Skip to main content

Transcending the "I"



The characteristic mark of substantial change is that the object undergoing the change does not survive that change or persist through it, but is destroyed in the process.  – Aristotle

Image


What is our never-ending focus on working hard to achieve the "good life" getting us? America, once the healthiest nation on earth, now ranks 27th - below all European nations and many third world countries. 

In her book, Transcending the I, Carol Grojean invites us to join her profound journey into her experience of self as she "woke up" from her way of living through external, socialized definition. Her journey began one day when, while exploring the dissatisfaction of her life, she participated in a workshop with a friend. Sitting on the floor in a circle, everyone was asked the question, "What do you pretend?" Her answer surprised her and sent her on a journey to redefine who she truly is.

"I pretend that getting up every morning and getting ready for work, the kids off to school, followed by 10+ hours sitting at a desk or in meetings, inside four walls not even aware of the weather outside let alone life, arguing for some reason or another and thinking that whatever the subject is, it is the end of the world if I don't get my way, then coming home late, usually too late for dinner with the family, and plopping on the couch in front of the TV with a big glass of wine to decompress so I can sleep

– I pretend this is a meaningful life."


While subjective well-being can be hard to define and even harder to measure, the 2017 World Happiness Report continues to demonstrate, year after year, that measures of happiness such as economic, social, and health are important to everyone, yet nothing is as important as mental health, or eudaimonia, that sense of meaning and purpose in one's life.

It appears that after 20 years in a large corporation, Carol had found herself senior in an organization and earning a healthy income, but unfulfilled in purpose and meaning. Feeling there should be something more to life than long hours, little time for family or friends, and full of meaningless things attempting to satiate her growing discontent, Carol took a leap-of-faith into the world of academia to better understand the modern society she came from.

The focus of Transcending the I as Carol's Ph.D. research was to leverage autoethnography (using yourself as a mirror of the larger culture you are studying) not only as a method of inquiry but also as a catalyst for experiencing transformational change within one person's psyche through research outcomes focused on answering the question:

How can the experiences of contemplative silence, mindful awareness, and indigenous ceremony facilitate transformational learning in support of human growth towards wholeness and interdependence?


Through journaling, introspection, and storytelling, Carol approached inquiry and analysis as a ceremony by which to reveal habits and patterns of my her of being which mirrored the larger culture she researched. Transcending the I is Carol's story.

Click Here!
Russell Vann
Author
GhettoBastard1968@gmail.com
PO Box 1223
Conifer Colorado 80433-1223
USA

Unsubscribe | Change Subscriber Options

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

On Writing Chase Scenes

By Carolyn Howard-Johnson Author of  The Frugal Editor,  the winning-est  in her award-winning HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers This article is excerpted from some editing I did for a writer of experimental fiction when I was on a Greater Los Angeles Writers Society panel writer of any genre can apply these suggestions to the chase, getaway, or high action scene in your script or manuscript before you send it to an agent or publisher or, better still, while you are writing the first draft.  Sometimes even the most fascinating, interesting and irresistible  detail can slow down the forward movement of your story. So as much as writers are told that detail is important, purge as much as you can from your action scenes and put it somewhere else or dribble it into narrative in other places in your manuscript. In the process, ask yourself if your reader really needs to know the color of the protagonist’s eyes. As important as detail is, some is better left to t
Post a Comment
Read more

Ampersands: Pretty Is as Pretty Does

   By Carolyn Howard-Johnson Author of the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers   Have you noticed how ampersands turn to gibberish when they are entered into some blog services like Google's blogpsot.com? That is only the beginning of problems ampersands cause for editors, and publishers of all kinds. Many of the difficulties they cause go unnoticed except by the publishing pros we would all like to impress like agents, librarians, bookstore event directors, and the acquisition editors at Knopf!    That's why I added a new section to the second edition of the winningest book in my #HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers,  The Frugal Editor . Because ampersands seem to be so popular these days, it's especially important for editors and authors who publish books to know a little about their history, how to use them, and how gatekeepers and readers of Lynn Truss's famous zero-tolerance a
Post a Comment
Read more

MARGARET FIELAND INTERVIEW (guest blogger)

When did you first know you were destined to be a writer? LOL, I never realized I was destined to be a writer -- I fell into it. I'd written poetry for years, collecting it in notebooks stacked in my attic when I wrote one I wanted to keep. This led me to several online sites and ultimately to discovering the Muse Online Writers Conference where I hooked up with Linda Barnett Johnson and joined her writers forums. She required everyone to write both fiction and poetry, so, with much trepidation, I started writing fiction. Then I got hooked on it, wrote a chapter book, took the ICL course and actually learned how to write it. Then in 2010, I was seized by a desire to write a sci fi novel, so I spent six weeks or so on world building, mostly, with a bit of plotting thrown in for good measure. Who would you cite as your influences? I'm a way-back sci-fi fan, and Robert A. Heinlein influenced me heavily. I took a lot away from his writing, notably the value of surpris
6 comments
Read more