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Complementarity and Integration: Utopian Individual and Collective Transformation with Suryamayi Aswini Clarence-Smith
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Jonathan
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Jonathan
welcome to
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Stefan Julich
the New Books Network.
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Surya Mai Ashwini
Welcome to the East West Psychology Podcast, the forum for the exploration of psyche and spirit. Join our hosts Jonathan Kay and Stefan Julich and their guests as they delve
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Jonathan
into the intersection of psychology, philosophy, world
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Surya Mai Ashwini
wisdom, traditions, the arts and more.
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Jonathan
Welcome to another East West Psychology Podcast. Stefan and I are here today with a special guest, Surya Mai Ashwini. Clarence Smith, who some of our people in our department would know of or have taken a class with which we'll get into speaking about soon. But we're really happy to have you as part of our department and welcome.
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Surya Mai Ashwini
Thank you so much.
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Jonathan
So how about I start just by reading a little bit, a short paragraph about you so the listeners can get a sense of the kind of academic side. And then why don't you can just jump in and tell us a little bit about how you kind of have come to the school and have come to be teaching a class at the school. But first, so here's a little bit about you. Surya Mai is an award winning scholar, educator and facilitator based in Oroville, India, the largest intentional community in the world. Surya Mai holds a PhD in International Development from the University of Sussex and a BA from the University of California Berkeley. She is currently affiliated with the Sri Aurobindo International Institute for Educational Research in Auroville. Her research on utopian and pre figurative practice has been published by leading editors and publishers in the field, notably in the Ralahin Utopian Studies series by Peter Language, the Alternative to capitalism in the 21st century series coming out of Bristol University Press, and Antipode book series by Willi dedicated to sharing the outcomes of her research to various audiences. She lectures internationally in both academic and activist settings. I think that last sentence makes a lot of sense as to why you are at CIS and why we're so happy to have you, because our school and our program especially has been always, I think, quite an innovative and important place for trying to develop the scholar practitioner types of knowledge production and bringing together the idea of thinking and doing in new and integral ways, which you also have a very, very deep connection to being from Auroville and being centered into Sri Aurobindos and the mothers what I've been writing about as the revolutionary spirituality or revolutionary spiritual practice. So welcome to this show and why don't you say a little bit about yourself?
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Surya Mai Ashwini
Thank you so much, Jonathan and Stephen, for having me. It's lovely to meet with you and chat with you about my involvement at cis. I'm really happy to be here. I just started teaching this academic year, so it's quite fresh. But my connection to CIS dates back to 2018, which is when I met both of you, I believe, for the first time, when CIS was celebrating its 50th anniversary, the same year that Auroville, the intentional community that I live in, was celebrating its 50th anniversary. And so there were a number of people from Auroville who were invited to participate in the CIS conference, and I was one of them. I believe I actually gave the keynote or the keynote on one of the evenings. Yeah, I did. I was doing my PhD at the time. And yeah, I just, I just want to share that. I think my most impactful memory of, of that first encounter with cis. I remember we were having this conference in Namaste hall and I just felt like, wow, this is the first university, let's say academic environment in which I feel comfortable or in which I feel like I, I can bring my whole self. And it wasn't like I had to make an effort to do that. I just noticed, oh, I'm. I'm completely at ease being my full self in this space. And I even remember there are a few people, I think, walking barefoot in that hall. And it was all the way to like. Yeah, I can, you know, be in the space, take up space, interact with others in a completely natural way in a completely authentic way. And that felt so nurturing because a lot of academic environments really don't have that. That vibe and that culture. And so that is also one of the reasons why I am. I'm so happy to be teaching here at CIS because I also feel like I can really bring my whole self to class and to my teaching. You know, I mean, I am an academic, but I also do a lot of embodied work. I also, you know, I'm deeply, deeply implicated in the integral yoga practice and philosophy. And this is the first. Yeah. And only academic space or university space, higher education, formal higher education space in which all of those things can come through in a perfectly natural way. So in my prefiguring utopian societies class, which I taught last semester, which is very. Which is definitely, you know, an academic class based on my academic research, I felt completely comfortable, you know, starting class with a meditation, inviting students into reflections. Just a real blend of the kind of teaching that I've done also in just Awareness through the body, which is an embodied integral yoga practice that was developed in Orville in which I'm actually teaching at CIS this semester. So, yeah, it just. I'm really, really touched by. By the culture, by the atmosphere, by the. The invitation to really bring one's whole self to. Yeah. To. To the space. And that. That is. That is welcome. That's been my experience and I'm very grateful for that.
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Stefan Julich
That's really lovely. I was thinking about my. Jonathan came in. Jonathan, when you came in, were there. Were there still classes in person classes?
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Jonathan
Yeah, I got almost two years of interest.
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Stefan Julich
Okay, that's right. I mean, I know that we work next to one another, but I just couldn't remember.
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Jonathan
Well, and also just to jump in for sex sodium I. That semester that you're speaking about, when you attended, that was my very first semester and I was just getting my feet on the ground and Debashish called me into his office and says, hey, you want to help out? Run or like help me do a conference? I'm like, oh, sure. I've never been to an academic conference. So I was thrown right into the fire. And that was the. And I think I would just reflect back completely. There's something about coming to CIS and feeling like my whole self was, Was. Was not only encouraged, but like really that was the. It was almost like demanded. It was like that was what I would felt was like almost the hardest part in the sense of like, am I equal to this? Can I bring my full self into this, into this work? You know, it was really. It's also a challenge, you know, but that's. I think that's the challenge that really brought the best out of me. But you're right, it was natural. It was like just being able to be here. And also it was very. There was. Yeah, it wasn't like you had to put on a mask or put on some kind of Persona, which is. Yeah. Sorry, Stefan.
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Stefan Julich
Yeah, no, that's okay. I was just thinking that when I, when I first arrived. So I got my PhD from East west and I came in 2006, so all our program was a completely in person program. It was. We were moving towards having online so that we could be more global and in our reach. But Covid really kind of, kind of forced our hand in a way. And now it's difficult to get people to come into the school. But one of the wonderful things that I experienced in coming in was exactly what you're talking about. This kind of embodied authenticity that people would. You would be sitting in a class, the professor would be lecturing, there would be a discussion going on, and people would be at the back of the room doing yoga or stretching exercises or their qigong and be completely focused on what was happening. But there was a freedom in, in the space for people to either explore or listen in the way that suited them. And I just found that also very freeing, very liberating. And this reminds me a little bit of our, you know, the scholar practitioner model that Jonathan was talking about and how the whole person is encouraged to show up. But there is this tension, as you pointed out, between kind of academic scholarship rigor and this freedom that also exists in this space. And I'm just wondering if maybe you can dive a little bit deeper into that from your experience. Given the work that you do, how do you kind of surf that, that edge between the two?
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Surya Mai Ashwini
Yeah, that's a beautiful question. You know, one of the first things that comes to mind is when I think of the yoga, I mean, in this case, the integral yoga practice, but a lot of yoga practices, you know, discipline is self discipline, self mastery, self discipline. Something that is, that is so key to so many of these practices. And I think that if we're, you know, looking at fostering an integral education or an education that's really also about the, the inner being and cultivating, you know, people's students inner development, I think it's also about encouraging that fostering of. Of an inner, maybe rigor of an inner desire for that level of. Of. Of clarity, of focus, of analysis if that is something that is keen on or is or is interested in. I will say that I do think that some of my students last semester were maybe a little bit surprised by, you know, kind of the level of, let's say, academic rigor that I like, the kind of bar bar that I held, but also really strongly appreciated it. So I feel like. I feel like these things can be really complementary, that one can foster, you know, intellectual rigor and at the same time invite people to be, you know, interpreting, listening, concentrating in whatever way works for them. So it doesn't mean that that comes from a, you know, mental space necessarily one exercise or more exploration invitation that. That I did in my very first class in my course was to ask my students, you know, this is a course on prefiguring utopian societies, you know, and communities. Here we are for this, you know, period in time altogether in this, you know, in this journey, in this class together. So, you know, if this were to be a utopian classroom, let's say, or classroom and inverted commas, class experience, you know, what would be the features of that for you? We all brainstorm what would make this experience a kind of utopian learning experience. Of course, we have the limitations of the online. A lot of people have loved to have the class outdoors, for example, but just to really reflect on how can we make this space something that's really like, wow, I really want to be in this space. This is how I want or how I would appreciate information being shared. This is how I would like to be able to engage. And then I invited them to, you know, bring those kind of prompts week to week, be like, hey, you know, some of us talked about like, maybe rather than taking notes, like do having crayons and like doodling, you know, like, you know, what. What was coming through. So hey, next week, like everyone, you know, invitation, bring your. Your color pencils or something else. It was like about having, you know, doing something sensory or tactile at the same time. So, so things like that. So I think that they can very much go together.
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Stefan Julich
Yeah. When I was taking classes, I took our class which is called Jungian Psychology and East West Spirituality, that being taught by the person who created the class, who was Brandon Collins. He was the chair on my dissertation, which by the way was on the mother's visionary yoga using a Jungian lens. So Brandon sent us home, we had a class and he would lecture generally for 20 minutes to 30 minutes, that was it. And then he would break us into groups and he would monitor the groups and usually two large groups in the classroom and then just travel back and forth between them and join in the conversation and listen. But he sent us home and he said, okay, there are some files in our online learning space, which was Caucus at the time. He said, go check in Caucus for the files and then start reading. So I went home and I opened up the files and there were 1500 pages of reading in there. And I was like, am I expected to read all of this? And I just started reading. I got about 400 pages in, and I came back in and he sat us down, and we sat down at the beginning of class and he said, so how did the readings go? And the room erupted. People were saying, how much do you want us to read? This is crazy. 1500 pages of reading. And he said, you're all graduate students and adults. He said, you get to choose. You know, I gave you a lot of readings. You choose. He, he, he saved this. He didn't say it right up front because he wanted to see how people would re. He was a psychologist. He wanted to see how people would react. And he said, I. I've never forgotten that because it was such a wonderful teaching moment. But it set off in me kind of a chain of thought that led to, when I started teaching my own classes, to the idea that I wanted to meet each student where they were. I want to accept the person that's coming towards me in the classroom space. I want to meet them where they want to be met. Which changes the focus of the educational experience from me imparting information to the student to a relationship in which I'm attempting to understand what it is that the student has come here to learn. It's very challenging because you're dealing with a lot of different students. We also have PhD and MA level students in each classroom. But I find it much more effective in that it requires engagement from everyone, including me. A type of engagement that teachers, faculty members often don't show in maybe standard universities where they'll just come and lecture in front of a group, and Maybe even the TAs are the ones that are answering online posts. So I'm fascinated with what you're saying. And this idea of. I mean, I don't know very much about the class that you're teaching on prefiguring Utopia, but what you've just said here, I'm finding really intriguing.
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Surya Mai Ashwini
Yeah. And I think it really speaks to when we're thinking about inclusivity and being inclusive and having inclusive classrooms and inclusive classroom environments. That's another thing that I love about CIS is it allows us to really push this concept. I mean, push isn't maybe the right word, but invite this concept at these much, much deeper levels to really. This whole thing of meeting students where they're at. And I've had that as well in my class. And some students are very different. And then, yeah, there's also a whole thing that happens in the group where they, you know, you know, have to be maybe patient or really kind of listen or see, you know, when I'm interacting. I had quite a relatively small class where you're mostly together, aside from when I would do kind of pair shares or things like that. And so to really, you know, also watch, you know, what was it the other students. What was it like to engage with each student like you're saying, where they're at, the questions they had with the. With the conform they had with the viewpoints they had with, you know, in some cases, of course, the biases that. That they had and, and yeah, said it's a. It's a much more engaged style of. Of. Of interacting. But I think it really. It's just. Yeah, it's just a really beautiful example experience of. Of. Of true. Of being inclusive at these. At these very deep levels, as coming back to what we were saying earlier, really inclusive of the. Of the whole self. Of that whole. Of that whole person. So, yeah, it's. It's really great to have the opportunity to. To. To teach in that way and for that to be. To be welcome and for students to, you know, to. To also be. Be into learning. Learning in this way and in this kind of environment. Because they certainly appreciate it. Appreciate it as well.
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Jonathan
I know that, yeah, really interesting points. And I think what's the question that is coming up for me is. Or what I'm hearing is the importance of being able to integrate multiple ways of knowing. So these are two obviously kind of important words in this department and this kind of work, I think. So it's like the integration in a way of holding different modalities together, realizing that they all bring a certain perspective which can hold something that's important to not only individual, but the fabric of a collective transformation. There's different modalities that we can receive different kinds of information through our different senses and how we at the same time need to be able to see that sort of more through that sense and, and allow that sense to kind of. Or that let's say that affective relation to the, the mode, for instance, kind of reveal something that the mind can't. Could never really or the mind will deliver, but in a reduced form. You know, so like the, the qualitative over a quantitative. But at the same time when we're talking about utopia and collectivity different like alternative possibilities of future collective organization. There is, it's always a collective thing. Just like individuation is always collective individuation. There's no such thing as an individual that is separate from its, from, from any type of Amelia or environment in which there's other individuating humans, but also other individuating things which now I'm stretching from Jung's idea of individuation more into my own research, which is kind of more coming out of Gilbert Simon Don and, But, but anyway, regardless, so that's. I guess my, my question is I, I'm curious at how we can kind of put or find a different kind of relationship of the mind in this process because we're talking about rigor, we're talking about the like and also we're academics here. There's something that's very deeply important about thinking and about discussing, about talking about concepts. And from an old, I mean older, I mean it's still very, it's still the prevalent kind of, of duality of mind, body, mind over body, rationality over everything in the humanist perspective. I think that in some ways there's a turn against rationality and a turn against the intellect. There's definitely, culturally speaking in the west, an anti intellectual turn which is part of the problem of polarization. But we can't be rejecting the mind and its unique powers to also bring us to a certain kind of utopian possibility. And so in your work I'm curious about how you navigate that in terms of the history of utopian thinking and practice, the role of the mind and in the sense of like maybe in the past, like even, maybe even Marxism for instance, or whatever. It's like there's a rational commandment or there's a rational set of ideas in which humans will understand with their mind. And then that would be used to hold people into a certain position. And I guess where I'm going with all this is being from Auroville, the mother gave the charter, but again not as a rational agreement, not as something which everybody can sit down and with their minds decipher. This is in, this is out. It's not a ment. It's obviously the mind comes in and the intellect comes in to interpret and to discuss. But there's also the very deeply affective level of being in community together, which is again, it's like, what is the notion of the integral here and in terms of our senses, in terms of our mind? So that's a long question, but I'm just trying to pose a field of questions that maybe you can dig into.
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Surya Mai Ashwini
Thank you. Yeah, there's a lot there. Maybe I'll answer or I'll speak to this both in terms of the teaching and in terms of the kind of the utopian aspect and the research. So in the teaching, and maybe this is a bit repetitive or let's say just carrying on from the exchange we just had with Stephen, but I really feel like there's complementarity that's important. So it's not about negating the mind and as you rightly say, what the mind can achieve and the clarity and so much transformational moments and really moments of awakening that can happen through a mental realization as well as. So to give like a concrete example, you know, Stephen was mentioning his. His professor, you know, lecturing at first, kind of more standard lecture, but keeping it relatively short and then having discussions. So that's, that's sort of the format that I have. I do give a lecture, you know, an academic lecture, maybe 30, 40, it kind of depends. And then. And then I, I use other ways of knowing. You brought that up to kind of explore the topic deeper in different ways. So, like, one example that comes to mind was one class that I did on, you know, prefiguring more than human utopias. So after the lecture, I. I think for that class I did a visualization, you know, imagining, you know, let's say, you know, we have prefigured more than human utopia. I mean, I didn't use those words in the visualization and kind of inviting students to. In this visualization, you know, who. Who are they relating to? What species are they relating to it? In what way? You know, and just kind of allowing, like after the lecture, allowing these. Just to explore the same theme with. In a very different, different way. And it's still using the mind, actually, because the visualization is a. Is a power of the mind. But that's just one example of so just really the bringing in the. The complementarity. So, yeah, that's. That's one example of that. And then in terms of the, you know, when looking at it, my research on. On Utopias, I mean, what. What comes out a lot is that it's. It's and, and this, this touches on the scholar, practitioner, you know, theme that we've, we've touched on as well earlier in this conversation is it's, it's the practice, it's the actual lived experience that is transformational. Right? So you know, when we look at it through the mind and a lot of, let's say the research on utopias are the kind of critics of utopian practice or whatever it might be, is looking at these experiments from the outside. And first of all, if you look at it from just a purely mental, rational perspective, a lot of these experiments seem really insignificant. Just look at the numbers of people involved. It's tiny compared to the human humanity. And, and the mind really looks at it also a lot in terms of, of kind of, you know, failure like success or failure. Right. So these different, you know, what, what were the, what were the goals, you know, going in? If we, I shouldn't say the mind. Let's just say this kind of rational thinking. What were the goals going in? Have they been achieved? Yes. No, you know, it's just looking at it from this lens. But, but when we go much deeper, so using, using the powers of the intellect and of research, when we go much deeper and actually do the in depth research and talk to people about their experience and what it actually means to be involved in these kinds of utopian projects, then we realize that the transformative potential of these is huge because the level of transformation that people are going through individually and collectively, regardless of what are, you know, what are the outcomes in terms of, let's say, the goals of a particular, you know, society or intentional community, the actual internal, let's say psychological process that is happening is, is so much more intensified than, than in so called mainstream, mainstream society. So there, there is really something that one, one cannot, one cannot comprehend that transformation. Just looking out, you know, looking from outside with the mind and trying to assess it. Right. With the mind, it's not possible. It's something that is, that is a lived experience. Transformation is a lived experience. One example that I often give is like, you know, let's say you're looking at somebody meditating, you know, I mean, how are you going to assess what. I mean, just like you have, you know, you have no access to like what is happening, but yet there is, there can be absolutely profound things, truly profound things that are happening. And there you, you cannot access other than through, through lived experience. So yeah, complementarity I guess is, is what I keep, keep coming back to
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Stefan Julich
and lived experience, it's a little Bit like I was having this conversation with my partner about the phrase the power of now, right? Eckhart Tolle's power of now. But like there's only this moment, just this moment, just this moment. But in this moment is enfolded the entirety. So yes, there's just this moment, but this moment comes with everything that you would encounter if you were really completely present to lived experience. Lived experience includes the mind. Lived experience includes the body. Right. It includes the soul, if you want to call it that. So I was thinking as you were speaking that Jung used a phrase that he talked about the number one and number two personalities. The number one personality being the one that lived on the surface in the world, more scientifically oriented, mind oriented. It looked at things in terms of use and value. That's what he said, use and value. But then there's the depth dimension where everything else resides and it resides in the body. I was thinking Jonathan was talking about the kind of anti intellectual streak that would see very, very pronounced. It's across the world, but especially in the U.S. however, there's a part of this, as I think about it, that it's not that well considered. We've had a dumbing down in the US with pulling funds away from public education and the push towards STEM rather than the humanities, where people actually engage in conversations where they think at a very deep level about the decisions that they're making in life and what's actually happen happening in their lived experience. So it's not very well considered, but there's been a distrust of the mind as the arbiter of truth and reality. And if we think about this, and I'm going out on a limb here, but I think I know you'll understand me if we think about it in terms of the spiritual task of the current period, that that distrust is actually something that you want in a way, distrust may be a bad word for it, but you want people to actually be able to enter into that consideration, to think about the place of the mind and its limitations and to honor if somebody comes, if somebody. You know, this has become like a whole movement in this country and people aren't thinking because they're acting in a collective, in a negative, collective way. However, the original impulse seems to me to actually be a very pure impulse where we say that the mind is entrapping us and we're relying on it to construct the reality that we're living in. And we're constructing a prison, we're constructing a box that we're forcing ourselves to live in we're doing it ourselves. So the distrust seems to me to be actually a good impulse.
- [32:40]
Surya Mai Ashwini
Yeah, that's a really interesting, interesting train of thought. And it makes me think of, you know, Sri Aurobindo's the planes of the being. Right. And so to recognize that we operate or we are made up of these different planes of the being. And of course, each and every one of these planes of the being has, as you say, their limitations or let's say, their range, their modus operandi, their, you know, what they're about. And they can't be about something that they're not about. Right. And. And the other. The other piece is around. Around the planes of the being is that the whole work of the yoga is to essentially harmonize these around. Around an inmost center. So that we have this little, how to say, like collage, kind of puppet in awareness through the body where you see the different planes of the being. So they can either be like, all stacked nicely one, you know, and globing the other, or they can be really kind of like, strewn out. And it's like the whole work of the yoga is to bring those really harmoniously, you know, you know, kind of, you know, unfolded, you know, in one another and. And around the center so that we're actually looking for all these different parts of our being to be informed from an inmost center rather than, you know, from reactions to, let's say, the outside. You know, you were talking about, like, what's happening now culturally in. In the US So rather than, you know, kind of reflecting and reacting to that actually being used, these planes of the being, the mind being used as a tool informed from. From a place of deep centeredness. So in the integral, yoga would be the psychic being. Right. So the soul, or the inmost center that it is from this place of deep knowing, deep truth, deep, you know, kind of essence that then we learn how to, you know, with purity, I would say, with sincerity, really use the. The different faculties. Faculties of our. Of our being.
- [35:00]
Jonathan
Yeah, that seems to bring in that term complementarity, which you were talking about earlier. And in relation to the kind of vision of integral that I think we need to hold on to. Because, I mean, there's like. That word is also very broad. It's also being used in many different ways. And even in the field of integral studies or integral theory, there's radically different polls to how people understand that. And so I think that all that we've been speaking to and that you've been bringing out and this notion of complementarity is that recognizing that we are in a state of fragmentation and it's not that you need to order, find a superior principle and then subjugate every plane that, that, that from that perspective is deems it insufficient or insuperior. It's not about ordering and controlling. It's more about this coexistence. It's like every plane in part can be in a complementary. In a. In a relationship, a complementary relationship in which each one can fully express itself without having to subordinate the others. And this is exactly what we're talking about, the mind. We've inherited this historically from, you know, from. And that this is exactly where I have taken up the question of post humanism through Debashish's work, because this is where it's very much against humanism and how that has been deployed and these ideas have been deployed through colonization and into kind of the contemporary problematic of capitalism and the nation states that we have today. But it's a very different kind of integral, which isn't like, again, not about the control, but about kind of like. It becomes more of a free play of parts and elements from a level which can observe and also participate, but without, like, without being hegemonic to them in a way. Right, but this is. So, this is, I think, where my mind is going because I'm just finishing the last chapter of my dissertation right now. Which is, which is, which is getting to how in my own life, musical practice and practice of integral yoga in individual ways has allowed for transformation. But when we start to think about collective individuation and collective transformation and the idea of utopia and also the ideas of, you know, in the lineage of Shurobinu and the Mother, spiritual anarchy or divine anarchy is like, how do we really start to get towards collectively being in places where we can do the same thing that you were just talking about in terms of the planes and parts and awareness through the body with. Not only with ourselves, but then with another person, then with two other people, then with a hundred other. The thousands of people in Oroville, but then not only with that, but what about with the. The locals living there, what about with the government, whatever. And then it just keeps on going. And Sri Aurobindo and the Mother are saying, well, keep, keep going, because this is a. Infinite and it's a cosmic thing. So at this point, we're, We're. We're left with one of the biggest kind of problematics that we could ever imagine. And that's where I think on the highest level or on like the, on the intri. A work. It's like the imminent divine is that plane in which I think that is there needs to be an aspiration towards this just infinity upon infinity. The infinity has to keep on growing in a way, to use a paradoxical phrase to the mind. But we just, I think that aspiration to find a more inclusive or all embracing a more to. To use the correct word, integral plane of existence is really the question of, of how we can relate yogic practice from, and take it from traditionally what would be very strongly individualistic thing into the, the. The conditions of our times with Sri Aurobindo confronted as a, like, as somebody who was a colonized subject and looked for at yoga as a way to not only transform oneself but then to gain power and knowledge to overcome the forces of colonization and political hegemony. And so anyway, I'm just trying to. Now I'm bringing it right into a very different lens than we've been talking about, but that's where I guess my question lies. And your experience is so unique and so valuable in these questions because you, you've grown up in this experimental township, you've also traveled extensively and so being a really a world citizen in that sense, you have experience in lots of different cultural containers, in lots of different perspectives. And I just wanted your thoughts on how is it that we, on a cultural level, how is it that we can continue to find and to find language, to find practice that can, can. Can aspire towards even, even the aspiration to find a plane of existence like this must be just so challenging.
- [40:34]
Surya Mai Ashwini
Yeah, I find it, I find it so exciting. You know, I find it so exciting to just like, to just imagine that, that possibility. Because it is a possibility. It is absolutely possible.
- [40:50]
Jonathan
And,
- [40:52]
Surya Mai Ashwini
and yet at the same time, you know, sometimes it's just we're the world and you know, we, it's just, we feel so far from it and like there's just such a huge gulf, you know, between, between that and the realities that we see which can be really, really despairing. I mean, honestly, you know, what's happening in the world today. I mean there's, there's a lot of really. Yeah, very heavy, very heavy stuff going on. But in the midst of all that, there's also this possibility which is, which is a real possibility. And, and so yeah, I just, I just find it so exciting to, to, to imagine that, to visualize that. And I think very, very simply, you know, what I would say is, is the most effective thing is, is to Be able to, to practice it, to be able to, you know, find spaces and, and in communities. And when I say communities, I don't mean in a formal way, right? It can just be friends, it can just be, you know, even your family. I mean, it can be so many different, you know, assemblages in which, which that experience happens. Because I come back to this thing of, of experience. Experience is transformative. And when, when you have been transformed in that way or in any way, you know, you, you can't undo that. You can forget it. You know, you can sort of forget it for a while. That happens a lot, right? The whole like Maya thing, you know, you kind of forget and then you're back in spaces where it comes and you remember it again and, but it doesn't go away. And, and when that transformation has happened, then you have a reference point, you know, that that's possible in you and with others. You know it because you have lived it, you have experienced it. And, and I think that, that, that maybe that's why, why I feel so excited is because I, you know, I'm not saying that I experience it every single day, certainly not. But I have had moments where I have really experienced it. And, and I think the, actually the, the, the context in which I experienced it the most often have been an awareness through the body sessions. Because it is a practice that unlike a lot of other or most other, you know, awareness practices which often are more individual, you know, you're kind of like seated. You know, if you think of mindfulness or a lot of it is like very individual based and individual and inward based practices. You know, awareness for the body has this whole interactive component where you have both very introspective exercises but, but also very dynamic ones where you're basically acting out like a mini laboratory of what does it mean to remain in this conscience centered space. When I'm challenged, I want to maybe challenge physically. You know, we do these crazy parkours, you know, where you blindfolded, sometimes blindfolded, balancing a plate on a stick and you're going, you know, so like, what is it? What happens when I am challenged? Can I, can I withhold my center? And, and it'll be clear because that plate is going to fall off of that stick while I'm blindfolded on this, you know, rocking piece of wood. I mean, like it's going to be very obvious to me. So it's really this, or if I'm interacting with, with someone else in a group, in a group setting. So it's to me, that's the really unique and and, and very valuable part of the awareness through the Body practice is it is kind of like a mini lab for real life because you do have interactions, you do have challenges and you do have beautiful opportunities to connect with others in at very different levels of the being and actually be in interaction. Not like we're all sitting and meditating together and we feel that, which is wonderful, but this, they're actually, you know, we're actually interacting and, and creating those, those spaces. Of course I will be. Or not of course, but I will be teaching this online this semester. I, I have taught some ATB in person actually at the, at the CIS conference. Of course I've taught it in person in a lot of other places, but at CIS that one time and I do hope to offer it in more of a retreat format so it can be in person and all those aspects can be explored. This semester I'll be doing it online so it will be more individual based. But yeah, so. So to come back to your question, spaces where that can be experienced is what I think is the most transformative.
- [45:45]
Stefan Julich
I remember participating in the group that you ran in the conference and it was really wonderful. I still remember it even after. How many years has it been? Seven years? Something like that now. It was really wonderful work. I'm going to go out on a limb here too because you, the two of you together kind of brought some things to mind and I'm just kind of putting it together. So the mother talked about the transformation of the cells of the body. And she would say, oh, it's like you can convince one cell to transform, but then you have to move from that cell to the next cell and convince it to transform. And while you're working on that other cell, the first cell just kind of slides back. So then you go back and you say, no, no, let's get used. It's a little bit like spinning plates, you know, many plates, right. And she talked about how difficult this, this is. And then she, at some point in the agenda, she also talks about how it's the same thing within the community. Even in the ashram where people have come at a certain level of development, they're ready to surrender. And yet, you know, it's like when she's in conversation with one person, the transformation is there, it's taking place, but then she turns her attention to another student and when her attention is taken off of you, you just kind of snap back into your habituated patterns.
- [47:13]
Jonathan
So
- [47:15]
Stefan Julich
I'm also thinking about this Just in terms of the collective moment that we're in right now, in alchemical thought, in kind of traditional alchemy, what would you say the pattern is? Solva et coagula. Right. Things need to be broken down before they can be reunified at a higher level. And I wonder sometimes, maybe it's misplaced optimism, but I wonder sometimes if that's exactly what we're going through in our society. The mother herself, and this is a religious sentiment, and I recognize it as such, and it has to do with faith and even a certain amount of belief on my part that the mother kind of made a statement that she broke through the golden door and the supermental was now kind of descending. And she pointed out that many things were going to change in the future. And there's a part of me that says these changes are awful. They're not leading anywhere that's good. This is terrible what's happening. And there's a part of me that remains optimistic and has faith that the transformation that we're going through perhaps is something that we need to go through collectively because we're still mired in a very particular way of being, thinking, acting in the world that's tied to these recalcitrant bodies, that untransformed bodies that need to be. To use a kind of New Ageism, Their vibration needs to be raised in some way. And how does that happen? Because each individual has to make the choice to turn towards that transformative impulse. And yet I know when my attention is turned away, I just want to eat chocolate and watch tv. So it's really difficult to remain focused on it. And yet we also don't want coercion. So it's a dance that we're all involved in. But there's a part of me that feels like this is what we have to go through collectively in order for this transformation to take place. And it's painful. All transformation is challenging, and I would say painful because you have to let go of old habituated patterns that are no longer serving. But they're our anchor. They're what makes us feel safe. So I'm not sure if that made complete sense.
- [49:42]
Surya Mai Ashwini
Yeah, it made sense. It made sense. And you know, what. What comes to me and. And. And this is very, very personal. But when you, you know, talk about what's going on collectively and. And sort of understanding or being able to hold that nonetheless and with a positive light or with a positive hope, let's say. See, I personally find it challenging to do that in the face of these, like, really, you know, large scale situations. You know, let's say, you know, Trump is president of the United States right now, Russia and Ukraine, I mean, these are like such huge. You know, the scale of that is so, is so huge. And this is where for me, being in a, in a collective setting like, like Oroville, you know, with, with the incredible challenges that the community is facing now, there is a piece around, you know, there's fracturing the community at present. There's a lot of challenges that the community is going through. I personally have, you know, definitely, you know, I lack a lot of understanding of what is really going on for a lot of people in this situation. But at the same time, I also know a lot of the people in my community. I know the history of my community, community quite well. You know, I have had a closeness. I've had shared experience, shared, you know, learnings, challenges, projects with so many other community members. And that closeness, let's say that, that, that intimacy or that interwovenness that allows me to see or to sense at some level that what you, what you're describing, that this, like how this transformation might be necessary or what it might serve because I actually have concrete reference points for, for that. I don't know if it's, if it's clear, but I, I, let's say I know at least vaguely the experiences that that or the history that some of this is, is actually stemming from. So I'm able to somehow situated. I find it harder to do the further out it gets and the less I have direct experience with it. That's one thing. And the other thing around what you were sharing about, you know, staying, staying in that, in that vibration, let's say is again, the people that we, that we surround ourselves with, the communities that we surround, the friends the, the, that we surround ourselves with. And I think that the more the workspaces, you know, the colleagues that we surround ourselves with and I think the more we are surrounded by people who encourage and invite us to be our full selves, to, you know, to, to, to look at things in, in, in deep ways, to show up, you know, with authenticity and with sincerity and with, you know, discernment and, and, and openness and, and whatever other qualities, the more that is reflected and encouraged, the more we are going to actually be carried in that and the less of a struggle it's going to be to try to do that in a context that is not actually supporting that, not supporting us to show up in those ways. So I think that's also an important piece and it goes back to Jonathan, what you were saying earlier about this potential. And this possibility is, you know, those of us who are lucky enough to be in environments that uphold us in those ways, you know, I think, yeah, we. We're really lucky. And, and this comes back to what we're, you know, how. How. I think we open this conversation about the kind of environment that. That CIS is and the inclusive, the type of inclusivity that it. Or the breadth of inclusivity that it. That it fosters and how it really invites us to. To show up in our. With our whole selves. So I think these kinds of environments that really nurture us to. To. Yeah, to show up to our fullest potential, let's say, or at least along the way. Along the way of that is. Is. Is. Is very valuable.
- [54:14]
Stefan Julich
So, Jonathan, before I let you jump in, something else just kind of popped up for me, and that is that. But I find myself in conversation with people or in relationship with people, sometimes listening and being engaged and in a kind of a fluid state. Jonathan and I had a conversation with Connie Jones, one of our adjuncts, who teaches Krishnamurti and Bohmian dialogue, which is, for me, it's an ideal. Without having known really what Bohmian dialogue was, this is what my intention is in any conversation, that I have to really be on the guard, be on guard against bringing my own desires into the conversation because they very subtly begin to form the conversation so that I'm not feeling threatened. So we can have this conversation in a way, or I'm not getting bored, or however it manifests. And I have the feeling that that open dialogue, that open way of being with one another, where we're not imposing a belief structure, right, but we're actually engaging the other individual as they're manifesting before us. That seems to me to be the way that we're headed. But as soon as I start thinking in that way, then I'm also posing, imposing a belief. And this idea of moving to the supramental, if you want to call it that, whatever you want to call it, where we're moving beyond the mind is so tricky because if I think I want to move beyond the mind, it's my mind that's actually saying that. And it's immediately like behind the scenes, trying to manipulate the conversation or my interactions with other people so that it can. It can stay in charge very subtly by saying, I am not in charge. It's really, really complex. And I think that maybe that's where embodied practice comes in. Because you can't. In some ways you can't fool the body. I mean you can, but not in this way. The body knows basically you can feel when there's something's being imposed. I think.
- [56:31]
Jonathan
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. I was gonna respond to a bunch of what we've been talking about because what was coming up and what I'm hearing in your responses through my. And which is great because you're. I think you're really bringing some of the, some of the philosophical, the conceptual, but really insisting. Yeah, great. But what's the experience? What's the community that's gonna lead to that experience? And that's really like. That's kind of like the micropolitical I would call it is like in any one given space, any one given assemblage or ensemble of people, of couplings with technology, of others, of nature, of anything. It's like, okay, well how is it that this can be a space that can lead to experiences based on these goals? And that's such an important message. And especially I think in our times. And what was coming up for me was, was really. And when you were speaking was like, well, okay, those spaces are. And, and that kind of an approach is really, there's no place for fear. You cannot, you can't. And that's maybe a little bit of what Stefan, you were talking about in a different. Relates in a different sense. But it's like when we act out of fear, I don't think that we're really going to be getting into the kind of situations that are co creative that are explorative that, that, that really are going to allow for the kinds of integral transformation. It may lead to other kinds of transformation in a, in a, not in a. You know, in a transformation in very much like a kinetic sense of like, well now I'm not around that person because I'm scared of them or whatnot. You know, like that's also a transformation. But we're talking about transformation with a little bit, a lot more of an, an ideological idea behind it of like, well, we're transforming towards something. There's a soul calling or there's a soul essence that is guiding this. And I think that in our times there's a lot of people are. I mean, I definitely feel it where you're just caught in your phone too much or you're reading the news too much or you're not in those communities that you're. That give you experiences that aren't governed as much by fear, by the fear of the unknown, the fear of the other, the fear of what might be done to you. Now there's a lot of people that need to be scared of what might be done to them because of a physical. I mean that's part of what we have to also live with and try to overcome along with them. But I think that that kind of a fear approach, it might even have like now, now, let's, let's see where I'm going here. Is that what, what's kind of the root of utopian thinking? Maybe not necessarily fear, but at one point somebody said, I want a different world. There has to be the identification of like, I am scared of this outcome. There needs to be like some proactive like event or like some kind of a moment where you're going to then say, this is not what I want. And this is not what I would say is a reactive or a fear based thing, but really an affirmation of like, I can actually, I am that micropolitical site of cosmic power as Sri Aurobindo was experimenting and realizing in the jail in Alipur, for instance. Right. And that's, I think these experiences as you've been encouraging us to find and build for ourselves, I think that, that if we can continually do that. So on a micropolitical and almost like a microtemporal sense, every little moment is another moment to try to practice this. But as they build up, then it kind of starts to feel like, oh, okay, there's more power here, there's more knowledge of how these, how I can engage with others in space that can bring that affirmation, bring that surrender to something greater than yourself, dispel the kinds of, of fear that the mind can create based on whatever kinds of surface images that we might be consuming through digital, through media or whatnot, and really affirm this kind of like a movement of transformation of ourselves and everybody else. And so I think that we're at a time in history where we need more than ever this to happen, where people can stop and say, I don't want this, I want something else. And so utopian thinking is more relevant than ever. That's really where I'm getting to. And I don't think if it's done out of fear and it'll be reactionary, it will be a lot of what we, maybe what we've already seen in history, which is like, okay, let's agree upon things that we don't want with our minds. Let's make up a constitution or let's make up a judiciary System which sees every human as this, that sees everything as this. And this is really what I mean, this is not where Sri Rabindu and the mother's ideas are going to go because they're going to go farther. Taking us into what I had already said, spiritual anarchy, divine anarchy, which is not a place of representational democracy. It's a place that demands that moment to say hey, okay, fine, this can work. Maybe we need this to some degree. But the larger perspective, the utopian vision here is actually saying we need to overcome this in the same way we need to overcome the mind. Now if we to go back to way earlier what, what we're seeing in the polarization happen, a movement in the states is that people are anti intellectual and where are they pulling back to? Well, they're not going beyond it to say well what's an intuitive plane of becoming? What's, you know, what are, what are higher possibilities of positioning the rational mind. But finding other types of minds like Sri Aurobindo has helped us, given us that question. There's also a recoiling out of fear of like well I'm not going there. So you recoil back in almost a regressive sense. And so I think that's where, that's where this, this like this utopian thinking in our times can really, can really help us pull us towards a different future. Now I know this is very long winded, I apologize, but the question that I have here is how do we avoid the problems of what has kind of plagued utopian thinking in the past, which is kind of, I guess you could say more of the problems of a rational teleology that comes with how we organize the future. And again you'll have lots of history to draw upon and lots to respond to. But I'm just trying to bring out like, like utopian studies in a broader sense and the role of Sri Aurobindo and the mother's thinking and the integral in this way. And I, and this isn't, this is me. But in my studies I find that I've really been battling with the problems of teleology and how the mind is very much involved and we need other structures like we're talking complementary, we need like mandalas of, of integration where many parts can, can, can build a different, a vision or some kind of image of a future that's not going to have the baggage and the problems that rational teleology has led to. And I think this is where utopian studies, rather than being thrown out by a lot of people, the criticism the, the. It's not pragmatic enough. There's so many critiques of utopian studies. But, but it's also based on the premise that that's what it is, but that's not necessarily what it is. So to open this back up again and give it more life than ever in the context that we're in, this isn't where my thinking is going, but so interesting.
- [64:31]
Surya Mai Ashwini
First of all, I couldn't have said it better myself. Thank you for the thoughts you shared. And yeah, regarding your question, you know, I mean, some of the staunchest critics of utopia say the problem with utopia is at some point it can become the same thing as totalitarianism. Someone has said this is the perfect society. And anyone who is not happy with that, you know, well, we know, we know. We know what happens to them in that society. So that is, you know, that is, that is, that is the. One of the main critiques is if you, you know, predetermine it, it too much and say, well, we have thought it through and this is what it is and this is what it's going to be forever. And where, where, you know, the mother has this very different approach. And, and not just her, some other, you know, some other thinkers as well. Block, for example, is really interesting, Ernst Block in this, in this, in this regard as well, is saying, well, you know, you cannot, you cannot predict this. You cannot say this in advance. Why? Because if, if, if you're, if you're, you know, if your starting point is an evolutionary perspective, then your, your utopianism, let's say, or your utopian view is that, you know, humanity is going to involve, is going to evolve and people are going to evolve and we don't know what that next level of consciousness that they're embodying is going to, to, to, to reflect, is going to need around it to support it. You know, we're talking about environments that kind of support. Like, we don't know, we don't know what's going to be needed at that next level, in the level, level after that, and then the level after that. So there's very little that we can predetermine, actually, which is, you know, which rings so true. And then at the same time, that leaves a lot of these projects open to criticism of, well, you know, you're completely unpragmatic, like you were saying. And, and this is a distinction that I make, you know, in my, in, in my classes, in my work. There's a difference between alternative and prefigurative. Right? You can have you know, alternative this, alternative that. But are pre. To pre figure to me implies that there is maybe an evolutionary perspective is a bit of a. Is a bit of a. Of a long, you know, of a big ask for any kind of prefigurative practice. But there is a looking toward the future. There is a wanting. Wanting that next level of where we could be as a collective, of trying to bring that into. Into the present, of trying to reach towards that. Whereas an alternate. Whereas alternate. And, and some alternatives are pre. Figurative, but they're not all prefigurative. So sometimes, you know, you just kind of want to do things differently, but it doesn't actually mean that you are operating from an evolutionary perspective. So that's where to me this thing that's where, you know, in my work and where I call my class, you know, prefiguring utopian society is because it's not just about saying, well, you know, let's. Let's do eco villages or let's do that or let's. Let's just take a concept that we like and just do this. This. Which doesn't imply like a whole perspective and approach to, to humanity that is about our evolution and where we want to be as, you know. Yeah, as, as a species. Really.
- [68:10]
Stefan Julich
There's a, you know, in, in academy, in academic world, you'll often hear about a theory. Oh, that theory has been refuted. Right. This idea that it's been refuted. But then you have to ask yourself who, you know, who's doing the refuting and what, what is the purpose behind their argument? Where are they coming from? So when we talk about pragmatism, and pragmatism is a philosophy coming from John Dewey had a very particular, kind of. Had very particular roots. And those roots are in positivism and materialism and this idea that. That everything has to be provable, it has to have use and value, otherwise it's not worthwhile. One of my favorite anthropological theorists was a person named Marvin Harris who developed the. What did he call it? Cultural materialism. Is that it? And the idea that every decision that human beings have ever made throughout history has always been economic. And I think he even extended it to the animal world. We always make an economic decision. And I thought I read this and it was like a little bit like reading, you know, some behaviorism, like early behaviorism, like Watson or something, and saying, wow, this is really brilliant. This is a system that closes in on itself so wonderfully that you almost can't argue with it. You have to step outside of it and then to see exactly what it is that it's what it's underlying assumptions are. Utopia. The word actually means not a place. It's not a place. It's not a pragmatic solution. It's in some ways a state of mind or a state of being or becoming as we like to say here, that is completely open. It's open but not relative because it does require a certain type in some ways. I'm already closing in, but it, it requires a certain type of engagement or let's just say engagement, honest engagement, authentic. Where we started in this conversation, authenticity. It requires a level of authenticity that I think is precluded when we are operating from a fear based mentality or fear based mentality. I guess we can say when we feel threatened, our job is threatened, our religion is threatened, our belief systems are threatened.
- [70:44]
Surya Mai Ashwini
Makes me think of. And maybe we, we close on this. I don't know. How long do you want to go for? It makes me think of this concept of the sunlit path, right that, that I think it was the mother, not Srivindo, who, who described it in these terms, but that essentially when, when you follow, when you're in, you know, in the psychic being and the follow the psychic being that describes it as the sunlit path. So this thing of it not being, you know, fear based of it not necessarily even being or actually not being painful, but a really, you know, this, this level of, of authenticity and, and integrity that that one operates from that enables us to walk, you know,
- [71:31]
Jonathan
in
- [71:31]
Surya Mai Ashwini
that light, in that vibration, in that aura. Let's say, even though we might be walking through challenges and challenging spaces.
- [71:41]
Jonathan
And maybe that can bring us right back to the very beginning, which was an experience that you and I had to some degree coming into the space of cis, that just seems to tie it right back up to again just trying to find, find spaces and places and communities and others that to put these, these ideas into action and to, and to build them physically, not just ideologically or, or, or mentally, but really that's. I think that's what was definitely required. But thanks so much for being here. This has been a fantastic conversation. We're so lucky to have you teaching in the department. And we'll definitely have you back again to continue the, the discussions because these are definitely. It's just starting to heat up. Okay, well, thanks sir. Mai, until next time.
- [72:41]
Surya Mai Ashwini
Yeah, lovely to see you both.
- [72:43]
Stefan Julich
Yeah, I was lovely to spend some time with you.
- [74:09]
Jonathan
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