Coombsville Road,
Napa Valley,
Napa, California, USA
May 27, 2020
"If you don't take it out into
the world,
you didn't get it in the first place."
...
What it all comes down to, when all is said and done,
where the rubber meets the
road,
is this: being transformed means being free to be and free to act. The
siege mounted by the
mind,
its hold-backs, its considerations and pre-considerations, its overtly
unnecessary cautions and pre-cautions about, in, and on our lives as
human beings, is ended. It's ended not by "taming" the
mind
nor by "destroying" the
ego,
but instead by taking responsibility for them rather than by being at
their effect, by owning them rather than by
resisting
them, by distinguishing them rather than by
identifying
with them (the latter may just be the most counter-intuitive of them
all).
Anyone who's ever touched on and / or been touched by transformation,
knows that the urge to
share
it is profound, so grandly predictably profound that if,
when experiencing transformation there's no delighful urge to
share
it, the
chances
are that whatever you got, wasn't transformation in the first place.
Then there's also the
business
of the way transformation is conveyed - not like an
intellectual (even like an
interesting)
discussion to be understood, but rather like a transferable,
sharable
experience (when I'm thirsty, please don't discuss
water
with me - just give me some of it cold to drink). Yes it's useful to
discuss an experience. That's how we get to grow and include new
horizons. But with a discussion being what it is, there's
a world
of difference between discussing transformation, and conveying the
experience.
Libraries and stack-rooms are filled with books carefully documenting
ideas which purport to provide access to
the source of
transformation.
Religions
and isms have been at it for centuries. Programs and
courses offer ways to "transform" our lives - which most of the time
simply come down to ways to change our lives (and "plus
ça change, plus c'est la même chose" - the more
things change, the more they stay the same, yes?). And when all is said
and done, transformation still isn't
present.
So where's transformation to be found? Where's it to be
seen? Where is it to be emulated? And (most importantly):
how will I recognize it and trust it when I see it?
There are powerful programs which convey the experience of being
transformed in ways that reliably create the opportunity for people to
experience being transformed for themselves, and to experience the way
being transformed is an empowering platform on which to stand and live
life, and to realize it's what (for the most part) is missing in life.
In the
same-old-same-old
way in which we ordinarily live, we've been powerless to break out of
old patterns which keep authentic transformation at bay, if not bury it
completely. Watch the
morning news,
or click a news app online. It's clear
the world
is
crying
out for transformation. Everyone knows (instinctively) it's what's
wanted and needed. As persuasion of and debate about its value is
now moot, the only remaining unanswered question to ask, is: how is it
best conveyed?
I assert all those bibles, all course materials, all podcasts, all
audio-books pale into insignificance next to who the conveyor of
transformation is being. You can talk up a storm, have all the
clever facts and information memorized by rote, and yet still not
impart authentic transformation. That's because facts and information
doeth not the domain of transformation compriseth. Facts and
information (the
sacred
and the profane) comprise only a very thin veneer of the conversation
for transformation. Who we're being is the ontological
domain of transformation. It's where the magic happens. So a person
transformed could read the telephone book or the
dictionary
out loud to you, and you'd get transformation not from all the data
they're reading but from who they're being as they're reading it. And
isms, materials, courses, and podcasts are only additional commentary.
Given what transformation is, it's getable directly from who people be
(which is inexplicable maybe, yet true nonetheless).
I was with
Werner
when he was
leading
a program for a group of four hundred people. It was both
rigorous
and arduous to be in it with him. All the conversations were in
English. If you didn't speak English, there was a less than zero
chance
you would understand anything. So it was with
interest
that I kept my eye on one of the
participants,
a
black-robed
Japanese
ZenBuddhistmonk
who (it became clear during the course) didn't speak English, and there
was no provision (yet) to translate the material into Japanese. There
was literally no way he could understand the conversation or the
processes or the
sharing.
Nonetheless he had
committed
himself to being in this intensive. And in the midst of all of it, I
wondered how he or anyone else who didn't speak English could ever get
anything out of the proceedings at all.
Finally, after the course reached its stunning,
inexorable
conclusion, I saw him walk over to
Werner
who was surrounded by other newly-elated
graduates.
When the opportunity
presented
itself and
Werner
recognized him, he put his palms together, bowed to
Werner,
and said with a very thick guttural Japanese accent "I ...
gaht ... it!".
Werner's
recognition of him and his of
Werner
left no doubt.
Werner
could have stood in front of that group for all the hours and nights
and days of the course, and just read the telephone book or the
dictionary
to them, and they would have gotten it anyway from his
brilliant,
total, complete end-run around understanding.
What they got by osmosis ie by
direct experience,
is
who we really are.
In generating,
sharing,
and receiving transformation, understanding (our go-to
faculty) is really archaic if not outright naïve. Once
transformation is encountered, even without prior knowledge or
experience, it's universally recognizable. Coming from
transformation ("coming from transformation" is a
proviso), you could read the telephone book or the
dictionary
out loud, and in so doing, be a powerful conduit for transformation.
