Passion, Creativity, and Grandchildren: Redefining Education (Encouragement: Creativity II)5/10/2017 Encouragement: Creativity (II). There are two parts?! Really?! How much could anyone possibly write about creativity? Volumes upon volumes, because creativity is part of the makeup, the constitution, essence of a human being. Everyone.
I mentioned this morning that we have been blessed with another granddaughter. When I held her earlier today, savoring that sweet pure infant scent, watching her little covered hands flailing, her little mouth sucking, just beginning to sense her way in this world, I wondered about her life journey. I quietly blessed her, that she would grow up with the knowledge of her own Heart always being there and that she will discern that and experience the joys of living in this physical world with minimal Ego distractions. And I thought of how creative children are from a very young age. I have seen their inventiveness and ingenuity in my own children and grandchildren as well as many others. In education, I observed younger students. Brilliant, curious, meaning-making kids. Kids who can use building blocks and balls and dolls and tools for things adults never do. And most adults overlook such genius — because Ego expectations have conditioned them to think in set society expectations about common objects. How does this happen? In large part it occurs when formal education begins, from preschool through college, including doctoral programs. I know. I saw it. I taught from seventh through twelfth grades, and I saw something else in the several thousand students I have had over the course of twenty-three years in education. Middle schoolers were much more creative, innovative, and curious than high school students, especially seniors. Don’t misunderstand me: I valued, cared for, and sought to evoke the greatness from any student I was privileged to have in my class. What do I mean, then? That when I helped students develop their own curriculum, the younger ones engaged with enthusiasm and produced work that I still remember years later. Eventually, seniors would work, but not all and most not with the same enthusiasm. Of course, exceptions occurred. However, the longer I was in the public school system that dove headlong and increasingly deeper into the standardization crazy pool, the worse it got. The last year I did the emergent curriculum with seniors was the last year because of the response I received. Three of my six classes actually, in one version or another, told me, “Mr. DePung, we really enjoy your class and the things you teach us. Just tell us what we need to know.” If you are an educator and think that’s okay, either learn or quit. It is not okay. They did not have the intrinsic motivation to learn on their own. Sir Ken Robinson has written extensively on creativity, having been an educator and holding a doctoral degree. He also has one of the most viewed TED Talks in all of their history. He knows whereof he writes, and he says this: “Creativity is as important as literacy.” If anyone can read but they cannot develop passion about what they read, if they cannot connect their passions to other things they have read, then they cannot create new knowledge. Education should be about creating new knowledge. It should not be about absorbing old knowledge and being tested on it. Tests are pretty much worthless. Creation is everything, because we are creators. Ego squashes that because Ego says conform, in virtually everything on a societal scale. Educational institutions provide pristine material for studying Ego operating on a corporate level — well, not as excellent as politics, but those politicians were all programmed in school. Fortunately, many people awaken to the greatness of Heart and creativity of core Self, but we live in society and should be aware. Robinson calls for a transformation of education. I’m not sure if I dilate his idea or constrict it when I claim education needs to be redefined. It is not about inputting knowledge. It should be about pulling out the essence of an individual, evoking all that brilliance within each one from birth. That means education should include environments in which students may engage in discovering Self and following and developing passions they entertain. Robinson says this in his excellent work, The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything: “The key to this transformation is not to standardize eduction, but to personalize it, to build achievement on discovery of the individual talents of each child, to put students in an environment where they want to learn and where they can naturally discover their true passions.” Do you hear that, those of you who are deceived policy-makers? Standardization is not education, no matter what words or frameworks you use to veil it. Yes, methods exist to implement such ideas. I want my grandchildren to experience education as a process of creating knowledge, of developing creativity in any passion they choose to follow. I don’t know where their formal education will be, but I know what their grandfather will be doing in the time he spends with them. And I would encourage you to do what I have done. Watch the babies, the toddlers, the preschoolers. Re-learn what on the spot passion does: it creates focus and innovation. And then you may be able to understand what a real educator should be doing. Blessings, and remember to make connections with the knowledge you collect, and create something new, something that only you can offer to the rest of us for further blessing.
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Tonight, instead of speaking about encouragement abstractly, I want to be an encourager. I would like to encourage you, my friend, to live creatively, to exercise creativity, to create something new, at least new to and for yourself.
Why would that matter? I mean, really, how would doing something only for yourself fall into the category of creativity? Of course, we all value creativity and creative abilities and expressions, don’t we — visual, creative, and performing artists, the whole entertainment industry, creative innovations of scientists, engineers? Yes, we do. Most of us at some point long to be able to create, and here is why: we, core Self, Heart, are eternal Sprit, the Spirit who is the Creator of all, the Spirit who in the biblical portrayal metaphorically brooded over the darkness and depths until creation occurred. Brooded like a hen over her eggs. Protected, nurtured, warmed, encouraged until creation hatched forth. We, then, have this essential drive and desire to create because that is our basic identity, my friends. Have a guess as to why we don’t live that out here? That’s right. Ego. Ego would keep us from living Heart and creating Purpose. Heart purpose, life purpose, will be creative because it will express Spirit here. It will promote interaction, connections, and unity. Remember, Ego is all about isolation and safety, whether that comes through superiority or inferiority. Ego doesn’t much care for equality. If we come to know core Self, we are going to brood over our lives until we find a way to create. And that is what I would encourage you to do. Acknowledge and speak to the real you. Take inventory of those interests, passions, dreams, talents. Know that anything you want is within yourself to create. You will create whatever you wish to allow yourself as a personal, human expression of eternal Spirit to experience. List out the Vision. Plan the goals. Don’t allow Ego to attach itself to a certain form — sidetrack tactics. Be open to miracles, magic, and the unexpected, but know that you will in one form or another create your envisioned reality. Work it, live Heart, and don’t stop moving in the power of your Purpose or the direction of your Vision. Don’t. Stop. For anything or anyone once you know Self and have created purpose. Create little manifestations of that big creative vision every single day. It could be anything of thousands upon thousands of things. Creation is NOT, by a long shot, limited to the arts of any kind. In fact, there are no limits to creation: a mechanic, a sales clerk, a teacher, a nurse, a sanitation worker, lawyers. No limitations! Keep learning. I continue to do so. Keep growing and expanding in your journey of awakening. The more we learn of the power and essence of Heart, the more confident we become. We grow more willing to accept, move through, and find solutions to challenges, challenges that Ego would use to make us “come to our senses.” I have more to say about creativity, but for tonight I want to encourage you to trust yourself, your true Self, the one that thrives and thrills at expressions of love, light, peace, passion, and discovery. Pay attention to the times when those responses emanate from your soul. You are your own best teacher and the only one who can learn for you. Blessings, you creative souls! I work hard to keep things simple because my own thoughts can get complex. It’s something I help students do all the time — unpack their ideas and ensure logical flow. Just good writing principles.
Why bring this up tonight? Last night I wrote about the relatively simple concept of encouragement. Here are the sort of ideas that pop into my mind: distinguish between intrinsic and extrinsic encouragement; Heart or Ego energy; reasons we need encouragement; types of encouragement. And maybe more, but this is enough! This whole writing journey, which I chose, created, and am pursuing, resulted from coming to know myself, which I won’t re-explain here. It started with a volume of poetry that was the first of a series of seven. I started the second, but then the novel started working and churning in my mind and soul. I wrote it and revised and submitted it to an editor and started rewriting it — still doing that. However, I learned a little bit about publishing and publicity and marketing while I was doing all of this through St. Louis Publishers Association as well as a savvy young friend who followed the likes of Gary Vaynerchuk. This put me in a mindset to attract other resources that have helped. Extrinsic encouragement works when it resonates with my Purpose and Heart. Intrinsic encouragement has come in the form of my own work. It seems really scattered in some ways, but the reality is it all harmonizes. I read material I wrote years ago, and I don’t remember writing it. However, it is so thematically consistent with my current work that I’m blown away. Intrinsic encouragement from my own being bears me up, and confirmation comes by my own Heart. This has been especially evident over the past fifteen months. I purposefully set out to build an audience, a base, a tribe, with whom I could share my work. I have never worked so intently on any one project for such a prolonged period — no days off, no breaks. It has become second nature to me in some ways, but I definitely challenge myself by doing this daily blog, the earlier informal Pages, and then, usually, a shorter picture type post that disseminates from Instagram. I currently use five social media platforms. The responses from readers and followers serve as another form of extrinsic encouragement. All of my work revolves around the theme of Self-discovery of that part of us who is the genuine deal, eternal Spirit, Heart, and the evidence of those who live their Heart in this illusion of time and space. And that is one reason I require encouragement. The more I understand my essence is Spirit, the more I understand that only a minority even care about it, and the more I understand that governance, business, and institutions of life operate via Ego, then the more I need encouragement. When I Ego-evaluate where I am right now, it appears fruitless — financially and even in terms of life impact. At those times I start Ego-drifting that way, I muster up my Heart to fellowship with because I need strong intrinsic encouragement. And then when I come across responses and encouragement from those walking in their personal truth and Heart-purpose, I receive a double whammy of extrinsic encouragement vibrating at the frequency I need. And I am so filled with gratitude when that happens. Ultimately, though, without intrinsic encouragement of the validity, beauty, majesty, significance, and blessing my work is, the extrinsic would only be used by Ego to further derail me. I would appreciate extrinsic encouragement, though, and blessing to at the very least publish my short book that I hope reduces my practical philosophy to the least common denominator in order that it may be a great uncommon encouragement to readers to help them discover Self and answer those questions: 1. Who am I? 2. What will I create as my Heart-purpose in being here? As I mentioned at the beginning, this is a challenge for me to simplify. How do I simplify an idea, a concept, that explains the disposition of the behavior and history of humanity, both individual and corporate? Well, to me, if it’s applicable, workable, logical, it does not require volumes for the basic explanation, so I’ve kept it short — like 11,000 words or so. If it’s a useful, practical philosophy, it should contain a clear explanation understandable to any reader. Hey, I know the facts and figures about book sales and all that. I need encouragement to finish and continue so that I may express eternal Spirit here. And I hope in the process, I bless and encourage many. I truly enjoy engaging in the fellowship of the Heart with those living their own truth. Till tomorrow, blessings and encouragement! We are social creatures, and social creatures need encouragement. I know I do, at least. Maybe need is too strong a word; I want encouragement. In fact, I’m pretty easy with just a little bit of it!
It wouldn’t be so easy these days to sway or influence me with encouragement, though, simply because I know the worth of what I am doing to myself and for myself. I know my work has value to the Universe, but it sure in the hell is nice to hear a fellow creature tell me what I’m doing means something to them. Is that Ego? Maybe my desire to hear such things are; however, encouraging someone else, if it is sincere, is a Heart function. Merriam-Webster, in part, defines “encourage” as “to inspire with courage, spirit, or hope” or “to spur on” or “to give help or patronage to.” As social creatures in a time-space dimension of illusion, we all need some form of encouragement. As mortals bearing eternal Spirit as Heart in this same plane of existence, we all have the ability to give and offer Heart-encouragement. So, yes, I want to enjoy, to feel, and to know encouragement that inspires me to have courage in the face of challenges, spirit in the sure arising of despair, and hope to bolster my faith. I won’t quit writing, influencing, or encouraging others to discover until and unless my Heart makes it clear Vision has been realized and Mission has been fulfilled. Along the way, I am quite sure what I am doing on a day to day basis is not only fun, fulfilling, and significant for living the reality of eternal Spirit through this mind-soul-body complex, but also it means something to fellow human beings. And in a real way, that is encouragement enough from my own Heart, and it has been many times over the last fifteen plus months, specifically, and for the last six years, generally. In some ways it’s cyclical. Encouragement inspires me to continue working my Purpose, my Vision, and Mission to encourage others. Roy T. Bennet is an author who published an ebook, The Light in the Heart (which you may want to purchase through Amazon — highly recommended!), and in his wisdom, he writes, “When you encourage others, you boost their self-esteem, enhance their self-confidence, make them work harder, lift their spirits and make them successful in their endeavors. Encouragement goes straight to the heart and is always available. Be an encourager. Always.” That’s only true if you wish to bless others. That’s a hallmark of Heart-energy. This new week, being an encourager could end up being an encouragement to you. Being an encourager promotes love, self-awareness of those you encourage, and higher life energies. This week is a good week to allow our own Heart to encourage us. Take that encouragement and bless others with it, and then, allow the blessings to flow to you. In a letter, Johann W. von Goethe, in his insight said, “Instruction does much, but encouragement everything.” My experience teaching proved this to be true multiple times over. When I felt a student just wasn’t getting something or wasn’t motivated, a few words of honest encouragement turned disengaged students into aspiring writers, communicators, or teachers. I can tell you those students who received encouragement to their Hearts truly encouraged me. Be of good cheer! When I recorded some random musings earlier today, I didn’t know where they might lead or how applicable they would be to anything. The underlying thoughts were, and are, these: If great truth comes to be discovered, articulated, and shared, will people respond to it? How many will care? Will enough care to embrace it and allow it to inform their lives in one way or another, depending on the discovery?
After my trying week, I have considered how significant my truth has been to me. In the past, I would have run, in one way or another. My spiritual awakening and realization of Ego and Heart being part of my total being has led me to share the greater implications of who and what we are as human beings and our purpose for being here. Computer problems aside, I didn’t run from that! There is a unifying force, dynamic, charge, and discharge of energy common to all of physical creation: biological, organic, inorganic, and the sentient. That essence of all is eternal Spirit, the creator-force of all. I have been primarily concerned with how that force represents in humans and humanity. I have called its presence in us Heart, and Heart acts as an operating system for our mind-soul-body complex. When we allow that with our sentience and cognizance, we are in concert, harmony, flow with the Spirit of all things, with the Universe itself. However, we come with another operating system as a sentient being. That default system is Ego. If we don’t choose Heart, then Ego will be operating, sometimes modified by Heart impulses. There is a curious blend of those two within us, but I speak of predominant energy. The interplay, paradox, and opposing dynamics of Ego and Heart explain the total structure and state of individuals, societies, nations, history, and humanity. That’s a pretty big idea to me, and it’s one that allowed me to persist and grow through this challenging week, even though I am exhausted. Before I share another application of this principle of what I have called the Grand Unified Theory of Humanity, I want to emphasize that not choosing Heart and allowing Ego operation is not wrong or some sort of sin. It will, however, if left unchecked, lead to loss of joy, sense of purpose, reason for existence, and a host of other things. And when Ego-energy drives lives, the effects of that keep rippling across individuals and, ultimately, is seen in corporate representations of humanity. I believe the worst evils happen when people consciously reject Heart energy and principles and embrace Ego. Today, communications about such spiritual realities that impact everyday life abound. Yet the majority of folks allow Ego to operate their lives by making decisions, choosing feelings, and taking action based on Ego’s shielding, isolating, and self-adulating functions. It just feels good and offers quick fixes based on immediate situations, and such fixes definitely take no accounting of the realities of Spirit working in and through all the Universe. Such responses lead to lives of mediocrity, because when we don’t align with Spirit in ourselves, we will miss out on the big picture, something that we all at our core long to co-create and be a part of with others. And when enough individuals settle into such a mindset and soul reaction, corporate entities of humanity take on shallow, unfulfilling, and self-absorbed characteristics. I will give one example of this, because if I had the inclination or time, I could research and write complete volumes and series on businesses, governments, religions, and various organizations throughout history that are characterized by Ego-energy. By way of application, earlier today I saw a headline by the Associated Press online: “Protections for 27 national monuments may be curtailed, cut.” The article details the current massively Ego-dominated administration’s efforts to give control of twenty-two monuments and the surrounding massive acreage back to states. Then, there are five marine sanctuaries included in Trump’s order. The Department of the Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke is working on it. Why is this reflective of the principles I have been discussing? Maybe it sounds noble — Ego will always rationalize even immorality — to give control back to states; however, the reality is the desires for reclaiming and snatching the lands out of protected status is that, according to Republicans in Utah, “the monument designation will stymie growth by closing the area to new commercial and energy development.” This is an Ego response because it exposes the gluttony and desire for ease at the cost of Nature and our environment. Most of us are not willing to wait for newer technologies to be developed that have manageable impact, renewable strategies for Earth. Most oil industry production has no renewable, recoverable ways of replenishing or healing the blights it produces. Other ways exist or are waiting to be developed, innovated through the work of those who would live their own Heart truth. Oh, maybe I should explain that the million acres of land the Republicans in Utah are scheming to grab back are lands “sacred to Native Americans and home to tens of thousands of archaeological sites, including ancient cliff dwellings.” Disregard of the rights of such cultures that have been trampled for five hundred years reveals Ego operating through an oligarchy of fascists. (Yes, look up the definition: it fits.) The intent is so obvious it’s almost laughable to try and justify it with blubbering, inane, stupid words about choice and giving control back to the people. It’s all, according to the Utah Republicans themselves, to give the lands away to the oil and gas industry in return for political support, the perpetuation of power, wealth, and control, hallmarks of Ego-energy. These traits permeate Ego-oligarchies. I do not know the outcome of this, even though I suspect some do. This is a matter of shedding Heart-light on Ego-darkness. It’s the nature of the two operating systems. This one instance of political machinations illustrates the Heart-Ego operating systems in action as they expand from individuals to a larger corporate context. And it could be repeated in examining the social, political, and economic development of humanity throughout history. And it brings me back to this: Does this matter to some? I know most of a population will not respond quickly to new perceptions, but many with whom I am in contact have the hope I do that increasing masses will awaken to Heart, to Spirit within, and live full and significant lives of Heart-purpose, exploring, discovering, creating, and developing the beauty of the Universe in the confines of these mortal lives. Blessings, my friends! |
Questions to consider:How many times have you asked yourself or simply thought about the following questions?
Who am I, really? What is my truth? How do my actions reveal what I really feel and believe? What would I do with my life if I could do anything? What is my passion? Why am I here? How can I discover answers to any of these questions? If you have considered any of these questions, I hope that my experiences and writing will give you some guidance. Please read my blog and comment and share your thoughts. I would love to hear from you! Archives
December 2019
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