A Family Game for the Holidays...Cultivating Love...

Family interaction, especially meaningful interaction that can bridge the gap between generations, can be difficult to navigate in our virtual culture.
If you have the opportunity to gather with friends, and those whom you call family, for some time this holiday season, there's a simple game that can be a great tool for nurturing and inspiring everyone present.
Everyone can play, everyone should play, and whomever does play, will come out a winner.
The game is called, 'What I love about....',
There are no age restrictions.
The rules couldn't be simpler.
Everyone sits in a circle, so that everyone can see everyone else.
Each player looks each other player, in turn, in the eyes and completes the sentence,
'What I love about...', with the name of the person whom they are looking at, and something they love about that person.
The game continues until everyone has, at least once, had a chance to speak.
A second or third time through can yield increasingly deeper levels.
Group hugs are allowed, but not mandatory.
Clearly the game, as simple as it may be in form, can be difficult to engage everyone in, and difficult to play for some.
Anyone whom finds it difficult should especially be encouraged to play.
Laugh along with anyone whom finds it cheesy or corny...and bring them in.
Be prepared to go first, so that you can set the tone and inspire the others.
Keep the game flowing in a joyful, humorous way and it can be very surprising, you'll learn as much about yourself as you learn about others.
So, come on now, don't be shy...dive in.

The End of the Beginning...The Emergence of the Rainbow Warrior

Today, my son, Phoenix,turns 16. And while the process of growing into a man, has been and continues to be ongoing and fluid, there is a certain undeniable resonance to this moment in the journey that deserves inspection, honoring....and celebration.

The art of parenting, as every parent to varying degrees comes to understand, requires from the outset, a constantly shifting balancing act between, on one hand, caring for, teaching and supporting, and on the other, empowering, encouraging independence and ultimately letting go...

Like training wheels on a bicycle, and teaching the pilot the art of navigation and the workings of the airplane, so they can fly away on their own, there comes a time in every parent's journey where they must learn to step back and observe....even if the first flights are test flights, into young adulthood and independence.

Thankfully, unlike the proverbial bird kicking the chick out of the nest so it can fly, our parenting process can continue to be just that, a process, rather than one defining moment, because in truth, I am not ready to let go completely of the best friend, best student and best teacher I have had the pleasure of knowing.

Yet, it is important to acknowledge cycles within the journey, ends of beginnings and beginnings of new stages in all of our relationships. It is important because that acknowledgement then infuses us with a perspective that allows a well-earned sense of celebration for the journey so far and inspires a new process which calls for an assessment of the role we have played, in order to re-imagine and visualize how we can best serve our rainbow warriors as they test their wings and explore the art of flying.

If, it has been and continues to be our intention, to reveal the heroic rainbow warrior within our children, to nurture and empower an integral, light being who has the courage and clarity to act with compassion and strength, so that they may realize their individual potential and gifts....and thus both lead and serve humanity's collective quest for enlightenment and an evolved consciousness....then, we must not confuse stepping back and allowing with thinking our work is done.  It isn't.

As I reflect on the dawning of this new cycle in parenting, in nurturing a young hero, a rainbow warrior, I am struck by the realization that the place where the lessons began and the intention was born, is also the place where the most important work for the new cycle begins.....within myself.

Of course, from the beginning, if we intend to teach integrity and compassion, we must embody it, or at least strive for it...but now, as we learn to step back and allow, and we strive to empower our young adults with the courage to pursue their heart's dreams and visions...now, as our words increasingly fade into the silent distance...now, more than ever, we must step up and embody our ideals and be strong models...because our actions will burn eternal, in their hearts.....

Dance: A Spiritual Pathway....

An inspirational chapter from PAPA'S TRIBAL CAFE: A PARENT'S GUIDE TO NURTURING RAINBOW WARRIOR'S...on the power of dance....

ESSENTIAL PORTAL: DISCOVERING DANCE AS A SPIRITUAL PATHWAY

" Dance is the hidden language of the soul." -Martha Graham

The journalist, Bill Moyers, during an interview with the great teacher, Joseph Campbell, tells the story of an academic who meets a Japanese Shinto Priest at a conference.
Upon meeting him, he tells the Priest that, “I have been to your shrines and temples and observed your ceremonies, but I can’t see any theology or idealogy”.
After taking a long, thoughtful pause, the Priest replies that, “I don’t think we have a theology or an idealogy. We dance”.
History teaches us time and time again, that the spiritual quest of humanity, the path to discovering the light within, while it can be suppressed and manipulated, cannot be extinguished. I have learned through personal experience, and through deep exploration with others, that dance is one of the most effective tools we have for activating the light within, and connecting us to the spiritual quest, precisely because it is one of the most effective tools we have for, aligning and freeing, the mind, the body and the soul.

"Free your mind, elevate your soul…let your body take control".
-Soul II Soul

When we free our bodies from the confining patterns of repetitive movement that compromise our routine daily behavior, when we let go of control and allow our movement to expand and flow fluidly, to respond to the calling of the music, to align with spirit, we liberate not only our body, but our hearts and minds, as well.
The mind, body and soul function as reflections of each other. When we relax the body, the mind and soul relax. If we take on emotional stress, our body becomes tense. When we free the body, we free the mind and soul. If the body falls into routine, into rigidity, so then will the mind and soul.
Disease is inertia. Healing is movement.

"If you put the body in motion, you will change."
-Gabrielle Roth

Consider the range of movement the average person goes through in a day. It’s very limited and very repetitive. For most people their movements are routine and rarely branch off into new directions. They climb out of bed, they shower, they sit and eat. They drive a car, or ride a train, or maybe walk to work. They sit at a desk, or hammer a nail, or plant some seeds, or push their pens in basically the same way every day. If they take a jog, or have a swim even, it’s pretty much the same range of movement day after day. Generally, people sit, walk, stand and lie down in the same way day after day.
When we dance, as our bodies move freely beyond our normal range of physical movement, we break the routine of movement that confines our mind and soul. When we allow our bodies to move with fluidity and a greater range of expression, we open our hearts and minds. As we move and breathe and flow, we unblock our heart, release our breathing and open our channels, or chakras. We generate inner light.
The masterful actress Olympia Dukakis once compared the training of an actor to assembling a plumbing system. She said that, the idea is to open and connect our emotional being with our physical power and our intellect, so that everything flows without obstruction and is expressed with the full potential of our beings. Dance is a great tool for unclogging our pipes and accessing, not only our inner light, but the source of universal love which powers it. Flowing movement and breath are the keys.

"I have discovered the dance.
I have discovered the art
which has been lost for two thousand years."
-Isadora Duncan

My journey into the power of dance, which led Phoenix and I to Hawaii, began in the early nineties, in Los Angeles. Every action has a reaction, and in that way, the sprawling smoggy empire of fame and fortune, of greed and exploitation, LA, spawned a reactionary underground culture in response to the surface glitter. In the last part of the twentieth century, a generation of youth that had grown up without any elders to guide them on a meaningful spiritual path discovered their own path. By accident. They discovered it through dance.
They discovered it under a blanket of stars and surrounded by ancient desert. Los Angeles is one of the most polluted and soulless cities in America, but it is surrounded by amazing, diverse and powerful aspects of Mother Earth. Within a couple of hours, the living Mojave Desert, giant Sequoia forests, snow-capped mountains, and the beautiful Pacific Coast can be accessed. And these pioneering dance tribes accessed them all.
A revolution in electronic music fueled a completely new dynamic in dance. Through modern technology an ancient, tribal portal was rediscovered, without teachers, without rules. Organically the inner light was ignited through dance in communion with nature.

"When humans participate in ceremony,
they enter a sacred space.
Everything outside of that space
shrivels in importance. Time takes on a
different dimension. Emotions flow more freely.
The bodies of participants become filled with
the energy of life, and this energy reaches out
and blesses the creation around them.
All is made new; everything becomes sacred."
-Sun Bear

When I discovered the power of collective dance, my theater work was already moving in the same direction. What I discovered blew the walls off of the work I was doing, on multi-levels. Borders between performer and audience were shattered. The power of the immersive experience was levels beyond anything I could accomplish as a director in the Theater. Ritual was at the core. The relevancy to our culture and to the balance of life on Earth was far beyond any work that could be done within the handicapped and dying form of theater.
People were dancing, not simply for a release of energy or as a social activity, but with a higher purpose that tribal cultures throughout history have long been aware of: To enter a state of trance where the body, mind and soul are aligned and awakened to the personal and collective divinity and where the limiting illusion of the ego burns away to reveal the higher-self.

"Dancers are the messengers of the gods" — Martha Graham

As I researched the phenomenon, I found examples in countless cultures. There are, of course, the whirling dervishes, practitioners of the Sufi philosophy, which has survived for thousands of years as a highly refined path to wisdom. There are the ceremonial dances of numerous Native American tribes. There are countless African tribal dances and the ritual dances of the Aboriginals. Shamans from Siberia to South America dance themselves into states of trance to connect with healing powers. Hindu mystics write of the power and necessity of collective dance as a step towards higher spiritual understanding, especially in their teachings of Shiva, the cosmic dancer. Hundreds of thousands of Krishna devotees gather religiously all over India to chant and dance their way towards spiritual devotion. Euripides, the Greek playwright wrote over 2,500 years ago of full moon collective dances in ancient Greece.

"The dancer's body is simply the luminous manifestation of the soul." -Isadora Duncan

The list is extensive and diverse and doesn’t stop here. While dance has transformed in modern cultures into a less meaningful interaction, its roots are powerful and transportive, and these roots do not have to be studied or known, to be accessed.
I discovered in the nineties, outside and around Los Angeles that the experience of dance in conjunction with hours of seamlessly mixed rhythms affected even those who had no awareness of dance as a spiritual experience. Ironically, these desert gatherings were started by a group of kids, that just wanted to play loud music for their friends, unknowingly they had stumbled upon a deep and essential calling of humanity. They evolved into something very special. Many came just for the party, but they left in a healthier state. It was inescapable.

"Within moments the eyes of the whole tribe
were on him.
His dance intensified.
It became freer and more expansive.
Like a flash fire it lit up the rest of the dancers.
The erupting dance activated the whole gathered tribe.
He was leaping and spinning in the middle of it all,
Soaring through the air.
The cover of fear that for so long had smothered
his heart,
Had finally, completely dissolved."
–Through the Eyes of the Phoenix

The forms of theater and film, which I had been working within, had been irrevocably transcended. This was sacred theater that approached ritual in its form and accessed the spiritual vision of the ancients through the technology of the present. I began to shift my focus from being a director creating theatrical experiences, to focusing on integrating mythological elements into dance gatherings in an attempt to focus them further and towards bringing out the ritualistic and tribal aspects.
I began to create events where everyone who came was participant through dance, and performance and where the energy of the gathering was focused on, most importantly the cycles of the Earth, moon and cosmos, but also on different aspects of our spiritual voyage as humans. I actively explored the realm where ceremony and ritual become rainbow bridges joining the physical and spiritual worlds. Dance was the key to the whole experience.
I have spent the time here to share a glimpse of my journey into dance in order to stress the value and potential that dance has to offer as a tool for nurturing our young Rainbow Warriors. Dance is an indispensable tool and portal. No experience is necessary. No format or system is required.

"Dancing is just discovery, discovery, discovery".
- Martha Graham

Given my path, Phoenix was obviously exposed early on to the power of dance. It has never ceased to be part of our lives. Music is usually in the air around our home and our movements are constantly reflecting the energy. My fingers are dancing as I type these words.
Children respond directly and instantly to music through dance. There is no better tool for freeing them up and initiating the expression of joy that flows effortlessly from the dance. The benefits of dance extend in every direction.
As a daily exercise dance is guaranteed to stimulate energetic flow and promote fluidity of movement. Dance is creative movement, encouraging children to dance supports their confidence to express themselves creatively in all areas.

"There is a vitality, a life force, an energy,
a quickening that is translated through
you into action, and because there is only
one of you in all of time, this expression
is unique.
And if you block it, it will never exist
through any other medium and it will be lost.
The world will not have it.
It is not your business to determine how
good it is nor how valuable nor how it compares
with other expressions.
It is your business to keep it yours clearly
and directly, to keep the channel open.
You do not even have to believe in yourself
or your work.
You have to keep yourself open and aware
to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open."
- Martha Graham

The freedom of dance empowers the spirit of our young Warriors to break through walls of conformist thought and behavior. The expression of joy that dance releases, allows, the spirit to soar and is a sure connector to the heart. The family that dances together laughs together.

"If I could tell you what it meant,
there would be no point in dancing it ."
- Isadora Duncan

When words are insufficient, when words are too much, when we or our children become trapped in our heads, in our thoughts, dance is a great liberator. When our energy feels low or dormant, when we, or our children, are feeling a touch of the common cold of mental illness, depression, dance is an empowerer.
When our all important sixth sense, the sense we can least afford to be without, our sense of humor has left us, or our children, stuck in seriousness, dance will reconnect us to our smiles.
Dance is a journey. Whether that journey is one of play or is a sacred journey, whether it is for five minutes, or it entails hours of sweat, it is always of value. Whether it is free form or it is an exploration of a particular style or tradition, dancing allows the Rainbow Warrior within to creatively express themselves and to stimulate the flow of their life force through all of the aspects of their being, and to unite their mind, body, and soul in joyous communion.

"You can’t change the World, but you can make it dance ".
= Smoochy

Harvesting the Supermoon

A week ago, on the eve of what was being billed as the largest full moon of 2012, but was in actuality, the closest full moon of 2012, I sat, in an almost empty, local football(soccer) stadium.

It was an hour before my son and his fellow 13 - 14 year old's were scheduled to play against a team from a neighboring island and the only others early arrivals, besides the teams, who were in the locker rooms, were a group of four, 9 or10 year-old boys.

One of the boys who looked to be a little younger than the others, or at least younger than one of the others, was singing with quite a bit of passion and quite loudly, which at first, I found to be very positive.  I appreciated his no holds barred enthusiasm and confident commitment to song.  

Not being very well versed in the Greek language, I vaguely made out the song was connected to the coming football game and was some sort of victory cheer, which was endearing, in a cute kind of way.  

But pretty quickly my understanding of the situation began to shift.  The other team came out and started to warm up.  The young boy's singing changed tone and turned into a more vulgar assault. Even without knowing everything he was, now more screaming than singing, the hate and crude meanness was crystal clear. 

Then from behind a stone wall, he thew an orange-sized, heavy rock menancingly close to the back of one of the visiting players heads. If his aim had been slightly better, he would have seriously injured the young boy.

Then the boys walked across to the empty stands and started picking up empty water bottles and beer cans from the previous nights Men's game.  Pretty quickly the young menace had a full soda can whizzing through the air at his friend, who didn't see it coming and almost caught it in the back of his head.

The boy was clearly dangerous and without any kind of conscience.  He was across the stadium from me and there was nothing I could do, but reflect on his home situation and wonder how he had become, at such a young age so reckless and mean.  Which of course led to meditating on what could be done about it and how he could be helped to connect to his heart.

The game started and the young boys settled onto a perch where they could somewhat more positively cheer on their slightly older peers.

By halftime, I had forgotten about the boys, when I noticed that during the break, while the teams were in the locker rooms, a group of youngsters had gathered by one of the goals and were taking turns, taking shots, at the goal.  The goalkeeper was none other than the little troublemaker, who was now channelling his reckless energy into quite a courageous and unintimidated display against a barrage of shots from much bigger kids than himself.

I quickly understood  how the answer for this boy lay not so much in dwelling on the root of his problem but in offering him a positive channel for his energy and a positive mentor who could help guide him with a strong loving hand towards positive expression and simultaneously enlighten him as to the destructiveness and harm his abusive behavior was causing.

Preparing the soil

The realization I had was one of how important it is for parents, teachers, coaches and community elders to provide positive direction and positive paths of expression for our youth.

While it is obviously important to assist in healing past wounds and doing our best to protect youth from unhealthy home situations, the work that will lead to abundant harvests for the youth and for humanity, the work that we can all participate in is to provide healthy soil for OUR children to plant seeds in and  encouraging them as they continue to work the field, so they may connect with their inner hero.

Athletics can provide a healthy realm to refine the hero, as it is a realm where the character is expressed and manifest in the physical realm, but it is just one of many paths where the rainbow warrior can be nurtured.  One of a thousand canvases.  One of a thousand truths.  And like all truths, it can be manipulated towards whatever end the teacher intends.  Obviously sports can be a healthy or destructive experience, depending on the coach and teacher.

What is key is recognizing an individuals interests and gifts and nourishing that direction, encouraging them,  as Joseph Cambell famously said, to follow their bliss. From sports, to arts, and technology, from building things to growing things the paths are infinite.

This young boy could be nurtured by a singing teacher, just as well as a football coach.  The point is to support him in a positive direction.

If our intention is to nurture rainbow warriors and to inspire integral, heroic, loving youth who will be the foundation of a healthy global community, then it is our duty to serve our youth by nurturing their talents and using that fertile soil, where they want to play, to help shape and reveal their true character, the hero that lies within all our hearts.

Occupy Love Street

"When I speak of love I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response which is little more than emotional bosh. I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality..This oft misunderstood and misinterpreted concept so readily dismissed by the Nietzsches of the world as a weak and cowardly force, has now become an absolute necessity for the survival of man."
 -Martin Luther King

As the sweet voice of justice rises from the throat of American masses whom are finally waking up to the economic chains they have become enslaved in, it is an important time to reflect on our own personal involvement and to take a long look in the mirror.

If we have become engaged in an economic, greed motivated system, it is crucial to remember it has not happened without our consent.  We are as much a part of a profit seeking, materialistically motivated system as we choose to be.  There is no sense in pointing fingers at the programmers and power brokers of the system, if we are not able to first examine our own intentions, motivations and actions.We must first disengage and clarify our own path.  We must insure it is rooted in the heart.

Ultimately, the real occupation needs to be of our own souls.  We need to occupy our heart spaces and prioritize the spiritual.  We need to occupy love street, if we have any real inclination towards transforming the system that has enslaved us.

Because ultimately, it is our own willingness to buy into the system in the first place that exposes us to relinquishing our power to it.  If we truly intend to transform a world out of balance, we must be courageous enough to first examine and challenge ourselves, to break our own personal chains.

Because once, we are truly able to occupy Love Street, Wall Street will no longer matter. We will occupy it, by first draining all its power.  And more importantly, we will be prepared to replace it with a more powerful construct. 

Cancel All Debt: Occupy Main Street

600 years BC, in Ancient Athens, the great statesman, Solon, laid the pathway for the emergence of the World's first true Democracy.  The bold moves he enacted broke the back of an economic system that had managed to accumulate all wealth into the pockets of a few and had the rest enslaved in economic chains.

The boldest of his actions and the most successful, was his elimination of all debts.  Prior to his implementing and creating a clean slate, workers were bound by long term, often lifetime, contacts to the bankers and landowners of the time.  In his time, debt was effectively contracted as work owed, rather than money owed, but the principals and systems of interest were hauntingly similar to our precarious times.

In one fell swoop, Solon eliminated all debts and thus freed the population from economic enslavement.  This more than any other single action, history has shown, was the trigger to the emergence of Democracy.

I remember back in the 1970's when I was in high school, our social studies teacher taught us that for the average American, the largest investment of their lifetime would be the buying of their home and that their second largest would be the purchase of a new car.  The thing they didn't teach us back then was that on every one of those purchases, by every one of those Americans, the biggest profit maker would be neither the homeowner or the homeseller, but a third party, who was not producing or benefiting anyone: The Banks.

Consider how different our economy would look if all those hard earned dollars forked over to banks for interest weren't extracted needlessly and if those same greedy bankers, who are now tightening the chains worldwide, in an effort to further exploit and enslave the masses, simply were not part of the formula.

Solon  did.  And guess what?  The bankers collapse didn't trickle down to the masses, it liberated them and sparked one of the greatest periods of human intellectual and spiritual accomplishment in our short history. True democracy was born.

Of course, we don't have a leader that is going to step up and initiate a massive reform of such truly transformative power.  Coincidentally though, the emerging Occupy WS force is not looking for leaders to enact anything.  Consider this: What if there was a massive economic strike against the banking syndicate?  What if every home and car owner who is making payments to the banks, en masse, as a collective, simply stopped making their payments?  How long would it take for the whole banking system to collapse?

Wall street doesn't need to be occupied, it needs to be vacated, so that Main street can be reclaimed....or at least occupied.

Greece full of hope and potential!

A day doesn't pass without an article being written about the bleak future of Greece.  IMF and banking propagandists are spreading rumors about Greeks being lazy, yet every Greek I know works 70 plus hours a week with a maximum of two days off a month.  There are consistently articles from economic experts telling us how Greece's massive debt will pull down Europe and by extension the global economy. Of course, very few of those articles explore the process that allowed Greece, the victim not the culprit, to be exploited and set-up for massive raiding.  Very few articles mention the vast off shore oil reserves that. like Argentina, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, etc, make them prime targets for military or economic take-over,  And I will not go into detail here about the economic warfare that has been raged on this tiny jewel of a nation, because this is an article about a bright future and the transcendence of a greed based system, a fear based culture that is eating away, like an uncontained disease at our precious Mother earth and the divine consciousness we are blessed with.

This is an article about a culture and a land that has the potential and power to lead and to be a model for a way of life that the heart of man is crying out for, that the divine spirit of Man is ready to manifest.  As the struggle for the soul of man, between the forces of economic greed and the forces of the heart ( the spiritual realm, God and Goddess) continue to intensify, as the consensus reality based on economic growth and personal possessions continues to crumble, those whom are grounded in their heart space are increasingly looking to a return to a harmonious relationship with the earth and each other.

Greece is perfectly situated on many levels to be a leader on this vital mission.  On this beautiful agricultural Island where I live, where underground fresh water supplies have sprung eternally for thousands of years to nourish the land and the people, there is barely a piece of earth that is not used for food production.  woven between the Olive, orange, pomegranate and almond trees are farmed fields of melons and tomatoes, or broccoli and cabbage in the winter.  Sheep and goats graze, nearly everyone has at least a few chickens.  Compare that lifestyle with an American suburban culture of mowed lawns using gasoline and water and human energy to maintain a look, form without function, of economic prosperity.

Yes, Greece is full of potential, because the jewels here are a culture that has not disconnected itself from the Earth, a culture that is full of hard workers who understand and appreciate the toil and reward of working close with our living Mother Earth.

Beyond that, Greece is still a culture that understands the importance of a town square and of discussing as a community their common journey.  The Greeks are not yet a culture seperated and divided, controlled and manipulated completely by a media with a strong agenda that is completely tied to corporate heads and a military-industrial complex.

So, yes, Greece is full of potential. Potential to model and create a sustainable future vision for humanity at the crossroads.  The potential is here.  What is necessary now is that leaders emerge with the courage and vision to let go of a false path, to break free of economic slave masters.  What is necessarily now is that the people, wipe the mirages of ipads and materialistic dreams from their consciousness and embrace the blessings that surround them.

Greece is full of not only hope, but more importantly of potential.  Greece can once again take up the role of global leadership, if Greeks are willing and courageous enough to break the economic chains of foreign greed and of inner delusion, if they are willing to cultivate their relationship with the Earth and their connection to community and village stewardship.  Greece has a very bright future not only as survivors but as leaders, if Greeks are willing to be the first culture not to submit to the process of economic enslavement that is now ravaging the earth and instead, let their hearts lead.  Greeks must lead by letting go of a consumer mentality, that is only profiting industrial, producing economies, like Germany and the like.  They must embrace an holistic, sustainable path, grounded in the earth and in their hearts and they must work together towards this end.

It is a path that will involve a complete and  massive shake-up and rethink of the government system and the education system.  It is a path that requires a great letting go and of great courage. And it is a path that is not only very needed, but is very possible to implement, here where government and education systems were born.

Yes, Greece is full of potential.  It is time to manifest.