us, it seems, are essentially saying the same thing. Empowerment and liberation are indeed what is needed. But the problem, I think, is that the practical tools capable of DELIVERING the empowerment and liberation we now need globally are tools which can only be readily understood and embraced by people who have ALREADY moved to what I call "both/and thinking"; (a thinking which others may have different terms for, including "spiritual" terms). The problem is that vast majority of us haven't yet moved to that level. When we do, the solutions will become obvious. And then we will find that we already ARE empowered and liberated! best wishes John Bunzl ---------- Greetings John, As usual, nice to hear from you. Thanks for joining in. Being in the 'gnostic' school of thought myself, I am quite comfortable with the kind of models Wilber, Beck, et al, develop, and I can see how those models have relevance to the kind of transformations we are likely to see as more and more of us learn how to tap into our own inherent wisdom, our connection to the divine. I don't share those folk's enthusiasm for elaborating those kinds of models in such great literal detail, but I'm glad to see good minds at work making sense of transformation in intellectual terms if that's what turns them on. As for your closing comments, about 'practical tools' that can only be used by people who have already moved on to 'both/and thinking', I am very curious indeed as to what those practical tools might be, and why they are only useful to certain people. Please do tell me more! Good tools are hard to find. curiosity aroused, richard -------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 10 Dec 2007 06:51:41 -0800 (PST) To: •••@••.••• From: Diana Skipworth <> Subject: Re: Spiritual Transformation, Evolution, and Culture Dear Richard, In the old Eagle's song: "The saddest thing in life is to live our lives in chains; never knowing-- that we've always had the key..." Or to go back to Kansas: "You've always had the power, my dear." I believe we have within ourselves the answer; if our awareness could only formulate the proper question. To me it is a matter of mind. Do our minds control us, or do we control our mind? Are you a temporary human being-- hoping for a spiritual after-life or, are you an eternal spiritual being-- having a temporary human experience? The answer of the above question determines the type of life-situation we choose for ourselves to forge or endure. America was forged by Masons who joined the light from the east (spirit) with the darkness of the north (earth) when they laid the NE cornerstone in ceremony. Ben Franklin, for example, wrote his own epitaph saying he would one day return in a "new, and improved, edition." The ideals of America today are no longer manifest because its leaders are not spiritual in nature, but lower and self-serving. Diana Skipworth ------- Hi Diana, It seems you have resonance with the gnostic school of thought. Greetings fellow traveller. the best, richard -------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 10 Dec 2007 10:12:18 -0800 (GMT-08:00) From: Howard Ward <> To: •••@••.••• Subject: Re: Spiritual Transformation, Evolution, and Culture Hello Richard - Based on the excerpt you provided regarding Richard Flyers suggestion that 'total awakening requires a spiritual change', I'm wondering why you are portraying his suggestion as "imposing" spirituality and "designing desirable spiritualities?" Is Mr. Flyer suggesting "imposing" this spiritual change, or is he suggesting that the dialogue needs to include the spiritual aspect of life? I'd image that one of the first questions that might arise, if we had a dialogue on this, would be: "What do we mean by spirituality? You have outlined three schools of thought, but I'm skeptical that any of these are what Mr. Flyer was referring to when he suggested a spiritual change. To my understanding, a spiritual life is one which is in sync with the movement of life, as opposed to following an ideology. This is a rather subtle shift which involves being aware of 'what thought is doing', which involves a willingness to question ones beliefs and opinions. A shift which gives priority to 'what actually is', instead of giving priority to abstract beliefs and opinions. Following a "school of thought" is not what I'd call spirituality. Following schools of thought tends to make us resistant to seeing what is actually going on clearly, which is what enables us to respond to life wisely...it seems to me. From what I read, I agree with Mr. Flyer's suggestion. Regards - Howard Ward --------- Hi Howard, We do indeed tread on thin ground when we try to guess what others may or may not imply by what they say. In the case of what I wrote, for example, I was not suggesting that R Flyer is seeking to impose anything on anyone, rather I was exploring one line of thought about where things might go if one were to set out to bring about a 'spiritual transformation'. As we shall see below, your guess as to Flyer's interpretation of spirituality is very much on the mark, and it turns out my own ideas about spirituality are fairly similar in that context. thanks for your contribution, richard -------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 10 Dec 2007 09:45:05 -0500 From: david creighton <> To: "Richard K. Moore" <•••@••.•••> Subject: Re: Spiritual Transformation, Evolution, and Culture Hi Richard, I find myself agreeing with Richard Flyer in that any 'secular utopia' is highly vulnerable to being 'turned'. I think of Aldous Huxley's Island, 'primitive cultures' generally when they encounter colonization (except the bwiti cultures of west Africa), and an experience with a community school project in Lanark County during the 1970s. Here a number of families had started building a schoolhouse for their children when a 'Jesuit' arrived and fear-mongered people into adopting an hierarchical structure (where none had been before). The 'secular utopian' project soon collapsed for lack of substantial grounding in anything 'higher.' ------- Hi David, Your examples are useful ones, but I question your interpretations of them. I'm not familiar with Huxley's 'Island', but I wouldn't classify 'primitive cultures' as 'secular utopias'. According to my research, these societies always have metaphysical & spiritual elements as very strong parts of their culture. Their vulnerability to colonization comes not from a lack of spirituality, but from the overwhelming influence of an invading culture that can exert pressure, in so many ways, on them and their environment and their cultural infrastructure. As regards the Lanark experience, I would attribute their 'priest vulnerability' not to a lack of some competing spiritual orientation, but rather to the apparent failure of the families to develop a coherent sense of themselves as a determined 'We', sure of their purpose and their way of working together. best regards, richard -------------------------------------------------------- From: Richard Flyer <> Subject: Re: Spiritual Transformation, Evolution, and Culture To: Richard Moore <•••@••.•••> Hi Richard: I had hoped to have a dialoge between us so that I could learn more about your vision. I guess I didn't expect that it would be public :) ---<snip>--- Hi fellow Richard, Please let me explain the posting policy I've developed over the years. I do often publish my responses to personal communications, because often my best thinking happens when I try to respond to thoughtful people who have been able to speak candidly in a private exchange. My 'etiquette' in such cases is to either not reveal the identify of the other person, or else not to share anything they said that they might not want published. I do get in trouble sometimes, but generally my correspondents have been comfortable enough with this policy, and the value to the cyberjournal list has been I think considerable. I hope that your smiley face indicates that you aren't too bothered in this case. If you had addressed this new response to the list, I would post it here for everyone to see. As you directed the message again to me, and as you once again have caused me to 'soul search', I once again want to share my response on the list, while limiting my reference to your message to 'small snippets' that I can't imagine you objecting to. In case, I'll do my best in that regard. I very much like your clarification of what you mean by 'spiritual'. If you define it by how people actually 'intend and do' toward one another and the world, that is very much in harmony with my own notion that 'spiritual change' is something that can happen when there is a shift of culture, provided that the shift encourages people to 'intend and do' in 'spiritually desirable' ways. I am very impressed that you have been able to explicitly bring up spirituality with diverse groups in a way that hasn't been divisive. Your focus on the 'outcome of spirituality' and 'common spiritual virtues' makes a great deal of sense, and I can see how it serves to unify. I haven't seen successes of this kind elsewhere and I'd like to learn a lot more about what's happening in Reno. I have seen situations where a group of people all move toward some particular spiritual focus (as in an intentional community), but moving toward explicit shared 'core spiritual virtues', while maintaining individual spiritual paradigms, is a very impressive accomplishment. I wish I had included Reno in my recent tour of community-activist hotbeds. I have watched your film and read your Building Bridges document. That is all very clear and it makes good sense. What I can't tell from that is the nature and scope of the 'shared virtues' aspect of your endeavor. Is it just the 'community weavers' group that has 'come to agreement' on this concept of spirituality? Is some kind of spiritual observance, a moment of silence or whatever, built into the various activities that the weavers initiate in the community? Are people in the community generally aware of an emerging sense of 'shared core virtues'? Do they talk about it in their churches? As regards your assessment of my own initiatives, "setting up a new system without any foundation", I can understand why you see things that way, particularly as you have found a way to approach community empowerment that does include an explicit 'spiritual wisdom' component, without being divisive. Nonetheless, there is a 'sound foundation' underneath my approach to cultural change, even though it may not be immediately apparent. I alluded to it in our previous exchange, and I think now is a good time for me to be more explicit. The kinds of dialog processes I advocate, processes that are able to evoke what I call a 'space of harmonization', are not at all like Conversation Cafes, World Cafes, or focus groups. We can talk about the nature of these processes at a technical level if you have interest, but for now I'd like to describe what this 'space of harmonization' is about, and the kind of things that tend to happen there. This 'space of harmonization' is real, it can be evoked, and 'what happens there' is something that has been observed repeatedly in practice. And 'what happens there' turns out to be the 'sound foundation' underneath my initiatives. In one of these sessions the dialog tends to pass through distinct phases, each phase being characterized by different interpersonal dynamics. This doesn't happen smoothly or linearly, it jumps around and backslides, but the overall gestalt of what happens can be best described as a sequence of phases and shifts. The initial phase can be characterized as 'purging' or 'getting all the cards on the table'. There is no attempt here to move toward any kind of agreement, nor to 'notice connections' between people's ideas. The important thing here is for everyone to express themselves as fully and sincerely as possible, and for each person's viewpoints to be 'heard' by the whole group. The 'interpersonal dynamics' while in this phase are basically 'one person expressing and the rest listening', and the facilitator's role is to support the expressing and the listening, and to steer away from debate and interpersonal confrontation. This initial phase tends to be chaotic, with ideas and viewpoints coming in from all directions, and people are likely to experience frustration and impatience at 'not getting anywhere'. In fact, things tend to 'get worse', as it becomes clear that some of the viewpoints that have been expressed appear to be quite irreconcilable. This 'descent' process, toward hopelessness really, turns out to be a good thing. It enables an eventual shift into other phases. The shift begins when people start realizing, "There it is. That's how we feel and we don't agree. We simply see things differently." That is the 'hopelessness' part. However, out of the process of hearing everyone express themselves fully and sincerely, another realization also begins to emerge. People begin to realize that they are in the company of 'other sincere and caring people', who just happen to have different experiences and viewpoints. While in 'idea space' no agreement has been forthcoming, in 'interpersonal space' a mutual respect and sense of trust begins to emerge. As this sense of 'mutuality' begins to take hold in the group, people begin to see the 'conflicts in their ideas' in a whole new light. Instead of thinking in terms of "I disagree with you", people begin to think, "I have have a valid concern and you have a valid concern as well." People begin to think in terms of "How can we find solutions that take all of our concerns into account?" It is at this point that the group begins to enter a very creative and collaborative phase, the space of harmonization itself. When people have accepted one another as 'trusted and sincere fellow humans', and begin to see themselves as working together on a mutual problem (how to deal with our various concerns), the interpersonal dynamics shift into what can be characterized as 'open minded collaboration' -- with everyone focusing their attention on their 'mutual problem', and each person bringing their own unique experience and insights to bear on it. Rather than conflicts, synergies begin to emerge among ideas. Person A sees a practical way to deal with person B's concern, etc. In this space of harmonization, a kind of temporary 'mind merge' develops, as if all the neurons in the room are linked together in one coherent problem-solving network. This leads to a tremendous release of creative energy and amazing outcomes can be achieved, at the practical level of 'finding solutions to community problems and conflicts'. Impressive as these practical outcomes can sometimes be, the more important consequence of these kinds of sessions are the shifts and transformations that tend to occur in the participants, by virtue of having participated in a space of harmonization. It is in the nature of these personal shifts that we can find the 'sound foundation' underlying this seemingly secular and agenda-less approach. The shifts I'm referring to are not particularly surprising, given the nature of the harmonization experience. People's eyes are opened, for example, to the fact that it is possible for 'ordinary people' with 'diverse views' to 'come together' as an 'effective collaborating group', and accomplish useful things together. People's attitude toward the possibility and value of collaboration and cooperation thereby shifts, in the very direction you seek, away from wanting to 'exercise power over others' and toward 'valuing cooperation'. Depending on how 'dominating' someone was to begin with, this shift toward cooperation can turn out to be a major personal transformation, something that is perceived as a 'significant turning point' or even a kind of 'awakening' by the person at the time. Such was my own experience, for example, and my current 'mission' can be traced back to that initial 'awakening' event. Another shift, closely related to the 'shift toward cooperation', is a shift toward an understanding of the 'potential of the collective'. That is to say, people's eyes are opened to the possibility of a 'We' that respects and includes the individuality of each participant, and a 'We' that is able to function as a 'wise mind' -- something greater than the sum of its parts. Given the competitive and individualistic nature of our dominant cultures, this shift toward understanding 'the collective potential', even if it only occurs partially and unconsciously, opens the door to some major personal transformations around 'the relationship between the individual and society', and the possibility of achieving 'real participatory democracy'. In one particular session, this kind of consciousness became explicit in the session, and the group emerged with the passionate expression, "We the People need to be more directly involved in making the decisions that affect our lives!" These shifts don't happen for everyone in every session, they can be partial or unconscious, and when they do occur they may or may not have a chance to unfold and manifest themselves as life goes on. But these kinds of shifts do tend to happen with enough frequency, and enough intensity, that 'harmonization events' can serve as an effective way of 'generating transformative consciousness' in a community. If such events are accompanied by the kind of community-building you do in Reno, for example, then this 'transformative potential' can find 'resonance' in ongoing community life, and the virtues of cooperation -- and the possibility of achieving an inclusive sense of a community-wide 'We' -- may have a chance to manifest themselves consciously in the community. I see value in your explicit approach to bringing up spiritual ideas in the community, particularly as you are able do so in a spirit of unification. And I have found that this harmonization approach tends to move in that same direction out of its own dynamics, with the realizations coming spontaneously from within the people themselves, as they experience the process, and as the experience gels in their mind over time. To this extent you and I seem to be going around the same barn, but by different paths. I see opportunities here for mutual learning more than I see a conflict in our approaches. In this spirit of 'mutual learning' I would like to suggest that 'dialog events', of the kind I've been describing, could be very complementary to the kinds of programs you are engaged in. At a practical level, these processes amount to a 'powerful technology' for enabling people to build strong networks and bonds (as they solve practical problems together), and it makes sense for this technology to be in your repertoire of community-building tools. At another level, these events can be a way for the community as a whole to 'take ownership' of the ongoing community-building process, so that it becomes self-sustaining and holographically led. Rather than remaining an ongoing leadership cadre, the weavers would blend into the community as peers, as people generally begin to behave with 'weaver consciousness'. It seems to me that any activist group that is seeking to bring about a transformation in society, of whatever kind, should always be aiming to 'start something' that then becomes self-sustaining and self-propagating. Otherwise, we can get into a situation where the activist group begins to see itself as the 'new elite', the new clique with 'the answers' for the 'rest of us'. I know that is not what you folks are about, and I think conscious attention to this 'pass it on to the people' concept is a good idea for any person or group pursuing a transformative agenda. once again, warmest regards, richard -- -------------------------------------------------------- Posting archives: http://cyberjournal.org/show_archives/ Escaping the Matrix website: http://escapingthematrix.org/ cyberjournal website: http://cyberjournal.org How We the People can change the world: http://governourselves.blogspot.com/ Community Democracy Framework: http://cyberjournal.org/DemocracyFramework.html Film treatment: A Compelling Necessity http://rkmcdocs.blogspot.com/2007/08/film-treatment-compelling-necessity.html Moderator: •••@••.••• (comments welcome)
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