Unity in Diversity

I just returned from our 24th annual summer weeklong Dzogchen retreat, held again on the Hudson River bank in Garrison, NY, where hundreds of acres have been reserved in their sylvan beauty and natural grace. We meditators rejoiced in and enjoyed the delightful presence of so many different kinds and types of people—- colors, professions, ages, genders, nationalities; for all breeds and all creeds are heartily welcomed at our Dharma Dog-House! Bow wow! Along with all variety of characters, Paris-based singer-songwriter Ben Beirs, a long time Dzogchen student, played classical guitar on two evenings and I chanted and bantered with him. Here’s the link if you’d like to listen and watch in- www.youtube.com.

There is unity in diversity. We are all interdependent, and share an underlying inter-being; check it out! I believe that it’s incumbent upon wise and discerning people to learn to see it, especially in these fractious, divisive days. Great French mathematician Rene Descartes said: “God is the circle whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere.” We are all included and embraced by whatever higher-power word like God may mean to us or stand for.  This is the mandala principle seminal psychologist and East-West thinker Carl Jung wrote about (it’s like a hologram), as an excellent metaphor for the web of being, the psyche, and all its interconnected, interwoven, distinct yet coherent and unified dimensions. That sacredness or at least intrinsic humanistic value is in and includes each and all of us, don’tcha’ think?

When I see myself and my needs and wishes in you and yours in mine, who would I exclude, exploit, discriminate against or harm? Concerning empathy and harmonious re-alignment,

Native American wisdom tells us if you want to know where a man is coming from, walk a few miles in his moccasins.