From Living the New Story – Series 4

First intention exercise

I intend to bond with this group as a powerful force for good in a world seeking focus and direction.

Questions for ongoing reflection and dialogue

1. What drew you to the journey at this stage in your life? And what is the intention you have set for yourself?

I participated in the first 3 series and have been inspired by the entire journey. I want to continue the deepening process.

I intend to bond with this group as a powerful force for good in a world seeking focus and direction.

2. What is your experience of the New Story so far? What thread of the New Story are you carrying?

My experience of the new story includes my roles as a rock drummer in the Haight Ashbury during the ‘summer of love’, as a founding member of the largest communal farm in the US, 28 years as a student and resident at the Zen Center of Los Angeles, and as a participant in Series 1-3 of Living the New Story.

After an online course about Joanna Macy’s book Active Hope my koan became “What is the shift of consciousness needed to reverse the multiple interrelated planetary eco catastrophes of our time?” Ever since then that is the thread I have been carrying, a thread of inquiry both personal and collective.

3. Where are you currently on your mystical journey of Self discovery? How would you characterise your spiritual path at present?

In 2007, about a year before my progressive neuromuscular condition appeared, I wrote a page called “Redefine the Object of My Quest”.  It is still a good description of my spiritual path.

The first sentence, in bold print, was

Keep developing the clarity of mind and openness of heart needed to help co-create an Earth Community based on wisdom, compassion, and the oneness of life.

The first three points were:

1. Allow the flow of energy to empty this vessel so it can contain everything.

2. Moment by moment move in the dance of life so as to most effectively benefit the evolving global awakening.

3. Develop and deepen the kindness and understanding with my wife and life partner, extend those qualities to family, neighbors, and colleagues, and further extend them to larger social groups and issues.

My life is still unfolding as an expression of these intentions.

 4. What are the spiritual practices and resources that connect, support, nourish and inspire you?

Morning and evening vows

Mantra Crystals that I use when needed in the flow of daily activity

Reflecting on my life by working on Empty Poetry

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 5. Where do you see personal myth operating in your life? Where do you see cultural mythology operating in the world around you?

When I feel lost I tap back in to my Bodhisattva vow. This gives me access to a storehouse of archetypal myths. I apply that to what’s happening with me at the moment. I semi-consciously decided, sixty years ago, that I wanted to develop my own  personal myth in this way when I first read about the Bodhisattva in Alan Watts’ The Way of Zen.

Most of my caregivers are from one agency. They dare all Filipino. Many are sending money to families they have left behind in the Philippines. This is a cultural stereotype. I am surrounded by this cultural myth all day every day.

 6. What is your relationship to the term ‘magic’?

The word ‘magic’ was used a lot in my home when I was very young. But not the magic we are  talking about in this course. My father was a very enthusiastic amateur magician and sleight of hand artist. The phrase that was used most often was “It’s fun to be fooled, but it’s more fun to know”. This early experience gave me a deeply ingrained skepticism about any kind of magic.

Recently I have been studying Jean Gebser’s The Ever Present Origin. His version of the evolution of consciousness has these “structures”: Archaic, Magic, Mythical, Mental, and Integral, each one superseding the previous. I am opening to the possibility of an Integrated consciousness  in which all these elements are fully present.

 7. What does the term ‘miracle-mindedness’ mean to you and what is its source? What direct experiences do you have of miracles having taken place in your own life?

8. What is the difference between ‘magic’ and ‘miracles’ to you at this early point in the journey?