It is actually already Day 3 of the invitational, and I’m finding it hard to do anything but talk and talk. I’ll try to catch up on what we’ve done so far though:
Day 1
At our house, the day begins around 7:00 a.m. Something about being in the mountains and/or at a retreat center is apparently inviting to early rising. As I haven’t shaken my own prediliction for working in the midnight hours, I lay in bed each morning and half-listen to Minor, Dan and Doug make breakfast and chat while my body soaks up a little further rest. We all head down to the main hall around 9:00 for morning meditation, which lasts about twenty minutes.
I am very, very out of practice with meditation, and it truly is like any other discipline in that competency takes practice. My mind takes the silence as an opportunity to voice, loudly, every stray concern, fantasy and unresolved work issue. My mind is so loud I half expect one of the more sensitive theosophists to turn towards me and gently, but firmly, implore “Chris, could you please keep that down? Some of us would like to actually hear our still small voice.”
There have been times in my life when within moments of sitting still, my whole being would start vibrating, a sense of deep peace and joy would descend upon me like a sacred vestment, where each thought was little more than a piece of cargo loaded on a freight car carried along by a slow moving train viewed on the distant horizon of a vast desert landscape. This was like standing with the pit crew on a Nascar race track. First lesson: unless I wake up early, have breakfast after meditation. The feeling and sound of my gastric juices taking apart my quickly ingested bagel and cream cheese do not help.
After meditation I returned to my house to get dressed for the day. Not that I went to meditation naked, but I dress for comfort there, while for a lecture and public forum I prefer something a little more formal. A few of us saunter to the classroom and find our seats for Joy’s talk. It is a boisterous crowd. The excitement of many old friends renewing their ties competes with the thrill of new friendships being forged.
To be a theosophist is to be a little different. To discover others like you has the impact of homecoming. And when what it is that makes you different, and what links you to this community, is as fundamental as a comprehensive worldview, an ethical orientation and path to radical self-transformation, that homecoming is one for soul after an epic pilgrimage.
Which is to say it takes us a while to settle down, take our seats and shut the heck up.
Nelda made announcements and Joy began to talk. Most of the first session was an overview of the week. It became very clear, very quick, that Joy herself had a surfeit of ideas. She started with three questions:
1) What are the essential truths of Thesosophy?
2) How do we share Theosophy in the 21st century?
3) What is the role of the foundational texts of Theosophy?
Returning to the ‘theme’ for the week, she asked “What is the relevance of theosophy and theosophical literature to me and the contemporary world?” Over the next few talks, she previewed that she would look at theosophy as a word, as a doctrine, and as a way of life.
We break up into groups. I am with Dave Ely, a relatively new member full of enthusiasm, Minor Lile, my roommate and the former manager of Camp Indralaya, Sherry Pelton, a composer and former teacher from Phoenix, Nelda Samarel, Director of the Krotona School and author of Caring for Life and Death, Pauline Van Beusekom, a woman with a dizzying life story that includes being a part of the San Francisco Zen Center before it was the San Francisco Zen Center, and Annine Wycherley, a 2nd generation theosophist from South Africa.
Over the course of the week, we’ll work together as a group exploring questions raised by Joy, examine some topic(s) in depth, and give a presentation to the larger group at the end of the session.
Our challenge is two-fold: how to select amongst the 20+ incredibly compelling questions Joy has asked, and how to bring unity to a group of theosophists, who are all reliably diverse and independent?
More to come . . .
Thank you Chris for sharing this important experience with us, and in such poetical way. It brings a lot of sweet memories to me… I wonder if you have noticed the strong presence of the eucalyptus trees and their strong lemony aroma. Walking close to them I have almost felt they were talking to me. Not that I hear voices…
Joy’s questions remind me a lot to what we – young people at that time – were trying to inquire in Argentina some years ago. Seeing the extraordinary value of the traditional theosophical literature, and looking at the present world at the light of it, is really a challenge and a bit of an art.
Something that we know, if we have read some of it, is that for those who are able to see the great scheme of things, the world wasn’t quite ready for something like Theosophy in the time the Theosophical Society was founded. In fact, it was the crazy enterprise of two visionary pioneers, and I’m not making reference to H.P.B. and Olcott. So, that Theosophy should be relevant today and will be for the years to come is not even put into question, at least for me. What I think should be our constant care is how to keep it alive without becoming inflexible and, at the same time, without bending it too much into our present mundane needs, making it loose its essential value.
To me, the metaphor of the Teacher appearing when the disciple is ready applies perfectly well to theosophy and us. Truth is always there, we just have to perceive it.
I’m looking forward to hearing more about the invitational, especially, how the questions presented by Joy are being addressed by the participants.
Thanks again!
Juli
Juli: Yes, the smells were one of the most distinctive features of Krotona. I could have navigated my way from the library to my house just by the dramatic narrative of scents along the way.
And yes, I agree that in one sense, the relevance of theosophy isn’t in question. In other sense, everything is always in question and benefits from a spirited inquiry. I believe it was this latter sense that drove the discussions of the week.
I’ll do my best to a few more posts up soon!
First blog I read after wakeup from sleep today!
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Mind Blowing!