Thank you Alan for this,

I'm trying to relate your fresh and illuminating
posting which appeals to my new artistic
sensitivities......., 
with Je Kan's spiritual visual intimations, which
appeal to my deep Christian faith,.....
with Alon's latest appeal for clarity that appeals to
the sacred duty of the teacher in my consciousness.

Time for fewer words.....and more reflection.


Thank you for these postings.

Brian
--- "A.D.M.Rayner" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Dear Je Kan, Jack and all,
> 
> I think you raise a deeply important issue, here, Je
> Kan, one that I touched
> on in my response to Chris Macrae that I circulated
> to this list, and one
> that is very dear to many poets and artists in
> regard to the educational
> (awareness-inducing) value of their work.
> 
> Chris Macrae had in fact pretty much reprimanded me
> for responding to a
> communication on one of his lists by sending some
> poetry and chapters 8 and
> 9 from 'Natural Inclusion' (which he regarded as
> self-publicizing semi-spam)
> that I felt was in support of what one of the
> correspondents was saying. He
> feared that this would offend some of the 'star
> (most connected hub)
> networkers' on his list and that they would withdraw
> their interest. He
> implied that poetry would not move and would indeed
> put off the 'top dog
> movers and shakers' who needed to be appeased if
> they were going to add
> their weight to 'save the world' movements. Well. ..
> Talk about celebrity
> culture! My own feeling increasingly is that
> sycophancy is no route to
> cultural transformation, when it is the top dogs who
> have often got where
> they are by bullying and hoarding. It's one of those
> perversities of our
> culture of discontent that those most empowered by
> money and fame are in
> many ways the last people to turn to for help with
> transformation - for
> them, 'seeing' the loophole in the security box is
> more difficult than
> passing a camel (thick cord) through the eye of a
> needle.
> 
> The issue is that there are forms of communication
> whose value lies in their
> invitation to reflection without the support of a
> verbal narrative - indeed
> where the latter may be intrusive and misleading.
> The invitation is for the
> observer, listener or experiencer to tap into to
> their own 'unconscious
> awareness' and find whatever they will find there.
> There is no requirement
> for the communication - if it is to be 'successful'
> - to reproduce in the
> 'receiver' what was in the mind of the 'transmitter'
> (contrary to the
> notions of Shannon - Weiner's rationalistic
> information theory, but in line
> with Gabor's [of holography fame] inclusional
> communication theory). Indeed,
> exact reproduction of the communicator's intention
> is often regarded as a
> non-creative 'failure'. Note how this relates to the
> distinction between a
> training instructor and a mindful educator.
> 
> In my own use of artwork, I have trodden a tricky
> tightrope between allowing
> my imagery to 'speak for itself', evoking whatever
> it will (I often use a
> painting in a seminar by asking what people 'see' in
> it, which gives rise to
> many different perspectives, often some I haven't
> appreciated myself), and
> providing some 'cryptic clues' or 'guidelinings', by
> way of poetic or
> lyrical narrative. In some cases, these 'clues' or
> 'guidelinings' can assist
> deeper enquiry, in the same way that a swimmer can
> help a non-swimmer
> immerse in water. The art of the communicator is to
> judge (in the sense of
> discern) just how much 'guidelining' it is
> appropriate to provide - and it
> is this question of judgement that is not only
> pertinent in my mind to this
> BERA enquiry, but also to the Jack - Je Kan
> conversation. Jack's judgement
> is that there needs to be more guidelining, Je Kan's
> is that the imagery
> alone is sufficient. Here is where the question of
> judgment needs to bring
> in the context of the audience and the diversity of
> perspectives it may
> contain, as well as what opportunity there is for
> sharing of view within
> this audience. In an 'ideal world' we would all be
> placed in a 'sharing
> circle' around Je Kan's imagery, each able to 'speak
> from the heart' about
> what the imagery invokes in us, and through hearing
> each other's diverse
> perspectives arrive at a richer understanding than
> might have been possible
> individually. But placed as we are at the busyness
> ends of a global computer
> network, such open sharing is not so easy. Hence
> each of us may have formed
> our own impression of Je Kan's imagery (if we have
> found the space in our
> schedules to observe it), but the group context may
> not have been conducing
> to sharing this [thoughts like 'what am I supposed
> to say?'; 'I don't want
> to fill up everyone else's mail box with my
> subjective impressions' etc may
> have crossed our minds].
> 
> For myself, any analytical explanation by Je Kan
> would have intruded upon
> the deep, engaging mystery of the imagery. I felt
> drawn in by the
> expressions on faces, the sense of deep personal
> commitment, the spirit of
> caring and sharing in a practice that objective
> onlookers might regard as
> 'mumbo jumbo' but which for that very 'reason' can
> take us 'beyond
> objectification'. The actions in themselves are
> meaningless; what these
> actions express is meaningful. The paint on a canvas
> in itself is
> meaningless - what this paint expresses...
> 
> So, Je Kan, far from being a 'waste of time', I
> think your posting and its
> significance merely took 'some while' for its
> creative influence to emerge.
> The most creative is rarely appreciated immediately,
> for the immediate
> 'surface impression' is what the most creative seeks
> to question, especially
> in a materialist culture.
> 
> So I keep telling myself as I face what feels like
> the general resounding
> rejection of my most heartfelt expressions as they
> bounce of 'the wall' of
> objective rationality. Should I 'sugar the pill' to
> make it more acceptable
> to the majority? Should Je Kan 'say what he means?'
> What kind of judgement
> is truly alive to its dynamic context?
> 
> Doubt is doubtless creative, as is Achilles Heal.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Warmest
> 
> 
> Alan
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Rev Je Kan Adler-Collins <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: 12 January 2007 01:08
> Subject: Re: insight to practice
> 
> 
> "Without such an  understanding I doubt if many
> viewers of the video-clip would  understand your
> values and commitment
> from just watching
> the video.  But I may be mistaken and my doubt could
> be inappropriate."
> 
> Your response was not unexpected and in a way I am
> glad that you did
> respond as you have. It leads me to the issues that
> I am worried about
> concerning how we see and what we see.  When I
> worked in my healing
> research with indigenous healers of different
> countries ( South
> America, Mexico, the first nation peoples, ) I did
> not know the history
> or the language other than what my culture had fed
> me.  I had no terms
> of reference and no pre conceived ideas about what I
> would or should
> see/feel spiritually. The shaman, healers, priest
> and medicine men do
> not give formal teachings as they expect your spirit
> to 
=== message truncated ===


Brian E. Wakeman
Education adviser
Dunstable
Beds