The Holding Pattern: On the Perfect Holiday Gift

"As we wait for tomorrow, remember that the gift is in the time."

Sometimes time speeds away at a crazy pace. We are all too busy, it seems. I hear the stories of people hurried to get from one place to the next. Too busy to stop and rest, to take a long and passionate walk, to relieve your tired feet. Space is filled with endless gossip about the mundane details that make each of us alive, unique. We are not sure what to say within the silence of the holding pattern. It is within this time that we begin to understand the true gift.

There is nothing more exasperating than waiting. There is nothing more frustrating than the holding pattern. How can we make the present be more than about tomorrow? How can we trust in the now so much so that we do not worry about how things will turn out?

We are in the holiday mode. People are scurrying about shopping. Spending money that they thought they did not have to make the day complete. It all comes together in the end even if that means borrowing. What are we buying? What is the purpose of a gift if it is not time? Think about the best gifts. We buy time with ourselves, with a loved one, with a thought, with an experience. Sometimes we forget that the gift is the time we put into it and the time we get out of it.

I have felt the heavy burden of wanting…of waiting. Waiting for the plane to take off. The announcement overhead indicates that the flight time will be further delayed. How much more do I have to wait? The trip has not even begun. We are traveling from one place to the next, excited about the possibility of reuniting with loved ones and the anxiety that comes along with it. We begin to value this break in routine in which we are given a chance to honor people and places that we have filed away in our past. We have fear but more so we are hopeful. That is why we do it year and year again. That is why we repeat the same journey. Perhaps we know deep down inside that our heart is yearning for peace, for a new resolution, a new beginning and forgiveness from any sorrowful past. We are like little children all over again and we believe in the power of magic, the power of gift giving and pine trees and candlelights. We are in a holding pattern and yet, it is here that we are experiencing the greatest joy. It is here that our imagination is already experiencing the perfect gift. It is the gift of time. Time to engage is such fanciful things.

As I was running this morning, I realized that I was living someone else’s dream. I realized that as the sun shown down on me and I could hear the pace of my heart, the cold seemed to bounce off my steady stride, I was wired and wide eyed – I realized that I have everything. I have been given the time to nourish my body. I have been given the time to contemplate beauty. I have been given the time to enjoy my children while they are still young and believing. I have been given grace to practice art and writing. I have been given a home filled with love and food and healing. I have been given everything I need, at this moment; my life is full. Time is such a valuable, valuable commodity.

Every year I am pulled by the spirit even though I don’t want to be. I am really more of a hum bug type of person. Really. I enjoy being belligerent and rebellious and angry. As I told a friend the other day, all of these things is what makes me unique. I want to be a monk but I want to be a freak. Is it the Boriqua in me?

Every year I am pulled by the spirit even though I don’t want to. And it is NOT the music playing on the radio and Black Friday. I think it’s the lights. I love Christmas tree lights. I love lighting a candle. I love staring at the night transformed by the myriad of colors. I love the magic of lights. I am immediately reduced to the childlike me. The child that remembers looking for my name under the Christmas tree. My aunt Carmen had a beautiful cursive that I always recognized on her gifts. She was so slow and meticulous about writing each name. She did not believe in Secret Santa – a tradition the family has adopted since her passing. I like Secret Santa. It reduces my stress this time of year. But, I loved Christmas year after year as a child with a gift and a name for every body.

I get the feeling that I am rambling. So, I suppose it is time to wrap it up. There is something so powerful about words. About the words that we make public. The words we write on a paper and share with another. I am so touched by the words that people carefully choose to commit to paper. I have been given so much love and glory through the power of words – words that have been given to me by authors too numerous to count. Authors that include members of my friends and family.

For this reason I am publicly sharing with all of my readers these few words about time. I have been in a holding pattern for quite awhile. Or at least I thought so. I mean, I have been under the impression that I have been waiting for something. Something spectacular to happen. Then I realized this morning that I am living a dream that I have forgotten to honor. I have been given the gift of time. The space of a day. The now, the me, this moment of mine that is delightful eternity. As I realize this, I feel I must bow down for grace. Say thank you, thank you Masterful One. Thank you for my open eyes. Thank you for my sunrise. Thank you for the bird chirps. Thank you for the universe. Thank you for keeping me this long in your arms. What has been up ‘til now, the holding pattern – becomes the heart of my journey.

May this season bring you peace and joy and the powerful grace of presence.

In the Midst of Chaos: Working for Peace

A Dialogue between Mr. Jason Manseau and Dr. Raquel Rios.

Jason Manseau is a forth year undergraduate student majoring in Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Waterloo. He can be reached by phone at 519-496-2751 or electronic mail at jremim@gmail.com

Raquel Rios, Ph.D. is the Executive Director of Real World Professional Development, a communications and professional development platform for educators and students to engage in a creative dialogue on diversity, community and spiritual awareness.

The purpose of this public dialogue is to promote the use of dialogue as a tool to build relationships across race, class, religion and gender for the purpose of collaboration for social justice and change. The dialogue is an interactive experience in which participants from diverse backgrounds share personal lived experiences, insights and thoughts related to a reading selection and consequent thought provoking questions designed by the participants themselves.

Reading Selections

Think On These Things
By Krishnamurti, 1964
On The Function of Education, pp.1-8

On Line Articles: (Click the link to access)

Principal Dealing With Two Tragedies: Richmond Rape, San Jose Attack
Ask the Right Question About Gang Rape
Gay Puerto Rican Tean Decapitated
Brutal Gay Hate Crime Murder In PR Not Being Covered

Overarching Questions: What is peace? How can we make a difference in the midst of chaos?

Prologue

Time falls down on us every day and life happens all too quickly. While we are busy dissecting the past and working towards a better future, the day passes and we are exhausted. Between these thoughts, we are often in combat. Fighting the moment-to-moment details that spring onto our canvas like drops of paint or spillage, depending on the wrath of the day.

There are good schools that work for peace and social justice in spite of what the news and media would like us to believe. There are not enough of these schools, in my opinion. I can’t pick up and move every time I hear about a school that is doing the right thing. Therefore, my own kids are pretty much tied up in traditional schools with little mention of social responsibility. Sporadically, maybe – like when my son’s class participated in a project in which they went into a nursing home and sang songs to the elderly. But, comprehensively – hardly. Elliot Seif, an education consultant and former Professor at Temple University in Philadelphia writes about Parkway High School for Peace and Social Justice (Educational Leadership, July 2009) and I want to move to Philadelphia before my son reaches 9th grade. Perhaps I should spend several days researching schools in New York City that do the same. Then, there are so many private schools that I can’t afford that claim social responsibility as part of their mission statement. Again, the process is exhausting. If I had my way, I’d like to know that all schools offer relevant and socially “responsible” curriculum and learning experiences.

I just feel like we are always being told: there is no time. There is never enough time after the task of teaching, documenting, doing this and that activity- aimless time consuming things that separate us from the real world of children. I wonder how many teachers stop and reflect on why they choose to spend countless hours in the company of children. I wonder if they stop to think about how these children will be the soul of our tomorrow.

I get a sense that there is absolute and painful urgency for some things – like a student’s GPA, attendance records, vaccinations or hand cleaning. And yet there is no apparent urgency about making the school experience interesting, socially relevant and transforming.

How do we build a culture of peace in our schools, in our communities? How do we do this day by day in spite of the real world limitations we face? How does one person make a difference?

This is the backdrop of this latest dialogue experience, which has undergone several transitions. I had originally invited a third party, a doctor of education, to participate – a young woman who has spent the last several years starting an on-line school to promote new education ideals – namely one that promotes self healing, self mastery and inner peace as a way to increase awareness. It was my intention to examine “peace and conflict resolution” from multiple perspectives – specifically to bridge the social justice perspective and the spiritual intelligence or transcendent perspective.

Unfortunately, midway into the dialogue, she decided not to continue. Her rationale was that it is not her intention or goal to “fix” or “reform” this dysfunctional system, but rather to offer a completely new paradigm for education, one that redefines teaching and learning. She felt that there is no reason to continually discuss the current state of conflict or violence in schools. It is her belief that healing is inner work and entails a global shift and how we focus our energy (on the old or the new paradigm) is extremely relevant to the outcomes of our work. She also was not happy with the methodology of the dialogue and felt that the questions should be more Socratic in nature and controlled by the facilitator.

I share this backdrop with you, reader, because I believe that while it is my intention to bridge different perspectives and come to greater understanding within our diversity as educators and students for social awareness and change – reviewing the process is equally critical in our understanding of this type of work. I believe we gain great insight into the nature of community building when we share the challenges, obstacles and inner workings of “dialogue” itself. In this way, I hope to find value in the experience and voice of others even when it is different from our own.

After she left the dialogue, I decided to reflect for some time on whether or not to continue on with Mr. Manseau even though the change in participation would impact the questions and the original focus. To say the least, I was uncomfortable and not sure how to proceed. I also felt that a certain level of trust was broken which cannot easily be repaired. One of the fundamental ground rules of dialogue is to make a commitment not to walk away until it is complete and to honestly make the effort to respond to the questions presented to you – even if they are not questions that you would normally answer. Instead of not answering the question because you feel it is not “relevant” to your work or your outlook on life – you can respond by discussing the question itself, why you do not want to answer it or how the wording of the question might mask assumptions that you are not willing to accept as truth. In this way, you honor the premise of the dialogue and you also honor your own voice. This can be hard to do, as demonstrated in this dialogue. We are often afraid of engaging in a dialogue that might somehow divert us from our own center. Participating in dialogue, therefore, is a courageous act.

Ultimately, I decided to continue the dialogue with Mr. Manseau, who so graciously agreed to finish the process to the end in spite of the ambiguity. I hope that the resulting dialogue does merit our efforts.

The tone of this dialogue is different from previous ones and I sincerely appreciated the opportunity to shift my voice into a less academic and more conversational style. This dialogue is also much shorter than the others, which I believe is to all of our benefit. Enjoy.

Raquel: What personal lived experience in your life has lead you to make a commitment studying and working for peace and conflict resolution?

We own over 200,000 acres of farmland in Canada where we hire off-shore people in order to come maintain our work, all of whom are African American. Coming from a small town where I grew up seeing African Americans clean my house and pick my tobacco, I observed a hierarchy of color. Also coming from a small town, bigotry and racism often talked and laughed about at the dinner table as opposed to playing Scrabble or Pictionary like ordinary get-togethers. Realizing that I was gay was when I felt marginalized in my own town where I was supposed to be on top. It was only after I understood that I would be the alienated minority if ever I came out of the closet, that I realized that I also should not see a black person as a laborer, a mentally challenged person or a useless being. The same as we shouldn’t see a gay person as someone who is diseased and different.

My decision to help foster peace may be a stretch, but what I do fight for is equality for rights, freedoms and opportunities. My epiphany, sadly, did not arise from hearing my mother call one of our workers the N word, but rather, my mother calling someone on the television the F word.

I argue that my wanting to become a peacemaker was not out of self-interest, but it was when I hit rock bottom with my own identity that I felt that I, nor anyone else, should ever have to feel this way.

Jason: What is your definition of peace and what is your biggest fear about the peace process?

Peace is not, in my opinion, the absence of conflict but rather the absence of violence. I believe that many people try to avoid conflict in their lives, which can create violence at one point or another because we cannot suppress nature and it is in our nature to experience conflict. Conflict is the transitional state between one way of seeing and being and another. We are in a state of conflict when we are being asked to change (our perceptions, our behaviors, our relationships, our attention) and we have not yet arrived at the new state. As a result, we experience conflict, disunion, a lack of comfort, chaos, confusion, defensiveness, and so on – all of the natural feelings that we attach to the experience of letting go of something and letting in something else. The greater the sense of loss the greater the conflict. The greater our refusal to surrender to change, the greater the conflict. Violence is one response to conflict – it is a choice. We can choose to experience conflict and inflict violence on ourselves or others or both. I also believe that it is easy to express conflict violently because it is a great release of energy that provides us with an immediate sense of liberation. Ultimately, the benefits of violence are temporary and the change that is taking place will inevitably continue with or without a violent outbreak. That is why I understand peace and conflict resolution work to be primarily about accepting conflict as natural and practicing ways in which we can experience conflict in our lives without resorting to violence. The only goal of this practice, the practice of peaceful conflict resolution, is to reduce human suffering.

I fear that peace, real peace both locally and globally will always be just beyond our reach. My fear is based on personal and professional experiences that have shown me how difficult it is for us to first consider the possibility of non-violent behavior. We are bombarded with violence and are taught early on the philosophy of “survival of the fittest” which I believe is at the heart of violent behavior. “Survival of the fittest” implies that we must fight each other for survival, that our society values the winner and that it is natural to discard the looser. It also implies that there is scarcity in the world, rather than abundance. Consequently, people believe violence is a natural part of the human condition and that a discussion of peace and non-violent behavior becomes almost mute.

My biggest fear, therefore is the possibility that humankind must continue to experience more and more severe acts of terror, war, suffering and disaster before they consider alternative ways of seeing and living.

Raquel: What is your definition of peace? Do you think peaceful conflict resolution is more difficult to achieve in communities that are marginalized, disenfranchised and impoverished? Why or why not?

My definition of peace is understanding. I don’t think that the iconic picture of children of different races holding hands on the globe is practical. I think that as long as we understand one another (regardless of religion, spirituality, race, culture or sexual orientation) we have a good foundation for moving forward as a human collective.

Going into marginalized and impoverished areas is essential in peace work because those are the ones who feel alienated and rash out. The process is long, but to help the obvious majority who are willing to change will never change the opinions of what the marginalized think of them. I think that by going into these small communities, their dogma about being left out in the world without opportunities or rights will change.

Often it is not a person’s belief about the other that creates conflict, but the narrative and opinions that do. We all believe life could be better. I often get belief and dreaming mixed up because our beliefs are never meet with our reality no matter how good we have it. And so when it comes to living a life of conflict, we believe it could be better even though we don't know how to get there.

BUT, we do have opinions about why we are where we are in the world and we place blame and create stories about others and ourselves in order to justify where we are and what we must do. That is different. That is our own personal narrative and opinion that I think separates each of us from one another. The one thing I believe all humans do have in common is belief – we all believe - though a lot of the times are beliefs are never met.

Again, I think we need to go into small, marginalized communities and give them hope and keep promises that we make. This is far more beneficial than helping those who are “on the fence.”

Jason: Is world peace unattainable? Or is it that peace should be a segmented process whereby we should work inwards into the global network?

This question relates in great part to what I spoke about previously. I don’t know if world peace in attainable or unattainable but I do want to believe that world peace in inevitable. I trust that the world, like the individual, must go full cycle until it lands firmly into a new place, a new reality in which suffering ceases to exist and human beings can find abundance and joy in their existence here on earth rather than waiting for the afterlife.

Because of this, I believe that peace work is ultimately a segmented process whereby we work inwardly and ultimately into a global network. I don’t think that peace work can happen without a fundamental transformation of the individual however I do believe that individuals working for peace within the current system intend to do so and this intent can lead them closer to the work that they have to do for themselves first. In other words, I don’t disregard organized peace work as being meaningless. The contrary is true. Aligning oneself to peace work, organizing for peace or other worldly pursuits in the name of peace-- all have merit irregardless of where each individual finds him or herself on the journey of inner peace. Why? Because as a collective, there is a shared intent towards peace and that intent, that energy can only move individuals towards the ultimate goal of experiencing both inner and outer peace.

Raquel: Why do you think there is an increase of violent acts in schools in the US? Is this similar or different to schools in Canada?

Canada is lead by small news stations whereby local news is hardly watched because we have access to FOX, CNN and other major news stations conceived by the United States. From what I understand by the media, the easiest answer would be that the United States has a much larger population and so it is susceptible to have more violence.

I think there is a much larger issue. The United States I would compare to “free trade” whereas Canada I would compare to “fair trade.” The “free trade” system helps very few become very rich whilst the remaining participants are left with nothing. People will raid before they starve. Whether it is selling drugs, the insecurities that many have because they have no other options in life or poor healthcare and educational systems -- violence seems to be the only option for a lot of youth to express their angst and aggression towards the world.

Canada has some violence, but Canada also has many social programs for youth to help find themselves whether it is athletically or academically. Surprisingly, they work hand-in-hand. If someone from Jane and Finch (the poorest and most dangerous place in Toronto, Canada) has shown great basketball skills, social programs help foster that talent but also encourage academics as a means to get farther with athleticism. Fair Trade? Yes.

Canada helps many of the poorest in its nation in order for them to thrive. The agenda may be that we want to appear to be more democratic and socialist, but the means sometimes justifies the end in spite of the motive. Canada spends a lot of its money on bettering citizens whereas the United States spends a lot of its money on those who can make more money for their country. As George Bush said in his 9/11 speech, “continue shopping.”

Violence in the United States has increased because children and youth need to exert some sort of autonomy in the world. Without power, we feel weak – and so many use violence as a means to become something in the world.

Jason: The readings suggest that the world is in chaos. Where do we untangle this mess? Is there a specific sector from which we go from? Do they all meet at some point?

I have always felt that we need to work with the most needy, the most helpless, the ones that have every reason to lash out against the world. I have believed that one should be in the heart of need and violence and that it is our moral and ethical obligation to extend a hand, offer compassion and communicate hope. However, I have experienced great disappointment in my efforts in this area (which has not always been the case) and have recognized the limitations of this way of thinking. This is really a personal response, because I think everyone is different and has a different purpose. I don’t know anymore if you have to live in the midst of hate, violence, need, despair and conflict in order to be of service to humankind and work for peace. Perhaps it is not for every body.

I am exploring the possibility that each of us has to first undertake the chaos we experience within ourselves before we can confront the outside world. It does not mean we have to live in a monastery until we have reached a state of enlightenment before we can be useful in the world, it just means that we have to work on understanding ourselves, our own internal conflicts and come to a state of compassion for the human condition before we can help others. I do believe we can do this simultaneously (help ourselves and help others) if we acknowledge that we are students in this endeavor, that we are imperfect and that our intent should not be to impact another, but to impact ourselves. Finally, I do believe that in doing so, there is a point in which individuals meet, sectors meet and that our individual and collective experience of “chaos” will change.

Raquel: Krishnamurti writes: Most of us have fear in one form or another; and where there is fear there is no intelligence. And is it not possible to for all of us, while we are young, to be in an environment where there is no fear but rather an atmosphere of freedom—freedom, not just to do what we like, but to understand the whole process of living? I ask: How might fear play a part in conflicts in schools? Do you think we need to give students in schools more freedom or less freedom to promote peace? What does it mean to be free?

This ties hand-in-hand with what I talked about earlier. I did not realize there needed to be a change until I feared I would lose everything. I think that when we fear, we research, speak and form collectives based on the fear. Rosa Parks was probably shaking the entire time when she sat in front of the bus at risk of becoming brutalized, assaulted or harassed, but because of her courage, she instituted change.

Total freedom doesn’t allow change. If we are all free to do what we want, we see no opportunity for betterment. I believe we need marginalization in order for people and people like myself to understand our vocation in life. Without conflict, where would we be? That doesn’t mean I rely on people’s deprivation in order for me to feel better about myself or to help nourish my sense of vocation, but I believe that when people fear, they think of every possible solution to get out and this is inevitable.

What we need to do is promote peaceful mindsets and solutions while people are in this metaphorical claustrophobic corner. There is a small window of time until people in the corner do things like commit suicide or resort to violence. This is where we must promote peace in order for those who are marginalized to act intelligently.

I feel we have to struggle in order to know what freedom is. I really haven't had to experience what struggle is, but I know those who have and they appreciate freedom. My friend Sadig who fleed Sudan at 5 will never discredit or hinder his freedom here. He is in Kiniesology and is law abiding because he understands what can be taken away from him. I believe that we need to be at a loss of something in order to understand what freedom actually is, otherwise we take our freedom for granted and become self indulgent.

Let's just say I inherit a lot of money when my parents pass. I have the freedom financially to buy a house, car and travel the world. But when I lose it or it gets taken away, I do not have the freedom I once had. But does that mean I don't have freedom? What I am saying is that freedom is not one thing, it is sought after and we must struggle in order to be enlightened for our freedom. We must find it for ourselves because someone else’s freedom could be my prison. Freedom is a self-enlightening experience that we all must struggle and fight for to be truly free.

Jason: I think we need to realize that bridging peace to an individual is based on individual perceptions and experience, so this is a personal question… Is chaos solved from our particular start-point, or does it differ based on values?

The focus here is the self. The self is experiencing chaos, is it not? Therefore, in order to understand this chaos, one must start with understanding oneself. Chaos for one person might not be chaos for another and vice versa. What I value will determine my state of chaos. This relates to my explanation of conflict above. We experience conflict or chaos when we are caught between two points or several points – it doesn’t matter how many, only that we are in a state of flux, transition. We experience chaos when there is movement. The movement can be from one spot to another or it can be totally dispersed in which there is an overwhelming sense of an implosion or explosion, depending on how you perceive it. Either way, there is an enormous amount of energy that is moving around us, within us. We might perceive this energy as happening to us, but ultimately we are part of the energy and we must decide how we are going to respond to it. That is why our perception of it, our value of it is so critical to understanding how to respond to it. Do you walk away? Do you stay in it? Do you fight it? Do you absorb it? Do you pretend it its not happening? All of these are choices, responses to chaos, to conflict. What we do with it is dependent on our understanding of our “self.”

Raquel: How would you work with a small community that has experienced a traumatic act of violence? How can schools work to prevent this type of violence and how can youth begin to reclaim a sense of peace after having been part of/ exposed to such violence at such an early age?

As for working with a community after a crisis has happened, there are many steps that can be taken; though in my opinion, I think that a VOM (Victim Offender Mediation) is probably the most suitable.

Everyone - no matter if they are directly or indirectly involved in a community crisis is affected. If it has to do with gay bashing, an identity is compromised. If it is something similar to that of 9/11, religion and culture are in question by all neighboring parties.

The process need not be constricted and nor shall there be an abundance of criteria and rules needed in order to do so, however, what we need to do in these situations (when speaking of the Gay bashing in Puerto Rico) is humanize the offender and the victim.

The outcome should be forgiveness. Not to long ago, a man went into an Amish school and shot several Amish students and children. Those mourning did not create an "us vs. them" approach, but instead went to the murderers wifes house to console her and offer her meals.

This example is what will be a classic in time to come - humanizing. We must not just humanize the victim but also the offender and those around each of them. By doing this - we start to see people as people with hearts and minds and not just physicalities personifiying a stereotype whether it be a flamboyant homosexual or a violent redneck.

I think that by doing this - the entire community can be involved in this process despite the origin of their feelings towards the situation. The family tree extends inasmuch as our ancestry, but the human family needs connectedness and understanding in order for us to understand ourselves and alike and different.

Jason: I believe that peace is a conceptualized process whereby some people see peace as a personal and very interpersonal thing. Is it a general concept whereby a tentative definition is less than sufficient? What do we do and where do we start? A spider web starts from one thread and becomes an intricate formation…where do we go?

I am not sure I understand the question but I think you are trying to say that the notion of peace is abstract – which might be what you mean by conceptualized. I understand why you say this and it reminds me of how we talk about love.

I think that peace is an experience. I think love is an experience. Oftentimes, words are insufficient to describe this experience. Both live outside the system of words. However, it exists and therefore I would not agree when you say that peace is a concept. It is real and the absence of peace is also very real. Especially to he or she who is experiencing it or lacking the experience of it. We know when we are at peace. We know when we are not. We know when we love. We know when we do not. It is a very real experience.

There is nothing to do and there is nowhere to start, really when you understand peace to be an experience, like love. When you love, you are just in this experience and there is very little that you can do about it. There is no time or space just the feeling of it and how it penetrates every cell in your body. It has a life of its own and we are enslaved by it. Peace, I believe is the same. When you are in a state of peace, you are no longer bound by the human condition. You are part of an energy that has a life of its own and you are in a state of surrender. In this place, you just do what is most natural and most apparent at that moment. There is neither beginning nor end because it evolves constantly.

I like your analogy of the spider web. The spider web starts from one thread, you say, but the thread is nature. What I mean is the thread is the spider’s natural mode of expressing itself into the universe. The thread is not a choice, it is not a beginning, it is a response to life, an experience of being and a unique act of creation. The resulting intricate formation is merely our perception of its beauty, but the fact is, the spider web is merely a place to rest and a place to store food, is it not? The spider was not out to create anything other than to live its own existence.

I think what all of this means to me is that we need to seek the natural answers within ourselves without any sense of obligation to society, to change society, to help the other, to solve the problem of world peace. I don’t think that we have to solve world peace and I don’t think we should take on that task. I believe that as we get close to our true nature, peace will be the inevitable outcome. Violence is not natural. Conflict may be natural but if we do not live in a state of constant fear, our response to conflict will simply be acceptance, patience and curiosity to see conflict unfold and transform into something new, a new state of being. That is natural.

I don’t think that we are built with the instinct to destroy, to create pain or to threaten our survival as a species. I think that we have lost ourselves and are struggling to be free and that once we give ourselves the permission to trust, love and find joy in existence - we will only act toward this aim, for ourselves and for others in the community as a natural extension of our being.

Many people question the validity of this argument. Especially when faced with a murderer, a rapist, a Hitler, a terrorist, for example – that we as human beings should be expected to retaliate with violence. That violence is self-defense and it is our basic right to secure our well-being. This is a good point and may have been true historically however I think history has also shown us that violence continues to escalate and grow and re-position itself throughout the globe – sometimes in the hands of the very victims who suffered long ago. When will we really consider exercising peaceful responses to conflict? We don’t even know what that might look like yet. I personally want to know what would happen if we do something differently.

This concludes this on-line dialogue on peace and conflict resolution. If you would like to ask a question of either participant, please contact info@realworldpd.org

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Transcensory Education: Expanding our Understanding of Intelligence

Dialogue with Doctors Raquel Ríos and Shiv D. Talwar

Dr. Shiv Talwar retired early from his career of teaching Civil Engineering to follow up on his early dream of doing “something” so that the identity savagery the like of which he experienced in India in 1947 becomes a thing of the past. Consequently, he helped initiate Spiritual Heritage Education Network Inc. (SHEN, http://www.spiritualeducation.org/). Shiv received his engineering education in India, United States and Canada. His childhood education in spirituality and human ethics began on regular early morning walks with his parents and continued formally with some excellent teachers in scheduled courses at school. This background enriched his life and shaped his values, still continues to do so and enabled him later to seek the guidance of his spiritual mentor Late Swami Vishwatma Bawra for advanced direction. He can be reached at shivtalwar@spiritualeducation.org

Raquel Rios, Ph.D. is the Executive Director of Real World Professional Development, a communications and professional development platform for educators and students to engage in a creative dialogue on diversity, community and spiritual awareness.

The purpose of this public dialogue is to promote the use of dialogue as a tool to build relationships across race, class, religion and gender for the purpose of collaboration for social justice and change. The dialogue is an interactive experience in which participants from diverse backgrounds share personal lived experiences, insights and thoughts related to a reading selection and consequent thought provoking questions designed by the participants themselves.

Reading Selections:
The Seven Dimensions of Spiritual Intelligence: An Ecumenical, Grounded Theory, by Yosi Amram, Institute of Transpersonal Psychology, Presented at the 115th Annual Conference of the American Psychological Association, 2007
Integrated Intelligence: The Future of Intelligence, by Marcus Anthony, University of the Sunshine Coast, Australia, Journal of Futures Studies, November 2003, 8(2): 39-54

Rios: First of all, let me publicly thank you, Dr. Talwar for participating in this dialogue. My first question to you is regarding the many terms used to describe an expanded understanding of knowledge to include a higher consciousness that transcends the human condition. Amongst them are: spiritual intelligence/education, transpersonal consciousness, transcensory education, and existential intelligence. Which term do you feel most comfortable with and why? How might the terminology be an important factor in the research and development of this body of knowledge?

My answer to your question is linked intimately to the thrust of my underlying thoughts, which I would prefer to present before addressing the question directly.

Who and what is a human being and what is her/his nature? Where do we come from and what is our ultimate destination? What is our relationship with others? What is the purpose of our being? Why do we want to do good and avoid evil? What is good? What is evil? Humanity has been seeking coherent answers to such questions from times immemorial.

According to the deepest insights of prophets, sages and seers the world over, everyone and everything in the universe in which we exist are a manifestation and an unfolding of an ultimate reality. This reality is different from anything that exists in the universe on one hand, and everything that exists is nothing but this reality on the other. Everything, all entities, all beings, all emotions and all ideas in the universe can be explained and understood, without recourse to any other entity, in terms of this ultimate reality. At the same time, there is nothing, no entity, no being, no emotion and no idea in the universe in terms of which the ultimate reality can be explained or understood.

But, we humans are intellectual beings and we need to understand. Understanding and explanations operate at different planes varying all the way from the most apparent and the simplest to that of the deepest insights into reality. Our understanding becomes our reality until we transcend it and reach a deeper comprehension. The process can go on as long as one keeps on learning through the focused application of one’s intellect in the initial stages and transcending in the later. This final understanding is called the ultimate as compared to the first understanding closest to the most apparent which may be called the immediate. Thus, there is a whole world of understandings between the immediate and the ultimate.

The stepwise journey from the immediate to the ultimate is the bottom up approach. This is the approach of science. This is also the approach of most spiritual seekers who can only climb one rung of the ladder at a time. On the contrary, making one quantum leap from the immediate to the ultimate and then explaining the immediate from this vantage is the top down approach which is available only to the select few. Let us look at how this works. The reality of the universe is undeniable. Something must come out of something. Nothing can come out of nothing. The universe comes out of its ultimate cause. Just like the reality of the universe is undeniable, the reality of its underlying principle is undeniable as well.

Since all “things insentient” and all “sentient beings” in the universe exist through an unfolding of the One ultimate reality. The process of manifestation begins with its appearance as two inseparable principles: one of consciousness that animates and one of a primordial nature that underlies the physical bodies of all sentient and insentient beings. This One ultimate reality is also referred to as the Absolute Being in order to differentiate it from us relative beings.

Since all beings, sentient and insentient, are manifestations of the One ultimate reality or Absolute Being, we all “sentient” and “insentient” alike share the two principles of consciousness and primordial nature. Thus, we are ultimately all one, both at the levels of our consciousness and our physical being, although at the relative level, our apparent reality is that of separate individuals.

We were told that we were created by God. What is this ultimate reality and what is its’ manifestation? The concept of God is an immediate level explanation that societies use to explain our existence. God is a personal being that creates us and the world. God creates us from nothing. There is no material used for his creation. We may understand that He creates us from Himself, in his own image.

The concept of an ultimate reality on the other hand is the deepest insight of all our prophets, sages and seers. These insights are written in our scriptures. But human scriptures are written so that they are meaningful to all of us including those who can only understand the immediate and the apparent. Human scriptures present the whole range of spiritual insights, from the immediate to the ultimate, experienced by our prophets, sages and seers on their personal spiritual journeys and recorded for our guidance.

In this context, language uses two mutually opposing terms: matter and spirit. Matter is characterized by direct sense perception through the cognitive senses, while spirit can only be perceived indirectly through the eye of the intellect. Matter is gross and apparent, while spirit is the subtle essence hidden behind the apparent. Understanding of the subtle essence is spiritual understanding. Its nature depends upon how deep below the apparent one is able to dive. It may be said that all spiritual discernment/understanding is transcensory in nature.

Direct human experience is related to the world of sense perception, i.e., to the material world. Our language describes our experience and therefore it too is limited to the material world. We define ourselves through our experience, our understanding, and our worldview, which define our personal identity. In that sense, all spiritual understanding/education is transpersonal.

As you said, there are many terms used to describe an understanding or consciousness that transcends human condition. Let us first consider the term existential education. Although the intended understanding/education is related with our existence, I do not think it is correct to call it existential education because the term is not specific enough in its definition of the subject matter to be taught, which in my perspective, is specifically related with the journey of the spirit. Between these two, the term which I prefer to use is spiritual because it reflects the nature of the intention more specifically than existential education.

The terms transcensory and transpersonal reflect the transcendental nature of the proposed education: we need to progressively transcend the realm of our senses and sensory experience on our journey from the immediate and most apparent to the ultimate. These terms are procedural rather than definitional in nature. Why not call a thing by a name that describes what it is rather than that which describes how to get it? I prefer to use the definitional term of spiritual education.

We already are familiar with the terms spirit or spirituality. Why coin new terms? One reason may be the historical burden the term spirit carries because of its close association with faith or religion. There is so much confusion between core spirituality (which may be called quintessential religion) and popular religion (commonly understood by its doctrine, dogma and ritual) that many people refer to popular religion as spirituality.

Religion for its popular appeal relates with the most apparent and immediate form of spiritual understanding to be grasped by the common person on the street. Education in core spirituality on the other hand aims at fulfilling the “promise” of religion by deepening the understanding and transform consciousness to see the underlying oneness of all creation.

Terminology is an important factor in the research and development of the intended body of knowledge. I do not recommend expedience as the deciding factor. In research and development, it is important to be rigorous, precise and academically honest -- otherwise standards are easily compromised.

The intended body of knowledge is already present in the world of scriptural literature. We do not need to reinvent it. What we do need to do is learn how to highlight core spirituality in meaningful ways to take it deep into our consciousness. To be meaningful in today’s context, we must interpret it didactically with affirmations from secular disciplines. In addition to concepts, we need to emphasize theory and practice of transcendental disciplines for transforming human consciousness to align with these concepts.

Talwar: What do you understand by the terms spirituality, spiritual development and spiritual education in a pluralistic setting and what in your opinion should be the purpose and goals of such education?

In search of a greater understanding of social justice and spiritual awareness, I found you and your organization. My journey began in my mind, traveled through to my heart and settled in meditation for some time before the door opened to deeper knowledge. This is occurring now with you, your network affiliates and the experience of non-coincidental events that have appeared on my map once it was started. All of this, my lived experience as I breathe it, highlights my fundamental understanding of spirituality and spiritual education. I define it as the overt, explicit and deliberate willingness to engage in an ethereal process that leads us closer to truth, focused and sustained action for inner peace and community building. You rightly state that “there is a whole world of understandings between the immediate and the ultimate,” and I often wonder where I now stand in that spectrum. When did I first begin to gain insight into consciousness? Where will the journey lead? What is the ultimate for me and how will I experience it? It is my belief that while the ultimate is a universal Oneness, each of us has a unique experience of it and an equally unique role within it. This is curiosity, as I see it. This is motivation, engagement with and for life. These things, too, are spirituality and spiritual development and all of what education is meant to be. What is education without this intrinsic desire for knowledge and infinite curiosity for the beyond?

Perhaps this is why I have been using the term transcensory education in my work because as you so rightly note, transcensory and transpersonal education are procedural rather than definitional in nature. Why not call a thing by a name that describes what it is rather than that which describes how to get it? I imagine that each of us will gravitate towards the term that currently defines our own inner understanding, our particular space in time. I am very much interested in the process that I am engaging in, the “how” so to speak so that as I live it and believe it and see it and experience the endless bounty within it, I can share it with others, teach it, and continuously engage in the process of educating for change.

In the workbook, Teaching to Transcend: A New Life Skills Workbook for Organic Teaching (Rios, 2009), I posit that transcensory education is the practice of reaching beyond the traditional human experience limited to the five senses in order to maximize human potential. Implicit in transcensory education is the notion that humans are at a critical point in their evolution and that we have the power to exist above and independent of the material plane. The role of the teacher, therefore, expands into new territory. Teachers become critical agents in the personal and professional development of their students by recognizing that integral to their work is to “shepherd” students through and into change (Pearl, 2001). In this space, students and teacher begin to experience a heightened awareness that all things are possible and that we are all part of an infinite universe in which we determine the shape and content of our daily experience.

Humans are multi-sensory beings and have access to a sixth sense or higher consciousness that guides us to reach beyond our human limits. Many artists speak of seeing things differently while drawing, for example, and have mentioned that drawing puts them into a somewhat altered state of awareness. They say that they feel alert and aware yet are relaxed and free of anxiety, experiencing a pleasurable almost mystical activation of the mind (Edwards, 1999). This “mystical activation” of the mind or spiritual intelligence, so to speak, becomes the gateway to higher order thinking skills such as problem solving and decision-making. Spiritual intelligence is defined as the capacity to use a multi-sensory approach – including intuition, meditation and visualization – to access one’s inner knowledge in order to solve problems of a global nature (Sisk & Torrance, 2001).

It is well documented across many fields and recently with greater fervor- that there is indeed a unique perception, a higher state of awareness and a shared yearning for greater purpose that acts as a significant variable in our understanding of human potential. It is important to know that all children occupy a place on the continuum labeled Spiritual Intelligence (Painton, 2007), contrary to what some educators propose – that spiritual intelligence is of and for the “gifted and talented.”

It is this very quality, this spirit variable of a child that transcends the human condition. Unfortunately because we don’t always see children the way they really are, just like we don’t always see ourselves for who we really are, our essence, our “soul,” so to speak -- accepting spiritual intelligence as a truth cannot be assumed and becomes an ongoing process of discovery. One of the goals of spiritual education is making a constant and deliberate intent to see children and all human beings with a heightened sense of awareness and reverence and to accept as truth this deeper dimension that we may or may not fully understand at our own personal stage of development. That our assessment of a child’s development or growth will be as far as our own development or growth allows us to see and therefore the possibility of limitation will always exist. We as educators can never be certain because certainty in our judgment of another human being falls outside the realm of spirituality.

In a pluralistic setting, transcensory education/spiritual education aims to unify and build community amongst beings who on the material plane carry diverse identities. Self awareness and raised identity consciousness can have many outcomes. I know this personally and academically. As one gets closer to understanding the self, there is an initial feeling of separation and individuation that can separate the “self” from others in a dualistic manner. Furthermore, if you are a person from a particular ethnic group, race, gender, sexual orientation or religion that has historically been oppressed, greater self-awareness creates the desire in you to want to fight for the rights of your particular group. Others from the outside of those oppressed groups can choose to become an activist as well but ultimately the same duality occurs. Consequently, many groups exist, each divided by identity lines. Activism becomes about fighting for “rights” that are distributed by those with greater power. In this way self-awareness raises identity consciousness, which feeds into the illusion that we are separate and that we have to compete for a bag of goods that somehow was put into the hands of the “other” or the enemy. It is my current belief that this type of activism, activism without a deep understanding of the universal spirit, can go against the common good because it perpetuates divisiveness and a limited view of reality. It is in this limited view of reality where we are separate and scarcity exists. It seems to me that the roles in history (like in all power relationships) keep changing and the oppressor becomes the oppressed at one point or another and that ultimately it is the attachment to “identity” that divides us because identity like borders, creates the illusion of separateness and that nature can be contained. It is this worldview that has created the passport. What is this passport and how has it been allowed to gain so much power over the lives of beings? This can be understood both literally and metaphorically.

All of these thoughts lead me to propose the following goals of transcensory/spiritual education, specifically within a pluralistic society:

~We are all human beings who share one common experience, that is this thing called life.

~Human beings in life are conditioned by personal and social identities that impact how we see the world and understand reality.

~Self-awareness and social awareness is a necessary and immediate step in all education. We must critically see ourselves within the context of the world to gain an understanding of the limitations inherent in the human condition.

~We can transcend the human condition in so far as we recognize the existence of a greater reality or energy source that is defined differently by different communities but which is ultimately concerned with matters of the soul or spirit.

~Teaching the whole child includes this spiritual dimension and actualizing one’s human potential depends on it.

~Transcensory/ spiritual education is the underlying force behind personal and social transformation.

Rios: What is the purpose of spiritual education and what is the role of the teacher in this paradigm?

In my opinion, the purpose of spiritual education is a clear communication of the core spiritual principle that the universe is an indivisible whole thoroughly pervaded and intimately connected by its ground of being. Its implications define the purpose of human life and ethics for entire humankind. It becomes our responsibility then to fully absorb this principle taking it deep into our consciousness in order to live our lives accordingly. This principle is totally unifying and inclusive of all beings and the environment.

The promise of religion is to achieve this purpose, but human history shows that it has failed to achieve it. Why?

Religion is a two-faced institution. One unites and the other divides.

Religion confines infinite reality in finite forms rendering somebody's God less Godlike, somebody's prophet less prophetic and another’s community less righteous and deserving. This is the divisive face.

Spiritual education promises to use a unifying face to dull the edge of the divisive one. Religion builds communities and core spirituality builds one human family in the wider universal context.

Religion is meaningful only to its followers. Core spirituality on the other hand is meaningful to the whole humanity. Religion has become the basis of exclusive tribal values. Core spirituality is the basis of inclusive and shared human values.

It is ironic, with religion, that what starts off unifying people into communities becomes the very thing that divides them. Community is good, but divisive tribalism is not.

Religious doctrine veils core spirituality and its propagation is not in the worldly interest of the institution of religion. It is obvious that religion is ineffective as a vehicle of teaching our underlying oneness and shared human values in a pluralistic world.

Religion builds religious identities. Core spirituality, on the other hand, transcends religion and can help human beings in transcending religious identities on their way to global human identities. Globalization of human minds is essential to eliminate identity savagery that is currently becoming commonplace.

The propagation of core spirituality and the building of global human identities is a matter of essence for the educational systems of the world. The educational systems must rise to meet this challenge if humanity is to survive the global problems it faces today. A measure of spiritual education is its success in facilitating spiritual insights for humankind to lead loving and constructive lives in unity and cohesion.

The prime role of the teacher in this paradigm is to keep its purpose in focus at all times and strictly follow a set of ethics for the delivery of spiritual education.

Spiritual Education must be delivered and pursued ethically. It must be remembered at all times that spirituality and religion are complimentary and not in competition with each other. Religion seeks to build communities of human beings while spirituality seeks to knit all beings into one family. Spirituality seeks to highlight the universality of religion. It regards all religions as different starting points of the same spiritual journey.

The important conclusion of spiritual endeavour is that it is senseless to bring in the element of exclusivity in one’s religion while downgrading others. This conclusion needs further elaboration because what is advocated here is not merely tolerance of other religions but mutual respect and acceptance of other religions. This can be ensured only when there is no seed of intolerance at all in the pursuit of a religion.

According to Meister Eckhart, “Everything pertaining to the spiritual realm is inclusive and unitive by nature, whilst matter is by nature exclusive and implies separative particularity; the more spiritual a thing is, the more inclusive and thus universal it is, and the more material a thing is, the more it excludes other things by the very rigidity of its specific contours.”

It is my firm position that spirituality that lies at the core of every religion is “inclusive and unitive by nature”

Talwar: How do you think spirituality relates with religion? What should be the strategies to ensure the support of religion in the promotion of education in universal spirituality?

I find the relationship between spirituality and religion problematic especially for many who consider themselves progressive, liberal or open-minded. The reason for this relates to your argument that religion has fallen into divisiveness, dogma and ritual in practice- void of any real spirituality. Religion has also been at the helm of many atrocities worldwide and so social justice minded folks could be skeptical of what I call, “institutionalized” religion. Notwithstanding, religion plays a very positive role in many people’s lives including within my own family. I was born into a Catholic family and we understood religion to be the place where we could entertain thoughts of miracles, help from the “spirits,” the importance of prayer and honoring tradition. This was and continues to be good food for the soul and so my reticence to applaud religion and my skepticism regarding any zealous expression of religious affiliation in my life is a paradox. Unfortunately, religious dogma has distracted me from thoroughly examining religion and scripture, which is where many of the great sages have found a home and a forum to communicate core spiritual ideals – those which I espouse.

Spirituality transcends limitlessly. Religion, on the other hand, encourages transcendence only to a point. It often feeds off the immediate, material and “ego” for sustenance. Religious doctrine veils core spirituality causing many a good intentioned soul to get lost in dogma and to move further away from the One spiritual truth. That is why there is great discrimination and slavery within many religious households.

One relevant book that helped me to reconsider “religion” from a more objective standpoint is Tolstoy’s The Kingdom of God is Within You. It really was the first book that repositioned religion for me and articulated the separation of religion from core spirituality, as well as its political context. I want to love Christ when I understand Jesus’ teachings and yet it is difficult to articulate this within the current context of religion. I love Buddha and the language associated with Buddha feels more free, and yet Buddha and Christ are the same and One. Why is this so? It is difficult to speak of Jesus with true love and compassion without feeling a sense of shame and repulsion for how his name is being used to spread hate and ignorance. I don’t want to be affiliated with that “identity.” I share this personal dilemma because I believe that my experience is far from unique and my work in the field of transcensory education will push me to critically reflect on these issues constantly. I believe that if I am honest and open about the challenge inherent in religious talks verses spirituality, others like myself will consider revisiting the notion of “the spirit” in education.

I worry that if people like myself do not step up to the plate and claim spirituality for its real worth, then religious fanatics will continue to push ahead misguided messages in our silence. It is important that we do not allow religious talk, or spirituality to be monopolized by the status quo because we negate our innate desire to know the unknown and speak and walk in truth. Children, most of all, need to know that we can take a stand for truth and at the same time not espouse any one religion over another. They need to know that knowledge and power are communicated through religious doctrine and that our silence, our decision to not take part in the spiritual debate is allowing a mere few to manipulate how we see and understand the spiritual world. It is simply not fair.

Therefore, it is extremely delicate and important as we move ahead with spiritual education initiatives and for this reason, I agree with you, Dr. Talwar, when you say, “Terminology is an important factor in the research and development of the intended body of knowledge” and that you do not recommend expedience in the deciding factor. What is the immediate goal and what is the ultimate goal of spiritual education and can we incorporate both? I ask this because immediate goals might require the use of alternative terminologies so as not to alienate the very people we need to commune with in our efforts to promote the spirit in education and our holistic understanding of human potential and the evolution of our planet.

You ask me what I suggest as strategies to ensure the support of religion in the promotion of education in universal spirituality. One strategy is to creatively build a new language around the field in order to ensure the engagement of common people who are at the immediate stages of spiritual development. There are many people who will not even engage in a dialogue if it is presented in a certain way. Why not create multiple entry points to the same material through the use of language? You say that we have to be careful not to compromise standards and I respond, this is true, however standards are likened to certainty and both, I fear, fall outside the realm of the spirit. What difference does it make how the conversation starts as long as the conversation has started?

Another strategy is to connect with and build alliances with organizations that work with religious groups who are committed to inter-religious understanding and cooperation. There are some larger organizations such as Universal Peace Federation (http://www.upf.org/) and The Tanenbaum Center for Inter-religious Understanding (http://www.tanenbaum.org/) and some smaller organizations like Faith In Place (http://www.faithinplace.org/) doing this kind of work. It is important to attract members of different faiths to work and network together because each member can network within his own religious group. The goals of these alliances should be to identify common ground, plan large scale initiatives that galvanize large constituency groups, develop a research and development agenda, advocate and lobby for education policy, work together to identify funding, share resources and publicly engage in an ongoing dialogue.

Rios: How can spiritual intelligence be applied to every day life?

In the context of this question, it is relevant to understand what spiritual intelligence is, how it is obtained in the first place, and how it is deepened and sharpened. Intellectual knowing is necessary as it creates awareness which provides the motivation to start the journey, but it is not enough. Why?

All of us are born with physical bodies and its needs keep us narrowly focused on them in a selfish manner. At birth, our cognitive and active senses are developed only partially and our intellect is not developed at all. We begin our lives with awareness limited to the fulfillment of physical needs only. We develop a sense of dependence on those who help us with our physical needs. Our dependence begins to turn into emotional attachment sowing the seeds of love: what we call natural familial love and affection.

Our helplessness in meeting our own needs and dependence on others initiates a sense of finitude to which are added a mix of likes, dislikes pleasant, unpleasant, pleasure, pain, and fears. These create a sense of self, an identity, the “me concept” even before we start feeling any natural love and affection. The “me concept” has had a head start on all other feelings and faculties, most certainly on the intellect which develops so very slowly.

Spiritual ideas such as oneness, unconditional love, universal love, sense of one universal family have not only to be planted but also cultivated. Remember, spirituality is a matter of the intellect and the selfishness in the “me concept” is natural. In my opinion, the real purpose of education is to expand the “me concept” to include all beings in the universe.

I have studied various wisdom traditions to some degree. They all agree on a necessary condition for beginning the journey towards a spiritually intelligent life and that condition is attenuation of the “me concept” which is called variously by names such as creaturely self, nafz, ahamkara, nefesh hayyah, inferior reason, ego self or simply ego, etc. They also agree that it must be totally eliminated for full expansion of consciousness to include all beings in the universe (expressed as the ability to see “God”); the words used in various traditions are to that effect are “Death”, “extinction”, “uprooting”, “transcendence”, “stillness” of the ego, etc.

So some kind of handle on this “me concept” or ego is necessary.

We need to:

~Attenuate of the ego to start on the road to spiritual intelligence;
~Progressively weaken the ego to continue further on the road; and
~Silence it completely or make it extinct for total all inclusive oneness or love.
This is the state of human perfection described variously as liberation, salvation, nirvana, tawhid, buddhahood, etc.

Spiritual intelligence is intelligence to align our lives to the truth of all beings in the universe. The truth is that there is One unseen ineffable spiritual reality that manifests as “us” beings in the universe. The degree to which we see and live that oneness is a measure of our spiritual growth and the degree of spiritual intelligence we have achieved.

As we saw earlier, our ego consisting of our likes, dislikes, fears etc. comprise our limited identity. When we get something we don’t like, do not get something that we like, or when we see danger, our ego identity is threatened and we feel stressed. Everything else remaining the same, the stronger our sense of likes, dislikes, and fears, the stronger is our ego identity and the higher is our stress level.

Therefore, reduction of the ambient level of stress is a good place to start for taking control of the ego for its attenuation, reduction of its strength and final stillness.

Stress reduction is also referred to as the attainment of inner peace which is the characteristic mark of spiritual attainment on one hand and the prerequisite for spiritual development or spiritual intelligence on the other.

There are various strategies for this purpose. I am not knowledgeable in many, but I will share with you what I know. It is important to note the characteristics of this strategy: it is evidence based rather than faith based therefore it is didactic and secular. In addition, one can feel its results -- even measure its efficacy.

Psychologically life is a process consisting of cycles of stimuli and response; physiologically life is a process consisting of cycles of inhalations and exhalations. The stimulus-response cycles can be autonomous (as in reactive lives) or under control of our volition (as in thoughtful lives). Cycles of inhalations and exhalations can be autonomous or under the control of our volition.

Brain is a physiological organ. On one hand, it acts for the mind and, on the other hand, it runs the various functions of the body. Thus, the body and mind are so intimately related that the psychological and the physiological life processes mirror each other.

Ego is a faculty of the mind and it “thinks” that it knows” everything. It runs the psychological process automatically (reactively) without or little involvement of the faculty of intellect just like the primitive part of the brain runs the physiological process of breathing automatically without involving the thinking part.

Spirituality is not natural, therefore spiritual intelligence does not grow autonomously; on the other hand it is a subject of thought. If we let the psychological and physiological life processes run autonomously without involving thought, spiritual intelligence does not have a chance. Thus for spiritual intelligence, we need to involve thought in life processes, in stimulus and response cycles psychologically and in inhalation and exhalation cycles physiologically. The extent to which we are able to involve thought in these processes determines the extent to which we are able to attain spiritual intelligence.

With this background, we can outline a technique for the development of emotional intelligence:

~Breathe with thoughtful awareness as much as possible; be aware of every inhalation and be aware of every exhalation.

~Thoughtful breathing will make life thoughtful; you will notice every stimulus carefully and respond thoughtfully. Remember psychology mirrors physiology. This is emotional intelligence.

~Emotional intelligence opens the doorway to spiritual intelligence.

Various exercises in breathing with full awareness can be developed for teaching mindful breathing. We must stress the need to develop a habit of breathing with awareness as much of the time as possible.

Autonomous breathing is shallow and fast. Stress also makes our breath shallow and fast. Breath with awareness of inhalation and exhalation slows down the rate of breathing and also deepens the breath. Each deep breath is then fuller taking in more air into the lungs for providing us with vital energy. Not only that every minute we spend in breath focus is a minute away from focus on our stressors, but we are also breathing in more vital oxygen. The result of the process is significant reduction in stress.

Now let us focus on your question of the application of spiritual intelligence in everyday life. Again I will only address this question in relation to the above strategy. Acquisition and application of spiritual intelligence in every day life promises significant benefits to an individual, his family, community and the world at large:

~Physically, it promotes physical health and prevents physical disease through the minimization of stress level. The mechanism is stress reduction that both leads to spiritual intelligence and results from it. We now know very well that high stress adversely affects the immune system leading to all kinds of disease including hypertension, head aches, hardening of the arteries, heart and stroke problems, cancer, and many others.

~Psychologically, it promotes mental health and prevents mental disorder. Reduced stress levels enhance the application of focus to life problems resulting in positive solutions, makes for thoughtful rather than reactive lives, helps in better management of learning, relationships, anger, habits, addictions, etc.

~Spiritually, it opens up the mind to deep insights through decreased stress and increased focus. New insights in turn lead to a higher level of spiritual intelligence through the raised level of consciousness. One feels better connected through the feelings of oneness resulting in love first with the immediate environment and then with the global environment. One reaches the ultimate spiritual intelligence when only One exists and there is none other.

Talwar: Various UN bodies have asked for inclusive spiritual education. Why are the recommendations of the various UN bodies merely gathering dust? What are the strategies to overcome the resistance to this change? What will you say to the political and educational leaders of a nation to convince them to implement education in universal spirituality?


I think that we are scared of the power of spirit in education. In part our fear is a result of our indoctrination – that is that we fundamentally believe that the realm of the spirit pertains to religion and therefore should not be included in real education discourse and policy making. I further believe that even though we can recommend inclusive spiritual education on paper, it is very difficult to put into action because making inclusive spiritual education a reality is an affront to the status quo and the status quo controls the necessary funding and resources necessary for it to get done on a large scale. The status quo, mind you is also you and I. I do not once remove myself from this dilemma; we are all apart of it in so far as we are dependent on a source of income or identity in order to acquire our basic needs and then some, in many cases.

The United Nations, like any other large organization can fall into the paradigm of becoming “institutionalized” and self-serving. It is a natural threat to the political organization. The fact is, we have not yet considered that if freedom existed, why would we need the UN? How would the role of the UN change globally? Does the very nature of its existence depend on the fall of nations and conflict? The traditional role of humanitarian oriented organizations is to provide possible solutions to problems in society, employ an “elite” staff of professionals in the research and development of these solutions, deploy many of these professionals out into the field to engage with the “problem sites” and to return safely to their home bases to write and disseminate reports on the atrocities they see, create and present lofty initiatives to address these atrocities, participate in an endless cycle of conferences, panels and professional experiences that appear to be acts of advocacy and every once in a while to implement a mission, a program, a project that in the end serves very few and whose benefits lasts for a very short time. Please do not misinterpret what I am saying here. The UN and other organizations have done good in the world and I don’t mean to simplify or belittle the work of these organizations, however I have always believed that with all of the resources at our disposal and all of the technological advances and amazing developments in the world – it just doesn’t make sense that we still have poverty, for example. Let’s take New York City. It is the home of many impressive peace, social justice and other humanitarian organizations, is it not? And yet on one corner you see the sky rise building that houses these organizations and their employees and directly across the street in some cases, fifty men and women waiting on line for the soup kitchen to start serving. This is not the poverty that Americans often speak about somewhere over there in Africa, it is the poverty in our own backyards; it is the poverty we experience in our daily lives. What is our reality? Do you see a discrepancy? I want to believe in our good intentions, just like I want to believe in public education. But when I go into a dilapidated school that resembles a jail more than a place for learning, I frankly find it difficult to accept that we are really working for the same thing and we really care about all human beings. Perhaps lofty recommendations gather dust because they are born out of a systemic practice that is within itself part of the problem.

How many of us are really willing to sacrifice, do the work it takes to make sure that we are all free from the burdens of the human condition? How many of us really believe that there is enough to go around and that we can all eat, have a decent roof over our heads, have access to health care, learn to read, lead? How many of us are willing to put our own career, our own paycheck, our own children on the line in order to insist, demand and fight for change?

Which strategies do I suggest to overcome this resistance to change? I can only share with you the strategies that I use to lead the humble life that I live and that I believe is transforming miraculously into something that might resemble a true and spiritual life. Perhaps these strategies are one and the same.

We must constantly speak and live the truth in everything we say and do. I have often felt ashamed of my own human weaknesses and have wanted to hide from them but my own weakness is my neighbors too and I have to feel free to share my suffering and my pain even though I might not see any immediate point in it. I also try to listen to others and bear witness to their stories, their struggles and in any instance try to offer words of solace and help, if I can manage in some small way to make a difference in how they see or live in the world, I try to do it. Here is a big challenge for me and I fail at it often, but I continue along and engage in this practice as best as I can. I hope you understand that I am still trying to answer your question about strategies to overcome resistance to change at the political level and in front of leaders of a nation. This means that if I am in a position in which I find myself engaging in a conversation with a person in a leadership position, someone who I believe has a certain level of influence in the material world, it is imperative that I speak and act the truth with that person even if that may threaten personal gain (which it will, I assure you.) We all have the opportunity to engage with people of influence at one point of another and we really don’t know how far up on the ladder of influence that interaction might go (or sometimes we know exactly how far up it goes) and in those moments -- to speak up and speak the truth is probably the greatest strategy you have to overcome resistance to change because you are opening your spirit to that person and showing them just what it looks like and often we fall into the habit of talking about spirit without actually living in the spirit. What does spirit look like? Perhaps I am suggesting that we need to model alternative ways of being and seeing.

I firmly believe there is nothing that I can say that can convince leaders of a nation to implement education in universal spirituality. I don’t assume any authority or right to convince anybody or any national leader to do something that is not in their heart to do so on their own. I also cannot presume that there haven’t been hundreds before me who have at one time or another, gotten down on his or her knees, to beg for the same. The fact is we do not have the power to convince anybody to do anything. We can only create the conditions within ourselves and starting with our own immediate circle that will lead to the implementation of universal spirituality in education. How can we further create these conditions?

I suggest that make your voice heard in a public forum in a capacity that you can handle, consistently and persistently. It is important to continue the education of people in formal and informal ways because we most fear what we don’t understand. The more people understand what education for liberation is (freedom), what spiritual education is (freedom), what transcensory education is (freedom), then more and more people will naturally want to participate in it. He who is not free, will not see any door before him. He who is free walks through the door and wishes to hold it open behind him. However, since it is easier to walk through an open door than to see it, and seeing is at the heart of real change, it is important that we include in our strategy an educational forum to share the experience of other ways of seeing and being. Engaging publicly in dialogue is moving the hidden into the light and creating the conditions in which more people have access to a deeper understanding of universal reality and as you put it, Dr. Talwar, Oneness.

A final, but important strategy that I have been experimenting with is learning to remain flexible and open to as many art forms of freedom education possible because like religion, they are all part of the same journey. It is important to remain unattached to language and terminology, but rather become attached to the essence of a movement, which will inevitably take on as many faces as we have on earth. Do not care so much which approach to align yourself with - only that its purpose and integrity are the same. What is the essential practice of transcending the limitations of the human condition for inner and outer peace and community?

Rios: Why do you think there is a push to understand transcensory education from a scientific perspective? How does the scientific tradition of “objectivity” work against a real understanding of transcensory education?

Some may consider it an anathema to put spirituality and science in the same sentence. To my mind, such thinking is based upon misunderstandings both about spirituality and scientific objectivity. Spirituality is not mere religious doctrine; it is on the contrary, about the truth, it is quintessential religion comprising its very foundation. At the same time, science is not merely imagination or image breaker; it only breaks those images that are imaginary with no base in reality. Spirituality is scientific objectivity applied in religion. Both science and spirituality have one thing in common, their search for the truth with the truth defined as something that does not change with time, place or the environment.

Scientific method prevents science from overstepping its domain. Faith, on the other hand, does not have similar built-in control. Conflicts are natural when the pronouncements of faith in objective domain cannot be affirmed by scientific objectivity.

I am a student of Patanjali who systematized the discipline of yoga into a science of contemplation to achieve union (yoga means union) with the object contemplation or seeing its objective truth. Spirituality is about seeing the objective truth of reality as a whole (existence) and science is about seeing the objective truths of existent objects.

With this background, I do not think that scientific objectivity works against the transcendental; scientific intelligence and spiritual intelligence are not each other’s enemies, on the contrary, they are mutual friends. Having said that, I must add that over enthusiastic empirical focus is not science in the same way as mere faith and religious doctrine is not spirituality.

Early nineteenth century science was characterized by positivistic reductionism with attention zealously focused on the empirical domain narrowly confined within common human experience.

Our perception of the truth by the bottom up approach typical of science is a process which is dependent upon the vagaries of time, place and the environment. The understanding of the truth in both science and spirituality depends upon our time dependent capacity of subtle perception.

The tools of perception in spirituality are our senses, logical reasoning and testimony of other seekers of spiritual truth. There are shortcomings in individual tools, but they are all that we have. We can increase the level of certainty by taking steps to overcome their shortcomings.

The tools of seeking in science are no different except that science continually strives to extend the reach of human senses with the use of instrumentation and that of inferential logic with mathematical reasoning. The testimony of spiritual seekers is replaced by the findings of other scientists.

The early age of science perhaps perceived the material world as that of multiplicity - each instance of matter as an individual unconnected with the others. But in the current knowledge of science, the entire infinitely diverse world of matter is ultimate one: energy, which is totally inexplicable in material terms. The current position of science may be summarized as follows:

Infinitely diverse material world is comprised of one fundamental reality, energy.

Energy is omnipresent in the material world. It not only comprises the fundamental material particles, but also resides in the large empty spaces between and around them without which there will be no particulate integrity. Thus, energy is both immanent and transcendent to matter which is comprised of energy, sustained by energy and which dissolves back into it at the end of time.

Material diversity is simply due to different atomic arrangements of elementary particles.

The micro world of atoms and subatomic particles exists in wave-particle duality and is not subject to deterministic cause and effect; instead it is a world of multiple possibilities and non-locality.

The macro material world is subject to strict determinism of cause and effect. Material interactions at the macro level are initiated by energy at the micro level to produce different particulate arrangements resulting in further diversity.

Science today recognizes three levels of reality for matter namely gross deterministic reality of common human experience underlain by a micro reality of multiple possibilities and non-locality. The micro-reality determines the gross form. It is thoroughly pervaded by the unseen shared material reality called energy. It is energy again which coalesces as the various sub-atomic particles. I am sure anybody who painted this picture of matter in the early period of science would have been subject to ridicule by the then men of science. Recognizing that the world of matter excludes life and consciousness how is this tripartite picture of matter different from the body mind spirit model of human existence presented by our spiritual seekers eons ago? Science now says that energy is the shared underlying reality of matter; our spiritual seekers have been proclaiming unequivocally that all beings in the universe share one unseen and ineffable ultimate reality.

Modern science is not a problem in the development of spiritual intelligence. The problem has been our failure to see meaning in it. We are addicted to compartmentalizing knowledge. We have to learn to integrate and integrate meaningfully.

The conclusion of underlying oneness may not be meaningful in the insentient material world, but it is immensely meaningful to thinking beings. It must be brought out and highlighted in our educational systems using full force of all spiritual traditions and secular disciplines including science.

Talwar: With most of the world caught in the religious paradigm, what kinds of curricula and strategies are needed by the educational authorities at the university, college and school level in successful implementation of this new educational paradigm?

We need curricula that is inquiry driven raising important questions about the socio-cultural, socio-political and spiritual context in which we live. The content is far less important than the process. We have extensive knowledge around content, and although content appears to be changing rapidly, the truth remains the same. That is why revolutionizing the process should take precedence. Teachers are not mindless robots that should be required to memorize a prescribed set of lessons and formats that would be meaningless in any other context. Teaching is a creative and transformational act for both student and teacher. That means curricula should be a metacognitive experience for both. If the teacher is not equally interested in the search for truth as presented by clearly articulated exploratory questions on the nature of life itself, then the child will not learn the passion of learning. Therefore, curricula should be elastic, non-linear and revolve around the exploration of relationships, present different opportunities for teacher and students to engage in activities that nurture critical thinking, collaboration, imagination, agency and contemplation – just to name a few of the essentials. This list is neither determined nor finite.

I have found in my work that engaging teacher groups in the process of curriculum development towards these aims is extremely rewarding and beneficial. I don’t mean teachers from different schools working with researchers or academics towards the creation of a curriculum to sell to schools. I mean teachers of one school coming together to participate in the theoretical, conceptual and creative basis that becomes the overarching questions that drive instruction. Teachers are not used to taking responsibility for their role as educators and liberators in the classroom and are often unaware of the power they have in their daily interaction with children. In order for curricula to have meaning in the classroom, teachers need to have an intimate understanding of the why, the how and the purpose behind every decision that is being made and school communities need to value this process above anything. I also want to add one final but important word about teacher participation in developing curriculum frameworks. I have seen efforts in this area fail because there is a seemingly “democratic” process around teacher groups and decision making around curriculum. Not everything is up for discussion. When a school attempts to adopt a transcensory approach to teaching and learning teachers need to understand that they are part of a larger movement and must be personally committed to its mission. So, in a teacher group working together to build a curriculum framework, they might spend time exploring how to foster mindfulness in the classroom, for example. They don’t spend time exploring whether or not to include mindfulness into the daily practice. Some teacher groups are given way too much decision making power and they feel empowered to spend quality time trying to theoretically dismantle the very mission and vision of the school! Effective leadership and taking a definitive stand in front of the school community is a prerequisite for successful implementation -- especially with regards to alternative approaches to teaching and learning. It is the only way to strengthen community behind a movement that goes against the status quo.

There are several strategies that should be considered when working towards galvanizing support around the implementation of curricula that aim to promote heightened consciousness:

Strategically position the initiative as an interdisciplinary approach rather than trying to bridge it to one subject. Curricula that aim to promote awareness and heightened consciousness can supplement many subject areas such as humanities, social studies, language arts, advisory, health & ecology, political science and the arts to name a few.

~Collaborate with teacher education programs at the university level in order to engage in research and development of the curriculum

~Offer professional development to the school sites in order to directly impact and include voices from the field

~Make a consistent effort to assess gains in student agency, stress and conflict reduction, heightened consciousness, critical thinking and problem solving skills, relationship skills, and literacy.

~Integrate the use of on-line learning platforms to cut across borders and establish a diverse constituency

Rios: According to John Bloomfield, historian/author of Other Ways of Knowing, politics is a manifestation of the state of our individual and collective consciousness. In turn, politics shapes our consciousness. Do you agree? How would you describe the relationship between transcensory/spiritual education and social change? Is spiritual education a political act?

I understand the goal of politics as the science to work for common good saving individuals, societies, and humanity from the excesses of individual and collective human condition. In that sense, spiritual education is a political act.

I agree with John Bloomfield that politics is a manifestation of the state of our individual and collective consciousness.

Our current state of consciousness has reduced politics and politicians to an art of trickery for self aggrandizement at worst and/or communitarianism and tribalism at best.

Today humanity is split badly into factions on the basis of religions: God, prophets, ritual, denominations, sects etc.; geography: countries, states, regions, counties, districts etc.; race: white, black, yellow, pink; gender: male, female; sexual orientation: bisexual, homosexual; and so on. Each faction is in conflict with the others for its “rights”. We are exploiting, terrorizing, and killing each other in the name of perceived injustice. We invoke the name of our God in justification of genocide we perpetrate.

Admittedly, there are differences in the world and what kind of world would it be if there were no differences between human beings. Just imagine what life would be like if there were no difference in sex. Would there be any life at all? Just imagine, if everybody thought alike, life would be very bland; or if all flowers were the same color, spring would have no meaning; or if all days were rainy, there would be no sunlight and no food to eat.

Differences are there for a reason. The reason may not be apparent. They are put here by the same universal consciousness as put us here. Currently, there is no discipline of education on earth that teaches our youth in a meaningful didactic manner the fact of our underlying unity and how to celebrate our differences in the light of it.

How can there be social justice if we do not see everyone alike? Jesus said, “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” How can that happen if I do not even see my neighbor as myself? If I do not see him as myself, I can’t love him as myself; if I do not see him as myself, how can there be social justice? If I see my neighbor as inferior, I justify more for myself and if I get more, I keep my mouth shut and let the neighbor fight for social justice without my support. If the neighbor’s voice is not heard and I do not help, what is she/he supposed to do?

Therefore, education to see my neighbor as myself is education for social justice and if education for social justice is political in nature then spiritual education is a political act. Jesus Christ is a perfect example of a politician who taught to “love thy neighbor thyself.”

The current educational systems the world over emphasize human awareness of the external environment or our own particular doctrines rather than the awareness of the essence of one’s own existence. I think that this lack of self-awareness leads to a one-sided development of human awareness skewing the path of spiritual development. Our educational systems prepare us more for the business, scientific and technological worlds on one side and to keep us busy with our particular ritual and doctrine on the other and less for the realms of understanding our own human essence and that of the universe. Who are we? What are we? Where do we come from? Where does the universe come from? Why are we here? How do we relate to one another and how do we relate to the universe? How do we come about and how does the universe come about? How should we behave with one another and how should we behave in the society and the universe where we exist? Educational systems do not lay enough emphasis on questions such as these and most of humanity is left to answer these questions using individual resources or by chance discoveries. Such a lack of systematic preparedness in matters of human essence and essence of the universe leaves us without proper perspective in making free life choices. We are caught in a box of natural tendencies and conditioning, which seem to drive us. Free will to chose in this box is not the free will of which we are capable. If education were to cause spiritual development in step with developments in the external world, it is imperative to strike a balance in the emphasis on matters of essence relative to the external environment.

Evidence of this lack of balance is present everywhere. In this post-modern era, the human mind is capable of developing space and air travel, computers, smart machines, the internet, human clones, lightening-fast communications, rapid means of transportation, health and disease control, etc. In comparison, there is no discernible improvement in inner human condition that underlies behavior, minimal standards of behavior being enforced from outside through laws, legislation or reciprocity of selfish individual, national or regional interests.

Unchecked passions seem to take control. Pleasure-seeking through sex, alcohol and drugs, seems to be commonplace. Family commitments weaken. Love, respect, and compassion generally seem to be absent or lacking or limited to our closed communities. Violence is commonplace. Emphasis on sex and pornography is alarming. Pleasure seeking, tribalism and communitarianism replace noble goals of life. Loneliness and depression seem to increase and mental health seems to deteriorate as we have more external facilities with increased technological development.

Hatred and lack of tolerance abound. Shortsighted profit motive and greed drive everything. Environment is being polluted to the extent that the very life on earth is threatened by climate change and ozone depletion. Weapons of genocide and mass destruction are so numerous that the whole population of the earth can be destroyed many times over. Humankind seems to be rushing towards hatred, violence and destruction without looking back. In general, we seem to lack the internal human tools to deal with changes in lifestyle brought about by increased development in the sphere of external environment. On the other hand, in the less developed parts of the world, comparisons with the developed parts have generated feelings of injustice and despair leading to loss of hope and growth of radicalism and extremism. Intolerance, hatred, and acts of terrorism have sent shockwaves around the world. Humankind seems to be in a state of turmoil. Peace, both individual and collective, seems illusive. Fear and greed appear to have taken humanity in a tight grip.

It is my understanding that in North America more Internet traffic is generated by each of the pornographic and gambling businesses than by any other human endeavor. Considering that North America is a developed region of the world with free and compulsory education until high school, one can imagine how this would be used in geographical areas of the world with little literacy, development, or education. Internet is a technological development with unlimited potential of human good. But look at the human condition that has reduced it to be a tool of slavery to baser instincts rather than a tool of freedom from slavery from natural instincts and inclinations!

Admittedly, leadership of some of the so-called developed nations has taken seemingly important spiritually progressive steps in the form of legislation guaranteeing basic human dignity and rights to their citizens, but lacking accompanying spiritual growth of the individual citizen, legislation remains ineffective especially in situations involving conflict with the houses of power. On an international level, human rights considerations remain subservient to national interests or absolutist visions of religious leaders in-charge of interpreting God or God made laws. Of course, there are instances of enlightened leadership on international level through acts of removal of walls, boundaries and barriers, but again such acts are largely driven by national and regional interests rather than spiritual or human considerations. On an individual level, humanity seems to be drawn towards pleasure seeking either here on earth or in heaven after death, mistaking momentary pleasure for lasting happiness and incapable of managing personal relationships, the environment and individual lives. We value pleasure to an extent that we are willing to go to heaven to enjoy it.

Leadership of nations cannot be essentially different from the individual citizens from whom it is drawn. In that sense, our collective consciousness determines the type of political leaders we live with and leaders in turn with the policies determine the type of consciousness in which we operate. That in fact also is true of our leaders in social, religious and other spheres of life.

Human history abounds in instances of religion being used by powerful political and economic forces for achieving their goals usually at the cost of immense violence, pain, and misery. Religions themselves, through misdirected institutional loyalty and human condition, have acquiesced in being exploited by internal and external divisive forces.

Today, modern technology has incomparably enhanced the power of these divisive forces. Instant communication and fast transportation have made the world into what is likened to a global village. At the same time, modern weapons have immensely increased the scope of mass destruction. As a result, alliances of the religious with the political, economic and other divisive forces have never been deadlier. There is an urgent need to attenuate human condition to prevent the formation of these deadly alliances.

Recent history has amply demonstrated the need of taking effective steps in guiding humanity in positive directions not only by preventing the divisive use of religion, but also by promoting the legitimate role of core spirituality or quintessential religion in uniting humanity.

Two major crises that are facing humanity today are increasing religious radicalization of the world population and global warming as a consequence of mindless exploitation of natural environment in turn resulting from our unchecked greed and selfishness on one side and desperate populations on the other. The severity of these crises is seen as threatening the very survival of humankind and the global environment. Our core spirituality enables the profound perception of the entire universe as an integrated and unified whole in which each one of its beings has its legitimate place. As a result, widespread education in the core spirituality has the potential for the resolution and the prevention these crises.

Amanda Ripley (Reverse Radicalism, Time, Vol. 171, No. 12, March 24, 2008) considers the question, “Why do people leave terrorist groups?” She quotes research to the effect that educating “radicals about the gap between their religious ideals and the groups they follow” is helping them to leave radicalism in favor of peace. It is worth noting that the significant conclusion of Ripley’s article is that the realization of the bankruptcy of the radical narrative represents the turning point from radical pursuits. As a result, nearly a dozen countries have begun programs to educate radicals in religious enlightenment.

Pastor James Wuye and Imam Muhammad Ashafa (http://www.fltfilms.org.uk/imam.html) of Nigeria lead opposing militia groups in Kaduna resulting in great personal costs and costs to their communities. Wuye lost an arm and Ashafa lost two sons and a teacher in 1992. Now the two men are co-directors of the Muslim-Christian Interfaith Mediation Centre in their city, leading task-forces to resolve conflicts across Nigeria. The turning point came when a spiritual teacher of Ashafa enlightened him about what his religion truly teaches i.e., its core spirituality.

These studies are affirmations of our human condition; it is such that we suffer first and then look for a resolution of our suffering. Wouldn’t it be wise to use education in the core spirituality as a preventative measure as well?

Jeffrey D. Sachs (Common Wealth, Time, Vol. 171, No. 12, March 24, 2008) argues that our survival requires global solutions to the global problems facing us today. We have no choice but to end ‘our misguided view of the world as an enduring struggle of “us” vs. “them”’. According to Sachs, “What we call violent fundamentalism should be seen for what it really is: poverty, hunger, water scarcity, and despair.”

To address these crises, Sachs notes that we have made global commitments and treaties which remain unfulfilled and real solutions have failed to emerge because of a long list of barriers such as cynicism, defeatism, outdated institutions, competing nationalism and unchecked greed.

Sachs suggests clear objectivity, new sustainable technologies, clear implementation strategy and sources of financing. He concludes with the crucial need of transcending the list of barriers which is related with our human condition. “We will need science, technology and professionalism, but most of all we will need to subdue our fears and cynicism,” says Sachs. He emphasizes his conclusion by quoting John F. Kennedy in exhorting us to end our differences and to make the world safe for diversity.

The solutions suggested by Sachs are all transcendental in nature; without clearly saying so, Sachs is in fact advising spiritual development on a global scale to transcend our human condition without which he sees no hope for global survival. Education in quintessential religion which we call the core spirituality of humanity has the potential of the kind of transcendence required to address the grave global crises we face today.

Global crises need global identities and we need to globalize human mind to acquire global identities.

United Nations stand for world governance and governance is a political act. Let us see what the various UN bodies have to say about the type of education needed to address world problems. Their recommendations clearly show the connection between politics and spiritual education; today’s political problems are crying out for spiritual education:

~According to Article 26 (2) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations (http://www.un.org/) says, “Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.”

~It is to be noted that “UNESCO is committed to promoting inclusive quality education.” “Inclusive education is based on the right of all learners to a quality education that meets basic learning needs and enriches lives. Focusing particularly on vulnerable and marginalized groups, it seeks to develop the full potential of every individual. The ultimate goal of inclusive quality education is to end all forms of discrimination and foster social cohesion” (http://www.unesco.org/en/inclusive-education/mission, and http://www.unesco.org/en/inclusive-education).

~In 1987 the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development issued a call for creation of a new charter that would set forth fundamental principles for sustainable development. The drafting of an Earth Charter was part of the unfinished business of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit and it was completed by an Earth Charter Commission setup on the initiative of Maurice Strong and Mikhail Gorbachev with support from the Dutch government. The 32nd General Conference of UNESCO in October 2003 supported a resolution 'recognizing the Earth Charter as an important ethical framework for sustainable development.'

The Earth Charter (http://www.earthcharter.org/) is a declaration of fundamental principles for building a just, sustainable, and peaceful global society in the 21st century. It seeks to inspire in all peoples a new sense of global interdependence and shared responsibility for the well-being of the human family and the larger living world. It is an expression of hope and a call to help create a global partnership at a critical juncture in history.

The preamble to The Earth Charter opens with the statement: “... To move forward we must recognize that in the midst of a magnificent diversity of cultures and life forms we are one human family and one Earth community with a common destiny. We must join together to bring forth a sustainable global society founded on respect for nature, universal human rights, economic justice, and a culture of peace. Towards this end, it is imperative that we, the peoples of Earth, declare our responsibility to one another, to the greater community of life, and to future generations.” It goes on to emphasize that “The choice is ours: form a global partnership to care for Earth and one another or risk the destruction of ourselves and the diversity of life.” and that “We must realize that when the basic needs have been met, human development is primarily about being more, not having more.” It goes on to remind us of our responsibility saying “… we must decide to live with a sense of universal responsibility, identifying ourselves with the whole Earth community as well as our local communities.” The Earth Charter urges us all to affirm a set of shared principles as a common standard by which we conduct ourselves and one of the principles (14.d) requires us to “Recognize the importance of moral and spiritual education for sustainable living.”

Historically, education has been a matter of governance and public policy. Education in the core human spirituality therefore also is a matter of governance and public policy. Our universities and institutions of higher learning must be charged with the responsibility of transitioning education into the core spirituality of humankind.

We must approach the project with caution. It cannot be left to religions to teach what is of grave importance to the entire humanity. Neither can we simply throw the problem in the lap of the school system without adequate preparation. It is an issue of paradigm shift from religiosity or secularity to the core spirituality; religion unites individuals into communities, humanity at large finds the narrative of stark secularism as devoid of purpose and deep meaning, and only the core spirituality has the potential of globalizing human mind to build one world community. We simply cannot afford to miss fully realizing that unifying potential for the sake of our survival.

Before we jump right in, we must involve our institutions of higher learning in an ongoing basis in strategic research; development of curricula, teaching and learning resources; training and preparation of teachers.

As noted above, one infinite ineffable reality lies at the core of peak spiritual experience of sages, seers and prophets. Communicating the concept and the meaning of one inexpressible reality underlying its infinitely diverse creation is a massive challenge.

Fortunately today, the dialectics and technology of communication are far more developed than in earlier times. We have a variety of well developed knowledge disciplines in the fields of humanities, social, natural and life sciences. The peak experience of the sages falls in the domain of these disciplines. We must bring the collective force of all these disciplines to bear in facing this communication challenge and in taking the life changing spiritual understanding deep in human consciousness. Our universities must engage in an ongoing research effort towards the development of spiritual intelligence.

Talwar: What would be your suggestions for curriculum outlines for teaching universal spirituality at the various educational levels? Although cognitive learning of universal ideas and concepts are important, what kind of curricular learning will raise the level of consciousness beyond mere intellectual learning?

Building a curriculum can be a powerful tool if done well. The written word is easily reproduced and put into the hands of the multitude. Carefully framing curriculum is essential. The greater elasticity of the material, the further it will be adopted across disciplines and educational contexts. Teaching to Transcend: A New Life Skills Workbook is an experimental approach towards this aim. I describe it as a holistic educational experience because it is organized around relationships, it is inquiry driven, it emphasizes the importance of “social responsibility” (Dewey) and focuses on the journey or process of discovery and expression. Holistic thinkers understand that human consciousness introduces other levels of reality, beyond the physical matter, biological life, or instinctive behavior. Therefore, holistic education purports to include the experiences of intuition, extrasensory perception, meditative insight, and enlightenment that have been reported throughout history, from all parts of the world. It suggests that there are dimensions of reality far more subtle and complex than the material world, which we usually call the realm of the soul or spirit (Miller, 2005).

Seeking purpose in the human experience and the recognition that we have the capacity to unleash unlimited potential if we are in alignment with a universal, intelligent and natural “energy” has been around for a long, long time. Yet, in the current climate where teachers are exasperated with standardized test driven instruction and increasing responsibilities toward improving math and literacy in the classroom sometimes working under the most egregious conditions - teachers struggle to reconnect themselves with the joys of teaching and learning.

Students struggle to find meaning in schooling. Even in school environments where there is abundance there is often no time to stop and contemplate the small things. Technology and fast paced media does impact how we value time and space and how we “see” ourselves in relation to the world around us. Transcensory education is about taking the time out to “see” things differently.

The key therefore is how can we create an environment in our classroom that allows for this heightened state of awareness to exist so that students and teacher enhance their ability to access their maximum potential as human beings – creatively, spiritually and academically. We now know that different tasks activate specific brain regions and that experience such as stress or exposure to violence can affect brain functioning and result in increased anxiety, aggression or impair decision-making and judgment, for example (Travis, 2009). Conversely, research demonstrates that peak experiences (Maslow) or spiritual experiences lead to more effective thinking and planning, higher moral reasoning, greater emotional stability and decreased anxiety. Therefore, it only makes sense for educators to explore ways in which “peak experiences” are deliberately integrated into the classroom.

The goal of transcensory education is fundamentally to create the conditions in which students and teacher reconnect themselves with the joy and purpose of learning, to learn to transcend the five senses to include multi-sensory perspectives, to teach agency and one’s capacity to change, to learn and practice interconnectedness, to foster creative expression, critical thinking and non-linear patterns of thought. Transcensory education can be seen as the intersection of many approaches to teaching and learning and theories of human development and evolution. In sum, transcensory education is about returning to a state of awareness that is ultimately organic in nature. This means that we are deliberately “reconnecting” with the natural and holistic way human beings have been learning and evolving over time.

For this approach, I have adopted some key practices and themes with which to begin framing learning experiences in the classroom. Strategically framing learning experiences is at the heart of any meaningful teaching and learning experience. That means that I do not prescribe a series of lesson plans but a metacognitive framework with which to launch, organize, present and reflect on information. Effective framing is critical when connecting learning to the being - it is the lens through which we present material, it provides the spirit and the purpose. In theater, this would be called “setting the stage” so to speak. The power of teaching is less about focusing on the content, but honoring the process. This is the first step in understanding education for enlightenment.

The key practices provide the group with important behaviors or habits that will help understand how we learn from a transcensory approach. The themes are universal focus topics that help uncover issues that are most relevant to the evolution of the human experience.

The key practices are:

Contemplation: Thoughtful observation, reflecting on purpose and intention, practicing patience, stillness and quiet

Dialogue: Listening and strategic storytelling, building a safe space, rituals and community circles

Creation: Producing artwork, singing, movement and dance, journaling and creative writing, music, performance

Activism: Visiting other organizations, embarking on pilgrimages, bearing witness, working and volunteering, demonstrating, public speaking

The themes are:

Personal Awareness: Identity, Cultural Studies, Physical attributes, Personality, Behavior, Health, Metacognition

Relationships: Love, Family, Responsibility, Conflict Resolution & Mediation, Belonging, Emotions, Sharing, Intimacy

Society & Politics: Community building, equity, public speaking, public policy, leadership, justice and organizational psychology, war and peace

Global Awareness: Ecology, economics, international affairs, the environment, poverty, natural disasters, world hunger and equity issues, travel, space

Spiritual Intelligence: Spirituality, religion, rituals, ceremonies, faith, belief systems, metaphysics, dreams, intuition, perception, visualization, energy frequencies & vibration, meditation, miracles

In conclusion, I stress the importance of metacognitive process over content. In order to do this, I have developed a framework with which to present educational experiences that will create the conditions for heightened awareness to exist in the classroom. This framework revolves around essential practices and themes and is driven by essential questions that must be explored collaboratively and creatively. This approach aims to address both intellectual and transcensory goals in the classroom. If we strategically position a framework over multiple disciplines that underline our universal Oneness, we bring meaning and purpose to content. The creative use of language and terminology can expand universal spirituality into the secular environment. Developing and implementing curricula frameworks such as this will undoubtedly have an impact on the spirit in education but it requires consistent effort, documented research in the overall affects on student gains, effective collaboration and ongoing dialogue across borders and a diverse constituency.

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References

Pearl, E. (2001). The Reconnection, Hay House Publishing
Edwards, B. (1999) Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, Penguin Putnam
Sisk, D. & Torrance, E. (2001) Spiritual Intelligence: Developing Higher Consciousness, Creative Education Foundation Press
Painton, M. (2007) Encouraging Your Child’s Spiritual Intelligence, Simon & Schuster Publishers
Miller, R. (2005) Holistic Education: A Response to the Crisis of Our Time, Paper presented at the Institute for Values Education in Istanbul Turkey
Travis, F. (2009). Brain functioning as the ground for spiritual experiences and ethical behavior, The FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin

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This concludes the on-line dialogue on Transcensory Education: Expanding our Understanding of Intelligence. If you would like to ask a question of either participant, please contact info@realworldpd.org

Building Authentic Relationships: Transcending Race, Class & Gender

Dialogue with Dr. Alice E. Ginsberg & Dr. Raquel Rios

Alice E. Ginsberg, Ph.D. is the author of Gender in Urban Education: Strategies for Student Achievement (2005) and Gender and Educational Philanthropy (2007) and is currently an independent education consultant.

Raquel Rios, Ph.D. is the Executive Director of Real World Professional Development, a communications and professional development platform for educators and students to engage in a creative dialogue on diversity, community and spiritual awareness.

The purpose of this public dialogue is to promote the use of dialogue as a tool to build relationships across race, class, religion and gender for the purpose of collaboration for social justice and change. The dialogue is an interactive experience in which participants from diverse backgrounds share personal lived experiences, insights and thoughts related to a reading selection and consequent thought provoking questions designed by the participants themselves.

Reading Selection: Understanding White Privilege: Creating Pathways to Authentic Relationships Across Race, Teaching Learning Series for Social Justice, 2006, Routledge, By Francis E. Kendall, Chapter 8: Becoming an Ally & Building Authentic Relationships Across Race

Alice E. Ginsberg: Before I respond to the questions, I’d like to honor the practice of a friend and colleague of mine who teaches education and women’s studies. She starts the semester by asking students to write a short autobiography. Then, towards the end of the semester she has them do the same assignment with the goal of seeing in what ways their perspective might have changed as a result of the readings, discussions and assignments. I think this is a wonderful idea because it helps them to become more reflective about what they are learning. An explicit part of her pedagogy is that schools should be places that promote equity and social change, and therefore education should cause students to question (not necessarily change) their own belief systems. Therefore, I’d like to share a few relevant details about my life.

As a white middle-class daughter of two academics, the idea that I would go to college was a forgone conclusion rather than a hopeful possibility. While most of my friends were applying to Ivy League colleges, I decided that I wanted to go to Temple University, a low-cost state school in Philadelphia, near where I grew up. I already knew that I wanted to attend a college that had both a diverse student body and a diverse faculty. Temple was located in a predominantly African American neighborhood that, in the early 1980’s, had yet to be gentrified in any way. I will always remember taking my first women’s studies class with African American writer and activist Sonia Sanchez. It was electric. For her the feminist and civil rights movements were up close and personal, and she made it a point to emphasize in her classes that we needed to go beyond the academic/activist divide. It was there and then that I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to become one of the first generation of women to actually major in women’s studies. It was my passion and would remain so to date.

While at Temple, I constantly talked with my best friend from grade school who was also majoring in women’s studies; she attended Barnard College in New York City. I marveled at the fact that she was reading all about postmodernism, post-structuralism and French Feminist Theory, while I was struggling my way through Toni Morrison, Angela Davis, and Gloria Anduluza. Even in a city as diverse as New York, most of her classmates were white and middle class, and much of what she learned in women’s studies explicitly prepared her to be a “leader” rather than what Kendall would call an “ally.” My education, on the other hand, focused much more on the goals of self-reflection and coalition building.

After graduating from Temple I took a variety of jobs at non-profit organizations, and eventually became a graduate teaching assistant for Antioch University’s Comparative Women’s Studies Program in Europe. In this program, undergraduates from colleges all across the United States spent four months traveling together in the Netherlands, Germany, (then) Yugoslavia, and England. We met with feminist groups in each of these countries and learned about their unique struggles and achievements, sharing and comparing. When we got to Germany, however, those of us in the group that were Jewish felt unexpectedly uncomfortable.

When we met with women’s groups, we wanted to know how they had experienced, or learned about the Holocaust, and how they saw this history fitting into their current work as feminist activists. What was their outreach to Jewish women? The majority of women in the Antioch group, who were not Jewish, told us that these kinds of questions were not a good idea. In their view, we were guests, and should not bring up such an uncomfortable issue. Unfortunately, disagreement over how to talk about anti-Semitism as it relates to women’s studies ultimately became the divide of our small group.

After the Antioch program was over, I was somewhat disillusioned with the whole concept of women’s studies. I believed it was premised on the fact that “women” were a coherent, identifiable group that agreed on more ideals than disagreed. I came to understand that one could be in an oppressed group and still be an oppressor; that one could lack certain privileges while owning others.

Another relevant anecdote is regarding the first book review I wrote. It was about lesbian rights, lesbian teachers, and addressing homophobia in education. I felt a little uncomfortable doing this, as I was in a heterosexual relationship at the time. Even though I wanted to be an ally to gays and lesbians, I also felt there was something disingenuous about letting readers, and editors too, assume that because I wrote about lesbian issues, I was myself a lesbian. I wasn’t sure that, while claiming the privileges of a heterosexual relationship, I could also be a true ally to gays and lesbians.

Currently, I am married with two sons living in a three-story house in an eclectic urban neighborhood, with “good” public schools, and holding a Ph.D. in “Education, Culture and Society” from the University of Pennsylvania. All of my work centers around issues of gender, education and social justice, however, I am adamant that one can only think about gender within the larger context of race, class, sexuality, religion, ethnicity, disability, and other cultural differences and inequities. I am well aware that the feminist movement has a long history of excluding and marginalizing the experiences of women who are not white and middle class. Things are changing for sure, but we still have a long way to go. Indeed, I have always had trouble with the term “women of color” because it suggests that being white is the norm, and that everyone else is lumped into one category of difference, of “other.”

Through my work in some of the poorest public schools in the country, I have seen the ways in which middle class white girls and working-class black girls often have a hard time finding common ground. Likewise, gay and straight students often do not see eye to eye. While all of these girls are subject to unfair sexual harassment and inequality of opportunity, the ways in which these events play out in their lives can be, and usually are, very different.

When I directed a three-year professional development program for teachers in the School District of Philadelphia called Gender Awareness Through Education (GATE), I found that well-meaning teachers were confused as to how to define words like gender equity, gender bias, gender awareness, gender studies, women’s studies and feminist studies. Did the vision of equity mean treating all students as if they were exactly the same? Did it mean teaching to their (perceived or real, socialized or genetic) differences? Did it mean simply calling attention to gender issues and letting students take it from there? Was feminist pedagogy appropriate at the K-12 level, and, if so, what would teachers interested in this pedagogy do differently? Last but not least, was the ever present question as to the role of male teachers who wanted to address gender, and what to do about discrimination and prejudice against male students? Was gender a synonym for women and girls? It was not uncommon when I entered an urban school to help teachers think more critically about gender inequalities, that teachers told me “It is African American boys that I am most worried about.”

Two books that I have written, Gender in Urban Education and Gender and Educational Philanthropy look closely at these issues and suggested concrete strategies for teachers and educational administrators interested in gender equity. Part of this work included thinking about new ways to assess whether money allocated to gender equity is money well spent. Who was it reaching? Was this “elitism” to target money for white girls over African American boys? In my most recent book, The Evolution of American Women’s Studies, twelve long-time women’s studies scholars reflect upon the ways in which the field has changed in the last forty years – including questions as to whether it should be its own discipline, to what extent men should be involved, and what we should call it (e.g., many women’s studies programs have changed their name to the more inclusive, and more neutral gender studies). One of the contributors to this book, Ann Russo, Director of the Women’s and Gender studies program at DePaul University, wrote: “The recognition that our work within Women’s Studies may be complicit in, at the same time that it is resistant to, oppression dislodges a simply formulation of us/them – oppressed/oppressor, victim/perpetrator, powerless/powerful.” She underscores the need to be more reflective and introspective about our own “identity, location, actions in relationship to and complicity in systems of oppression and privilege.

Some of the contributors to the book and I will be giving a workshop about addressing these intersections at NWSA’s annual conference in Atlanta in November. This year’s theme is Difficult Dialogues and we will examine just these kinds of issues. As you can see, participating in these difficult dialogues is part of my work and I look forward to them. All of my personal and professional experiences are relevant to this dialogue revolving around Francis Kendall’s writing on building authentic relationships across race, class and gender. So, let’s continue on to answer these questions directly.

Alice, my first question for you is this. According to Kendall, alliances for social justice across race, class and gender come with a degree of risk. The risks are different for both parties and depend a great deal on levels of privilege. Starting with alliances for social justice across gender, since this is your area of expertise, what do you think are some of the risks involved in working across gender for social justice? Do you think these are similar risks with regards to alliances across race and class? If so, how? If not, how are they different?

Let me start off by saying, that social justice is not something that is magnanimously “granted” or quietly “claimed”; in most cases it is something that takes many years, undergoes many different triumphs and setbacks, and, perhaps most importantly, is rarely the achievement of one individual. I believe alliances across gender, race and class are critical, and, at the same time, always need to be critically re-examined in our work for social justice. Kendall has done a wonderful job of outlining some of the risks inherent in these kinds of alliances – especially when you are in a more privileged position than those you are creating alliances with. Some of the passages that stood out most strikingly for me included the following:

“This type of alliance requires a great deal of self-examination on our part as well as the willingness to go against the people who share our privilege and with whom we are expected to group ourselves.”

“When a white person “gets it” and begins to speak honestly about racism and the supremacy of whiteness and how they play out in the organization, she or he becomes a threat to other white people and is seen as a potential danger to maintaining the status quo.”

“Allies understand that emotional safety is not a realistic expectation if we take our alliance seriously. For those with privilege, the goal is, to quote David Tulin yet again, ‘to become comfortable with the uncomfortable and uncomfortable with the too comfortable.’”

I believe that these alliances undoubtedly require us to discuss issues, which are uncomfortable or even downright contentious – such as me being a Jew and visiting Dachau. Personally, such alliances often mean that we might alienate members of our own cultural group(s), and risk having to share, or lose entirely, some of the privileges we benefit from. This is a lot to think about.

Yet, I am willing to take this risk because I feel strongly that we cannot eliminate one form of oppression without looking carefully at all forms of oppression. They are interlocking systems that must be examined in their entirety. When we allow African Americans to be treated as second-class citizens, we pave the way for treating poor people, lesbian, and women in similar manners. We, as a society, often use similar justifications for exclusion and marginalization across difference.

Raquel Rios: First of all, I’d like to thank you, Alice for participating in this dialogue. It is a new experience for me as well, creating a dialogue in a written format in order to explore some of the complex issues involved in building relationships for social justice work. I appreciate that you decided to share some relevant personal experiences to start. This gave me a sense of who you are, your background and your perspective on life in general. Therefore I will do the same.

My grandparents were born in Puerto Rico and immigrated to this country in search of a better life. My grandmother was an orphan raised by Catholic nuns and who played the piano quite well. At the age of thirty, she was sent to New York by the monastery to live with a family in Brooklyn that agreed to provide her with piano lessons and in exchange for room and board; she agreed to become the family maid. Unfortunately, shortly after her arrival, she realized that piano lessons were never part of the arrangement and my grandmother never continued her study of piano. When she met my grandfather, she left the “host” family to start her own life, which began in Harlem in the projects, the only affordable apartment they could find. After years of marriage and four children, my grandfather returned to Puerto Rico and left my grandmother to raise the children on her own which she did miraculously with the help of public assistance. She spent her free time serving the community through the church and sang in the choir. For this service, all of her children attended private Catholic school and received a strict and focused upbringing. My mother was the youngest.

My mother married young to a man born from the only other Puerto Rican family living in that section of the projects at the time. Years later, my father, became an engineer and my mother found her calling much later in life as a social worker. My parents and step parents raised me to value three things: education, hard work and God. I attended several high schools in search of a good fit. I was accepted to Bronx High School of Science but left there when I was awarded a scholarship to attend Phillips Exeter Academy. After a year of living in a wealthy New Hampshire boarding school, I experienced an identity crisis so I decided to return home to be closer to family.

I graduated from New York University with a BA in foreign language education. As a sophomore, I had taken the opportunity to spend a year abroad in Spain, which greatly impacted my perspective on language and culture and the values inherent in American society. Upon graduation, I began teaching Spanish. Throughout my teaching career, I was constantly harassed by colleagues and students alike to take a stand on issues regarding the hidden meanings behind race, class, culture and language and I realized that the context of school (especially as a language teacher) was a natural, but explosive intersection of all of these variables and yet none of these issues were ever explicitly addressed in curriculum and practice in a holistic way. I completed a Masters degree from a city college and left teaching to engage in research and to explore ways I could integrate my socio-political observations into my work. I worked for several educational organizations full and part time while married and raising my son. I learned quickly that the world of education was much larger than I had ever suspected, the political climate in New York was intense particularly surrounding bilingual education. I realized that my education to date ill prepared me for the work I needed to do to get really involved in bigger issues.

When my second child was born, I enrolled in a Ph.D. program on-line. After thoroughly researching the local schools and understanding the on-site time commitment required of doctoral students, I felt overwhelmingly disheartened. It was at this time that TUI University, primarily geared towards educating military officials (I later learned) had begun to advertise a Ph.D. program in Educational Leadership. Even though the tuition was still quite high, I would be able to be at home with my newborn and five year old son as well as go back to work when the time came. I completed a Ph.D. in Educational Leadership with honors and because of the flexibility of the program; I was able to engage in the research that would integrate my passion for social justice and critical pedagogy in education.

After graduation and two long years of intensive searching, I realized that I was not going to find a job in a higher education institution. The fact is I was never once invited to interview for a faculty position. I had fallen through the cracks at this stage of my career and I was devastated, to say the least. In retrospect I realize that it was the first time “the system” did not work for me and thus a new awareness was born. Through this adversity, I learned to walk with humility and compassion for folks who work very hard with little or no just reward.

I launched my blog, Real World Educators for Action Learning in 2005 but really began writing seriously on it in 2007. Through this blog I came in contact with a bright, social justice advocate, Shadia Alvarez, who gave me the opportunity to consult with her small school in the South Bronx. There I started working with zeal and began designing curriculum. Real World was officially born.

The purpose of Real World is to create an ongoing, creative forum in which diverse educators and students examine real issues that impact how we see and interact with the world. Critical dialogue about real life issues has never been at the forefront of education discourse and praxis and while “social justice” initiatives have historically been about improving “outcomes” for disenfranchised and marginalized student populations, I believe that middle and upper class privileged groups are in equal need of dialogue for holistic change. Ultimately, looking back at my own personal experience, spanning public and private, cross country and abroad, I see that there is a significant disconnect between what is being taught and learned in schools and our communal needs. It is my hope that in this commitment to engage and reengage in a public dialogue that transcends diverse perspectives, we can begin to make individual and collective action for change.

Alice, you have asked me to answer the same question I posed to you and I am glad because it really resonates with a lot of people – the notion of risk.

Raquel, what do you think are the primary risks of forming such alliances across race, class and gender?

One of the primary risks of forming such alliances across race, class and gender etc. is the risk of vulnerability. I find that the greatest vulnerability for those of us who do not belong to a privileged group is that of livelihood. Survival is one of the most powerful human basic needs and forming alliances across race, class and gender really puts into question our fundamental belief system about survival. Many individuals and groups, especially within the context of a capitalistic and patriarchal society, begin to adopt a polarized perspective of lack vs. abundance. Individuals and groups that have historically been victimized by oppression often see the world through the filter of scarcity, or the fear of lack. This simply means that if a person is concerned with their basic needs, it is difficult for them to engage in an alliance across privilege because they will constantly feel dependent and needy on the relationship for personal gain. This relationship can be within the context of an organization. If there is a threat to the individual’s job stability, the “alliance” to the issue of social justice will often take back seat. If the person is coming from a position of privilege, speaking up and fighting for an issue of social justice is less risky. The level of risk involved will often dictate how each behaves facing adversity.

A real life example of this type of risk is when I was working for an educational organization several years ago. The team was disgruntled and often discussed compensation and the overwhelming and unequal distribution of projects across the team. We were all in agreement that the company took advantage of the team and that we needed to collectively advocate for redistribution of projects and travel as well as stronger professional support and recognition. However, as we continued speaking to each other and getting to know one another, I started learning more about the team members. I learned that some depended on the salary for their livelihood while others were in a completely different boat. One young and enthusiastic team member announced that her parents had just purchased her an apartment in an extremely expensive section of the city. She shared she had to cover the mortgage of course, but with her parents’ hefty down payment, the payments were going to be minimal. In addition to the fact that this colleague had no student loans to be concerned with, I realized that her level of vulnerability was drastically different from my own and that I had to think twice about our “mutual” enthusiasm to confront the administration with our complaints.

Consequently, I believe alliances across race, class and gender must address the issue of livelihood and both parties need to understand that there is no work that is done for free when basic needs are not being met. This cannot be taken for granted and it is not about giving money or giving charity, but rather making a commitment to open doors through the alliance that would otherwise be closed. For an alliance across class, the open door might very well be a work related recommendation or contract where as in an alliance across race, the door might be access to a community that otherwise would not welcome an outsider so to speak. We need to ask ourselves: How do we level the playing field in an alliance so that both parties are equally valued and free to work for the greater cause?

When Gandhi first started working in South Africa, he was offered a salary for his public work. As a relatively new barrister, he was not making any money but had already started creating a formidable reputation for himself. Gandhi refused to take a salary for his public work but asked the soon to be Natal Indian Congress that they provide him with judicial cases with which to earn an honest living and that that the public work must remain a service he would offer free to the community. They agreed and within the first several weeks, Gandhi received enough cases that he was able to take care of himself and his family and continue his public service free of charge.

Similarly, I work as a consultant and publish materials. If I am not hired or no one purchases my materials, I don’t have the funds to produce the Real World journal, which is a not-for-profit experience that comes out of my earnings. This journal is my public service and commitment to publishing student and teacher artwork and writing on diversity and community. I know that this journal does impact those who generally don’t have a voice and I hope to be able to continue offering the experience.

These real life stories are relevant. People of privilege often put “social justice” and “change” work into the category of “public work,” “volunteer work” or “community service” from the comforts of a steady income or financial freedom. This in many ways presents great risk to individuals and groups who don’t have financial flexibility and freedom that are equally committed but are consequently left out. This dynamic makes advocacy and activism a luxury for the privileged.

Alice, what is your definition of change agent? Do you consider yourself a change agent? Why or why not?

I definitely consider myself a change agent. The ways that I work for social justice are primarily through my writing, which takes diverse forms e.g., books, articles, commentaries, book reviews, poetry, curriculum guides, program evaluations and the like. Although my books are published by academic presses, and most (though certainly not all) of my articles are published in academic journals, I strive to write in such a manner as to be accessible to a larger readership. I interweave political observations with concrete strategies for change, with personal stories and anecdotes. Sometimes this means revealing more about myself than I’d like but one of the first tenants of feminist pedagogy is that the personal is political. This is in large part what drew me to women’s studies -- the idea that learning needs to be authentic and relevant, and somehow tied to real strategies for change and evolution.

I see myself as a change agent even with my family and children. For example, my younger son Nicholas, who is 10 years old, told me a story about how he was on a field trip with his summer camp and as they were walking down an urban avenue, a car full of young men went by and they started propositioning the female counselors. According to my son, the younger children in the group were perplexed as to what was going on, and the counselors quieted their concerns simply by saying “It’s complicated.” My son, who knew exactly what was going on, later said to me: “Mom, while it was happening I just felt so proud that I had a mother who was working to change these kinds of things.” This was a great and unexpected compliment. Both my sons (my oldest is fourteen) know how important feminism is to me, as are other forms of justice and equity.

I am especially pleased that my family lives in an urban environment where my children experience diversity all the time. I have not only chosen to live in a diverse community, but my sons and I discuss the impact of racism all the time. For example, we talk about the fact that many of the middle-class white children at my younger son’s neighborhood elementary school leave the school in fifth grade to go to a magnet school, leaving the school with a disproportionate number of African American children in the upper grades.

Raquel, is there a particular forum in which you feel more or less comfortable working for change and social justice? If so, why?

Much like you, Alice, I have always been an avid writer. Writing, like the arts, is a visceral experience and therefore speaks to the universal, which I believe is essential in working for change and social justice. I suppose I always felt free in the written form and have excelled in this area, whether through experience or talent, I will never know – but the point is, that writing and publishing my work is my most comfortable forum. I also believe that truly working for change and social justice is a commitment to be vulnerable and share personal lived experiences strategically so that what you communicate resonates with both the self and with others on many levels. That is why most academic writing is void of this transformational element required in change work -- it does not always honor the human experience outside of a very predetermined context. For this reason, I tend to support creative literary forums for change.

I also feel very comfortable working in schools with teachers and students. All types of schools. The school environment is so alive and invigorating and really touches every fiber of my being. As a professional development specialist and consultant, I have worked with various sized groups of teachers and students ranging from 2 to 125 in a variety of settings. I must say that the larger groups can be at first a little daunting but I am a firm believer of breaking larger groups down into smaller groups, which helps foster intimate dialogue and exploration of the material. I have worked in (and attended) private and public schools as well as not-for-profit organizations and corporate environments in Spain. While not all of my work focused explicitly on social justice, my presence has always embodied change and agency.

Ultimately, I believe that I am most comfortable in a forum that changes organically in response to the context and the need.

Alice, have you experienced alliances with people across race, gender or class? If so, what was your motivation? How did the alliance initiate? What were some of the rewards and challenges with this alliance? If not, why do you think this has not been part of your life and are you interested in making this happen? What is your motivation?

I must say that after reading Kendall’s chapter on alliances, I did pause to consider what alliances I have experienced – both personally and professionally. I realized that in many ways my work has been more targeted towards “alliances with issues,” than with “individuals.” This is not to say that I have not worked closely with people of color, and individuals from different class backgrounds over the course of my career. Nor is it to say that I haven’t formed close friendships across such differential identities and experiences.

As I look honestly at this question, however, I realize that writing is the forum in which I feel most comfortable working for social change. I am currently working on several book projects, including a book of dialogues among feminist academics and activists. I bring this project up because I am constantly getting emails from my co-editor about different activist protests and meetings that I don’t have the time (or motivation) to attend. I am thinking now that, while there is no reason to belittle the impact of my writing as a valid forum for working towards social justice, it is not the only route. In other words, I realize that I may need to reconsider the need for my participation in other avenues of change.

Raquel, as you think back on your own education, in what ways, if at all, were you encouraged to “question the facts”? What impact did this have?

When I was graduating from 6th grade, my teacher wrote in my autograph book, “Who is going to ask me Who, What, When, How and Why?” This fabulous teacher saw and embraced a precocious child. My first teacher, however, was my mother and to this day, I credit her for encouraging me to question the facts. My mother was always engaged in exploring some issue or another transforming family gatherings into a loud and boisterous debate. A good example of her teaching happened that same year the end of 6th grade. I attended school with a pretty diverse group of kids many of whom were Jewish. Several of my best friends were Jewish and one friend Chinese. We were in the honors class and at the end of the year we received our report cards with our placement for the following year. My Jewish friends who lived close to me were placed in a high performing junior high school located close by but in a predominantly Jewish section of our community and me and my Chinese friend were placed in the lower performing school in the opposite direction. When my mother approached the teacher, a Jewish lady herself, she said that she would vouch for me as her niece or something like that. While my mother believed that my teacher was well intentioned, she did not leave it at that. She took me with her to the office of the high performing school. She explained the situation and wanted the change to be made. She was told that the reason the Jewish students had been enrolled in that school was because they wanted to study Hebrew, which was not offered at the other school. So, my mother replied matter-of-factly, “Oh, then that’s perfect because we have always wanted our daughter to learn Hebrew.” The secretary stared at my mother in a long silence and made the change. That first year, my Jewish best friend and myself were assigned to Spanish class. Ha!

This story might not be the one people would expect to hear about educational experiences, but it is a critical part of my education especially when reflecting upon your question. The impact of my “informal education” was enormous and I am forever grateful for it.

I will add that throughout my entire formal educational experience all the way through a masters program, I was never exposed to any critical pedagogy in the field of education. In fact, it was not until I was engaged in independent research for my doctorate that I stumbled across critical educators starting with Paolo Freire, The Pedagogy of the Oppressed – which was the first book that truly offered me a new paradigm.

Alice, Kendall discusses many strategies with regards to building relationships across privilege. Do any of these strategies resonate with your personal and professional experience? Is there a strategy you would like to add?

The strategies that were most powerful for me when reading this chapter included the following:

“Before identifying yourself as an ally, you should spend a lot of time examining how your life is influenced by having white privilege and what being an ally means to you.”

“We also need to communicate clearly about our boundaries in terms of time and commitment, actions and behavior.”

“Authentic cross-race relationships… require paying serious attention to nuances of behavior that we might otherwise take for granted.”

“I must consistently ask myself what it means to be white in this specific situation. How would I be viewed if I were of color? Would I be listened to? “

“Sharing the lead is very different from taking the lead.”

“For many of us, this means exploring and owning our dual roles as oppressor and oppressed…”

I especially agree with Kendall that it is important for everyone to recognize that we each share some privileges while being excluded from others – e.g., no one is singly an oppressor or only a victim of oppression. I would also like to emphasize the importance of her point that before getting into such alliances we need to consider the strength and boundaries of our commitment. In my work at many non-profit organizations I have found that such organizations need to “follow the money” in order to survive. In other words, the issues they choose to commit themselves to often change as the social and political climate changes. This is not meant to be a criticism, just a sad observation.

Moreover, Kendall speaks eloquently of the need to pay attention to “nuances of behavior that we might otherwise take for granted.” She tells a wonderful story about being invited to a black person’s home and not understanding the courage it took for that invitation to be issued to a white woman. As Kendall suggests, we must ask ourselves whether the same actions would have the same meaning in a different context (e.g., if we were black instead of white, gay instead of straight). This makes me think of the irony of the recent arrest of African American Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, for breaking into his own house!

I also agree that we often don’t even realize that our gender, race, or class helps to form our interpretations. We don’t necessarily “speak the same language” as other cultural groups, which I mean both literally and figuratively.

As to what strategies I would add, I am thinking specifically now of strategies for the classroom. I am very drawn to the work of Rosamond S. King an artist and professor of English at Brooklyn College. In Radical Teacher #83, she suggests that radical teachers should, among other strategies: 1) always teach at least one text you disagree with; 2) Assign a “cultural response paper” that students write after going to an event about any culture other than their own; 3) have students interview someone with at least a thirty year age difference; 4) challenge students’ ideologies by asking them to support them with facts; 5) question facts; 6) teach texts written by and about whomever your students despise, and from wherever your country is waging war; 7) encourage service learning; and 8) discuss not only the texts, but also how they were produced, marketed, and distributed. I think these are all great ideas, many of which I wouldn’t have thought of on my own.


Raquel, in what ways do you agree or disagree with the statement that “all knowledge is political”?

When I taught a course at Manhattanville College called Teaching Literacy Skills in Middle School through Collaborative Study of Social Identity I was determined to practice an exploratory and liberatory approach. The class was primarily going to be about critically examining the relationship between literacy and social identity in order to determine which methods are best suited for teaching literacy at the middle school level. Towards this aim, we did a lot of bubble mapping and brainstorming of terms and words that in any other context might have been considered elementary. In one of the first sessions we explored the words literacy juxtaposed with the word identity. The large paper that I had tacked up on the board was beginning to fill with a variety of words that came to the mind of the students. Imagine the words that can enter your mind when you think of literacy. Reading and writing are the basic first words but then your mind expands, you might begin to include words like: context, meaning, communication, comprehension, skills, illiteracy, standards, vocabulary, text, print, media and so on. And rightly so because literacy starts somewhere but gradually begins to take on greater meaning. We did the same for identity and the same occurred.

After several minutes of this exercise I asked them to reflect on all of the words written on the board and to think about the relationship between the two – literacy and identity. The class was comprised of teachers who had returned to school for a master’s degree and frankly I thought the task was relatively simple. But I was wrong. They started feeling frustrated and annoyed with me. Finally, one student asked why I didn’t just tell them what the relationship was. At that moment, I found myself at a critical crossroads in my teaching. I doubted my approach and questioned whether I was actually teaching them. I knew that if I had just told them or started my session with a lecture first (which I had planned for them the end of the week), I would be assured of their comfort and assured of the outcome. But I did not. I decided to continue on in spite of the resistance and trust the process. I had them link words and talk it through; I bombarded them with more questions and told them that only they could offer the class with answers. Finally, the group began to identify relationships between the two words and several of the students created statements articulating the relationship. These organic statements became the foundation for the rest of the course and I believe that the experience and discomfort was worthwhile for them and for myself. Throughout the course, I reminded them of that experience and the outcomes and they felt completely confident in their own understanding of the challenges and benefits of “critical pedagogy.”

I share this anecdote in response to the question because I believe that this story communicates that yes, all knowledge is political and by its very nature, the mode in which we choose to exchange knowledge is also political. The words that I chose to present to the class were based on criteria that I determined to be relevant to their learning experience. The approach that I chose to present the information was also based on criteria that I determined was important and valuable for the class. Making choices, these criteria are a political act.

Knowledge, like literacy can be simply understood at the surface. You might say -- knowledge is information. But with further examination, you find that knowledge is knowing and knowing is understanding and understanding is meaning and so on. Therefore, the term knowledge becomes a more complex term that connotes understanding of what a person or group of individuals deems to be “truth.” What a group or an individual deems to be “truth” about the world, what a group classifies as “experience” or “scholarship” all suggest that there is a filter, or criteria that is decided upon and accepted by an individual or society. Once there is a criteria, or a standard for “truth” then there is power because who or what entity determines this criteria? Politics is all about relationships and decision-making and therefore politics is also about power. Clearly, all knowledge is political when broken down in this way.

Alice, I have one clarifying question for you. You mentioned that your “work in some of the poorest schools in the country, you have seen ways in which middle class white girls and working class black girls often have hard time finding common ground… While all of these girls are subject to unfair sexual harassment and inequality of opportunity, the ways in which these events play out in their lives can be and usually are very different.”

In these poor public schools, are middle class white girls and working class black girls in the same classes? What has been the context for your observation of their struggle to find common ground? Have you had any experience observing these relationships across race/class in a wealthy public school? Private school? If so, has there been any difference in their ability to find common ground? Finally, which do you believe race, class or gender take the dominant role in forming common ground?

I mistakenly implied that the middle class white girls and working class black girls I observed were in the same schools. I didn’t word it carefully enough. What I meant to say was that, given the range of schools I have worked in and visited, I have seen two very different systems of education at work for white middle class girls and working class/poor black girls. You are right to imply that they don’t often come into physical contact with each other – given the way neighborhood public schools are still segregated by race and class. I could talk more about these different experiences if you wish, but I don’t think that is your question. It is worth noting that much of the early and most touted research on gender equity in education was based on equity between middle-class white girls and boys. It did not pay adequate attention to the impact of race and class in both the curriculum and in teachers’ (often) unexamined attitudes. In response to your last question, however, I would definitely say that it is not productive to isolate or privilege race, class, or gender. They need to be examined contextually, as differences become more or less salient in different social and material contexts. Moreover I see racism, classism and sexism as interlocking systems of oppression and inequity. You really can’t talk about one without at least paying attention to the others.

Raquel, I have one clarifying question for you. You note that: “Throughout my entire formal educational experience all the way through a masters program, I was never exposed to any critical pedagogy in the field of education. In fact, it was not until I was engaged in independent research for my doctorate that I stumbled across critical educators starting with Paolo Freire, The Pedagogy of the Oppressed – which was the first book that truly offered me a new paradigm."

Why do you think you were not exposed to any critical pedagogy before stumbling on it yourself? Do you think this is the case for most pre-service teachers? Too what extent do you think policies like "No Child Left Behind" make it even harder for teachers to "take risks" in the classroom? Also, I too am a big fan of Freire. Could you say a little bit about how reading his work changed the way you thought about teaching and learning?

Critical pedagogy is a critique of the status quo in that it implies students (and teacher) need to critically examine the power relations embedded in knowledge and the transfer of knowledge, similar to the argument I made earlier with regards to all knowledge being political. This implies that the role of the teacher in not to impart knowledge, but to create the conditions in which students are able to explore the meaning of the world around them starting from their own unique perspective. An important component of this pedagogy is that the students themselves are participants in their education as a vehicle to understand more deeply the conditions of their lives and to acquire the academic skills to ultimately be a part of the solution to injustice (Gutstein, 2003). I believe that one of the primary goals of critical pedagogy is student agency, which I have defined over the years as being simply the belief that that one is able to make a difference in the world.

Reading Freire was like finding a new language. He was able to articulate what was -up to that point in my life- a very abstract and intuitive notion on my part about the nature of literacy and knowledge. His work validates all “lived experience” as being crucial to our understanding of knowledge, power relations and agency. The idea that educators must learn from the students continues to impact my work today because it completely transforms the role of teacher. My recent work and research in the area of spiritual intelligence is intricately related to this concept in that we are beginning to expand our understanding of “lived experience” to include the spiritual realm which is intuition. This holistic approach gets us closer to truth.

Critical pedagogy creates fear within the institution because it has always been explicitly about examining power relations with the goal of liberating both the oppressed and the oppressor – that means liberating the human being from the “system” or an unconscious way of doing things. A student in the course that I taught at Manhattanville College wrote in her reflection that she was completely against critical pedagogy because she couldn’t understand why any teacher would want to anger the students by bringing up issues of inequity. Furthermore she felt that any proponent of critical pedagogy was looking for an uprising or a revolution. I was very pleased when I read her reflection because even though she was “against” critical pedagogy, she clearly understood that critical pedagogy is revolutionary. Eventually, my hope is that she will realize that a revolution of the mind and spirit does not necessarily result in a violent uprising.

No Child Left Behind nourishes this fear and it becomes increasingly difficult for teachers to take risks. NCLB also moves funding away from programs and initiatives that work for increased awareness and critical thinking. Educational leaders are more concerned with standards and getting kids to pass tests, which drives instruction. When conducting research for my dissertation on the impact of teaching literacy for social justice on student achievement, I found that teachers don’t prioritize initiatives that they are not sure will positively impact reading and writing skills as determined by standardized test scores. For this reason, people who work to promote this work in schools experience resistance. My study indicated, however that social justice curriculum positively impacts student agency and student engagement, especially for the African American boys who continue to be the largest at-risk group in public schools across the country.

Finally, Alice, could you share some reflections of having participated in this dialogue?

After reading Kendall’s work and participating in this dialogue starting with my own personal history, I think the thing that stands out most for me is the need to form more alliances with actual individuals, while still continuing to reach large numbers of people through my writing. Although my writing has not been sheltered from attack, it is obviously much more comfortable for me to write about change in the safety and comfort of my own (middle-class) home. I may need to rethink this.

This dialogue has also drawn me back to an amazing book I recently reviewed for Feminist Teacher called Shut Out: Low Income Mothers and Higher Education in Post-Welfare America. This collection takes a remarkably candid look at the ways in which the welfare system keeps poor women poor, and makes it almost impossible for them to get a higher education while taking care of a family and fulfilling the requirements needed to continue to get greatly needed monetary assistance. It made me think that even as I chose to go to a state school while most of my friends were going to more “prestigious colleges,” many women never get the opportunity to go to college at all. This is not about individual discrimination or laziness; it is about systemic failures and the need for systemic change.

Raquel Rios: First and foremost, I will say that conducting a dialogue rather than an interview in which there is the opportunity for both parties to ask thought-provoking questions is invaluable. How often do we experience a real conversation between two diverse people and not have one person hide behind questions or formality? This dialogue expanded a period of two weeks in which Alice and myself had ample time to engage in this discussion thoughtfully. This pass of time and the ensuing back and forth correspondence towards its publication has offered me a greater understanding about the nature of relationship building rooted in a mutual commitment for change and heightening awareness. As a result of this dialogue, I feel a strong regard for Alice and her work and have been honored by her grace in return. The fact that Alice and I have agreed to participate in this public dialogue at the start of our relationship in order to build common ground for future collaboration is an act of faith and trust in the organic process of relationship building for the purpose of change. There was no other purpose beyond this dialogue, only to engage in this step and this step alone has made all the difference.

This concludes the first Real World on-line dialogue. If you are interested in participating in this dialogue by responding to or posing questions to Dr. Alice E. Ginsberg or Dr. Raquel Rios, please email your questions to info@realworldpd.org and they will be reviewed for publication.

Transcending Great Expectations

Many years ago while attending a prestigious prep school, I was part of a track team. I considered myself a sprinter then and I don’t recall if a coach gave me that label after observing my performance or if I had volunteered to take on that role. In retrospect, I find this small detail important and perhaps you will understand why.

My memory consists of one track meet in particular. I was to run a race, but don’t remember the distance. It was within the “sprint” category of races, not too short but by no means cross-country. My recollection of the event is quick but sharp like the instant when your car crashes into another vehicle. I was in the lead or in the very least, heading in that direction. The finish line was very near and I could not see anybody around me. A cramp the size of a tortoise attacked my right hip, sat there under its shell. The pain was intense, but subtle. I was confused. On the sidelines, my team cheered me on, calling my name. I was so much wanting to please them. I flashed into their hope, a slice of exuberance and great expectation beckoned me to fight the grip of pain. In me we all had a winner. After all, I was a fast runner, a natural. But the pain grew sharper in a second and like a breath wiped out from underneath a flame, I broke down completely in the middle of the race. I stopped seeing and the crowd stopped cheering. There was silence and there was me. This is the moment that grew into a cloud. This cloud hangs over the countryside, daring and dark but not letting go of one droplet before it’s time. It steadily holds us, foreboding the eminent downpour, ominous and lurking. There was this silence and there was me.

Many years have passed since that day. As an adult, I naturally fell into a routine of speed walking – it requires less endurance and stamina than running, I thought. Ultimately it was a stress-free choice. My sprinter self never thought to take up jogging. Recently, as a result of the many changes that I have begun to embrace, I have started experimenting with the practice of running. At first, my short distances were sufficient but slowly I started considering goals and endurance and challenge. As my short distance increased, I began to consider that I was no longer a sprinter and even more startling was that I found myself contemplating the possibility that I might have never been a sprinter in the first place.

On the day I succeeded in circling the track for the first time, I returned home with a feeling of accomplishment but it was not joy. I felt this gnawing; subtle pain in my side, a tiny thorn that I had imagined had long ago disappeared. Even though I was enthusiastic, I also felt anxiety each morning about approaching the track. I couldn’t give up my exercise and I needed to be consistent so this dread, if you will, became a concern. Should I go back to walking? Finally, each day I would return to the track and I would give myself permission to walk, not run. I would not force myself to go to that place, encounter my failed self, the other me that I needed to keep at a distance if I were ever to succeed at doing anything. Frankly, doing something, anything was the most important thing. Most of the time, I would run, anyway, knowing that at any time I could walk. I would sometimes jog very slowly teasing my failed self who I realized never left my side. I had accepted my limitation. I was not a runner or an athlete after all.

As the days passed, I continued teasing myself and ironically, I began to run more often than walk – but never once did I make a commitment to run the whole track. I believed my success was born out of this mind game and I found it so fascinating that I communicated my experience to my spiritual guide. I explained the challenge, this battle with myself and put my “experiment with truth” into the context of my youth and tried to explain the perspective of the child I was back in prep school. My spiritual guide nodded gently and when I had finished he let out a long sigh. There was silence and there was me. What? What? I wanted to know. He simply replied, “What an extraordinarily high expectation you had set for yourself back then.”

At that moment it must have been a jolt or a teardrop, but the cloud above my memory broke and out poured the heavy rains that had been ominously hanging over my field of dreams for some time now. The innocence and the simplicity of that statement was a sacred offering, a gift that alters the past. It was in that moment a quantum leap occurred. I traveled to twenty years before and hugged that child doubled over in pain and whispered into her ear the words she most needed to hear, the words that reassured her that there was no such thing as failure and to remind her of all the things she was and was not. She was not a sprinter but a runner, because she runs. She was not a finite moment but a living, breathing life process that was always and will always continue changing and evolving and transforming. Alchemy.

What were those expectations of myself and where did they come from? How did it happen that those expectations quickly led to shame? How do we know which memories are paralyzing and how can we free ourselves from them for recovery?

Everyday I return to the track and I now steadily watch my process as the subject of my own experiment and every day I discover something new about my understanding of expectations. What I find is a bit alarming and might appear unorthodox in a time of standards and performance based assessment. However, I cannot deny or refrain from communicating to all who are open to see. There exists the possibility that expectations can have a damaging impact on performance. As an educator, I have always been a strict proponent of high expectations in teaching and learning and have professionally counseled teachers to “raise your expectations” of the students in front of them because I believed that student failure is directly correlated to the teacher’s expectations. This belief is strongly enforced by research and praxis so you must know, my reader that these revelations and explorations of the nature of expectations are both discerning and tenuous.

John Wheeler, the famous physicist suggested that the universe is built like an enormous feedback loop; a loop in which we contribute to the ongoing creation of not just the present and the future, but the past as well. The universe is therefore interactive where the consciousness of the observer alters what is observed (Harvey, 2009). Looking at my own personal and professional experience that spans twenty years of time-space, I recognize how my own level of consciousness as observer (and the level of consciousness of my spiritual guide, which in this case is a significant variable that we can not omit) can change the past and ultimately change the outcomes of the present and future. The liberatory effect that resulted from the release of this clogged energy field from my past continues to impact my current performance. I cannot ignore the fact that the “high expectations” that I had adopted had become an inhibitor rather than a motivational factor in my growth. Consequently, the performance based assessment of this critical moment continued to impact performance over time-space until there was an intervention (guide) that helped create a transformational shift in consciousness that completely altered that which was observed.

Expectations are not neutral. Expectations, like standards come from somewhere-- an individual, a group, a society, a norm, etcetera. Our assessment of any performance or action is based on an expectation or standard thereby reinforcing the notion that both expectations and assessments are determined by a third party or force that becomes the filter through which the performance is observed. This determines, if you will, the level of consciousness of the observer, which in turn will alter the results or outcome. As educators, our unconscious acceptance of expectations and a standard of performance do impact what we observe in our students. Furthermore and perhaps more importantly, our assessment of the performance however subjective it might be (based on higher or lower levels of consciousness), does impact the performance of the student over the time-space continuum.

This means two things. One, the role of a critical educator must be to transcend judgment when observing his or her students – or engage in impartial observation. And secondly, the role of the critical educator is to understand that a student’s performance cannot be understood within the limitations of linear thought. That is to say that a student’s performance must be seen as a continuum that expands time-space that includes past, present and future. The latter requires that the transcendental educator accept the possibility that his or her impartial observation and conscious assessment of an act or performance contains within itself the power to heal and create a brighter future.

Let me conclude this writing by saying that I am not suggesting that educators should not hold high expectations of their students. That would be fool hearty. What I am suggesting is to consider the possibility that our expectations can have a positive or negative impact on student outcomes. As we begin to assess students, we need to stop and consider the power inherent in this act. Ask yourself: What are my expectations of this individual child? Where did this expectation come from? Is this expectation grounded in knowledge of the child’s learning process? Have I engaged in the practice of impartial observation in order to heighten my awareness of this child’s learning experiences? How will my assessment of the child impact the child’s sense of self? Will it inhibit or motivate? These questions are just some of the ways we can transcend great expectations and truly see the reality in front of us. It is an act of courage in a time when we are forced to stand in judgment of others with little regard to the elasticity and alchemy of knowledge exchange.

Back to School Blue: A Word on Belonging

It is the month of school, the time when families from all over come together to deposit their most precious beings into the hands of others, who for some reason or another have found themselves in the business of educating. It is the time when teachers and administrators rub elbows, pull up sleeves and invest time in reconnecting with each other, with the hum drum of an old, or new, school building, putting up bright posters and stamping names into books in order to put some kind of rhyme and reason to the daily routine of schooling. Summer trails not too far behind. Was it a dream, after all? Where do I fit in, in this new space that once was mine but now seems to have taken on a new shape, a new face? Time does that you know. It makes the same feel new and the new quickly feel the same. Frankly, I love the air that September brings. If anything, it brings new beginnings and curiosity. Will the dreams that I built in the sand over the summer break or unfold?

My memories of school trickle back every September, now more than anything since my own children are old enough to remember. My son is attending my old stomping ground and through him I am revisiting an old place I used to call my own. I listen into the silence of my daily walk and remember the joy and the pain of growing up and mostly, the overwhelming need to belong. I remember all the schools I attended, all the people I befriended and realize that year after year I was always, always looking for belonging. In many ways, my education failed me in that respect, or was it society in general, I don’t know – but yearning to belong is in my memory like a legacy. Why did I need this so much? Why was it so difficult to find, this ethereal feeling of belonging. What is it to belong anyway?

Somehow the need to belong is built into our DNA. Yes, I believe this is true. Don’t you? It is one of the basic needs of the human being. Should I tell you that Maslow said so for it to be true? And yet, I find that very few youngsters feel like they really belong at school. Kids are so cruel to one another. The clicks and gangs and groups that are formed quickly spread throughout the school building establishing rules and imaginary criteria for fitting in. Perhaps not so imaginary, really. Do kids still group themselves by race, ethnicity, and language these days? Yes, I believe they do. Teachers do, haven’t you noticed? Not everywhere, not always -- but in many schools and more often than you think. Why? Probably because many of us still believe we are attracted to those most like us. We assume that we probably agree on most things if we share the same background. In schools where at least 50% of the teachers are middle and upper class whites teaching in schools where 100% of the kids are poor, black, Latino and immigrant populations – well, there is much to talk about when it comes to grouping, belonging, identity. Of course, these issues are by no means exclusive to inner city schools. Prep schools and private schools are equally plagued with the right to fit in, class and status issues sometimes trump race, but not always. More often than not, it is exactly, exactly the same albeit articulated differently. In the inner city, black, Latino and Asian teachers cringe when they listen to white teachers complain about certain students and behaviors and white teachers feel like they couldn’t possibly understand what it’s like to be a white teacher in front of angry brown kids. Further uptown, white teachers teach brown teachers the status quo and parents fight for diversity initiatives that never really get off the ground because somehow, somewhere with all the diversity around diversity seems not to be working. And perhaps they’re right. Perhaps, we are ALL right. We are divided amongst ourselves, aren’t we? Aren’t we?

We communicate that to our kids. Every time we describe a person by racial terms or by the amount of money they have or by their job title, we are dividing ourselves and sorting and selecting based on the illusion that we are different. So even the kids of the current generation who have significantly more exposure to multiple perspectives and people of all kinds than we ever did on television and the Internet - don’t really have access (real access) to people unlike themselves except for the people they might encounter at school. That’s why schools become the microcosm of our society. It is the place. Our own complex feelings about belonging in a diverse society, a society plagued with materialism and inequities often misinterpreted through the lens of race (a label that really has nothing to do with the color of your skin and yet has everything to do with the color of your skin)– are transferred to our students every day. Where does the “I” in “we” really belong, anyway? Regardless of all of the confusion, belonging continues to be a pre-requisite for life.

How can we create a sense of belonging for our students and ourselves? How can we break free from the labels and assumptions and stereotypes and desires and fears that continue to isolate ourselves from the universal human experience? Is there a possibility of something else, perhaps another place where we can meet eye to eye? Is it possible to create a leveled playing field? If we live in isolation of one another we can never experience true belonging. If belonging is one of our basic human needs, we can never fully develop our true potential without it.

I would like to make a suggestion. Let’s say that humans are at a critical point in their evolution and that we now have the power to exist above and independent of the material plane and that we have the power to determine the shape and content of our daily experience. Think about this. Read it again. Then ask yourself this: If we could transcend the material plane, how might we see human beings differently? What would we see? There is a unique perception, a higher state of awareness, so to speak that is key in our understanding of human potential and I am asking you to consider this possibility as you begin to contemplate belonging. Not just belonging, but the belonging that will be your responsibility in your school, in your classroom, in your intimate space called teaching and learning space, the space that you will share every day with your colleagues and your students. How can you see yourself and your students differently? How can you help them develop their true potential?

Here is another suggestion. Know yourself. Know your students. What is this sense of knowing that I refer to, that Gardner (1999) refers to? How does this sense of knowing oneself and others create a sense of belonging? Can we deliberately create the conditions in which teacher and students have access to this sense of knowing, this sense of belonging in our classroom? This is probably the most important question that you need to think about when planning your school year – whatever your subject may be -- because it is here, in this search that you will understand your purpose and the power of teaching.

In the first month of school you will inevitably earn the respect or lose the respect of your students. It is that simple. Rarely will you regain respect if it is lost. It’s possible, but rare. Many new teachers reading this might not understand this yet, but you will soon. Other more experienced teachers understand this rule, but still struggle to be successful early in the year. You might ask what does respect have to do with belonging? Well, my dear friend, I am going to tell you a secret. Remember this. The students in front of you – you know the ones that will be in your care for the next ten months -- all know the thing that you might not be ready to accept. And that is, belonging is one of the basic human needs and no teaching or learning will take place without it. If you value the humanity in yourself and in the young souls in your care enough to diligently, purposefully and strategically create a sense of belonging in your classroom, you will earn their respect for the rest of the year. Why? Because respect is born out of the seed of humanity- it is the place where we all meet and all see each other as we truly are – this is human potential. Trust me and take the first step.

Balance

I look around and I see the torrential rains pounding against the trees, the muddy cars and streets, the aggressive and inappropriate police, the underground railroad bloodied by sweat and overworked civic servants, the endless rows of malls and stores that continue to push ahead time by precipitously changing the stock of clothes from season to season, holiday to holiday and fast as it goes I never seem to catch up and frankly I am pissed off because like a child, I am enjoying the sand and don’t want to hang up my bikini yet.

Just yesterday I found myself walking alongside tiny white rowed houses propped up by narrow sidewalks, Andalusian tiles and every once in a while a terra cotta awning barely providing for a shady patch. Cars and mo-peds speeding by, children and grandparents walking home at four in the morning talking street, gossip on every corner topped with a cold beer flood over tobacco and spit lined bar stools, a friendly face found on the beach and the heat that forces your bones to lay still, very still so that the tiny cool breeze will find its way through the maze of window panes and narrow hallways hopefully to land on you for long enough than a heartbeat, then morning -at least when the mountain and ocean dew meet for breakfast and then and only then will it be cool enough to enjoy a cup of coffee and fresh squeezed orange juice. I see poverty and anxiety and hopelessness and flat screened televisions blasting cartoons or the news, garbage bins piled high and overflowing, a torn mattress thrown along the curbside, a sign that warns of too many plastic bags swinging high over a recycling container that spits out bottles of wine and Casera. The older generation complains that there isn’t enough discipline and the younger generation demands liberation from structure and the little ones find themselves caught between the two, silenced voices as of yet, confused and raising themselves while the adults bicker about politics.

Looking outside, I find little balance. I want to choose sides, find the first class ride, make believe that I have a choice, contemplate a better life, think that somewhere out there is a place where I will be happy and free and the weather will cooperate with my mood swings. Somewhere there will be that perfect city where the streets will be clean but the police won’t beat people and the ocean air will float over all the pot holes so there will be no rancid smell of urine or dog feces. A place where we won’t notice any difference between people because there will be no rich and no poor – no immigrant and no citizen, all will belong and all will believe that the place that we live in is really, really just a home for just anybody. Work will be found and hopelessness will not lurk in alleys, bars will be places for joy and the doors will close long enough for people to visit the library, books and movies will be free and fancied like candy and all the while, people will spend at least one part of the day walking and wetting their feet on sand or in the grass, walking to the sound of music or the beat of the sun, clocking time with the rhythm and using this space to give thanks and remember.

There is never going to be balance looking at the outside. There will always be too much rain or too much sun if you look at life through the glass mirror that separates yourself from the world. There will always be a fault. There will always be an imperfection. There will always be something wrong with what you see, when you look outside. We are all desperately looking for balance and we are all so disappointed. Perhaps balance is really just accepting that life is made up of extremes? That our experience of life is like a pendulum – swinging back and forth but never stopping in between? It is a constant movement from one extreme to another and when you get to the far right, prepare yourself, it will return to the left and somehow in this dance, time moves along and life falls not on either side but lies down along the entire continuum. Life is not static – it is always in transit from and to, the ebb and the flow, the high tide will be followed by the low and the deep passion of the night will always be followed by the height of the sun – or the rain, if you are by chance in London or New York on any given day.

I had the opportunity to visit the beach almost every day this past month and many of you may know this, but visiting the beach is like visiting a relative. It is a very familiar place but you never know what you’re going to get. Some days the water is flat like a plate, gentle and calm and shining. Other days, the waves are jumping and the wind lifts grains of sand sending tiny pellets into your skin. Dark water spotted with seaweed, deep green and brown or diving deep under clear blue turquoise waves that rock you and hug you and speak soft stories into your ears. Temperature changes and rocks that you can’t see appear and sometimes there are days when it’s best not to wet more than your feet. Sit alongside it and respect the wisdom from slightly afar. On one day, I never got close enough to the beach because there was no parking and I rode home in the car and watched the sea from a great distance. I was often disappointed. There is nothing more painful than going for a swim and finding the waves too violent or the temperature too cold. But, on the one or two days when I found the perfect combination between the sea, and me-- well, it was amazing. I felt that I had tasted the great heavens. Floating and swimming there in perfect balance, harmony, and perfection. It was only several moments out of many, many - and like ecstasy, it was powerfully hypnotizing - the beauty. Yet, time has passed now since those moments and my memory of the beach is not confined to those two days. It is rather a collage made up of several moments each imprint a unique variation of the sea, the wind, the sand, my feet. All of them together continue to allure me back knowing that on any given day, I might not know what to expect, might not know how we both are going to interact – whether it be in mutual silence and respect or in absolute communion.

Visiting the beach, like visiting a relative is a good exercise in understanding life’s balance. While we are somehow in a familiar place, we really don’t know which way the pendulum might go. If we look for balance, we are not going to find it because our life energy is constantly flowing and moving the scales of balance from one end to the other. On those occasions when we allow ourselves to surrender to this movement, we will experience the miraculous joy of the heavens. There we can see the entire spectrum of colors, a prism of sorts-- when all of the variations and extremes come together to create light.

Balance.