Some folks know that eventually I plan to take my adventures and experiments with the place-based movement and martial-art that my friends and I call SHIFT, and take it as a jumping-off point for highly kinetic community theater intent on expressing the stories in the mythic cartography of one’s own Land. I didn’t invent this idea. In all honesty I doubt I’ve had one original idea in my life. Author Eva Wong inspired me to have this vision, by telling a story of her childhood…

From Eva Wong’s Tales of the Taoist Immortals

When I was a child, the stories of Taoist immortals were also dramatized in opera. Before Hong Kong became a bustling city crowded with skyscrapers and shopping centers, Chinese Opera troupes performed frequently in the streets. On the day before a performance, a street, usually one near a marketplace, would be closed. Workers would build the stage, set up rows of benches, and erect little tents where the performers could rest between acts. Large scaffolds decorated with flowers and banners would be placed around the stage and the seating area, and written on the banners were the names of the prinicipal singers. Whenever a troupe visited my neighborhood, our entire household–my parents, my grandmother, myself, and the servants–would go to the performances. I still have vivid memories of those shows; they were the only occasions when I was allowed to stay up late. The operas didn’t begin until dark, and, on a summer night in Hong Kong, that usually meant nine.

In Chinese opera, the performers were not only singers, but also acrobats and martial artists. The stories of the immortals–Chang Tao-ling’s battle with the lords of evil, Chu Yuan-chang’s (the founder of the Ming Dynasty) treacherous betrayal of his friends, Kiang Tzu-ya using his magic to defeat the evil emperor–came alive as the performers sang, whirled, sparred, and somersaulted around the stage.

Life-affirming interpersonal communcation can feel a lot easier than the world of self-help books and gurus make it seem.

In the way of Tracking, we have a wonderful metaphor for a relationship that we can use also with human people, not just the other-than-human ones.

In this episode I share my personal routine of reflection and communication that I use to improve relationships in my own life.

Jean Liedloff and the Continuum Concept: http://www.continuum-concept.org/

Marshall Rosenberg and Nonviolent Communication: http://www.cnvc.org/

Don Miguel Ruiz and the Four Agreements: http://www.miguelruiz.com/

 

 Clarity and Peacemaking: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

TAOIST-ANIMIST IMPROVISATIONAL TRAINING: “YES, AND…”

While boxing the other night, I felt a huge revelation wash over me. The tool I learned from Viola Spolin, via Lisa Wells, called “Yes, and…”, has so many intriguing and empowering applications. As soon as I began to, with my body, say “yes, and…” to every move of my partner/opponent, suddenly I acquired an overwhelming sensitivity, and stopped receiving hits. Not only that, but I landed a quite remarkable hit on a mentor of mine who said “he never even saw it coming”.

This didn’t occur because I had practiced harder, or sparred more, or psyched myself up. It happened because I applied what I knew from improvisational games to boxing, out of intense need to avoid getting clobbered. I didn’t acquire more skill, I just applied sensitivity from one area of life, to another.

This has made me realize that, in every day life, in every moment, I can either embrace by saying “yes, and…”, or I can resist with “yes, but…”, or “no, because…”, or just plain “no!”.

A TAXONOMY OF RESISTANCE

“Yes, but…” gives the impression that I’ve accepted the input of my partner (whether a boxing partner, traffic, weather, a creative project), but really it works to passive-aggressively counter it in the end. It doesn’t actually say, “Yes, and…”.

“No, because…” strives to show how reasonably I act with my resistance. Really, in all rational courtesy and right thinking, one must accept that my refusal of the world’s input makes a lot of sense! I will talk my way out of the reality of my resistance. Unfortunately, this means: in boxing I get hit, in traffic I start road raging, when writing I don’t finish projects, in relationships I build grudges., when swimming I drown, and so on. “No, because…” may fool other people, but it doesn’t fool the prevailing forces of the world. And it doesn’t make for a satisfying life.

“No!” actually comes the closest to an honest form of resistance. No apologies, or disclaimers, just outright tension and rejection. I have a lot of respect for “No!”. However, don’t confuse “No!”, with using “Yes, and…” to say the word ‘no!’ to something. For example, someone wants a schoolkid’s lunch money. To express “No!” basically means to curl up into a ball, to turn away, to shut one’s eyes. To say, “Yes, and…” by saying the word ‘no!’ means to stand up for yourself, to draw a line, to totally accept the conflict in which you stand.

CONFLICT GIVES LIFE

“Yes, and…” doesn’t mean capitulating, it means accepting both the energy of your partner, and the energy coming from within yourself. It doesn’t mean to pretend buddha-hood…quite the opposite. Remember, it comes from a methodology used to train actors! So you open up wide for the energy flowing through you. To say “Yes, and…” in the face of your fears, may mean to say “No effing way!”, may mean you laugh, may mean you cry, but whatever it looks like, it means wholly accepting the energies in the present moment.

It means you never ignore energy, you in fact underline it, point at it, jump up and down and get excited when you see it. No matter what. Fear, Joy, Anger, Sadness. They all move as energy, and to follow them means to Flow.

LIFE MEANS MORE THAN SURVIVING

Once I saw a hand-out, for a class on wilderness survival. At the top, I read an admonition to the effect of: when you find yourself in a surivival situation, DON’T PANIC. This struck me as funny because of the unintended reference to Douglas Adam’s ‘Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’, and also because of the poor understanding of psychology it reflected. As a poor choice, “don’t panic” ranks second only to panicking, in a survival situation. It doesn’t tell you what to do, it tells you what to reject.

In an amusing way, this also compares well to an object in Douglas Adam’s book, the “Joo Janta 200 Peril-Sensitive Sunglasses”, a pair of sunglasses whose tinting turned completely opaque and jet-black in the presence of danger. This would count as a “No!”, in terms of improvisational technique.

How might you play with this? The next time you find yourself in an unpleasant or uncomfortable situation, with your whole self say “Yes, and…!” to it. Then go into action. Notice what happens.

I wish I could make it more complicated than that. Sorry.

How does our language affect us? Do indigenous people’s languages reflect their fundamentally different relationship to the world, as contrasted with cultures of modern civilizations?

If we wanted to change the way we speak, in order to reflect a more satisfying relationship with the Land around us, where might we start?

E-Prime, English without the verb “to be”, offers an approach.

E-Primitive takes it even farther, adding verbiness and other factors that deepen the observation and process-oriented perspective of the world around us.

This podcast clocks in at about 26 minutes.

 

 E-Primitive and a Language of Place: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

I admit, I don’t have personal experience with many of the ethnobotanical hallucinogens, often called “entheogens”. I’ve never taken mushrooms, or LSD, or such things. I can only tell my own story here, and I feel the need to.
When hearing non-indigenous people describe their plant-assisted ’shamanic’ journeys, I feel something missing. It reminds me of the great visionary stories, of Black Elk, and Buddha, and Jesus, and Stalking Wolf. And it all seems so intense, violent, and non-relational.

And I still don’t see why one needs a plant-intermediary to help establish a deep connection to land and spirit.

As in the title above, for me building relationships with friends and family, human and other-than, feels like an ongoing series of weddings. Courtships, and laughter, dancing, and feasts. Gifts, gifts, gifts, and receive thankfulness and community in return.

A wedding has so much going on. Just imagine then, if a crew of guys came in, and started up a fourth-of-july quality fireworks show, right there? Thunder and explosions, bursts of color and light, oohs and ahhhs.

But what about the wedding? It suddenly turned into spectacle.

I’ll admit, Christmas lights and fireworks don’t do anything for me, and maybe this explains the disconnect on my part.

It just feels so simple to me, though. My routine works this way: You want to befriend Cedar? Give Cedar gifts! Talk, and listen, to Cedar! Steward the Land around Cedar! Ask for blessings. Give blessings.

Can entheogens even find room to coexist in such a cozy, tight space, between courtier and beloved, between two best friends living in the bright, rainy world?

I don’t have any advice for those thinking about entheogen use, or who currently do. I tell my own story here, and wish you luck with your own.

You’ll notice in the sidebar I’ve begun a twitter stream of short questions, thoughts, and personal revelations. I often do several updates a day, and you can go to my twitter home page for the archive.

If you’ve never heard of “twitter”, essentially it allows for micro-blogging, putting a 140 character cap on any one post.

I hope, rather than the accumulated trivia of my day, you’ll find this another good resource for little thoughts on animism and updates on projects the College has going on.

Does the College of Mythic Cartography enrich your life? How? If you truly receive real benefit and support from what you see and hear in these electronic pages, I ask for your help to pay website, archiving, equipment, and staff costs.

If you’d like to see the College of Mythic Cartography produce more videos, podcasts, written materials, and workshops, please donate $5, $20, $50, $100, or more to help further the work we do. For as long as possible, we’d like to offer what you find here freely, to folks who need it. Help us put off the day as long as possible when we’ll need to bring in advertising or subscriptions to help fund what we do.

Thank you.

Julie Cramer has offered up another in her monthly series on personal traditions of clarity and health. Read her piece on Spring Cleaning, and learn what Sobonfu Some, Martin Prechtel, and Village traditions the world over have in common.

Listen to me interview Lisa Wells, instructor of theater, creative writing, and wilderness skills, author of Cedar Rapids: the Coming Derrick Dean, and poet-about-town.

In the interview she talks about the fascinating connection between prayer, theater, intuition, nature awareness, storytelling, and that ineffable creative energy that we sometimes call “shamanistic” or “mystical”.

I apologize in advance for a bit near the beginning where the microphone seems to go on a walkabout - I hope you can still catch what we say, as it addresses a worthwhile issue. Also, I mention the word “Duende” as meaning “wind” in Spanish.  It doesn’t.

Get out of your head, and into your body, courtesy of Lisa Wells.

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Live on location in Urban Scout’s Moho, a conversation between him and me on his affection for, and frustration with, E-prime.

The video runs a bit long. We made it for you die-hards out there.

Conversation about family, village, and what went wrong with civilization.