Receptive Listening 2/14/10

February 14, 2010

Well, It's about 4:00 AM and i have to get up and write before the mode passes. I have sometimes called it "midnight musings" and have wondered why this frequently happens to me. I think I may have finally figured it out, thanks to a phone conversation yesterday with Pheobe Ballard, now Phoebe Ballard Ford. In this conversation I suddenly blurted out that "Receptive Listening" was probably one of the most significant formative experiences in my life.

Receptive Listening was a 6 month program developed by Phoebe and Jack Ballad that brought together about 25 or so young (?) adults for a weekend once a month at the home of General Skinny Wainwright in Rye, New York. The program was mostly based on Carl Jung psychology about which I can't do justice in detailed, appropriate explanation. However I do recall that people, supposedly, can be categorized by 4 different types -- thinking, feeling, sensing and intuition. One of those types is usually predominant and its opposite is buried in the subconscious. In my case the predominant seemed to be "thinking" and its opposite, "feellng", was buried to some extent. The surprising hypothesis to me was that creativity in a person likely comes out when it is possible to bring to consciousness, at least temporarily, the inferior or un-predominant mode. In my case, shifting from thinking to feeling seemed to work a bit.

Getting into that inferior mode was part of what "Receptive Listening" was all about. We would all "center down", frequently flat on the floor, with no conversation at all for 15 minutes or so, listening to appropriate music while attempting to individually feel and relax every muscle in the body, head to toe. I can remember being totally unaware after a few minutes of where I was or the other people around me. It must be similar to the feeling of being immersed in yoga. At the end of this centering down time we would start to write or to paint or to mold clay on different sessions, with no conversation that might collapse the temporary flight into the inferior mode. For me the painting or clay modling didn't indicate much creativity. But I was surprised at what came out of me in the writing sessions.

I think this is what happens to me now, some 40 years later when I awaken in the wee hours, can't sleep for all the stuff whirling around in my head, and feel I must get to the computer and write for a while if I am ever going to be able to go back to sleep. I must have been centering down into my inferior type (feeling) while sleeping. For whatever it may be worth to me, when I read the stuff I have written later on in the day when I am clearly back in a thinking type mode in the noisey world, I am often amazed or puzzled by what I have written and can't change a single word of it (except for spelling, of course).

Well I am going back to bed now and I bet I will fall asleep instantly, fully relaxed.

There was another somewhat different revelation to me from the Receptive Listening course and that had to do with actually listening deeply to other people and discovering wonderful qualities in every one of them. Maybe I will reveal a confession on my part, related to this, during another inferior session.

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It is now early in the morning of February 15 and I need to describe the "confession" mentioned above.

When I met the other participants the Friday evening of the first monthly session I remember mentally asking myself what in the world have I gotten into! I figured there were a half dozen or so in total with whom I might enjoy this six month program. Wow! What a changing experience for me! During the next six months we met with each other in twos, sometimes in threes, after centering down, probably in our respective inferior modes, and listened intently.

In short by the time the six months were over I knew there was something remarkable and great about everyone of them. Several had serious problems, all of us to some degree -- things we would ordinarily be reluctant to discuss. I remember thinking later on that I bet I would find something great about Hitler even, if I had a chance to center down with him! Now that is way out, don't you think?

We were ordinary people. But this experience has led me to my current mission in life, recording life stories of people who came to Park City with a passion for skiing and other outdoor life experiences and took on any kind of work to permit them to stay here. They have handsomely prospered in the last 35 years or so and made this town quite remarkable. I call them Extraordinarily Ordinary Passionate People of Park City with Imagination, Initiative and Perseverance. They are affectionately known as successful Ski Bums (not a pejorative title around here!). And I now like to consider myself as an Elder Ski Bum.

Bush Bashing January 2003

Just one possible scenario January 2003

To all my friends who together with me try to figure out what we should do!!

When we are all talking at the same time it seems difficult, in my opinion, to stay focused on the above subject. It is so easy to fall into Bush bashing and why we are in current difficulties. I am not at this writing attempting to be an apologist for President Bush. I believe the mess we are in is the result of something far beyond just Bush.

At the outset, I believe we are indeed in the early stages of a major world war. So for the moment, try to accept this as just an hypothesis and see if my analogies make any sense. (If you disagree with this, l hope you will put in writing a different analogy and a scenario of your own as to what we might do.)

We (the USA) were ill prepared for either WWI or WWIl. When we finally were forced to enter these conflicts, we made several feints that were not decisive victories but were appropriate in the overall conflict while we marshaled our strengths and moved slowly in the right direction. It took a long time with island hopping along the way before we could even consider attacking Japan directly. So when I hear that we should have attacked Iran (or North Korea) rather than Iraq, I am reminded that it is necessary to choose battles carefully. And if, once again, you are willing to accept my thesis that we are in a major world war, perhaps it is reasonable to consider that our leaders chose an acceptable feint.

I try to make an analogy of our current situation like a boil on my body that has been slowly growing for several years (at least since early attacks on our culture by Muslim terrorists in the 1980s). I don't have a certain explanation for why this boil is on my body. Some folks (the Mea Culpa group) tell me it is my fault for doing something bad that caused the infection. Maybe that is so but maybe it is simply the fault of my less-than-perfect humanity and my genes. Now what should I do about this boil? Let it slowly grow until it festers? Or maybe my body will cure it without any action by me! If it does continue to get worse, I expect I will eventually be forced to lance it, go through painful time and recover. If I follow the latter course of action I feel the healing will be more difficult and I expect I would be better off doing something about it now since it is growing rapidly.

Straight Party Vote

Straight Party Vote 10/6/10

Once again, at the NATIONAL LEVEL, I think it is extremely wise to vote the straight party to make sure as best we can that our party will be as strong as possible in Congress. As you can see from recent difficulties a shortage of Republican votes allowed passage of some pretty awful stuff. I would hate to see an opportunity to prevent such blockage be lost because an individually chosen representative of the Republican party in a wayward state was not to someone's liking because of some particular issue or issues. Their defeat in a national election could have much greater affect on overall national policy. No doubt we have had some pretty sorry representatives but the state may need to wake up, not the party as a whole. I don't know how close the election will be in the Senate but I don't want to take a chance on losing because of a doubtful representative in Alaska or Delaware. I am concerned about any single-issue voter unless the issue be "less government control over our lives". --Ralph

A New Iraq

Message from sender: Call me a blinded optimist but I choose to believe Iraq has gone through enough and advanced far enough that the people will not permit civil war based on religious differences -- no matter sensationalist reporting. WORLD | October 17, 2010 Sunnis in Iraq Allied With U.S. Quitting to Rejoin Rebels By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS and DURAID ADNAN The loss of the fighters, whose switch to the government's side was pivotal in pulling Iraq back from sectarian warfare in 2006, poses a new threat.

terrorists

Bullies just get stronger until challenged 10/14/10

I just had forwarded to you an article indicating that the Amsterdam judiciary appears to be taking a strong stand against threats from extremists. They are brave indeed.

Historically standing up to a bully by any name or stripe usually has a salutary effect, as scary as it may be. Maybe Islam will attempt to police itself and begin to delegitimize actions of its more terrorist elements if they see Western Culture willing to redefine the demands of "political correctness". If they don't the bully element will likely only get stronger on the back of success and tend to lead the world into another fascist era, similar to the 1930's but far more destructive than the 1940's.