Raising Consciousness, Part IV

Dear Friends, I had meant to do this blog at a little later date, but it is better for me to do it today, before hard reality sets in.

In the first part, I talked about being able to see things from different points of view. This is also a very important part of raising consciousness, of looking at things objectively rather than subjectively. This is a very important step - to put aside your own viewpoint and consider someone else's.

Today, my company was informed that we will be shutting down in a few short months. This is a result of being bought by a larger company 18 months ago. It's nothing new in the world of business and economics. I will be laid off shortly, after 5 years. As a single mom, in the world's 2nd most expensive place to live in the world, it is a little alarming and daunting. But that is not what I want to talk about.

I started in 2006, working as a temporary office worker. It had been 12 years since I had been in the workforce. The first day back in an office was horrible. After the first hour I wanted to cry, and by lunchtime I wanted to go home and never come back. I couldn't do that, because I knew I had to get back to work to support my family. I was also struggling to manage my rheumatoid arthritis. Because of my job, my wrists and feet literally ached for months.

After about a year, though, I found the rhythm to what I was doing. It was a start up company, and I had 4 people working under me, just trying to keep up with the deluge of work. I loved it! People appreciated my being there, I felt valued, I was making some money, working outside the home, meeting people. I had a job in which I could make my own decisions, organize my work, set my own pace.

The thing I loved most though, was the people. I had a chance to meet and work with people from all over the world: India, Sri Lanka, Romania, Germany, France, Madagascar, Africa, the Philippines, China, without going very far at all! My travel opportunities off the continent have been limited so far to the UK and Hawaii, not very exciting, but eye-opening nevertheless.

The point is, my life has been enriched by the people I have met from different cultures. It doesn't matter if it is for only a short time, or long, and hopefully theirs were enriched in return. It may be hard for someone to imagine who is a "world traveller", who is used to seeing different places and people. Who takes "hopping across the pond" very lightly, as matter of fact. This is not the case for me. My parents grew up in small towns on the Prairies, and never dreamed that one day they might get to see places like the Sandwich Islands, Borneo, Scandinavia, or Australia, but they did!

Having the chance to meet someone from another country is something I would put a high value on, not just for my own sake, but for the sake of a larger, world-view, and especially for those who might otherwise never have an opportunity to expand their own. The benefit of hosting and enabling an inter-continental conference works both ways, my friends, both ways.

Sparks

Raising Consciousness, Part III

It's amazing what you can find surfing the internet, and where it leads you. This picture is on the Colorado Plateau, near a spot called the 4 corners, taken in a rare year when the elements come together in such a way that the desert becomes a carpet of purple flowers. It is a flowering, or bursting forth, but not just out of nowhere. In between, the rhythmn of the seasonal cycles works. This is a definition for "epiphany" which I like very much. That special moment occurs often only after long, hard, repetitious movement or work. (remember I promised to bring up repetition?) When the time is right, something miraculous can happen.
The same can happen in the different ages of man. What happened in between 1000 AD and 2000 AD? The Renaissance! A seemingly sudden flowering of literature, science, art, religion and politics. It involved social and political upheaval, and has been called the "bridge" between the modern and middle ages. Of course, it did not happen without a lot of hard work on the part of pioneers like Archimedes, Socrates, and so on.
What often happens, though, is that a person's work or genius is not fully recognized or appreciated until decades, if not centuries later. The common man simply is not ready, and cannot fathom it until a great deal of time has passed.

This year, 2012, I feel we are once again on the verge of the opportunity for a "renaissance", or flowering in similar areas: medicine, agriculture, religion, education, socio/political arenas. Perhaps it could be said that through the work of a great pioneer, 100 years ago, and the steady devotion to his work that has taken place over the past few decades. Perhaps Dr. Steiner's work, otherwise known as anthroposophy, could be called the "bridge" into the future. It's kind of like learning how to play a musical instrument: you have to practice scales and chords endlessly, until you can do them in your sleep. Only when you have become a "master" is there the possibility for you to make the leap to "maestro".

In Alfred Heidenreich's 1942 lecture, he acknowledged that his generation might not see the actualization of Steiner's work, certainly not to the extent that they had hoped. Today, 70 years later, thanks to all the hard work performed with sincere dedication, I think we can be more optimistic.

Raising consciousness is what our Living Gold Conference (or as I like to call it, our big fat Canadian Conference) this summer is all about. There will be workshops on numbers, comparative religions, spacial dynamics, music, singing, sculpture, economics, historical occurrences - even on humor! Do you know the phrase "live large"? It means take everything to the max, take everything in, stretch the boundaries, tear down the walls. Oh and yes, Vancouver Island also offers bungee jumping...

Go for the Gold!
Sparky

Raising Consciousness, Part II

Hi there. Today I want to present 3 images: the cadeuceus (on the right), the one below, called a taijitu, better known as yin and yang and one more, without an actual picture.

Notice that neither half of the taijitu is completely black or completely white. Theoretically, no one is completely bad or completely good. It also introduces the concept of "chi", or "life energy". You probably have realized by now the connection between ancient mythology and yoga, as discussed in my previous blog. The answer is of course, that yoga goes back hundreds, if not thousands of years. So too does a practice in China called chi gung, or qigong. It is similar to t'ai chi, which personally I find a lot easier to try than yoga - it's downright embarrassing watching me try to get down onto, and up off of, a floor mat.

Typically, a qigong practice involves rhythmic breathing, coordinated with slow, stylized repetition of fluid movement, and a calm mindful state. From a philosophical point of view, it is believed to help develop human potential, allow access to higher realms of awareness, and awaken one's true nature. Please note the phrase, "repetition" - I will come back to this in my next blog.

Did you pick up on the word "dynamic" in the previous blog? I like this word a lot. What other words can you think of that include this one? How about spacial dynamics, or bio-dynamics? I am going to try out spacial dynamics for the first time this Sunday after church, courtesy of one of our members, Les Tulloch, who will be presenting a workshop on this at the Living Gold conference, together with a colleague from Argentina.

I like the use of symbols, as they tend to be universally recognized, which is good when you are addressing someone who may not be entirely familiar with your own language. Numbers are also universal symbols. Another member of our church, Felix Scharnberg, introduced the concept of "fractals" to us awhile ago - positively fascinating. The image for this concept could be the spiral. It's a fact that our world could not exist without numbers, - even we as human beings would not exist. Think of the symbol for DNA.

This brings us to the second symbol, the caduceus. It is associated with the god Mercury, and the metal by the same name. In Greco-Roman times, this god stood for trade, commerce, negotiation, an equal exchange, or balance (this is what yin and yang is about as well - balance - it ties in nicely with our Living Gold conference, too). Under the Greek name, Hermes, he stood for initiation, shepherd, numbers, divine messenger, and mediator between the physical and spiritual worlds.

Now I want to give you the last symbol: the feathered serpent of ancient Mexico, Quetzalcoatl. He was the patron god of priesthood, learning, knowledge, and represented the evolution of human consciousness. One of our workshops during the conference will be on the Virgin of Guadalupe, presented by my friend, Stephanie Georgieff.

These are all just tidbits, which I hope will entice you to look into further. My final blog on this subject will be in a few days, around the 4th and last Sunday of Epiphany, where I hope to tie everything neatly together.

Wish me luck! or maybe I should say, Kung Hei Fat Choy!

Sparky

Raising Consciousness

In case you are wondering, Chinese New Year is once again almost upon us. This year will be the Year of the Dragon! Unlike in western mythology, Chinese dragons are considered very lucky. It's a symbol for power, excellence, heroism, perseverance, nobility and divinity. He is energetic, decisive, optimistic, and wise. It is a portent for dynamic energy. He can sometimes be portrayed with wings.

It turns out that there are all different kinds of dragons, and the one for this year in particular is a water dragon. It has been 60 years since the last such creature. Water ameliorates the fiery nature, allowing it to make very considered decisions, taking into account all sides or points of view, to see all the possibilities and potentialities.

There is a new theory out of MIT, based on 10 years' worth of research, called Theory U, by C. Otto Scharmer. The book is still on my "to read" list, but was recommended by a friend in the U.K., Tom Ravetz. There are three basic steps: opening the mind (accessing one's authentic Self and recognizing one's blind spots), opening the heart (jettisoning all your emotional baggage and ideas you are tied to) and opening the will (taking everything up to a higher level, or consciousness). In other words, "leading from the future as it emerges". It is reminiscent of Japanese "circle groups" that were popular in business a couple of decades ago, but with a creative or artistic twist. You don't know what is possible until you knock down the walls and open things up, kind of like the story of Joshua and the city of Jericho.

Now if you had used the term "raising consciousness" 200 years ago, people would have said you were daft. It was only in certain circles that this was acknowledged, primarily amongst the priesthood, in fact going back at least 2500 years, in other words it was more or less a secret. Only since perhaps the 1960's has this concept entered everyday language, and perhaps partly due to the pioneering work of Rudolf Steiner , 100 years ago.

Kundalini yoga in particular, embodied this idea, which arrived in the U.S. in 1969. I want to quote a wonderful definition: Practitioners call Kundalini yoga the yoga of awareness because it focuses primarily on practices that expand sensory awareness and intuition in order to raise individual consciousness and merge it with the Infinite consciousness of God. Its purpose is to cultivate the creative spiritual potential of a human to uphold values, speak truth, and focus on the compassion and consciousness needed to serve and heal others. In its highest form, it is practiced for the purpose of opening the heart center, serving others, attaining self-realization.

How did we jump from Chinese mythology to yoga? How did we get from something that goes back perhaps 4000 years to the present?

That, my friends, is the subject of my next blog, but I will give you a hint: the Dragon is the 5th sign of the Chinese Zodiac, and that is a very interesting number.

Stay tuned!

Sparky

Christmas entryway arch

Sparky had the idea of taking a photo of our front entrance as it was decorated for the twelve days of Christmas so I took my camera on Monday. After the service I had taken a few head on from the stairs by the bus stop, then I went for a short hike through the trails in direction Confederation Park. When I got back I took one more look and decided to try one at a slight angle. This one just looked better plus I got the top of the shrub that almost died on us a few years ago!