Courting the Wild Twin

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Author :
Publisher : Chelsea Green Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1603589503
Total Pages : 145 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (35 download)

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Book Synopsis Courting the Wild Twin by : Martin Shaw

Download or read book Courting the Wild Twin written by Martin Shaw and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2020 with total page 145 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Myth is our wild way of telling the truth, of sharing stories that have our living earth speaking through them. There is an old insistence that we each have a twin we know nothing about. A wild, curious twin that was thrown out the window the night we were born, taking much of our energy with them. This story is a quest to find and court our wild twin, for they have something important to tell us. If there was something we were here to do in our few, brief years, we can be sure that the wild twin is holding the key. In Courting the Wild Twin, Martin Shaw, an accomplished storyteller and scholar of myth and oral tradition, explores two ancient myths concerned with the wild twin and shares how vital they are to our ability to confront challenges with purpose, courage and creativity. Myths are our secret weapon. They have a radical agency of beauty in our age of amnesia, an agency far beyond concept and polemic"--

Smoke Hole

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Publisher : Chelsea Green Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1645020967
Total Pages : 145 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (45 download)

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Book Synopsis Smoke Hole by : Martin Shaw

Download or read book Smoke Hole written by Martin Shaw and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2021-05-20 with total page 145 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "With potent, lyrical language and a profound knowledge of storytelling, Shaw encourages and illuminates the mythic in our own lives. He is a modern-day bard." – Madeline Miller, author of Circe and The Song of Achilles At a time when we are all confronted by not one, but many crossroads in our modern lives—identity, technology, trust, politics, and a global pandemic—celebrated mythologist and wilderness guide Martin Shaw delivers Smoke Hole: three metaphors to help us understand our world, one that is assailed by the seductive promises of social media and shadowed by a health crisis that has brought loneliness and isolation to an all-time high. Smoke Hole is a passionate call to arms and an invitation to use these stories to face the complexities of contemporary life, from fake news, parenthood, climate crises, addictive technology and more. Shaw urges us to reclaim our imagination and untangle ourselves from modern menace, letting these tales be our guide. More Praise: "I can still remember the first time I heard Martin Shaw tell a story. The tale that emerged was like a living thing, bounding around, throwing itself at us there listening. I had never heard anything like it before." – Paul Kingsnorth, Booker shortlisted author of The Wake "Martin Shaw’s work is so very beautiful. A new animal. His love of images is deep and contagious." – Coleman Barks, author of The Essential Rumi "Through feral tales and poetic exegesis, Martin Shaw makes you re-see the world, as a place of adventure, and of initiation, as perfect home, and as perfectly other. What a gift." – David Keenan, author of Xstabeth "Shaw has so much wisdom and knowledge about the old stories, it emanates from his pores." – John Densmore, The Doors

A Branch from the Lightning Tree

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Author :
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781935952015
Total Pages : 234 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (52 download)

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Book Synopsis A Branch from the Lightning Tree by : Martin Shaw

Download or read book A Branch from the Lightning Tree written by Martin Shaw and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A BRANCH FROM THE LIGHTNING TREE is centered around several key elements: 1. It features four texts and commentaries ? Welsh, Russian, Siberian and Norwegian myths that explore the process of leaving what is considered safe and predictable and journeying out into wild, uncertain areas of nature and the psyche in search of new insights. The four stories have at their center a man, woman, and adolescent. 2. A narrative of why the author gave up a large musical publishing deal with Warner Brothers to spend four years living in a tent in the wilds and over a decade facilitating wilderness rites-of-passage for others. 3. Shaw's eloquent insistence that without a renewed attention to myth and the initiation process we are only partially equipped to reestablish a complementary relationship with the living world. 4. The core of these stories are paradoxical in nature, far from the clumsily perceived ?hero' myths, and point towards Trickster, or Coyote, as a way of existing in a world ambivalent to the insights of what you could call traditional knowledge. A BRANCH FROM THE LIGHTNING TREE is unique in the field of myth and ritual in several ways: 1. It carries an ?in-the-field' narrative of several hundred men and women who have gone out into wild places to fast for four days and nights. Not in the Amazon, or in Mongolia, but in a place that is indigenous to them, that grounds the experience in the wider context of their lives, rather than a one-off event that can be hard to reconnect with. This is part of a growing mood to get to the bones of initiatory experience, rather than the cultural affectations. The stories illustrate both the grandeur and struggle of this often subtle process. 2. Unlike many of the big mythological sellers (i.e Bly's IRON JOHN or Pinkola Estes WOMEN WHO RUN WITH WOLVES), A BRANCH FROM THE LIGHTNING TREE is not a gender piece, but focuses on both men and women's movement into wildness as part of the bigger awareness of climate change and ecology. It presents the old stories as keys into any debate on these issues, that the ability to think metaphorically/mythologically loosens the grip of literalness, and can ?re-enchant' our perspectives. 3. As a wilderness teacher Shaw has noticed that the real point of crisis that is emerging is the return to community, rather than the time out in the wild. This is turning of rites-of-passage on its head: Shaw reasons that the rites-of-passage process requires three stages following an initial Call to the Soul: (i) Going out of the Village, and the severance from ordinary life and the stepping into the image-laden language of myth, story, ritual; (ii) Into the Forest, baring the soul to extraordinary forces, receiving the sacred wound, bonding with the living world; (iii) And Back Again, return to community, the performance of identity, and the confirmation in and of the Soul. A BRANCH FROM THE LIGHTNING TREE invokes Robert Graves work on the White Goddess, and the Crow poems of Ted Hughes-it is a combination of practical knowledge, imaginative insight and passionate storytelling that gives Shaw's book its persuasiveness and power. At times incantatory, at times novelistic and poetic, he writes as someone who has been to these places, undergone these trials and tested himself at the extremes of lived experience.

Courting the Wild Twin

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Author :
Publisher : Chelsea Green Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1603589511
Total Pages : 145 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (35 download)

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Book Synopsis Courting the Wild Twin by : Martin Shaw

Download or read book Courting the Wild Twin written by Martin Shaw and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2020-03-11 with total page 145 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ‘Fabulous.’ Dan Richards, author of Holloway ‘Terrifically strange and thrilling.’ Melissa Harrison, author of All Among the Barley 'A modern-day bard.' Madeline Miller, author of Circe This is a book of literary activism – an antidote to the shallow thinking that typifies our age. In Courting the Wild Twin, acclaimed scholar, mythologist and author of Smoke Hole and Bardskull, Martin Shaw unravels two ancient European fairy tales concerning the mysterious ‘wild twin’ located deep inside all of us. By reading these tales and becoming storytellers ourselves, he challenges us to confront modern life with purpose, courage, and creativity. Martin summons the reader to the ‘ragged edge of the dark wood’ to seek out this estranged, exiled self – the part we generally shun or ignore to conform to societal norms – and invite it back into our consciousness. If there was something we were meant to do with our few, brief years on Earth, we can be sure that our wild twin is holding the key. After all, stories are our secret weapons – and they might just save us.

From What Is to What If

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Author :
Publisher : Chelsea Green Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1603589066
Total Pages : 242 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (35 download)

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Book Synopsis From What Is to What If by : Rob Hopkins

Download or read book From What Is to What If written by Rob Hopkins and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2019-10-15 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Big ideas that just might save the world”—The Guardian The founder of the international Transition Towns movement asks why true creative, positive thinking is in decline, asserts that it's more important now than ever, and suggests ways our communities can revive and reclaim it. In these times of deep division and deeper despair, if there is a consensus about anything in the world, it is that the future is going to be awful. There is an epidemic of loneliness, an epidemic of anxiety, a mental health crisis of vast proportions, especially among young people. There’s a rise in extremist movements and governments. Catastrophic climate change. Biodiversity loss. Food insecurity. The fracturing of ecosystems and communities beyond, it seems, repair. The future—to say nothing of the present—looks grim. But as Transition movement cofounder Rob Hopkins tells us, there is plenty of evidence that things can change, and cultures can change, rapidly, dramatically, and unexpectedly—for the better. He has seen it happen around the world and in his own town of Totnes, England, where the community is becoming its own housing developer, energy company, enterprise incubator, and local food network—with cascading benefits to the community that extend far beyond the projects themselves. We do have the capability to effect dramatic change, Hopkins argues, but we’re failing because we’ve largely allowed our most critical tool to languish: human imagination. As defined by social reformer John Dewey, imagination is the ability to look at things as if they could be otherwise. The ability, that is, to ask What if? And if there was ever a time when we needed that ability, it is now. Imagination is central to empathy, to creating better lives, to envisioning and then enacting a positive future. Yet imagination is also demonstrably in decline at precisely the moment when we need it most. In this passionate exploration, Hopkins asks why imagination is in decline, and what we must do to revive and reclaim it. Once we do, there is no end to what we might accomplish. From What Is to What If is a call to action to reclaim and unleash our collective imagination, told through the stories of individuals and communities around the world who are doing it now, as we speak, and witnessing often rapid and dramatic change for the better.

What is Genocide?

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Author :
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
ISBN 13 : 0745657516
Total Pages : 209 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (456 download)

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Book Synopsis What is Genocide? by : Martin Shaw

Download or read book What is Genocide? written by Martin Shaw and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2013-04-26 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this intellectually and politically potent new book, Martin Shaw proposes a way through the confusion surrounding the idea of genocide. He considers the origins and development of the concept and its relationships to other forms of political violence. Offering a radical critique of the existing literature on genocide, Shaw argues that what distinguishes genocide from more legitimate warfare is that the enemies targeted are groups and individuals of a civilian character. He vividly illustrates his argument from a wide range of historical episodes, and shows how the question 'What is genocide?' matters politically whenever populations are threatened by violence. This compelling book will undoubtedly open up vigorous debate, appealing to students and scholars across the social sciences and in law. Shaw's arguments will be of lasting importance.

Wild Nights Out

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Author :
Publisher : Chelsea Green Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1603589945
Total Pages : 225 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (35 download)

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Book Synopsis Wild Nights Out by : Chris Salisbury

Download or read book Wild Nights Out written by Chris Salisbury and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2021-06-03 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The book gives adults ideas for activities to get kids outside after the sun goes down, from night hikes to trapping moths. It’s also a fascinating meditation on humans’ relationship with darkness.”—Outside "A fun, inventive adventure guide about helping children explore nature after dark . . . Its activities are a great excuse to turn off the television, set down smartphones, and explore the rich, mysterious world just beyond the back door."—Foreword Reviews The go-to guide for exploring nature at night, whether on summer holidays, weekends away or even back garden adventures! Foreword by Chris Packham, author, naturalist, and BBC presenter Learn how to call for owls, walk like a fox and expand your sensory perceptions. Wild Nights Out is a wonderful new hands-on guide for those who wish to take kids (of all ages) outdoors for fun, thrilling nighttime nature adventures. Parents, grandparents, teachers and nature educators alike will discover a wealth of unique activities to explore the natural world from dusk till dawn. Alongside games, walks and exercises to expand our senses, storyteller and outdoor educator Chris Salisbury will bring this unexplored nocturnal dimension to life with lore about badgers, bats and minibeasts as well as tales of the constellations and planets to share around the campfire. In Wild Nights Out you can expect to find: 25 fun and informative games and activities Practical information on how to conduct night walks safely Animal facts and stargazing stories Beautiful black-and-white illustrations throughout Nature has so much to offer at night, so let Wild Nights Out be your guide to the dark. It will boost the resilience and self-confidence of children and adults, and instill a lifelong love of having fun in the outdoors when the sun goes down.

A Hut at the Edge of the Village

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Author :
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781843518006
Total Pages : 224 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (18 download)

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Book Synopsis A Hut at the Edge of the Village by : John Moriarty

Download or read book A Hut at the Edge of the Village written by John Moriarty and published by . This book was released on 2021 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Hut at the Edge of the Village presents a collection of Moriarty’s writings ordered thematically, with sections ranging from place, love and wildness through to voyaging, ceremony and the legitimacy of sorrow. These carefully chosen extracts are supported by an introduction by Martin Shaw and a foreword by Tommy Tiernan, a long-time admirer of Moriarty’s work.

Snowy Tower

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781935952923
Total Pages : 261 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (529 download)

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Book Synopsis Snowy Tower by : Martin Shaw

Download or read book Snowy Tower written by Martin Shaw and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 261 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Snowy Tower, Dr. Martin Shaw continues his trilogy of works on the relationship between myth, wilderness, and a culture of wildness. In this second book, he gives a telling of the Grail epic Parzival. Claiming it as a great trickster story of medieval Europe, he offers a deft and erudite commentary, with topics ranging from climate change and the soul to the discipline of erotic consciousness, from the hallucination of empire to a revisioning of the dark speech of the ancient bards. Ingrained in the very syntax of Snowy Tower is an invocation of what Shaw calls 'wild mythologies' -- stories that are more than just human allegory, that seem to brush the winged thinking of owl, stream, and open moor. This daring work offers a connection to the genius of the margins; that the big questions of today will not be solved by big answers, but by the myriad of associations that both myth and wilderness offer.

Belonging

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Author :
Publisher : Her Own Room Press
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 258 pages
Book Rating : 4./5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis Belonging by : Toko-pa Turner

Download or read book Belonging written by Toko-pa Turner and published by Her Own Room Press. This book was released on 2017-12-19 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 2018 Readers' Favorite Gold Winner 2019 IAN Book of the Year Award 2017 Nautilus Award Gold Winner Feel like you don’t belong? You’re not alone.The world has never been more connected, yet people are lonelier than ever. Whether we feel unworthy, alienated, or anxious about our place in the world — the absence of belonging is the great silent wound of our times. Most people think of belonging as a mythical place, and they spend a lifetime searching for it in vain. But what if belonging isn’t a place at all? What if it’s a skill that has been lost or forgotten? With her signature depth and eloquence, Toko-pa maps a path to Belonging from the inside out. Drawing on myth, stories and dreams, she takes us into the origins of our estrangement, reframing exile as a necessary initiation into authenticity. Then she shares the competencies of belonging: a set of ancestral practices to heal our wounds and restore true belonging to our lives and to the world.

The Culture of Make Believe

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Author :
Publisher : Chelsea Green Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1603581839
Total Pages : 722 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (35 download)

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Book Synopsis The Culture of Make Believe by : Derrick Jensen

Download or read book The Culture of Make Believe written by Derrick Jensen and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2004-03-01 with total page 722 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Derrick Jensen takes no prisoners in The Culture of Make Believe, his brilliant and eagerly awaited follow-up to his powerful and lyrical A Language Older Than Words. What begins as an exploration of the lines of thought and experience that run between the massive lynchings in early twentieth-century America to today's death squads in South America soon explodes into an examination of the very heart of our civilization. The Culture of Make Believe is a book that is as impeccably researched as it is moving, with conclusions as far-reaching as they are shocking.

The Spell of the Sensuous

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Author :
Publisher : Vintage
ISBN 13 : 0307830551
Total Pages : 344 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (78 download)

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Book Synopsis The Spell of the Sensuous by : David Abram

Download or read book The Spell of the Sensuous written by David Abram and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2012-10-17 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the International Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction Animal tracks, word magic, the speech of stones, the power of letters, and the taste of the wind all figure prominently in this intellectual tour de force that returns us to our senses and to the sensuous terrain that sustains us. This major work of ecological philosophy startles the senses out of habitual ways of perception. For a thousand generations, human beings viewed themselves as part of the wider community of nature, and they carried on active relationships not only with other people with other animals, plants, and natural objects (including mountains, rivers, winds, and weather patters) that we have only lately come to think of as "inanimate." How, then, did humans come to sever their ancient reciprocity with the natural world? What will it take for us to recover a sustaining relation with the breathing earth? In The Spell of the Sensuous David Abram draws on sources as diverse as the philosophy of Merleau-Ponty, Balinese shamanism, Apache storytelling, and his own experience as an accomplished sleight-of-hand of magician to reveal the subtle dependence of human cognition on the natural environment. He explores the character of perception and excavates the sensual foundations of language, which--even at its most abstract--echoes the calls and cries of the earth. On every page of this lyrical work, Abram weaves his arguments with a passion, a precision, and an intellectual daring that recall such writers as Loren Eisleley, Annie Dillard, and Barry Lopez.

Civil Society and Media in Global Crises

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Author :
Publisher : Burns & Oates
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 264 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (91 download)

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Book Synopsis Civil Society and Media in Global Crises by : Martin Shaw

Download or read book Civil Society and Media in Global Crises written by Martin Shaw and published by Burns & Oates. This book was released on 1996 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Part I Concepts and Contexts

Scatterlings

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781940468501
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (685 download)

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Book Synopsis Scatterlings by : Martin Shaw

Download or read book Scatterlings written by Martin Shaw and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Scatterlings Martin Shaw walks the myth-lines of seven stories based in and around his homeland of Dartmoor, England. Rather than the commentaries on such tales being primarily balanced against other literary sources, Shaw uses what actually occurs on these walks as the main source of information on the tales. The swoop of raven, the swamp, the thinking that moves through him, all form a knot of relationship between the land and the story. As he walks he tells the story of the place back to itself. This is a highly unusual move for a mythologist, an aspiration to use speech as form of animistic relationship, of binding, of praise to a place. In a time of rapid migrations and climatic movement, Shaw asks: how could we be not just from a place but of a place? When did we trade shelter for comfort? what was the cost of that trade? What are the stories the west tells itself in private? Scatterlings also takes us on a wonder through the wild edges of British culture, a story of secret histories: from the ancient storytelling of the bardic schools to medieval dream poetry, from the cunning man to animal call words, to Arabian and steppe Iranian influence on English dialect. Through its astonishing journey, Shaw reveals to us that when you gaze deep enough into the local you find the nomad, and when you look deep enough into the nomad you find the local. Scatterlings is a rebel keen, a rising up, to bend your head to the stories and place that claim you.

Storied Lives

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Publisher : World Soul
ISBN 13 : 9780615270388
Total Pages : 112 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (73 download)

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Book Synopsis Storied Lives by : Craig Chalquist

Download or read book Storied Lives written by Craig Chalquist and published by World Soul. This book was released on 2009-05-01 with total page 112 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most books on discovering one's "personal myth" focus on uncovering the general patterns or scripts of a life. STORIED LIVES by depth psychologist Craig Chalquist, PhD goes much farther by showing how specific myths play out from cradle to grave. Personal accounts of discovering and working with these myths enliven the book's emphasis on refashioning these plot lines from the inside out.

The Reality of Being

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Author :
Publisher : Shambhala Publications
ISBN 13 : 1590309286
Total Pages : 338 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (93 download)

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Book Synopsis The Reality of Being by : Jeanne de Salzmann

Download or read book The Reality of Being written by Jeanne de Salzmann and published by Shambhala Publications. This book was released on 2011-12-06 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An important book on liberating ourselves from the state of “waking sleep” in which we live our lives, as taught by one of the most influential spiritual teachers of the 20th century As the closest pupil of the charismatic spiritual master G. I. Gurdjieff (1866–1949), Jeanne de Salzmann was charged with carrying on his teachings of spiritual transformation. Known as the Fourth Way or “The Work,” Gurdjieff’s system was based on teachings of the East that he adapted for modern life in the West. Now, some twenty years after de Salzmann's death, the notebooks that she filled with her insights over a forty-year period (and intended to publish) have been translated and edited by a small group of her family and followers. The result is this long-awaited guide to Gurdjieff's teaching, describing the routes to be traveled and the landmarks encountered along the way. Organized according to themes, the chapters touch on all the important concepts and practices of the Work, including: • Awakening from the sleep of identification with the ordinary level of being • Self-observation and self-remembering • Conscious effort and voluntary suffering • Understanding symbolic concepts like the Enneagram • The Gurdjieff Movements, bodily exercises that provide training in Presence and the awareness of subtle energies • The necessity of a "school," meaning the collective practice of the teaching in a group Madame de Salzmann brings to the Work her own strong, direct language and personal journey in learning to live that knowledge of a higher level of being, which, she insists, “you have to see for yourself” on a level beyond theory and concept. De Salzmann consistently refused to discuss the teaching in terms of ideas, for this Fourth Way is to be experienced, not simply thought or believed.

Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice

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Author :
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 014012991X
Total Pages : 353 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (41 download)

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Book Synopsis Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice by : Mark J. Plotkin

Download or read book Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice written by Mark J. Plotkin and published by Penguin. This book was released on 1994-08-01 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fascinating account of a pioneering ethnobotanist’s travels in the Amazon—at once a gripping adventure story, a passionate argument for conservationism, and an investigation into the healing power of plants, by the author of The Amazon: What Everyone Needs to Know For thousands of years, healers have used plants to cure illness. Aspirin, the world's most widely used drug, is based on compounds originally extracted from the bark of a willow tree, and more than a quarter of medicines found on pharmacy shelves contain plant compounds. Now Western medicine, faced with health crises such as AIDS, Alzheimer's disease, and cancer, has begun to look to the healing plants used by indigenous peoples to develop powerful new medicines. Nowhere is the search more promising than in the Amazon, the world's largest tropical forest, home to a quarter of all botanical species on this planet—as well as hundreds of Indian tribes whose medicinal plants have never been studied by Western scientists. In Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice, ethnobotanist Mark J. Plotkin recounts his travels and studies with some of the most powerful Amazonian shamans, who taught him the plant lore their tribes have spent thousands of years gleaning from the rain forest. For more than a decade, Dr. Plotkin raced against time to harvest and record new plants before the rain forests' fragile ecosystems succumb to overdevelopment—and before the Indians abandon their own culture and learning for the seductive appeal of Western material culture. Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice relates nine of the author's quests, taking the reader along on a wild odyssey as he participates in healing rituals; discovers the secret of curare, the lethal arrow poison that kills in minutes; tries the hallucinogenic snuff epena that enables the Indians to speak with their spirit world; and earns the respect and fellowship of the mysterious shamans as he proves that he shares both their endurance and their reverence for the rain forest.