"Krisch's meditations can heal.
They are trance-like and therapeutic, moving the reader to experience the extraordinary in the ordinary. I couldn't put them down."
-Dr. Douglas J. Green, D. Min., Counselor
Fall 2011 Update : Prayers and Knives - currently being taught in University of Oregon's Human Settlement Course with legendary professor Rob Young
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What is the essential role of mentors in our lives? Where do we find these mentors?
How does their support play into the lifelong pursuit of making peace with ourselves?
Extra! Extra!
Chapbook (aka - a short soft-covered book) for sale:
Prayers and Knives
and other Meditationson the Search for Mentors
By Douglas Krisch
26 pages. 8 short pieces plus a thrilling introduction and inspiring conclusion
available by check or paypal for 5 dollars plus one dollar shipping and handling.
Paypal link below
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Table of Contents
Introduction
The Medicine Woman
The Ghettos Within
Prayers and Knives
The Weather of the Mind
Ode to the Mentors
Our Long Hug
The Raw
The Tincture
Conclusion
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Introduction
"What is necessary, after all, is only this:
solitude,
vast inner solitude,
to walk inside yourself and meet no one for hours -
that is what you must be able to attain."
-Rainer Maria Rilke
The great teachers
are great mentors.
They hold us, the support us,
they nurture and guide us in the path to self-knowledge.
***
With all these 'problems of the self' dominating our culture, with rampant loneliness and isolation, with millions eating dinner by themselves this evening - why is it that we should seek out solitude? Why is it that we should be seeking paths into our own selves? What is this self-knowledge and why is it essential to our lives?
Creating spaces for self knowledge is essential simply because we need to build some refuges in our lives. We need to find places where we can escape the daily deluge of information, from the daily torrents of advertisements where all types of experts and pretty faces tell us how to eat, how to sleep, how to raise our kids, how to find peace. With all this supposed guidance, with all this access to information, how is it that we appear to be more lost than ever before?
Over the past five and a half years, I have been conducting a long-term research project where I speak to people of all ages about the role of anxiety and depression in their lives - where and when it emerges, how they respond in the short-term and the long-term, how they distract themselves, how they listen. Well, the initial results are in: the core tenets of our modern culture are not working for many of us.
We have managed to largely neglect our emotional selves. We have failed to validate and respond to our emotional needs and many are struggling - some overtly, others subtly - because of this neglect. So how are we to move forward from here?
***
This chapbook is about the role of mentors. Now I loosely define mentors as any being or place which provides a nurturing space in which we feel comfortable and courageous enough to listen to that elusive voice within us. That voice is an emotional voice and a powerful voice. It is, however, a voice much maligned in our culture. But our neglect of our emotional selves has led to a slew of challenges we now must face.
But it takes great support to have the courage to listen to these repressed selves. This is the role of mentors - people, animals, rivers, music - whatever allows you the calm support in order to head within and explore.
The journey to know the self, the journey to love the self, is a lifelong journey and one of the greatest of human challenges. Indeed, very few will make it all the way to the end, where we fully accept whatever life provides for us, where we can lay at peace upon our own death beds.
I am commonly asked, "Isn't this self-knowledge work selfish?" I respond by encouraging the questioner to become the experimenter - to simply try it out. One of the most powerful epiphanies emerges when we realize how often our inner battles are thrown onto others all day long. We begin to see that the path towards self-knowledge eventually leads towards a self-love which in turn moves us towards a profound place of deep empathy for all who cross our paths each day.
This collection of meditations examines the search for mentors - the search for connection and support during this journey within.
solitude,
vast inner solitude,
to walk inside yourself and meet no one for hours -
that is what you must be able to attain."
-Rainer Maria Rilke
The great teachers
are great mentors.
They hold us, the support us,
they nurture and guide us in the path to self-knowledge.
***
With all these 'problems of the self' dominating our culture, with rampant loneliness and isolation, with millions eating dinner by themselves this evening - why is it that we should seek out solitude? Why is it that we should be seeking paths into our own selves? What is this self-knowledge and why is it essential to our lives?
Creating spaces for self knowledge is essential simply because we need to build some refuges in our lives. We need to find places where we can escape the daily deluge of information, from the daily torrents of advertisements where all types of experts and pretty faces tell us how to eat, how to sleep, how to raise our kids, how to find peace. With all this supposed guidance, with all this access to information, how is it that we appear to be more lost than ever before?
Over the past five and a half years, I have been conducting a long-term research project where I speak to people of all ages about the role of anxiety and depression in their lives - where and when it emerges, how they respond in the short-term and the long-term, how they distract themselves, how they listen. Well, the initial results are in: the core tenets of our modern culture are not working for many of us.
We have managed to largely neglect our emotional selves. We have failed to validate and respond to our emotional needs and many are struggling - some overtly, others subtly - because of this neglect. So how are we to move forward from here?
***
This chapbook is about the role of mentors. Now I loosely define mentors as any being or place which provides a nurturing space in which we feel comfortable and courageous enough to listen to that elusive voice within us. That voice is an emotional voice and a powerful voice. It is, however, a voice much maligned in our culture. But our neglect of our emotional selves has led to a slew of challenges we now must face.
But it takes great support to have the courage to listen to these repressed selves. This is the role of mentors - people, animals, rivers, music - whatever allows you the calm support in order to head within and explore.
The journey to know the self, the journey to love the self, is a lifelong journey and one of the greatest of human challenges. Indeed, very few will make it all the way to the end, where we fully accept whatever life provides for us, where we can lay at peace upon our own death beds.
I am commonly asked, "Isn't this self-knowledge work selfish?" I respond by encouraging the questioner to become the experimenter - to simply try it out. One of the most powerful epiphanies emerges when we realize how often our inner battles are thrown onto others all day long. We begin to see that the path towards self-knowledge eventually leads towards a self-love which in turn moves us towards a profound place of deep empathy for all who cross our paths each day.
This collection of meditations examines the search for mentors - the search for connection and support during this journey within.