Life is Transformative

Recently I had the distinct pleasure and privilege of having conversations with a minister from the United Church of Christ, a student of the Bible and an adherent of the word of Jesus Christ, and then with a devout Muslim, a student of the Koran and an adherent of the word of Mohammed, later with an orthodox Jew, a student of the Torah and an adherent of the word of Moses, then with a practicing Hatha Yogi, a student of the Vedas and an adherent of the word of BKS Iyengar. All four, it turned out, were also graduates of Werner's work.

In these conversations, what came out first and foremost was how these four devotees regarded Werner's work as empowering to their respective arenas of worship, how Werner's work (amongst other gifts) allowed them to strip away the deadening positions and beliefs they had inadvertently mired their faiths in, allowing them instead to experience the material directly for the first time.

All four told me in similar words Werner's conversation for transformation is really holy and sacred in the truest sense of both those descriptors.

"Beautiful!" I thought, "Even arguably true."

Having said that, the only issue I have with using those descriptors is they're overly charged with meaning, interpretation, and significance. They evoke an already always listening in people which makes it harder for them to actually hear the conversation for transformation. While I get what they refer to in designating the conversation for transformation as holy and sacred, I personally stay clear of those descriptors in my own conversations for transformation with people.

Now ... the other side of this coin is: it's all holy and sacred. There's nothing in this world that isn't holy and sacred. Holy and sacred, as seen on the high road to enlightenment, is really just normal. Furthermore, on the high road to enlightenment, a state of being without ego is touted as an ultimate state. I assert being without ego is ultimate ego.

In both these regards, I prefer Werner's slightly irreverent notion of "dogshit" reality. You don't have to ask me to explain what "dogshit" reality is. Think of a self-proclaimed wise man thinking he's made it, when suddenly he steps in dogshit. You have to be something of a rogue to appreciate it. In order to avoid the trappings of the already always listening when it comes to the holiness and the sacredness of the conversation for transformation, you have to choose the low road to enlightenment rather than the high road. The irreverence of the low road to enlightenment pokes fun at even our most precious beliefs and practices. It has to. It has to consider even our most precious beliefs and practices may just be already always listening - unexamined deadening positions and beliefs even though they may be cherished unexamined deadening positions and beliefs.

On the high road to enlightenment, I'm enlightened as long as I believe in enlightenment. On the low road to enlightenment, I'm enlightened as long as I speak enlightenment.

There's nothing wrong with the high road to enlightenment. I love it's piety, sanctimoniousness, reverence, respect, joy, and beauty ... AND ... I question how effective it really is, given peoples' already always listening.

When the holy and sacred conversation for transformation ceases to be effective because over the years people, with their best intentions foremost, have starched it with meaning, interpretation, and significance and thereby reduced it to jargon in the already always listening, then it's time to reinvigorate its vocabulary and to bring forth who we really are in its delivery.