Benefit Dinner & RSI June 2008 On the 20th of June, Think Outword, a peer-led training in social threefolding for young adults based in the Berkshire/Taconic region, held a benefit dinner and auction at the Hawthorne Valley School to raise funds to send a group of young people to the Rudolf Steiner Institute to participate in a course with Nicanor Perlas on socially engaged spirituality. The dinner was a huge success; we raised close to $6000, which met our needs and surpassed our expectations. We would like to sincerely thank all who came and supported us. We were truly touched by the warmth, generosity, and enthusiasm of this community. Below is a brief reflection on the course written by Kristin Dalton:
“Think Outword was lucky enough to bring 13 young people up to the Rudolf Steiner Institute in July to work with Nicanor Perlas, a social activist and anthroposophist from the Philippines. The course began by drawing out our concerns, the things we would like to see changed in the world, and worked at wrapping our minds around the power and complexity these issues hold. We then turned our focus inward to ourselves and spoke of the qualities of a spirit-filled unifying experience, pure creativity, and worked with understanding that the world presents itself to us in ever changing contexts, and through pure thinking we can grasp the needs and conditions of each situation as it comes. We then began a journey of deconstructing ourselves and the world as we know it, of emptying the vessel in a way to gradually arrive at a kind of threshold from where our unifying, non-dual, creative moments are inspired. Then through courage, strength, equilibrium, and above all, selflessness, re-emerge back into the world with true knowledge of the power that lies behind our every deed. For our individual deeds do not just effect what lies in our direct environment, but also effect the whole, as long as our motive is the health of the whole. Through drawing most of the content out of the participants, Nicanor led us through an experience of realizing that we ourselves hold the answers to our most complex questions. It was extremely empowering and revealed the state of the world as something very serious but also something penetrable, changeable, if it is true that to the extent that we can overcome evil within ourselves we can overcome evil outside of ourselves. Then we can begin to see the world in a light where the tasks required of young people today no longer seem impossible.” Thank you to all who made this incredibly rich, transformative, experience possible for us. - Peter Buckbee on behalf of the Think Outword group
