Autumn 2013 Newsletter
(September 2013)
Autumn 2013
Dear Living Tao friends:
There are many new and exciting adventures since my early June news update to share with you all.
The August weeks at the River House were enhanced by visits from board member Robert Walter, cellist Michael Fitzpatrick, and visiting teacher Deng Ming-Dao.
Bob brought “William Shatner’s Get A Life!” a new documentary film, featuring Bob discussing with Shatner the mythic dimensions of the phenomenon of Star Trek Conventions and what compels “Trekkies” to attend. Bob’s presentation and commentary at the Gold Beach Bookstore was, as usual, very compelling and full of valuable insights.
Michael played for us and spoke about his experiences as an artist. Over the weekend he gave two wonderful concerts at the Harper house by the sea.
Ming-Dao shared Taoist insights from his books, and taught the group traditional martial arts grounding discipline before we introduced Mama Huang’s Ba Ji Form.
After returning to Urbana, a 24-hour Russian Educational TV program, “Psychology 21” (recommended by old colleague and friend Stan Grof), requested an interview with me. Although our mutual schedules were tight during the short week the Russian film crew had in the States, we managed to meet the day before I left for Italy. Xenia Kuleshova, the producer and the interviewer with a 3-camera crew, flew red-eyed from SFO to O’Hare to Urbana for my interview (then reversed the trip to return to Russia the following day). It was a fruitful 3 hours of sharing insights of TAO, experiencing Tai Ji as living philosophy, and moving and dancing together in my studio and garden–a joyful encounter.
Stay tuned to our website to see the interview.
The next day I flew to Cortona, Italy, for my fourth presentation at the annual gathering in this charming Tuscan hill town. For nearly 3 decades Cortona has been a haven for the graduate students from ETH Zurich–the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology to dedicate a week to the discovery of values, which are often neglected in the natural sciences’ academic education. The students immerse themselves in the exploration of arts and crafts, emotions and psyche, philosophy and spirituality, dance and bodywork, and music to foster and practice interdisciplinary thinking through personal experience.
Michael Fitzpatrick and I opened the week with our TAO of BACH concert at the Cortona Cathedral, where we transformed the CHI in this ancient church, receiving 3 spontaneous ovations. It was a special delight to have Giuseppe Urselli with many of his Tai Ji students coming all the way from Southern Italy to share the dancing CHI in the cathedral.
I gave my interactive “lecture” on “The Three Pillars of Asian Wisdom”, inviting the students and other presenters to experience the philosophical essence of the teachings, through dancing the symbols, meditating and moving to Michael Fitzpatrick playing BACH.
Now, I’m home in Urbana for a month before leaving for Beijing to join the Hawaii delegate to the Zhou Enlai Peace Institute
to celebrate the 60th Anniversary of the “Five Principles of Peace”, which was first written by Premier Zhou Enlai on December 31st, 1953. It has since become an international standard for peaceful relations between all countries, endorsed by the United Nations.
By invitation, I will perform a “Dance of Peace” at the National People’s Congress, to match Zhou’s “Five Principles of Peace”, which I will interpret through the classic Tai Ji form of Wuxing 五
行, “Five Moving Forces” of Nature.
Here is the philosophical content I hope to convey, non-verbally. Perhaps impossible?! But I will trust the TAO and Tai Ji magic.!
1) Mutual respect for each nation’s territorial integrity and sovereignty.
The Fire power 火, The Heart – Prepares us to define open boundaries, whether they be global or personal; and if infringed upon, guides us to find peaceful resolution through dialogues from our heart.
• We must ignite the passion to strive and hope for world peace.
2) Mutual non-aggression.
The Water power 水, The Flow – Cleanses conflicting congestions in the world. Healing all wounds and breaking through all barriers to connect all beings on this planet with the “Watercourse Way” of TAO. 道法流水
• We will have the compassion and tolerance to dissolve all blockages and impasses between the people of the world
3) Mutual non-interference in each other’s internal affairs. The Wood power 木, The Connection – Reaching out to others without forceful interference through Wu Wei. 為無為, while observing and finding harmony with other cultures, with mutual respect for ways that differ from our own.
• We need to allow other’s organic growth without obstruction, envy and hidden competitiveness
4) Equality and mutual benefit Metal power 金, The Golden Crystal – Searches for balance and diamond/crystal congealing in all aspects of life, while gratefully opening to receive and share our treasures with others.
• We shall strive towards the alchemical crystalizing of all nations to find cohesion and consensus with one another
5) Peaceful co-existence
The Earth power 土, The Grounding – Observes with gratitude all the abundance of this Earth. Cherishes and shares it with the world, while releasing all judgments of others.
• We must protect and preserve our Mother Earth and honor our individual and collective cultural and historic beginnings and endings, to have New beginnings.
This occasion will also celebrate Zhou Enlai’s 115th birthday year. Clearly, both China and the world are beginning to acknowledge the importance of Zhou’s legacy to the world. Many of you may recall the vivid moment the “Bamboo Curtain” opened when Zhou greeted Nixon in Beijing in 1972–A shining and hopeful moment in recent World History.
You have also heard and read stories about Zhou Enlai from me, including a few in my book, Quantum Soup. Also the fact that he just might be the actual “matchmaker” for my parents while they were at the famous Huang-Pu Military Academy.
My father was a graduate from the first class; and my mother, also a cum laude graduate in a select group of women cadets, was from the sixth class. Zhou was then the Dean of the Political Science at the Academy.
Our delegation will then visit the Memorial Hall of Zhou and his wife and comrade-in-arms, Deng Yingcao, to participate in a 2-Day symposium on Zhou’s “Five Principles of Peace” legacy at Nankai University in the city of Tianjin.
Following Tianjin, I will return to Beijing to help organize a reunion with all the Chinese friends who have been invited in the past 5 years to the “Potential China” forum I have helped to organize and support at Esalen Institute. The initial Sino- American Forum started in 1987, however Esalen became deeply involved with U.S./Soviet exchanges, and had to suspend the China ventures until 2009, when we decided it was high time to resume. After mutual consensus we named this gathering “Potential China”. I designed the logo with the brush calligraphy of Zhong 中, the Center, as in Zhong Guo 中國 “The Middle Kingdom”, with an open circle around it.
This year’s “Potential China “ forum is themed “Chinese Identity”, and will occur the last week of October. International participants will discuss and explore the true current identity of Modern China, and old friends of Living Tao and Lan Ting, Amory and Judy Lovins and Mr. Richard Kong (the 78th Confucius descendent) will also be present.
In closing, as I write this report, looking at the full moon at the Chinese Mid-Autumn Full Moon Festival, I wish to remind our Living Tao friends of the immortal lines of two famous poets in these poems.
The first, by Li Bai 李白 from Tang Dynasty:
The bright moonlight by my bed
I take it as frost on the ground
I look up at the bright moon
I lower my head, missing my home!
And, second, by Su Dongpo 蘇東坡 of Song Dynasty:
How rare it is to behold such bright moon?
I lift my wine cup, asking the heavenly sky
Wondering what is the time in the celestial kingdom above
HAPPY Autumn Full Moon Festival to you ALL,
CHI-eers,
Chungliang