Tuesday 5 May 2015

A Word About Love...

…An Aspect Of Which Is Service

I knew that my time was up in the spiritual community that I lived in for many years when I started getting angry at the people around me.  It was capped when we had a community meeting at which there were two points of view to be considered: in effect, whether we were members of a spiritual community, giving of our time and efforts to the community out of Service to the community, for its work of Service to the planet, in the process of the raising of consciousness that humanity was involved in, in a process of Personal & Planetary Transformation; or - as I say: in effect, whether we were employees of a workshop business.  I had asked for the discussion, and was championing the former point of view, which was presented for the meeting under some Position Statement that I forget at this point in time; but I will never forget the Position Statement that the other side was ‘debating’ under.

It was: ‘If You Pay Peanuts, You Will Get Monkeys.’1 

It was all I could do to keep from going up to the first ‘debater’ for that side of the coin, as it were, in a cold fury, and say to him or her:

’So, we are all monkeys, in your thinking.  And all of the former members of this community, over the years, giving of their time and efforts - their best efforts, at that - out of a sense of Service, to this community, for its Service to the world, were monkeys.’

I didn’t say that, to any of the members of the community - to the budding employees of the workshop centre - holding the position that we should pay ourselves more, for, not our Service, but our work2 - because I was too angry to, and felt it would be counterproductive to wade in to the session with such a charge of anger undercutting my communication skills.  But that was it, for me.  For even having the subject broached, was to be too far down the road to corruption, that I chose not to fight it anymore.  And left the community - the aspiring workshop centre [stop it, Stan] - shortly after that meeting; after quietly, in those last days, cleaning out my room of all my many years of books and papers, and wall posters with inspiring quotes, and clothes, and walking, in the end, out the front door.  Which I had entered some 37 years before, eager to give of my best support to the place.  Out of a sense of Service.

Not out of a sense of what I could personally get out of it.   

And also knowing, that it wasn’t just ‘them’ that I was angry at, for betraying (my perception of their betraying) the dream.3  It was the concern it gave me, that:

If even people drawn to live in a spiritual community during some part of their lives can’t stay with the dream, the vision of doing things - of giving of one’s best, out of Love - how could I expect your average Joe or Jill in the wider world to ‘get’ it???

And so I returned to my home country, of the United States - and to my old home town, in point of fact -  for a retirement breather, and with questions in my mind.  Mostly, to wonder if I was wrong, to feel the way I did.  Had.  For years before discovering a community where they were practicing what I had long felt, as the way of the future.

In, ultimately, a moneyless society.  Wherein we share goods and services with one another - and give of our best in the process - out of a higher motive than the one of profit-making.  Out of the highest motive there could ever be: out of gratitude to our Creator for life with meaning.

Out of, in a word:

Love.

And now, here a few years down the road from that personal crossroads for me, I see that we macrocosmically are, indeed, being asked the same question; and about to 

make that choice.


P.S. In all fairness to some of those community members/workshop centre employees, I should say, and acknowledge, that they were looking - wanting - to live there permanently, not have to go back out into the commercial world, and earn there what they needed for their families.  But that idea was tainted with the fact that there was an economic downturn in the commercial world, and so they were not there for the 'clean' reasons that so many of us old-timers were, instead were looking for something of a haven.  Wanting to live their lives amongst likeminded people, yes; and no harm in that.  (The spiritual community was at the centre of a growing 'eco-village,' of self-supporting peoples.)  But it still undercut the specific purpose for the community's founding.  Which was on the principle of Service to Others.  Not Service to Self.
   (As I said to the community at another, near-to-the-end meeting: "The (Findhorn) Foundation cannot be all things to all people."  Meaning, we could not, nor should not think to, meet all prospective Staff members' needs.  That wasn't what we were there for.  But the 'communism' model was entering our Eden in the form of some thinking of: 'From each according to his ability; to each according to his need.'  No way was I going to support that idea.
   The bottom line: That was not what we were there for; would be to take us off course, off our mission, lose our primary focus, from what it had been originally.  Which was what had drawn me there in the first place.  So, if that original idea was beginning to change, it was time for me to move on.
   It was time for me to move on anyway, because of things going on back home.  Another story.)  

--

Footnotes:

1 To clarify: We members were not 'paid' for our work.  We first of all paid a membership fee even to be there (which was legally a non-profit charitable Trust, with all proceeds plowed back into the running of the Trust, including upgrading of our residential conditions, etc.); 2) got our room and board; and 3) once we had achieved Staff status (having been there long enough, and gone through an attunement process), one got a small monthly stipend for pocket money, called 'allowance'.  One had to have had savings, or support from parents, in order to stay there for very long, as we were not there for the money, but for the (experience of) Service.  But as time passed, a change crept in.  I was away for some years, and when I came back, they were 'paying' themselves more in allowance, and our situation drew the attention of the state (plus, they had gone to contracts for the Staff; another aspect of the muddle that had been entered into), to the point where the Staff membership needed to have a formal declaration of 'income,' in order to clarify any tax factors; so we began to be issued the appropriate governmental forms with our monthly allowance for 'wages'; which deepened the psychological process of both the membership and the management considering the allowance as 'income' for which we had provided work.  And thus began the rot/shift of consciousness.    

2 'BUT WE'RE NOT HERE FOR THE MONEY!!! - Excuse me.  Carry on.'

3 One of the principles that the community was based on was the attitude that Work is Love in Action.
   A wonderful concept.  We are doing ’work’ because it is God’s work.  In order for us to learn lessons from it.  And grow, that way.  In spiritual stature.  The budding gods that we are.  
   Very gods in the making.  For being a piece of that Continent; a part of that Main.  In which the Whole is contained in each of the Parts; holographically. 
   
---

…And Another Aspect of Which Is Justice

We will get to the bottom
Of 9/11.  The very
               bottom.
We will get to the bottom
Of the Sandy Hook
Elementary School exercise
             practiced for
That day.  The very
              bottom.
We will get to the bottom
Of the Boston Marathon   
Bomb drill, complete
With crisis actors, doing
Their thing, nicely.
We will go further
Afield even, and get to
The bottom of the JFK
Assassination.  Of that
Of RFK.  And Martin
Luther King’s.
We will get to the bottom
Of all kinds of things
       (like vaccines
     and antibiotics).  
                Because
It is that time.

And a lot of it
     is due to
     the Jews.
More precisely
   the Zionists
   (who include
   more than
   the Khazars;
with many Christians
      included
      for cover)
Who are behind much
Of the mayhem
Going on
In our time;
        demonizing
   the Muslims
   (who have their
   own problems
   to contend with
   already; as if
   they needed
   their mortal enemies
   the Jews
   to exacerbate
   matters)
   and so on.

              Why
      is that,
      you say?
The answer:
        In order
To create the conditions
For their takeover:
      for Martial Law
To be declared
In the U.S.A. 
        in order
        for their
  New World Order
  to come in
  (America being
   the key
   in
   The Play)
  and corral us all
  in their prison.

          Over
           My
       dead
       body.

         And I
  don’t plan on
  moving on
  just yet,
       with work
I mean service
               still 
  to engage in
Here.

So there’s
Your answer
About the future.

And mine.


Interesting
How these things
Work out
some
           times.

2 comments:

Graham said...

Hi Stan, whenever I was left in charge of Transport you were always the first [and often only} person to offer your help and support.
I'm now back in England, though I still return to hold Transport when required. I always remember your help and advice, and can confirm that you 'walk your talk'. Best Wishes
Graham

Stan said...

Hey Graham - Hi!

Thanks for your comment. Best wishes.