workshop:inspired_people

inspired people

[note: This list is used to give presentations on inspired people and art-related topics]

Walter and Lao Russell

Chronology

  • Walter Bowman Russell (1871-1963), US
  • Lao Russel (1904-1988) (her original name was: Daisy Grace Cook), UK
  • married in 1948, together they wrote several books, and established the University of Science and Philosophy in 1957,
  • “Russell left school at age 9 1/2 and went to work, then put himself through (…) Art School.”
  • “In his youth, Russell earned money as a church organist and by leading small orchestras.”
  • “Might of the Ages”

    1900: At age 29, he attracted widespread attention with his allegorical painting “The Might of Ages” in 1900. The painting represented the United States at the Turin international exhibition and won several awards.

  • 1903: Russell had published three children's books (The Sea Children, The Bending of the Twig, and The Age of Innocence)
  • 1908: “Russell's rise in New York was immediate; a reporter wrote, 'Mr. Russell came here from Boston and at once became a great artistic success.' Walter Russell's careers as an illustrator, correspondent in the Spanish–American War, child portrait painter and builder (…)”
  • introduced ice-skating into the US
  • sculpting: …
  • 1921: Russell experienced a transformational, revelatory event that he later described in a chapter called “The Story of My Illumining” (“cosmic illumination”) (7x, but at the age of 49 for 39 days)
    • “Each year in May, year after year, came those ten or more days when I sought the forests to be alone with God. Each year I became slightly more aware of my purpose which I was to know fully in 1921. It was enough for the time that I was made aware of the fact that I must demonstrate tremendous versatility to prove to man that whatever he desired to do he could do. ”
    • “In one timeless flash I “knew all things.” All that I have ever written since then are but three dimensional extensions into a universe of time and space. It DID take time to think them into form and write them down but to KNOW all things was timeless. All of my chemical and astronomical charts were made before I knew the names of the elements or of stellar formations. Illumination into the Light means just that - for it is the Light of all-knowing, or the Light of love, which is manifested by THINKING God's all-knowing into complexities of patterned form. I instantly, and timelessly, knew the still magnetic Light which is the fulcrum of life and power, also I knew the heartbeat of the electric universe which manifests love, life and power in matter. ”
    • The “The Divine Iliad” was written down in 1921, but only published 23 years later (upon encouragement by Lao Russell)
    • “These 30,000 words of The Divine Iliad will last through all time. They are God's words, not mine, written through me. They are the essence of all-knowing, for which I have been prepared to translate in the words of man, for the books which will form the foundation for the new civilization, the first of those books being The Secret of Light.”
  • 1926: After five years of preparation, Russell was ready to challenge the field of theoretical physics with his new knowledge: “The Universal One
  • 1927: Elected president of the “Society of Arts and Sciences”
  • 1927: published The Russell Genero-Radiative Concept (1930) and defended his ideas in the pages of the New York Times in 1930-1931.
  • 1947: “The Secret of Light
  • 1949: “It will be remembered that no one who has ever had [the experience of illumination] has been able to explain it. I deem it my duty to the world to tell of it.” What was revealed to Russell “in the Light” is the subject matter of “The Divine Iliad”, published in two volumes in 1949.
  • 1957: “Atomic Suicide

Russelian cosmology concepts

  • LIGHT BALANCE (in all aspects of the universe)
    • Law of Balance” (or “the law of love”): rythmic balanced interchange
    • Two-way Universe” of gravitation and radiation. Gravity and radiativity are opposite pressure conditions.“
  • Examples:
    • astronomy (galaxy and star formation)
    • chemistry (structure of the periodic table)
    • geography (weather patterns, seasonal pole-ice formation, Aurora borealis lights)
    • biology (life and death, body symmetry, cell division)
    • psychology / social relations (intrinsic male / female traits, left/right brain hemisphere)
    • soul (desire and ideas for greatness, feeling of karmic (im)balance)

quotes

  • “We know the how of many things, but we do not know the why of anything. We do not know what magnetism is, nor gravitation, electricity, energy, light. If we knew the secret of light we would have all knowledge. If the coming centuries ever give us that secret of light, it will not come through the scientific mind; it will come through the inspiration of a poet, painter, philosopher or saint.”

M.C. Escher

Johann Sebastian Bach

    • play music from the Bach playlist
    • live performances:
    • Music theory concepts:
    • Quotes:
      • “I play the notes as they are written, but it is God who makes the music.” – J.S. Bach
      • “The aim and final end of all music should be none other then the Glory of God and the refreshment of the soul.” – J.S. Bach
      • “Bach's harmony consists in this melodic interweaving of independent melodies, so perfect in their union that each part seems to constitute the true melody. Herein Bach excels all the composers in the world. At least, I have found no one to equal him in music known to me.” J. Forkel (Bach's first biographer)
      • “One of the most extraordinary things about history's most extraordinary musician is the fact that this man's music, which exerts such a magnetic attraction for us today, against which we tend to measure much of the achievement in the art of music in the last two centuries, that this music had absolutely no affect on either the musicians or the public of his own day.” - Glenn Gould (pianist)

Nikola Tesla

Dhamma Brothers

    • “Convicted murderer Grady Bankhead described the retreat as, “tougher than his eight years on Death Row.” (wikipedia)
      • course description
        "For the first nine days there will be complete silence among the participants with each other. They should not communicate verbally, nor by notes, gestures or eye contact. Participants may speak to the Teacher for guidance at any time, and to the other meditation course personnel for any material needs."

        "The course requires hard, serious work. There are three steps to the training. The first step is, for the period of the course, to abstain from killing, stealing, sexual activity, speaking falsely, and intoxicants. This simple code of moral conduct serves to calm the mind, which otherwise would be too agitated to perform the task of self-observation. The next step is to develop some mastery over the mind by learning to fix one's attention on the natural reality of the ever changing flow of breath as it enters and leaves the nostrils. By the fourth day the mind is calmer and more focused, better able to undertake the practice of Vipassana itself: observing sensations throughout the body, understanding their nature, and developing equanimity by learning not to react to them. Finally, on the last full day participants learn the meditation of loving kindness or goodwill towards all, in which the purity developed during the course is shared with all beings." - [[http://www.dhamma.org/en-US/about/vipassana|source]]
  • meditation:
    • Samatha (stillness)
    • Vipassanā (insight / knowledge)
      • “Vipassana is one of the most ancient techniques of meditation. It was taught in India more than 2500 years ago as a universal remedy for universal ills”
    • Kriyā (action)
  • The Dhammapada” book: “The best of ways is the eightfold; the best of truths the four words; the best of virtues passionlessness; the best of men he who has eyes to see.”

Jesus

  • Jesus
    • related quotes:
      • “Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for the meat which endureth unto everlasting life”
      • “Be still, and know that I am God”
      • “Seek that ye may find, and knock that it may be opened unto you. For every one who seeketh shall find, and to every one who knocketh it shall be opened.”
      • “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now”
      • “It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”
      • “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee (…)”
      • “I and My Father are One.” - “What I am, ye also are” - “Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?” - “Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.”
      • “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.”
      • “A mystic is one who is more fully aware of the Light. He is the supreme genius. Jesus, the one mystic of all time, can never be exceeded, but he can be equaled. The end of the journey of man is to equal Jesus in full cosmic consciousness of the Light.” - W. Russell
      • “Jesus is not so much a problem to be solved as a mystery to be pondered.” - Rev. James Martin
    • film ”Jesus of Nazareth“ (1977) fragments:

John Muir

Andrei Tarkovsky

  • video: Cinema of the Soul (collage with Bach music)
  • video: Poetic Harmony (introduction) (15 min)
  • cinematic style "Tarkovsky developed a theory of cinema that he called "sculpting in time". By this he meant that the unique characteristic of cinema as a medium was to take our experience of time and alter it. Unedited movie footage transcribes time in real time. By using long takes and few cuts in his films, he aimed to give the viewers a sense of time passing, time lost, and the relationship of one moment in time to another. Up to, and including, his film Mirror, Tarkovsky focused his cinematic works on exploring this theory. After Mirror, he announced that he would focus his work on exploring the dramatic unities proposed by Aristotle: a concentrated action, happening in one place, within the span of a single day." - wikipedia * stream of thoughts in art and psychology * "In a 1962 interview, Tarkovsky argued, "All art, of course, is intellectual, but for me, all the arts, and **cinema even more so, must above all be emotional and act upon the heart.**" His films are **characterized by metaphysical themes, extremely long takes, and images often considered by critics to be of exceptional beauty.**" - wikipedia * "Several people involved in the film production, including Tarkovsky, died from causes that some crew members attributed to the film's long shooting schedule in toxic locations. Sound designer Vladimir Sharun recalled: We were shooting near Tallinn in the area around the small river Jägala with a half-functioning hydroelectric station. Up the river was a chemical plant and it poured out poisonous liquids downstream. (...) Tarkovsky died from cancer of the right bronchial tube. And Tolya Solonitsyn too. That it was all connected to the location shooting for Stalker became clear to me when Larisa Tarkovskaya died from the same illness in Paris.

De Oerakker

(van Ruurd Walrecht & Co)

“In Wildness is the preservation of the World.” - Henry Thoreau
  • intro:
    • insecten en planten soorten teloorgang
    • EU oer-zaad handelsverbod *
    • wat heeft een mens eigenlijk nodig? (water, voeding, huis, relaties, natuur?, …)
  • ruurd_walrecht.jpg “Ruurd Walrecht is an amateur gardener of Dutch origin, moved to Sweden where he has adapted to the local climate many varieties, including Dutch ones. But he is more than just a vegetable gardener as he has been interested in saving old varieties since 1960 and has also created a foundation in 1965 in Holland - De Oerakker - to save those old varieties.”
  • “In 1995 richtte Ruurd Walrecht Stichting De Oerakker op, met als doel om historische land- en tuinbouwgewassen als levend cultureel erfgoed te behouden.”
  • video: Eternal Mash (53 min), 2009

poetry intro

Truly fine poetry must be read aloud. A good poem does not allow itself to be read in a low voice or silently. If we can read it silently, it is not a valid poem: a poem demands pronunciation. Poetry always remembers that it was an oral art before it was a written art. It remembers that it was first song.” - J.L. Borges
The fact is that poetry is not the books in the library. Poetry is the encounter of the reader with the book, the discovery of the book.” - J.L. Borges
Come what come may, time and the hour run through the roughest day.” - W. Shakespeare

what is poetry?

  • What is poetry?
    • “Poems are collections of words that express an idea or emotion, that often use imagery and metaphor. (…) poems come in many, many different forms.”
    • “Poetry (the term derives from a variant of the Greek term, poiesis, “making”) is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and rhythmic qualities of language — such as phonaesthetics (euphony and cacophony, pleasant-unpleasant qualities), sound symbolism (“the idea that vocal sounds or phonemes carry meaning in and of themselves”), and metre — to evoke meanings (…)”

types of poetry?

  • “There are three main kinds of poetry: narrative, dramatic and lyrical. It is not always possible to make distinction between them. For example, an epic poem can contain lyrical passages, or lyrical poem can contain narrative parts.”
    • Narrative or epic: Bhagavad Gita, Gilgamesh, The Iliad, Homer, Beowulf, …, The Raven (spoken, info)
    • Dramatic (focus on the external, drama descriptions): “a formal type of poetry which expresses personal emotions or feelings, typically spoken in the first person. (…) it refers to any drama that is written in verse that is meant to be recited. It usually tells a story or refers to a situation. This would include closet drama, dramatic monologues, and rhyme verse. Examples of dramatic poetry would come from: Shakespeare. (…) Verse drama is particularly associated with the seriousness of tragedy. (…) In the second half of the twentieth century verse drama fell almost completely out of fashion”
    • Lyrical (focus on the personal perception): “a formal type of poetry which expresses personal emotions or feelings, typically spoken in the first person.” - “Lyric is a loosely defined term for a broad category of non-narrative, non-dramatic poetry, which was originally sung or recited with a musical instrument, called a lyre. Generally, lyric poets rely on personal experience, close relationships, and description of feelings as their material. The central content of lyric poems is not the story or the interaction between characters; instead it is about the poet's feelings and personal views.” - “The vast majority of poems written these days are lyrical verse”
  • more detailed structure lists: 1, 2
  • video: western poetry history (14min)
    • Shakespearean sonnet structure: example, paraphrasing: “There are fourteen lines in a Shakespearean sonnet. The first twelve lines are divided into three quatrains with four lines each. In the three quatrains the poet establishes a theme or problem and then resolves it in the final two lines, called the couplet. The rhyme scheme of the quatrains is abab cdcd efef. The couplet has the rhyme scheme gg. This sonnet structure is commonly called the English sonnet or the Shakespearean sonnet, to distinguish it from the Italian Petrarchan sonnet…”

listening tips

  • feel the poem:
    • freely render the imagery and concepts in your mind
    • hold multiple frames of composited-concepts in your mind
    • feel the emotional tensions of the frames and their rhythm
    • detect the important elements
    • ponder the deeper meaning… and your deeper meaning
  • unstructured and structured communication:
    • 'unstructured' voice-sound synthesis (primitive form of singing)
    • spoken words
  • goals: emotion expression, inspiration, enlightenment, consolement, protest, …
  • techniques: buildup, metaphors, contextualization, semantic accents, word-bending, …

poetry examples

  • ancient poetry
    • ancient India: Jain verses, Mahabaratta / Bhagavad Gita, Upanishads
een regenworm vliegt
in de snavel van een merel
richting hemel
  • rap: (see spotify)
  • see also: poet.tips (“find your favorite poets”)
  • poetry into song: Iceland heima, see also spotify poetry-playlist

Carl Jung

bio

    • “Carl Gustav Jung (1875–1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology. Jung's work was influential in the fields of psychiatry, anthropology, archaeology, literature, philosophy, and religious studies.” - “Jung was one of the first people to define introversion and extraversion in a psychological context. Jung’s approach to consciousness was fundamentally experiential.”
Jung maintained that the experiences described in the Red Book were the foundations of the distinctive theories of his analytical psychology (…) As Jung refined his analytical methods, he developed the themes he first explored in the Red Book through study of Eastern and Western religions, psychological phenomena without scientific explanation, mythology, alchemy and physics, and the dreams of contemporary women and men.
  • personal life:
    • solitary and introverted child
    • his mother's complex (depression, “night spirits”)
    • disappointed by his father's academic approach to faith
    • totem & stone ritual as a child
    • medical school
    • married Emma Rauschenbach (1903): “Enduring his infidelities and mood swings, she was his “intellectual editor” to the end of her life. After her death, Jung described her as “a Queen”. (…) At the time of her marriage she was the second-richest heiress in Switzerland.”
    • 1912-1930 The Red Book (pdf) (Jung's personal “individuation” through visions / fantasies / imaginations)
    • 1944 near-death experience (heart-attack)
      • After the illness a fruitful period of work began for me. A good many of my principal works were written only then. The insight I had had, or the vision of the end of all things, gave me the courage to undertake new formulations. I no longer attempted to put across my own opinion, but surrendered myself to the current of my thoughts. (…) It was only after the illness that I understood how important it is to affirm one’s own destiny. In this way we forge an ego that does not break down when incomprehensible things happen; an ego that endures, that endures the truth, and that is capable of coping with the world and with fate.”
  • historic context:
    • Colonialism
    • World War I
    • Freud
    • Travels

videos

psycho-analytics

    • “In Jung's theory, complexes may be conscious, partly conscious, or unconscious. Complexes can be positive or negative, resulting in good or bad consequences. There are many kinds of complex, but at the core of any complex is a universal pattern of experience, or archetype. Jung believed it was perfectly normal to have complexes because everyone has emotional experiences that affect the psyche. Although they are normal, negative complexes can cause us pain and suffering.”
  • “(…) a core pattern of emotions, memories, perceptions, and wishes in the personal unconscious organized around a common theme”
  • “Some complexes usurp power from the ego and can cause constant psychological disturbances and symptoms of neurosis. With intervention, it may become conscious and greatly reduced in their impact.”
  • “By ego I understand a complex of ideas which constitutes the center of my field of consciousness and appears to possess a high degree of continuity and identity. Hence I also speak of an ego-complex”.“
  • neurosis: “a mental and emotional disorder (unbalance) that affects only part of the personality, is accompanied by a less distorted perception of reality than in a psychosis, does not result in disturbance of the use of language, and is accompanied by various physical, physiological, and mental disturbances (such as visceral symptoms, anxieties, or phobias)” - “Jung found that the unconscious finds expression primarily through an individual's inferior psychological function, whether it is thinking, feeling, sensation, or intuition. The characteristic effects of a neurosis on the dominant and inferior functions are discussed in Psychological Types.”
  • Jung's theory of neurosis: “Jung's theory of neurosis is based on the premise of a self-regulating psyche composed of tensions between opposing attitudes of the ego and the unconscious. A neurosis is a significant unresolved tension between these contending attitudes. Each neurosis is unique, and different things work in different cases, so no therapeutic method can be arbitrarily applied.”
  • Transference: “It is common for people to transfer feelings from their parents to their partners or children (that is, cross-generational entanglements). For instance, one could mistrust somebody who resembles an ex-spouse in manners, voice, or external appearance, or be overly compliant to someone who resembles a childhood friend.”

individuation

  • Individuation: “According to Jungian psychology, individuation is a process of psychological integration. “In general, it is the process by which individual beings are formed and differentiated [from other human beings]; in particular, it is the development of the psychological individual as a being distinct from the general, collective psychology. (…) a process of transformation whereby the personal and collective unconscious are brought into consciousness (e.g., by means of dreams, active imagination, or free association) to be assimilated into the whole personality. It is a completely natural process necessary for the integration of the psyche. Individuation has a holistic healing effect on the person, both mentally and physically.” - “The symbols of the individuation process … mark its stages like milestones, prominent among them for Jungians being the shadow, the wise old man . . . and lastly the anima in man and the animus in woman.” Thus, “There is often a movement from dealing with the persona at the start … to the ego at the second stage, to the shadow as the third stage, to the anima or animus, to the Self as the final stage. Some would interpose the Wise Old Man and the Wise Old Woman as spiritual archetypes coming before the final step of the Self.”

archetypes

  • “Carl Jung understood archetypes as universal, archaic patterns and images that derive from the collective unconscious and are the psychic counterpart of instinct. They are inherited potentials which are actualized when they enter consciousness as images or manifest in behavior on interaction with the outside world. They are autonomous and hidden forms which are transformed once they enter consciousness and are given particular expression by individuals and their cultures. In Jungian psychology, archetypes are highly developed elements of the collective unconscious. The existence of archetypes can only be deduced indirectly by using story, art, myths, religions, or dreams.”
  • “Mind is the indescribable magic constant of the cosmos. The invisible source of: awareness, knowledge, desire, love, peace, inspiration, beauty, creativity, bliss, health, honesty, curiosity, playfulness, courage, discernment, discipline, perseverance, responsibility, empathy, gratitude, forgiveness, humor and more.”

synchronicity

other

  • Modern criticism: “Jung's ideas tend to be less discussed than those of Freud's, often because Jung's work tended to veer into the mystical and pseudoscientific. On the whole, Jung's archetypes have not been viewed favorably in modern psychology and are often studied more as a historical artifact than a major contribution to the science of the mind and behavior.” *

Lars von Trier

  • Lars von Trier (Denmark, 1956)
    • Communist, nudist, atheistic parents who did not allow much room in their household for “feelings, religion, or enjoyment,” and also refused to make any rules for their children, with complex effects upon von Trier's personality and development.
    • “Von Trier periodically suffers from depression, and also from various fears and phobias, including an intense fear of flying.”
    • “His work is known for its genre and technical innovation; confrontational examination of existential, social, and political issues; and his treatment of subjects such as mercy, sacrifice, and mental health.”
    • His film inspiration: ”The Perfect Human”, “The Night Porter
    • “Golden Heart Trilogy” together with “The Idiots” and “Breaking the Waves
    • “1964 in small town Washington state. Selma Jezková, a Czechoslovakian immigrant, and her preteen son Gene live in a rented trailer owned by and on the property of married Bill and Linda Houston, he the town sheriff. Beyond Bill and Linda, Selma has a small group of friends who look out for her, including her primary confidante, Kathy, with who she works, and Jeff who wants to be her boyfriend. Jeff regularly waits outside Selma's workplace long before the end of her shift to drive her home, despite she always refusing in not wanting to lead him on. Her primary job is working on the Anderson Tool factory assembly line, but she does whatever she can to earn money. What only Kathy knows among Selma's friends is that she is slowly going blind, her medical condition being genetic. Selma is barely able to see, just enough to do her job. Her primary reason for moving to the US and for working all the time is to earn enough money for an operation for Gene when he turns thirteen, …”
    • Bjork's “abuse” allegations
    • + lower quality stream (starting from 54th min)

Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

stages of grief

Any natural, normal human being, when faced with any kind of loss, will go from shock all the way through acceptance.

Quotes:

  • “The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of those depths.”
  • “Love is really the only thing we can possess, keep with us, and take with us.”
  • “People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.”
  • “Consciously or not, we are all on a quest for answers, trying to learn the lessons of life. We grapple with fear and guilt. We search for meaning, love, and power. We try to understand fear, loss, and time. We seek to discover who we are and how we can become truly happy.”
  • “It is important to feel the anger without judging it, without attempting to find meaning in it. It may take many forms: anger at the health-care system, at life, at your loved one for leaving. Life is unfair. Death is unfair. Anger is a natural reaction to the unfairness of loss.”
  • “Denial helps us to pace our feelings of grief. There is a grace in denial. It is nature's way of letting in only as much as we can handle.”
  • “Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself, and know that everything in life has purpose. There are no mistakes, no coincidences, all events are blessings given to us to learn from.”
  • “It is difficult to accept death in this society because it is unfamiliar. In spite of the fact that it happens all the time, we never see it.”
  • “Those who have the strength and the love to sit with a dying patient in the silence that goes beyond words will know that this moment is neither frightening nor painful, but a peaceful cessation of the functioning of the body.”
  • “It is not the end of the physical body that should worry us. Rather, our concern must be to live while we're alive - to release our inner selves from the spiritual death that comes with living behind a facade designed to conform to external definitions of who and what we are.”

architecture / city planning / landscaping intro

“We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us.” - W. Churchill

(todo)

  • examples:

Claude Monet

Vincent van Gogh

Viktor Schauberger

Inayat Khan

Renaissance

Hermes Trismegistus

Rudolf Steiner

Goethe

Federico Fellini

James Joyce

William Shakespeare

Osho

William Blake

Hilma af Klint

Peace Pilgrim (Mildred Norman)

Sri Aurobindo

Leonardo da Vinci

Joseph Wright of Derby

Tizian

Stanley Kubrick

Orson Welles

(todo)

Dante

Hellen Keller

Giordano Bruno

Auguste Rodin

Masanobu Fukuoka

Wilhelm Reich

Buckminster Fuller

Benoit Mandelbrot

John Lennon

Allan Watts

Bruce Lee

John Coltrane

Che Guevarra

Bob Ross

Rumi

Kahlil Gibran

Benjamin Zander

Dogon tribe

Tibetan yogi's

  • ”The Mountain Yogi“ (Pooye Lama Gomchen Milarepa)

Eric Laithwaite

Marshall McLuhan

Viktor Frankl

Sebastião Salgado

Joseph Campbell

George Carlin

Wim Hof

various ideas

  • color theory & color perception
  • various films / directors 1:
    • Kurosawa's 100
    • Tarantino
    • Scorsese
    • David Lynch
    • Werner Herzog
    • Woody Allen
    • Wes Anderson
    • Luis Buñuel
    • Roger Ebert
    • Susan Sontag
    • Scorsese
    • video: Agnes Martin
workshop/inspired_people.txt · Last modified: 2021/11/06 00:54 (external edit)

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