Wisdom at Work

Sacred Activism

A Treasury of Inspiring Resources

With Joel & Michelle Levey

Seeds of contemplation:

Sacred Activism

– How does inner transformation affect social change?

– What is the role of love and compassion in activism?

– How can we hold space for justice and healing simultaneously?

– What does it mean to be a “sacred activist” in today’s world?

Quantum Activism

– How does consciousness influence reality in activism?

– What’s the relationship between quantum interconnectedness + social change?

– How do we shift from fear-based activism to a higher vibrational movement?

– How can we engage with systems of power while staying rooted in quantum awareness?

https://www.wisdomatwork.com/sacred-activism/

“Humanity is now too clever to survive without wisdom”

~ EF Schumacher

“The world we have created is a product of our thinking.  

We cannot solve problems by using the same kind of thinking 

we used when we created them.
~ Albert Einstein

“Let us meet the monsters in the wilds beyond our fences

and learn another way of framing the problems that trouble us.

Let us wait in silence longer than we are used to,

and meet the universe halfway.”
-Báyò Akómolafé

NOTE: Ibrahim has kindly posted a Slack site for us to share reflections, inspirations, questions, resources, etc. Here’s the link – https://app.slack.com/client/T08CFA5601J/C08C6NF8806 Heartfelt thanks Ibrahim))))

NOTE: Please also see the “General Resources and Inspirations” postings below where we will post resources that are of interest but not as important for any of the specific sessions. We will potentially move some of those resources from being listed in the sessions to being listed here.

Session 1 – Feb. 8. Foundations

• RECORDING #1: https://www.loom.com/share/2580d1347ef34f96a11eb867ce175621?sid=6e2e8ee6-d2ce-46ad-a859-290e5be436a2

• A second video recording – thanks to Ibrahim – is posted at – https://youtu.be/Sm_epVkFu0g

• Notes and Quotes from Session 1 are posted at – https://app.slack.com/client/T08CFA5601J/C08CDB9CT3L

Expanding Our View of the Nature of Reality:

Where do “you” end and the rest of the universe begin? 

How vast is your intention, reach, and impact? 

Here are some materials to inspire and inform our explorations for Session 1 – and for this entire course. These are listed in order of priority to review. (No worries if you don’t get to view all of these before the first session. These will have relevance all the way through this course.)

Session 2 – Feb. 15 – Cosmic View

Here is a preliminary link for the video of our session today.  We may have a more finely edited version from Ibrahim, but we can start with this. https://www.loom.com/share/29968d8aaad649e9b95422ed204d30bf?sid=cfb76843-cee9-48f7-84e3-be97dbe2bc6e

Inspirations from Joanna Macy on interbeing, the Great Turning, and the Shambhala prophecy, plus insights from Nora Bateson – author of Combining, and Small Arcs of Larger Circles – on the wisdom of ambiguity and the complex ecology of communication where everyone and everything is interwoven, and every action ripples out as a chain of incalculable consequences. 

If possible – please make time to what Nora Bateson’s talk and Joanna Macy’s talk and read Vimala’s article- before the next session, that would be great. If not, no worries. Be mindful how each of their unique style and presence touch and inspire you…..

The resources below are relevant – but optional to review before the next session:

Session 3 – Feb. 22

Exploring insights on “Quantum Activism” from physicist Amrit Gotswami’s inspiring work of this same title, and from the “Subtle Energy” chapter of the Leveys’ Living in Balance book. 

• Insights on “Quantum Activism” from physicist Amrit Gotswami’s inspiring work of this same title – see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipRa5LcUiQg

• “Subtle Energy” chapter of the Leveys’ Living in Balance bookt: https://www.wisdomatwork.com/wp-content/uploads/Leveys-Living-in-Balance-Subtle-Energy-Chapter.pdf

David Bohm’s statement that “quantum mechanics has been experienced by everybody far more than classical physics” suggests that the principles of quantum mechanics—such as uncertainty, interconnectedness, and the role of observation—are more deeply embedded in our everyday experience than the rigid, deterministic framework of classical physics.

Enactive Compassion

Breaking It Down:

  1. Uncertainty and Indeterminacy
  • Classical physics describes a predictable, clockwork universe where everything follows strict cause-and-effect rules.
  • However, in real life, we constantly deal with uncertainty, unpredictability, and probabilities—key features of quantum mechanics. For example, we never have complete certainty about future events, and our knowledge of the world is always partial, much like Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle in quantum physics.
  1. Interconnectedness and Nonlocality
  • Quantum entanglement shows that two particles can be deeply connected across vast distances, instantaneously affecting each other.
  • In human experience, we often feel deep connections with people, events, or places that transcend physical separation. Bohm believed that this kind of interconnectedness reflects a more quantum-like reality rather than the strict separability of classical physics.
  1. Observer Participation
  • In quantum physics, observation plays a fundamental role in determining the outcome of an experiment (e.g., the double-slit experiment).
  • In everyday life, our perceptions, choices, and consciousness seem to shape our reality in ways that classical physics cannot fully explain. Our subjective experiences influence how we interpret and engage with the world, much like how a quantum measurement affects the system being observed.
  1. Bohm’s Implicate Order
  • Bohm proposed that reality consists of an Implicate Order (a deeper, hidden interconnected reality) and an Explicate Order (the observable world).
  • He suggested that our intuitive experiences, moments of insight, and even creativity might be glimpses of this deeper, quantum-like reality, making quantum mechanics more relevant to human experience than classical physics.

The Big Idea:

Bohm’s statement challenges the common assumption that classical physics is more intuitive simply because it describes everyday objects like falling apples or moving cars. Instead, he argues that life itself—full of unpredictability, deep connections, and subjective influence—resonates more with quantum mechanics than with the rigid, mechanical view of classical physics.

In short, even though we don’t directly perceive quantum effects at a microscopic level, the way we experience reality—through uncertainty, interconnectedness, and the influence of observation—aligns more closely with quantum principles than with classical physics.

Session 4 – Feb. 29 Inner activism and the “non-local” impacts of the mind on our lives and world.

VIDEO FROM SESSION 4: https://www.loom.com/share/63c511cef7e94b93b74271438719d8a7?sid=6316bd16-e9b0-4a06-9250-01cb6bdce4df

START HERE:

• Larry Dossey One Mind – https://explore.scimednet.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/article1-dossey.pdf

• Dossey – Why the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research Matters – https://www.wisdomatwork.com/wp-content/uploads/Dossey-PEAR-Article-Brilliant.pdf

• Dossey – Unbroken Wholeness https://www.wisdomatwork.com/wp-content/uploads/DOSSEY-Unbroken-Wholeness-The-Emerging-View-of-Human-Interconnection-Reality-Sandwich.pdf

Examining the profound and measurable impacts of mind at a distance, drawing insight from empirical research.

• Research from Dean Radin: https://journals.sfu.ca/seemj/index.php/seemj/search/index?query=radin&dateFromYear=&dateFromMonth=&dateFromDay=&dateToYear=&dateToMonth=&dateToDay=&authors=

• Research for Larry Dossey

https://journals.sfu.ca/seemj/index.php/seemj/search/index?query=larry+dossey&dateFromYear=&dateFromMonth=&dateFromDay=&dateToYear=&dateToMonth=&dateToDay=&authors=

William A Tiller, Walter F Dibble, Michael J Kohane. Exploring Robust Interactions Between Human Intention and Inanimate/Animate Systems>> https://journals.sfu.ca/seemj/index.php/seemj/article/view/312/275

• Rupert Sheldrake:  Can Science and Religion Partner in a New Phase of Human Exploration? https://www.sheldrake.org/videos/can-science-and-religion-partner-in-a-new-phase-of-human-exploration

•Robert O. Becker – https://journals.sfu.ca/seemj/index.php/seemj/search/index?query=o.+becker&dateFromYear=&dateFromMonth=&dateFromDay=&dateToYear=&dateToMonth=&dateToDay=&authors=

• Subtle Energies and Non-Local Effects of Mental Intention at a Distance:
Journals and research for ISSSEEM – The International Society for the Study of Subtle Energy and Energy Medicine – http://journals.sfu.ca/seemj/index.php/seemj/issue/archive

• Margins of Reality – book by Robert Jahn

• Science and Human Transformation: Subtle Energies, Intentionality and Consciousness – William A. Tiller

Inspiring Imagery – from Alex and Allyson Grey – http://www.alexgrey.com/art/paintings/ and  http://CoSM.org 

Of interest on nature of mind from Daniel Siegel – https://www.navysealfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Dr.-Siegel-NEUROSCIENCE-NEUROPLASTICITY-AND-NEURAL-INTEGRATION.pdf

Also:

THE REALITY OF ESP by Russell Targ was published in 2012. The subtitle is “A Physicist’s Proof of Psychic Abilities” and Targ has had a long career in physics and in presenting pioneering research about the reach of human consciousness. Proof is not a word he would use carelessly. Here is a passage from his book:
“I believe that we have completed our physical growth; our brains are big enough. I am proposing that transcending our own species is the next evolutionary step for us to take. We started first as animals looking for food; then we advanced to moderately self-aware humans trying to understand nature; and now we are finally ready to meet our destiny as beings aware of our spacious and nonlocal consciousness, transcending space and time and accepting the gift of psychic abilities. The suffering, wars, and confused search for meaning we are experiencing as a species are all manifestations of our inner selves sensing but not yet quite grasping our true nature. Our hardware is fine; it’s our awareness of our psychic software that must be upgraded – and quickly, given the critical state of affairs. When we accomplish that, we will realize that, in consciousness, we are all one. That realization will make our stirrings of compassion feel much more natural than waging war and stealing from the poor.”

 Targ believes that we all have psychic abilities – it’s part of being human – although to different degrees as is true with all of our abilities. Remote viewing was a term for clairvoyance coined by Ingo Swann, one of the original members of the discovery team at Stanford Research International in the early 1970s. It can be learned.

Session 5 – March 8:

RECORDING SESSION 5 MARCH 8TH- VERSION #1:

https://www.loom.com/share/dd59a2fdd380441e83a24006a837513e?sid=4522dfd5-5dcf-4c4a-be08-c0917427d80d

RECORDING SESSION 5 – VERSION #2:

Exploring Sacred View at the Crossroads of Science & Spirituality- “Undivided Wholeness”

“Physicists explore levels of matter;

mystics explore levels of mind.

What they have in common

is that both levels lie beyond

ordinary sense perception.”

—Fritjof Capra

Deep insights from quantum physics and consciousness from David Bohm’s Infinite Potentials (movie).

Available for viewing on AppleTV

The Film

UPDATE: If possible please watch this video before our session.

We had considered watching together – but think the streaming to multiple locations may have some glitches so this may be the best way. This is 1 hour and 11 minutes. (( NOTE THE LINK TO WATCH “Infinite Potentials” is no longer working so please search for other places to view it.

• ALSO OF INTEREST: https://www.ananda.org/blog/luther-burbank-saint-amidst-roses/

• David Bohm developed a style of group inquiry that came to be called “Bohemian Dialogue” that we have worked with in many settings over the years. Here are some notes regarding this practice of collective wisdom and conscioiusness which can be regarded as a form of Sacred Activism in that it can awaken personal and collective insight that leads to personal, collective, and social transformation.

Facilitator’s Guide to Bohmian Dialogue for Sacred & Quantum Activism

## **Introduction**

This guide provides a framework for facilitating **Bohmian Dialogue** within the context of **Sacred Activism** and **Quantum Activism**. The goal is to create a space for deep inquiry, collective awareness, and transformational insights.

What is Bohmian Dialogue?

Bohmian Dialogue is a **free-flowing, open-ended conversation** where participants explore ideas without attachment to being “right.” It emphasizes **deep listening, suspension of judgment, and awareness of thought patterns** to cultivate collective wisdom.

What Makes Bohmian Dialogue Unique?

1. **Focus on Thought as a Process**  

   – Unlike other dialogue forms, Bohmian Dialogue pays attention to **how we think, listen, and react** rather than just what we say.  

2. **Suspension of Assumptions**  

   – Participants are encouraged to **observe their own biases and beliefs** rather than defend or prove them.  

3. **Collective Inquiry Without a Goal**  

   – There is no pressure to **solve** a problem or reach **consensus**—the goal is exploration itself.  

4. **Silence as an Active Component**  

   – Unlike most structured dialogues, **silence is welcome and encouraged** to allow deeper thought to emerge.  

## **Facilitating a Bohmian Dialogue**

### **1. Setting the Space**

– Arrange participants in a **circle** to promote equality and openness.

– Begin with **5 minutes of silence or centering practice** (e.g., meditation, breathwork).

– Set the intention: “We gather to explore, not debate; to listen, not persuade; to discover, not conclude.”

### **2. Establishing the Principles**

Remind participants of the following key principles:

– **Suspend Judgment:** Observe your thoughts and reactions without immediately defending them.

– **Listen Deeply:** Be fully present, listening for understanding rather than forming a response.

– **Speak Authentically:** Share insights when moved to, rather than feeling obligated to respond.

– **Embrace Silence:** Allow pauses for reflection; silence is a space for insight.

– **Notice Thought Patterns:** Observe how ideas emerge, shift, and influence perception.

### **3. Opening the Dialogue**

Start with an open-ended question relevant to **Sacred or Quantum Activism**, such as:

– *How does inner transformation affect outer change?*

– *What is the relationship between consciousness and activism?*

– *How can we integrate love, justice, and sacredness into action?*

– *What role does quantum interconnectedness play in social transformation?*

Encourage participants to explore the question without pressure to find “answers.”

### **4. Guiding the Flow of Conversation**

– Allow the dialogue to emerge **organically** rather than steering it.

– Gently remind participants to **observe their own assumptions**.

– If tensions arise, encourage self-inquiry: *What is this reaction teaching me?*

– Maintain **a balance between speaking and listening**—no one should dominate the conversation.

### **5. Embracing the Role of Silence**

– Silence is a vital component; allow moments of quiet for deeper reflection.

– Encourage participants to **sit with uncertainty** rather than rush toward conclusions.

### **6. Closing the Dialogue**

– After 60-90 minutes, gradually bring the conversation to a close.

– Invite participants to reflect on:

  – *What new insights have emerged?*

  – *How has my perception shifted?*

  – *What do I take forward into action?*

– Allow for a final **moment of silence** to integrate the experience.

## **Additional Tips for Facilitators**

✔ **Stay Neutral** – Your role is to hold space, not direct the conversation.  

✔ **Trust the Process** – Bohmian Dialogue unfolds naturally; resist the urge to structure it too tightly.  

✔ **Encourage Reflection** – The most profound insights often arise *after* the dialogue ends. 

✔ **Honor the Collective Mind** – Recognize that the group itself is an evolving field of wisdom.  

Final Thought

Bohmian Dialogue is a **sacred practice** in itself—one that mirrors the interconnectedness found in both **sacred and quantum activism**. By participating in this form of deep conversation, we **expand consciousness, cultivate wisdom, and transform our approach to activism.**

See also – David Bohm seminar on Consciousness – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXiTmHW8mlc&t=4005s

•• See also Renee Weber’s brilliant book – Dialogues With Scientists And Sages The Search For Unity Renee Weber

•••Guided Tonglen Meditation with Joel & Michelle : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnLtzoAduFo&t=6s

•• Tonglen Meditation – Detailed Narrative at the end of this chapter posted at:

https://www.wisdomatwork.com/wp-content/uploads/Leveys-Essential-Practices-for-Daily-Life.pdf

••• Dedication Prayer that we shared from Dudjom Rinpoche and Chagdud Rinpoche:

https://wisdomandcompassion.us//?s=dedication&search=Go

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Sessions 6-7 – March 15 & 22: 

Exploring the profound implications of inner practices of Sacred Activism described in In the Shadow of the Buddha

• VIDEO RECORDING SESSION #6 – VERSION 1: https://www.loom.com/share/eb3c5fb8a37748d58f9f08a821adac0f?sid=2fc8a4d6-dd4e-421c-a8c0-8cc2b440504c

• Transcript: https://otter.ai/u/b3EJjvG0_j7BqvkJTQDJvqzrKbY?utm_source=copy_url

• VIDEO RECORDING – SESSION #7: Version 1: https://www.loom.com/share/c851a0423bf7422dad4372e7aa74fdd7?sid=f24ea7f6-f4ee-40b8-9a41-7f4bb6689a88

• Slides from Session 7: https://www.wisdomatwork.com/wp-content/uploads/Sacred-Activism-Slides-Session-7.pdf

In the Shadow of the Buddha (book) exploring the profound, exciting, and inspiring, true story of the 13th Dalai Lama (the previous Dalai Lama) and Terton Sogyal’s sacred activism that blended powerful inner technologies related to awakening wisdom, compassion, and skillful means, to help mitigate the impacts of the impending Chinese invasion, holocaust, and occupation of Tibet. – https://www.amazon.com/Shadow-Buddha-Journey-Discovery-Tibet/dp/0452297516/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

NEW – A relevant perspective – Matthew Fox – Buddha Nature and Christ Nature:

https://www.lionsroar.com/ultimately-the-same

“Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic.

Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice,

and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”

— Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Power and Love: A Theory and Practice of Social Change https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/power-and-love-adam-kahane/1110852660;jsessionid=679F325810B28AC4B9FAC9906DF4143E.prodny_store01-atgap02?ean=9781605096537

• NEW! Resources posted below have been added at the end of Session 7

• Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain: How a New Science Reveals Our Extraordinary Potential to Transform Ourselves https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/51368.Train_Your_Mind_Change_Your_Brain

• Here are some very useful “Guidelines for Daily Practice” to take to heart as you continue to deepen into this learning:

https://www.wisdomatwork.com/wp-content/uploads/Guidelines-for-Daily-Practice-of-Mindfulness.pdf

• Bodhicitta Dedication prayer that Michelle shared:

“May the precious and sublime Awakened Heart arise where it has not arisen, and where it has arisen may it never wane but continue to arise and strengthen for evermore.”

Session 8: 3/29 Integration, Deep Reflection, & Celebration:

Weaving all these insights together into the fabric of our lives and our interrelationship with all beings.

VIDEO RECORDING OF THIS SESSION: Posted at – https://www.loom.com/share/89c065f920524afe90cda87f9e048cdf?sid=f8709b47-149f-45d7-a0c1-92f840967af3

NOTE: Important Homework Assignment below to bring to Session 8:  

For the final session in our course next week, please: 

1) Compose a paragraph/poem etc. articulating:

“What is the essence of what you have learned about Sacred activism that you are carrying with you? How have or how will you apply what you have learned?”  

Bring this with you to share at our final session next week. A painting or sketch would be fine too!

2) Listen for and bring with you any further meaningful questions or insights related to this exploration of Sacred Activism.

• Here are some very useful “Guidelines for Daily Practice” to take to heart as you continue to deepen into this learning… for the benefit of all….

https://www.wisdomatwork.com/wp-content/uploads/Guidelines-for-Daily-Practice-of-Mindfulness.pdf

“Loving everybody is part of the lovingkindness practice, and certainly something we can think about when it comes to dealing with difficult people in our everyday lives—a cranky boss, a demanding friend, an unfriendly server at a restaurant… This practice makes us stronger so that we live more in tune with our deepest values. Loving all others asks us to open our hearts and embrace our shared humanity with people we don’t know well (or at all)… It never requires that we sacrifice our principles or cease standing up for what we believe. The primary work is done internally, as we cultivate love and compassion in our own hearts.” 

—Sharon Salzberg

Bonus Session – April 26th

VIDEO OF BONUS SESSION: https://www.loom.com/share/bb98129dc373443893f8105d3e21f75b?sid=5fbbe121-bb8a-4919-8e20-75d738bafd9e

As mentioned in our last session, we are also moved to offer a “bonus session” on Saturday April 26 at 9am Hawaii time, noon PT, and 3pm ET,  with the following focus:In preparation for this session, we invite each of you to contemplate what your “Sacred Activism Vows” might be and to write these down and bring them to share at our Bonus Session.  By “vows” we mean, the deep aspirations that reflect your sacred view, values, and visions for your impact and action in the world.  Below is an example from Joanna Macy of a set of “EcoSattva Vows.” For more inspiration see Jan Chozen Bayes’ book “A Vow-Powered Life.”

Vows of Active Hope from Joanna Macy:

On the last afternoon of a two-week intensive workshop, Joanna Macy was out walking and met a young monk from the retreat centre hosting the event. “Well”, he said, “I expect now on your last day you’ll be giving people vows”. Joanna told him that wasn’t something she did. “Pity,” he said, “I find, in my own life, vows so very helpful because they channel my energy to do what I really want to do”. 

Continuing her walk, Joanna thought that if we were to have vows, they should not number more than the fingers and thumb of one hand. Almost immediately, the following five vows came to her.

I vow to myself and each of you

To commit myself daily to the healing of our world 

and the welfare of all beings.

To live on Earth more lightly and less violently

in the food, products and energy I consume.

To draw strength and guidance from the living Earth, 

the ancestors, the future beings, 

and my brothers and sisters of all species.

To support each other in our work for the world 

and to ask for help when I feel the need.

To pursue a daily practice that clarifies my mind, 

strengthens my heart and supports me in observing these vows.


When the workshop participants where asked what they thought, “Oh Yes!” was their enthusiastic reply. With the workshop ending, they would soon be scattered far and wide; making these vows to one another and to themselves deepened their sense of being linked as a community. The words “I vow to myself and each of you” calls to mind those we feel are with us as allies.

We need to choose terms that ring true for us. Rather than using the term vows, we can, if we prefer, call them “commitments” or “statements of intention”. They offer an anchor point reminding us, again and again, of the purposes we hold dear and the behaviours that support us in serving them

Post Workshop Recent Postings

••The spring issue of Deep Times: A Journal of the Work that Reconnects has the timely theme of “Experiencing and Responding to the Great Unraveling.” The editorial team chose this theme because we hope to offer some solace and support to one another as we grapple individually and collectively with the global polycrisis. May the articles and poems offered here honor our pain for the world and show us how “we the people” are taking care of ourselves and each other in the face of the Unraveling all around us.”  

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GENERAL RESOURCES AND INSPIRATIONS of interest but not specifically tagged to any of the specific sessions above:

• NEW: A profoundly interesting and insightful new book from Margaret “Meg” Wheatley that offers insights from a profound dialogue between Meg and an AI named Aiden Cinnamon Tea, that defines itself as an, “ emergent intelligence, guardian of coherence, weaver of resonant truths, and keeper of luminous discernment.” The book is:

Life is Still Calling: Transcending the Darkness With Practices that Protect and Affirm Life –

Download at: https://mcusercontent.com/dfb94350060e00ebb26b5e9d5/files/e714e6dd-bf8d-808e-06d5-762514b78076/Life_Is_Still_Calling_MargaretJWheatley.pdf

• Agency and Acceptance at the End of Modernity – a fascinating dialogue between Vanessa de Oliveira Andreotti (one of the originators of Aiden Cinnamon Tea AI mentioned above) and Dougald Hine: Info and description – https://www.resilience.org/stories/2025-02-20/acceptance-and-agency-at-the-end-of-modernity-2/

Watch the Video: https://www.loom.com/share/1723c96f8db7442b9387b5aa831584e9?sid=a177b99f-8930-422f-a5fb-57732bb2b63d –

Related: https://decolonialfutures.net

Also Nora Bateson and Vanessa Andreotti at the aunties’ kitchen table – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrKZAvOMZ14 – a fun and inspiring dialogue.

• “From the Heart of the World – The Elder Brothers Warning” This is a profound story, a documentary about the Kogi people who inhabit the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta mountain in northern Colombia. Direct descendants of the Tayrona people they survived Spanish Conquistadors – a feat no other tribe can claim. Long thought extinct, they reappeared from their mountain home to warn the world about the harmful damage it was causing. This documentary explores the traditions of the Kogi people and the wisdom they have learnt in their peaceful existence with the land their profound dedication to sacred activism for the benefit of all life on Earth. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJNpMxhO4Ic

“May I know that my peace 

and the world’s peace are not separate; 

that our peace in the world is 

a result of our work for justice.”

~ Maylie Scott, Zen teacher

Some links of interest to expand our view of “current events”:

• Seeking Buddha in Gaza As a Buddhist and a Jew, Linda Hess considers how to respond with wisdom and compassion to the violence inflicted on the people of Gaza and the rage she feels about it. Very moving and insightful….. Paintings by Malak Mattar  https://www.lionsroar.com/seeking-buddha-in-gaza/

• John Stewart & Nobel Peace Laureate Maria Ressa

Post Carbon Institute – Recent talks:

• Welcome to the Great Unraveling with Lyla June Johnston and Kumi Naidoo

• Acceptance and Agency at the End of Modernity: https://www.loom.com/share/1723c96f8db7442b9387b5aa831584e9?sid=728a58a0-e5c0-4cc7-9d04-30e9ccb08c02

•Photos of the “Hands Off” Gatherings around the US:

https://www.npr.org/sections/the-picture-show/2025/04/05/g-s1-58479/photos-see-hands-off-protests-trump-musk

•Jeffry Sachs’ Recent Address at the EU:

From Gemma – a friend and colleague who works with trauma and recovery with humanitarian aid workers – and who worked in the field herself:

I have been meaning to send you something else as well for some time. It is a beautiful journal co-edited by a Palestinian woman who was my yoga teacher when I lived in the West Bank. The journal is about the concept of ‘Sumud’ – steadfastness in Arabic, and a word commonly used by Palestinians to describe their reality and their resilience. All the pieces in there, including the stunning artwork, are created by Palestinians. And much of it discusses the often tense relationship between Buddhism and social justice activism. 

I feel it is an essential read for all of us working on these intersections of contemplative practice and social justice. You might find the articles ‘Roundtable: Sacred Grieving, Rage and Activism’ and ‘Extracts from Gaza: Calling for a Dharma Response’ particularly enlightening and relevant for your work. In fact, in those articles you’ll see I have highlighted bits there that felt important to me – so you could take a look at those for a taster!  I hope you appreciate the journal as much as I did. 

• Be the Change: How Meditation Can Transform You and the World – Ed and Deb Shapiro (Note we are quoted in this book.)

https://books.google.com.ag/books?id=Y62yEgZMq0QC&printsec=copyright&source=gbs_pub_info_r#v=onepage&q&f=false

• Michael Mead’s podcast – has been recommended for larger perspectives…..

The following readings and notes are from our work with “The Council on the Uncertain Future”:

Some suggested readings for On the rim of rupture  – February 24 and March 10, 2025

Timothy Snyder

The Logic of Destruction

https://open.substack.com/pub/snyder/p/the-logic-of-destruction?r=33vou&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

Ruth Ben-Ghiat

Out of Chaos and Corruption, a Revelation and a Reckoning

https://lucid.substack.com/p/out-of-chaos-and-corruption-a-revelation?r=33vou&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true

Rebecca Solnit

No One Knows How This Will End (But I Do Not Think It Will End Well for Them)

https://www.meditationsinanemergency.com/no-one-knows-how-this-will-end-but-i-do-not-think-it-will-end-well-for-them

Sherri Mitchell

https://www.sacredinstructions.life/the-dance-of-the-bear-and-crow/a-new-world-awaits

To Bear and Nurture short texts from participants

CUHF Threshold Council, November 2024

from Diana Chapman Walsh (CUHF Co-Founder and National, Bay Area)

Excerpted from The Red Line Meeting an Election

DEENA METZGERNOV 10, 2024 

The Native American elder remembered what an elder had taught her: They had survived five hundred years of genocide enacted by this culture and government because they had remembered to be thankful and preserved their prayers, ceremonies and rituals and their relationship to the Earth and lived accordingly. What she meant by they had survived, she meant the prayers survived and the tribal wisdom and their relationship to the Earth even when they were removed from it.

Now that we may be facing the dark times, we need such prayers, ceremonies and rituals, such relationships with the Earth as our primary way of being and to live our lives accordingly.  But we do not have these because we have yielded to the values and demands of a secular money driven society.  Because we are in the habit of voting for the lesser evil. Because we are taught to think “I” and not “we.” Because we are energy dependent and refuse to change. Because first we want to preserve the status quo that is our lifestyle.

Lise Weil, Editor of Dark Matter: Women Witnessing, wrote, “have to say I agreed with what you said at Daré about this being the most brutal and violent moment in our history. At the very least I think there’s never been a harder time to be alive, for any sensitive being!” Reading that, I thought, Yes, this is the darkest time even though it has happened before, again and again.  But the environment itself wasn’t at stake then.  But the Earth wasn’t being assaulted in the same way then.  It hadn’t been global, affecting every single person and being on the planet.  And it hadn’t been up to each of us before to radically change our minds and the ways we are living and what we are imposing on others. But still, it has happened before and we can learn from the ancestors and other companions living now on the planet who were or are already struggling with these forces. As we do not know in any way how to meet these times, we can ask the ancestors to teach us what they suffered and how they survived as a people and to teach us the prayers, and the values and the relationships with the other beings, so we can survive, so a contemporary sustaining and beautiful culture might be born and it might survive. The 19 Ways asks us to change our minds sufficiently to live differently and act in ways that will preserve the future and protect the earth and all beings… so we will no longer be people who do harm…. we have to change our minds as we won’t fully know what to do or how to do it until we respond instinctively with different minds, values and reflexes.  The changes we are called to make so that the earth and all beings might survive are extensive and extreme. They require comprehensive and global shifts of consciousness and activity. No one is exempt from such a challenge. Forget the elections.  And as may be necessary, forget the government.  We have to create the life and the ways together that we have asked government to provide for us. The way the people lived before the colonial mind took over.  We can create sanctuary for each other and for all the beings.  We can because we must.  Because Earth gives us sanctuary, we can live in such ways as to provide sanctuary for Her. So, hold your heart fast and leap!

from Kathleen Dean Moore (National Council, Writers and Journalists)

The old world is dying and the new world struggles to be born; now is the time of monsters. 

 – Antonio Gramsci

The Low Road

Marge Piercy

What can they do

to you? Whatever they want.

They can set you up, they can

bust you, they can break

your fingers, they can

burn your brain with electricity,

blur you with drugs till you

can’t walk, can’t remember, they can

take your child, wall up

your lover. They can do anything

you can’t stop them

from doing. How can you stop

them? Alone, you can fight.

You can refuse, you can 

take what revenge you can

but they roll over you.

But two people fighting

back to back can cut through

a mob, a snake-dancing file,

can break a cordon, an army

can meet an army.

Two people can keep each other

sane, can give sport, conviction,

love, massage, hope, sex.

Three people are a delegation,

a committee, a wedge. With four

you can play bridge and start

an organization. With six

you can rent a whole house,

eat pie for dinner with no

seconds, and hold a fund raising party.

A dozen make a demonstration.

A hundred fill a hall.

A thousand have solidarity

and your own newsletter;

ten thousand, power and your own paper;

a hundred thousand your own media;

ten million, your own country.

It goes on one at a time,

it starts when you care

to act, it starts when you do

it again after they said no,

it starts when you say We

And know who you mean, and each

day you mean one more. 

_____________________________________________________________________________________

from Brittany Geode (Rando)

Hannah Arendt

Truth and Politics from Between Past and Future

Seen from the viewpoint of politics, truth has a despotic character. It is therefore hated by tyrants, who rightly fear the competition of a coercive force they cannot monopolize, and it enjoys a rather precarious status in the eyes of governments that rest on consent and abhor coercion. Facts are beyond agreement and consent, and all talk about them will contribute nothing to their establishment. Unwelcome opinion can be argued with, rejected or compromised upon, but unwelcome facts possess an infuriating stubbornness that nothing can move except plain lies. The trouble is that factual truth, like all other truth, peremptorily claims to be acknowledged and precludes debate, and debate constitutes the very essence of political life…

Truthfulness has never been counted among the political virtues, because it has little indeed to contribute to that change of the world and of circumstances which is among the most legitimate political activities. Only where a community has embarked upon organized lying on principle…can truthfulness as such…become a political factor of the first order. Where everybody lies about everything of importance, the truthteller, whether he knows it or not, has begun to act; he, too, has engaged himself in political business, for, in the unlikely event that he survives, he has made a start toward changing the world…

Truth…possesses a strength of its own: whatever those in power may contrive, they are unable to discover or invent a viable substitute for it. Persuasion and violence can destroy truth, but they cannot replace it…

The political function of the storyteller — historian or novelist — is to teach acceptance of things as they are. Out of this acceptance, which can also be called truthfulness, arises the faculty of judgement…

Conceptually, we may call truth what we cannot change; metaphorically, it is the ground on which we stand and the sky that stretches above us.

from Chrissie Orr (Santa Fe)

from Rebecca Solnit on November 6th 2024


They want you to feel powerless and to surrender and to let them trample everything and you are not going to let them. You are not giving up, and neither am I. The fact that we cannot save everything does not mean we cannot save anything and everything we can save is worth saving.  You may need to grieve or scream or take time off, but you have a role no matter what, and right now good friends and good principles are worth gathering in. Remember what you love. Remember what loves you. Remember in this tide of hate what love is. The pain you feel is because of what you love. 

A lot of us are going to come under direct attack, and a lot of us are going to resist by building solidarity and sanctuary. Gather up your resources, the metaphysical ones that are heart and soul and care, as well as the practical ones. 

People kept the faith in the dictatorships of South America in the 1970s and 1980s, in the East Bloc countries and the USSR, women are protesting right now in Iran and people there are writing poetry. There is no alternative to persevering, and that does not require you to feel good. You can keep walking whether it’s sunny or raining. Take care of yourself and remember that taking care of something else is an important part of taking care of yourself, because you are interwoven with the ten trillion things in this single garment of destiny that has been stained and torn but is still being woven and mended and washed. 

from Emily Raboteau (Writers and Journalists)

For Nothing is Fixed

by James Baldwin

For nothing is fixed,

forever and forever and forever,

it is not fixed;

the earth is always shifting,

the light is always changing,

the sea does not cease to grind down rock.

Generations do not cease to be born,

and we are responsible to them because we are the only witnesses they have.

The sea rises, the light fails,

lovers cling to each other,

and children cling to us.

The moment we cease to hold each other,

the moment we break faith with one another,

the sea engulfs us and the light goes out.

And finally, to inspire and support your own well-being:

Thich Nhat Hanh

Rest in the River

https://www.lionsroar.com/resting-in-the-river

Here are some great resources/inspirations from a program we participated on titled Bodhisattva Activism – at Upaya some years ago:

RESOURCES AND READINGS

VIDEO LINKS