Divine Kingship in the Quester
Presented on: Thursday, March 26, 1981
Presented by: Roger Weir
The King and the Queen in the Quest
Presentation 12 of 12
Divine Kingship in the Quester
Presented by Roger Weir
Thursday, March 26, 1981
Transcript:
I wanted to divide tonight into three portions. three separate portions. So, I'll try to present a summation for those that can bare. And then we'll have a short break. And then well have some images. And then we'll have another short break. And I think that we'll go down to the library for some quiet chat about things because it should phase out that way. And in the next series I'll come back and **inaudible word** the whole carnival of images again and somehow come back to it.
It's very difficult to **inaudible word**. And those of you who are here have survived innumerable temptations not just walking by the **inaudible word or two** kiosk. And if attended **inaudible few words**. But you survived **inaudible word** so far and that's the trigger **inaudible several words**.
We have, we have an interesting series I have developed. And as you can tell I did it at first, and I have done so at the beginning of every lecture series. That if they discourage me to **inaudible word** from me, if I to urge you towards a depth of information points of data that you could file away that you could follow with supposed **inaudible word** of the mind and feel satisfied that you know something. That sort of knowing and that sort of knowledge is but an exercise for a portion of the mind. And not to be relied upon for the growth of the character much less the **inaudible word** of the spirit. And so, I purposely try to shy away from any kind of presentations of material that would **inaudible word or two** leave you to consider that at last that here is the information, the truth to process just as it should be. We are habituated to, to seeking for this and we are most encouraged for ourselves when we have to recognize shadows on the wall and you think of course that those of us that can quickly recognize the most shadows must be smarter, the happier and most prosperous and dynamic. And I guess you know the vocabulary of that sort of thing. It is not so. It is not so at all.
One simple symbol that have occurred throughout the series has been the infinity sign. And I think that you're familiar now with the, this pattern. that set inside the parenthetical field of experience this motion yields an increasing acquaintance and orientation with oneself. With oneself not so much as a center but with oneself as a moving process of perception and conception. And that as long as the field of inquiry keeps growing and expanding, enriching itself and this process is kept in motion, so that the Hermetic chain of development, rather like the strands of DNA in our genetic makeup, the process of enlightenment proceeds. It's just as if this double helix form moving through a non-polarized, non-analogized spatial-temporality. Using lots of big words here. As long as this happens continuously, we move toward what is always been considered salvation or enlightenment for emancipation. the tendency all along is to stop training the process. To make a map or a picture or a conception of where you've got to, who you are, where you've been, and where you're going. And as soon as we do that, where we are **inaudible word** and like a sport in major we shoot off at incredible speed. And we think that we're at last developing and two or three years later we find ourselves completely worn out. **inaudible word or two** do it again and we wonder what happened. This kind of objectifying part of the phenomenon that we are is a great disservice. And to encourage someone to do this of course is just the mark of ignorance.
There are things, volumes written just before the second world war in Germany, which epitomizes the they stop frame reference position that's the German psyche had come to by about 1938. It is an excellent book in many, many respects. But there are flaws in the book. and it was translated by kind of an interesting individual. My wife edited one of his books one time and I had any conversations with the man. And I found him to be extraordinarily European in his outlook. And that he has many, many frames of learning but he had no sense of life whatsoever. The book is entitled The Discovery of the Mind. And the author is Bruno Snell. A very famous classist, German classist. And he has a series of chapters. The first one of course, is Homer's View of Man. And there's a **inaudible word** in which I've reproduced on the board. In Homer's View of Man goes on page seven and he contrasts a drawing of a human being, 20th century child with a painting of a Greek face. And there's a difference. A **inaudible word** difference. This drawing has a center in the body of the figure. And the old Greek word **inaudible word**can be applied to this. That is the body occurs as the collective identifying objective shape. An outline. So that one quickly let's say draws a body. One puts a body and a head and appendages. Finish this lumping together and making an objective static form, which then is inclusive, and it is lifted very easily by a play of the mind in that **inaudible word** is the quickest way to become totally disillusioned about the process of thinking. This yields a dead end in the **inaudible word** of classical Greece every other time instead of **inaudible word or two**.
On the other hand, this figure is characterized by mobility. And Homer never conceived of the person at a body but rather a collection of limbs and mobility and processes. And the mind for Homer is not a static conception either. There are many elements sort of loosely aggregated together that cooperate and make human beings but are quite separate and distinct.
How does Snell in this sort of objected mind look at this? He writes this, towards the end of the **inaudible word or two**,
But since they must be that meaningful at one time or another it has been suggested that among the so-called primitive people that came or the priest, is often regarded as a possessive of a special magic force which elevates him high above the rest of his fellow tribesmen. And that the formulas which we have cited originally described as leaders as an invested with such a form.
This is a great suggestion. We would of course be mistaken to look for a belief of this sort in our Homeric poem. So says Snell.
The very fact that the formulas have become hardened. That metrical patterns now determines their use. Prevents us from exploiting them towards a magic interpretation of the **inaudible word or two**. The Iliad and The Odyssey have a great deal to say about **inaudible word**. there is not a scrap of evidence to suggest that there's anything mystic about them.
Hold that in suspension and we'll come back to that.
All in all, magic and witchcraft have left few traces in the poems except for some rather atrophied **inaudible word**. Homeric man has not yet awakened to the fact that he possesses in his own soul the sources of his power. But neither does he **inaudible word** these sources to his person by means of magical practices. he received them as a natural and fitting donation from the Gods. No doubt in the days before Homer magic and sorcery held the field. And even Homer's view of the human soul has its roots in such a magical practice. For it is only to obvious that the psychic organs, such as the Neuse and the **inaudible word**, incapable as they are of spontaneous thoughts or actions, are at the mercy of wizardry. And that meant to interpret their own mental processes a lot of these minds consider themselves a battleground of arbitrary forces and uncanny power.
Now this kind of writing **inaudible word** makes a split. And creates the impression that if we are dealing, as we have been throughout this lecture series, if we are dealing with **inaudible word** a focus of forces much like Homer consider man. That this is susceptible to a criticism that this view is arbitrary and ambiguous at best. But underneath it all is associated with magic and a corollary with witchcraft. And that this view is quote primitive and naive end quote. Therefore, this is a more sophisticated view, displacing this view. And leaving us to suppose that we have advanced by replacing the mobility and the multi-dimensional ambiguity of Homeric men with a central objective unified view of the person. Well this leads directly toward the kind of quandary that Plato exemplified in his **inaudible word or two** dialogues. And for that **inaudible few words**
Because depending on the view of man that one accepts tentatively as sort of a template for conception about one's own self one's, own nature and the possibility of someone else's maturity and nature. Depending on which of these
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one keeps in mind all other things follow as we have seen in this series. Including shades of political life. This view leads to a totalitarian state with an inevitable **inaudible word**. And it is exemplified in Plato. But the same outlook here leads to a democratic kind of a state and is also exemplified in Plato. And curiously at the very **inaudible word** of Western rationality the bifurcation has gone unnoticed and is left ambiguous. And with the past gone, tied up a beautiful ribbon and **inaudible word** the Academy is going **inaudible word**, Speusippus **inaudible word** Plato's nephew. never **inaudible few words** criticism again sort of path into our background, into our history, something accomplished with ambiguity attached.
What about Plato? **inaudible few words** great chain of being. He writes, the most fundamental of the group of ideas of which we are to review the history appeared first in Plato. And nearly all that follows might therefore serve as an illustration of a celebrated remark of professor Whiteheads," that's Alfred North Whitehead who wrote Process and Reality **inaudible word**. Whitehead observed that the biggest general characterization of the European philosophic tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.
But there are two conflicting major strains in Plato and in the Platonic tradition with respect to the deepest and farthest reaching **inaudible word** separating philosophical or religious systems. he stood on both sides. And his influence upon a later generation worked in both directions. The cleavage to which I refer is that between what I shall call other worldliness and this worldliness.
Other worldliness and this worldliness.
"By other worldliness I do not mean a belief in and a preoccupation of the mind with the future life." Not talking about reward after death or reincarnation or anything like that. He's talking about a transcendental realm above or beyond that realm which we find ourselves and apparently **inaudible few words**. This is the witchcraft. This is the magic. This is the infusing **inaudible word** by which this view of man is aggressively displaced by this view of man whenever the mind comes into play with its tendency to stop the process of the great chain of being. And the process of inquiry into an ever-enriching field of inquiry. And one seeks to get a determination. Where am I? Who am I? Where have I been? Where am I going? At the time we have all those expectations or the coordinates you have reduced down and abstracted out from living time into a psychological photograph of an idea of time. And instead of participating in reality one participates in illusion.
But of course, we are in fact, in actual fact, constantly in living time. We are constantly real. And so, the sun rises, and the clouds go by and the grass grows but we do not participate in that living process. And more and more as this picture or its projection into larger or more effective structures seems to displace this to literally reorganize the natural realm in terms of its own schema of orientation. We have an increasing displacement of reality by illusion. And of course, as we have seen in our time that can go to extraordinary lengths now.
The old mythological designation of this was that when this had happened you had the phenomena of the wasteland. And there must be then someone to restore the wounded king to help. So that that in leaves **inaudible word or two** the natural realm. Stop this displacement. Stop this whole process. And return it back to the flow of living times.
So, the question is, is Homer **inaudible word**? Or is this viewpoint one of quote magic. Well with several hundred years, following a book by another German professor named Volk. written about the time Mozart was writing ones of his symphonies. He describes the fact that there couldn't possibly be a Homer because one person couldn't possibly have done all this himself. And so that the displacement process was even applied to the genesis of the works themselves and for several hundred years **inaudible few words**...Homer **inaudible few words**. And so, who chose the committee etc. etc. etc. **inaudible word or two** until in our time certain individuals came to for and discovered that the **inaudible word** process of Homer is quite distinctive different from what the academic assessment of what Homer is. And one of the first people to do this incidentally was **inaudible word or two/name**. In his own translation **inaudible word**. And when one reads that, it is a **inaudible word** translation of the **inaudible word** Greek. But it's an extraordinary portrayal of Homeric man, mobile again in the flow of the great chain of being. And one should read it out loud.
And swiftly following that **inaudible word** individual, I guess the most accessible to us is W.H.D. Rouse. In this little **inaudible word** translation of The Iliad and The Odyssey. Rouse incidentally was the **inaudible word or two**.
I have a study of Homer here called The Homeric Imagination. A study of Homer's poetic **inaudible word** perception of reality. It was published about ten years ago by Indiana University Press. And the writer is an Italian seaman. He used to sail. He used to be out in the sun and the wind all his life. And so, when it comes to applying his classical expertise to Homer it suddenly opens up. But understands what is being given here. The same thing as **inaudible word or two/possibly a name**. And just a paragraph from him and then we'll go to Homer himself.
This is chapter three on The Representation of Nature and Reality in Homer.
The representations of nature in Homer follows the same lines as that of **inaudible word** action. As he discarded or transformed historical or traditional data in the portrayal of an essential drama, so he ignored any or local predetermined landscape in pictures and places in which that drama was enacted.
He discarded or transformed traditional data into the portrayal of essential drama.
That is Homer **inaudible word** was extraordinarily sophisticated and came at the end of a very sophisticated civilization. And instead of going into this kind of the process of striking out he was taking images that had already been frozen into similes and **inaudible word** and so forth. And reintegrated them back into a narrative that reintroduces them into the flow of life.
The very same thing could be said for the I-Ching in China. That book took the old frozen divination statements and similes. Like the superior man, perseverance and suspended emblems and so forth. The I-Ching **inaudible word** book reverses this process and brought back into play the old magic that had made man a king of the natural order. And each time that a people or a civilization has rediscovered this process they have in fact flourished. And come back into life. Come back into time. Come back into nature. Live again and create again.
This transforming possibility of course centers around a central experience. I guess the name that psychologists by now **inaudible few words**, the mystic marriage together of a man and woman. But on this level, the coming together of a king and queen. The reuniting of them. And this is how Homer portrays it. And this is the place in which the lecture series The King and the Queen in the Quest sort of begins to tie a bow or a knot. It can go either way.
This is how Homer describes it. This is the Richmond **inaudible word** translation and if I had **inaudible word or two**
Circumspect Penelope said to him, **inaudible word** you shall have you're going to bed whenever the spirit desires it. Now that the Gods have brought about your homecoming to your own strong founded house. And to the land of your fathers. And since the Gods put this into your mind and you understand it tell me what this trail is since I think I shall hear of it later. So, it will be none the worse if I hear of it now. Then in turn resourceful Odysseus turned to her and answered, you are **inaudible word** strange. Why do you urge me on and tell me the speak of this. Yet I will tell, concealing nothing. Your heart have no joy in this. And I myself am not happy since he told me to go among many cities of men taking my well-shaped ore in my hands and bare it until I come where there are men living who know nothing of the sea. Do we prove that it's not mixed with salt. Who never have known ships. Whose Chiefs are painted purple. Never have known well shaped oars. And act for ships as wings do. And then told me a very clear truth **inaudible word or two**. When as I walked some other wayfarer happens to meet me. It says I carry a **inaudible word** on my back on my right shoulder then I must plant my well-shaped oar round and render ceremonious sacrifice for Poseidon. One ram, one bull and **inaudible few words**. And take my way home again. And render holy hexatones to the immortal God who whole holds the wise **inaudible word** all of them in order. Death will come to me from the sea in some all-together unwarlike way. they will end me in the **inaudible word** time of a sleep old age. My people about me will **inaudible word**. All this he told me would be in confidence. Circumspect Penelope said to him in answer, if the Gods are accomplishing a more prosperous old age then there is hope that you shall have escaped from your troubles. Now as these two were conversing with each other, meanwhile the nurse and **inaudible word** were making the bed up with soft coverings under the light of their flaring torches. That **inaudible word** work and presently having bed made. When you're known as mistress of the chamber and guided them on the way to the bed. And her hands held torch for them. When she could drop them to the chamber she went back. They then gladly want to get together in their old ritual.
One can hear and experienced such a meaning and such a focus of forces. And on one hand hear a children's story. And on the other hand, hear the mystery of mysteries. It depends on our own participation because it is us who make that alchemical work. it is our processing, our participation, our adding our own to that focus. In this case with Homer, with the translator. which takes out all the old objective habitual images which is kept frozen and hindering ourselves in our mind, in our day resolves them, re-enters them into a process, precipitates out again a new form. Nothing which will be in slides.
Now this of course means many things. Paramount among them is the abmission that we began the lecture series with. And that is that there is a watershed and way of telling whether what is in the right process or not. and that is the simple little **inaudible word**. Are you participating in aspiration? Or are you participating in authority? Authority seeks to extent control. And to refer to an easy reducible, measurable quantification, an aspiration with its complement inspiration is constantly in the motion of giving out and bringing back. These of course, are true magical watersheds because one can live an entire life and accidentally use them from time to time and never know. It takes the spark literally of divinity to know what one is participating in as it happens in the **inaudible word**. And that of course is the great watershed. It's on one side, those who forever dull, never become golden. And those on the other side who's scintillating the very essence of the jewels of the world.
Joseph Campbell in the fourth volume of his Masks of God: Creative Mythology has a statement right at the beginning, when he in the very first chapter is writing about experience and authority. And he writes this. And we'll close and have a short break and we'll come back to further process. He writes this,
The rise and fall of civilizations in the long broad course of history can be seen to have been largely a function of the integrity and **inaudible word** of the supporting **inaudible word** of men. We're not before **inaudible word** but aspiration is the motivator, builder and transformer of civilizations. A mythological cannon is an organization of symbols **inaudible word** in import by which the energies of aspiration are evoked and gathered toward a focus. The message leaps from heart to heart by weight of the brain. And where the brain is unpersuaded the message cannot pass. The light that has untouched. For those of a local mythology still works there is an experience both in accord of the social order and their harmony with the universe.
And of course, the point of the whole book is not to reduce it to a point.
Let's take a break and then we'll come back to some visual images.
**inaudible background chatter and movements for approximately 2 minutes **
Who would like Plato's **inaudible word** dialogues? Anybody? Free. Who would like it?
**inaudible background chatter/movements for another minute or two**
**inaudible few words** by Lovejoy **inaudible word**. I don't think it is. I really just don't thing it is. He was a very feisty...**inaudible background chatter**...little scrawny scholar with a mustachio and gold teeth. Yeah. Yeah.
**inaudible background chatter and movement for a few minutes**
This is a **inaudible word** fresco from San Antonio **inaudible word**. And just to show you the detail, not for its content but for the technique. **inaudible word** that is creating by color and volume. Form and shape. Without relying extensively on the use of line, delineation or form. And this is what is happening quite often in a so called magical **inaudible word**. Homeric or if you wish those forces that believe that **inaudible few words**
that there's a just position, which at first in small one that looks **inaudible word or two** shoulder. And see that it's an aggravating, in this case, brush strokes of the various shades of green. And as one moves back it continues that process there are **inaudible word or two** desired shape or form. **inaudible word or two**. And quite often this shading....
END OF PART ONE
That there's a just position which at first in small, this one looks like a shoulder. One can see that it is an aggravating of, in this case brush strokes of various shades of green. And as one moves back it continues that process there are **inaudible word or two** the desired shape or form.
Again more **inaudible word **. And quite often this shading is not just the simple effect as we saw in the Goya or as we can see in a Rembrandt. Or we could use any example. But in addition to that there a transforming effect that's happening at same time. That is to say as we move through the world of time and space just like **inaudible word**. As the psyche and time-space create a realm for us, we may see it as the Goya Curioita and the Graves transformative technique at the same time. Both effects are happening. And so, we begin to have what is term traditionally as symbolic vision. That is as we see almost any one mundane event or process becomes capable of being transformed and seen as a part of some larger pattern. So that when we talk about say a challis of light, or a bird a baby bird like shape that has a galaxy in its body, which at the same time is like a universal egg. Which at the same time is giving birth to this darkened form with its **inaudible word** of light within a greater darkness. And just as we utter the most mundane descriptions of the symbolic vision is metaphorically and extending **inaudible word** the very simple process of seeing and doing into something which if it were being taken objectively would be called creating belief. But in fact, is simply re-organizing into living time by **inaudible word** and by transformation images of the world.
Again, Morris Graves Blind **inaudible word**. And again all **inaudible word** still
operating and applying.
This of course selected because it is graphically portrayed in terms of content as well as in terms of artistic technique. Exactly what has been discussed. You see the reverberation. You see the transforming. This **inaudible word or two**.
Marc Chagall **inaudible few words** so that then forms begin to emerge out of a primordial focus, which occurs again and again. Yes, we've seen red. Yes, we've seen yellow. Yes, we've seen green. We've seen the **inaudible word**.
Here's **inaudible few words** version of it. And once we've acquainted ourselves with a, the primordial image base off nature as such and **inaudible word** ourselves of the transforming capacities of our psyche. And brought them into play. And have suffered through that pitfall of having reduced them down again. We made them reality back into living time again and again and again.
And what do we create? We create a universe. The world. Magical? Yes.
That's what Chagall is doing here. **inaudible word or two**
There are people flying without wings in **inaudible word or two** yes, they do.
Chagall again.
For those you have been coming you're familiar with Chagall and **inaudible word** world here. You are familiar with **inaudible word**. This is a recapitulation. Little **inaudible few words** in her eye. This time **inaudible word** of Chagall.
And this is **inaudible word or two** from Chagall again. **inaudible few words** it's always real? Yes, it's real.
This is the sketch for the window of **inaudible few words** again by Chagall. Here's the sketch of it. You can see the process unfolding. The aggregating of primary colors. **inaudible few words** and just as grand as **inaudible word**. And if you put that in 12 feet high, put some sunlight behind it. Put somebody who can see that and enjoy that in front of it and you've got a world.
Monet. **inaudible word or two** Is it an impression? Yes. **inaudible few words** Yes. Is it really like that building? And it has transformed that building in **inaudible word**. we can say well it doesn't really look like **inaudible word**. Well we can be even more objective that that if you want to **inaudible word**. These are just light rays out of a machine **inaudible few words** on that wall. You see you can **inaudible word** as far as absurdism in that way.
The other way yields the magic of the universe. And restores man to his living **inaudible word**. Creates the realm in which there really are kings and queens, kingdoms and palaces.
**inaudible word or two**
So that the symbolic vision begins to literally transform. using color. Using shape. Using relation. Using **inaudible word**.
And a lot of **inaudible word*. Yeah.
Is this real? Yes. Did it really happen? it is really happening now.
You see once one has stopped reducing the world to the absurdity of frozen objectivity seeking in orientation, a return to the style and shaping it all comes **inaudible word**.
This is Max Ernst first painting **inaudible few words**. Notice the, the intuitive shaping of
the Sun. The circular goldenness above the spray of **inaudible word** colors. You will see this again and again in the next few slides.
Here is Ernst as a jaded man during World War II. And yet working among the surrealistic shadowy forms of light the almost obscene degradation of natural forms. And still somehow circular life. He didn't **inaudible few words**.
Here's Ernst again. About 1954 here. I think he was in; I think he'd come to Arizona. Flew down to Arizona. Here again. differentiation in forms. the circular light almost egg shaped in the background.
And take this one few years later.
**inaudible word** is back. And then...I see what's happening. My slide projector is **inaudible word or two**.
When the Siren's awake and **inaudible word** to sleep. A title **inaudible word or two** and you can see again what continuity. This was painted about 1959. Fifty years after the first one in this series. Look at the continuity in certain respects. Look at the **inaudible word** in terms of the magical world. **inaudible few words**
What's his name again?
Max Ernst.
Oh Ernst.
He moved to where did you say?
He moved to Sedona Arizona.
And the last in the whole series of paintings in here. this one's called the two **inaudible word or two**. One of the most remarkable paintings of our time. I once had this transferred to a poster size photo and had it for 30- 40 years in my office. Thousands and thousands of students and other faculty going through. It was an extraordinary that once one regains the mystic sense of life that this, you could sit in front of this for hours and enjoy. And it would tell the most fantastic stories. The **inaudible few words**.
Look at the transformation now, the open white becomes the bright white amassing of strokes. The focus of course is just as clear as possibly **inaudible word**. And the horizon becomes a bird like, **inaudible word** like geo, geometry like suspended **inaudible few words**.
And that's a Wyatt. We've seen all these in various parts of this series. And this is sort of like a grand finale of bringing back a lot of images that you've seen before. All of them. And now we're **inaudible word or two** again.
We're seeing more than a beautiful Kartell **inaudible word or two** snow. You see **inaudible word** the edge of the line. You're seeing a focus of **inaudible word**. One of which we are in **inaudible word or two**. And we come closer to something that Wyatt is continuously, not representing but presenting for us. Not representing to us. Not imitating to us but presenting for us consistently the everyday homey qualities of his life, the Homeric view of man.
The occurrence in the mundane **inaudible few words**. The transformation **inaudible several words**...light and shadow. Its filled with our perception of its possibilities. It's overflowing with **inaudible word**
The wonderous sense of presence. The invisible. That aspect that we rarely **inaudible few words** is always implicitly playing like the wind in and among our focusing **inaudible word**. Regarding spirit. And that force which occasionally manifests itself in the nighttime dreams of, of children are those likely capable in the intricacies of argumentative **inaudible word**. They are the **inaudible word** of the guardian **inaudible few words**.
**inaudible word** images from **inaudible word**. One of her prized possessions which he here constantly presents for us. And we have **inaudible word** trying not to see it. It's almost like the **inaudible word** of kings. It's always the same process as the **inaudible word**. It's very close to Morris Graves **inaudible word**. it's all one. It's like the magical palette of the solar system creating a gorgeous image. **inaudible word**.
These are slides of Saturn from **inaudible word**. Is it real? Yes. You can see it every night. **inaudible few words** but there is another perspective as you can see here. A wonderful voyage of **inaudible few words**. How many rings does Saturn have? **inaudible word**
Talk about mysticism. There's a poetry in **inaudible word**. Your science courses will never be the same. It's just too **inaudible word** for words.
Is that a painting?
No, it's a photograph.
So, we're at home and I went **inaudible few words** wonders of the wonder **inaudible word**.
Well I invite you all down to one of the tables in the library and let's sit around for 10 minutes or 15 and garner some impressions from the series. And then we'll **inaudible word or two**. Just sit **inaudible word** for just a minute.
**inaudible background chatter/movement for a few minutes**
I get to be more and more of a **inaudible word**. Instead of buying things I think we should make them all. Whatever it is that we need. I have an old friend who knows how to make paper and knows how to do all the French marbling. and It's just amazing to meet somebody who knew how to make a book. He can make everything. He can make the paper. the end papers. He could make, do the weaving for the cloth for the cover. And he is still alive. and there, it's like meeting antiquity. It's incredible.
Part of the value and the valuableness of an open-ended process is the garnering of other people's images and impressions. Even just a few. And when I was teaching in a program which I designed where there were sixteen courses going in an overlapping cycle and pattern. Part of the most valuable interchange point was that once a year, irregardless of expense, I would take the material from each student. And I would have five or six hundred students for a year. And I would take material from each person and reproduce it, and have it put together in a folder. Sometimes it was enormous and thick. We'd run about a thousand pages a year per student. And give this to each person. And it was always incredible that a year or two later you'd go, and you'd go and visit these students in their home, and they have all these things on their wall. Because they were part of their life that they had incorporated and enriched their own life. When we saw this, we began branching out finally we were doing like silk screening process posters of drawings and things. And making little card sets. image-based survival kits they were called. Each June we would have about two or three hundred of these and we just give them away free. And there would be hundreds of people coming to get them that weren't even students. Because they were, there was just like such a well of possibility. And possibility is always preferable to information. Because you can do almost anything with it. And there were no rules and there were no structures. And you would think that such amorphousness would not be delightful. And yet it was. Just gorgeous.
Because this kind of a process, the kind of education which I was trained to proceed with, reinstates our confidence to begin from scratch and address ourselves to the unknown. And by just interacting with it in a non-formalized and yet identifiable pattern to create a relationship and to create a world out of it. And it can happen with anybody in any circumstance whatsoever. It's a timeless primordial process. And it is exactly the same process that if done over and over again finally yield the quality of insight, which is referred to I think most appropriately in Asian religions as that heart principle, the Anahata chakra principle of the universal loving kindness. And of course, the, the old mudra of that is the one in which the palm is up, and the other palm is down, like that. As opposed to the mudra, which is the Dharma chakra mudra, which is this. Which is for **inaudible word** or, or insight or wisdom.
The other is for that loving-kindness which Socrates called being a companion. That ingredient, that context without which we never learn anything. Or as Plato says we have to have that metanoia where we wake up to how it is that we know anything at all. And then for the very first time we begin to see. And literally thrive.
And part of the process which I can't provide. And I can't structure for it it's just a chance for you to talk to each other just for a few minutes. Just your impressions. Thoughts that you might have.
Things that you do after the lecture series when you go home. How do you go home? Or what happens during the week.
And I'll give you just one example that happened it, happened about almost 12 years ago. I had a; I had a student who was a truck driver. He was in his late fifties. and he was, as he told me he was tired of being a slob. And so, he kept in roll, enrolling in these courses. And in the third year that he was there it took all that time to sort of get rid of the numbness that being a truck driver for 30 years and having to be a tough guy had incurred on him. He came in one time and it was big glow on his face. He had a fresh haircut. A fresh, fresh pressed shirt. And he had a copy of Sophocles Oedipus Rex and he said I loved this. It was such a triumph. He was in his own realm. A real king. I mean he had done it. He had cracked the numbness that life thumped on to him and come back into his own person. And he was as free as anybody will ever be free to go and explore. And he knew it. And he was just so happy that it was true. And that's education as opposed to instruction, or encouragement or, or making a name for somebody or something like that. All those other processes are papier Mache flowers. They aren't the real bouquet.
I think I would like to share. **inaudible several words/sentences from the room** and while I had had **inaudible word** psychotherapy many years ago. The therapy that I had gone through **inaudible several words**....that I had opened myself up to seeing things that **inaudible few words**. So, when you mentioned **inaudible several words**. And fortunately, **inaudible word or two** began. I was very **inaudible several words/sentences**. And I have so far been told that **inaudible few words**. This is such a different experience for me. I was **inaudible several words**. It's different for me in so many ways. **inaudible several words/sentences**. If one is really serious then there is a lot of things **inaudible few words**.
Yes. This is so.
**inaudible few words** and you turn around and you have to smile at yourself **inaudible few words**.
**inaudible word or two** still looking. I don't know if I'm being Polly Anna. I think there's probably **inaudible word** things I need to work on. I'm not sure I thought of any **inaudible word or two**. I've read so many books
**inaudible few words**.
That's why I last.
**inaudible comment from the room**
That's why last time I showed all those images from Zacharias(?) which are horrifying. And when one realizes that he painted them from his own guts, his own experience. He saw almost all of those events portrayed in his own life. The monstrousness of it all somehow almost overwhelming. And yet I think the image that I retain of Zacharias(?), the little hat and the cigar and looking at some student making some painting. And it was horrible in content and yet the style was right. And taking the cigar out and saying perfecto. It was horrible to see and yet it had been done right and thus from the master perfecto.
And that really requires courage at the heart to be able to do that. To be...and it, it isn't the old Hemingway thing of having grace under pressure. That kind of thing. I think Bertrand Russell once recounted that he had had to see that life was horrible, horrible, horrible behind compare. and only then could he begin to live. And it's why he stopped writing those pretty books he said, as he called **inaudible word** Mathematica. But he just he could no longer write something that because not a part of the human life that he had seen and so began writing different kind of books.
But that penetration is through the painful is extraordinary. I know in my experience that there were times when I actually physically shook in meditation and wondered what the hell was going on. And there are, there are long periods in certain spirit trails where there are absolutely no feelings inside whatsoever. One has been temporarily wiped clean with the antiseptic swab. And you wonder if there is any possibility of feeling again. Because all of the, the realms are completely gone. It's almost as if there had to be some sort of an electrical charge port and you were neutralized. Totally neutralized.
And there are horrific episodes. But I think that as has been shown time and time again it's far worse to be naive. And to go on as if none of this were possible. That is the worst. And so on of all the hells possible ignorance is the one styled the worst.
It seems sophomoric moments of physical or spiritual suffering. And spiritual is quite distinct from psychological. One thing about being psychologically in pain but to be spiritually cursed that's a whole other issue. But even so ignorance.
**inaudible comment from the room**
Yes.
**inaudible comment from the room for a few minutes** And this is something that is helping me and I **inaudible several words/sentences**. I am, I have in my own prayer found it important to me **inaudible word or two** so I'm curious to know **inaudible few words**.
Let it circulate for just a minute. Because that's a serious question.
I experienced the same kind of thing. Once for absolutely no apparent reason, I was in the middle of something else. I found because I **inaudible several words**....catholic. And that she being catholic **inaudible few words** had no relationship to what it meant to get down on my knees and pray. Because I didn't even know what the connection was. I didn't know the what the **inaudible few words**. I had no idea what conceptual idea or beyond conceptual idea of what God was. **inaudible few words**. So, I completely grew away from that to the next best thing, which was a, I was quite convinced that **inaudible few words** the answer to what I was looking for. And after sort of meandering around in the maze **inaudible word or two** came up to **inaudible word** a few years ago. And there I am doing something in the middle of the day and I suddenly **inaudible word or two**. And I find myself begging forgiveness from **inaudible several words**. And I think it's important to set that, we were talking about **inaudible word or two** in one of the dialogues. With all of the things that we've seen and all of the things that we've done. Which were not related particularly related to wisdom. **inaudible word or two**. But the process by which you approach is very **inaudible few words**. And I think then if you are serious...Seri, seriousness comes first so sort of the flipside of that **inaudible word** kind of **inaudible word** you know is always kind of you see, see what you did there? See what you did there? She's always kind of **inaudible few words**. But I think if you are serious. If you do keep that **inaudible word**, that rhythm you can never stop. Once you stop you then, you then become **inaudible few word**...and serious. It keeps you **inaudible word** when you do that. The flexibility is like holding there. Both in absolute tension but **inaudible word** relax **inaudible few words**. You're the target. The direct shield focusing **inaudible few words**. If that is kept up **inaudible few words** truly, the dissolution which is to be **inaudible word** of the psyche. Something magical happens. That spot index. The lightning strikes, you know. Divinity **inaudible word** and presents you with something that blows your mind. And suddenly we then see how related we are on this incredible cycle of energy. The whole **inaudible word**
If I've learned one thing. I've learned one thing by coming here. **inaudible few words**. I'm just beginning to get things here and there. **inaudible few words**.
I think it's a balance.
See I wasn't sure what I was feeling. I was terrified. And so, I never **inaudible word** in a divine sense. I could never, it was always **inaudible word**. It was always in bits and pieces. and I always **inaudible word** something down there to find the root of it. But there's so many piles and stuff around that I could never watch it. **inaudible few words** Balance of **inaudible word or two** could I gain something **inaudible word**
**inaudible few words**....experience is quite the opposite because I have witnessed **inaudible word** extremely emotional and found it does not **inaudible several words**...I guess you could say unorthodox.
**inaudible word or two** I haven't been to so many **inaudible few words** and I've always had **inaudible several words/sentence or two**. I just wanted to share that with the whole room.
That's good.
**inaudible several words**. I know you know how hard **inaudible several words**...and myself have gotten so far. And it's really **inaudible several words**.
Well I was sort of like sitting on **inaudible word or two** pretty well balanced. And then all the sudden somebody came along and knocked me off balance. Again. It kept happening throughout my life. And I'd been to psychotherapy for many years and thought I had that balance pretty well down. And then I get here and **inaudible word** gee I **inaudible few words** and it all come together here. And all of the sudden I remembered, gee I don't have to go home and take a nap every night. **inaudible few words**.
Yeah.
And that's where I am.
Yeah. **inaudible word**. Yes. Yes, it's true.
I just love this class. I wouldn't miss it for the world.
Speaking of balance. **inaudible word** was off balance for a very long time and I was....
END OF PART TWO
And some of these things that we've been **inaudible several words/sentences**
I've gotten to know an odd population in Los Angeles and I **inaudible several words/sentences**. So, when the classical descriptions of **inaudible several words/sentences**...that he ever could have hoped to believe. Stick with it because what you can make out from the hedges of the labyrinth **inaudible few words**...
And so, I came here and **inaudible word** and gee I **inaudible word** I **inaudible few words** and it all come together here. And all of the sudden I remembered, gee I don't have to go home and take a nap every night. **inaudible few words**.
Yeah.
And that's where I am.
Yeah. **inaudible word**. Yes. Yes, it's true.
I just love this class. I wouldn't miss it for the world.
Speaking of balance. **inaudible word** was off balance for a very long time and I was....was very naive. Very naive. Very. I was just a kid, but my age was like 25. And I thought that the earth is beautiful and everybody's beautiful. And I had the wrong attitude which I always thought that if I do something to somebody. I have to expect another instead of, which is wrong. Yeah. So, when I do something to somebody now, I don't expect another thing you know. Instead of. And I kind of later on I start jumping everyplace. Just going every place. I used to believe the **inaudible word** man. I used to believe the wrong man. I used to believe that the good word. I used to believe the bad word. Everything. I used to believe to everything. And that comes from naiveness.
And I got hurt from the good words, from the bad ways, from the very bad situation and from the very good situation. And I came to a point to a time I would never forget that day. I was at home. I, I woked up. I was really gone. I was broken and broken, break down. I was, I was sure that I was going to do something about myself not about anybody else. But I can't believe it. I walked out and I saw a round, a round thing like this like space. This is what it looks to me. And something like airplane, vrmmmmm. Does like this. And I'm looking right through this you know. Like **inaudible word** through this round thing and I'm looking to this airplane, believe me. And this is the first time I'm talking about now. I never talked about this. And I'm looking to this, I'm saying oh this is this airplane or what. And I felt myself in different world. And now I'm walking by to my sister's apartment, which is right about 20 feet further than or I live. And I saw a big **inaudible word** moss like this on the tree. Like this. I said what the hell is going on. I came in at home. I came back home. I didn't even reach to the house. I came back and I was, I was very uncomfortable. I was so I couldn't explain what's going on. I couldn't see what's going on.
So, finally my mother said come on I'll take you to your aunt, you know. So, we went to my aunt and we were sitting on the table and everybody's scared of me. Everybody you know like; I was scared of myself now when I remember I was scared of myself. And what **inaudible word or two**. And this is all the result I think that I was very naive. I was totally blind. I didn't know what's going on I don't know shall I blame my parents? Or shall I blame myself? Or is this the way it comes my road or what you know I was terrible.
And finally, finally my cousin, my cousin. He, he study Buddhism and all this stuff. And he said come on I'm gonna take you to Lake Casitas. I used to smoke five packs a day cigarettes. Five packs Marlboros a day. One after the other. We went to Lake Casitas and now I'm talking and talking. Talking and talking. Hours and hours. I'm just talking. Sitting and talking, you know...
END OF RECORDING