I want to share with you a gorgeous rendering of my allegory A Gathering of the Tribe in the form of a 9-minute film conceived by Aubrey Marcus, with animation by Aldous Massie and original score by Jon Hopkins.
Great to know you are moving seamlessly into visual and sound creative collaborations. You expressed wanting to do that a while back I remember, as the words alone were not quite hitting the mark at one point for you. I love what you say and it is good to hear you acknowledging that it is time for action - while advocating compassion and care because of your loving belief in the good in us all. I am still trying with that and am making small changes along the way, so thanks for the example.
"On the other hand, I have a grave concern not about whether “we” will win, but about the manner of the winning. The normal pattern of othering, of vengeance and punishment, and of attributing the evil of a system to evil people will ultimately result in a repeat of history."
So let's bust this "normal pattern".
The only reason the normal pattern happens is because "the winners" have not learned what went wrong in the first place. They gain control of gov't guns and then do the same old thing with them. Why? What are they missing? What actually went wrong in the first place?
Nothing went wrong. Everything happened precisely as intended. In essence, gov't power IS a gun: a tool that can only do its' job according to the will & wisdom of the human being(s) in control of it.
As long as we believe in the "wisdom" of huge numbers of guns controlling everyone by force then that is what we will have. Who will be in control of the guns? Who else but people who enjoy forcibly controlling other people. AKA human predators and criminals.
The only way things will not repeat the normal pattern is when "the winners" understand that the problem is not the "evil people in power", the problem is human belief in "power over people" itself. The winners then enter the machine and dismantle it completely rather than assume control of it.
It's a tripod, folks. Pull one leg off and it all falls down. Eliminate predatory banking (which funds gov't power) or eliminate gov't power (which defends predatory banking) or eliminate controlled media (which provides popular support for both) and watch history not repeat itself.
I like this comment, but I think the metaphor needs another layer: the tripod, as it stands now, has supportive braces at the bottom preventing any one leg from being pulled. These three powers described are intertwined on many levels by these braces.
"The problem is human belief in 'power over people' itself" = well said, I think this might be the core element of those supportive braces, but defining a single tangible change that could happen here on Earth to dissipate those braces seems futile. It really does seem like a collective shift is required without this escalating into a whole lot of violence.
Back in 2019, I had the silly idea that if there was a three-day period where everything just STOPPED, people stayed in their homes, and just spent the day thinking and talking in real time, face to face. I thought this would cause so much inner reflection, that a global shift of consciousness would be inevitable. Then the pandemic was declared, most people were in their homes for much longer than three days, and things seemed to only get worse. Sure, the nonstop fear-mongering probably played a big role. But it seemed to highlight a more glaring underlying problem in society, and that is that seems most people really would rather just look away than confront the true demons (both within themselves, and the dark perpetual problems of society).
Facing the demons is the only way to learn what went wrong in the first place. It's gonna require every one of us doing that in order to make this collective shift happen.
Have to agree with all you say here, OEA. I don't actually see us all moving into any kind of "winner" scenario anytime soon, if ever. I say these things not so much in the spirit of inspiring actual activist-type action, but simply because they need saying.
I certainly am not personally doing anything to "save the world". Better to set about the task of climbing out of the muck & mire of ones' time so one can see straight and speak clearly without adding to the confusing, battle-weary din of this vs. that. Folks are always free to decide for themselves what's up. Truth is always there for anyone willing to seek it out rather than be told what it is.
You are so right about the tripod legs being braced with every scrap of reinforcement material/tech available. The media leg, however, does appear to show a modicum of decay and wobbliness as the web clings to life as an outlet for alternate views. Desperate, shocking displays of force such as the establishment of "Democratic Peoples' Republics" in Australia, Austria & Germany, not to mention the increasingly bizarre and convoluted plague storyline, will inevitably result in increasing numbers of folks smelling not just one rat, but a growing, thriving infestation.
As ever, there is no enemy-- just us tiny little fleshy humans struggling for breathable air within ourselves. All I want to say is: The good air, folks-- it's really there. Keep climbing. Once it hits your lungs, all the noise out there won't mean a thing.
Thanks for that. I feel it. I am a fan of yours and just discovered Aubrey, very impressed. Here is a song for this - it needs a new final verse - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AISD0cupGBY and my favorite song, Sting Love is the 7th Wave https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXZistami3c also check out my Substack, rebuilding my life's work after 20 years of mold and legal abuse. I have been finding my kindred spirits.
Yes, thank you for those links! I am very much wondering how the bioneers think about all these issues. Holly Near sang at the Bioneers conference. They are a terrific group who are very involved in ecology, etc.
I went to Bioneers around 2000. I loved it. I was a friend of Kenny Ausubel in college and we did a project together on education. I also wonder where they are with this as long as we are seeking out kindred spirits.
What you've said here, Charles, exactly mirrors my own state of mind.
The oscillation between a primitive desire for vengeance and the more enlightened, spiritually oriented, perspective I've spent decades trying to cultivate is right at the heart of this epochal battle, for this pilgrim at least.
I know the battle I am engaged in can only be won, in any meaningful sense, if I don't lose my soul in the process.
I'm currently reading the first four Earthsea books, by Ursula K Le Guin. My daughter recommended them. The parallels with our times are stark and arresting. It sometimes seems as if Le Guin had the gift of prophecy.
Your own writing has a similar potency, I venture to suggest.
Reading your wonderful words strengthens my hope and reaffirms my faith that there is only one way, ultimately: the path of the spirit, whoever your God happens to be.
This is the eternal Dance of Lila, of the circle of conscious evolution. We start out in great, blissful connection on the planet, as the indigenous knew, then lose that and must seek an awareful chosen return, as in the Bible’s Prodigal Son story, Siddhartha’s journey, and even the “children’s book,” The Giving Tree. (Following our inner knowing passions here, we will return before we are too old to help spread the word.)
Perhaps I have a wrong understanding of the Dance of Lila; however you saying that Siddhartha ended it, with my interpretation even, is correct. There are 4 Yugas, time periods in India wisdom knowledge, which you may know. The Golden Age of Knowledge, basically connection to the One/Divine, whatever name we want to use, followed by the Age of Ritual, then the Age of Doubt and the Age of Conflict. We are in Kali Yuga, the Age of Conflict. The return to the Golden Age is through choice of right action and knowledge that we are all One, connected. The Giving Tree follows that cycle, the old man returning to connection with the tree late in his life, after having started out in blissful oneness with the tree as a child. Siddhartha started out in a palace, saw suffering, took his own journey into societal humanhood and trial, and became enlightened. Also the Prodigal Son is the same cyclic journey. That is what I have taken to be the Dance of Lila; I could be wrong. TS Elliot: "You will search and search and end up where you began and know if for the first time." We have to choose to restore human life to connection, from where it started with blissful indigenous knowledge.
Funny that Wikipedia doesn't have your view on the Giving Tree amongst the various views on the book.
I would however point out that Buddha taught liberation as "unbinding" so that there is nothing connecting the sense streams anymore. The opposite of the Oneness stuff, which is a Hindu Advaita philosophy that he decided was not leading to liberation.. Unfortunately many people are confused about what he taught because over the centuries the teachings have been distorted and most people who interpret them have not actually dissolved into nibbana, so they are just going based on whatever experience they have had, and the Oneness experience is very easy to get since it is basically an expansion of the illusion we already are in. I have a video showing a nibbana meditation at the bottom of already-perfect.blogspot.com if interested.
Forgot to mention that once knowledge is gained, the cycle or dance is over for that individual. Also, technically, all this never happened, for the One cannot become dual or the many. I believe that is the meaning of the dance.
Charles, this is beautiful, thank you. This will mean so much to my 14-yo daughter who does not "fit in" and who believes with every fiber of her being that she is from another place and time. I cannot wait to sit and watch this with her.
Thank you Charles. What a perfect rendition. The MBW workshop at Schumacher in 2015 is forever engraved on my heart and soul. I recall asking if you could recount the Gathering of the Tribes then. It didn't arise. What did unfold, for me, was a magical and miraculous heart wrenching, joy filled and life changing experience. We were, I think, 12 men and 12 women. A rarity of balance and a felt sense of the whispers of what unity might look and feel like. Bless you.
We got beamed down here to help the crazy humans to see the higher dimension, but how do we actually get them to see it? Most of these humans have zero interest in a higher reality.. Now more than ever people have lost their spiritual spark and chosen materialism, it seems. I have met others who are extremely advanced on the spiritual path but even most of them seem to have no clue what Bill Gates and Klaus Schwab are up to.
I was able to choose which glasses I put on, for a long time. And now I'm in danger of losing touch with 'the old glasses'. Because I live too much in the new dimension. I'm for the first time now aware of it. And it is not convenient, because it has not only come to live that new dimension but I want also be a bridge.
Interesting that you call yourself hoax.
It would be nice to talk to you: are you open to that?
Hm, yes I'm not clear still. I'd like to talk to you. I'm not on that website. I tried to sign up but it got stuck loading in the middle of the process.
If you have whastapp or signal messengers my number is 12672702057
I remember this story from the close of your book and also I saw you read it (somewhat reluctantly) during your interview with Aubrey Marcus. Thank you also for addressing the perceived oscillations in your recent essays. It truly helped me put the parts together. I greatly appreciate the "help" you are sending (:
Here in San Diego, I will be attending an event this weekend - The Heart of Freedom - with RFK Jr., Alec Zeck, Kevin Jenkins and others. Your video confirmed my desire and need to come together with like minded souls.
Lifting my heart and raising a glass to the healed world!
Edit: just saw the video, wow... it reminds me of Delores's story in the HBO series westworld. She still had the spark of seeing beauty driving her actions and helped enhance conditions for a new free will. Please do watch the show! Here's one of the key clips https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgTfBV7TzuE
The revolution may bring in a lot of the same, as you had mentioned in the sith article.
There's a psychologist who studied this, called Dabrowski. He pretty much said that any time there's an upheaval, the same characteristics end up being portrayed in the new system. How? Well, the useless but crafty class (who rule today)- the psychopaths, sociopaths, and damaged narcissists end up gravitating to ANY power , twisting it to their needs.
Thats why we have the left pushing for vax passes and other nonsense.
That's why we had the right pushing for bigger and bigger military industrial complex while crying about big government.
Whatever this revolution results with, hopefully we rememeber the true reason why it happened.
And I am afraid like you, as the greeks said that democracy is only possible when the leadership aren't philosophers (not the bullshit kind we see today), OR when the people are philosophers.
Let that sink in... how many of us are truly self aware after centuries/millenia of being domesticated???
EPIC beauty, you are. One precious breath at a time, Charles, inhale all the Love you're made of! I and millions of others are so, SO, so grateful for your heart, mind, soul, voice and words. Perhaps you saw the letter I wrote, moved by your work, yesterday morning... https://www.leaningintolight.com/blog/a-letter-to-the-outrageous-beauty-of-light
Thanks Charles ...thanks for the tears and the truth. For in facing our deepest hurt we can rise to a greater passion to make a difference, and be loving ~ Be the active force of Love. I appreciate your contribution and encouragement! Love, Francesca :)
Great to know you are moving seamlessly into visual and sound creative collaborations. You expressed wanting to do that a while back I remember, as the words alone were not quite hitting the mark at one point for you. I love what you say and it is good to hear you acknowledging that it is time for action - while advocating compassion and care because of your loving belief in the good in us all. I am still trying with that and am making small changes along the way, so thanks for the example.
"On the other hand, I have a grave concern not about whether “we” will win, but about the manner of the winning. The normal pattern of othering, of vengeance and punishment, and of attributing the evil of a system to evil people will ultimately result in a repeat of history."
So let's bust this "normal pattern".
The only reason the normal pattern happens is because "the winners" have not learned what went wrong in the first place. They gain control of gov't guns and then do the same old thing with them. Why? What are they missing? What actually went wrong in the first place?
Nothing went wrong. Everything happened precisely as intended. In essence, gov't power IS a gun: a tool that can only do its' job according to the will & wisdom of the human being(s) in control of it.
As long as we believe in the "wisdom" of huge numbers of guns controlling everyone by force then that is what we will have. Who will be in control of the guns? Who else but people who enjoy forcibly controlling other people. AKA human predators and criminals.
The only way things will not repeat the normal pattern is when "the winners" understand that the problem is not the "evil people in power", the problem is human belief in "power over people" itself. The winners then enter the machine and dismantle it completely rather than assume control of it.
It's a tripod, folks. Pull one leg off and it all falls down. Eliminate predatory banking (which funds gov't power) or eliminate gov't power (which defends predatory banking) or eliminate controlled media (which provides popular support for both) and watch history not repeat itself.
I like this comment, but I think the metaphor needs another layer: the tripod, as it stands now, has supportive braces at the bottom preventing any one leg from being pulled. These three powers described are intertwined on many levels by these braces.
"The problem is human belief in 'power over people' itself" = well said, I think this might be the core element of those supportive braces, but defining a single tangible change that could happen here on Earth to dissipate those braces seems futile. It really does seem like a collective shift is required without this escalating into a whole lot of violence.
Back in 2019, I had the silly idea that if there was a three-day period where everything just STOPPED, people stayed in their homes, and just spent the day thinking and talking in real time, face to face. I thought this would cause so much inner reflection, that a global shift of consciousness would be inevitable. Then the pandemic was declared, most people were in their homes for much longer than three days, and things seemed to only get worse. Sure, the nonstop fear-mongering probably played a big role. But it seemed to highlight a more glaring underlying problem in society, and that is that seems most people really would rather just look away than confront the true demons (both within themselves, and the dark perpetual problems of society).
Facing the demons is the only way to learn what went wrong in the first place. It's gonna require every one of us doing that in order to make this collective shift happen.
Have to agree with all you say here, OEA. I don't actually see us all moving into any kind of "winner" scenario anytime soon, if ever. I say these things not so much in the spirit of inspiring actual activist-type action, but simply because they need saying.
I certainly am not personally doing anything to "save the world". Better to set about the task of climbing out of the muck & mire of ones' time so one can see straight and speak clearly without adding to the confusing, battle-weary din of this vs. that. Folks are always free to decide for themselves what's up. Truth is always there for anyone willing to seek it out rather than be told what it is.
You are so right about the tripod legs being braced with every scrap of reinforcement material/tech available. The media leg, however, does appear to show a modicum of decay and wobbliness as the web clings to life as an outlet for alternate views. Desperate, shocking displays of force such as the establishment of "Democratic Peoples' Republics" in Australia, Austria & Germany, not to mention the increasingly bizarre and convoluted plague storyline, will inevitably result in increasing numbers of folks smelling not just one rat, but a growing, thriving infestation.
As ever, there is no enemy-- just us tiny little fleshy humans struggling for breathable air within ourselves. All I want to say is: The good air, folks-- it's really there. Keep climbing. Once it hits your lungs, all the noise out there won't mean a thing.
mmmmm good air :) once again well said <3
Thanks for that. I feel it. I am a fan of yours and just discovered Aubrey, very impressed. Here is a song for this - it needs a new final verse - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AISD0cupGBY and my favorite song, Sting Love is the 7th Wave https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXZistami3c also check out my Substack, rebuilding my life's work after 20 years of mold and legal abuse. I have been finding my kindred spirits.
awesome songs!
THANK YOU for those wonderful links!
Yes, thank you for those links! I am very much wondering how the bioneers think about all these issues. Holly Near sang at the Bioneers conference. They are a terrific group who are very involved in ecology, etc.
I went to Bioneers around 2000. I loved it. I was a friend of Kenny Ausubel in college and we did a project together on education. I also wonder where they are with this as long as we are seeking out kindred spirits.
I love these songs and spent the morning playing them over and over for inspiration. Thanks for sharing.
wonderful!
What you've said here, Charles, exactly mirrors my own state of mind.
The oscillation between a primitive desire for vengeance and the more enlightened, spiritually oriented, perspective I've spent decades trying to cultivate is right at the heart of this epochal battle, for this pilgrim at least.
I know the battle I am engaged in can only be won, in any meaningful sense, if I don't lose my soul in the process.
I'm currently reading the first four Earthsea books, by Ursula K Le Guin. My daughter recommended them. The parallels with our times are stark and arresting. It sometimes seems as if Le Guin had the gift of prophecy.
Your own writing has a similar potency, I venture to suggest.
Reading your wonderful words strengthens my hope and reaffirms my faith that there is only one way, ultimately: the path of the spirit, whoever your God happens to be.
Peace and goodwill to all!
This is the eternal Dance of Lila, of the circle of conscious evolution. We start out in great, blissful connection on the planet, as the indigenous knew, then lose that and must seek an awareful chosen return, as in the Bible’s Prodigal Son story, Siddhartha’s journey, and even the “children’s book,” The Giving Tree. (Following our inner knowing passions here, we will return before we are too old to help spread the word.)
I've never heard that interpretation of The Giving Tree as the Dance of Lila.
Also I don't think that is the correct understanding SIddartha's journey. He set out to end the Dance of Lila, and he succeeded.
Perhaps I have a wrong understanding of the Dance of Lila; however you saying that Siddhartha ended it, with my interpretation even, is correct. There are 4 Yugas, time periods in India wisdom knowledge, which you may know. The Golden Age of Knowledge, basically connection to the One/Divine, whatever name we want to use, followed by the Age of Ritual, then the Age of Doubt and the Age of Conflict. We are in Kali Yuga, the Age of Conflict. The return to the Golden Age is through choice of right action and knowledge that we are all One, connected. The Giving Tree follows that cycle, the old man returning to connection with the tree late in his life, after having started out in blissful oneness with the tree as a child. Siddhartha started out in a palace, saw suffering, took his own journey into societal humanhood and trial, and became enlightened. Also the Prodigal Son is the same cyclic journey. That is what I have taken to be the Dance of Lila; I could be wrong. TS Elliot: "You will search and search and end up where you began and know if for the first time." We have to choose to restore human life to connection, from where it started with blissful indigenous knowledge.
Oh Ok yeah now I see what you are talking about.
Funny that Wikipedia doesn't have your view on the Giving Tree amongst the various views on the book.
I would however point out that Buddha taught liberation as "unbinding" so that there is nothing connecting the sense streams anymore. The opposite of the Oneness stuff, which is a Hindu Advaita philosophy that he decided was not leading to liberation.. Unfortunately many people are confused about what he taught because over the centuries the teachings have been distorted and most people who interpret them have not actually dissolved into nibbana, so they are just going based on whatever experience they have had, and the Oneness experience is very easy to get since it is basically an expansion of the illusion we already are in. I have a video showing a nibbana meditation at the bottom of already-perfect.blogspot.com if interested.
Forgot to mention that once knowledge is gained, the cycle or dance is over for that individual. Also, technically, all this never happened, for the One cannot become dual or the many. I believe that is the meaning of the dance.
Charles, this is beautiful, thank you. This will mean so much to my 14-yo daughter who does not "fit in" and who believes with every fiber of her being that she is from another place and time. I cannot wait to sit and watch this with her.
It Is Perfect. Thank you deeply...
Thank you Charles. What a perfect rendition. The MBW workshop at Schumacher in 2015 is forever engraved on my heart and soul. I recall asking if you could recount the Gathering of the Tribes then. It didn't arise. What did unfold, for me, was a magical and miraculous heart wrenching, joy filled and life changing experience. We were, I think, 12 men and 12 women. A rarity of balance and a felt sense of the whispers of what unity might look and feel like. Bless you.
Beautiful animation, but these are my thoughts :
We got beamed down here to help the crazy humans to see the higher dimension, but how do we actually get them to see it? Most of these humans have zero interest in a higher reality.. Now more than ever people have lost their spiritual spark and chosen materialism, it seems. I have met others who are extremely advanced on the spiritual path but even most of them seem to have no clue what Bill Gates and Klaus Schwab are up to.
The greater the disalignment, the more that which is true within us gets stirred up and awakened.
I almost forgot and now have to make an effort to put myself in this place. Isn't that actually beautiful and encouraging?
You forgot what?
I see and experience what you see.
I was able to choose which glasses I put on, for a long time. And now I'm in danger of losing touch with 'the old glasses'. Because I live too much in the new dimension. I'm for the first time now aware of it. And it is not convenient, because it has not only come to live that new dimension but I want also be a bridge.
Interesting that you call yourself hoax.
It would be nice to talk to you: are you open to that?
Are you also at naascommunity.org?
Hm, yes I'm not clear still. I'd like to talk to you. I'm not on that website. I tried to sign up but it got stuck loading in the middle of the process.
If you have whastapp or signal messengers my number is 12672702057
You forgot what?
Bravo on the short film Charles.
I remember this story from the close of your book and also I saw you read it (somewhat reluctantly) during your interview with Aubrey Marcus. Thank you also for addressing the perceived oscillations in your recent essays. It truly helped me put the parts together. I greatly appreciate the "help" you are sending (:
Here in San Diego, I will be attending an event this weekend - The Heart of Freedom - with RFK Jr., Alec Zeck, Kevin Jenkins and others. Your video confirmed my desire and need to come together with like minded souls.
Lifting my heart and raising a glass to the healed world!
Burst into tears
Edit: just saw the video, wow... it reminds me of Delores's story in the HBO series westworld. She still had the spark of seeing beauty driving her actions and helped enhance conditions for a new free will. Please do watch the show! Here's one of the key clips https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgTfBV7TzuE
The revolution may bring in a lot of the same, as you had mentioned in the sith article.
There's a psychologist who studied this, called Dabrowski. He pretty much said that any time there's an upheaval, the same characteristics end up being portrayed in the new system. How? Well, the useless but crafty class (who rule today)- the psychopaths, sociopaths, and damaged narcissists end up gravitating to ANY power , twisting it to their needs.
Thats why we have the left pushing for vax passes and other nonsense.
That's why we had the right pushing for bigger and bigger military industrial complex while crying about big government.
Whatever this revolution results with, hopefully we rememeber the true reason why it happened.
And I am afraid like you, as the greeks said that democracy is only possible when the leadership aren't philosophers (not the bullshit kind we see today), OR when the people are philosophers.
Let that sink in... how many of us are truly self aware after centuries/millenia of being domesticated???
Alphabet Vs the Goddess- please watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QQuD62RxrU
EPIC beauty, you are. One precious breath at a time, Charles, inhale all the Love you're made of! I and millions of others are so, SO, so grateful for your heart, mind, soul, voice and words. Perhaps you saw the letter I wrote, moved by your work, yesterday morning... https://www.leaningintolight.com/blog/a-letter-to-the-outrageous-beauty-of-light
Beautiful blog!
Thanks Corinne!
Now, that was cool Charles!
"Here we are" for sure.
Nice video.
Brilliant ,insightful and right on the money as usual sir. Blessings from Auckland, New Zealand
Thanks Charles ...thanks for the tears and the truth. For in facing our deepest hurt we can rise to a greater passion to make a difference, and be loving ~ Be the active force of Love. I appreciate your contribution and encouragement! Love, Francesca :)