The Life We Want to Lead

The video linked below on mortgage foreclosure practices challenges any reductive or ego-centered notion of Creating the Work You Love.

It is quite possible that the same people who press for foreclosures that can ruin other peoples’ lives, go to church, give money to charity, and attend local school board meetings. They just have agreed to see “work” in a similar way that our industrial culture has agreed to see the use of animals as a food source: as something “out there,” as an object separate from “me and my intimates,” as an arena where exploitation and slaughter do not count. After all, “that’s why they call it work.”

The effort to develop “Right Livelihood” needs to be integrated with the effort to develop a just and sustainable culture. Placing work in the realm of “war” and “hunting” is one strategy that may have its place, but it is not the only way to envision working. The same mortgage brokerage and broker my dedicate their work energy toward the mission of keeping people in their homes. There is just not that much reward for it apparently, but you do have to look at yourself in the mirror every day. The very foundation of Abundance is your conscience. If your heart cannot get on board with what you are doing, get out before your wings atrophy, before you accept defeat in the form of mere comfort. I ask the brokerages, “Is this the best you can do?” Creating the Work You Love might be more aptly phrased, live and work your conscience. The stakes are too high for anything else.

http://www.consumerwarningnetwork.com/2008/07/02/mortgage-servicers-secret/

Lest We Forget

Rick passes this along from Wm Blake’s satire,

The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

The ancient Poets animated all sensible objects with Gods or Geniuses, calling them by the names and adorning them with the properties of woods, rivers, mountains, lakes, cities, nations, and whatever their enlarged & numerous senses could percieve.

And particularly they studied the genius of each city & country, placing it under its mental deity;

Till a system was formed, which some took advantage of & enslav’d the vulgar by attempting to realize or abstract the mental deities from their objects: thus began Priesthood;

Choosing forms of worship from poetic tales.

And at length they pronounc’d that the Gods had order’d such things.

Thus men forgot that All deities reside in the human breast.

Rick Speaks on the “Dark Night” at Wainwright House Oct 2

Here’s an opportunity for those in the New York/Connecticut region who might like to attend a mini-workshop with Rick on his Journey through Darkness theme.  This seems a very timely opportunity to spend an evening exploring helpful perspectives and processes re: a subject about which many can currently relate.  Join the healing journey; info follows.

Journey through Darkness: The Uncharted Sea

“In the middle of my life, I found myself lost in a dark wood” – begins Dante – setting the stage for his archetypal journey through the realms of the collective soul, a passage from anguish to redemption, that we too may find ourselves on, willfully or not.

Contemporary processes that deal with loss, illness, or life transition too often focus on “learning the lesson and moving on.” What is lost therein is the rich and fertile loam of the dark woods, the depth that can open the soul to its possibility.

Join Rick  for an evening of exploration into darkness. Through myth, meditation, and open dialogue we are guided through the shadows of our lives; whether they appear as loss, chronic illness, addiction, or not knowing one’s next step. By going into the depths, into the dark wood of the underworld, we release shame around “not knowing” or not having “the answer,” and, following the archetype of Chiron – the wounded healer – we allow ourselves to fully embrace the life process we are given, to receive its wisdom and grace, and peace that can pass all understanding.

Thursday, Oct 2, 7-9pm  $25 members; $35 non-members, registration requested by Sept 30.

Wainwright House

260 Stuyvesant Avenue

Rye, NY 10580

914-967-6080 x102 (Diane Negvesky, M.S)

www.wainwright.org

Rick Appearing at the Power of Words Conference

If spending a September weekend in Vermont expanding your appreciation of, and facility for, creative & purposeful expression through language strikes you as time well spent… perhaps you’d enjoy this unique event.  Rick will be there, speaking on Saturday Sept. 13th (see summary below), and also offering a post-conference  AntiCareer workshop on Monday the 15th.  The event is hosted by Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont.

More info at http://www.goddard.edu/powerofwords

Liberating Yourself and the World Through the Spoken, Written & Sung Word
Sept. 12 – 15, 2008

Explore how we can use our words – written, spoken or sung – to make community, wake ourselves up, and foster empowerment, healing and transformation. Sponsored by the low residency Transformative Language Arts Concentration at Goddard College, this conference features workshops, talking circles, performances, open readings, and celebrations.

The Goddess of Speech and the Resonant Word ~ Rick Jarow, PhD

In the Vedic Scriptures of Ancient India, “Speech” was envisioned as a Goddess (named Vāc) who stood at the apex of creation. One who received her favor had dominion over both the gods and their realms through acquaintance with her secrets and powers. This presentation explores the intricacies of sacred speech and its corollary science, the practice of mantra (mantra-vidya). And in so doing, it challenges contemporary linguistic notions of the arbitrariness of the linguistic sign (and conventions of representation) by explicating the different levels and powers of the Word.

A Father, a Son, and a Crow

Rick asked me to post this little tale~

THE CROW

An 80 year old man was sitting on the sofa in his house along with his 45 year old, highly educated son.  Suddenly a crow perched on their window. 

The father asked his son, “What is this?”

The son replied, “It is a crow.”

After a few minutes, the father asked his son the 2nd time, “What is this?”

The son said, “Father, I have just now told you, It’s a crow.”

After a little while, the old father again asked his son the 3rd time, “What is this?”

At this time some expression of irritation was felt in the son’s tone when he said to his father with a rebuff.  “It’s a crow, a crow.”

A little after, the father again asked his son the 4th time, “What is this?”

This time the son shouted at his father, “Why do you keep asking me the same question again and again, although I have told you so many times IT IS A CROW.  Are you not able to understand this?”

 
A little later the father went to his room and came back with an old tattered diary, which he had maintained since his son was born.  On opening a page, he asked his son to read that page.  The son read the following in the diary: 

“Today my little son aged three was sitting with me on the sofa, when a crow perched in the window.  My son asked me 23 times what it was, and I replied to him all 23 times that it was a crow. I hugged him lovingly each time he asked me the same question again and again for 23 times. I did not at all feel irritated; I rather felt affection for my innocent child.”

While the little child asked him 23 times What is this?, the father had felt no irritation in replying to the same question all 23 times and when today the father asked his son the same question just 4 times, the son felt irritated and annoyed. 

So….

If your parents attain old age, do not reject them or look at them as a burden, but speak to them a gracious word; be cool, obedient, humble and kind to them.  Be considerate to your parents.  From today say this aloud, “I want to see my parents happy forever.  They have cared for me ever since I was a little child.  They have always showered their selfless love on me.  They crossed all mountains and valleys without seeing the storms and heat, to make me presentable in society today.”

Manifestation Beyond the Project of Me

Many think of manifestation as “self-improvement” but if that is all it is, it is but another ego project doomed to failure. To renounce manifestation on the other hand, due to some notion of temporality or futility of this world is to remain in reaction to thought (to samsara) and not to break through to the other side. What then exactly is manifestation? 

The Idols of Environmentalism

Greetings, all~

Rick was sent an article published in Orion Magazine, and he thought it might spark some thoughts and conversation here.  It’s a formidable piece, spanning two issues of the mag – I am posting just a couple of excerpts here and providing a link further down for anyone interested to pursue.

Have a brilliant summer!

Whitehawk

The Idols of Environmentalism
Do environmentalists conspire against their own interests?   
by Curtis White

Published in the March/April 2007 issue of Orion magazine

THE IDEA THAT WE HAVE powerful corporate villains to thank for the sorry state of the natural world is what Francis Bacon called an “idol of the tribe.” According to Bacon, an idol is a truth based on insufficient evidence but maintained by constant affirmation within the tribe of believers. In spite of this insufficiency, idols do not fall easily or often. Tribes are capable of exerting will based on principles, but they are capable only with the greatest difficulty of willing the destruction of their own principles. It’s as if they feel that it is better to stagger from frustration to frustration than to return honestly to the question, does what we believe actually make sense? The idea of fallen idols always suggests tragic disillusionment, but this is in fact a good thing. If they don’t fall, there is no hope for discovering the real problems and the best and truest response to them. All environmentalists understand that the global crisis we are experiencing requires urgent action, but not everyone understands that if our activism is driven by idols we can exhaust ourselves with effort while having very little effect on the crisis. Most frighteningly, it is even possible that our efforts can sustain the crisis. The question the environmental tribe must ask is, do our mistaken assumptions actually cause us to conspire against our own interests?

…

The Sacred Art of Manifestation: This School of Earth

How many times have we heard that the “Earth is a school” and that we are in a process of learning?  But how many times have we refused to take the course?  The idea that manifestation is a process of consciously desiring, a conscious way to “get what I want” is immature at best and pernicious at worst, for it assumes that “man is the measure of all things.”  In fact, we cannot even remember what we did yesterday, not to mention our birth, or lifetimes past.  

Who are we, really?  Where do we come from?  Why are we here with one another?  Is it not, ultimately, to learn how to love, and to love more fully and powerfully? 

And what if, in this process, what we want is what we already have? This does not have to be resignation or fatalism.  What if we are being asked to work skillfully, lovingly, intricately, and mindfully with the exact circumstances given to us, with every detail from taking a drink of water, to tying our shoes, to fixing the car, to opening to our pain, to accepting the depth of our feelings, to working energetically for change?  

An ordinary day can become an eon.  A simple walk outside can be a walk into blazing glory. Can we love our life, the one we have been given, so much that we may be inspired to use it well? 

Can we receive so deeply that every exhale is an offering? 

Can this very day be the day, the time of our awakening? 

RJ

The Community of Acceptance

The search for community is often a long and hard one. We all desperately want, and need, to belong to something, somewhere, somehow, and yet we have also fought desperately for our freedom and are legitimately fearful of backsliding into group dynamics that suffocate individual expression and creativity. 

This, in essence, is the problem around the desire and need for both community and freedom, for arguably, we cannot have one without the other. The late 70’s and so called “me-generation” 80’s perhaps witnessed the apex of individualism in unbridled capitalism, the quest for endless sensation and experience, and ultimately (as Philip Slater entitled it) the pursuit of loneliness.  

Ironically, as the “glory of me” ideal was cracking through various forms of addiction, existential despair, and loss of will, the ideal of the commune was also falling apart. The construct of any collective willing to sacrifice the individual for its group mind was revealed as stultifying and oppressive.  And as one communal experiment after another grew up, and then disbanded, through the counter-culture, the challenges of our living together were painfully revealed.

Radiant Spirit (cont.): Abundance Practices 5, 6 & 7

 

This is the fourth installment of Rick’s “Radiant Spirit” article, featuring practices of abundance 5-7, that we can work with daily.  This series began on April 4.