|
Dear Friends committed to living and aging consciously:
The energies of light and renewal are springing forth in the world around us and in the depths of ourselves as being who are an integral part of the magnificent web of life At the same time, powerful energies of darkness assault so many of our brothers and sisters who are victims of hatred and aggression, and assail the psyches of those of us who are not.
Both of these realities must be acknowledged as we choose the hope and trust of Spring AND grieve and condemn hatred and unconscious, unbridled ego. It is our hope that you will find this newsletter to be a support as you allow Spring’s life affirming energies to arise in you and flow through you. These energies include compassion, grief, and righteous anger, which feed our commitment to shining our light brightly in the darkness.
Our lead article, by Ron Pevny, is about inertia—that powerful force that numbs our life energy and keeps us from allowing life’s gifts to freely flow through us. He offers suggestions for overcoming inertia, while also posing questions that so many of us struggle with.
Wendy Dudley writes about the beautiful act of becoming that requires both endings and beginnings—an inspiring reminder of the perfection of all the seasons of our lives—with a special emphasis on the ever reliable new beginnings of Spring.
Diane Allan’s contribution is the story of five women who met 10 years ago on a Choosing Conscious Elderhood retreat and have been supporting each other, through thick and then, ever since. She offers an important reminder of how essential community is for aging consciously, and shows what is possible when commitment and non-conditional love bring people together.
We also present poetry to touch your heart and stir your intuition. You will find information about our conscious eldering retreats and workshops. We present information about two books and one new manuscript we highly recommend as resources for your conscious eldering, as well as two organizations and one newsletter we are proud to have as partners in the work of supporting the development of true Elders.
We include a lot in this newsletter. We suggest you not race through it but rather, savor it, perhaps one article or section at a time. May it support your growth into the conscious elderhood that is your birthright, but which requires your willingness to accept it as both gift and responsibility.
|
|
On Inertia, Aliveness, Nature and Spring
by Ron Pevny
As I sit here at my desk in our new (to us) home in Fort Collins, Colorado, watching an early Spring storm build from gentle snowfall to “Winter Storm” intensity, I find myself reflecting on inertia. The inertia that makes it difficult for me to begin writing an article for this newsletter and to make progress on my book project. The inertia that keeps me in bed in the morning when I have had plenty of sleep. The inertia that leads to my reading yet another “spiritual growth” book and feeling yet another temporary high when I know, thanks to the impact the many crises of these times have had on me, that what I really need is to do more of the difficult inner emotional and spiritual work I am seeing is certainly not finished It is inertia that many registrants tell me they hope to overcome by coming to our retreats this year after feeling numbed by the seemingly endless challenges of these past two years.
At times it is clear to me when I am giving in to inertia. At other times I feel confused about the difference between disempowering inertia and the life supporting dynamic of lying fallow—hibernating to restore myself for the season of growth ahead. I want to choose to experience and savor aliveness in each of my precious and numbered elder days, yet often feel ambivalence as I settle for activities that require little effort and produce little in return.
I know and teach that elderhood is a time for shifting from a primary focus on “doing” to a focus on “being, yet I see so many people whose “doing” seems to give way to filling their days with shallow enjoyments that do not fulfill the human need for true aliveness and service. To my mind, this is not “being,” but rather, “existing”, with the choice for aliveness undermined by inertia. So I reflect on question such as these: How can those of us committed to conscious eldering overcome such inertia while not feeling we need to constantly be efforting?; What is a healthy balance between living consciously and allowing ourselves to just relax?; and When we feel we need to bring more intentionality to our days, how do we overcome the inertia that stands in our way?
While I do struggle with such questions and bring them to our retreats to tap the wisdom of the elders there, most of whom have these same questions, here is what I do know about inertia as it relates to the commitment many of us have to growing into a conscious elderhood. At any stage in life, and moreso in our later years, fulfilling our potential for growth, fulfillment, service and aliveness requires effort— pushing beyond our current perceived boundaries and comfort zones. This is difficult, and as we age it becomes increasingly easy to tell ourselves that we are done efforting; it is now time to relax.
This is why it is such a critical element of our conscious eldering work that we focus on becoming more and more aware of what brings us truly alive versus what provides much less fulfilling distraction or enjoyment and helps fill our hours. A key to such awareness is whether our choices feel like they open our hearts to appreciation, gratitude and creative expression. And whether we feel we are contributing our life’s energy to the world and in reciprocity drawing in life energy, or not. The more we feel true aliveness as we make our daily decisions, the easier it is to make the effort to push beyond our comfort zones. The reward makes it worth it.
Another critical factor is making a disciplined commitment to engage in certain practices over a period of time that will support our aliveness, growth and momentum. We have all heard that establishing new positive habits requires that we engage in certain behaviors each day for at least a month, or 40 days, or whatever. By doing so, these behaviors become a part of us. It is so much easier then to incorporate them into our lives, and the energies of inertia weaken. For this reason, making a long-term commitment to our growth that involves doing tangible work each day or each week to support our emotional and spiritual growth seems to be the only way, amid inner inertia and pervasive outer distractions, to bring forth the conscious elder that lives within us all. This is the reason Katia Petersen and I are writing a conscious eldering growth-book intended to serve as a year-long practice guide to the many facets of aging consciously.
Whether you use our book to be released early next year, or my book “Conscious Living, Conscious Aging” or other of the fine resources available, I encourage you to make a commitment to using practices that speak to you (and some that may seem more challenging) on a regular basis. On our retreats, participants often report that, in their experience the only way to assure that their commitment to their growth work is sustained is to schedule into their lives time that is used only for this work. It is not sufficient to tell oneself that you will do some growth practices when you don’t have other things to do. If your growth is truly your priority, make it a priority as you schedule your weeks..
Inertia thrives when we are isolated. Having the support of one or more kindred spirits who share our vision for what aging can be makes all the difference in the world. Sharing our aspirations—our challenges, our achievements, the personal growth work we are doing—with at least one other infuses our commitment and confidence with an energy that overrides disempowering beliefs about our potential as we age and the inertia that is fed by these beliefs.
Finally, with the arrival of Spring I remind you of the vital role the natural world plays in bringing forth the aliveness of the elder within us. Most of the people who come to our retreats, whatever their religious preferences, say that their deepest experiences of feeling in touch with the sacred, or spiritual, dimension of life have happened when they have been in nature, away from human-created structures and ideas about what has value, what is possible, what to strive for. The natural world opens the human heart and mind to what is most true and natural in the world around us and within us. Eldering is nature’s way of supporting our growth in life’s later chapters.
I encourage you to schedule time in a natural setting this Spring—perhaps a few hours or a day—reflecting upon what is most important to you to nurture as we emerge into the season of new life. In what ways do you need to bring healing to your past so that old baggage and stale energy (strong components of inertia) do not keep you from truly blossoming into your potential? When you think of the various dimensions of who you are, how can you intentionally act, in whatever life circumstance you find yourself, to support your need for good health; for community; for giving your gifts to a world in need; for spiritual and emotional growth; for learning; for adventure; for personal expansion, for joy. Allow yourself to get in touch with that yearning deep inside you to feel truly alive rather than settling for less.
|
|
ENDINGS AND BEGINNINGS: THE BEAUTIFUL ACT OF BECOMING
By Wendy Dudley
As I write this, a crescent moon sings with the stars outside my window. She is fresh, newly seeded with intention. As she grows, swelling through her phases, I find I too am thinking of the greening time. While dry grasses sit silent beneath the snow, there are fragile stirrings of new life, gestating in wombs and tucked inside tiny buds. New beginnings.
This is a transitional time, as we move from winter to the unfurling of spring, like a frond unfolding to the lengthening light. Some birds are early nesters, such as the grey jays and owls, and they are already tending to their eggs. In the northern Hemisphere, behaviour in the wild ones is changing, as they begin marking their territories, preparing to give birth in their dens and burrows. The Celts refer to this time as Imbolc, meaning “in the belly of the Mother.” Whether deep in the soil, or beneath the river ice, the flow of life begins to gurgle. Gestation is the beautiful act of Becoming.
Because we are composed of natural processes, these cycles also stir within us, asking us to plant something new, encouraging us to nourish fresh thoughts and intentions. What a fertile field for us, as the sun begins to warm and move higher in the sky. Just like the circle of seasons, or the spiral of galaxies, we too live by cycles, feeling various energy shifts throughout the year. Come Spring, we stretch and yawn. We breathe in to receive and breathe out to give. As elders, we know that from death rises birth. We accept the ongoing metamorphosis, as we have witnessed this through the spiral of seasons throughout our lives.
We cleanse, we purify and we shake off our winter slumber, as we complete our time of reflection and introspection. With the closure of this cycle, we create new space for what is to become. Endings and Beginnings: We cannot have one without the other. The two are partners in an entangled embrace. If we do not de-clutter and cut cords, how can we welcome the new? Whether we are completing a project or leaving a job or grieving for the loss of a close friend or loved one, we know that we are shedding something that once was. We let go. And in doing so, we free ourselves from the mud keeping us stuck in the past.
Whether we light a fire, dance, or cut yarn to symbolize an ending, think of this as honorable closure. We have now written the last sentence of our winter story. So what will be the first words of our new story? What is the first stroke of paint we will lay down on our new canvas? What is the first musical note we will sing in our new song?
We can mark Beginnings with ceremony. In the Andean culture, one process is to step inside a prepared circle of white flowers, an initiation into our new life, recognizing we are about to birth new ideas, new gifts, and new energies, to be shared with family, community and the world. Have fun with this; design your own ceremony, in which you give thanks to all you have learned so that you may go forward with greater understanding of your purpose. Make offerings, in gratitude of what was, and what is now to be. Nothing flows one way. Our generosity in showing gratitude will be returned to us on the next stretch of our journey. Expand into this new cycle, this new rhythm of the greening. When we do this, we are becoming initiated. When we align with the death and life cycles of Nature, we deepen our creativity and potential.
As we awaken to spring birdsong, we have the opportunity to share in their wake-up call. Check in with ourselves, remind ourselves of our sense of purpose, and think of ways to nourish that which brings us joy and meaning.
Life is essentially a cycle of many deaths and many births. To quote author and theologian Henri Nouwen: “When we are ready to die at any moment, we are also ready to live at any moment.” We extinguish, so that we may ignite. For in learning how to live fully we learn how to die. And with each “small” death we have the opportunity to be born. And so we celebrate and honour both beginnings and endings. Such is the pilgrimage, not to some distant place, but through our inner landscapes.
So with the blooming season upon us, let us flower with imagination, our creative grace. It does not matter our age, for imagination has no boundaries. We are elders, but within us sparkles an eternal childhood sense of wonder. Many of us have experienced all of life’s phases, except for physical death, and in so doing, we are liberated to take the best from each phase of life, and, with wonder and imagination, live them all simultaneously during our elderhood.
Let us till yesterday’s fields, then empty our seed packets, so that we may nourish them with our imagination. Then may we rejoice, as such potent fertility shape-shifts into our own verdant growth. As Anais Nin wrote, “The day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
Wendy Dudley is a teacher, healer, and death doula; author and artist; Qi Gong practitioner; animist and eco-spiritist; and mesa carrier of the Andean rainbow lineage. She can be reached at dudleyart1@gmail.com, or through her website at www.wendydudleyart.com.
|
|
|
‘Sisters’ in Aging Consciously
by Diane Allan, MSW
It has been a real honour and challenge to try to encapsulate in a short article the dynamics, challenges and gifts of a group of women who, for ten years, have been committed to supporting each other in aging consciously. Ten years! We began at Ghost Ranch on a Choosing Conscious Eldering retreat, initially a bit wary of each other and the startling desert landscape. But over the next few days, along with the other participants on the retreat, we laughed, cried, danced, and drummed together on the land. Our stories were shared and witnessed, ceremony performed and with the help of retreat leaders Ron Pevny and Anne Wennhold a strong sense of community was formed in the larger group, and a lasting bond was formed among five of us women. Each of us began to grow into our elder selves, and we committed to helping each other keep growing as we aged. Upon leave-taking, we five committed to monthly phone calls for ongoing support on our Conscious Eldering journey, and so we began our shared journeys of growth together.
Our calls have been guided by Life rather than by Agenda. Each call begins with sitting in virtual circle and passing the 'talking stick’; sharing what has transpired in our lives. Each receives deep listening and heartfelt responses. Each of has experienced losses and successes, relationship beginnings and endings. Typical of our age, there have been many changes. One had a severe stroke and has worked through recovery and rehabilitation. Another suffered financial difficulties and loss of a treasured home. We have all moved, some to be closer to family and others a result of financial concerns or health issues or a combination of these. Work/volunteer lives shifted to doing less. I retired, gradually, and with much resistance. We are all active single women with full lives and yet we continue to commit to this group.
Our roles as parents have changed continually as our children have grown through early adulthood, birth of their own children and toward middle age. One mother had to face a child’s life challenging illness and pregnancy loss. Others have supported their children through divorce and trauma recovery. As a family member struggled with challenging situations we turned to our Conscious Eldering Group for support and guidance for adapting parental strategies and maintaining boundaries. Each of us has at times brought to the group a heart broken and need of the sustenance, and the group has provided as we witnessed and held space for painful emotions. And at other times we celebrated our own successes and those of our family members.
We have shared our own life experiences as leaders, counsellors and group facilitators. Each brings many gifts! And each of us has been encouraged as well as challenged by the others on our journey. Support for adaption and growth is unflinching, and falling into unhealthy patterns is queried and questioned. This comes from years of deep listening and knowing each others’ stories as we have changed and grown through difficult times.
The Life Review work we did on the retreat was just the beginning of healing related to early traumas, unresolved grief and relationship wounds. Each of us has worked individually with therapists and healers of all stripes. And, because we have built such trust, each of us has been able in our circle to find and provide unflinching support for healing and wholeness. One way we do this is to explore questions such as: ‘now that life is different, how do I find meaning?’; ’what do I value most?’; and ‘what feeds me?’
We met once in person in these ten years, in Oregon by the Sea. Our VRBO allowed us to easily access the vast beach and healing ocean and we spent time there alone and together. It was a challenging, growing time! What we had anticipated as a fun and nurturing time became for each one of us an opportunity to meet shadow characters, or a wounded inner child, or relationship issues of other kinds. There were hard conversations and unresolved conflicts. Each of us had to work hard to maintain connection, we dialogued about our process as much as possible, but there was no resolution. We left with each having to consider whether we would continue the group and how.
It took many months for us to reclaim that trusted safe environment we had created. It took asking for help, and allowing ourselves to be vulnerable, and ability and willingness to take responsibility for choices made. It took having the strength to ask for forgiveness and to offer it. Most of us used the help of counsellors and healers as we dealt with these issues. It was a multi-layered process over months that involved revisiting painful events of the weekend, talking them through, sharing feelings and being grateful for small steps forward. The group was able to hold non judgmental space while members worked through hurt feelings and misunderstandings. This was a very feminine process - slowly coming back, sharing deeply, emphasizing the love and commitment we valued in the relationships. It took time and growing pains. I found it humbling to participate in such a powerful process.
We now share a real commitment to creativity. One of us is a published poet, another has created a variety of genres of art she has sold. One creates beautiful books of photos and poetry and another writes occasionally and plays with paints for fun. Family continues to be important, as does travel and friendships. We all explore Spirituality in ways that speak to us, including Nature rites and rituals, singing and prayer, meditation and other spiritual practices.
These calls have come to mean a great deal to me. As I am the youngest, at 70, I benefit from the others' wisdom immensely. They are my wise crones and my guides and I feel blessed. I feel supported in my journey of healing and growing as a conscious elder. My creativity has been supported, my bruised ego repaired, and my soul has received solace during tough times. Living consciously means finding meaning, having a spiritual practice and a creative one, choosing uplifting people and spending time in nature. This group provides healthy portions of most of these activities.
This group of wise elders with over 450 years of life experience includes Helene, living in Ohio, Leigh in New Jersey, Linda in San Francisco, and myself Diane, in British Columbia. Carol from Montana pops in when she can. It is astounding to me that we have maintained this bond through primarily tech connections for this long! Zoom is now our medium but for about 7 years it was just phone calls and sending occasional photos through email. I believe that we will continue to meet as long as we can still talk! There is such a deep heart bond, and that the connection will always be there, supporting us throughout our conscious elderhood.
Diane Allan lives in British Columbia after living most of her life in Alberta where her Eldering journey began. She has counseled seniors and facilitated groups in “Aging Well “in her work in Calgary. She has participated in two Choosing Conscious Elderhood retreats and has studied and practiced Sage-ing. She has also studied Ecopsychology at Naropa University and Vision Quests with School of Lost Borders.
|
|
|
artwork by Doug Van Houten
Healing
by Bob Calhoun
Trees heal
On the long path
Of growing and dying
We see the scars
And wonder how they are made that way
To heal, repair
After loss, a brush with death
And journey on
Trees heal
As we do
Our bodies are built that way
To make new
Sort out good from bad
Remake what is lost
Cleanse the system and go on
Healing is
An active present
Balancing what was, is and is to be
An expectation of a future
Yet with full surrender
To the many futures that may be
Scarred trees remind us
How precarious the journey is
However long or short the path may be
Toward an end which rotting logs
And graves remind us
Surviving
Is the gift of daily healing
And often comes with days
When much is asked
Taking all the healing energy
Just to move and live and be
Trees teach us
Quietly about healing
Encouraging us to trust
The process of our living
And reach for another breath
If not for one tomorrow
The next one offered for today.
Dedication of Merit
by Betsy Hearne
May all beings meet change with equanimity
May all beings reach havens from suffering
May all beings foster the wellness of others
May all beings benefit the worlds we inhabit
May all be mindful in the moments of life
May all be accepting in the moments of death
And may these thoughts nourish all in need and the merits of our practice benefit all beings
|
|
|
Live Your Life Without Fearing Death
By Shawnee Chief Tecumsah
1768 - 1813
So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart.
Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life,
Beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and Its purpose in the service of your people.
Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide.
Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend, even a stranger, when in a lonely place.
Show respect to all people and
bow to none.
When you arise in the morning, give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself.
Abuse no one and nothing, For abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision.
When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes
they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way.
Sing your death song and die like a hero going home."
Mindful
by Mary Oliver
Every dayI see or hear something
that more or less kills me with delight,
that leaves me like a needle in the haystack of light.
It was what I was born for —
to look, to listen, to lose myself
inside this soft world —
to instruct myself over and over
in joy, and acclamation.
Nor am I talking
about the exceptional,
the fearful, the dreadful,
the very extravagant —
but of the ordinary,
the common, the very drab,
the daily presentations.
Oh, good scholar,
I say to myself,
how can you help but grow wise
with such teachings as these —
the untrimmable light of the world,
the ocean’s shine,
the prayers that are made
out of grass?
|
|
|
Upcoming Conscious Eldering Programs
We are so very eager happy to again be able to offer in-person retreats this Spring. The first, which will be in April in the Southern Appalachians, is our annual Next Step retreat for people who have participated in one of our our signature weeklong Choosing Conscious Elderhood programs. And then we will be back at Ghost Ranch May 1-7 for the 18th time, for Choosing Conscious Elderhood. Due to a recent cancellation there is one space available. If you are interested, please contact us asap.
Then is the Fall we have two retreats scheduled, both of which have several openings: Katia Petersen and Ron's Pevny's new Aiming High focused on purpose and intentionality; and Choosing Conscious Elderhood at Ghost Ranch. And we are always eager to present our shorter weekend conscious eldering workshops for organizations that invite us and will handle the logistics.
Please consider joining us if you seek an empowering vision for your elder chapters, tools for helping make that vision reality, and the warmth of a supportive community of kindred spirits. Our programs provide a powerful opportunity to have your idealism acknowledged, your hope rekindled and your dreams for a vital, passionate elderhood supported? They offer you the wisdom of skilled guides and the heart-and-mind-opening energy of the natural world, to open you to the rich possibiities of your later-life chapters--for growth, purpose, spiritual deepening, and giving your elder gifts to support a healthy society and planet.
|
|
|
Choosing Conscious Elderhood
Ghost Ranch, New Mexico
May 1-7, 2022
There is one space available. If you would like to claim it,
please contact us asap..
September 25 - October 1, 2022
Several spaces are still available
Aiming High
Cultivating Purpose and Intentionality in Life's Later Chapters
September 11-15, 2022
Hope Springs Institute Retreat Center, Ohio
For Organizations, Faith Communities, etc:
We are available to present our weekend workshops or custom designed programs for groups who would like to sponsor one in their area. Contact us to explore possibilities.
for details on our programs and registration information, please visit
www.centerforconsciouseldering.com
|
|
In the early 1980s, Ron Pevny's filmmaker friends Joseph and Johanna Tieger, introduced Ram Dass to Daniel Elleberg and filmed them in conversation for a nine-part PBS series on personal awakening and planetary survival. Then in July 1983, Ram Dass teamed up with Daniel Ellsberg to create an altogether unique event at the Lama Foundation in the mountains of northern New Mexico: a seminar on the threat of nuclear annihilation offered within the context of a three-day meditation retreat.
Joseph and Johanna’s friend the late Skip Robinson fashioned the transcripts into a 70,000 word manuscript that was intended to become a book, but the project fell through. Over the past few years, Joseph has gone through that entire 70,000-word manuscript, treating it as a sacred relic, searching for material worth resurrecting. He feels that, “while Ellsberg’s contributions turn out to be mainly of historical interest, Ram Dass’s prove to be timeless.” Joseph has created an 8,000-word extract containing the most luminous teachings that Ram Dass has left us for living in our current
apocalyptic times—with spiritual wisdom as a foundation for conscious social transformation. I feel these teachings are especially relevant to the role conscious elders can play in these times of crisis.
Additionally, Joseph and Johanna are planning to create a site where they will make available without charge the entire body of videos and texts they co-created with Ram Dass on this subject, including both the How Then Shall We Live? series and our follow-up PBS series, Reaching Out. If you would like to receive this document and/or be notified when this site goes online, please email Joseph at josephtieger@icloud.com.
Ron Pevny
|
|
|
"A beautifully written and important book about aging and elderhood. Pevny reminds us that consciously moving into our greater years is a major rite of passage, and he offers skilled guidance through the many questions and challenges, endings and new beginnings, that arise."
Meredith Little, Co-founder of the School of Lost Borders
Since Ron's book was released in 2014, many elder wisdom circles and discussion groups have found it to be an excellent resource around which to center their discussions and group practices. A facilitator of several of these groups has created a study guide for this book. Contact Ron for information on how to obtain this guide.
|
|
|
What Carl Jung called “the second half of life” has the potential to be a remarkable curriculum for insight and awakening. When wisely understood, the changes inherent in the aging process become stepping-stones to the actualization of our best human qualities: wisdom, lovingkindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity.
Author David Chernikoff has spent decades pursuing spiritual study and practice with remarkable teachers, including Ram Dass, Jack Kornfield, Sharon Salzberg, Father Thomas Keating, and Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi. In Life, Part Two, he distills lessons from across contemplative traditions to invite readers to embrace seven essential elements of conscious living: embracing the mystery, choosing a vision, cultivating intuitive wisdom, committing to inner work, suffering effectively, serving from the heart, and celebrating the journey. These elements culminate in wise elderhood--a state celebrated by indigenous cultures around the world, yet largely unacknowledged in contemporary Western society. For those of us who aspire to live fully and to love well as we age, Life, Part Two is a lucid guidebook that empowers us to personally thrive and to contribute with ever greater clarity and purpose.
From a review of this book.
|
|
|
The Human Values in Aging Newsletter
The newsletter you are reading is not intended to provide a comprehensive listing of workshops and other resources available these days to help support people in aging consciously. That job is well done by Rick Moody in his monthly Human Values in Aging newsletter. To receive it on the first day of each month, send an email to hrmoody@yahoo.com
|
|
|
One of our partner organizations, the Elders Action Network is an educational non-profit organization fostering a budding movement of vital elders dedicated to growing in consciousness while actively addressing the demanding social and environmental challenges facing our country and planet. They work inter-generationally for social and economic justice,environmental stewardship, and sound governance. They offer their multiple talents and resources in service to the goal of preserving and protecting life for all generations to come. Anyone committed to living and serving as a conscious elder in invited to join them in this critically important endeavor. EAN offerings include, among others,
* Bi-weekly Elder Activists for Social Justice Community Conversations
*The growing and influential "Elders Climate Action" initiative
* The Empowered Elder--EAN's foundational program
*The new Sunrise Movement - an intergenerational collaborative effort between EAN and Sage-ing International
*The Elders for Regenerative Living initiative
To learn about EAN and its initiatives and programs, visit www.eldersaction.org
|
|
|
Another of our partner organizations is Sage-ing International, the pioneering organization in promoting the principles of conscious aging, or "Sage-ing". Their work is grounded in the work of Rabbi Zalman Shachter-Shalomi, who introduced conscious aging to the world with his workshops at Omega Institute with Ram Dass and others and via his seminal book, From Age-ing to Sage-ing.
We would like to especially recommend the Sage-ing Book Club, facilitated by Sage-ing Leaders Jerome Kerner and Judith Helburn. Their monthly Zoom meetings feature exploration of the wisdom in books of strong interest to conscious elders .
To learn about Sage-ing International and their greatly expanded offerings of online workshops and seminars, Elder Wisdom Circles, and their training program for Certified Sage-ing Leaders, visit www.sage-ing.org.
|
|
|
Ron Pevny, Founder and Director
970-223-0857
3707 Coronado Ave, Fort Collins, Colorado 80526
ron@centerforconsciouseldering.com
|
|
|
Service is reaching in toward our own wholeness, reaching out toward the world's needs, and then living our life at the intersection
Parker Palmer
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
