(A
Book Review by Robert B. Cunningham, Ph.D.)
"Myths
have always arisen in response to ultimate question -- questions such
as “Where do we come from?”; “Where are we going?”;
“What’s the real meaning of life -- of my life?”; and
“Does life -- my life -- have a purpose?” Myths arise to
respond to these questions whether asked by all of humanity, a
particular culture, or an individual life lived in the turning of a
new century within the relatively small circle of family and friends
and jobs and struggles and dreams.
If
nothing else it seems we humans are born to ask ultimate questions. It
is our job, our duty, our destiny to ask ultimate questions and then
to listen for the myths that come back from the depths in response. Bob
Keller and Varley Wiedeman have shared from their collective wisdom
that has been gleaned from long life times of asking ultimate
questions and straining to hear the response coming from the True
Depth, the Great Mystery, the Sacred Other.
The
book is crafted with beautiful imagery and poetic commentary that
invites engagement and conversation; that feels like Soul beckoning
soul – “Dissolve the Cosmos whole. Absorb her into mind and
soul.” The book lures us into the ultimate bonds between Creator,
creation, and created: “We are the space where the Earth dreams, Her
precious realm where vision gleams.
Assisting
Earth to self-reflect, Is how the Earth and we connect.” The
destinies of the “living world” and humanity are united,
intricately and intimately bound together in the task of exceeding
survival and stretching into the potential of wholeness: “The
human gift to living world is to make sure she’s all unfurled—to
see her, feel her, speak her clear, and be her truthful, conscious
mirror.” The “living world” is of course the revealed
world, the created world, the vessel into which the Great Mystery
poured its sacred essence. And for what reason, what yearning,
what purpose did the Sacred Other move? What more poignant motive moved
the Sacred but to be seen; “The Mystery ineffable Sought form that
was expressible.” True for the Sacred Other—true for the
human soul.
Psychoanalysis
has taught us that the infant demands to be seen if it is to thrive,
to develop, to fulfill its gasping for life. The agony of
aloneness is overcome in being seen and finding the gaze of the other
that responds with care, nurture and knowing. Could it be no less
true for the very Source of life and how wonderful to be seen in the
manifestation of the miracle of creation?
No
small bet played by the Creator, the Source of Life and Everything. The
Living Earth enters into existence with no guarantees, no ace in the
hole or card up the sleeve: “we are a risk of major size, that Earth
allowed to actualize.” The Fire in the beginning not
only quickens life in the human soul it also fuels human drives,
ambitions, inflations, and images of hubris. How to deal with
this power of life in ways that moves to fulfillment and actualization
of all that is sacred? What is proposed is the notion of
“adventurous play.” This wonderful concept of spontaneity and
openness to the Other allows for human potential to be released in the
service of what is best in life and makes it possible to discover
the unknown and waiting newness in self and the world. Again
psychoanalysis has taught us the value of play—the necessity of
play.
D.
W. Winnicott recognizes that play is the work of infants and children
and adults that brings a special relational space for personality and
world to relate. It allows the self to know how it fits into the
world on the outside and what the outside can provide the self for
growth and healing. Play is an essential ingredient in
psychotherapy and healing of soul. Play is essential for
creativity to germinate and bring out new possibilities in life. Adventurous
is the perfect adjective for it connotes courage and risk. There
is no greatness of spirit without courage, no extension of the limits
of the known without the willingness to risk, no transformation of
need into love without wonder, no movement of fear into curiosity
without lowering the illusions of control and power. But in this
all there is the potential of disaster and the explosions of
grandiosity: “Here please recall why Earth birthed man, to feel and
value cosmic plan.”
Much
is demanded of the individual: “What Cosmos needs explicitly is each
one’s authenticity. It means to hold, possess, attain, To
comprehend, endure, maintain.” No one gets off easy. The
task to be a true self, made from and into this divine experiment is
demanded of each one of us. It is as though each one of us finds
ourselves making up a little piece of the mandala in the end of a
kaleidoscope. We are each a tiny grain of sand but necessary for
the mandala to form and transform as the wheel of time moves. Our
place can be filled with its own color and shape and/or it can be
empty and only partially filled in. We have good and evil before
us and ultimately we have death awaiting us. This is no small
thing and the journey is all that we have.
Bob
and Varley have given us all a beautiful gift in the offering of this
beautiful book. It is theirs to pass on. It is ours to
appreciate. In both the giving and the appreciating life is
brought into more fullness, meaning is made more real, and the myth is
heard."
~:~
"What a WONDER full book!
It is a picture book; a nursery rhyme; a love song; a
repeating, gorgeous
splash of color and
an overview of what has been called 'the new cosmology.' Every
sense is activated in the process
of reading this book aloud — as it should be read, in the
tradition of the author’s ancestral bards.
Endorsers write that it is a “winsome” …“cosmic canticle;”
a “whimsical reverie” that is “provocative fun;” a “Dr. Suess
for Adults”…in “the great oral traditions of storytelling.”
I second all of the above, as well as Brian Swimme’s
comment that “(o)ne can already imagine an entire generation of
children lying in bed and listening to
their parents as they read to them the mysterious story of where
they came from in the midst of these one hundred
billion galaxies.” And,
I would add, one can imagine entire generations of
parents and grandparents sharing
the joy of the experience.
Varied and beautiful pictures grace the top of each page of text,
drawing the reader into the mystery of the image and
the rhythmic poetry on the bottom half the page.
Each page of the ten (10) chapters--(averaging) 10 pages
each--is coded with a distinctive visual image, nurturing the
reader’s association between the cognitive context
and visual images of the referent concept--and making it easy to
locate one’s place in the book. The print
is large, adding to the inviting feel of the copy itself.
One has the holographic sense that the spaciousness
of the universe is somehow replicated on each page.
What is the content of this
“myth of our own?” It
is the stuff of a cosmically oriented, individual ethic which “the
new science” suggests is the only sensible attitude in the modern
world. The
Introduction ends with the naming
of six (6) key concepts developed by mathematical cosmologist Brian
Swimme. Within this framework the
next six (6) chapters expand our understanding of these dynamics of
the universe in easy, down to earth metaphor and rhyme; naming and
imaging each concept in turn: Allurement (spiral Milky Way);
Sensitivity (waves
of water breaking on the seashore); Memory
(horizon view of repeating mountain ranges); Adventurous
Play (astronaut on the moon); Unseen Shaping (the red flames of a
roaring fire); and Celebration (flying
hot air balloons). The
next two (2) chapters — Good and
Evil, and Death — refine the significance of the more
abstract concepts for the day to day, human concerns of our time.
The last chapter — Wrap Up — wraps things up.
My three (3) peeves are small. There
is no table of contents. There
is no index. And,
though the picture sources
are well credited, there are no references telling the curious where
to search for more information on this
intriguing perspective. However,
these are frustrations only if you are a perennial “digger” like
I am. And even
then, there are enough cues for where to look next if one is really
hungry for more — such as the work of Brian
Swimme and many of the other endorsers as well as the individuals
whose ideas are mentioned in the introduction.
So, to “Wrap Up” in the words
of author, Robert Keller:
Now as we close this happy task,
There are some questions
we must ask.
Like how can people watch the sky,
And never ask the
question “Why?”
And how can people think they’re
best,
And have control of all
the rest?...
And when will people ever learn
To join the world,
embrace her turn?...
The starry skies through luring
shove
Teach us that Cosmos’
made of Love.
The seas invite us to dissolve
And be absorbed in Love’s
resolve.
The memories now stored in land
When realized help us
expand.
The forms of life express
surprise.
Advent’rous play can
vitalize.
The fire teaches proper way
To move into creative
play.
Then wind sums up what love wants
done—
“Just celebrate and
live as one.”
Wilderness
Heart Workshops
