Thank you for coming to an Optimist’s Path through Cynicism. This podcast is going to start with the theme that peace is possible on the premise that we have to start believing in peace before it's going to be possible to start solving the particular problems of peace.
So my story begins in south central Colorado at my studio, where I have lived for 20 years up until about five years ago. And this podcast is going to be broken down into four sections and I'm going to start with me talking on my walks in south central Colorado at the studios of Midi Age Production, where I live for 20 years. And then I am going to introduce you to my father, and my father was a peace activist and had a great influence on me. And so we will have Reflections on my Father the Reverend, and following that I want to introduce you to Machai St Rain who is out there on this premise that peace is possible. So the first thing we're going to do is introduce you to my story from the walks in south central Colorado at the studios of Midi Age Production.
SEGMENT 1
So, an optimist’s path through cynicism. First, this declares I'm an optimist. Second, it declares that I'm traveling through cynicism. And in four-dimensional space, it assumes I'm moving through it in time. My process involves really trying to find a way to pull myself out of cynicism and just a lot of depression with finding out that the world isn't as optimistic as I thought it was, and that we're not all trying to work within the same common value and framework that I was raised to thing was just about being a person, it just seemed second nature to me. And I discovered that that's not true with everyone, that we have a lot of different ways of, of seeing things and that every person is kind of a center of their own universe and we all have our own perspectives. And being able to acknowledge each other's perspectives, to be able to be respectful to each other for whatever our sense of things are, and not listen to those who would want to put us into categories and stereotypes and certainly trying to miscategorize who we are as a people, and where do I plug into community.
And the community that I first started plugging into, of course, is the juggling, and discovering the Renaissance Festival, which gave me, you know, a lot of creative training for, well, theater in a lot in a lot of ways. Certainly there are other activities like Braver Angels, and the work that we do with that, that also needs to be done. We need to find all the different ways that we can support peace, all the different ways that we can find to support healing. That telling our stories heals us and others, and my story is An Optimist’s Path through Cynicism and the juggling. And actually, the juggling is tied into The Wizard’s Fool with Sebastian and the blessed fool. All these traits that I embodied in this jester character I do as a professional juggler. Really, it's about supporting peace, right. It's supporting ways of building community, and like going out to a social dance, juggling clubs brings us together and juggling itself is a lot like a dance.
I have something to bring out into the world. If I can pump myself up, if I can use that experience as an actor… not an actor so much as a performer. As this character that I've developed in the story that I'm putting together that represents everything that I feel about humanity's potential, and where we've gone wrong, and fractured our own spirit, fractured our own community. How do we get back to that? This is what the story The Wizard’s Fool is about. It includes this vision of bringing the arts into the world, into our communities, as a way of learning to get to know each other, or just having shared experiences and the opportunity to get to know each other one-on-one.
What's going on in the world is going on right here, out of these eyes, and the eyes that are looking at this video right now. And we need to get together and be okay with each other. And that there's no reason that I need to be afraid of what most others are doing right? Most other conservatives, or other religious people, or most other… whatever you want to put in there, whatever you're afraid of; other hippies are doing… the hippies, oh, gotta be afraid of them, you know. The hippies say, “Oh, the man,” you got to be afraid of them. And we're all just pointing fingers and doing what human beings seem to do, which is creating an “us” and “them”, right? Our tribe, our culture, has value over their tribe, their culture. And when you take that to an extreme, you make them into something other than human beings, and then it's okay to go kill them. And we've got to get away from that mentality. And the insidious thing about all of that is, is it's so subtle that most people aren't aware of their own motivations, or the motivations of those who are there listening to. And that whole idea of intention, again, being a critical component of, of how we make decisions and who we're following, is really important.
And I believe that's where an optimist path through cynicism comes in. And an optimist path through cynicism is that… how do we grow into not being afraid, not following down that path of cynicism, and instead nurturing optimism, right, it's like, which Wolf thrives? Well, the one you feed. We need to feed our optimism and just be more aware of our cynicism, and put it aside, deal with whatever problems that we’re cynical about, and just stay optimistic. And I think one way to do that is to go do fun things with other people. And this, I believe, is where both the idea of doing the full immersive multimedia show goes into, and the Juggling for Mind/Body connection comes into.
It's easy to stereotype what kind of person is out here, and if you got other people telling you, “oh, the people out there are…” and then fill in the blank, and usually it's not good, and you should be afraid of them.
And why do people do that?
And it seems like it's, I mean, I know why politicians and the people with the power and the money, do it. I mean, they're manipulating us. And ultimately, our response to that has to be our education, our self-growth, and our ability to grow community and talk to each other one-on-one. And I have a real distinction between the people on the ground the people who are us, and the people who are representing us in our political structure. And there are so many misconceptions and misunderstandings, it's so easy to just throw up your arms and not know what to do. And I think that's too easy of a response: “oh, I don't know what to do” because largely, I do know what to do, and in a lot of ways I'm doing it!
But if we just understand more from the background of things, where people are coming from, I mean, not only what they believe, but why they believe it, and how they came to believe it. And that comes so much with culture of, of what we're around and what we're raised with and what media we consume, actually. And we've got to be careful about what media we consume, or at least be thoughtful that there are a lot of people out there, a lot of messaging that really goes to the root of our own fears, of our own psychology, of our own biology. And I believe that Juggling for Mind/Body Connection, as with jugglers for peace, as is my music and my desire to do the multimedia stage show and this fictional story of The Wizard’s Fool and this coming together of spirits into one again, of reuniting, I mean, this whole thing all has a centralizing theme to it.
So I guess I've said everything that needs to be said for now and the journey continues in all its forms. So I will end with my salutation of Peace and Love and let's support healing in all its forms.
SEGMENT 2
My dad was a Unitarian Universalist minister from my first memories, and I grew up with the values of a Unitarian Universalist minister and a Peace Activist. And this is an excerpt where he's talking about the history of the church and looking at where the church is growing. So I'm, in a way, I'm kind of taking this out of context, but I think this is key to the point that he makes as a minister, but also as a peace activist. And in my own reflection of what the lessons I learned from hearing sermons like this in my life, that that this is an important lesson because it asks us to question our memory of history, of our own history, of our collective history, and to be more thoughtful about the future. So with that, here's my father, the Reverend Robert Bob Eddy.
“Know your history, but don't be enamored of it, or limited by it. Now, there's a difference between real history and what you're likely to see in your high school history textbooks. That version of history was written by the victors and is filled with errors and disinformation and deletions. It's a form of fiction. But there is a real history, the way things really were. And that's the history that will help you while looking back to move forward. But again, a caution. Don't try to learn from recent history. Go back a decade or two, or as we'll do this morning, five.”
So my dad was a peace activist for sure, and I got a lot of that and I have to admit that I think my Preacher Kid genes are starting to kick in, and my need to do some public speaking and to help other people create art through, you know, to create meaning in their art through a message of their choosing. In my mind right now is that optimism is worth pursuing and this is so closely related to that peace is possible.
SEGMENT 3
Machai St Rain is someone I met here just a couple of years ago and I am just so thrilled to introduce to you Machai St Rain on her latest campaign. I mean, she's been in Bloomington, Indiana for as long as I've known her in the last couple of years. And she before that did some really incredible things out in the world. And so now Machai is doing these peace tours and is going to be going to Times Square for International Peace Day, and I love what she's doing with her peace flags. And it's the stringing them together that is growing a longer and longer visual presence of these peace flags, of people one by one writing out, it becomes a visual manifestation of what we are actually trying to do: that we are not alone and we are able to grow this idea and these movements and make real change in the world.
MILES: Hey Machai St. Rain. Machai, ever since I've known you you've been trying to build one tight knit community. What community are you building now? What community are you putting together?
MACHAI: Watersong Peace Circle, which is a community of people who want to come around, come together around the concept of healing themselves and others and the earth, especially through sound healing. When people actually stand in their power, then the whole machine just grinds to a halt. And like by Buckminster Fuller said, the best way to create a better future is to make the old thing obsolete. And so living in a peaceful, sustainable world is so such a no, no brainer, you know, it's such a no brainer. It's such a… Living in a peaceful, green, verdant sustainable world where there is equality for all people and plenty of food and water is totally within our reach and within our doing given the technology and the huge leaps in technology that we've had in the last 100 years, and even in the last 10 years, what is happening on Earth is absolutely pivotal.
So I think one of the very first things is that we can achieve nuclear disarmament. You know, there was a treaty signed, and now those countries have just now begun to… they just had their first meeting in June on what would be the process for nuclear disarmament. So I think that as citizens of the world, we need to let our leaders and let people know that we are paying attention, we do care, we do want nuclear disarmament. And, um, I think that we have to remember that, you know, research has shown that non-violence is a growing force for social change, and that it is even more even more effective than violent revolt, given the Harvard study that was done.
So I think, um, with each individual person, you know, being able to anchor into their source, you know, Source Energy is infinitely creative. You know, just look at the incredible diversity of life, you know, it's infinitely creative. And just like I was talking about those rituals before, when we open ourselves to that unknown, you know, open ourselves and we, we step into the possibility of this new day and we stay awake through the day, we keep doing these little rituals, or little things, little meditations that keep bringing us back to this moment into this moment. And when you are living in this moment, and you are able to tap into your real true core, divine joy, it feeds you, and life is magical. And the thought of doing something like nuclear war is so far past absurd.
What is it really important at this time right now is that we are moving into the time of the individual coming into their own, each of us coming into our own personal power and responsibility to give back what we are given, you know, those divine gifts flow out, and then are received back and when we're living in that flow, life is so magical, and you have just no idea what's going to happen. I think the United Nations is a good start. The treaties we have for Nuclear Disarmament are a good start. The worldwide knowledge and understanding that is being passed around now about mindfulness and manifestation and understanding your own spirituality and neurobiology. It's all a very exciting time to be alive and to learn and grow and bring peace right now. It's more possible than ever.
SEGMENT 4
I want to talk more about An Optimist’s Path through Cynicism. I'm realizing that there are all sorts of things that I can do, and I want to do, and what is the motivating force? Why am I doing this? I have an opportunity and I want to take advantage of that opportunity. And so An Optimist Path through Cynicism is, like I said, less the story of my life and more the values that I wish to express, which I think can boil down into, you know, why isn't there more peace and love in the world? And my personal journey is believing that we need to be the change that we want to see in the world. But that thought is so relevant, and so relevant to what I want to do because I believe transformation of the world is going to happen one person at a time. Now, that doesn't mean that we don't do all those other things, too. But at the heart of it is what's my transformation? Who am I?
I grew up with a lot of values about changing the world, you know, leaving the world a better place than I left it. I think, I think that's actually what I remember as a kid, to leave every situation better than I found it. So An Optimist Path through Cynicism, like I said, is actually meant to be my memoir. But it's also my call-to-action. It's also my hope to connect with other people who find themselves in a situation where they're so cynical, they feel they've lost their optimism, or they want to be optimistic, or they were optimistic, and now, they're trying to find their way through the cynicism.
And this brings me to my work with Braver Angels. And Braver Angels is a political depolarization group that started right after Trump was first elected. And it's about bringing conservatives, and the point of view of individuals within that stereotype, with liberals and blues. And so Reds and Blues come together, and that has really helped me in being able to define my own message because I was so taken by the message of Braver Angels; that if we come together as individuals, not to try to change each other's minds, but to truly from a perspective of curiosity, truly want to learn what other people actually believe, not what we think they believe, and how they came to that view, that point of view. And for me, I think ultimately, the message that I clearly want to state is that optimism is worth pursuing, that it is a path through cynicism, and we have to be educated and connected and talk to each other. And then ultimately, it's a place where we can explore the fact that we are optimists and that that is worth exploring.
My name is Miles Eddy and I'm operating as A Heartfelt Production. You can find Machai St. Rain at www.MachaiStRain.com. And you can learn more about the Reverend Robert M. Eddy at www.UURev.org. And you can find this podcast at www.AnOptimistsPath.com or download from your favorite podcast supporter. And in next week's podcast, I am going to introduce the three pillars of optimism.
Original Music by Miles Eddy and you can download my new album Flow State Journeys at www.MilesEddy.com/music.
So optimism is the path through our cynicism and I encourage you to dive into your own creativity and to take action. And remember, at some point, you know what you want to do. Sometimes, less thought, more action. Always be thoughtful. Peace and love. See you next time.
You can check out the video of the podcast on my website www.AnOptimistsPath.com
