Category: Field Notes

According to Jeremy Rifkin, economic and social theorist, writer, and public speaker, a new civilization is emerging: The Empathic Civilization (this is the book title of one of his 21 bestselling books). It may be so, and I hope so. But looking all around me, I don’t see any strong evidence that we as members of the current civilization are doing very well, in terms of practising empathy. Read Field Note

Dr. Arnold Mindell (aamindell.net), whose work I have referenced previously in my Field Notes, suggested that World War III was already in process: “The war between the sexes!” While Mindell had in mind two sexes, Male and Female, I will, in keeping with today’s cultural context, extend the plurality to more than the two binary categories: to all gender categories. (However, in this Field Note, I won’t address couples’ relationship that goes beyond two-person couples.) Read Field Note

Many of you may see or hear this title and wonder, “Huh? Why would I want to magnify the problem? Don’t I want to get rid of it? Surely, it makes no sense to want to make the problem bigger than what it already is.” Indeed, I cannot emphasize the prevalence of ideas of what might be called common psychology, or common consciousness, strongly enough. Within this consciousness the automatic reaction is to want to destroy the problems we encounter, and as quickly as possible. Read Field Note

As many of you already know the topic of inner work is one of my most central interests as a therapist, educator, and human being, and this practice is of course not entirely new or novel. However, our culture, being overwhelmingly outward-focused, relentlessly enables such impression that it is new!. We just have to look around to see all the ways people are offering outward-focused solutions to any and all problems we humans encounter. Read Field Note

This Field Note is a co-authored dialogue in which Heesoon and I engage in an exploration-and-discovery conversation about relationship. More than being “about” our relationship, this dialogue bears fruit from and for our relationship. I certainly made some discoveries as we proceeded with this process. We offer you this open conversation not so much as a window into us rather as a possible window into yourself and your own close relationships. Read Field Note

In this Field Note, I will focus on how we feel energetically within as we go about our days in the world, and how we feel in terms of connection to the primal source of this energy, if indeed there is such. If this latter is not available you can use your wild imagination to conjure it up. Read Field Note

This is a ‘Bonus’ Field Note. I had intended to take a break until October. What follows is an academic journal article publication, for which my colleague and friend, Dr. Thomas Falkenberg (University of Manitoba), and I were interviewed by Dr. Heesoon Bai. The Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education is a new journal in the field, and our article is about inner work: a perennial topic for me, as you, my readers, would know. Read Field Note

As you no doubt know, a prologue is what comes before what is the main body of, what will follow, in this case, the June Field Note. I woke up this morning and had the thought that the core of what the Field Note is about, the unexpected, the unwanted, and the horrible, and on further reflection I new that it is about anything unexpected, even those happenings that I might prefer and like. Read Field Note

I will focus on two aspects of human communication in this Field Note: Content- the words and their collective meaning Process- All the non-verbal aspects of human communication. I will describe these two aspects with my major focus being on what I am calling the process aspect of communication. This is the non-verbal dimensions that include Read Field Note

If you are like me and I would suggest most other people (that you know), you may find, at least at times, taking up a practice and staying with it to be difficult. Presumably we get into a practice (whatever it is) because we are interested and feel that it offers something of value for us. But somehow, one way or another, we often enough find ourselves not doing the practice. Some familiar practice examples of this are diet, exercise programs, meditation, and the whole range of life and skill building practices that we are keen to adopt. Read Field Note