belief systems

One World in a New World – Fyodor Ovchinnikov – Co-Founder, Institute for Evolutionary Leadership

October 15, 2021 by Zen

Our First Episode of One World in a New World

Your host explores a multinational journey and personal passions for getting people, places and things to work together better with Fyodor Ovchinnikov, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of the Institute for Evolutionary Leadership The Institute for Evolutionary Leadership is a California-based social enterprise that develops leaders for systems transformation through educational programs, advising, strategic initiatives, and community building. It was co-founded in 2014 by Manuel Manga and Fyodor Ovchinnikov.

Fyodor shares his circuitous journey through various universities for undergrad and graduate work, his mentors and their suggestions for assisting business development that eventually became IEL. The multidimensional path to meeting Manuel Manga and co-founding IEL is particularly interesting for those who have a passion for changing the way we approach business in the 21st Century.

He speaks of developing relationships around the world and the impact of a dream he had as a teen that had a profound connection to the reality he experienced years later. The reality of the attention, intention and interactions Fyodor gave to his passion demonstrates how many worlds work together simultaneously even though we may not be aware at the moment.

From Fyodor:

“Zen is very knowledgeable about a variety of topics related to transformational leadership and group dynamics. As a contributor to collective narratives co-created by the participants of the Thought Leadership for Systems Transformation Program, he added great value with his passion and experience. Zen is also a talented network weaver and a skilled podcast host. If you are looking for a coach or facilitator who has a deep commitment to transcending division and separation or if you are looking for a thought partner or connector in the field of change, engaging Zen would be a great choice!”

Life’s Puzzle Pieces – The Art and Science of Assembly

October 8, 2021 by Zen

Life’s Puzzle Pieces –

The Art and Science of Assembly

Life’s Puzzle Pieces walks you through the tasty tidbits of tactical and strategic transformation from decades of in-depth empathic and self-development tools discovered, learned and practiced through a lifetime of contact, consideration and confluence of and with the One. I’ve learned about spooky action at a distance up close. We can create our own Unified Field.

Life’s Puzzle Pieces takes you deep into your own process and offers you the ability to consider many points of view, challenging you to change on a moment to moment basis. Life is a process. Solving puzzles is a process – utilizing the Law of Attraction. This material is perfect for spiritual beings in process of becoming, too.

The most exciting puzzle is one of your own design that you haven’t discovered yet. That’s the one that is latent within you, just waiting for you to ask the right questions so it can burst forth with answers… your perfected form, fit and function in the world.

As a transformational life coach, having a life of amazing events and opportunities, I first had to learn about this process and protocols of epistemological and ontological confluence.

It took decades to discover and demonstrate proficiency as an educator and practitioner. The talk doesn’t matter if you aren’t walking it. Anyone can make money, it’s HOW you align with self, others and Earth that creates fulfillment and true success.

Life’s Puzzle Pieces – The Art and Science of Assembly

Orphaned at birth with an early adoption brought about enough challenges, but a near-death experience as a teenager launched a life-long quest for learning the secrets of finding balance between inner and outer realities.

Prior to this book, Stubbing My T.O.E. on Purpose – A Seminal View of Consciousness, Cosmology and the Congruence of Science and Spirituality received not only a personal recommendation, it also landed me an interview that was a 28-year wish come true. I’d produced and hosted a TV show in Phoenix that began in 1990, with the hope of someday being worthy of an interview with one of two hosts I wanted to emulate – Dr. Jeffery Mishlove and Bill Moyers. In June of 2018, a serendipitous moment brought Dr. Mishlove’s attention and contact for anther matter that evolved into three conversations for his YouTube Channel – New Thinking Allowed and nearly 17,000 views total.

I don’t just talk about the journey… I show you how you can take your own. Start with this and perhaps we can explore further possibilities. Kindle Unlimited: https://amzn.to/3Addhu

Co-Creating a New World Order Out of Chaos and Confusion

September 3, 2021 by Zen

Circumvention to Circumspection

You might think the title indicates a laborious attempt at describing some kind of utopian ideal with a new age twist. You’ll be disappointed, or perhaps pleasantly surprised. What I intend to share are some notions of very practical and pragmatic practices that will certainly set you up for a better experience now and in the future. You are co-creating a new world order of experience.

In writing Stubbing My T.O.E. on Purpose, I wanted a catchy title that referenced brilliance and humor in a double entendre. However, it’s the subtitle that really has the meat: A Seminal View of Consciousness, Cosmology and the Congruence of Science and Spirituality. Sure, most of us don’t go so deep into exploring our inner environment, let alone look for references in the outer world. We just don’t think that deep most of the time.

I’m a thinker; the deep the better at times. My early childhood set me up. Being orphaned and adopted, still an infant, turned into a quest for connection shortly after my adopted sister arrived a few month after my fourth birthday. I had a sense for exploring inside even then, developing a relationship with a ‘voice’ that’s been with me since. Ally, guide, mentor, teacher or unseen helper are many names I’ve heard the voice called; confidant and trainer work for me.

In my humble opinion and with more than just conjecture, I believe we all have such a voice within. It has nothing to do with religion. It has to do with character and conscience in our personal development. In a world where it’s customary to compete and win at all costs, that voice has been diminish by the fear of failure or loss or rejection. Success has been about acquisition and dominance of the market, with very little concern for the real human side of things.

Impostor to Real Deal

We’ve all been in a place where we’ve had to ‘fake it to make it’ until our confidence and skills developed in negotiating life, work and relationships. Many entrepreneurs feel inadequate, insecure and even a little insane in the face of their high expectations for performance and success. It’s great to set the bar high, though thrashing oneself repeatedly for not meeting a goal on time is a bit unnecessary. You don’t realize you’re being an impostor, a lesser self; denying your own inherent ability and innovation.

Ability and innovation? True, if you didn’t have the ability you’d have chosen something else. Meeting the challenges takes innovation; discovering that the way you think about the patterns and processes that are mandatory for achievements can evolve. There is a growing congruence of science and spirituality, method and mortality. The way we achieve real success requires a different kind of attention, intention and interaction than in the past.

Real success has taken on a much different meaning in the last few decades, as Cultural Creatives have grown up and become grandparents. The drive for dollars has been replaced by conscious capitalism and social entrepreneurialism where community and planetary needs are more important profit. Now that we’re in a time of what seems to be a complete restructuring of how we do business, agility with a conscience and being comfortable with ambiguity is critical. Covid caused an explosion in remote working, which had the side-effect of less pollution, just one of the benefits of the restructuring.

Another side-effect with the obsession on self-hygiene and forced sequestration was the opportunity to look in the mirror, the inner one, and question everything about self. How do we feel about the narrative? What do we truly believe in? What are we willing to die for, in the case of facing both vaccine and virus? How are we going to move forward and restore our lives, relationships and work? What changes are we going to have to make personally and professionally? Is there something else in process? Are we co-creating a new world order of natural design, one we’ve been missing, appearing through our experience?

What IS in Process?

Regardless of the cosmological consideration, religious prophecies, theories about population control or world domination; we still have to work together as human beings living on one planet. Perhaps it’s time we looked at a bigger picture, the larger puzzle and stop bickering about the corner pieces. Things will move forward. It’s the how that will make the difference and THAT happens beginning at an individual level, then a local level and beyond.

What appears to be in process is a great ‘weset’ in the ‘upwising’ of our notions about what we have in common and what we can do together as a result. A wise friend once told me, “There’s no ego without wego.” I use that statement for my partnering sessions when talking about teamwork. It’s not the elimination of ego, it’s the redirection of it from self to the needs of the job, project or program. We’ve tried to separate things for far too long, categorizing and specializing taking us further apart from acting as ONE.

That notion of acting as ONE has folks really perplexed, even though the basic understanding of the concept is present. The fear of loss of individuality and giving up freedoms is central to the reticence of exploring how it might happen. The trending of talk about complex systems is accompanied by the sense making trends in leadership and organizational development which further obfuscates simple solutions at the personal level.

The truth is we cannot change others or the world until we focus our attention, intention and interaction on changing self and, contrary to the thinking crowd, learn how to sense our way through our circumstances, situations and events in our lives. There’s a call and response happening across socio-economic conditions. How do we answer the question: Why are we here? Perhaps the notion of a perfected form, fit and function in the world needs consideration. That is an experience-able process in co-creating a new world order.

Perfected Form, Fit and Function

That phrase probably evokes the question of personal mission or purpose in life. Do we even ask that question now? What if we did? Perhaps we’re looking at all wrong or making it way too complex. In reality, even with the major changes in how we do business now there is no real change in the division of labor. It’s attitude. We all know the phrase, ‘your attitude determines your altitude,’ in career development and in life.

Finding your perfected form, fit and function doesn’t mean you have to stop what your doing and completely change your life. That’s where I come in as a transformational life coach. Of course, re-creating your life is possible if you feel disconnected or unfulfilled in the career or work you are doing currently. However, just changing your attitude about what you are doing and why can make all the difference in the world, no matter your vocation. What you do does make a difference to others, even if you cannot see it immediately or think you’re doing something menial.

The knowledge garnered from my early spiritual awakening let me know we are cosmic consciousness condensed into form. Even with that knowledge, the practical application of it evaded me for decades as I explored the nature of my own being and how I related to the world. That relationship included personal and professional realms, family, community and work. Being secure in myself and not because of a job or relationship, I had a little wiggle room for exploration and moving on when necessary.

A wise man and Taoist rector, Khigh Dhiegh, once told me there are two ways to interpret circumstances – desirable and undesirable. That comes from our senses, not our thinking, the nature of the circumstance affects how we feel. In the notion of quantum physics and the knowledge that everything is vibration alludes to the fact that we cannot think our way through a system built on vibrations, we have to sense our way through it. Does this not assist in co-creating a new world order?

Faith, Love and Trust – Co-Creating A New World Order

You probably think I’m going to talk about God with that subtitle. I’m not. The faith, love and trust in religious frameworks gives your power away. I believe, and that true religion supports, is the faith, love and trust in yourself. Your religion, or even if you have one, doesn’t matter. If God dwells within, then it is still the faith, love and trust in yourself that builds upon that notion.

How I see that faith, love and trust transforming into a practical and pragmatic framework (maybe even science) is in the focus of our attention, intention and interaction. According to modern quantum theory, our ability to be aware and observe affects our reality and quite probably produces it. In my opinion, the nature of quantum entanglement for humans is the acquiescing to the natural order in creation as an experience.

When we can cognate that and learn how to be present in the moment with it, the faith, love and trust converts into our direct experience. After all, that is truly the only thing we can trust is our direct experience. Theories don’t matter if they are not experience-able. We each have an individually unique experience, yet it is so close to others at times that improvisational moments produce break-through events in personal, professional and even technological realms. It’s a real new world order of being.

We are collectively in one of those moments, a bit prolonged with the nature of our ‘great weset‘ (better than ‘reset’) and an upwising of humanity toward a greater reality that bridges science and spirituality in a wonderful kaleidoscope of experiences with the same intent – to learn how to work together better and thrive, not just survive. My work helps some of those folks (hey, I’m only one guy) accelerate their understanding and capacity for self-expression and manifestation of their dreams and goals.

So co-creating a New World Order that I propose is one that is a naturally emergent quality of our evolutionary process toward harmony with self, others and Mother Earth.

What are Your Thoughts?

Agility in a New World of Business and Personal Challenges

April 30, 2021 by Zen

What is Agility?

Business agility is the ability of an organization to: Adapt quickly to market changes – internally and externally. Respond rapidly and flexibly to customer demands. Adapt and lead change in a productive and cost-effective way without compromising quality.

I like to look for the best in things, or at least to take what is given and look at it from a greater perspective in relationship to the whole. We tend to be pretty narrow-focused when in the midst of a crisis or challenged when we feel we don’t have answers.

Taking all the bias away from who or what Klaus Schwab is, he’s in a position of power and authority to help shape our future. That is unquestionable as the Executive Director of the World Economic Forum. Let’s go a little deeper into the transcendence he offers in his book COVID-19: The Great Reset.

In speaking toward business challenges, he states that companies and corporations need to be agile. Those who cannot or hold to ‘old’ ways of doing business will more than likely fail. Let’s look at the word he uses – AGILE. It’s a buzz term in corporate philosophy.

It would seem that AGILE ought to include our current evolving knowledge of how connected our lives and the planet are, business needs to consider the ISO 26000 Social Responsibility Standards on a go-forward basis. Like B-Corps, the ISO 26000 is intentional, where all other ISO certifications are quality-driven with documentation of ‘system’ adherence as proof. Imagine the agility of a workforce with common beneficial goals.

Intentionality

Don’t we need to be more intentional? Aren’t we being asked to look at a greater order? Even the recent reveals of Military videos of unidentified aerial phenomena means there is a bigger picture than we might have thought possible. This also, on a deeper level, speaks to the possibility of a greater order as well, one that we haven’t recognized because of our obsession with patterned behavior and desire to get ahead.

On a personal level, then, we also need to be AGILE in all the best ways possible. We deserve to be all that we are, right? Agility means that we are able to navigate the ocean of emotion together and find safe harbor as a global villagers who’ve learned how to play together better. Imagine the joy in that and the increase in all the right things for us all.

Isn’t it obvious that all the discordant patterns and ill-be-gotten agendas are surfacing for acknowledgement (many have been in denial) and transcendence? Whether it’s your own ignorance and misbehavior or our international leaders, corporate, government and military. Life is precious. We’ve got abundance, just not good management of it. Controlling a population isn’t the answer; empowering it is. That AGILITY in the 21st Century.

Agility commands our best and demands performance beyond words. Unfortunately people are usually unappreciated, underpaid and overworked to meet goals. It’s a drive for production that nearly eliminates any joy in the workplace, it’s all too serious. Leaders and owners forget about their internal customers – their suppliers, vendors and workforce. Change has been seen as too hard and a laborious process with way too much resistance.

I don’t know about you, though I get the sense that self-fulfilling prophecies abound as a result of that style of unconscious leadership and management. We get lost ‘in’ the business and neglect to work ‘on’ it from a human capital standpoint. People are PRICELESS! Both employee and management MUST agree on that fact and act accordingly. We call that interpersonal and emotional intelligence in learning organizations and holistic systems thinking.

For many years as a coach and consultant for business affairs, the truth is revealed of happy people getting more done with less supervision and exceeding expectations given the power to do so. Any critical thinking and deductive logic reveals that fact. It’s repeatable across the gamut of industry, government and military. Of course, happy people don’t tend to go to war, either. Everybody has what they need and the ability to perform to their potential. Our collective potential is harmony among people and planet. Why not give that a try?

Turning the Great Reset into a Great Awakening

April 19, 2021 by Zen

Great Reset into the Great Awakening?

Can we turn what’s being called the ‘great reset’ into a ‘great awakening’ that is beneficial? We’ve all been affected by the last year’s chaos and confusion over a pandemic that has the world in it’s grip, right? Businesses across industries and sizes have been saddled with the challenges of agility, perseverance and transformation to incorporate new demands and a shifting marketplace. Much of what was once done face-to-face has transformed into virtual encounters and/or organizational meetings.

I turned to a world-renowned leader for some additional perspectives, possible guidance and world view. Klaus Schwab is the Executive Director of the World Economic Forum, an organization that features global leaders and shapes economic policies that trickle down to you and me. Beyond the bi-polar views of the organization and its function, he notes some critical issues we face. Whether we like it or not, we’ve become a global village made up of people like you and me, as well as local, regional, national and global organizations struggling to meet the demands of this new 21st Century outlook.

Klaus’ questions about ‘can we be caring and compassion toward each other coming out of COVID?’ and ‘will businesses be agile enough to meet the demands and survive, let alone thrive?’ are certainly important questions we all need to consider; if not personally then for our businesses or companies. We simply must find a way to work together better and offer solutions that allow us to remain free and unencumbered by medical or political restrictions. Healthy people, and humanity in general, need options that don’t prohibit the evolution of our specie toward a Type 1 Civilization, our next step in our planetary civilization’s evolution toward the stars.

My life experience is one that has allowed me to consider other aspects of our reality, our interconnectedness across many fields of play. I say play because we are all actors who determine our own scripts, whether we realize it or not. The notion of cosmic consciousness condensed into form, which was the core understanding I received in a near-death experience as a teen in college in 1975, gives us pause to consider just how powerful our choices, our feelings and our thoughts are and how they affect our reality. Larry Dossey, MD, in his book One Mind (highly recommended), brings ancient and current understanding into view and illustrates, through examples of extraordinary abilities, that we are inexperienced and vastly under-educated in the knowledge of self, let alone others.

Can we turn the great reset into the great awakening? My transformational life coaching practice echoes this understanding as I work with clients who have dreams and aspirations and a loosely developed skillset that allows them to at least begin the journey of moving their dreams to reality. Several clients have come, some after consulting other business coaches who give them data dumps but no ‘how to’ hand-holding, only to find out that through careful and considerate questions the path for them opens as we craft action plans for them to do so. Whether they realize it or not there are spiritual practices that support their journey. The most simple is the old adage paraphrased, ‘where two or more are gathered, there I am also.’ Here’s an interesting question: Who are you?

Turning the Great Reset into the Great Awakening

For at least a couple of decades I made regular visits to discussion groups and workshops on self-improvement and self-development. The question I closed the last paragraph with was asked quite often, which drew out all kinds of answers. Some referred to what their jobs were, some were spiritual like ‘I am a divine being’ and some were focused on family relationships. Those were all good answers and relevant to the individuals, though the deeper truth seemed illusive, and all-encompassing answer that worked for everyone. I was first asked the question in the early 80s in Jim Tolleson’s Empire Builders weekend intensive held at the Francisco Grande in Casa Grande, Arizona.

My answer: “I Am… and the rest is up to your perception.” How or why did I answer that way? The simple answer is that my NDE allowed me to reference what appeared to be the fact that even as a cosmically conscious individual, others were bereft of the experience and therefore could only see me through their own lenses of perception. Every time we encounter another, those lenses apply whether we are cognizant of them or not. We see people, places and things through our own lens, developed or not. So how to we develop a better, more expansive lens, or do we? Perhaps a more well-developed lens will assist the process of converting the great reset into the great awakening.

I had a recent conversation with a business leader and philanthropist who mentioned Marianne Williamson’s quote in part. I’ll include the whole quote here as you will see how powerful it could be for you:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

In the growth to self-awareness and success we have to address the fears we encounter, and we all encounter fears. An old friend, Willy Whitefeather [RIP], in an interview I had with him for One World so many years ago, offered an interpretation that I’ve seen repeated over and over for decades. ‘FEAR is only False Evidence Appearing Real. What we seek to do is Free Every Anxious Reaction.’ The young whippersnapper in me piped up with, ‘and what we usually do is F.. Everything And Run.’ It’s quite interesting how the latter is absolutely true. We avoid rather than lean into our fears. Let’s turn this great reset into a great awakening of the human spirit of transcendence.

Embracing Your Own Creative Power

Imagine if you embraced the notion that you were powerful beyond measure. How would that look? Probably pretty scary at first. As a transformational life coach I start with that premise and work with clients to extend and integrate that awareness into their lives, their personal experience system beyond the beliefs they may have been entertaining for most of their lives. Their lives truly transform.

One client recently came to me with a dream of having her own TV show, among other things. The pandemic had severely dampened her work; doing live performances as an artist painting icons on the fly. No events meant no work. Sound familiar?

That all changed in a matter of months. Her faith in God played a huge part, though she didn’t realize it really turned into faith in herself. Our agreement (where two or more…) of her dream-come-true fueled the thoughtmospheric action that allowed it to come forth, first as a single show in an ongoing series that features a pay-it-forward theme. It worked so well that the producers began discussing the potentials of her own show and were going to pitch it to their network of over 75 million viewers. I don’t want to reveal much more, though you’ll find her in my testimonials, as the events are still unfolding. So, what is your dream or dreams?

Certainly I cannot take credit for the entire flow of events. I was merely a player in them, knowing the right script in order to engage the spectacle of transforming dreams into reality. How do I do that? Can it be learned? How can you take advantage of your own brilliance, skillset and talent? I’m able to do it through decades of practice, trial and error and learning the depths of cognitive science in order to apply the principles on a regular, if not on-demand, basis. Of course you can learn it, too, and with the help of a coach/mentor it is certainly much easier and truncates the timeframe you’d experience just doing it on your own. Taking advantage of your brilliance, skillset and talent means you lift yourself out of the self-deprecation and self-doubt you’ve no doubt included in your internal dialog with self for years.

Is This for YOU?

transformational life coaching, online life coach, transformation - a guide for change — This workbook is set up for a 30-day process. It will change your life for the better.

My program isn’t or everyone. It’s demanding of your intelligence, your ability to suspend beliefs and learning how to read the signs that are all around you at any given moment that you’ve been dismissing or missing altogether. It’s a kind of science of mind, an application of cognitive science, though there is really no religion or spirituality to it. It’s built in to every one of us by design. Like Larry Dossey offers in One Mind, and I can deliver to you as an experience over time…

Imagine a united consciousness, an awareness of which all of our minds are a part . . . and a potential way out of the division, greed, and destruction that threaten to engulf our world.

Most of the books about our connectedness offer examples of others who’ve managed to perform beyond the imagination and, consequently, have become objects of reference and study. Some offer methods to experiment and explore your own natural abilities, gifts and talents. After a decade or so of coaching and consulting, I put together a guide of my own, called Transformation: A Guide for Change. It’s got many of the exercises I learned and some that I found on my own through experimentation, trial and error, that worked really well. Since you are here, I’ll offer you a free download, without requiring your email or name, so you can test it for yourself and perhaps follow up with me.

A Kind of Revolution That Elevates instead of desimates

Maturation – Effective Management of the Collective Challenges

March 22, 2021 by Zen

“Remember when you were young?” brings certain thoughts to mind, though maturation isn’t one of them. My mind connects music usually, especially with some life events. ‘You shone like the sun… Shine on you crazy diamond,’ comes to mind with that question. If music is the language of the soul, perhaps that is a reminder and Pink Floyd just happened to be the vehicle. Music carries feeling for many and in the consideration that reality is all vibration, perhaps feeling our way though it is most appropriate.

Maturation – Early Onset and Recognition

When we’re young, during our teens and twenties, immaturity is usually not a consideration. If fact, we often think we know more than our elders, right? At that point in our lives we don’t realize that the maturation process ahead of us is led by experience and time; neither of which we had then. It’s frustrating when that kind of behavior inhibits the ability to ask questions and listen. It’s more about telling. There are exceptions, though they are rare.

In our late 20s stage of maturation we develop careers and families, or most of us do, and figure out whether we can really get along with our partner or not. Right now, according to statistics, it’s a coin toss. That ought to be disturbing, though it’s actually declined over the last couple of decades. If we cannot get along at home, how can we expect to get along in the world? The reciprocal applies; if we cannot get along in the world, how can we expect to get along at home. It’s the same personality in both places, right?

Those that are a bit more serious will look for help in some way. Our deepest desire is to love and to be loved. What makes that happen? We certainly cannot force it. As we continue developing in our 30s, that question leads to answers of faith, love and trust. Our integrity, or lack of it, helps or hinders the faith, love and trust to evolve in a relationship. We tend to trust without reason when we’re younger. Our faith is tested when we realize our choices might not have been the best. There’s no fault in that; we’re maturing and making mistakes is part of the learning.

By our forties we’re locked in careers, or at least we were, and our children are approaching graduation and perhaps going off to college. At least they are preparing to leave the nest and fend for themselves. This brings up another test for many. What’s next? Because our attention and effort toward raising children, as single or dual-income households, absorbed attention and time, we’re now feeling a sense of emptiness and maybe a lack of fulfillment. That’s how it was up until this last year.

Now there is a new set of circumstances as we come out of masked sequestration. Those previous maturation process are now in question because we’re all having to face the same challenges in socialization and working relationships. What kind of unspoken and unfulfilled expectations will we have of others who feel differently than we do about moving forward. This is what Klaus Schwab meant, I believe, in his question regarding recovery. Will we be able to be caring and compassionate toward one another? Can we avoid splitting apart because of a narrative that is questionable, yet has millions in line? What about the other millions?

Age of Wisdom?

In my early 30s I hosted a television show called One World. Our aim was to interview people from all walks of society and find out some basic stuff, that revealed sense made common. We asked about inner and outer promptings that caused choices and grew maturation. We asked about fears and how they overcame them. We asked about how they saw those same patterns in the world around them; in their communities, cities, nations and the global community. It was an amazing opportunity for me, having an insatiable curiosity about life, others and how we learn to work together.

Willy Whitefeather [RIP] was my one of my first guests. He was a mixed-blood Cherokee with a penchant for storytelling. I’d met him through another friend, Merel Bregante. Merel was working with another friend, Shayla, in creating a stage presentation for a kind of ecstatic dance. They performed it at the Mesa Amphitheater later that year. Willy was living in a teepee at the Goldfield Ghost Town at the time, accompanied by a rattlesnake that joined him in the tent at night occasionally. It was really strange, though he was fine with it and didn’t feel threatened, knowing it was just seeking warmth. Few of us could handle that, I’m sure.

I had some other involvement with First Nations through the Phoenix Indian School Preservation Coalition that had formed to address the design of the coming of what would be called the Steele Indian School Park. One of my other guests invited me to be their scribe and co-present their desires to the Mayor and City Council of Phoenix. 18 of 21 Tribes were represented and I had several years of wonderful, though sometimes heart-wrenching, experiences with them. I later spent time on the Hopi reservation when my oldest daughter set me up with her Hopi friend’s mother, a daughter of a past tribal president.

Willy and I lost touch as we both went different directions and the temporary relationship built from the interest in the show waned. He still made a big impact on my life and a couple of decades later I felt the need to reach out to him for some reason. I looked up his book, Outdoor Survival Handbook for Kids, online and found a website. I reached out to the webmaster, not really knowing who it was, to see if somehow they had contact info for Willy. It turned out to be Merel’s wife and a week or so later I get a phone call… ‘Osiyo, Brother!’ was Willy’s voice on the other end.

Now I was in my mid-forties then and after some catching up, Willy paused and said, ‘There’s something you need to know now. In our tradition you cannot form or join your own council until you are 51.’ That struck me solidly. We’d been talking about world events and the changes in humanity necessary for our continued survival. He had referenced many prophecies on the show about how these times were going to roll out. Women cutting their hair, putting on war paint and going to battle with men was one of them. I knew even then that women truly held the strength of sustainability and that the feminine energy is what has been missing in the Patriarchal-driven world. I paid a lot of attention to the next few years.

Waxing and Waning – The Tipping Point

I have to admit I’ve been pushing boundaries and exploring beyond this world for most of my life. No matter, I think part of the wisdom that turning 51 brought was the fact that none of that matters if we don’t have practical ways of applying our wisdom, let alone our knowledge. I’ve been involved with consciousness studies for several decades, curious of the questions necessary to reveal the prudent path, the practical and pragmatic applications that make a difference in the world.

When we understand ourselves intimately, going beyond the questions of maturation to the experience of the answers and letting that sink in, we naturally learn better ways of living, working and making the world better. Be Here Now provided some early recognition of the path ahead, though it gave no specific directions. It just acknowledged the journey would be wild and wonder-ful.

I met Jose Arguelles in 1997, whom I’d hoped to encounter after first reading his interpretation of the Mayan Calendar’s End/Beginning of Time; which just meant a new cycle, not a destruction. Much like the ‘apocalypse,’ an uncovering or unveiling of great knowledge and information was taking place. He explained that, according to his understanding, we were accelerating in developing awareness like no other time on Earth that parallel the information curve. Evidence was plentiful with all the books, CDs, movies and TV shows that explored many concepts and worlds.

So what happens on the other side of the Tipping Point, which was supposed to be the Winter Solstice of 2012? The answer is pretty simple and yet we all seem to be missing it: Implementing the awareness of our connectedness back into the existing systems we’ve built. Admittedly, they aren’t the best at serving the needs of humanity as there are still wars over resources and territory, still homelessness and poverty. On a universal picture, that’s just not acceptable.

My work focuses on turning that awareness, the insight and intuition that others garner as they question the Great Reset and what they can do, into actionable plans. The magnitude of those plans isn’t the issue. They might even be so small that others might think them inconsequential, yet they make all the difference in the world to the fulfillment of the individual. That’s where the caring and compassion comes in. It doesn’t matter the station in life or the activity of achieving goals and objectives, as long as one recognizes its value to the whole as well as the individual. New models of behavior begin to replace old ones and the systems change over time.

Will maturation ever be complete? Doubtful… we’ve got several types of Civilizations to advance toward according to Kardashev.