Last Sunday, I was joined by poet, author and philosopher of the soul, Mark Nepo for a dialogue entitled “the Practice of Being Human: Seeing with New Eyes in the Best and Worst of Times.”
I appreciate Mark’s intense fidelity to some key values — life as a process and a practice which is all about learning, without end; felt experience and inquiry (as contrasted to solutions and answers); and a compassionate relationship to the ordeal of being human. Another is his poetry — his eloquent, evocative, vulnerable and candid sharing of his own deep experience in ways that so often resonate.
In his thirties, Mark was diagnosed with a rare form of lymphoma, and his struggle of healing helped to deepen his soul and shape his commitment to experiencing life fully while staying in relationship to an unknowable future. It also opened him to accept healing from all spiritual approaches and today he calls himself a “student of all paths,” studying both the common threads and the unique gifts that each school has to offer.
I asked Mark to share his way of practicing with the daily news in this “best of times and worst of times,” within the context of Beyond Awakening’s animating question: how can higher consciousness enable humanity to rise to the challenge of our world’s increasingly urgent, complex and intractable crises?
Mark pointed to the perennial wisdom of Aristotle: “We have a right to censor a work of art or information if it makes us experience pity or terror without an inner necessity to do so.” Part of the best of these times is that we have instantaneous access to information and images from around the world. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, but when catastrophic events such as 9/11 are replayed over and over, the effect on us can be numbing, paralyzing and destructive.
He also noted that it is always the “best of times and worst of times,” and the nature of the universe is for things to come together and fall apart. However, things that fall apart make the most noise. Things that come together, usually do so quietly. Everything is coming together and falling apart as it always has, but our media’s negativity bias has us transfixed by the misleading constant ruckus of things falling apart.
I thought it was important to acknowledge that while the nature of the universe is for things to come together and fall apart, there does seem to be a greater scale of crises at hand than we’ve ever faced. So I asked Mark to press a little deeper into the idea of being moved by the “experience of pity or terror” into compassion or action, rather than shut down.
Mark agreed with the necessity of action, and then spoke about residing in a balanced view of reality. One of the first practices he learned from Buddhism was the notion of seeing things as they are. This means seeing what is coming together as well as what is coming apart, neither through rose-colored glasses nor through the cloud of fear and anxiety. Until then, we don’t have the eyes to see what right action might be.
One of the richest parts of our conversation was when I asked Mark about the fact that he never seems to offer techniques or solutions as a part of his teachings. He points not so much to outcomes or ideals, but to ways of being with experience.
Mark explained this approach by saying that the most mysterious, amazing thing about being human is that no one knows how to do it, despite all the great literature and teachings. Therefore if we are humbly, fully “here,” we can start an honest friendship by admitting to each other that we don’t know, that in fact we don’t have a clue. But we can share our experience, when our heart broke, or we lost someone, or we stepped into wonder.
He quoted the mystic Mechthild of Magdeburg, “A fish cannot drown in water, A bird does not fall in air.” For human beings, whose gifts are so mysterious and varied, part of our journey is to discover what our “element” is. When we discover this, our gifts will manifest.
In the meantime, our dreams are there to exercise the heart and inspire it to inhabit its aliveness.
I invite you to the listen in to the full recording here.
Announcement
I’m excited to be joined by Mark Nepo this Sunday, March 29th for a dialogue we’ve titled The Practice of Being Human: Seeing with New Eyes in the Best and Worst of Times. I’m especially grateful and touched because this will be Beyond Awakening’s 100th episode, and Mark epitomizes the kind of teacher and thought leader who can illuminate the way beyond awakening to transforming the world.
Mark Nepo is beloved as a poet, teacher, and storyteller. He has been called “one of the finest spiritual guides of our time,” “a consummate storyteller,” and “an eloquent spiritual teacher.” His books have been translated into more than twenty languages. In 2013, Mark’s Two-Part Interview with Oprah appeared on Super Soul Sunday on OWNTV. In these interviews, Mark discussed the lifelong lessons from his cancer journey twenty-six years ago, and why he believes listening with a full heart is the key to living a vibrant and meaningful life.
Though he has gone deeper than most both as a poet and as a spiritual teacher, he no longer separates these two identities. He considers himself “a student of all paths.” During his cancer journey he gladly accepted help from people of all faiths. If a Catholic priest offered to pray for his healing, he gratefully said yes, even if it was on the heels of having received spiritual support from a native American healer or prayers from his Jewish family members. He now feels called, “to illuminate and praise the common center of all paths” because he feels that every person today needs to develop their own personal practice.
Mark is concerned with the enormous environmental, social and political challenges of our time, but he still believes that the whole human experiment is innately hopeful. He resonates with Vaclav Havel’s way of talking about hope — not “as the belief that things will turn out well, but the conviction that everything will have meaning no matter how it turns out.”
After contemplating the animating question of this series — how can higher consciousness enable humanity to rise to the challenge of our world’s increasingly urgent, complex and intractable crises?— Mark quoted Charles Dickens’ opening to A Tale of Two Cities, saying that our time, like every time, is both “the best of times and the worst of times.”
As one thing intensifies, it all intensifies. He points out that life comes to us whole, not neatly sorted into piles. The joy is inextricably bound to the pain. Somehow being human is just hard enough that we need each other, ensuring the journey of love.
But what we are challenged to do, individually and collectively, Mark says, is simply to really be here, to truly inhabit ourselves. It is only right here that we can find the source of our trust, courage, joy, and compassion.
I’m very happy to be diving into honest conversation with this deep student of the process of walking the human journey of the soul. I hope you’ll join us!
About Mark Nepo
As a poet, teacher, and storyteller, Mark has been called “one of the finest spiritual guides of our time,” “a consummate storyteller,” and “an eloquent spiritual teacher.” His work is widely accessible and used by many and his books have been translated into more than twenty languages. He has published fifteen books and recorded nine audio projects. Recent work includes The Endless Practice, Inside the Miracle, his latest book of poems, Reduced to Joy, cited by Spirituality & Practice as one of the Best Spiritual Books of 2013, a CD collection of teaching conversations based on the poems in Reduced to Joy, and Seven Thousand Ways to Listen, which won the 2012 Books for a Better Life Award. He became a number one New York Times bestseller with The Book of Awakening. Mark has appeared several times with Oprah Winfrey on her Super Soul Sunday program on OWN TV. He has also been interviewed by Robin Roberts on Good Morning America. The Exquisite Risk was cited by Spirituality & Practice as one of the Best Spiritual Books of 2005, calling it “one of the best books we’ve ever read on what it takes to live an authentic life.” Mark devotes his writing and teaching to the journey of inner transformation and the life of relationship. He continues to offer readings, lectures, and retreats.
HOW TO PARTICIPATE:
Sunday, March 29th at 10:00am Pacific; 11:00am Mountain; 12:00pm Central; 1:00pm Eastern
*Find Your Local Time
Please Note: There will be a limited number of lines available on the live conference call, so we encourage you to listen online if possible. To make sure you can get through by phone, we encourage you to dial in early.
ACCESS INSTRUCTIONS
- To listen live by phone, dial: 425-440-5100 (alternate #: 501-707-0312)
- Then, enter Access Code: 272072#
- To listen live online go to: http://InstantTeleseminar.com/?eventid=64394724
- To download the audio after the teleseminar is complete go to the Beyond Awakening Audio Page
Join the Dialogue: About one hour into the dialogue, we’ll open up the lines and you’ll have the opportunity to interact with us directly over the phone or via instant message. Here’s what to do:
To interact live by voice, dial into the conference line number and wait until we ask for a question from someone in your region, or
Send us your question via instant message in the teleseminar window on your computer
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We look forward to your attendance!
Sincerely,
The Beyond Awakening Team