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It’s Been A Long Time …
Posted by Joseph Riggio on Wednesday, May 23, 2007It’s been a long time ... been a long time ... been a long, lonely, lonely time ...
Howdy all, if you recognize the intro you'll know something of my history and where at least some of my attention was in the 70's. Our histories shape up in funny ways ... often in ways that are out of our awareness. I've been away and it has been a long time precisely because of this ... the distance it takes to get far enough from ourselves and what we're doing to recognize what all of that may be when viewed with some perspective.
As a fan of the modern anthropologist, Edward T. Hall and his work, I recall reading in one of his books a comment about not being about to recognize the ubiquitous nature of your own culture from within. Specifically Hall stated that you must get outside of or beyond your own culture to become aware of what it even is, that to you/for you your culture "is" the way the world "is" ... it is what's real."
So for a long time for me in part my culture has been the MythoSphere ... or the world of the MythoSelf Process work I do and the people I engage in the process of doing this work. Truly it would be most fait to say that this work is a lifestyle choice, a way of being in and moving through the world by virtue of making specific choices in a consistent and sustained way.
I've highlighted some of these choices before here in my blog and elsewhere in my writing as well. These choice include:
There are others which I've pointed to here and there from time to time, and yet this short list may begin to give you a sense and/or a reminder of what kinds of choices are associated with the MythoSelf Process and the lifestyle I refer to in relation to it.
However, it continues to fascinate me that the most common question I continue to get asked will be:
Well, what will I be able to do as a result of taking the MythoSelf training?
Yet it remains consistently clear to me and in my answers to them that this process has never centered on what you either will or will not be able to do. The core of the MythoSelf Process has been and remains oriented around who you are ... the ground of your being. This position generates all of your experience in the world ... your perceptions ... your responses ... how others will respond to you ... you name it and you'll find that the answers reside in this ground of your being, what I so fondly refer to as your ontological position.
So the invitation has been and remains:
If you are ready, willing and able come along and begin the journey ... this is the adventure of your life. The opportunity is for you to explore who you are, the life you are living and what is possible for you in this lifetime. Once you've left the dock there will be no returning to that port of call again ... while the journey is magnificent, you can be assured that the shores you will land upon will be ones that are only now semi familiar to you ... dreams and imaginations of exotic places ... yet by journey's end these are the very shores you will call home.
Now, I get that this journey will not be for everyone. In fact the invitation takes years to hear for most. And even then, when they've heard the call, it will only be those who have prepared themselves who will ready, willing and able to partake of the adventure fully. Yet, more and more clearly I recognize that this is the call that seduced me decades ago and the journey I've been on ever since. Along, the way I've been a herald, a guide, a guardian, a magic helper ... even a monster at times. Yet, most of all I've been the hero on my own adventure ... and learning what it means to become the returning buddha ... the enlightened teacher, one who has been there and seen for themselves the transcendent reality and the liberation therein contained.
After a lengthy apprenticeship I've become familiar with "stalking reality" in the Zone myself (ref.: "Stalker" - Andrei Tarkovsky, 1979 and the "Generative Imprint" Model - Roye Fraser). I've gone through being:
All along the way I've know there wasn't really anything to "know" and less to "understand." I thought there might be some things to "get" and I believed there was much to be "experienced." All that and more has been part of being on the journey and even when I was lonely I was never really alone. This among many gifts bestowed upon me on the adventure has been a singularly profound awakening for me. The simple realization that, "I am always in relation to ..."
And, letting go of doing ... even the desire to be doing has been among the hardest thing of all. So, now when I hear others asking of me, So, what will I learn to do as a result of taking the MythoSelf training? I'm first inclined to laugh and then sympathy for them overrides this impulse and I respond most often by remain quiet and telling them, "Simply this." Sometimes that can be enough.
I'm becoming more comfortable with the idea that's been said before, "When the teacher is ready the student will appear." ... or at least something like that. And, I'm coming to understand that the readiness of the teacher becomes most apparent by the level to which they themselves have become transparent and allow themselves to be vulnerable ... innocent ... knowing in their unknowing ... as well.
Maybe someday, if we haven't met yet we will ... on the great journey called life ...
Best regards,
Joseph Riggio, Ph.D.
Princeton, NJ
For a complete MythoSelf program overview, detailed program descriptions, logistics and pricing information on MythoSelf training programs Joseph will be running in 2007 download his introductory letter and the program brochure: 2007 MythoSelf Series.
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