The All Things Contemplative Blog©

Show Notes

Thomas Yeomans, Ph.D. is the founder and director of the Concord Institute. His background includes education at Harvard, Oxford, and the University of California and professional work in the fields of literature, education, and psychology. Tom has been involved with psychosynthesis and spiritual psychology for over forty years. He studied with Roberto Assagioli, M.D. in the early 1970's, and has trained professionals in psychosynthesis and spiritual psychology since then, both in individual and group work, throughout North America and in Europe and Russia.

Tom has published writing on psychosynthesis and spiritual psychology as well as three volumes of poetry and a childrens' book. He is founder/director of The Concord Institute and co-founder of the International School in St. Petersburg, Russia. He is also a painter and musician. Tom maintains a private practice in psycho-spiritual consulting and mentoring in Shelburne Falls, MA. His latest book is Holy Fire: The Process of Soul Awakening.

Tom Discusses

-  What is contemplative?
-  What is psychosynthesis (PS) as a framework for human development? Freud, Jung and Assagioli – the full spectrum of human consciousness and experience
-  House as metaphor of human consciousness and Assagioli’s addition of a “terrace”
-  The inherent, natural evolutionary tendency of human development toward integration, synthesis and spiritual maturity
-  Abraham Maslow and self-actualization
-  Tom searching in his 20s, PhD program and discovery of Assagioli’s “egg diagram” as personal epiphany
-  The centrality of the present moment as a touchstone in PS underlying aliveness and vitality
-  Doctrine and dogma – “you can’t dogmatize the present moment”
-  Tom’s latest book, Holy Fire: The Process of Soul Awakening - the purpose of using  “holy” and “soul” as terms
-  The book is primarily written for “serious seekers” not necessarily for professionals
- In PS the emergence of needs arising from existential reality is key and techniques and methods are selected appropriate to serving those needs specific to each individual
-  The story of Craig the dumpmeister
-  Four types of awakening and their "wildness"
-  Importance of cultivating an appreciation of the unknown
-  Pythagoras, his lyre and awakening to the cosmos
-  Paradox of opening to the Big Picture and self as unique
-  No split between macro and micro as with Aristotle – the non-dual
-  The lived experience of poetry and painting as spiritual practices
-  Tom closes by reading his poem “Now”

References Mentioned

The Concord Institute

Holy Fire: The Process of Soul Awakening

Assagioli's "egg diagram" of the human psyche

Show Notes

Regina Roman has been leading pilgrimages and designing travel/study programs since she was 18. She is a spiritual director at the St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, author of published articles on pilgrimage and spirituality, and is an icon writer. She also studies with various shamans and native American medicine women on the ancient healing traditions. Her gift is in creating the space and the study program for a meaningful experience within the journey. Her wish for us is to sense the experience, feel the wonder and awe, and ponder upon all the threads that bind us through time, place and people. (from the Sapira website – see below)

Update: In our discussion of the Aramaic meaning of Sapira, I should have said if you pray in secret "your being will blossom and flourish" (Matthew 6:6). As always, comments and questions are welcomed - click on title above. - Ron Barnett

 Regina Discusses

 - What makes something contemplative?
- Socrates on truth as a wandering that is divine
- Two aspects of the contemplative stance: receiving, expression
- What is pilgrimage? Why go one one? What makes one meaningful?
- Two elements: outer desire to see or experience something; inner wish for transformation
- The story of Gary’s experience of silence, stillness, and absence of boundaries
- Importance of preparation and clarity of purpose
- Holy curiosity and inquiry – the mind and heart as sources
- An Executive Coach encounters the King’s inner chamber at the Pyramids
- Sapira – Journey with a Purpose pilgrimages to Egypt
- The Aramaic Sapira means first glimmer of light/continued illumination
- Amanda Gorman Presidential inaugural poet “There is always light….if only we’re brave enough to be it”
- Group silence on pilgrimages – "What tugs at your heart?"
- Religious affiliations of Sapira pilgrims
- Pilgrimage - any journey with the purpose of finding something that matters deeply
- Stories of intimacy: Regina’s birth and the nuns, Ron and the psychiatrist
- The I Ching: “there are forces in the world bringing people together who need to be together”
- Grace and gratitude
- Sting and relief; Kabir – “the breath inside the breath”

References Mentioned

Sapira - Journey with Purpose website
The Art of Pilgrimage: The Seeker’s Guide to Making Travel Sacred, Phil Cousineau
Matsuo Basho, Japanese poet
The I Ching or Book of Changes  
Kabir Das, mystical poet

Show Notes - to leave comments/questions click on title above. 

In 1982 Pat Johnson and family moved to the Lama Foundation in New Mexico and there two months later she met Fr. Thomas Keating. She served as the Lama liaison for two 16-day centering prayer (CP) retreats that he led at Lama in 1983 and again in 1984. These were the first intensive contemplative practice retreats using CP in the Christian tradition and inspired by Zen shessins he'd experienced.

In 1984 she served an experimental 9-week retreat Fr. Keating led at St. Benedict’s Monastery in Snowmass, CO where he was a monk. This began the Snowmass CP retreats at the monastery. From 1984 until 2018, Pat served and oversaw these retreats. She has also served as a Board member of Contemplative Outreach Ltd. and was its overall interim administrator for several years. 

Stephen Hatch, M.A. is a contemplative teacher, thinker, photographer and writer.  For the past thirty years, he has have lived as a "Worldly Monk," combining family life with meditation, silence, solitary time spent hiking and camping in the wilds, a simple lifestyle, and mindfulness. He has a B.A. from Colorado State University in Philosophy and Religion, and an M.A. from Iliff School of Theology. In the 1980s, he trained with Thomas Keating and then worked for several years with Contemplative Outreach, the organization Keating established to teach centering prayer. Formerly he was on the faculty of Naropa University, Boulder, CO where he taught contemplative Christianity.

We’ve enlightening episodes coming: Wilderness Mysticism, Retreat to 8,000 Feet, Living in the Non-Dual Here and Now, Bluegrass Zen, and Miksang Photography.

“My mind was racing with a thousand thoughts. I was not sure how I would deal with the long, dark hours to come but I soon noticed that each hand pull stirred up the bioluminescence in the water and broke up the darkness below. After I mentally adjusted to the dark space below me, I turned my focus to the night sky and the universe on display in the stars. I had rarely seen a night sky so bright and so full of stars…I got lost in the stars for several hours and the time passed as if I was time traveling…I realized that the whole ocean below me had lit up with its own show of bioluminescence…below me as deep as I could see, there were star-like dots of light, mimicking the night sky. I felt like I was floating in space, suspended between the sky and the sea. It was humbling and at the same time, felt primal on a level that is hard to articulate…it was the ultimate experience…time melted away in the largeness of it all.” (Jim Clifford, Catalina Channel night swim)

Jim Clifford, attorney, farmer, and senior citizen shares how he trains his body and mind;  the psychology of open water swimming including "the zone"; how he manages his mind during the many continuous hours involved; his experience of two contemplative values silence and solitude when swimming alone for hours at a time; and transcendence in nature.

References from the Show

https://openwaterswimming.com/2015/11/jim-clifford-thrice-as-nice/

Jane Goodall https://awaken.com/2020/05/mystical-experience-of-jane-goodall-ph-d/ 

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