TCS Newsletter, July 2024
- The Contemplative Society
- Jul 8, 2024
- 5 min read
“There is a great difference between comprehending the knowledge of things and tasting the hidden life of them.”
Quaker mystic Isaac Pennington
Summer greetings from the Contemplative Society!
This newsletter features a personal invitation from Heather Ruce to join our upcoming Wisdom School in Sorrento BC from September 8-12, 2024. Since the earlybird deadline for registration is fast approaching, we hope you will find this a timely reminder and inspiration to click on the link below and register today!
Reflection from Heather Ruce:
Life is evolving, changing, and transforming all around us and within our very being. This has always been true, as well as the reality that there are times when the corresponding instability and growth pangs are particularly intense. Based on what is transpiring globally, we seem to be amidst another one of those periods of discomfort…a storm before a new dawn that we have yet to see on the horizon. This might be understood, as philosopher Jean Gebser suggested, to be a time in which the current structure of consciousness many have been operating under is no longer sufficient. And while a new structure of consciousness is emerging, it is not yet fully realized. I find this perspective to be very useful in contextualizing and navigating life at this precarious period in history.
As a Wisdom student I am called, in such periods, to stand firm and deeply rooted in sources of hope, guidance, significance, and comfort that are beyond the circumstances of and outcomes in this world alone. I know I live with one foot in the finite and one foot in the infinite—fully human, fully divine. I recognize that Wisdom comes not only from the physical realm I/we inhabit in time but, as Wisdom teachers say, that the source of Wisdom lies outside of time in a more subtle and yet more vivid realm of divine consciousness. This realm is what Jesus referred to as the Kingdom of Heaven which is within each one of us and always available when we have the heart, as an organ of spiritual perception, online and the lens clear. I am/we are then open to the possibility of comprehending spiritual reality and truth that may assist us in the physical realm.
I see in myself the propensity to live most of life asleep to the ways of the heart, in a consciousness too narrow to comprehend and respond to what is needed in each moment of the now in any given situation of consequence. As a Wisdom student my wish is to align with the cosmic heart in being and in action. Thus, it is important to be amenable to Wisdom as a way of knowing with my whole Self. I realize that Wisdom becomes recognizable as my perception intensifies by way of engaging the three centers of intelligence—mind, feeling, and body—in a comprehensive awareness which brings the heart online.
I have come to value Wisdom Schools as they are intended to support me, and all who participate, in shifting the lens of our perception from primarily operating out of our ordinary, albeit necessary, egoic consciousness to the spiritual consciousness arising from our awakened and transparent hearts. Through an intentional rhythm of different practices and teachings, we begin to taste a three-centered awareness. We learn to recognize when we are caught in our personal dramas and agendas in total, and how we might consent to the heart of God.
I have also come to see that what we discover and stabilize within ourselves in the setting of a Wisdom School then becomes accessible as a place to come from more often in life. Although at this point in human history, it seems especially easy to look around at all the tragedies in our midst, it is also possible to look around at what is taking place as a necessary albeit uncomfortable addition to the current structures of consciousness. Right alongside our normal human experiences of feeling discouraged, scared, angry, and overwhelmed which we mustn’t deny or repress is the ability to draw from a wellspring of abundance that is not of this world.
In this upcoming Wisdom School, drawing on the work of Jean Gebser, Cynthia Bourgeault and other spiritual teachers we will be exploring and embodying the following themes in order that we might be more equipped to traverse this particular passageway:
the three centers of intelligence—our body or moving center, our feeling center, and our thinking center—that are necessary for a Wisdom way of presencing, knowing, and comprehending
how three-centered awareness and utilization allows us the chance to begin to perceive with our hearts as our primary organs of spiritual perceptivity
the practice of remembering ourselves and our true nature as having one foot in the physical realm and one in the divine realm
the practice of cultivating our witnessing presence and observing when we fall asleep to our true nature
the practices of conscious labor and intentional suffering
the structures of consciousness according to Gebser—archaic, magic, mythic, mental, and integral—that are useful to understand and integrate within ourselves
how understanding these structures of consciousness and the breakdown of our paradigm can help us locate where we are in our current global circumstances and cooperate with the shifts arising
how we might become Wisdom hospice workers amidst the breakdown of our current structure of consciousness and Wisdom midwives of the structure which is emerging
I hope you will consider joining us for this inquiry in person on the beautiful wild lands of the Sorrento Centre or online from your own home.
Yours on the journey,
Please join The Contemplative Society for our Autumn offering this year:
Three Centered Presence and Transformation of Consciousness: A Wisdom School With Heather Ruce From September 8 to 12, 2024
SCHOLARSHIPS: A limited number of $200 scholarships are available for participation in this retreat, as provided through the “Margaret Haines Scholarship Fund” of The Contemplative Society (TCS). You can request a scholarship application form through TCS by e-mailing us at: admin at contemplative.org and in the “Subject” line of your e-mail type: “Margaret Haines Scholarship Fund – Application Form Request”.
TCS is a non-profit charitable organisation run by a volunteer board and a dedicated circle of contemplatives. It was formed in Victoria, BC, Canada in 1997 to serve an emerging contemplative renewal, and to support and spread the teachings of Cynthia Bourgeault and other distinguished Wisdom teachers. We lovingly carry forward this work, adapting to the changing needs of the present and future, while anchoring ourselves in the ancient Wisdom tradition.
We would love for you to join us as a member and to help sustain and build our offerings with a donation of any amount.
Copyright © 2024 The Contemplative Society, All rights reserved.
Our mailing address is:
PO Box 23031, Cook St. RPO
Victoria, British Columbia,
Canada, V8V 4Z8
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