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Exploring
the Possibility of Education and Culture Working Together to Instill Values,
Toward the End of Producing Integrated Individuals and Cohesive Communities
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"Well it sure as hell beats working!" has frequently been by
glib response to questions regarding why I am still in school, my wit
serving as an easy way out of conversation that I didn't necessarily want
to have. And it sure does beat working a nine to five at some cult-like
corporation where it is expected that I sublimate my own values to those
passed down by those above me on a hierarchical food chain, but my reasons
for continuing my education have deepened and clarified, particularly
over the past year. This paper serves as a genuine effort to answer questions
of why I am still in school and what I am studying and why I chose to
read the books I read for this examination, and to start to frame those
questions that will surely ensue.
My overarching interest is in how education and culture, two of the main
educative arenas in American culture, can be used as tools to change or,
at least, offset the existing value system in American culture, not necessarily
on some large scale, but in communities, starting with my own, with myself.
I have often been struck by how my emotional, spiritual and intellectual
development have not coincided. I have spent the past year examining spiritual
paths and practices and focusing on concepts of "self" realization
and integration, by which I mean that, aware of the interdependence and
interconnection of all things, one strives to understand the purpose of
one's existence and to become aware of all the desires and projections
that one has constituted as self. In Education and the Significance of
Life, which was by far the text with which I had the most affinity of
thought this summer, and which provoked the most thought in spite of its
shortcomings, J. Krishnamurti writes on the confusing nature of the concept
of self. He writes:
Ignorance
is lack of knowledge of the ways of the self, and this ignorance cannot
be dissipated by superficial activities and reforms; it can be dissipated
only by one's constant awareness of the movements and responses of the
self in all its relationships.
What we must realize is that we are not only conditioned by environment,
but that we are the environment- we are not something apart from it. Our
thoughts and responses are conditioned by the values which society, of
which we are a part, has imposed on us.
We never see that we are the total environment because there are several
entities in us, all revolving around the "me," the self. The
self is made up of these entities, which are merely desires in various
forms. From this conglomeration of desires arises the central figure,
the thinker, the will of the "me" and the "mine";
and a division is thus established between the self and the not-self,
between the "me" and the environment of our society. This separation
is the beginning of conflict, inward and outward.
Awareness of this whole process, both the conscious and the hidden, is
meditation; and through this meditation the self, with its desires and
conflicts, is transcended. Self-knowledge is necessary if one is to be
free of the influences and values that give shelter to the self; and in
this freedom alone is there creation, truth, God, or what you will. (56-7)
I
have trouble defining the self because self awareness or self knowledge
seems to really mean awareness or knowledge of how one has constructed
one's self, of how that self functions in various environments and interactions,
it seems to mean self transcendence or, as is often the case in this Krishnamurti
text, enlightenment. I (perhaps because I have not yet reached enlightenment)
see the self as these desires and projections as Krishnamurti does, as
interconnected with everything as Thich Nhat Hanh explained that the Buddha
did/does in Being Peace, but also as an individual, albeit one who cannot
be divorced or disconnected from the society that produced him or her.
In Demian, Herman Hesse succinctly explains it in the following manner:
Each man's life represents a road toward himself, an attempt at such a
road, the intimation of a path. No man has ever been entirely and completely
himself. Yet each one strives to become that- one in an awkward, the other
in a more intelligent way, each as best he can. Each man carries the vestiges
of his birth- the slime and eggshells of his primeval past- with him to
the end of his days. Some never become human, remaining frog, lizard,
ant. Some are human above the waist, fish below. Each represents a gamble
on the part of nature in creation of the human. We all share the same
origin, our mothers; all of us come in at the same door. But each of us-
experiments of the depths- strives toward his own destiny. We can understand
one another; but each is able to interpret himself to himself alone. (4)
Self,
for me, also has something to do with the idea of individual destiny,
of each person being a gamble on the part of Nature to possibly fulfill
their part in what I might call a Divine plan. It means coming to understand
one's purpose for being alive through, for want of some academic term
or secular euphemism, God.
Krishnamurti's Education and the Significance of Life presents a perspective
on education that asserts that education itself has little to do with
bringing about integrated individuals, that "conventional education
makes independent thinking extremely difficult" (9). He goes so far
as to blame education at least partially for hindering one's development.
He writes:
In seeking comfort, we generally find a quiet corner in life where there
is a minimum of conflict, and then we are afraid to step out of that seclusion.
This fear of life, this fear of struggle and of new experience, kills
in us the spirit of adventure; our whole upbringing and education have
made us afraid to be different from our neighbor, afraid to think contrary
to the established pattern of society, falsely respectful of authority
and tradition… Though there is a higher and wider significance to
life, of what value is our education if we never discover it? We may be
highly educated, but if we are without deep integration of thought and
feeling, our lives are incomplete, contradictory and torn with many fears;
and as long as education does not cultivate an integrated outlook on life,
it has very little significance. (10-11)
My
larger question is why can't education bring about integrated individuals;
my slightly smaller question is why can't my education help me in my quest
to become an integrated individual? I have emphasized in the past how
much of scholarship in general and, at times, scholarship of my own is
a performance rendered in fairly strict accordance with institutional
and individual perceptions and assumptions of what the rules and limits
of "scholarship" are. Fighting this, my work has moved from
the point where personal narrative was at least included in my writing
to pepper it and to serve as a reminder that what was being written was
coming from me to the point where I now, perhaps stubbornly, refuse to
divorce myself, feign objectivity, or even pretend that I can write with
authority about anything other than myself and my ideas.
This insistence on being personal could be construed as narcissism, as
a liability of my scholarship, or as my response, both honest and political,
to scholars of the past and my example to scholars of the present and
future. Or it could serve as a reminder that many of the rules and strictures
only exist if we uphold them for ourselves and others. Krishnamurti says
that "The whole content of life can never be foreseen, it must be
experienced from moment to moment; but we are afraid of the unknown, and
so we establish for ourselves psychological zones of safety in the form
of systems, techniques and beliefs" (19-20). If we acknowledge that
our definition of scholarship has afforded us a safety zone constructed
out of fear and out of our own self projections ("If we don't define
scholarship as x, y, and z, then couldn't almost anything be considered
scholarship?" Well, yes it could, in that case. "And doesn't
that make what I'm doing less prestigious, less special?" Yes, it
does. "Oh…") then stretching the boundaries of scholarship
might mean enlarging the possibility of understanding our own projections,
fears, and desires.
Maybe I should explain at this impasse that I don't have a heck of a lot
to lose, so I don't have a whole lot of fear. Unmarried, with only a dog
as a dependent, a Masters degree already conferred upon me from this University,
myriad talents and interests that I can fall back on (and some of which
I actively want to engage and explore), and, as I found out on Friday,
my fellowship money for this semester already directly deposited in my
bank account, I don't have to try to pretend to be something I'm not or
pursue scholarship to the detriment of my own well-being. I don't want
to bring more highly specialized, inaccessible, esoteric, function-less
knowledge into the world. And thanks to the honesty of the professors
on my committee, among others, I am aware that the dangling carrot of
tenure doesn't bring any more happiness, fulfillment, or peace than any
other part of the process of achieving it. Krishnamurti taught me the
very important lesson that "Freedom is at the beginning, it is not
something to be gained at the end" (114).
My inspiration and instruction for this exam have come from many different
places, ones that do not frequently show up on reading lists for comparative
literature preliminary examinations, but which offer knowledge that I
find valuable to progressing my goal of integrated, experiential, educative
development. This is the path that my intellectual interests has been
leading me to, trying to figure out how I fit in and where ideas like
mine are more common. Books on mindfulness and yoga are intellectual texts
for me because my desire is to be educated on integration of the individual.
The books I read proffered different value systems, different educative
(especially self-educative) processes, and fictional, autobiographical,
and semi-autobiographical chronicles of self-fulfillment. When reading
these books I tried not to look for anything specific, but just to be
open to the experience of reading it. Afterward, I reflected on the beliefs
and living principles that underscored the text. I was interested in pinpointing
what values I might see as lacking in American culture and what alternatives,
supplements, or "inoculations" (as Sandra Lipsitz Bem calls
them in her book An Unconventional Family) I would suggest.
Some of the characteristics that I find negative and problematic in American
culture are the materialism and the narrow view of success that it inspires,
the unmediated and often excessive consumption, the misconception and
misrepresentation of love, the individualism, the unhealthy relationship
to the body, the dichotomous, linear, univocal thinking. Jean Beaudrillard's
America offers a poignant, if romantic, outsider's perception that shows
many of the negative aspects of American culture (I call them "negative"
and "problematic" in American culture because I find them negative
and problematic in myself when they arise, as they sometimes do). I often
find it ironic that many minority scholars struggle to insert themselves
into a structure, an institution, or a dialogue that is predicated on
exclusion, on patriarchy, and on the predominant hegemony; or that they
create equally problematic oppositonal responses. If one truly believes
in equality, how does it make sense to create a binary between "them"
and "us"? Doesn't that perpetuate dichotomous thinking, which,
clinical studies show, may perpetuate hierarchy? Doesn't seeing oneself
as disenfranchised and white males as empowered create that reality, at
least to a certain degree? But, then again, I think it might be easier
to fight for insertion or fight against the "hegemonic white patriarchal
male" and his system than trying to create something completely different,
or at least seem easier.
I see the self-help and new age phenomenon as indicating that a re-education
of sorts has been taking place. Dissatisfied with the meaninglessness,
lovelessness and hopelessness that Cornel West relates to Nihilism in
his book Race Matters, many Americans have sought a restructuring of their
beliefs, values, and practices and have used the Self-Help/New Age genre
to foster this re-education. Self-help/New Age books have frequently become
best-sellers, indicating that there is a spiritual market out there of
people thirsty for a new understanding of themselves, the world, and God.
Of course, I can't set a moral agenda for the nation, but I can suggest
that communities help determine what, how, when and why their children
are taught, so as to reinforce it at home, and I can begin to outline
what beliefs I hold and would hope to have at the foundation of the instruction
of my own children. I am not advocating the enforcement of those values,
merely an awareness of one's own values and mindful attention to whether
or not they are instilled, reinforced, and even questioned through education,
literature, songs, movies, and television, games, discussions, and practices.
I think that anyone who teaches must acknowledge that their own beliefs,
interpretation, values and understanding, as well as those of the institution
which they assume they must uphold, are ingrained in their teaching in
subtle and not-so-subtle ways. And yet most parents seem more concerned
with the credentials of a teacher than with the beliefs which he or she
will thread through the instruction.
I do not see myself as endorsing swapping one fiction for another fiction.
Rather, I believe that certain beliefs, manifested in action/ practice,
help lead to what one might call self-realization or fulfillment. I have
included some of them in the appendix to this paper. They are not religious,
per se, but they are also not secular. They do not promote any one conceptualization
of God, but also do not deny God's existence. They exemplify the mestizaje
that Maria Lugones articulates in "Purity, Impurity and Separation"
by being neither one, nor the other, but kind of both, and at the same
time neither. God is present and also not present in, for example, the
Dalai Lama's assertion of the Buddhist belief that the fundamental nature
of human beings is compassionate, generous, honest and peaceful.
I see religions as offering a variety of possible paths to self-realization
through God, but I am also mistrustful of it in general. I think that
the fear of religious leaders past and present has caused them to assert
that there is only one way, only one path to God (and that God is only
their God) because they doubted the ability of the people to follow faithfully
and believe truly if made aware that there are infinite paths leading
to God. Sure, some may seem swifter, some longer, some surer, but they
are as infinite as the galaxy, as infinite as God himself. One thing I
learned from re-reading The Autobiography of Malcom X and then viewing
Spike Lee's film "X" was that there were many Muslims in the
Nation of Islam, but only one, Malcom X, was a man of God. Many see religion
as an end in of itself and do little to push themselves toward self realization;
they hold on to their projections and desires and, what's more, they do
it in the name of God. Malcom X was a true servant of God and an example
of what happens when religion does work. Gandhi was another. I see them
as being servants of the same God, but on different religious paths, as
we all must be.
One thing I did find remarkable in my reading was that I did not encounter
an example of successful self-realization that did not have some concept
of spirituality and/or an understanding of God at its center. In revisiting
Jamaica Kincaid, Marguerite Duras, and Willa Cather, I noticed the marked
absence of an intimation of spirituality, and I wondered if the repetitive
narrativization of loneliness and emptiness that I found present in all
three authors couldn't be at least partially linked to it. Their voices
ring so false to me, come across as performances of assumed identities,
offer little to me as a reader, though I have read them repeatedly and
with great interest.
Reading quite a few autobiographies over the summer for this examination
heightened my awareness of the importance of sharing the evolution of
one's perspective, of striving to integrate the plural voices that one
so often has not into something smooth, linear and flawless, but into
something choppy, jagged and incomplete. More often than not, I've learned,
my growth and development come from the jags, from exposing them to and
exploring them with others. The personal narrative that is included as
an appendix is based on the idea that showing where I have come from will
elucidate where I am at the present moment and help clarify the possibilities
that the future holds.
What is the goal of education in today's society? Is the goal of education
to establish a universal base of knowledge or logic? What are the values
and beliefs behind our educational system? What type of thinking and lifestyle
does it promote? What doors does it open and what doors does it close?
I don't yet have answers to any of these questions that draw from anything
other than my own experiences because I chose not to focus on these questions
for my exam, although they are still present in my mind. I limited my
research to exploring the values, practices and goals that I would like
to see more of in education, in my life and in the lives of others, some
of which I will explore now and others of which appear in the second appendix
to this text. I am not even sure if I need to know the answers to those
questions. If I am interested in using education to establish a knowledge
of self, of the cultural, political, and religious assumptions inherent
in an individual, thereby rendering them choices rather than assumptions,
then I might want to understand and accept what is before even imagining
what can be. Or, I might assert that what can be is, in me, and worrying
about what is for others is not a productive game-plan. I would be very
interested in where you would suggest that my scholarship go from here,
what questions it should take on, etc.
One of the goals I see as important is instilling meaning. In a song by
The Last Poets, they implore, "Put more meaning into everything you
do. More meaning into loving, eating and living and there will be more
meaning in you, which means everything!" When we have no connection
to the food we eat and the clothing we wear except that we purchased it
with our cash or credit, it is very hard to instill it with meaning. I
see mindfulness as being instrumental in the process of creating meaning.
By "meaning" I mean non-monetary worth and connection. One of
the most powerful experiences that I had with meaning occurred during
my trip to Guinea Bissau, West Africa, where I had what one might call
a Zen experience of food preparation and consumption. I found that knowing
the origin and original form of the foods I prepared heightened my awareness
of what I was eating. The process of preparing, of adding spices, of considering
nutritional value all added meaning to the food itself, which was all
the more delicious because it required such an involved process to prepare
it. Eating became a more mindful experience, instead of merely being blithe
consumption. I have since started sewing my own clothes as well, when
time permits, a process which deepens and strengthens my appreciation
of them, which moves them from the realm of apparel into the realm of
accomplishments, however small. I seek more ways to apply mindfulness
to my daily practices in this quest for meaning, for non-monetary worth
and connection.
Another practice I found beneficial in understanding myself was examining
and questioning the notion of success as it is commonly defined in our
culture. In her book Yoga Mind, Body & Spirit, Donna Farhi examines
success by comparing the notion of success in American culture with that
which is the basis of the practice of yoga and is strengthened and confirmed
through the practice of yoga. "We are taught from an early age that
what we do and what we own are the sole components for measuring whether
we are 'successful.' We measure our success and that of others through
this limited vantage point, judging and dismissing anything that falls
outside these narrow parameters. What yoga teaches us is that who we are
and how we are constitute the ultimate proof of a life lived in freedom"
(Farhi, 7). Examining one's notion of success often helps elucidate the
desires, attachments, and projections that help uphold one's image of
one's self. Farhi explains, "We build self-images and construct concepts
and paradigms that feed our sense of certainty, and then we defend this
edifice by bending every situation to reinforce our certainty" (Farhi,
12).
My own examination of my idea of success has evolved slowly. It still
upholds some of the qualities I dislike in myself (like vanity, or the
desire to feel loved and accepted, for example), but also has forced me
to begin examining those qualities, applying mindfulness to them and,
in my case, prayer and meditation. It is my hope that these practices
will bring about an ability to perceive the invisible signs that Farhi
speaks of:
One of our greatest challenges as Westerners practicing yoga is to learn
to perceive progress through "invisible" signs, signs that are
quite often unacknowledged by the culture at large. Are we moving toward
greater kindness, patience, or tolerance toward others? Are we able to
remain calm and centered even when others around us become agitated and
angry? How we speak, how we treat others, and how we live are more subjective
qualities and attributes we need to learn to recognize in ourselves as
a testament to our own progress and as gauges of authenticity in our potential
teachers. When we remain committed to our most deeply held values we can
begin to discern the difference between the appearance of achievement
and the true experience of transformation, and thereby free ourselves
to pursue those things of real value.(Farhi, 8)
My
goal and my recommendation is gentle, non-violent movement toward peace,
and movement toward others who share similar beliefs and practices. My
choice to discuss at length the self was in no way an effort to downplay
the importance of community. Community plays a very large role in nurturing
successful practices, one which we can hopefully discuss in person and
I can explore further in my scholarship.
I read in more than one book that things had never been worse than they
were then, when the author wrote it. And yet they do get worse, in spite
of all the scholarship trying to change things. They get worse, but they
also get better and, most importantly, they are what they are. Acceptance
of what is without comparison, projection or expectation is the only way
that change is enacted organically. In The Desiderata of Happiness, Max
Ehrmann writes that "whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt
the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore, be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be." I believe that the only way that
one can change oneself, a situation, or the world is to first accept it
as it is, embrace it, and have no intentions toward it. As Ehrmann reminds
us in his poem, "With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world."
Appendix
I: Personal Narrative:
My high school years were fraught with feelings of alienation from my
education. I was consistently left feeling like what I was being taught
was the history, literature, art, and logic of the important people of
the world, and that the important people were not like me. Most often
they were white, most often male, and even the few perspectives offered
by African-Americans (Richard Wright, Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou) or
other non-whites (I can only recall reading Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong
Kingston) only seemed to lament their non-white existence, with the exception
of The Autobiography of Malcom X which opened me up to the possibility
of hostility and resentful antagonism against the predominant (read white,
hegemonic) paradigm. I usually felt excluded from, and yet represented
by those few black voices, feeling that the conflation of race and class
and the use of texts by non-whites as representational insight into the
culture of non-whites left me without a voice of my own.
High school was also a time when, socially, I didn't belong. I was an
honorary member of many cliques, but never really an integral part of
any community. I was frequently accused of talking, thinking or acting
like I was white, an indictment that I could never fully refute because
I wasn't sure what being black was and it seemed to me that others were.
Eventually I gained enough credibility and likeability to be an honorary
member of the black clique as well. Besides dance classes, I spent most
of my time after school watching situation comedies on television by myself
until my mother got home from work. I lived a very sheltered life, but
still had fruitless crushes and a few close friends from jazz chorus.
I read a lot of teenage romance novels and fell in love with romantic
love, something I had never seen in my one parent home. I got my first
kiss at sixteen, my second at seventeen, which was quickly followed by
a sexual experience in which I felt that I had no choice, one where I
was left questioning if I could consider it rape if I said "no"
and "I don't think we should" only a few times and without much
authority and then froze up until it was over. My boyfriend assured me
that it wasn't; so we stayed together for almost a year.
All the while I was pursuing God on my own by starting to regularly attend
church with a friend of the family. I knew that my relationship to God
could include more than saying grace before meals and prayers before bed,
but that was all the religious instruction I received at home. The rest
I was forced to pursue on my own. Though I was christened as a baby, my
baptism at 18 marked my conscious assertion of my belief in God- whoever
or whatever God was.
The very much unwanted burden of sexuality, coupled with my recent blossoming
into attractiveness and mild popularity and a burgeoning spirituality,
and no way of making sense of it all left me a variety of "selves"
which I performed contingent upon the situation. I could play the good
daughter, the dedicated student, the flirty pretty girl, the sexual girlfriend,
but in reality I was none of these things. I had no integrated self, no
true voice, and lacked even the language to explain what was occurring
in me.
When I left for college, it was not to embark on a quest for my own voice,
but rather to study economics and Japanese. Marketable knowledge from
a prestigious institution, I hoped, would pave my way to some sort of
well paying job, maybe even a really well paying job. I got a C+ in first
year Japanese and never ended up taking an economics course, but the biggest
slap in the face came from realizing that there was a lot more out there
than I realized, a lot more ways of thinking about things and a lot more
possibilities than I had ever been offered previously. I was dumbfounded
by the idea that language encodes our perception, that our beliefs are
actually choices that we make, that the voices of people of the African
Diaspora were many and came in different languages. I studied English,
Black Studies, Francophone Studies, and began to understand what it was
I was looking for. I wanted to figure out what I believed- not what my
parents had taught me, what my education had enforced, or what I had learned
from television and movies. I had no idea.
I spent my college years experimenting with ways to be, not very aware
of the beliefs that must have produced my actions. I played rugby, I enjoyed
the popularity that being considered one of the "hot chicks"
on campus afforded me, I fooled around a lot and slept around a little,
I sang as a soloist in various groups, I got my first hangover, tried
my first drug, smoked my first cigarette. I also had my first very real
experiences of God (other than this one time when I was made very firmly
aware that I could help more people in the world by not becoming a doctor)
while singing with the gospel choir. I never found a church home in college,
but my experiences in the gospel choir confirmed and strengthened my belief
in God. I was ambivalently embraced by the black community of Amherst,
only to reject them myself in the end because I felt their concept of
blackness limiting. I struggled off and on with an eating disorder, with
feelings of loneliness, of being out of control, of being inferior, of
being at Amherst only to give the paying white customers a feeling of
diversity, a splash of color.
Without really knowing or noticing it, I began to divorce myself from
the larger Amherst community, favoring the small co-op community where
the closest things to hippies at Amherst College frequently resided. I
didn't like the sport-dominated dining hall culture at Amherst, where
who one ate with was a very political decision. I also didn't like having
so many unhealthy eating options available to me, a bulimic, and wanted
to start to set some healthy boundaries with food. I developed some strong
bonds in the co-op, became a little healthier, a little happier, and a
little more aware.
After two years of floundering with every issue and idea I ever had, I
came to school here at the University of Michigan. 'Cuz it sure as hell
beat working. I chose comparative literature because I spoke English,
French, some Spanish, and very little Italian, and I knew that people
in Comparative Literature spoke a lot of languages. That was all I knew
and, really, all I needed to know because working at some job with some
boss who wanted me to care, or at least pretend to care, about helping
other people make more money called for a lot more than I was ever willing
to give.
I felt like the dark horse of my cohort because I came with no funding
(though I did receive full funding upon asking Vicky. As Fate would have
it, an incoming student could not get her US visa and the department was
able to offer me her fellowship). I felt completely different from everyone
here (a feeing confirmed by my perusal of their rationales for their genre
exams) and feel like I went from dark horse to black sheep. I thought
that graduate school would encourage me to think for myself, yet there
I sat in class after class that legitimated the thinking of the important
people of the world, and reinforced that the important people were not
like me. My experiences fueled insecurity, fear of inadequacy, emotions
which encouraged conformity. Yet even when I tried to conform I felt inadequate!
In the end, what put it all in perspective was falling in love. Twice.
Okay, so maybe one doesn't fall in love, break up, then fall in love with
someone else 2-3 months later, but I never claimed I had it all together,
did I? But the love made me put less of my eggs in the school basket,
and helped heal the feelings of isolation and aloneness that I thought
I would have here in Ann Arbor forever. Last year I began to feel like
I had established some communities. I started a band, joined a church,
established bonds that I had never had before in life, including tentative
ones with my peers in the department. I renewed my own faith in God, but
have determined that many of my beliefs and practices come from Buddhist
teachings and that that does not make me any less of a Christian. I have
started practicing mindful food preparation and healthful eating, am trying
to get my finances in order, and feel happier now, overall, than ever
before.
At this time I feel called to go to New York in order to pursue my scholarship
and integrate it with my other great interest, music. I would like to
experiment with how I can use music to bring about positive change. I
also plan to work on my relationship with my mother and my grandmother,
continue and deepen my practices, and adopt a new one- celibacy. I have
wondered why I would uproot at the very moment when I have started to
experience some peace in my life, but I consider it God's decision more
than my own.
Eventually I would like to start a commune/community and teach college.
For a long time, I realize, my goals and desires have been based around
creating an ideal environment for raising children. One of the reasons
that I am in graduate school is because I, perhaps naively, thought that
a professor's life was one that was fairly amenable to child rearing (summers
free, nice community). And being in graduate school has only made me think
more about the type of world I would like my children to live in and what
I can do as an individual to make that possible.
The community that I would like to develop or join will be interested
in working to produce goods to fulfill our needs rather than working to
earn money to buy things to fulfill our needs. One of the things I hope
this will do is restore meaning. By making thinks- clothes, food, etc.-
we would hope to have a deeper understanding of those things by re-establishing
a connection with the process involved in their creation. We would have
an educational "system" led by the individual and guided by
the parent/ instructor. A child would learn about things as he or she
discovered them or developed an interest in them. Education would be non-linear,
more concept based, with certain values at its core. What values? Things
like respect for themselves, for others, for nature, for the ideas of
others, for some sort of higher power, like a desire to make their life's
work be something geared toward bringing about positive change in the
world, like a life conducted around, based on, and geared toward creating
and spreading peace.
Appendix
II: Beliefs and Practices
The Four Agreements
1. Be impeccable in your speech.
2. Don't take anything personally.
3. Don't make assumptions.
4. Always do your best.
(From The Four Agreements by Dom Miguel Ruiz)
The
10 Living Principles of Yoga
Yamas- Wise Characteristics
1. Ahimsa- Compassion for all living things
2. Satya-Commitment to truth
3. Asteya- Not stealing
4. Brahmcharya- Merging with the One
5. Aparigraha- Not grasping
Niyamas-
Codes for living soulfully
6. Shaucha- Purity
7. Santosha-Contentment
8. Tapas- Burning enthusiasm
9. Swadhyaya- Self study
10. Ishvarapranidhana- Celebration of the spiritual
The Eight Limbed Path (Ashtanga) of Yoga
1. Yamas and
2. Niyamas- 10 ethical precepts
3. Asanas- Dynamic internal dances in the form of postures
4. Pranayama- Breathing practices
5. Pratyahara- Drawing one's attention toward silence rather than things
6. Dharana- Focusing attention and cultivating inner perceptual awareness
7. Dhyana- Sustaining awareness under all conditions
8. Samadhi- Return of the mind into original silence
(From Yoga Mind, Body & Spirit by Donna Farhi)
The
Five Mindfulness Trainings
1. Aware of the suffering caused by the destruction of life, I am committed
to cultivating compassion and learning ways to protect the lives or people,
animals, plants, and minerals. I am determined not to kill, not to let
others kill, and not to support any act of killing in the world, in my
thinking, and in my way of life.
2. Aware of the suffering caused by exploitation, I am committed to cultivating
compassion and learning ways to work for the well-being of people, animals,
plants, and minerals. I will practice generosity by sharing my time, energy,
and material resources with those who are in real need. I am determined
not to steal and not to possess anything that should belong to others.
I will respect the property of others, but I will prevent others from
profiting from human suffering or the suffering of other species on Earth.
3. Aware of the suffering caused by sexual misconduct, I am committed
to cultivating compassion and learning ways to protect the safety and
integrity of individuals, couples, families and society. I am determined
not to engage in sexual relations without love and a long-term commitment.
To preserve the happiness of myself and others, I am determined to respect
my commitments and the commitments of others. I will do everything in
my power to protect children from sexual abuse and to prevent couples
and families from being broken by sexual misconduct.
4. Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful speech and the inability
to listen to others, I am committed to cultivating compassion and deep
listening in order to bring joy and happiness to others and relieve others
of their suffering. Knowing that words can create happiness or suffering,
I am determined to speak truthfully, with words that inspire self-confidence,
joy and hope. I will not spread news that I do not know to be certain
and will not criticize or condemn things of which I am not sure. I will
refrain from uttering words that can cause division or discord, or that
can cause the family or community to break. I am determined to make all
efforts to reconcile and resolve all conflicts, however small.
5. Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful consumption, I am committed
to cultivating good health, both physical and mental, for myself, my family,
and my society by practicing mindful eating, drinking, and consuming.
I will ingest only items that preserve peace, well-being, and joy in my
body, in my consciousness, and in the collective body and consciousness
of my family and society. I am determined not to use alcohol or any other
intoxicant or to ingest food or other items that contain toxins, such
as certain TV programs, magazines, books, films, and conversations. I
am aware that to damage my body or my consciousness with these poisons
is to betray my ancestors, my parents, my society, and future generations.
I will work to transform violence, fear, anger, and confusion in myself
and in society by practicing a diet for myself and for society. I understand
that a proper diet is crucial for self-transformation and for the transformation
of society.
(From For a Future to be Possible by Thich Nhat Hanh)
On
Children
Your children are not your children,
They are the sons and the daughters of life longing for itself
They come through you, but they are not from you,
And though they are with you, they belong not to you.
You can give them your love but not your thoughts.
They have their own thoughts.
You can house their bodies but not their souls
For their souls dwell in a place of tomorrow
Which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You can strive to be like them, but you cannot make them like you.
(From The Prophet, by Kahlil Gibran)
Desiderata
Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may
be in silence.
As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull
and ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere, life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
it is perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrender the things
of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue
and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding
as it should.
Therefore, be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace with your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful
world.
Be careful.
Strive to be happy.
(From The Desiderata of Happiness by Max Ehrmann)
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