Notes from a BackJack

It occurred to me recently that personal transformation has become a pretty popular enterprise.  Teachers, books, techniques, and workshops abound.   

Okay, I admit the reason I've come to this conclusion is that I plan to attend yet another day-long workshop on how to transform my life.  The flyer promises that the techniques I learn during this "experiential workshop" will not only change my life, but by making those changes in my life I can change the world.  Wow.  That's a pretty lofty ideal.  I'm not sure that we can really do this in an afternoon, but still, I think I'll go because I'm keenly interested in changing the world. 

I've attended various workshops like these for several years, so I have a pretty fair idea about what I'll find when I arrive:

Organizers will look a little harried as they flutter around the sign-in table. There will be a strange atmosphere of approachability, confusion, diffidence, chaos, and poor communication. Name tags will be issued; perhaps they'll already be printed up for those of us who've pre-registered (assuming our names actually appear on the pre-registration log and someone can find evidence that we have indeed already paid our fee). Or, our hosts will provide chunky blue marking pens and blank white stickers ready to be adorned by our names. Some folks will add flourishes and artwork to stand out among the crowd of folks who are there to express their Oneness.

There will be newbies as well as folks who are "seminar junkies." Some will already have been to several workshops put on by the same group with which we will interact this day. They'll have that "in the know" camaraderie and will greet each other with confident smiles, hugs, and have chummy conversations in hushed, excited tones about tasty tidbits of insider information they just can't wait to share with each other. The rest of us will be cut from the pack and will feel just a bit unworthy to be in the midst of such an illumined group.

Some will be overawed by the whole experience. After all, the workshop is being presented by one of the nationally-recognized teacher's direct students. This means, of course, that we're getting the inside scoop on cutting-edge personal and planetary transformation theory and technology. Simply by our being here we're among the elect - the few who now are privy to what others haven't yet experienced. By the end of the workshop, we'll no longer be outside the pack; we'll be one of the insiders and at the next workshop we'll be able to greet the others with warm smiles, hugs, and chat in hushed, excited tones.

Everyone will be carrying water bottles. Among the elect, the water bottle be one of those blue, dioxin-free containers filled lovingly at home from special filtration contraptions designed to de-ionize and re-ionize, detoxify, energize, balance, and imbue mystical, healing properties to what was once simple H₂O. If one is really among the elect of the elect, the filtration contraption was lovingly blessed during a full fire and water ceremony by a direct descendant of the Third Most High Mystical KarmaDogma on the evening of the last full moon to occur during the millenium's only blossoming of the sole surviving MamaSutra tree on the Holy Mount of High Mists. This, of course, is now the only water that can be consumed by the rare blessed ones who plunked down $2500.00 for the filter. The rest of us will drink from dioxin-laden flimsy plastic water bottles plucked hurriedly from the shelf of the convenience store down the street from the day's venue.

Participants also will tote their own meditation cushions, knee-rests, or other accoutrements to help make their day more comfortable. Every stitch of clothing was weaved by exiled Tibetan nuns. The materials from which the clothing is made came from sustainable farming practices, using only the rarest of silkworms (which are fed vegan diets and treated humanely) and organically grown cotton or hemp plants. 

Someone will begin to ring meditation bells as a signal that it's time to enter the holy of holies for this transformational day at the Embassy Suites.  We'll wend our way through the clusters of folks who stop in the doorway to chat and embrace.  I have often wondered why people who are so committed to movement are determined to block all entries and exits at every opportunity.
 
Shoes will be shed and left in heaps along the edge of the meeting room wall.  Hopefully, I'll be able to find both of mine when it's time to go home.

As we enter the conference room, we'll see a sea of blue BackJacks.  Typically, there's barely enough room to fully stretch one's legs all the way out.  Not sure why that is, but it seems to be  de rigueur at every similar event.  We'll jostle around, piling our stuff behind and around us in an attempt to find a comfortable sitting position for the next several hours.

As the morning unfolds, we'll get up and move those BackJacks around into several different formations, depending on the exercise.   We'll pick up and re-arrange all of our accoutrements each time.  The room will swell with excited chatter and conversation and it will take several minutes for the facilitators to entice attention back to the front of the room.

At some point we'll break for a snack of fair-trade organic raw almonds and raisins harvested by an intrepid tribe of indigenous people scratching out a subsistence living in a remote village perched atop the highest peak in the Azores. The village elder is a wise shaman who foretold the coming of the day when the tribe's almonds and raisins would be consumed by our very group. The shaman, of course, will have blessed our snack before sending it down the mountain on the backs of rare, albino donkeys which also were blessed prior to undertaking their journey of deliverance.

The nature of an "experiential workshop" is such that at some point during the day the facilitator will tell us to pair up in dyads or other groupings. We'll then sit knee-to-knee and perhaps hold hands. Or perhaps we will be asked to create an energy flow-inducing gymnastic that will create a sore tailbone long before any energetic benefits are realized. We will make direct eye contact, gazing lovingly and receptively into each other's deep, dark corners. Our inner lights will shine forth and we'll create a safe haven in which to bare our souls to people we've never met before. Chances are, the person with whom I'm going to partner will be on some weird garlic and Noni juice diet and I will have a very difficult time focusing on being lovingly present with the person's existential woes.

Instead, I'll be frantically trying to take shallow breaths in such a way as to avoid offending my partner while staving off nuclear odor damage to the tiny yet extremely sensitive receptors lining the insides of my unenlightened nostrils. I'm always surprised by the amount of flatulence that seems to proliferate among folks who eat only macrobiotic raw foods and practice countless hours of advanced yoga techniques for optimum bioenergetic performance and physiological function. In spite of the prevalence of major garlic breath and other odors, epiphanies will be the order of the day. Tears will flow and hugs will follow. Transformation will occur, at least for that moment. But then, being in the moment is what it's all about, right?

Okay, so maybe I'm not quite ready to change the world, or at least maybe I'm not ready to go to that workshop after all.  And I have to admit that I'm feeling somewhat unimpressed by the proliferation of spiritual gizmos and ersatz spirituality. 

Still, while the whole movement seems to be entirely predictable, there is something refreshing about being able to get out of the everyday grind of traffic, office politics, more traffic, grocery store and bank lines, and competitive salad making at the Whole Foods salad bar (I'm always surprised by the grabbing and glaring that goes on there -- really, folks.  There is enough to go around).  It is nicer to spend the day with people behaving spiritually rather than with people behaving badly.  Maybe I'll go to that workshop after all.

How do we keep this going without becoming cliche?  That's what I'm challenging people to examine.  For me, I have pulled out of "spiritual community," at least for now.  I'm focusing less on spiritual ya-ya or being one of the spiritual in-crowd.  I've done enough of them to realize that there is a common chord that runs through it all, and that is what I'm looking at and examining.  My journey to awareness, etc., has become more personal and (contrary to appearances) quieter.  I'm allowing the Presence to reveal itself to me in the way that is unique to my relationship with it (complete with neuroses, bad hair days and filters), rather than following anyone's prescription for ascension, enlightenment, consciousness - whatever buzzword fits.

There's as much automatic (and frequently just plain rude) behavior among spiritual folks as there is among religious and non-religious folks.   And, as with religion, there are so many paths and processes that claim Oneness, enlightenment, integration, etc. - most of which just seem to be take-offs on someone else's work.  Each person has a slightly different take, and adds it to the previous teacher's work.  Evolution is good and necessary, but I think sometimes folks who don't want an office job are just looking for a way to earn a living and gain some attention.  Still, it seems to be human nature.  It's the same way we got Methodists, United Methodists, First United Methodist, United Free Methodists, etc. 

It's funny - spiritual folks do exactly the same thing folks have always done.  Just wearing different clothes and eating different foods, sometimes using a different language.  I never understood why it is that these non-Western non-religious paths to God seem to have a requirement to reject everything that went before and focus on the outer form, just as long as it's different.   It's important to get additional information and viewpoints out, but sometimes it's wearying to watch the spiritual-movement-of-the-month-club shuffle.  Or the rainforest-superfood-berry-drink-of-the-moment spiritual consumer rush.   Maybe wearying isn't the right word.  It's getting comical.

Where is the spiritual discernment these days?  Instead, I see a lot of spiritual competition and one-upsmanship.  Where is God in all of this?

I have to come clean, though.  There was a time early in my spiritual quest when I dearly wanted to fit in.  So I did all of the things I noted in my blog.  Then, one day, it struck me as lip service rather than heart service.  But I began to notice the play acting a few years ago and decided to really look at my own spiritual behavior as a result.  I've shifted to a certain extent, although I'm the first to acknowledge that continual shift is an absolute requirement.  Maybe some day I won't pay any attention to whatever anyone does.  I'm not there yet, though.

Spirituality shouldn't be marketed.  Or at least, I think we need to be careful about the way we "consume" spirituality.   Still, how would we know there was another way of thinking about God/Spirit/Whateveryouwanttocallit without those who pass it on.  I appreciate those who have gone before me.  There's the conundrum, though, isn't there?  If someone's book or workshop hadn't been there to help me understand what was going on back when I first began having spontaneous mystical experiences, I'd probably have shut the experiences down or sought psychiatric help.

So - how do we keep the learning fresh without getting hooked into the trappings?

Karen E. Kelsay © 2008  All rights reserved.