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Trebbe Johnson's
Newsletter
March 2010
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Dear Questers, Friends, and
Seekers of the Beloved,
From the window of the small
commuter plane, I watched
the falling snow fill the
footprints of the men who
had loaded the luggage into
the plane just minutes
earlier. It was 6:00 AM on
Thursday, February 25, and
every other morning flight
scheduled to take off from
this small airport had been
cancelled. My husband Andy
and I were (we hoped) on our
way to Chicago, then on to
southern California and the
Wilderness Guides Council
gathering in the desert, my
favorite yearly event with
my favorite people. Because
I love my work I often
forget to notice how much
time and effort I put into
it, but I knew I was
desperate to get away. I sat
nervously as the plane
waited (and waited) to be
de-iced. Finally, we rolled
down the runway, and in that
Alice-in-Wonderland switch
of worlds that never fails
to astonish me, no matter
how much I fly (a lot),
moments later we lifted
above the clouds into bright
sun and blue skies. When we
returned five days later, we
learned that the heavy snow
had shut down the airport
for a day and a half. The
gathering was wonderful, as
usual, and I am still
grateful to have gotten a
literal break from the
skies.
To those who are receiving
this newsletter for the
first time... welcome! Here
you'll find news of upcoming
Vision Arrow
events, reflections,
profiles of extraordinary
people, and stories of
transformation that occur
when we accept, in small,
bold, startling ways the
invitations that the world
is always sending us.
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YOU DON'T HAVE TO WORK AT
PLAY
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During one of the snowstorms
that drove into the East
this February, I received
this photo from Genie Wing,
my friend since college.
Genie is an artist who also
works as an art therapist in
the New York City public
school system, and when the
schools closed because of
the snow, she went outside
to play. The result was this
delightful snow sculpture of
a woman sitting on a bench.
Play is an art. It's also an
innate skill that all of us
inherited from our animal
ancestors but that many of
us lose as we age.
Sometimes, on the vision
quests I lead, people
declare that they will
"play" during their solo
time. You can tell that
they're not quite sure they
will remember how to do so,
that playing might take
quite a bit of effort.
Do you remember how to play?
Play means slipping into an
interactive relationship
with your surroundings. In
order to play, all you have
to do is let the world
around you come alive. It's
not that hard. Just imagine
that you're magic and you
can cast a spell that will
make everything around you
animate, conscious, and
eager to hang out with you.
Trees, houses, shadows,
litter, footprints, even an
untidy room... imagine all
of them released from their
customary roles and inviting
you to join them to
rearrange your perception.
That's what children do. How
often have you seen a small
child suddenly squat down on
the ground in rapt
fascination with some new
life form (twig, bug, candy
wrapper) that demands
attention? Some odd and
fascinating thing has
spontaneously extended an
invitation to the child to
enter its world. The child,
without hesitation, says YES
and starts exploring the
possibilities.
There are many ways adults
can play. Here are some from
my own personal toybox:
[bullets] After you load the
groceries into your car,
ride your empty supermarket
cart to the place where the
carts are collected and
brought back into the store.
When you tidy up your house,
move one object at a time
from its wrongful to its
rightful place (place A to
place B). Then at place B
pick up something and bring
it to its home at place C.
Pick up something from C.
Continue until there's
nothing within reach that's
out of place. Then you're
done. When you're driving,
imagine the sights you pass
(red barn, kitschy lawn
ornament, stone house)
clicking like beads onto a
string. Then test yourself
and see how well you
remember the route you've
"strung." At twilight, watch
for fairies.
It doesn't take a lot of
work to play. It's just a
matter of letting the world
come alive and asking
yourself and it how you can
explore together.
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RADICAL
JOY FOR HARD TIMES NEWS
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Join us for the
Global Earth Exchange
on Saturday, June 19!
On that day
people in 100 locations all
over the world will be
gathering at wounded places
to find and make beauty.
We have groups planning
events in California,
Colorado, India, England,
Vermont, Utah, North
Carolina, and even
Antarctica, among others.
Join us to bring attention,
compassion, and creativity
to a place you love... and
to be part of the worldwide
network that is forming
around a brand new path of
environmental activism.
Visit our website and
fill out the application
form.
If your site is among the
first 100 chosen, you will:
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Receive a free packet
containing a T-shirt, a
Radical Joy for Hard
Times flag, guidelines
for how to host an Earth
Exchange, and other
items to support your
event,
-
Be offered regular
support that we will
make available to all
our hosts worldwide,
including, we hope a
web-based gathering
shortly before the
event, so everyone can
"meet" one another!
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Bring international
attention to an
ecologically wounded
place
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Possibly be featured in
a book that we are
creating about the event
Creating a sustainable
future on Earth depends on
opening our hearts to the
natural world in its
brokenness as well as its
splendor.
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YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE NATIVE
TO TALK TO NATURE
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During the Wilderness Guides
Council gathering (see
Greeting above), I heard a
story that made me realize
that ideas about the
possibilities for
interaction between
nature and human
beings are still being
stereotyped by supposedly
enlightened people. It seems
that the board of directors
of the School of Lost
Borders, the original
wilderness rites of passage
organization, founded in
1981 by Meredith Little and
Steven Foster, applied last
year to have a booth at the
2009 annual Bioneers
conference.
The Bioneers was founded
twenty years ago and is
dedicated to "the emerging
culture of social and
scientific innovators who
are mimicking nature's
operating instructions to
serve human ends while
enriching the web of life."
In October of every year
they have a conference that,
according to friends of mine
who have attended, brings
together just about the most
inspiring collection of
people, projects, and ideas
that you can imagine.
To
their surprise the School of
Lost Borders learned that
their application had been
denied. The reason: the
Bioneers felt that Native
Americans might be offended
that a non-native
organization was offering
wilderness rites of passage
journeys, frequently
referred to as "vision
quests."
The term "vision quest" was
devised in the nineteenth
century by white
anthropologists as a way of
describing a Plains Indian
ceremony that involved
fasting in a sacred place
and calling for a vision
that seeker could bring back
home to help his people.
However, for thousands of
years spiritual seekers of
many different cultures have
been leaving their community
behind and going off alone
to seek wisdom and insight
in the wilderness. Jesus
fasted in the desert and
prayed for guidance about
the life mission that had
been hounding him and that
he could not quite commit
to. Mohammed went regularly
to a mountaintop cave to
receive the teachings of
Allah, sung to him as verse.
The Buddha sat under the
bodhi tree to seek the
nature of reality; after
having attained
Enlightenment, he touched
the earth before him and
asked it to bear witness.
According to Greek myth,
King Minos of Crete would
regularly seek refuge in a
cave on Mount Ida; there he
would reflect on his rule
during the previous eight
years and ask the gods to
help him in the years to
come.
Let me say that I spent
several years during the
late 1980s and early 90s
writing in depth about
American Indian issues, and
I am aware of and
sympathetic to native
people's distress when
non-natives borrow their
traditions and ceremonies
without having been granted
either training or
permission to do so.
Nevertheless, the assumption
of the Bioneers committee
that native people have some
kind of exclusive claim on
transformative experiences
in nature is both
condescending to natives and
presumptuous to non-natives.
Obviously, some ceremonies
aimed at transformation and
connection, such as the
notorious sweat lodge in
Sedona last year that killed
three people, are clearly
borrowed from American
Indian traditions and are
irresponsibly carried out.
But there are many simple
practices and exercises that
any person of any cultural
background can do to deepen
their relationship with
nature, discover truths
about themselves through
what fascinates them about
the natural world, and have
powerful experiences that
are at once completely
unexpected and profoundly
familiar. The vision quests
that my colleagues and I
lead do not use Native
American traditions. In
fact, part of the reason we
love the work we do is that
we are shown, over and over
again, that when any person
of any background spends
time alone in nature, what
happens can transform their
life.
Instead of communicating the
message to supporters that
only native people can have
a certain kind of spiritual
experience in nature, the
Bioneers organizers should
encourage their thousands of
conscientious, dedicated
members and followers to
explore not just native, but
non-native ways of
discovering insight,
healing, and wisdom in
nature. In fact, maybe the
organizers need to go on a
quest themselves.
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CIRCUMFERENCE OF HOME--A NEW
BOOK
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In 2007, Kurt Hoelting, a
commercial fisherman,
wilderness guide, and
meditation teacher, decided
to give up car and air
travel for one year and use
his kayak, his bike, and his
feet for transportation. His
personal bioregion became a
circle extending within a
sixty-mile radius around his
home.
In search of what he calls a
"radically local life," Kurt
confronted unexpected
challenges and made
discoveries much different
from what he had imagined
when he set out on this
experiment. For a year he
chronicled his inner and
outer journey in a
fascinating blog. Now, he
has written a book about
it, The Circumference of
Home. It has been
endorsed by such luminaries
as David Abram and Bill
McKibben. In these times
when so many of us are
seeking ways to want less
and live better on our local
piece of Earth, this book is
an inspiration.
(I apologize that I can't
create links to Kurt's book.
I am in JFK airport waiting
for the flight to Singapore,
and the connection is very
bad.)
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UPCOMING
EVENTS
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My book,
The World Is a Waiting Lover,
with a foreword by Thomas
Moore, author of
Care of the Soul, is
available from
Amazon.com or from your
favorite bookstore.
UPCOMING PROGRAMS
March 9-21, 2010
Bali From Within
We'll be on our way when you
read this! Watch for
Bali From Within
2011.
This year
our Bali trip is timed so we
can participate in the
three-day Balinese new year,
Nyepi. Nyepi begins with
everyone in the village
chasing huge
papier maché monsters
out of town, continues with
a day of reflection, and
ends with an evening of
mingling with friends and
eating on the street. The
trip, as usual, also
includes visits with
Balinese artists, a gamelan
musician, village priest;
hikes in the forest; a
blessing ceremony at the
sacred spring Tirta Empul,
and many other events
visitors rarely have a
chance to engage in up
close.
Upside of the Downturn
The telephone "round table"
discussion of our
relationship with money is
back for its fifth
incarnation. If it seems
impossible to you that an
exploration of the thorny,
troubling subject of money
be a warm, searching, even
fun exploration... think
again.
Upside of the Downturn
does not provide advice
about money; it invites you
to explore your own
relationship with money as a
dynamic with a long history,
deeply embedded attitudes,
and vast possibilities for
change. We already have one
person signed up for the new
round, so email me if you
would like to participate.
Cost: $95
Path of the Lover Workshops
This popular workshop, based
on my book about love and
desire and how we can work
more consciously with it,
shows you how the many
different paths of love in
your life are really all
connected--and part of the
dynamic inner force called
the Beloved.
You will:
-
Connect with the
archetypal Beloved in
you, that knows how to
say YES to what you love
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Discover how your past
loves (including those
that didn't work out)
were essential in
opening you up to a
bigger capacity to love
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Learn to recognize the
inner voice of the
"loyal soldier" that
wants to hold you back
from following your
heart
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See how
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fascination and
allurement have led you
all onto important paths
This year the workshop will
be offered in five
locations:
April 30-May 2: Cincinnati
(contact
Tom Rubens)
May 7-9: Gainesville,
Florida (contact
Martin Goldberg)
July 30-August 2: Seattle
(contact
Ruth Dow Rogers)
November 12-14:
Schloss Glarisegg, Lake
Constance, Switzerland (contact
Silvia Figel)
November 19-21:
Eschwege Institute,
Eschwege, Germany
Endless Mountains Vision
Quest
This four-day program, held
in a secluded 400-acre
nature preserve, is
specially designed for those
who seek a meaningful rite
of passage in a beautiful,
yet accessible place. You
explore many of the same
processes and practices as
in the longer vision quest,
but with a focus on reading
Nature's lessons and
discovering how they apply
to your own path in life.
For the twenty-four-hour
solo you may choose from
among diverse ecological
niches: glacial pond,
meadow, wetlands, stream, or
forest. Minimal backpacking.
For a complete list of
programs offered by Vision
Arrow, see our
website.
Call 570 727 4272 or
email
Trebbe if you have questions
or would like to talk about
any of these programs.
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