There is this thing called “radical love.” Paulo Freire had said the most important thing of all in life is radical love as Joe had mentioned in an interview and they both wrote about radical love frequently in their works. Almost everyone who knew Joe knew that he was the quintessence of radical love. And of course, there are many other people who live or have lived their lives from this same type of radical love: Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King, Jr., Albert Einstein, Wilhelm Reich, Nikola Tesla, Dalai Lama, and so many, many others even who have not received recognition they have earned. Myself, I am still, well, in my imaginary at least, just a baby in these matters:  Joe has put it as having to “take me from kindergarten to the doctoral level and he doesn’t have 18 years to do it” (that is to learn about all of these spiritual matters). He was being humorous, of course. In another place and time, he was my Master Teacher and he did literally take me from kindergarten to doctoral level in 18 years, but you know how it is: Forgive me, I am imagining all of that. It has simply been created out of my holotropic mind, I guess. No wait, it was all just a dream; I remember now.

At any rate, back to the topic at hand:  I do not believe that radically loving means we have to be as humble as Joe was, which is a good thing because I am not sure there are many -- if any of us -- who could live up to that on this Earth plane given the conditions we must live within, and that is just my own feeling, although this idea has been confirmed by Masters I work with. I believe there are times when people cause us immense pain, especially when we are radically loving, because they want to put our consciousnesses (the topic of my last two blogs) into a constrictive steel container and bolt the lid down tight. I think these are the people we have to just leave behind and that this is what is really meant when the Bible or various religions talk about people being “left behind.” It just means that we have to move on, even if it means leaving our own family members behind because it is the only way we can escape the pain and make greater progress toward love (some of us can eventually circle back, but this is not often within our control). Indeed, the grander purpose of all of this is that we will then be able to find our one true soulmate, a very important endeavor at this particular point in history -- which is a very complex, deep and mathematically-focused science topic for another time and something I am still learning about.

If we do not leave behind these people who are dragging us down with them then our own progress to reach that blissful balance between our hylotropic and holotropic consciousness becomes severely hampered and our abilities to devote our love, time and effort toward the alleviation of human suffering in the world comes to a standstill. I have experienced a small sample of that sort of pain and the devastating consequences in my own life and I have had to leave people behind, but nothing I have done in sharing love and working toward the dream (our mission) could begin to compare to the magnitude with which Joe shared his love and energy, given how he freely he handed these out to everyone who crossed his path. I truly believe that Joe was quite the miracle man. He still is.

As I said, for some reason (and it is not really such a strange reason at all now that I have received more of the right kind of education these past six months) I have been drawn to all of these spiritual, cosmological, metaphysical, philosophical, scientific, mathematical, and very, very fascinating topics. These are subjects I have never, ever studied in the past, (and for those who have read my previous blogs at another time and place, which have now evaporated, apparently, will know that these topics are out of the ordinary for me) but I continue to receive prompts from whence I do not know to delve deeply into these somewhat esoteric matters and not only dig deeply into them, but to share the topics here on these blogs. These are topics for which I am getting great assistance from both here on earth and from somewhere beyond. I am also being directed by higher authorities that this is indeed a task I need to carry out. And of importance today is something that was recently brought to my attention as a highly urgent matter and that is the subject of radical love.

Radical love, as I have just recently learned, is a code word and the sad thing about it is that very few people really know the code. When we speak of radical love, what we are really referring to is spiritual love. Just as I did not know what radical love was, I also did not know even what spiritual love was until very recently. Spiritual love extends far past the consciousness-constricting ethnocentric influences of the 3D earth plane and outward into all other planes of existence and realities. Some of you out there will not be able to comprehend this and I cannot say that I fully understand it quite yet either (I have much more training to go through). This is just the information I am currently receiving. Hopefully, you do know that there are many dimensions. This is a big thing in physics now. Many scientists have identified the dimensions and have mathematically and verbally described them, even as we are being forced ever more strongly backwards into the ancient Newtonian-Cartesian paradigm that denies such things. We should have shaken off this limitation many, many years ago.

But since few people “get it,” as far as what radical love really entails, the proposal here is to just call it like it is. Radical love is spiritual love that transcends materialism, space and time. If we can grasp that idea, it will be so much easier to live out our radical spiritual love-filled lives here on earth in this current “reality” and we can actually begin to worry more about taking care of our suffering and struggling brothers and sisters today than narcissistically worrying about what great things tomorrow may bring us personally. This was the true mission Joe was on in which we work to change education up to focus on the alleviation of human suffering. Of course there are many other people working on this very mission in a number of highly critical ways and it is all very symbiotic and it will all soon come together. The education mission is the mission I continue to work on -- along with many other people -- here and there -- transcending the bounds of materialism, place, space, and time. My brothers and sisters know . . . and they are working on this, too. And so we are all very, very blessed.

Photo Credit

http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2005/casa/casa.jpg

The images on this web site may be used for non-commercial educational and public information purposes. Please credit images to "NASA/CXC/SAO.

Wow, That Last Message was somewhat harsh.

LOL. It did not come from me, personally. Honestly. I know not whence it came, but it does sound like whoever sent it is pretty damn adamant that people take heed. I think I had better do some of that homework, myself, because I do want to stay on the good side of things. It is just SO WORTH IT! How can it not be? I mean think about it: If you commit yourself to the mission, your life is totally dedicated to the service of others and the alleviation of their suffering – not to yourselves, not even to your families. And why? Because you know in your heart that it is the right thing to do. It is just totally the right thing to do. And by doing the right thing, EVERYTHING else falls in place. Your every need is provided for (including for your family and loved ones!) and then some. Honestly, when you do get in this cycle, (which I have accomplished, even if I do not totally yet understand the hylotropic and holotropic concepts and will need to spend more time, study and work on that), you really begin to wonder, why in the world did I not do this sooner? I do know that Joe wanted us to do some heavy work on our consciousnesses. That is what his last book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction was all about and he stated, “I still want my critical pedagogy to help shape self-conscious students who gain the capacity to imagine modes of consciousness that earthlings have never before imagined” (2008, p. 220).

Let me give an example of how we can be rewarded if we jump out of the Newtonian-Cartesian thought paradigm. WOW, what example do I even give? I literally have thousands of them. I want to keep it simple for now though just to make a point. I will save the extreme complexity for later down the line and I can hardly wait to get to that, either – it is SO AMAZING. But for now, for one simple example, I was informed that if I finished up the treasure hunt yard search, even though it was just a training mission, I would be richly rewarded. As if the diamond ring and the cool yin-yang silver piece were not ample rewards in themselves. But next thing, out comes the NEW Treasure Hunt in which I made so many rewarding discoveries, and honestly, I know I have more work there and I will no doubt discover many more rich and rewarding treasures when I start exploring the other clues and their interrelationships in more depth. Then came the announcement of the Universal sanction of our imaginary marriage (I am really into happy fairy tales). So yesterday, which was the big special day, I was told to go shopping for myself….I found clothes on sale half price so that made me happy; it is always good to find bargains. I picked out quite a few new items, got up to the cash register and the cash register only charged 25% of the total price instead of 50% (and you know how it goes with Newtonian-Cartesian minds: the clerk just knew the computer had to be right). Imagine that!  Now you can just explain it rationally, but for me it is total magic because it is just one example of how the Universe takes care of us! My money quadrupled in value just like that; which is something that often happens with money (which is just a form of energy) and I have learned I do not need nearly as much of it as I used to think I did. This is a small example, but it happens all of the time for me. And money comes in from places I do not even expect. All because I don’t expect it and just keep the faith and trust that God has many Angels who look after us, and perhaps even more important is to remember to always be grateful for even the smallest of signs. Even pennies are important if it turns out they are from Heaven. You will be richly blessed if you notice the smallest of signs and thank God and whomever you feel was responsible for providing the special blessings for you. People who attend church really should get this. But most of them don’t. They can be just as competitive and self-serving as the next guy. One of Joe’s clues (my imagination again) for the NEW Treasure Hunt exemplifies this: “It is well read, but most people never remember what it says” which is the Bible, of course -- and it can be any equivalent, such as the Koran, or whatever is read in any given religion. We really need to also believe what we are told about God taking care of us. We really need to fully engage in reciprocity. Then, we can see magic and the more we observe the magic and are thankful for it, the more that is sent our way. It is so simple (but very complex below the surface).

And so, I am spending my energy (and it all really does come down to energy) on teaching all of my sweet and brilliant students most of whom are so far below the poverty level that reaching the cutoff point for poverty looks good to them (believe me, I have been there!), working with some absolutely adorable children in a very poor neighborhood to give them a “Joe” Treasure Hunting summer they will remember for a lifetime (and not charging any money for it), totally dedicated to getting Joe’s brilliant work out on this website and elsewhere, again without charging anything for my time or service, and what are my rewards? Literally DAILY miracles, signs, signals, magic, and so, so much love that emanates from every direction. I could not be happier. And so I wonder why didn’t I get this figured out sooner? I have really been missing out until now. And my purpose in sharing this is because I want as many people as possible to experience this joy, this “jouissance” as Joe has so often framed it. It is delightful, delectable, and delicious.

The message I am getting today is that we need to shut off the devil’s radio and leave it off. We all need to get with the real program. Otherwise, you are only creating more misery for yourself and everyone around you. When your consciousness focuses on negativity, limited realities, violence, hatred, wars, destruction, evil, etc. --- by God, that is what you will create! Don’t you all get it? Focus on love, happiness, sharing, generosity, knowledge and knowing that the Universe loves you and will take the best of care of you if only you release your mind from those confining, constricting, and what I have found to be very, very painful boxes. Focus on expending your energy toward creating that better world. Aside from physical violence, gossip is one of the most destructive activities one can engage in – for the person engaging in it, for those who listen to it, and for the person who is subject of the gossip (unless they have done their homework on consciousness). Walk away from gossip. Shut it down. Turn it off. Joe talked about the “Devil’s Radio” in his book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction, and I did not know what it was. I had to look it up. Here is a song about it. As everyone knows by now, Joe LOVED music and often spoke through lyrics of songs, which is why I almost always close my blog with music and I do try to imagine he is helping me pick out a song that he would love.

Have a lovely day.

Vanessa

Devil's Radio Lyrics

Gossip, gossip
Gossip, gossip

I heard it in the night
Words that thoughtless speak
Like vultures swooping down below
On the devil's radio

I hear it through the day
Airwaves gettin' filled
With gossip broadcast to and fro
On the devil's radio

Oh yeah, gossip
Gossip, oh yeah

He's in the clubs and bars
And never turns it down
Talking about what he don't know
On the devil's radio

He's in your TV set
Won't give it a rest
That soul betraying so and so
The devil's radio

Gossip, gossip
Gossip, gossip
(Oh yeah) gossip, (gossip) oh yeah
(Gossip) oh yeah, (oh yeah) gossip

It's white and black like industrial waste
Pollution of the highest degree
You wonder why I don't hang out much
I wonder how you can't see

He's in the films and songs
And on all your magazines
It's everywhere that you may go
The devil's radio

Oh yeah, gossip
Gossip, oh yeah

Runs thick and fast, no one really sees
Quite what bad it can do
As it shapes you into something cold
Like an Eskimo igloo

It's all across our lives
Like a weed it's spread
'till nothing else has space to grow
The devil's radio

Can creep up in the dark
Make us hide behind shades
And buzzing like a dynamo
The devil's radio

(Gossip) oh yeah, (gossip) oh yeah
(Gossip) gossip, (gossip) gossip
Oh yeah, gossip I heard you on Satan's wireless
Gossip, oh yeah You know the devil's radio, child
Gossip, gossip
Gossip, gossip

Lyrics courtesy of www.sing.com 

References

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and critical pedagogy: An introduction. Springer.

Image courtesy of Microsoft.

 

 

Yesterday I presented a sort of homework assignment for everyone. This was a gift from another realm whether you wish to believe that or not. Believing is irrelevant. I know you are curious about the differences between hylotropic and holotropic consciousness and how to achieve a balance between them. I also know that almost none of you did your homework. For those who have researched this, thank you and I can assure you that you are being observed and will be highly blessed with some special assignments for this great project we are all working on. For those who have not looked into even the mere definitions of hylotropic and holotropic consciousnesses then I would like to convey that you are living up to the reputation of how most earth people are viewed from the cosmos.

Earthlings are generally viewed as being lazy, especially if they are not able to see the immediate benefits for themselves, personally, and so they do not take action. Now, this is exactly what must change – and it will change with a better balance between modes of consciousness. This is so important that today, even though it is again my day off – and not only that a VERY special day in that my special marriage has been just today totally sanctioned by the Higher Galactic Councils – in other words, the entire Universe – and I should be celebrating with my Special Someone and not writing this blog for people who are too lazy to do the work for themselves even though they have been practically handed the key to their own happiness right on a silver platter. It’s all ok, though, since I also am being observed and I know that my actions doing this work on my official wedding day -- our third celebratory date, btw -- (yes, we have three anniversaries, which will all be explained later; for now, let it suffice to say that changing Cosmic Law is a complex process) will be more than adequately recognized. And it is not even the recognition or rewards that move me to do this. It is my love for humanity and my overwhelming desire to see that more people are happy and free from suffering that moves me.

It is the great love for people that keeps this mission going, and great love alone. You are all fortunate that the entire Universe is in love with you. The wishes are for all people to be happy and live in bliss and the only way this is going to happen is if you – each one of you – escapes the confines of the hylotropic mind and integrates a wider open mode of consciousness. Thus, the lesson you have been provided is of utmost importance, and yet, of course you have not followed up on it, which is exactly what is to be expected.

Don’t you see? The crazy “drug-seeking” behaviors that are so widespread and your insane reliance on prescribed medications is merely the futile reach for what you know is possible in terms of blissful experience, but it is an experience that can never, ever be reached through faux methods. I must remind you, it is a totally futile approach because there is no drug, no artificial chemical, no natural chemical even that can do the work that you need to do yourself to regain a consciousness by which you bring only goodness, joy, and bliss to yourself and those around you. I say regain because most of you have been there before and have simply forgotten. While there is some upfront work to do in order to begin to remember, it will all flow back to you given you are receptive to that.

Also, for those who have already remembered, as I pointed out yesterday, keeping knowledge swept under the carpet will NOT move humanity forward. Therefore, if you do have knowledge and you are not sharing your knowledge with at least those loved ones around you so that the flow can continue, then you are – as the educational elite are so prone to express it – supporting the status quo. By supporting the status quo you know in your hearts that you are preventing the very thing people need most – knowledge and empowerment to strive toward those holotropic highs that you, yourself are enjoying but keeping from others. This is selfish and must change now. Knowledge has been and will continue to be released. If you read or have read my previous blogs this will be clear to you and you will come to realize that at this point subversion is harming you the most. And you will be very relieved to know that the old tricks of blackmailing, coercion of, and labeling people who are advanced in consciousness as “crazy” do not work any longer. Cosmic Laws have changed. Cosmic Laws are now in effect such that instant karmic reflection nips this despicable behavior “in the bud.” Anyone who pulls these nasty tricks on people by attaching labels, calling them crazy, or otherwise engaging in despicable behavior will find that their actions come right back to them instantly. This is because knowledge has been released. The crazy ones are those who rely too heavily on their hylotropic consciousnesses and attempt to force other people to do the same just so their greedy, selfish, and destructive needs can be met.

Perhaps there is great humor in all of this – although it is at the same time very disconcerting since this sort of behavior halts the evolutionary development of humankind to more advanced ways of being and living in the world – as well as circumvents the taking great care of the environmental concerns of earth. Humor is questionable but it does serve its purpose. Irony is not questionable whatsoever. It does not take a brain surgeon to make the observation (and believe me, there are literally billions who are making this observation), that it is the excessive leaning toward the hylotropic mind that creates a true psychological imbalance – the very diagnosis those who have this condition attempt to project onto those who do not. (Grof, 1985, 1993; Kincheloe, 2008). Of course, your own psychology, limited and elementary as it is, explains this phenomenon. It is projection, denial, and transference. These are all terms you can find in any beginner’s text on psychology. So, it does render this entire situation as quite ironic. We must rise above the irony and change the situation!

Joe has talked about this quite frequently in his work and as I have repeatedly mentioned he did see an element of humor in it – albeit a limited humor since it is also painful to experience the flames that come our way even though we are shielded, not to mention our distress over the pain this error in judgment has on so many of our brothers and sisters and their children around the world. If you remember, I did write a blog, Imagine A Wonderful World in which I discussed the fact that this advanced way of thinking in which I now point out is an integration of the two modes of consciousness is the “way of the world.” And while we have attached new "labels" as such on this experience (but note that we do not attach labels TO people), I do want to point out that this is NOT a new way of being. It is an ancient as well as a very popular way of blissful existence throughout the world. In fact,  I questioned how a white Eurocentric elite minority even dares push their views on the entire world. And yet they did: Throuh the Bully Pulpit and Madness, and by attempting to destroy Dreams such as those Joe had. and those of Martin Luther King, Jr. Those days are over now. One thing Joe pointed out was that “indeed, one of the important functions of FIDUROD [a complex form of positivism, Newtonian-Cartesian form of thinking that is pushed on us] is to quash any idea that there are diverse dimensions of physical, social, and psychological reality…” (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 83). In this sense then, this reductionistic thinking that accompanies nearly all social environs in Western society as well as being pushed to all reaches of the globe, is PSYCHOLOGICALLY UNHEALTHY as are those very people who ascribe to them and attempt to force others into those boxes. THIS NO LONGER WORKS! It is time to change things (and scream if that moves you).

Have you not seen that the numbers of labels continue to grow and grow? Can you not see how CRAZY this really is? And do you think that EVERYONE but a select elite few will sit around and continue to take this? The majority rules. The people have the power, not the few Eurocentric elite who continue to choose to keep their minds constrained in Newtonian-Cartesian boxes and to use these labels to harm people and make them suffer. Remember Joe’s primary purpose is to alleviate suffering. This labeling is one of the biggest problems currently and has been selected for immediate work. Stop labeling. Stop drugging – yes, DRUGGING – children, even your own children, to force their evolutionarily advanced consciousnesses into YOUR “psychologically debilitating” Newtonian-Cartesian boxes (as Joe has framed it).

Many of you, most of you in fact, need to do work in this area, so please pull yourselves away from your worthless entertainment and work on your consciousness. It is only through this work and the work you do to serve others toward alleviating their suffering from these horrific labels – and this goes for labels of all sorts which I am intimately familiar with having been very recently subjected to them myself and having suffered the debilitating effects. Thank goodness I had loving help getting through the ordeal. And please do not “get me wrong here,” and mistinterpret my message -- I am not feeling any more superior or further along in my abilities than the next person. I have my own work to do as I am also boxed in due to my having lived through many experiences that served well to confine my consciousness. So, please do not think I am coming at you as a “know-it-all;” I am most definitely not and I have extensive work to do. I am merely relaying information that I have been asked to relay. I will be working just as hard as the next person. I will be planting many more yellow roses for Joe.

But for now, I am going to blissfully celebrate my day and how blessed I feel to be “sealed for eternity in holy matrimony.” Ah, but please do not worry, I do know that this is definitely outside this dimension and not at all “reality”…just the sweet rewards for believing in magic.

Have a blissfully cosmic day,
Vanessa

PS Coming Soon! A reality everyone can relate to: How Joe Kincheloe’s NEW Treasure Hunt Methodology and Critical Complex Epistemology, once I overcame My Confusion, transformed an entire neighborhood -- and my Sweet Rewards…. all to be covered and updated in future blogs throughout the summer --- plus, how to solve Einstein’s Riddle with Joe’s theory. It is going to be a busy, blissful summer with much news to report.

References

Grof, S. (1985). Beyond the brain: Birth, death and transcendence in psychotherapy. New York: State University of New York Press.

Grof, S. (1993). The holotropic mind. New York: Harper Collins.

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and critical pedagogy: An introduction. Springer.

Image courtesy of Microsoft.

One final message which I am sure some people will not understand, but this is a Special Day and what else is there to say? I am totally dedicated to THE DREAM -- call it Martin Luther King's dream, call it President Obama's dream, call it whatever dream you wish because there are many, many of us who have the same dream. But this is the joekincheloe.us website, this is a special day, and I call it Joe's Dream. I am devoted and dedicated to Joe's dream and "it's no sacrifice at all," as Elton John would say; it truly is no sacrifice at all.

Today is Saturday, my day off! However, the members of the Greater Councils, which appear to be growing in number now as more people get on board, all know how seriously I take my work and so they have released some information that they wish for me to provide at this time. (If you wish to view this as an imaginary, that is all fine, good, and it is probably very healthy for you for the time being.)

Those who have already chosen to work on this great mission that Joe and many others have left behind for us to continue, as well as some of you who have been sitting on the fence trying to decide whether you wish to jump on board will clearly understand the message I am putting out here today. As I have repeatedly pointed out in previous blogs, the participants in this mission is rapidly – even exponentially – growing in numbers all over the planet, so in that respect, it is not a “Joe Thing” in the event you are one of those people who are abhorred at the focus on Joe on this web site. Please do keep in mind, however, that this is the joekincheloe.us website and this project in his honor has been very highly and universally blessed.

At any rate, along with Joe’s mission to alleviate human suffering in the world and to make the world a better place, the other part of his dream is his Critical Knowledge Network, which he discussed in his book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction in the Preface, as well as throughout the entire book. It turns out that there are many people who are interested in his concept. A Think Tank has formed with people of the most advanced scientific and philosophical minds that have ever existed and it is rapidly forming or will be forming multiple Critical Knowledge Networks around the globe. You are invited to join in! And as I have mentioned, the cosmic rewards are so beautiful and so great that they can scarcely be described, especially in terms of Newtonian-Cartesian ideals. It literally will begin to make one feel crazy if they attempt to use a lower dimensional concept to describe a higher dimensional experience.

In order to move things along a little faster, since we are behind schedule, thanks to the Bush Empire our collective consciousness created that has drug out for so many years, the Critical Knowledge Network has passed down the following recommended studies for those who are ready to move ahead more rapidly.

Epistemology: Define both hylotropic and holotropic modes of consciousness. Consider the advantages and disadvantages of each and who promotes one form of consciousness over another form of consciousness (and why).

Ontology: Seek a balance between the two forms of consciousness that works for you.

Cosmology: Focus on the enjoyment of the simple things in life: your interrelationship with the earth, plants, people, children, sunshine, pleasure, etc. As you enjoy your day, identify those daily postformal treasures that pop into your life which Joe talks about often that gave him such joy -- and which we all are blessed with if we take the time to see them and enjoy them.

The recommended activities will help immensely to prepare you for the mental stamina required to work productively on this very important mission, providing it is your wish to do so. It might be noted here that under a newly (relatively speaking) accepted and operating paradigm “the concept of ‘higher sanity’ or genuine mental health should be reserved for individuals who have achieved a balanced interplay of both complementary modes of consciousness….a harmonious blending of the two modes does not distort reality, but gives it a mystical flavor” (Grof,1985, p. 401). Quite frankly, I am not able to envision how this can even happen if we continue to cloak, hide, or subvert knowledge as has been and continues to be rampantly occurring in education and other certain places in the world, including on the Internet. Thus, I am pointing out today that Critical Knowledge Networks are already being formed in alliance with some very special Think Tanks of highly evolved and intelligent people. They are graciously releasing knowledge in a controlled and gradual process in order to make it easily accessible by literally anyone who has balanced their consciousness as described, wants to work on the mission in positive and productive ways, and puts forth the actual effort to gain the accessible knowledge and also puts it into action to alleviate human suffering in their own unique and creative ways. It is true that this work can be quite demanding, so you do have to be dedicated, but the rewards are truly out of this world.

Have a great weekend.

Vanessa

References

Grof, S. (1985). Beyond the brain: Birth, death and transcendence in psychotherapy. New York: State University of New York Press.

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and critical pedagogy: An introduction. Springer.

Image courtesy of Microsoft.

I do think it is sometimes easy to feel like Joe’s dream was stolen, much like Martin Luther King’s dream was stolen from him, because they both left the world far too soon and both suffered in various ways on account of their dreams. Martin Luther King had suffered all kinds of ridicule for his beautiful dream. Good dreams for a utopian future and how people who have such dreams sometimes come to be treated always remind me once again of Plato’s cave, which I have mentioned before. All of the people were in a dark cave and there were shadows on the walls being created from something from somewhere outside the cave. They did not understand the shadows. One brave man dared to go outside and have a look and found a beautiful enlightenment as to exactly what the shadows were, but when he came back to tell the people how beautiful and joyful it was outside the cave and to come out and look, they just laughed at him and ridiculed him – and stayed inside the dark cave. They were too afraid to go outside and see for themselves and they felt very threatened to have someone tell them what was out there, so they called him “crazy.” Joe talked about this a lot and laughed about it….and yes, I know, I am supposed to write a blog about it. For some reason it keeps getting put on the back burner. But never forgotten.

I think many people felt that Martin Luther King’s dream was stolen. This song is in honor of his dream:

 

Martin Luther King and Joe actually shared the same dream and I believe this will give their joint dreams a vey special and maybe even a magical power to continue on and be realized. Joe always stressed interrelationships over the objectification of people or the focus on things and facts. Indeed, Martin Luther King, in a speech on April 4, 1967, just one year before he was assassinated had stated, “I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must rapidly begin the shift from a ‘thing-oriented’ society to a ‘person-oriented’ society” (Bigelow & Peterson, 2002, p. 327).

Joe’s entire dream is clearly outlined in his book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction. If you read the book you will have a clear idea as to what his dream is, how it can truly work to create change, and how you can contribute to making his – and Martin Luther King’s dream – come true. Personally, I do not believe that the dream for a beautiful world with no suffering can ever be stolen. This dream lives on each day through everyone who continues to work on Joe’s, Martin Luther King’s and other great people’s mission for making the world a better place and there are many people who are doing just that. This is a beautiful thing. Those who want to get on board simply need only read Joe’s book and start taking local and global action to make a difference. It does not matter how small your actions are because everyone’s work will meld together and create magnificent changes in the world.

As Martin Luther King put it, “Now let us begin. Now let us re-dedicate ourselves to the long and bitter – but beautiful – struggle for a new world.”

Martin Luther King and Joe’s dream lives on through those people who have not given up hope. It lives on through those of us who believe in the dream and struggle on a daily basis to live the dream in whatever small ways we are able. And it lives on through Obama’s Peace Train. Change is truly on the way.

 

References

King, Martin Luther (1967). A revolution of values. Speech presented in New York City on the occasion of his becoming Co-Chairman of Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam, April 4, 1967. In Bigelow, B. and Peterson, B. (Eds.), (2003) Rethinking Globalization: Teaching for Justice in an Unjust World, pp. 327-328.

Photo courtesy of Microsoft.

Wow that was an amazing experience. . . . at least he brought it down to the ground gently, claiming he was just making a “pit stop.” (lol). Seriously, that was my dream night before last! I attended a carnival on some other planet and rode home on a motorcycle. The carnival was great. You could actually win stuff playing their games, but I left it all at home in my dream house (I would love to tell more about that, perhaps another time). Next, we flew back to Earth on a motorcycle down through space with some lovely mountain scenery thrown in for entertainment and enjoyment just before we touched ground.

Next thing I notice we were heading down toward a building to land. HE says he needs to make a “pit stop” which is a multidimensional joke that will have to be explained another time as it is likely to be totally misinterpreted without the explanation. But nevertheless, he totally succeeds in landing the bike ever so gently on the ground right next to the building which looked suspiciously like the side of my house. It did not look familiar to me since I do not normally look at my house from a birds eye view nor do I spend much time on that side of the outside of my house. In the very next instant, I was in my bed wide awake.

Never a dull moment! I must say, I do find this creative aspect of my imagination highly enjoyable. And maybe this great dream was one of my rewards for working so hard on the NEW Treasure Hunt – where in the WORLD do these creative ideas come from? I was not warned that if I used Joe’s postformal thought, my imagination, including my dream life, would go crazy….oh, wait, I guess he did mention that quite a number of times. I am still under a directive to write a blog about those very topics . . . soon.

I have learned and I am still learning so much from the NEW Treasure Hunt that it is incredible. This, after having gone through some minor frustrations and confusion. There are so many interrelationships it’s really quite mindboggling. And the interesting thing is how you can come to see just how everything that would appear to be UNrelated is, in fact, RELATED! For example, who would have thought that the scientist who discovered orgone, that life force energy – which was so controversial at the time, but has now been confirmed – would have documented his conversations with Albert Einstein. But he did! And they are in the book that was one of the clues I was supposed to look at. He had some interesting things to say about Einstein that explains why Einstein may have created the Riddle he did. At any rate, showing how to solve Einstein’s Riddle with Joe’s methodologies was exciting to me and in my view, one of the greatest treasures from this current and ongoing treasure hunt. It will certainly alleviate a lot of pain, which was always Joe’s goal. I know that one person who came across Einstein’s Riddle was very disappointed when she could not solve the riddle. But it was just beautiful to see her face light up when I told her, she CAN solve the puzzle if she uses Joe’s techniques. And she was very happy when I told her I would write up his techniques in a way that she can use them to solve it. Now that is a true treasure – to see people feeling good about themselves, instead of watching their faces fall when they think they must not be as smart as the next guy. I really have to thank Einstein in this situation because he seems to be so ready and willing to correct this misconception about his Riddle after all of these years. If he had not been, I don’t think the Riddle would have popped up as a clue for me TWICE in one day! (See Clues #4 and #7.) It seemed pretty emphatic that I was to make that correction as evidently there were two people trying to get me to see the riddle and do something about it.

Another very special treasure was that the hunt led me back to a reading assignment Joe gave me when I was studying the bricolage for my dissertation proposal. He had given me a very specific assignment and what I deemed was a very special reading assignment, just a few pages, actually. It turned out that these few pages were exactly what I need to build a framework for this new bricolage methodology. While we do not want to use a strict framework, but rather an expanding and flexible framework, it is still necessary to have some sort of guidance for discerning between which interrelationships are important to consider and which we may not need to add to the mix, especially when there are many variables to compare, such as in this NEW treasure hunt which had a total of 11 clues and several dozen variables. We cannot possibly consider absolutely every interrelationship because that would quickly take us on the road to infinity. So, a simple framework that provides guidance is called for here. While Joe does not refer to it in his work specifically as a framework, that is exactly what he has provided, so I do feel that was probably my most valuable treasure out of the project so far. I am working on the write-up now and will go into much more depth and I will no doubt discover additional treasures. The write-up will hopefully provide a very useful tool to help teachers and students connect all of those isolated “factoids” (as Joe refers to them) that they have to learn in order to pass the standardized tests. If they adopt this new methodology it will put some substance into their studies and they will learn so much more than if they stick to just memorizing all of the facts. They can actually learn and remember something worthwhile and pass their tests with flying colors. In my book, that is very valuable.

So all of this wraps up the NEW treasure hunt, for the moment anyway. I was told that I would find a treasure that “jumps off the page” and would be “very valuable.” The framework jumped off the page at me (even though Joe did not call it a framework in his book) and this will be very valuable for the students who are still stuck having to pass standardized tests and for their teachers. So, I am happy.

My next step is to write all of this up in much more detail. Actually, I have a good start on it already and I will make sure it is in proper academic prose, which I actually have learned to do quite well in my doctoral program. Joe did convey that it is important to write in multiple styles to meet various purposes. I also want to make sure I provide a write-up that is usable for any teacher or student to apply to solve puzzles like Einstein's Riddle. In addition, I will want to look at some more interrelationships between variables in more detail as I know there is much more to learn yet from extending this treasure hunt out further. Also, I have not even begun to discuss ALL of the treasures I have found during this hunt. There are so many of them, but I will go into more depth in the document I put together and make available online. It is also important to keep in mind, with postformal treasure hunting it is the “thrill of the hunt” that is often as exciting as finding the treasures. As Joe has pointed out, the emphasis of these treasure hunting experiences is the process of knowing and thinking rather than on a production of some sort of final, positive knowledge and “correct” form of reason (Thomas & Kincheloe, 2006, pp. 129-130). I am not certain which aspect of postformal treasure hunting I would classify as the most fun – It is all very exciting and I love all of it!

One last thing before I sign off today and that is I want to express my gratitude to everyone who was involved in any way with this NEW Treasure Hunt (both here and in my dream life). Of course, that means I thank Joe and also Albert Einstein, Wilhelm Reich, both the Intergalactic and the Pleiadian Higher Councils, all of my Master Teachers, Grandmother, my neighbors, the landlord, all of the children who are looking forward to treasure hunting, and everyone else who has been or will be involved in this NEW Treasure Hunt. Thank you, everyone so much! I am not able to express the enormity of my gratitude for making this experience exuberantly joyful through the constant discovery of new interrelationships, new treasures, new friends, and new insights that have evolved -- and continue to evolve. And a heartfelt thank you to Joe for encouraging me to use my "postformal creative imagination" to create the most exciting motorcycle ride I have ever experienced, even if it was just a dream!

Love & Peace

Vanessa

References

Thomas, P. L. & Kincheloe, J. L. (2006). Reading, writing, and thinking: Postformal basics. The Netherlands: Sense.

Photo courtesy of Microsoft.

 

 

 

I am taking just a short diversion from my work on the NEW Treasure Hunt today to bring you a brief Special Service Announcement at the request of the Higher Council. And as I have said before, we must always do what the Higher Council requests of us because the rewards are always SO DELICIOUS!!! Keep in mind though that we never do the tasks for the rewards, but rather for the good and great mission we are all busily working on to spread knowledge, education, peace and love throughout the world. The sweet rewards that follow are simply icing on the cake, so to speak.

As teachers, we often talk about diversity in the classroom and the best ways to adjust our curriculum to meet diversity needs, and so I ask you: Are you considering the new and growing population of Ravers at all? Many teachers might find this public service information helpful for creating ways to meet the needs of these very, very special and highly intelligent group of students who are growing in numbers and who are becoming increasingly frustrated with the dumbing down of their education.

Below is a Raver’s manifesto. The original website has been provided for those teachers who wish to learn about these students, which would be a very wise move as a teacher if you plan to stay in the business of teaching for a few years. It is expected that the Raver populations will swell each year from now well into the future to unimaginable numbers. If you have not even heard about these students or of their educational needs as students, it may very well be too late for you as a teacher. You will not last long with them under your tutelage – unless you get informed rapidly. At the end of this blog, I have included a couple of videos that will be helpful and then some web sites for you to visit to familiarize yourself with their needs, which may seem unique, but will soon be the norm. You simply must remember these children are NOT drug addicts; they do not engage in this sort of destructive behavior and will be highly insulted if you even hint – or even THINK – along those lines. Yes, THINK, because many of these students are very skillful with reading the minds of those adults who work closely with them. I can assure you, this is a challenging group of students and they will make or break you as a teacher….get informed today!

Tomorrow I will have an update on the NEW Treasure Hunt. My problem is that I have TOO much information to convey and I do not want to short circuit anyone’s brain, so I have to carefully narrow things down for what is appropriate to share with people this given moment in our illusionary time plane. I think much of it is all going to have to go into a book because there is just too much – but do not worry. It will be available for free download, as I know there are hawks out there watching and they would strike if I attempt to make money off anything relating to Joe’s ideas, even though I know Joe would not mind me receiving “remuneration” as he would probably put it. But no worries there. I am more than well provided for through cosmic law which is much more powerful and fulfilling than any earthly manmade laws --  all in exchange for the work I do on this site and elsewhere. The secrets of exactly how this works will be revealed in a future book so that others might contribute to the universal goals of this monumental project and receive their just compensation. And these secrets are much grander than any other Secrets published previously, so you will probably want to watch for the book. Yes, my imagination again -- it seems to extend beyond even the limits of postformalism. Wait a minute though, does postformalism even have limits? Hmm....something to ponder. (This is NOT to be misconstrued, however! My mission is love, peace, joy, knowledge, education, equality, and a beautiful planet.)

And now, for the Raver’s manifesto. Read, become informed, and open your consciousness to make room for these delightful children coming to a school near you.

Raver's Manifesto
by Unknown

Our emotional state of choice is Ecstasy [Note: And I do want to point out that this is NOT referring to any form of drugs, but rather a state of emotional bliss]. Our nourishment of choice is Love. Our addiction of choice is technology. Our religion of choice is music. Our currency of choice is knowledge. Our politics of choice is none. Our society of choice is utopian though we know it will never be.

You may hate us. You may dismiss us. You may misunderstand us. You may be unaware of our existence. We can only hope you do not care to judge us, because we would never judge you. We are not criminals. We are not disillusioned. We are not drug addicts. We are not naive children. We are one massive, global, tribal village that transcends man-made law, physical geography, and time itself. We are The Massive. One Massive.

We were first drawn by the sound. From far away, the thunderous, muffled, echoing beat was comparable to a mother's heart soothing a child in her womb of concrete, steel, and electrical wiring. We were drawn back into this womb, and there, in the heat, dampness, and darkness of it, we came to accept that we are all the same. We came to accept that we are all equal. Not only to the darkness, and to ourselves, but to the very music slamming into us and passing through our souls: we are all equal. And somewhere around 35Hz we could feel the hand of God at our backs, pushing us forward, pushing us to push ourselves to strengthen our minds, our bodies, and our spirits. Pushing us to turn to the person beside us to join hands and uplift them by sharing the uncontrollable joy we felt from creating this magical bubble that can, for one evening, protect us from the horrors, atrocities, and pollution of the outside world. It is in that very instant, with these very realizations that each of was truly born. We continue to pack our bodies into clubs, or warehouses, or buildings you've abandoned and left for naught, and we bring life to them for one night. Strong, throbbing, vibrant life in it's purest, most intense, most hedonistic form.

In these makeshift spaces, we seek to shed ourselves of the burden of uncertainty for a future you have been unable to stabilize and secure for us. We seek to relinquish our inhibitions, and free ourselves from the shackles and restraints you've put on us for your own peace of mind. We seek to re-write the programming that you have tried to indoctrinate us with since the moment we were born. Programming that tells us to hate, that tells us to judge, that tells us to stuff ourselves into the nearest and most convenient pigeon hole possible. Programming that even tells us to climb ladders for you, jump through hoops, and run through mazes and on hamster wheels. Programming that tells us to eat from the shiny silver spoon you are trying to feed us with, instead of nourish ourselves with our own capable hands. Programming that tells us to close our minds, instead of open them.

Until the sun rises to burn our eyes by revealing the distopian reality of the world you've created for us, we dance fiercely with our brothers and sisters in celebration of our life, of our culture, and of the values we believe in: Peace, Love, Freedom, Tolerance, Unity, Harmony, Expression, Responsibility and Respect. [and add to this, Remembrance. I would like to point out that this entire web site is dedicated in remembrance of Joe, as well as all of the other elements of the Raver’s Manifesto, and as such, it is the very sort of action that Ravers highly support.]

Our enemy of choice is ignorance. Our weapon of choice is information. Our crime of choice is breaking and challenging whatever laws you feel you need to put in place to stop us from celebrating our existence. But know that while you may shut down any given party, on any given night, in any given city, in any given country or continent on this beautiful planet, you can never shut down the entire party. You don't have access to that switch, no matter what you may think. The music will never stop. The heartbeat will never fade. The party will never end. I am a raver, and this is my manifesto.

-end-

Ain’t it time to PLURRR now?

PLURRR
Peace
Love
Unity
Respect
Responsibility
Remembrance

Have a PLURRRY day!

Vanessa

References and Additional Information

Raver's Manifesto http://www.genxglow.com/forums/community/grand-central/ravers-manifesto-1047/#post8048

Wikipedia PLUR http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PLUR

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=PLURR
http://www.bay-c.co.uk/963330910/990130416/1003428276/1050224623/1055407756
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PLUR
http://www.plurlife.com/view_group.php?group_id=980

http://innerrave.org/dance.html

Raver’s Picture -- Image courtesy of christieh67

http://i295.photobucket.com/albums/mm134/christieh67/ravers.jpg

Enlightenment by Dancing

http://innerrave.org/dance.html

Rave is Everywhere:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0FbcqFObRo

As a parent (or maybe  a teacher) don’t ya just feel like screaming sometimes? I mean, really. Your kids come home from school and they are all stressed out, complaining, “School is stupid!” and you have tried working with the teachers and you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t. If you even TRY to work with the teachers, you start hearing whispers: “helicopter parent(s)!” And it is just as well anyway since trying to work WITH the system often becomes much like talking to a brick wall. The irritating thing is that so many (not all, but many) of the teachers, the administrators, and – if your child is in special ed – the special ed teachers and the other numerous “specialists” PRETEND to listen to you. And you THINK you are being listened to, because, after all, who knows your child better than you do and they know that, right? And these people are so good at putting on acts that it is easy to believe you are being listened to. And then it is just immediately back to the same-o, same-o. You could have saved your time and energy – maybe put in a few more hours at work and had steak for dinner instead of mac and cheese again. And the worst of it is – what is truly heartbreaking – is that your child comes home feeling even more down and depressed every day. Some teachers even take things out on your children and are just plain mean. That really hurts. And so you give up trying to work with the school system. Believe me, I have been there and done that. I even finally pulled my child out of the system and homeschooled her. Don’t get me wrong. There are good school systems and there are bad ones. Idaho is atrocious whereas Oregon does a decent job even if they are still locked into the No Child Left Behind nonsense.

Maybe, instead of being a parent, you are a teacher who truly cares about what you see happening to your students and you are all set to make a difference. You work beyond the call of duty to meet your students’ needs and take time to listen to them and their parents. The students and the parents love you. And the next thing you know, the principal or some administrator in the school district puts more demands on you, requiring you to complete mundane tasks that take enormous amounts of time that in no way benefits your students or helps them learn. Maybe you are REQUIRED to teach to the standardized test, even though in your heart you know it’s not the best way to prepare students for the test or life itself. Or maybe you are handed some new and great curriculum that is all scripted out for you that has been “proven” – by someone who never taught school a day in their life! I have been there and done that, too, and sometimes it literally makes me feel like screaming. Well, I do scream, I guess, inside. Not sure how good that is for my health, though.

The thing that was cool about Joe is that he talked about this very stuff in all of his work – and he experienced it himself, so he really and truly did know what he was talking about unlike some stuffy academicians in the higher echelons of the university – and he cared. But rather than scream (although I am sure he would understand why we might want to scream), he used his energy to develop ingenious ways of dealing with these problems. If you are a parent or a teacher, you might especially find his book, Teachers as Researchers helpful. His real goal was to provide us who are trapped at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder with the tools to outsmart the very people who are so clever at keeping us here. For the past few days I have been engaged in a treasure hunt he left for me to work on and I have been attempting to uncover some of the treasures he left especially for US. Remember, I chose this site name because it represents US AT THE BOTTOM of the ladder, not the United States as a national construct. Maybe this was Joe’s answer to the dilemma the world is faced with today. We can beat the imperialists, transnational capitalists, and war mongers (who are behind the current educational system) at their own game.  And so I have been treasure hunting to find out better how we might do that. Tomorrow I am going to begin sharing some of the treasures I have found in the NEW Treasure Hunt because in addition to finding all of the clues, I have been blessed with many special treasures during the process.

One thing is certain when it comes to getting the education we want for ourselves and our children it boils down to this: We can beat those elite power wielders at their own game, or we can scream. Or we might want to do both.

More to come . . .

Vanessa

References

Kincheloe, J. L. & Berry, K. S. (2004). Rigour and Complexity in Educational Research: Conceptualizing the Bricolage. New York: Open University.

Image courtesy of Wikipedia The  Scream. Artist Edvard Munch Year 1893 Type Oil, tempera, and pastel on cardboard Dimensions 91 cm × 73.5 cm (36 in × 29 in) Location National Gallery, Oslo

This is NOT a Treasure Hunt (lol). Yes, I do believe I have been led astray! I have been working diligently on this NEW treasure hunt and I feel like I am getting nowhere fast – and not only that, I have a big sneaking suspicion that I have been set up: I think this is another initiation. The Council members like to pull this on me, especially if the intergalactic members get involved (lol). The intergalactic members always have their weight to pull (and I could tell you some hair-raising stories about my experiences).

Anyway, I really have been working hard on this treasure hunt and I have all of the information for the clues now. I am just not sure whether I should bricolage it all using Joe’s new methodology as is or whether I need to do more research. I am going to put out what I have so far and I think I will give this a rest and sleep on it to see what enlightenment tomorrow brings, if any. I thought maybe readers would like to see what I have, but I will warn you that determining all of the interrelationships with so many variables is mind boggling, so I will have to determine how I can do this intelligently. Just so you know, there are 11 clues, so there are 2,048 possible combinations just with the clues alone, and we’re not even talking here about the 10 or more variables within each clue….yikes, I don’t see how Joe did this stuff. If I remember right, he had said something about DISCERNMENT.

Well, here are the eleven clues again with the information I found, summarized. Maybe you can make heads or tails of it. But keep in mind these are just summaries, so if this looks complicated, think about what I must be going through!

The Clues

1) It’s well read and most people never remember what it says. I promised I would give the answer to this since I knew it almost right off the bat: it is the Bible. But, as Joe always pointed out, everything is more complicated than it would first seem. This applies here, so here is what I came up with:

There is more to this of course, because it is an issue that the Higher Council has been working with me on for months now, but I am truly doing better. It centers on the notion that we are not to worry about where our next meal is to come from and such things as that. If we believe that we will be taken care of, we will be taken care of. This is what most people forget, and I am sure this is what the clue is leading up to. I am getting better at remembering this and only seldom have a relapse. I am supposed to tell people reading this that if they stop worrying about themselves and start worrying more about others who are in great need, they will receive blessings too, and they will come to realize that their past efforts to take care of “number one,” have been in vain because cosmic law has it going the other way around. Take care of others first and the flow of energy always will come back to you and will ensure that you have more than what you need. That way you always have something to give to others to keep the flow going. This works with money too, which is no different than anything else in that it is simply a form of energy. Unfortunately, our capitalist society has placed far too high a value on money in order to facilitate greed, selfishness, and division between people, even those people who claim to love each other.

2) On the Internet. Like they say "Out of sight, out of mind" so whatever you're pursuing - paste it everywhere you see. (A commentary for ways to provoke creative manifestation.) Brian Kim. Not only will it help keep you on track and remind you of your goal, it will slowly drive it in to your subconscious and activate the part of your brain that scans the environment, enabling you to sift through your daily life to spot the opportunities that can help get you what you want.

3) Through a song. The song that was given to me while I was exercising was Age of Aquarius.

LYRICS

4) In the mail. This was interesting because I did not have any mail, but there were multiple clues as I was on my way to go get the mail. I found a lovely glass or crystal object almost buried in a hole in my yard when I was moving the sprinkler. I had a great conversation with my neighbor who handed me a print out of Einstein’s riddle, which I wrote a blog about, so you can read that here: Joe was a greater genius than Einstein. I ran into another neighbor who gave me additional clues for the Valley Treasure Hunt. All on my way to get the mail! It is amazing how many treasures we can find during the day if we keep our eyes and ears open.

5) On the telephone over a conversation. This one netted me $20,000!

One of the “little treasures” along the way: My $20,000 student loan went through! For some reason it would not let me e-sign it yesterday and so, like I always seem to do in such cases (due to my “backsliding” in my belief that I will be well cared for), I became worried. No more worries! I signed the loan and it was all approved! And to think I do not ever have to pay it back, thanks to Obama’s future legislation!

6) In Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction This is covered in the blog I wrote that reviewed the first part of the introduction. 

7) In an article about or by Einstein during my research – this turned out to be the riddle, unless something else shows up in all of the research that is currently in progress. I think this is right though, because, as I will discuss later, this riddle showed up for me twice in one day in two entirely different places! I think that justifies a great emphasis on this particular item and I was not supposed to overlook it. See clue #4.

8) Through a book about life force energy called orgone, discovered by Dr. Reich. He provides a rather interesting definition of an interesting energy form called orgone.

“The existence of a specific life force seems highly probable to me! That is, an energy which is neither heat, electricity, magnetism, kinetic energy (including oscillation and radiation), but an energy which specifically belongs to those processes we call ‘life.’ That does not mean that this energy is restricted to those natural processes which we call ‘living beings’; it is present certainly in the formative process of the crystals. Perhaps for this reason, it would be better to term it ‘formative energy’ instead of life energy (Kammerer, as cited in Wilhelm Reich Selected Readings: An Introduction to Orgonomy, 1960).

9) It revolves slower than the earth but faster than Jupiter. While this sounds easy, everything is more complex than it would first appear which Joe taught me well. Are we talking about another planet or something else? Are we talking about planets in our solar system? How about expanding our consciousness and thinking in terms of the universe? While some people might want to answer Mars it may very well be that this cannot be answered and is thus an “unknown.” Besides that, planets' speeds are variable, so that also makes it complex (are we talking about average speeds, fastest speeds, slowest speeds?). Can we accept that there might be unknown factors?

What Einstein has said about consciousness:

A human being is part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. We experience ourselves, our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. A kind of optical delusion of consciousness. The delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty … The true value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure and the sense in which they have obtained liberation from the self….We shall require substantially new manner of thinking if humanity is to survive (Einstein, 1954). Retrieved Monday, March 16, 2009 from http://www.spaceandmotion.com

10) The median is 64. This seems easy – retirement age, right? I found it was much more complex than it would first appear. The US population is living longer but retiring earlier. Why is this?

The median age of retirement declined in the United States during the latter half of the last century. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, in the period 1950-1955, the median age of retirement was 66.9 for men and 67.7 for women. By the period 1990-1995, it was 62.7 for men and 62.6 for women. The median retirement age is projected in to be 61.7 for men and 61.2 for women during 2000-2005.

Resource: Trends in Early Retirement

http://www.ebri.org/publications/facts/index.cfm?fa=0701fact

11) Yesterday (June 18, 2009) these astrological signs were in alignment with what planet? This again, is very complex and I will provide more details as I get further into the research.

 

Planet alignments and effects http://www.moodalert.com/

The first of these alignments is between Mars and Venus. This will last until at least the first week in July and will exert a strong influence over the whole of that period. The reason why this influence will be especially strong is that Venus and Mars are the two planets closest to Earth and their effects will therefore be very keenly experienced. Typical traits to result from this alignment will include impulsive and passionate feelings with a strongly sensual nature that may include inclinations of a highly erotic nature. This may lead to excessive, or inappropriate feelings and attentions, with the possibility of unhappy emotional relationships. The second major alignment of this period is the on going alignment between Neptune and Jupiter. These have the potential to lead to increased emotional sensitivity with delicate and self refining impulses together with traditional Jovian qualities associated with generosity, understanding and fun loving enterprise and activity. This alignment also disposes to increased psychic and mystical awareness that may open up inner pathways to new and more exciting dimensions of personal thought and discovery. On another level it may offer creative and original solutions to problems, or encourage one to participate in ventures and activities that one may have never previously considered. June 18: A noticeable diminishing in tensions as we begin the rise to the next New Moon. Good for relaxation and an unhurried routine. Alert is 7.

*****************************************************************

I am definitely going to have to sleep on this! But I am not hopeful for finding “valuable treasure” now that I have this suspicion that it is only a trial run. :( Especially after my experience with the The Wrong Old Fort Road as well as the long trek out to Right Old Fort Road  just to end up with a nail! Although, I really should not complain at all (I’m sorry!) because as long as I put forth an honest effort to try and find the treasure, in the end I am always rewarded. I am just disappointed in a way because I really thought all of my initiations and training sessions were over. Guess not. No wait! He promised me they were over; he promised he would help. .  . I feel abandoned – and I am so confused!!!

Image courtesy of Microsoft

When I moved into my new home last February, I was prompted to plant yellow roses and so I planted four rose bushes total, one of them a climbing rose.  Upon researching the significance of yellow roses, I found that they represent spiritual power, wisdom, and joy. The roses are just beginning to bloom here and this is a photo taken yesterday of the very first rose that has blossomed.

 

The First Yellow Rose: for Joe

Only yellow roses

Are worthy to give you, a King

Who works in Nepantla spaces

To make freedom ring

Only yellow roses

Represent your power and your strength

To carry on your dream

No matter what the length

Eternity is not too long

To show your dream prevails

It matters not the weather

Rain, storm, or hail

Your power shines through

You will always succeed

To overcome the destruction

Of those enamored with greed

Your dream prevails through spiritual Love

And wisdom, peace and joy

That spread throughout the land

To render the war machine nothing but a child’s toy

The yellow rose, a special lovely symbol,

Representing your fondest dream come true

Love, Peace, Wisdom, and Joy

This first yellow rose must be for you

 

Happy Father’s Day

 

I always figured that Joe was smarter than Einstein, but now I have discovered evidence that shows this is indeed most likely the case. I don’t know what’s goin’ on, but I keep getting these assignments from the Higher Council to do research in order to locate all of Einstein’s mistakes and things he did not fully understand. The worst of it is, I am not that much of a scientist nor am I at all familiar with Einstein’s work, so it has me feeling like I am working way out of my league.

At any rate, you all know about the NEW TREASURE HUNT, right? (Click on the link to review it if you wish.)  I will update you on all of the clues and provide a little information about them, but I just got so excited over the fact that during this treasure hunt which I have just started on, one of my clues led to the discovery of a mistake Einstein had made that shows Joe was a greater genius than Einstein, which I knew anyway, but now I have the proof! And it seems that Einstein would want to fix his mistake since it affects 98% of the population in a negative way and I keep getting these nudges, from whence, I do not know, to find and correct his mistakes.

The mistake I found today is a biggie and I think that Einstein was like Joe in that he really loved people and would not want this mistake to carry forward any longer. I think he is figuring enough damage has been done and perhaps now he better understands Joe’s theories. Obviously, it was put in my hands to discover the mistake and to put it out here for the whole world to see. I did do some research to see if anyone else has discussed this issue and was not able to find where anyone has. I do know Joe wrote some kind of book about Einstein along with some other people, but I have not read it and I doubt very much that Joe would have pointed out this flaw. Unlike me, he accepted people as they were, faults and all and rarely corrected them. Although he did correct me one time, but it was only for my own good (I will tell that story another time). I have said this so many times, but I have to say it again. I am so blessed! I love my work because there is never, ever a dull moment and, just like Joe always said, there are new treasures to be found every day.

Joe was smarter than Einstein: How so?

Here’s the deal. Einstein knew he was a genius. What he did not know is that we are all geniuses, which of course, as I have stated before, Joe knew this without a doubt. Joe knew that we just need to take time to learn some new ways of researching, learning, and producing knowledge, -- a multiperspective, multidimensional approach that recognizes complexity and interrelationships and results in our ability to engage in continual perceptual shifts -- along with learning to use the tools that can sort them all out. Joe has lovingly and painstakingly provided all of this for us. We just need to read and apply his work!

Well, Einstein seemed to think that geniuses are something special and rare, and so he went to great efforts to develop a riddle that he claimed only 2% of the population is smart enough to figure out; thus, 98% are not smart enough to figure it out. I can just hear Joe setting him straight! “No, no, no Einstein, you have it backwards! 98% of the population CAN figure this riddle out! We need to correct this right away. Your assumptions are faulty, Einstein, and maintaining this view continues to harm people and does not serve our mission well to alleviate suffering in the world. Not only that, your escape from the Newtonian-Cartesian paradigm is incomplete.” Of course, Joe would be highly understanding of this mistake since Einstein was outright abused when he was young and trying to get his education, just as many children today are abused in the educational system that focuses on labels. All kinds of labels had been attached to Einstein and Joe related to that well, so there is no blame to be placed here. We just need to correct this so that the same sort of pain does not continue. And Joe came up with the solution for correcting it. I think Einstein would quite willingly release the honor of being the greatest genius of all time over to Joe in light of this. After all, Einstein only created the riddle; he did not devise a way for everyone to solve it, which is the greater accomplishment. Joe did!

Pop Quiz

Which of the following of Joe’s theories will work best to solve Einstein’s riddle? (Einstein’s riddle is reproduced below so that you can give it a go.)

A) postformalism

B) multiculturalism

C) the bricolage

D) critical complex epistemology

 

Once you have determined the best approach, you are “home free” for solving Einstein’s so-called nearly unsolvable puzzle presented below. Be sure to study up first, though, because you will need the tools.

Einstein's Riddle

ALBERT EINSTEIN'S RIDDLE

ARE YOU IN THE TOP 2% OF INTELLIGENT PEOPLE IN THE WORLD? SOLVE THE RIDDLE AND FIND OUT.

There are no tricks, just pure logic, so good luck and don't give up.

1. In a street there are five houses, painted five different colours.
2. In each house lives a person of different nationality
3. These five homeowners each drink a different kind of beverage, smoke different brand of cigar and keep a different pet.

THE QUESTION: WHO OWNS THE FISH?

HINTS

1. The Brit lives in a red house.
2. The Swede keeps dogs as pets.
3. The Dane drinks tea.
4. The Green house is next to, and on the left of the White house.
5. The owner of the Green house drinks coffee.
6. The person who smokes Pall Mall rears birds.
7. The owner of the Yellow house smokes Dunhill.
8. The man living in the centre house drinks milk.
9. The Norwegian lives in the first house.
10. The man who smokes Blends lives next to the one who keeps cats.
11. The man who keeps horses lives next to the man who smokes Dunhill.
12. The man who smokes Blue Master drinks beer.
13. The German smokes Prince.
14. The Norwegian lives next to the blue house.
15. The man who smokes Blends has a neighbour who drinks water.

ALBERT EINSTEIN SAID THAT 98% OF THE WORLD POPULATION WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO SOLVE IT.

Correcting False Assumptions

 

Stating that 98% of the population cannot solve this riddle is where Einstein is wrong. If you use Joe’s theory (the correct/best one for this puzzle) you will be able to solve it in 30-60 minutes, maybe less if you have already had practice with the form of thinking required. Click here for the answer, but only if you have given it a serious attempt. http://www.manbottle.com/trivia/einstein_s_riddle/einstein_s_riddle_answer

 

Here are some free tips:

 

1)     Use linear thinking sparingly.

2)     Use a systematic, but improvisational process.

3)     Show what you know.

4)   Use multiple perspectives and frequent perspective shifts.

5)     Continuously explore relationships.

 

At a later date, I will post the complete solution, showing which theory I used and exactly how I used it to solve this riddle and I am definitely not classified as a genius according to our standard IQ tests, which are bogus anyway; I hope you know that. This is important because it is the whole point in bringing out the fact that Joe has corrected Einstein. Joe looked upon quantitative measurement of intelligence in a very unfavorable light because he knew how flawed the measurements are, not to mention that the whole idea of measuring intelligence is a grotesque misconception.

 

Note there is no one “right” way to solve this riddle, although there is one right answer. The solution can be achieved via multiple pathways, some shorter than others. It is not a matter of intelligence that gets one to the solution most quickly. It is simply a matter of the amount of practice you have had using the theory. More practice and you will be able to solve puzzles like this one in your head, without ever writing down a thing. That’s how brilliant Joe’s theory is! Joe was definitely smarter than Einstein, but I’m glad that Einstein is game for correcting his mistakes. OK, both men were equal geniuses, but Einstein, in spite of his great ability to engage in perceptual shifts, got trapped in the Newtonian-Cartesian IQ nonsense, whereby Joe escaped it and found a solution to get us all out of it.

 

Treasure Hunt Update

 

Yes, I have all of the clues now and this is quite a complex project.

In case you were wondering about the last three clues, I was given them before I went to bed the day the treasure hunt started, just as promised. In fact, here is the complete list of clues, all of which I now have found and I am onto phase 2 of the treasure hunt – the bricolage!

 

The Clues

1)     It’s well read and most people never remember what it says. I promised I would give the answer to this since I knew it almost right off the bat: it is the Bible. But, as Joe always pointed out, everything is more complicated than it would first seem. This applies here, so I will explain more later.

2)     On the Internet. Like they say "Out of sight, out of mind" so whatever you're pursuing - paste it everywhere you see. (A commentary for ways to provoke creative manifestation.) Brian Kim.

3)     Through a song. The song that was given to me while I was exercising was Age of Aquarius.

4)     In the mail This was interesting because I did not have any mail, but there were multiple clues as I was on my way to go get the mail. I found a lovely glass or crystal object almost buried in a hole in my yard when I was moving the sprinkler. I had a great conversation with my neighbor who handed me a print out of Einstein’s riddle. I ran into another neighbor who gave me additional clues for the Valley Treasure Hunt. All on my way to get the mail!

5)     On the telephone over a conversation. This one netted me $20,000!

6)     In Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction This is covered in the blog I wrote yesterday

7)     In an article about or by Einstein during my research – this turned out to be the riddle, unless something else shows up in all of the research that is currently in progress. I think this is right though, because, as I will discuss later, this riddle showed up for me twice in one day in two entirely different places! I think that justifies a great emphasis on this particular item and I was not supposed to overlook it.

8)     Through a book about life force energy called orgone, discovered by Dr. Reich. Yes, he provides a rather interesting definition of an interesting energy form called orgone.

9)     It revolves slower than the earth but faster than Jupiter. This is tricky because there is more than one planet that fits this.

10)  The median is 64. This seems easy – retirement age, right? I found it was much more complex than it would first appear. I will include more details later.

11)  Yesterday (June 18, 2009) these astrological signs were in alignment with what planet? This again, is very complex and I will provide more details as I get further into the research.

Well, that’s it for today. I am SO EXCITED, which I seem to I find myself saying more and more often these days. I have shown that Joe was smarter than Einstein! Like I said, I already knew that, but you know how it is: We must have proof. I have additional proof in writing which shows exactly how anyone can solve this riddle, but the Higher Council has asked me to hold off just a bit because they would like people to figure out which theory to use, learn to use it, and then try the riddle before I provide greater guidance. They are confident that most of you will be able to figure this out just fine, thus making Einstein’s mistake even more glaring and confirming that Joe was the greatest genius ever. And while who is or is not a genius is not so important; what is important is that we correct the misconceptions about IQ testing through ample evidence. IQ tests today are causing so terribly much damage to the poor students who are forced on unhappy paths just because people put so much faith in bogus numbers. Einstein, himself, has requested his error be brought out in order to undo his contribution to this sad condition and he approves of this blog (I know, it’s my imagination, again, lol, but I do enjoy using my creative imagination when I am researching).

May you be richly blessed with the treasures that are waiting to be discovered,

Vanessa

P.S. There are a few people who attempt to discredit this riddle by suggesting that perhaps Einstein is not really the one who developed it. I have official word: this is irrelevant. Einstein’s name is and always has been associated with it, and it would be Einstein’s wishes to take full responsibility so that the error in judgment is revealed and corrected. Like Joe, he wishes no harm upon people, but only love, joy, and peace, and it has been deemed that the claim this riddle has anything to do with quantitatively measuring intelligence continues to cause great harm.

Public domain photo of Einstein courtesy of Wikipedia

Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction by Joe L. Kincheloe: A Review

(To read this book, click on the book image, to the right of this blog).

Chapter 1.

Introduction: What We Call Knowledge Is Complicated and Harbors Profound Consequences

Joe Kincheloe (2008) opens the chapter by discussing the agenda of transnational corporations and the continuing flow of money from the poorest people in the world into the hands of the richest. Basically, from my perspective, this simply halts the flow of money, which I have mentioned might be looked at as a form of energy (as explained by my beloved spiritual advisor). Once the money is all pulled out, much like using up our nonrenewable energy resources, and the rich fail to put that money back into circulation, the entire economic system is doomed to fail. And indeed, Amin (2008), an economist, predicts this failure will likely occur soon. Since his writing of this article, we have seen many failures of the economy. Amin points out that “capitalism and market economy are not synonymous” (p. 51) and that the majority of the population does not own property (e.g. capital), thus, they are forced to sell their labor power to the owners of capital. Of course, this all aligns with what Marx has presented in his great work that presents an extremely in-depth analysis of capitalism, showing two possibilities: a transmutation to some form of socialism or the complete demise of the entire system. Amin also identifies ten very large banks which form an “oligopoly” and fifty large “financial, industrial, agribusiness, trade and transportation groups forming a “plutocracy” that work together to dominate the global economy” (pp. 52-54). Amin predicts a series of “firestorms” which are likely to begin in the South over these current conditions in which the economy is a total “farce.” According to Amin, it cannot survive.

During all of the various and destructive ways these conditions continue to exist and manifest throughout the world, there are many, many people who are harmed and even killed. The public is force fed lies through the media to keep us all placated. Further, we are excessively distracted by irrelevant and time wasting diversions such as movies, lame television programs, and video games. And as Kincheloe points out, which is what this book addresses throughout, is that “When the politics of knowledge surrounding the Iraqi War are combined with tens of thousands of other informational issues, we begin to realize the extent of the ‘knowledge problem’ of our age” (p. 3). Again, Kincheloe (2008) frames the blatant lies we, the public, are being fed in very polite terms by referring to them as “distorted politics of knowledge” (p. 3). I must admire him for his composure and ability to maintain a dignified demeanor in spite of the horrific consequences of this distorted knowledge. Personally, I become very angered by it all.

He continues by describing the difficulty of the current educational enviros for reacting positively and responsively with this information he is about to present to us for confronting our thirst and dire need for real knowledge, and yet conveys the absolute necessity for the future of humanity to do just this. It is a matter of inserting a democratic, purposeful education that has as its goal creative knowledge production for the betterment of humanity into a stale, knowledge depleted “me first” environment that resorts to the very type of education that Freire (1972) warned us against, “banking education” in which fragments of information, often intertwined with lies and misinformation are fed into our minds. Thus, we are deceptively told this constitutes knowledge and an education. Since knowledge (REAL knowledge) truly is power, we continue to be disempowered through education – the very system that we have come to believe is an empowering one that will lead us to achieve our dreams. We are so enamored with the idea that what we can “regurgitate” (as Joe puts it) on a standardized test is a measure of our intelligence that these tests dictate nearly everything happening in education today as well as which pathway each student should be set out on, whether it is toward the military, the slave job market, further non-education, or if nothing fits, there is always a paved road to prison. These are the sad facts and it is not getting better. Indeed, we will soon be seeing these same types of federally-mandated standardized tests at the university, even the graduate levels of education, unless we take concerted action to put a stop to it.

The tragedy of all of this is that, as Kincheloe highlights, we are leaving behind the “why” questions we have asked during the process of our education in the past for a focus on a “technicist” education (p.4). He discusses in detail why this is happening. As I have just pointed out, there are ulterior motives to serve the capitalists and thus, the purpose of education is not for people “to become scholars who use their knowledge and skills to do good things in the world, to relieve human suffering that plagues the planet” (p. 4). No, the purpose of this education is to “train, well-regulated and passive students to accept what is” (p. 4). And we are to accept “what is” with no questions asked. This is where we get into the concept of hegemony in which we, the oppressed believe in and support the very systems and conditions that are oppressing us.

We need a new vision of what could be. This is one of the reasons Joe has left us this great book -- truly a gift to the world – so that we all may creatively imagine and create that vision for a better world. Kincheloe has often referred to this type of vision as critical immanence in many of his other works, but here he simply speaks of “what could be” (p. 4). How do we develop within ourselves the creative imagination to acquire the great vision Joe had and has presented to the world through his numerous and brilliant works? According to Kincheloe (2008) it of course begins with gaining an intimate familiarity with knowledge, its production, and its dissemination. We need to be asking the right kinds of questions about knowledge – and answering them. On page 4 he lists the types of questions we need to be seeking answers to such as who produces the knowledge and what might their motivation or purpose be. Think about the various roles you play in your life: teacher, parent, student, friend, lover, etc. Then ask yourself what knowledge are you passing to others within these various roles? Where did you get this knowledge? Where did that source get its knowledge? What is the quintessential purpose for passing the knowledge to others? Is there important and helpful knowledge that you may be missing? Answer the questions Kincheloe has presented for several different roles you partake in and think of some other questions to ask and answer relating to these roles. What can you do to change this? How can you improve your life and the lives of those with whom you share your knowledge?

Joe had a beautiful vision for a world of beauty, peace, love, and joy. . . we must create it for him -- for all of us -- so that his work was not in vain.

To be continued. . .

 

PS YES!!! I am working on the NEW TREASURE HUNT!!! I have all of the clues now and I am employing Joe's great conceptualization of the bricolage. In fact, I am using a new methodology -- that is, a new way of employing the bricolage which he actually taught me in a dream. So, be sure to check back tomorrow. I hope I will have made progress toward unveiling the treasure. If not quite yet, I will at least clue you in to all of the clues . . . it has been a lot of fun and very exciting.

References

Amin, S. (2008). ‘Market economy’ or oligopoly-finance capitalism? Translation of a chapter from Du capitalisme a la civilization to be published in 2008 by Slyllepse in Paris. Monthly Review, April, 51-61. Retreived April 21, 2008, from Academic Search Premier (31486861).

Freire, P. (1972). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. 

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and critical pedagogy: An Introduction. Netherlands: Springer

How do you know you are fulfilling your true mission in life? This is a question that haunted me for most of my life especially given I did not even know what my mission was. Not anymore. I am doing exactly what the Higher Council wishes and I am working toward my dreams for a better world. The reason I know for a fact that I am doing what the Council wishes is because first, I am in constant communication with them, and secondly, is because absolutely everything I wish for comes true now, and third, they have promised me that if anyone tries to stop me or fetter in any way, they will receive “instant karmic reflection.” And so this is just the most joyful, blissful time of my life.

Some of my blessings: a beautiful new home, furniture fit for a king, everything needed to make a house a home (I had NOTHING when I moved into my new home in February!), a beautiful diamond ring. Now I have promises of another tax refund (I get my house down payment back!), I am going to get a significant refund on my tuition for reasons I cannot go into here, I qualified for a big enough loan to get everything I need for finishing my doctorate – including a new computer and a video camera so that I can do multimedia for my course development projects, and in the future, Obama is going to set up a special student loan forgiveness policy for certain very poor students – this one might take some work, so if any of you can lend a hand to push that through, that would be fantastic! The thought is that by freeing up people from having to pay more than they can afford in student loans that this will stimulate the economy better than them repaying the money. It makes sense to me, plus I think we poor students are entitled to some sort of rebate considering how in debt we have had to go just to get an education and how the banks have ripped us off.

A certain member of the Higher Council sent me this song today just as a reminder, which I thought was really sweet. And today, they are starting me on a totally new treasure hunt, which is a REAL treasure hunt, not a training mission. I will be given some clues which I must follow to locate some treasure of “quite substantial value that will serve [my] needs for quite some time.” I am so excited! I will be sure to keep everyone updated. Btw, the Council members truly will bless you if you help with this project. This is because it is such a great purpose – to alleviate all suffering in the world – that they have God’s greatest blessing and support. So, if you are still looking for that perfect mission, just think about what you are passionate about and use that passion and your own special skills and talents for moving the project along. You will truly be just as blessed as I have been ever since I started working on this mission.

THE NEW TREASURE HUNT!!!

Wow! Is this my imagination again??? If so, I love it! This morning when I first awakened, I came up with this message from Joe. Remember, now, this is my wild and crazy imagination at work here, but this is outlining a really cool  and fun, perhaps even “postformal” treasure hunt I will be working on over the next few days while my kids are away at camp. No help for this one. But here is what my imagination tells me that Joe is saying about this fantastical treasure hunt the Higher Council wishes for me to enjoy today as I go about my daily tasks.

This is a NEW treasure hunt for Vanessa. She has truly worked so diligently on the training missions during which she repeatedly got “down and dirty” literally. She scrambled through and around blackberry brambles to reach the places where I had indicated the treasure might be – all to please me. She literally dug in the dirt, pulling out worthless screws, bolts, washers, nails, and fragments of metal as detected by the gold-detecting metal detector. She drove all over the countryside, 80 miles round trip numerous times at the suggestion of her treasure hunt guide (that would be me) all because she loves me and did not want to disappoint me – and because she has total and 100% faith in my mission and was willing to do whatever it took to prove that to me. She has even made multiple trips to check up on the elderly 84-year-old man and has taken him food, kindness, love and camaraderie all out of the kindness of her sweet soul – her heart. I am quite honored and truly blessed to have someone so lovely who is devoted so completely to my dream – the alleviation of suffering in the world. For in the final analysis, this is truly what the mission is all about. And even Vanessa and Rainbow Princess, as they engaged in these wild, crazy, often humorous training sessions, were in complete joy the entire time They are both well prepared now for the real assignments that will work directly toward the mission. Oh, and I might add – there was never a greedy thought in the minds of these two beautiful women as they sought the treasure that the various clues were leading them toward. Their thoughts always were focused on the mission and consisted of questions like: How can we help someone with the funds received from the diamond ring we find in the yard? (This is why I had to intervene and have the diamond delivered personally, as it was meant to be a gift for Vanessa as a symbol of our spiritual marriage). They never, ever ask the question, “What’s in it for me?” And so now is the time for the Real Treasure Hunt in which Vanessa will find something quite valuable. And again, her thoughts are on what she can use this treasure for toward meeting our project mission. She would like a new computer and video camera for developing her curriculum for all of the poor children in a particular neighborhood – and to take each one of them to the valley this summer for their own treasure hunting experience. The Higher Council worked out this plan I am about to present in order to both reward Vanessa and Rainbow Princess for their hard, unselfish work on their training mission and to jump start the lovely plans they have for the neighborhood children. Their mission to help these children engage in fascinating and passionate educational experiences is a quintessential example of the kinds of actions we are hoping to see take place all over the world once my theory – which has been released now – spreads as it has been calculated to do. So you see, Vanessa and Rainbow Princess want to have weekly get togethers with the children so that they can learn all about the interesting history of their local valley (which has been shoved aside as a place of interest, incidentally). It was, in fact, one of the earliest settlements in the areas and stolen from the Indians who were living there at the time – and the children are going to hear about this. Also, Vanessa and Rainbow Princess will be providing some very interesting arts and crafts projects for the children that relate to the history of the valley – plus they want to take each and every child on a field trip to the valley to see where the old Indian fort was, to romp in the wilderness, to search for the Lost Treasury Notes, to solve the Mystery of the Old Grist Mill, to visit the House of the Forlorn and pan in the nearby mountain stream for gold, to climb a tall mountain, and to see the Studebaker and Old Combine hidden in the blackberry brambles. This will make such an exciting journey for the children and a happy and joyous summer they will remember for a lifetime. Vanessa and Rainbow Princess have been faithfully and diligently working on the curriculum for this summer program and unfortunately, their funds – which are merely a form of energy, btw, have become precariously low for accomplishing everything they need. Well, Vanessa knows well by now she need not worry, of course, since I, as her loving husband and one of God’s angels will always see that she and her children have absolutely everything they need and then some. The problem is in purchasing all of these extra things needed for the children of an impoverished neighborhood, which is really no problem whatsoever given it is such a great and worthy purpose and fulfills my mission. Thus, THE NEW TREASURE HUNT! Today, as Vanessa progresses through the day, various clues will come her way and these clues will come in different formats: 1) The Internet; 2) through a song; 3) in the mail; 4) over the phone through a phone conversation; 5) In my book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction; 6) through an article as she continues the research I have her working on about Einstein; 7) through a book about the life force energy called orgone that was discovered by a Dr. Reich; and finally, to get her started, I will provide the first clue: “It’s well read and most people never remember what it says.” And so there you have it; there are a total of eight clues. Actually, there will be a total of eleven clues, but the last three clues will come tonight before she goes to bed.

And what is she to do with these clues? Bricolage them, of course! She is to write about each of them and the situations surrounding them and once this is all synthesized, it will be clear exactly where she will find the treasure and even exactly what the treasure is. So check back in about three days and she will have found THE NEW TREASURE. Better yet, follow along with her here. I am sure she will keep readers updated about her trials and tribulations as she searches for the clues, decodes them and then synthesizes them for the GREAT GRAND PRIZE. It is sure to get quite interesting before it is over and I am going to be in total bliss watching her as she discovers all of the little treasures along the way – because you see, one final treasure at the end of this treasure hunt does not adequately convey my gratitude and appreciation for all that Vanessa does toward promoting my work – taking it out into the world as she does. I don’t see anyone else who is working as hard as she does and thus she is to be greatly blessed in every way I and the other members of the Higher Council can conceive of. And we are never disappointed in the amount of gratitude and love Vanessa demonstrates and even returns to us. Truly, we are all blessed in a great symbiotic relationship with one major purpose: We will make the world a better place – a sort of heaven on earth where everyone is free to travel about wherever they wish and there is nothing but joy, peace, and love. Now I know Vanessa has told you that you, too, can enjoy these great blessings. And she is so correct! So won’t you join in today?

Happy treasure hunting,

Joe

Wow! He really is long-winded sometimes (lol). Oh that’s right: This is all my imagination. Well, I am going to pretend this is real cuz it just sounds like so much fun --  and I am going to do this treasure hunt today! In fact I already know the answer to some of the clues and I will continue with my day collecting the rest of them! I am SO EXCITED! I just hope the treasure will help me get everything I need for the sweet little children. I do not want any of them to have to miss the treasure hunt in the valley.

OK, so to summarize the clues, here they are:

1)    It’s well read and most people never remember what it says. (I already know the answer to this; it was almost too easy! Think about it and see if you can figure it out and I will tell you tomorrow.

2)     On the Internet

3)     Through a song (this was given to me already since I have already started on my list of tasks for the day – it was given to me while I was doing my exercises and I wll let you know tomorrow as well)

4)     In the mail

5)     On the telephone over a conversation

6)     In Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction

7)     In an article about or by Einstein during my research

8)     Through a book about life force energy called orgone, discovered by Dr. Reich

9)   To be given to me before I go to bed tonight

10)  To be given to me before I go to bed tonight

11)  To be given to me before I go to bed tonight

That’s it! I am SO EXCITED!!! because I just love treasure hunts and this one is sure to be the best one yet! Check back tomorrow for an update.

Vanessa

Image courtesy of Microsoft.

Reality is bending to our intentions, new dimensions in thought are opening up, the human family is uniting like never before to set a new standard for what’s possible creatively, collectively, and in a spirit of innovation that will heal this planet! Can you feel it too? The spiritual, intellectual, & energetic vibration of this solar system quickening has begun its exponential growth pattern.    ~ Dreaming Bear

As I had stated previously, it was predicted  that I would gain certain insights when the roses bloomed, and as I have also stated, even after the roses began to bloom and I started gaining this insight, I did not feel the time was right to convey it. The time has been right, now for awhile and in fact I had written two blogs last month which I am now posting here. The only reason I did not get them posted earlier is because there were other issues that I felt I needed to address before coming out with the insights. So anyway, here the insights, and you may choose to believe them or not. We do still have free will, at least most of us – if only more of us would use it more often!

The following was written May 31, 2009

The Roses Are Blooming

The roses are blooming and I wrote a special blog for the occasion and I know the world is just really not ready for the revelation, so I am not posting it at this time. As I mentioned, back in my Treasure Hunting Blog on May 24, I was supposed to have experienced some sort of special insight when the roses bloom. Well, the roses are beginning to bloom and I have the special insight, at least part of it, and in fact, have written precisely what that enlightenment is all about. I suspect there will be more related to it as the number of roses blooming increases. The revelation has to do with a new understanding of Joe’s work, but upon deep reflection, I have assessed that the world is simply not ready for it. And yet, at the same time, I do feel obligated to inform people. And so I will break it to everyone in pieces – in bricolage pieces so that it is more easily digestible and perhaps I will not be called crazy, like certain beloved people have been in the past, although I won’t set my hopes on that. I honestly am not out to subject myself to that sort of pain; I am merely trying to live up to what I have been called to do, a great blessing, really.

It’s funny. But it’s not. This all reminds me so much of Plato’s Cave. You know -- where the guy went outside the cave and discovered something great and beautiful that explained the dark, formless shadows, and he lovingly and generously came back in to share his knowledge…and the people in the cave all called him crazy, yet they were too afraid to go out and check it out for themselves. I will have to consult with higher powers to determine what information I am to release now and what can wait, and I say this knowing full well that there are people at this very moment who will latch onto that statement and label me. Little do they really know that there are some of us who do have a close relationship to God.  What is funny about this is that so often the very people who CLAIM to be Christian and have a close relationship with Jesus and God, of which there are literally millions, are the very ones who would question my sanity when I say this…I find this very, very strange. They must be living out some sort of deception or false reality or they would not question things this way. I can imagine that would be a very difficult existence – to contend to have a personal relationship with Jesus, for example, and then not really have one. For I think if more people truly had this relationship, we would certainly see much less human suffering in the world. The truth is, we can all have these close relationships and we just need to do so and tap into them more for guidance and knowledge in our lives. The help and guidance is there and freely available for anyone who seeks it. I know many people do seek that guidance and just don’t talk about it and that is another issue. We all need to talk more and share what we have learned.

The problem I have right now is that time is so critical. I know we are running out of time to make changes. The thing is, the changes will happen – there is nothing stopping that because it is all wound up tight in Joe’s theory, so the real problem is that we are running out of time for us, ourselves to change in order to meet the coming changes that are already beginning to occur. Essentially, Joe’s theory has been released and you can look at it as a form of energy. I am trying here, to put this in concrete terms even though this is highly simplistic for what is an extremely complex conceptualization, all so that more people can relate. We might consider his theory as a form of energy and as we all know energy cannot be created or destroyed. We either go with the flow, jump in and swim down the stream with it (or get on his boat!!!) or we can risk drowning if we continue to fight the current and attempt to swim or boat upstream. His theory is that tight. There is no room for diversionary actions or tactics. The theory has already been released and there is nothing we can do to halt its symbiotic effects -- and why would we even want to since his theory only creates great and beautiful things?! -- and yet there are some things we can do to move things along a little faster and a little better, which is why I have asked that people read his book. Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction.

That’s all I can really say right now. I do hope people will take this at face value and decide that maybe they had better take a closer look at Joe’s work, read his books, and begin to actively apply his brilliant ideas in their lives. I will explain it all in much greater depth gradually, as more people become receptive and as I gain more insight when the roses are fully in bloom. And believe it or not, there is actually a scientific explanation to why Joe’s theory will work this way! Imagine that! But, yes, Joe was also a scientist and he studied Einstein’s work along with some other scientists’ work quite extensively. But right now the most imperative thing for people to realize is that it is futile, and it will only work against them if they do not get on board – on the boat – with Joe’s theory. Any other boat at all will sink, so my strong advice is to get off sinking ships and get on board with Joe. At the same time, you should know that those of us who are already on the boat have been enjoying a beautiful boat ride with the sun shining down on us and many blessings bestowed upon us. I hope you will join in. That is my mission … to get the word out and have as many people join in as possible. It’s truly a very beautiful thing.

 

The following was written May 30, 2009

Could this be the enlightenment?

The roses are blooming! And they are so beautiful! Remember back on May 27, 2009, I had mentioned that I am supposed to experience some sort of enlightenment when the roses bloom.) I am only saying this once, though. Joe’s theory is so brilliantly and divinely designed and synergistically and symbiotically connected and intertwined with each and every one of us and everything on earth that subverting his work ultimately amounts to subverting ourselves. And by subversion, I mean all possible forms of subversion, from simply ignoring his theory, to actively challenging it, and to changing it. I am not presenting this in a negative light or as some sort of dire warning, but rather as an advisory such that we all should take heed and realize that Joe’s educational theory is a part of us all. I am offering this information in a last ditch effort to extend a hand to those who seem to think I am up to no good, or at least those who choose to treat me that way, and I do realize that it may very well be futile. Nevertheless, I do have to try. I do have a love for humanity and I truly wish only the best and goodness for everyone. But I am also highly aware of the fact that, no matter how good one’s intentions are, or perhaps BECAUSE one’s intentions are good, then the whole game becomes destroying that person in some way, whether it be their livelihood, their reputation, or just their enjoyment in life. It is one of those sad facts of life. But we can never give up hope. Paulo Freire and Joe Kincheloe both made that very clear.

The truth is I am up to all good things. I only want to see love and joy and peace in the world, the world that was meant to be. Therefore, I think it is important that we embrace this idea that Joe’s educational theory can help get us there and to really “wrap our minds around it” and pull in his brilliant theories and recommendations and let them guide and direct our actions to improve education and, ultimately, the world. However, whether we actively do this or not, his work is so cleverly devised that it cannot be destroyed in any way – I think he incorporated a lot of physics into the design such that his theory cannot be created or destroyed, much like the First Law of Thermodynamics shows that energy cannot be created or destroyed, only converted to new forms.

His theory is like energy that has been let loose. I still have to do more research on that aspect, however. The theory is designed so that we can use our own “creative imaginations” and we can add or expand on certain aspects, but it cannot really be changed or destroyed because it has been so perfectly, divinely, synergistically, and symbiotically designed. And not only that, due to the tight intertwining and the interrelationships within it, we ultimately destroy our own well-being if we move too far away from all of the beautiful and great things his theory would have us creating. Well, I guess this is my own theory, here. Kinda hard to prove, except to just watch and test it over time. But just because we cannot quantitatively assess something easily, does not mean it does not exist as a possibility. Anyone who has read Joe’s writing knows how much he stresses that fact. What is consciousness, for example? How do we define it? How do we measure it? We know it’s something that can be controlled and manipulated however and we sure have many people doing just that! In fact, it is highly ironic that certain people absolutely insist on quantitative measurements, which you can’t get when it comes to measuring consciousness, yet those very same people have no problem with the manipulation of human consciousness to the maximum extent possible for their own benefit.

Joe was a genius far above what anyone on Earth can even comprehend; sometimes I truly believe he was the greatest genius on Earth, but again, that is not something I can prove. His work is ingeniously designed not to be subverted, destroyed, or otherwise tampered with and in fact any efforts to do so will likely result in the individuals who might attempt this to be excluded from the education enviros and there will be no recovery for their work due to the symbiotic manner in which a consideration of multitudes of phenomena have been incorporated into the theory. I honestly don’t think Joe left anything out and that is the way synergism operates; nothing can alter synergistic effects that are built into the theory. I don’t like to be a bearer of bad news and indeed this is extremely good news for those of us who have supported Joe and his work, which is the majority of us, no doubt.  It is my belief that Joe possessed an advanced “ecological consciousness” – which he explained is “produced by an awareness of the infinite ways phenomena are connected” and which is the “heart of symbiotic hermeneutics” (Kincheloe & Berry, 2004, p. 63). Some people criticized Joe because he believed in synthesizing so many variables, but the truth is, he had it all figured out to the “t” as far as the exact number of variables it takes, according to quantitative dimensions, that would render his theory impenetrable.

And while he never claimed to be a mathematician because it was not his specialization, I can assure you that even in math he was highly advanced and there were calculus computations that went into devising his theory to ensure it was tight and that it would result in exponential growth once released. I do not fully understand quite yet how the equations work and where they are hiding in his theory, but I do know that they are there, along with many other great treasures that are just waiting to be found. And further, Joe states, “While there are definitely times where one might want to present a literal transcription of someone’s words, the larger objective in critical complex knowledge production involves getting into ‘behind the scenes’ work with the data one collects in order to construct meanings that can change our lives and worlds” (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 132). Joe’s research was much heavier and deeper even than most people imagine, heavier and deeper than most of us can comprehend even. He stated in his book Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction, “Indeed, there’s more to research and knowledge production than following proscribed steps of empirical observation. No matter what the method, whether it be quantitative or qualitative, the point of research in a critical complex epistemology is to provide a compelling interpretation of a phenomenon that sets the stage for transformative action” (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 133).

Lest we think Joe did not understand what he, himself is saying here and did not indeed practice what he preached, I am merely clarifying this and hopefully helping more people see that it is in our own best self-interest as well as the best interest of all of the beloved people on Earth and the future of the world environmentally if we understand the magnitude of what seems to be a simple concept and apply it in our own conceptualizations to move education forward. In one way it is very simple and we need only understand that simplicity. The complexity is hidden from sight; Joe did all of that hard work for us. So yes, of course, Joe incorporated what he knew intimately into his theory! He has set the stage for transformative action! And not only that, those of us who take active roles on that stage in support of him and his work are going to be richly, richly blessed and we will also bless all those we come in contact with as we go about our work facilitating transformative empowerment of people all over the globe.

I hope you will think about this deeply. I know many people loved Joe and I would love to see even more people incorporate his theory into their educational work and actively promote his work. I know in my heart it will make a huge and amazing difference for our learners as well as for all of us (which is why I chose the website url us; this way we can keep in mind it is all of us working together with Joe’s theory)

 

These are the roses in my neighborhood; as you can see, only a very few are blooming so far…I will be back with a new picture in a couple of weeks or so and hopefully with many more roses blooming and many more incredible insights. Let’s see if the prediction holds up all the way through. I hope it does.

So, there you have my enlightenment for the time being. I matters not whether you believe it. The theory has been released and its transformative effect will continue to grow exponentially just like Dreaming Bear says love will spread throughout the world. Joe’s theory, if you truly understand it, predicts this! Somehow, I think Dreaming Bear and Joe were like brothers because Joe definitely used that exponential equation in the formulation of his theory. And I do not doubt Joe or his work, whatsoever. I have total faith in it! I knew there was a reason he insisted on calling it a “perpetual revolution.” It is because once the theory is released, it perpetually – and exponentially -- spreads and transforms the world.

I am certain there will be many of you who are very skeptical about what I have discussed today, and that is perfectly ok. Skepticism is good. I just don’t want you to be left out on account of your skepticism. Go with this. It cannot hurt and if you do go with something that is continuously evolving and then prove that I am wrong; so be it. At least by some of us following Joe’s theory, the world will have gotten better in some form or fashion, and that is a very good thing. I just want to end by strongly encouraging you to get on the right boat or at least begin swimming downstream by studying Joe’s work and applying it in your life, learning, and teaching and also by leading others to doing the same. You will find that once you are on board Joe’s ship with the sun shining down on you, your life will suddenly transform in amazing ways!!! It’s AMAZING!

 

References

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction. Rotterdam: Springer.

Kincheloe, J. L. & Berry, K. S. (2004). Rigor and Complexity in Educational Research: Conceptualizing the Bricolage. New York: Open University Press.

Photos courtesy of Microsoft (except roses)

Joe’s theory is ecological. And it is mathematically calculated to exhibit exponential growth. This is one of my insights that came when the roses started blooming – not just that his theory is ecological since I already knew that, but that this is only part of the story. Joe was very heavy into science, deep ecological science, and he was a mathematician. If you did not know that about Joe, then you did not really know Joe. When his theory is released, partly due to the symbiotic factors that are tightly interwoven into it, along with its very effective built in “fertilizer” (radical love the likes of which the world has never seen) and knowledge that quenches one’s thirst on a parched dry desert day (its critical epistemology), it is going to spread much like a beautiful plant would grow given bountiful supplies of fresh water, fertilizer, and places to grow. It’s going to spread around the globe like a wild, crazed weed. Indeed, that’s what some people will think when it first starts out – they may even be thinking, “that Vanessa is a mad woman” (lol). And they will think that about the next woman, guy, and child who adapts. And while these skeptics are busy calling us names and gossiping – or listening to the “devils radio,” as Joe refers to it, this wild, mad “weed” is going to grow everywhere. It is unstoppable.

An attribute that is built into the theory is that there is no stopping it. There is no weed killer today that can stop this “weed” (or what people may think is a weed, just because the way it looks when it starts out) and so it quickly becomes futile to try and get rid of it. It is already too late even now to stop it, so attempting to do so is wasted effort. Those who do try to stop it will be left behind so fast that they will not have realized what happened to them until it is too late. And not only that, every effort they exert toward killing this “weed,” comes back on them, identical to the way that universal karmic law operates: instant karmic reflection. Joe was so brilliant that all of these things are built into his theory and much more even, which I will discuss at a later time, once all of this really sinks in. So those people who attempt to destroy what is happening via his theory will end up suffering the consequences upon themselves which they had intended to implement via their efforts to destroy what Joe had created. Soon it becomes too late for them to join in or attend the celebration party because very few of those people who didn’t “get it” in time will actually be able to catch up and get on board – only those who have genuinely overcome their lack of faith in what a beautiful, complete, and fulfilling dream Joe has created.

This is just about the time it is revealed that his work is not a weed to be trashed in the annals of history, but it is much like a bugleweed; it is actually a beautiful plant with the most beautiful flowers ever, flowers fit to send the King or the God of Love, flowers that spread enlightenment, love and joy wherever they bloom. Like Joe’s theory, once the bugleweed first gets released and starts growing, many people also do not understand and they think it is just something to get rid of – that is, until the springtime arrives and millions of these lovely purple flowery spikes pop up all over and the most beautiful and numerous butterflies imaginable come out and flutter among the people.  And since people love purple and butterflies, they finally realize what great value there is in this so-called weed spreading all over the planet. 

The humorous thing is that what people don’t realize, just the way bugleweed works, Joe’s theory works – it keeps the real weeds – all the bad people and stuff we see in the world today – from growing up into it. Critical Complex Epistemology is just so tightly woven one could compare it to a bugleweed mat which functions in the same manner. The bugleweed mat grows low to the ground all year round, much like grass except that it has lovely bugle-shaped leaves, but it is such a tight mat of vegetation that no weeds can possibly grow up through it. And then in May and June come the lovely royal purple flowers that release enlightenment that will make the enlightenment I am experiencing with the roses blooming look like child’s play. So take this as a trumpet call: Joe’s theory is ecological, it is scientifically and mathematically devised, and once it is set free, it grows much like a bugleweed. And this is a very, very good thing for you, for me, and for everyone because much like the bugleweed spreads, love will spread all around the world. That’s beautiful music to my ears!

Image courtesy of www.robsplants.com

As I have stated before, Joe's writing was multidimensional in that it was written on multple levels. However, he has set each and every one of us FREE (the open doors of which I have previously written) – because he wholeheartedly believed in freedom of expression and freedom to create  -- and freedom to interpret whichever dimension touched our hearts. He was passionate about creative education and passionate in his belief that everyone on this earth is entitled to receive a relevant, rigorous education that is respectful of their worldviews. Because Joe’s work is multidimensional as well as extremely intellectual, it is not always easy to decode. That is what this site is about: I am taking his work, which is coded at level nine -- which is above the academic elite level, although a level that I would wager many of us among the “proletariat” (we lower class citizens) out here can understand -- and I am bringing it down to level three and then back up to level nine so that EVERYONE can apply it in some way, whether it is teaching their children, teaching their students, or teaching themselves, whether it is preschool, elementary school or postdoctorate work, whether it is formal education or it is informal education. (Levels one and two will not be covered in depth because they are quite clear for the most part and not fun to dwell on.) OK, I am just speaking in abstract terms here and these are not hierarchical levels (no level is better than or smarter than another level), but in simple terms I will be decoding various parts of his text and providing examples of how his theory can be applied.

Much more of this work needs to be done in a similar manner so that people all over the globe can be empowered to find creative and innovative ways to live peacefully and joyfully in the world without having to worry about where their next drink of water or next meal is going to come from. God, however one wishes to define God, would never – and in fact, does not -- approve of this current pathetic and pitiful state of the world. Joe’s work, his theory can be applied in any and every conceivable educational environment. Naturally, that leaves his work open for multiple interpretations and for many, many people to begin where he has left off in ways they feel will best meet Joe’s primary mission: to alleviate human suffering where they are “situated” in the world. Situated is actually a good word since most of us are not free to get up and wander freely around the world; most of us are pretty stuck right where we are and right where we are is where we need to start getting to work.

And so I have chosen to read the passionate Joe. The other side of his passion was his anger or perhaps frustration is a better word. He also mentioned sadness after he having had spent more than forty years patiently, humbly, lovingly trying to convey his message, to continue to confront the realization that there are educational elite who still do not get it; those who talk the talk but do not walk the walk (Kincheloe, 2008).Joe’s last book is a passionate book. And it is a sad book and yet it is also a hopeful one.

Of course I would read that level of his work. I am the victim of the educational elite and all of the other elite power wielders of various sorts who have and continue to abuse me because they do not “get it,” nor do they want to, and I see the abuse administered to my friends, my family, my brothers and sisters all over the world, and heartbreakingly, to all of our children. Our children. For my entire life I have been a member of the proletariat, the elite word for people who aren’t worth a you know what, except to be used to clean up after the powerful elite; and it is amazing just how much damage and destruction they can leave behind. Do you think I am alone in my anger? Hell no, I am not alone. There are billions of us. Joe was there, too.

“…I wanted something (an ontology?) that transcended the low-affect, often arrogant, bourgeois culture of the upwardly mobile who were supposed to be the models for those of us who didn’t possess dominant cultural capital. I didn’t want to be like them and I didn’t want their unreflective consciousness – hell, I still don’t. I’m on the lam, still avoiding those who would attempt to construct my consciousness in this dominant cultural way. I still want my critical pedagogy to help shape self-conscious students who gain the capacity to imagine modes of consciousness that earthlings have never before imagined. (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 220).

There are billions of us out here who know that we will never be able to meet the insatiable demands of elite groups who hold, maintain, and USE their political, cultural, and capital power against us, whether it is simply to make us comply like robots to their insane, selfish, diabolical, self-serving demands or whether it is to actually harm us, make our lives miserable and intolerable, or even kill us. Read Joe’s books. He speaks to us over and over again. And he speaks to the elite as well. He was not happy; not happy at all with the way things have continued to go, and he has stated that very fact so many times in his work, most notably in his last book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction:

The imperial market has hired a cadre of voluptuous sirens who whisper to us in our dreams, who take scholars, even critical pedagogues, and corrupt them with careerist motivations and visions of high status in the academy. Using their carefully crafted appeal to human desire, they induce us to peddle their occult, faith based, but official knowledges without even our conscious mind knowing what we’re doing….they commodify the demise of the human race. Turn up that hydrogen jukebox, baby, and together we’ll listen to the crack of doom (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 113).

Honestly, I’m not particularly happy with the “way ‘we’ are” in Western societies at the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century: the hierarchies, the ways men treat women, the heterosexism, racism, class bias, the competition, the fear of ‘taking a hit,’ the new-bourgeois low affect “cool,” the humorlessness of particular topics, etc. (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 252).

Joe also seemed frustrated by his feeling that he could not seem to bring his writing down to a level so that the masses could run with his beautiful, brilliant, loving, and compassionate ideas so that they would be empowered to grab for the real knowledge that can make their lives better.

Thus, Paul and I attempt to maintain the complexity of the ideas with which we are working, while concurrently making the ‘story’ compelling. I struggle book after book, article after article to accomplish this elusive goal (Thomas & Kincheloe, 2006, p. 6).

Joe was a beautiful writer, I absolutely love reading his work and I do encourage others to read it. I think the problem was simply that his work was not reaching the masses. We can understand it! We need many, many people who will apply his work in multiple, ideosyncratic ways so that his work reaches everyone – everywhere on the entire planet. We can no longer depend on our education systems to bring the knowledge to us; they have failed us, even when we have paid exorbitant funds in tuition and have become insanely in debt as we futilely grasp for the remnants of real knowledge. We are an angry “proletariat”.

Corporate knowledge producers know that more powerful information tools have never existed and they want to use them to make sure the world’s people are narcissistic, materialistic jerks who look out only for “Number One” and support an unbridled free market. In the world of the corporate power wielders, greed is good and compassion really is a force that undermines the efficiency of the market. (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 206).

If the critical complex epistemology is taken seriously, everything is open to change, as the comfortable Western assumptions about knowledge, being, and socio-political and economic arrangements no longer hold. In such a critical geopolitics of knowledge the West loses its status as the locus of certified knowledge production. (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 192).

I want a critical pedagogy and a critical complex epistemology that ain’t one damned bit scared of getting’ hit by the goon squads of dominant power. Such critical pedagogues are not afraid to seek a higher dimensional ontology. Such an effort combined with sharpening the actions we take for justice becomes a basis for our life long quest. (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 181).

So what are some of the things Joe has stated that I am heeding and which guide me in my work? Where do I even begin? This is one of the reasons I am so insistent that people read his last book, which he made available free on the Internet.

Joe speaks about how our education system is not making the grade, contending that “the way mainstream education perpetuates students’ alienation from knowledge of the social and the self” results in students being “lost in a sea of social confusion” in which they lose their ability to self-direct or act in behalf of themselves. Further, he states, “To confront this alienation, … [WE] must provide specific examples of formal and informal educational programs that promote a progressive education that fights alienation” (Kincheloe, 2007, p. 25).

Joe said to listen to us:

The future of critical pedagogy involves addressing complexity head on and making sure – as I maintained at the beginning of this chapter – that critical pedagogues listen carefully to marginalized groups from diverse corners of the planet….For the millions of indigenous peoples of Africa, Latin America, Asia, Oceania, and North America, indigenous knowledge is an everyday way of making sense of the world, the self, and the relationship between them that rewards individuals who live in a given locality” (Kincheloe, 2007, p. 17).

Get it folks??? Other worldviews are an EVERYDAY WAY OF MAKING SENSE and a high level way of making sense, at that. We want to drop the Eurocentric notion – the rich white way of thinking -- that if we “others” who hold other worldviews, think the way we think then we must be crazy. My God, the entire world is “crazy.” Do you even realize what a minority Eurocentric “thinkers” are? How insane is that – to think a mere pittance of the population can dictate what the rest of the entire world should believe? GET A GRIP. This is why Joe stressed multiple perspectives and indigenous knowledges. They are the way of the world.

In his conclusion for his chapter in the book, Critical Pedagogy: Where Are We Now?, he wrote: “Where are we now? Wedged between an ideological rock and a hegemonic hard place with a relatively small audience. I believe critical pedagogy contains the imaginative, intellectual, and pragmatic power to free us from that snare. Such an escape is central to the survival of not just critical pedagogy but also to human beings as a species” (p. 40). Joe’s last book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction provides the pathways – multiple pathways – for that escape, not for critical pedagogy – but for humanity.

I’m excited by the idea that an education guided by a critical complex epistemology becomes in part a genealogy of consciousness where students and teachers study the forces and processes that produced their consciousnesses. No matter what the grade level, students from elementary school to graduate school can become scholars of consciousness. Our critical complex genealogy is a key step in our efforts to become more epistemologically savvy….we move to a new level of awareness…. (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 220).

As I have stated, we are an angry proletariat at least I know that I am – we are the people who have been violently forced to sit at the bottom of the elite’s imaginary hierarchical ladder and who must continue to give our hearts and souls to meet the insatiable greed and profit for those few at the top; we are the people who are dying each day because we are not deemed valuable enough to be profitable for continuing life on this earth. We are angry because even our children are being grotesquely abused and are dying all over the world, including right here in our once highly respected education system in “America.” This is NOT America, by the way. AMERICA will come into being when we open up ALL of the borders and we all live in peace and harmony.

Our children, those who have survived, are becoming adults now and they are angry at the abuse they have suffered. Do you think we are all going to sit around and let this continue for even one more generation? We are rising up all over the globe to say once and for all: ENOUGH!! NO MORE!!! We will NOT support the continuing – what academics give such a pretty name for, hegemony --- and what we call DAMNED IF WE DO AND DAMNED IF WE DON’T quandaries we are always forced into, or otherwise known as “being between a rock and a hard place.” Do you really think we do not know what is really happening? We are jumping out from under those rocks now. You will be seeing many more of us, many, many more of us saying ENOUGH! We have had it. It is our turn.

Joe knew us. He lived us. He was us, and it is all expressed in his books. We are free now to let his work guide us in the way we see fit to help lift us up out of this misery. The powerful elite will not be stopping us. Not this time. We are reclaiming our freedom.

Joe was truly brilliant and his final book demonstrates this once again in how he has laid out a foundation from which every human can blossom, no matter what age, no matter what station they occupy. Epistemology, which is the study of knowledge and what we believe is true and how we come to believe it, is a critically important dimension to education, hence, Joe’s Critical Complex Epistemology. Teach this to your children. They LOVE saying the word epistemology (and they will laugh). And they will love learning about it. This is the education we need in our world today. A happy and joyful one. Joe was totally brilliant. His work provides many, many pathways for each of us to discover our own freedom, both individually and collectively. And it should also be noted that an endorsement of his work is in reality an endorsement of everyone – even this is locked up in his theory. He stated, “We have much work to do at both the individual and the social levels” (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 252). We need to all get to work now so that we can eventually celebrate love, peace, harmony, and freedom – along with a beautiful planet – another aspect of Joe’s theory I will get into another time. Believe me he left nothing out of his theory.

Hopeful for a beautiful world,
Vanessa

 

References

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and critical pedagogy: An Introduction. Netherlands: Springer.

Kincheloe, J. L. (2007). Critical pedagogy in the twenty-first century. In Kincheloe, J. L. & McLaren, P. (Eds). Critical Pedagogy: Where Are We Now? New York: Peter Lang. pp. 9-42

Thomas, P. L. & Kincheloe, J. L. (2006). Reading, writing, and thinking: Postformal basics. The Netherlands: Sense.

Images courtesy of Microsoft

Random Fact: There are 21 other people in the world for evey single US citizen.

Just a quick update today since it is really my day off and I am recovering from having finished up massive writing assignments for my two doctoral classes. But I did want to let everyone know we finished the yard search! That is so exciting because, to be honest, it was just a training mission and my assistant was getting really tired of digging up nails, old bolts, lug nuts, washers and such. We have quite an interesting collection.

We checked quite thoroughly and are now convinced that the lovely silver hand engraved Celtic disk (shown in the picture) which I discussed in a previous treasure hunting blog, was the only actual treasure we were meant to find. It is true that my long lost friend had sent us on the yard search mission originally to find a diamond ring, but fortunately for us that ring manifested in another way – being delivered right to my door -- which was much more appropriate than having to dig it up out of the dirt. So I am thankful and feel very blessed for that. 

So anyway, that’s it today. Just a little update. Now we are excitedly awaiting our reward as we were told that when we completely finished the yard mission we would get a substantial surprise. We love those kinds of surprises because when they say substantial, they mean substantial.

There will be treasure hunting all over the land this summer and I can guarantee you, it’s going to be very exciting! So I hope you check back and keep up with our very magical mystery treasure hunt saga. As always, this is evolving, so I never know where we are going next until we receive instructions from those on high.

Hope you are having a lovely weekend.

With Love,
Vanessa

 

Psychologists and scientists who have been researching a new epidemic are finally putting the pieces of this mysterious puzzle together. It is estimated that approximately 50% of the population may now be suffering from this disorder, which spans all ages and ethnicities. Psychologists have labeled this odd disorder, “Neurotypical Disorder.” Neurotypical-diagnosed individuals suffer from slightly below average to average levels of intelligence and numerous other symptoms and odd idiosyncrasies. For example, many suffer from severe insecurity and may become very anxious if not attached (or at least in very close proximity) to other Neurotypical individuals. They tend to become extremely agitated when around people of higher intelligence, especially geniuses or people with neurodiverse tendencies. Scientists are still investigating this phenomenon and are experimenting with methods of intervention, including behavioral techniques to help these individuals develop better coping mechanisms so that they can function more successfully in a neurodiverse society.

Another odd behavior of the Neurotypical individual includes maintaining piercing eye contact when they are speaking to someone and demanding it from others, even though it may not be culturally acceptable for some individuals. It is thought that the Neurotypical may become very suspicious and even fearful without this eye contact, which may be a result of their innate insecurity.

Neurotypicals tend to engage in dysfunctional forms of communication and demand that others communicate in the same manner. It is thought that their poorly developed communication skills lead to behaviors such as odd facial expressions, body movements, and excessive hand movements as they are speaking. They also have a tendency toward dishonest and deceptive acts, hidden agendas, lack of compassion for other humans, and an inability to establish and follow a code of ethics that incorporates the needs of others. It is not yet understood if the unethical behaviors, such as saying one thing and doing another, maintaining one set of standards for themselves and another set for others, and the obsessive focus on "what's in it for me," are a result of inadequate communication skills combined with their innate insecurity, or whether there might be a cognitive defect that affects memory as well as the ability to eperience compassion. It is thought that resolving these issues will require intensive reprogramming of the individual’s basic value and belief systems if progress is to be made toward communication skills and behavior that will allow them to function harmoniously with the rest of society. Neurotypical individuals also lack creativity and innovativeness, but prefer rigid plans, behaviors, rituals, etc. This deficit makes it difficult for them to understand creative endeavors such as art, music, writing, and any form of creative expression that invokes ideas that lie outside the neurotypical's immediate level of comprehension.

Another trait identified with these individuals is the apparent insatiable need for dysfunction, disorder, chaos, and excessive noise. It is thought they may be suffering from a type of sensory integration dysfunction that leads to “sensory numbness.” As a result of this numbness, greater sensory stimulation is required than for the rest of the population. Many teachers have identified this phenomenon in the classroom and since the excess noise and dysfunctional behaviors demonstrated by Neurotypical students cause distress for the other students and make it hard for everyone to learn, special education interventions, such as resensitization and other options will need to be developed that address the Neurotypical’s deficiencies in processing sensory information.

These individuals also exhibit competitive, restricted, repetitive, and stereotypical patterns of behavior manifested in the form of aggressively chasing, hitting, kicking or throwing balls around or passively watching people who engage in this behavior with no observable benefit other than someone wins and someone loses. They can be very rigid in this behavior and other odd stereotypical behaviors may accompany it such as slapping teammates’ bottoms, overeating, excessive drinking, and screaming or yelling. Other behaviors observed include obsessions with “famous” people, collecting signatures, spending large sums of money for clothing or shoes with special labels sewn into them, consuming large amounts of alcoholic beverages, collecting large sums of money for no apparent purpose, disfiguring themselves for social impact, and other various habits that serve no useful function. Many neurotypicals spend exorbitant amounts of time passively infiltrating their minds with images and sounds that spew forth from assorted boxes such as televisions and radios, collectively referred to as the “devil’s radios” (Kincheloe, 2008) since the effects tend to be quite negative, result in excessive gossip, and propagate increasingly excessive bizarre behaviors on the part of these individuals.

The most insideous manifestation results when a neurotypical gains a position of power. A classic example is a former president and the devastation and havoc that he wreaked all over the world, and especially in Iraq, known to be the birthplace of knowledge where great museums and artifacts have now all been destroyed -- all as a consequence of his neurotypical tendencies gone crazy.It appears that the authority such a position engenders aggravates the symptoms drastically and results in magnified greed, lack of compassion, the oppression of untold numbers of people, murder/wars, and the massive destruction of societies. Measures are being implemented to ensure that neurotypicals do not gain such levels of power until such a time a cure is found.

The American Psychiatric Association is in the process of establishing DSM Diagnostic Criteria to help identify these individuals. Scientists believe they are close to identifying the gene that causes the disorder and that this may eventually lead to a cure. Congress is providing funds to research this condition with their new “War on Neurotypical Disorder” (WOND!) and for Education Reform efforts (WONDER!). Parents may ultimately have the choice as to whether they want to give birth to a child with the disorder, although this is very controversial. A more humane approach would be to emphasize the benefit of neurodiversity in society and provide lots of support and intervention for people diagnosed with the disabling Neurotypical Disorder.

There is hope on the horizon! Evidence is mounting that Joe Kincheloe's (2008) Critical Complex Epistemology applied broadly across the educational spectrum provides a cure for these struggling individuals. Updates to the ongoing research into the application of his newly developed theory will be provided right here at the www.joekincheloe.us website.

Copyright January 2007. Revised slightly June 2009

No Rights Reserved.

We need hope.

References

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and critical pedagogy: An Introduction. Netherlands: Springer.

Photo courtesy of Microsoft

DISCLAIMER: Of course, this is a spoof. The basic idea for the spoof actually came from individuals who have been diagnosed with autism, asperger "syndrome", or other autism spectrum "disorders" who are tired of being labeled  and defined by DSM Diagnostic Criteria. Point is, why do we label? Why don't we accept diverisity, including neurodiversity? Why is there an insistance on one "right way" to be in the world that is restrictive and rigid? Joe's Critical Complex Epistemology can take learners to higher, more creative levels of cognitive functioning while honoring diversity. "The multidimensionality and multilogicality of a critical complex epistemology not only change the ways we map the world but they also move our minds to a new locale in the complex web of reality." (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 182). More tomorrow....

Just to summarize the purpose of this site, it is extremely important, healing, and helpful to keep Joe’s mission to “alleviate human suffering” in the forefront and to remember that his project is one which each and every one of us can be working toward in some way in lieu of chasing our own self-centered, capitalist-dictated, material interests. Indeed, I hope there are people all over the world who are doing just that – pushing his work out into the world and applying it in multiple formats and venues. If not, I hope they are at least doing what they can to create greater freedom and justice, and are working toward eliminating poverty, hunger, and other forms of suffering that manifest among oppressed peoples of the world. If we are not doing something, we are part of the problem. If we are supporting the status quo and the current capitalist system rather than trying to break ground for new, innovative changes, we are part of the problem. This NEW PROJECT (as outlined in Joe's book) which Joe was just beginning to launch out on by publishing his new book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction is much, much bigger than any one of us. It is much much bigger than any group of us.

The Higher Council has encouraged me, as I complete the tasks they assign me, to keep this big picture in mind, along with the ultimate gift of a beautiful world in which everyone can reside in peace, harmony and love that will manifest if we follow the plan. No one said it would be an easy road, though. If it were not for the reminders and support I get from the Higher Council, along with the knowledge that they truly have the world’s best interests at heart and that they are composed of absolutely the greatest minds that have ever evolved, I am not sure I would be able to complete some of the tasks they set before me. And they are so good to me, providing me with respect, freedom, understanding and flexibility. For example, today they advised me to post my blog late just due to various circumstances and all of the other things they knew I had to accomplish today. They are such great people! Oops, I have digressed....

I am so relieved that I am now free to work on this great project. I have finished up my coursework, which was quite a distraction, although not unproductive as I worked out some ideas for using the bricolage research methodology in multiple venues. Anyway, from now on, and on into the future, I will be totally focusing on the positive and amazing benefits that can derive from using Joe’s theory in schools and in life, and I will be demonstrating many ways in which this can be accomplished. Of course, this project is always evolving, so I do not plan too far ahead at any given time. I actually love the freedom that allowing something to simply evolve provides. There is no stress, no overtaxing the brain to come up with some quick scheme, no frustration if things don’t work according to plan. Just go with the flow where Joe’s theory leads. I can tell you that I will be ramping up the information on the web site and I am looking forward to working on those projects. I will be adding the new content as mentioned previously, including academic and practical daily applications of his work, and important activist information.

Of course, I will continue with the review of Joe’s book, which I do feel is critical for everyone to partake in. Please, please, read his work. There is a link to an online version of his latest and greatest book right here on this page. If you are a teacher, use his book for a textbook. The information he has conveyed is just so critically important. I will soon be compiling all of the reviews into a document that makes it easier to access them, since currently the reviews are spread throughout my blogs, and of course this will be freely accessible and may be copied and distributed as is wished.

And please, as difficult as this may be, do try to remember there is nothing in this for me at all. I am always amazed, and quite frankly, disappointed, at how easily people believe that everyone only has some ulterior greedy purpose. Joe did not. I would be doing him a dishonor if I was doing this for some earthly benefit. I am just biding my time, trying to do something highly worthwhile until I move on to a better dimension. I know that my rewards come to me from many directions. We just need to keep the energy flowing for good and worthy causes without focusing on what’s in it for us. My only purpose is change. Change to make the world better. Joe’s book has many, many keys for doing this. Look for the keys. Unlock the doors. I do not claim to know all of those keys. I will be discovering them right alongside the readers as I write the reviews of his book and I am sure, with the multiple levels his work has been taken to, I will miss finding some of the keys. As I have stated before, his book is a gift to the world. Inside the book are gifts for each and every one of us if we just take the time to look, accept them, and use them to create exciting and amazing possibilities. And yes, it involves a lot of hard work and climbing mountains and removing the irritating boulders along the way. Isn’t this our calling? Anything as great and beautiful as peace and social justice on earth without human suffering is worth the effort, in my book. It was in Joe’s book, too.

Image courtesy of Microsoft

Sorry,  this is late this morning. Just heard from the Higher Council, and yes, they want me to post this, except they asked me to abbreviate in one place cuz they don’t approve of swearing in public.

Joe always stressed using our creative imaginations. If I were communicating with him, these are the messages I would have received. They are presented randomly in order to maintain privacy of those who may find the message relevant, with the exception of one, because he feels it is important that Nathalia receive the message directly.

Regarding the accusation that Vanessa is “living vicariously” through me, let me make it clear…it is I who am living vicariously through Vanessa out of her gracious, loving generosity to devote the rest of her time on the earth plane to my cause. Not only does she dedicate her time and effort, but she has devoted her soul, spirit, and mind to my cause. But she can speak to all of this and I only ask that you listen to her.

Vanessa is my soulmate. I was her master teacher for 18 years at another time, another place. We were sent out on a mission for a reason. We had made agreements. We are spiritually married – you don’t think I manifested that diamond ring, her new home and everything in it for no good reason, did you? This does not mean I do not recognize the fact that I have many, many soulmates, both family and friends. You all know who you are and I love each and every one of you …I do wish you would listen to me more often, talk to me. For those who are interested, we each have just one true soulmate, our “other half” so to speak with whom we match up with at various points. Vanessa is mine. And mind you, it took enormous work on my part to have our marriage sanctioned, because I had to institute some cosmic law changes first, which you will no doubt hear more about later.

Regarding the blogs: Yes, of course, it is me speaking through these blogs at times and helping Vanessa (Yes, I helped her write the poetry, too). Do you really think one human being on earth could accomplish it all? You do know that she is also teaching four university courses and taking two doctoral level courses toward her PhD and raising two teenage children, and more. I couldn’t ask her to do this entirely on her own. I especially enjoy choosing the music; y’all know how much I love music. Vanessa, herself has been quite “freaked out” by some of my choices, we have argued a time or two over them, but it is out of her loving kindness, her wishes to please me, and the knowledge that we are working on a grand project much bigger than any one of us, that she does ultimately agree to post my selections. If you read my book, you will learn that the Internet is a fractal. We love playing with the Internet from this side and guiding our loved ones to the knowledge they seek. I have had great fun manifesting the perfect music for the blogs through YouTube. By the way, you all have master teachers here who want to help you if you would only be more receptive.

Regarding the vehement and nasty complaints and attacks from many directions on Vanessa about the joekincheloe website: "Frankly, Scarlett, I don’t give a damn." We are going to do what we GD well please. Here is just a small portion of the instructions I have given Vanessa, already. There is more, but this is enough for now:

Everything is in place. You know your role for the next few months and I will review it here for you just to give you reassurance so that you are confident you are on the right track. I know you worry about my credibility too and that’s all perfectly normal. But what you are doing with the website is exactly what needs to happen – we need to get through to ordinary people so that they can adapt and apply my theory – just in the same sort of manner you are doing – creatively, idiosyncratically, and even what might be judged by others as “crazy.” This is creativity, dear, and there will always be people who do not recognize and we cannot let them deter us from expressing the critical information that needs to be widely disseminated. You are doing a wonderful job.

Regarding my laughing at Vanessa for her being an “eager beaver critical pedagogue,” First let me make this clear. I recognized that Vanessa was connecting with what some people refer to as “the source.” She is a channel through which knowledge and communication from this side can flow through quite freely and she has several master teachers here who help her. She was tapping into that, just as she does now, although it was subconsciously occurring at that time. She has now had much more training (thanks to me) and of course, she continues to go through training to develop this natural ability. This has absolutely nothing to do with critical pedagogy as much as those who are aligned with the ideology may be inclined to arrogantly believe. I will mention at this point since I am on the topic that we wish to break free from the movement as it is only serving to hamper our goals at this time. In response to a rather cruel comment sent to her that misrepresented what I was laughing about, here is what I have told Vanessa:

I was laughing at them, not you. Of course they would never comprehend that. There is a rare person who is willing to put forth the effort you were for change in the world. Hell, I did so myself. I was obsessed with it as represented by the enormous amount of books I wrote. Now why would I be laughing at myself? Read what I have written about “crazy” in my work and put that out on a blog before the week is over, dear. Still, I know it hurts. I have been laughed at and humiliated many, many times. We just need to move on and know in our hearts that what we are working toward is so monumental and so great that we are willing to experience a few moments of discomfort.

In light of this last recent vicious attack on Vanessa, which included lies, name calling and labeling in public (all of which I abhor), I am extremely angered about it. It took many, many hours of my time to comfort her and guide her back up to the spiritual level she needs and deserves to be functioning at in order to absorb all of the new knowledge we are sending her way along with maintaining the website and everything else she has to do (yes, we. There are many of us here working on this project.). This state of affairs does not make me happy and there are likely to be severe karmic debts in the future if this should happen again. You can be thankful that I actually called them off this time. While I do have a lot of power, I do not have enough to prevent karmic debt payments in most cases. And yes, I am now a King, as well as a member of the Higher Council of which Vanessa speaks. I am also known by our people (my and Vanessa’s) as the God of Love due to my special abilities to help people work out disagreements in a loving manner. Unbeknownst to the people who attacked her, she was doing them a favor: trying to save a sinking ship. It was to no avail and it in no way warranted what transpired. So now it is time to leave Vanessa alone and let her do her work. I will leave it to her to explain more about what we are trying to accomplish as she has an excellent understanding and you can just follow along with her. If you follow her website, you will be watching the evolution of something great and beautiful. And just know at all times, what Vanessa is doing is at my request. The poem was clear about that – “what Joe wants, Joe gits.” And I am so blessed to have her in my life to help me complete my earthly mission.

Special Message for Nathalia Jaramillo: “You are a brilliant rising star.”

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That’s it for today. I was not sure I would even be able to write a blog today; well I guess I didn’t cuz Joe wrote it. In fact, I had asked Joe if I could take a week or so off because I was so upset and distraught over being attacked and he said he would take it up with the other members of the Higher Council, but that it should be fine. But what ended up happening is that first, Joe stayed by my side constantly which raised my spiritual vibrations and that helped so tremendously. And then I also slept a lot, during which we astro-traveled to some places for some very special healing. I feel very rejuvenated, thank goodness. I have some assignments for my courses to finish up now.

Now, please do not misinterpret this and send out the attack dogs, cuz it is ALL JUST MY IMAGINATION...runnin' away with me.....  Last I heard, we are free to imagine. Or has the Patriot Act even taken away that right?

 

PS Leave Vanessa alone and let her do her work.

 

Image courtesy of Microsoft.

Well, my friend, who I refer to as my long lost friend (because we had quite a misunderstanding for too long, but we are back together now) and who prefers to remain anonymous, has been reminding me to finish the treasure hunting. This is a worthy project, if you have been following the valley treasure hunts as once I finish, I will be able to construct a curriculum which I will refine throughout the summer as I take children treasure hunting. Then I will write it up, and of course, I do plan to make that freely accessible here on the site. It is a fun learning activity for all ages. I know I have certainly enjoyed the research and investigations. We still have to solve the Mystery of the Old Grist Mill and find the Lost Treasury Notes.

However, currently, I am tied up with some higher priority project tasks, but as soon as I wrap them up over the next few days, it will be back to more treasure hunting. And I really miss Mel, the elderly 84-year-old gentleman, a treasure for sure, who lives all by himself in a very decrepit house in the valley, which we came to call The House of the Forlorn. I hope he has not been expecting us, as we were visiting him every other week and we are going to be waiting three weeks this time. He did say last time that he had enough food for awhile, so that’s good, and I gave him my phone number, so I do hope he calls me if he needs anything. I worry about him a lot. Anyway, there are so many wonderful treasures at his house, a house which was built around 1920. In my last treasure hunting blog, I mentioned the Studebaker and ancient combine hiding in the blackberry brambles, the possibility of gold in his mountain stream, and who knows what else we might end up finding. Plus, he has been talking about finding treasures inside his house too, so we have him in the treasure hunting mode, now, too. He told us he has an old Indian hatchet that he had found stuck in one of the trees on his property, so that’s really cool. I hope he shows it to us sometime when we visit him. He would like some help cleaning up his property, which we have decided will be a great summer project for teens and adults, so we are working on the plans for that. Perhaps we will find enough treasures for him so that he will never have to worry about money again. And I hope we can fix his house. Even the porch has fallen off, so the only way in and out is through the back door.  My wish is that he will want his home fixed up and that there will be enough helping hands this summer to do so.

Another update is that I have come to realize that it is simply not meant that people like me (you know, people who have lived in the very depths of poverty and have been raped all their lives in every conceivable manner) is ever meant to complete an education or get anywhere worthwhile in life. And even if they do complete an education, they simply do not stand a chance for other reasons. It does not matter how good we are at something, we are forever labeled “low class citizens;” it must be stamped on our foreheads or something. Or maybe there is a long list of us somewhere and everyone in the elite group is allowed access to the list and they let us move up the ladder just a bit so that we feel the drop when we are shoved back down where we belong. And there seem to be endless ways to shove us down. So anyway, being impoverished, I had to borrow exorbitant amounts of money to pay tuition and I am now in debt to the max, and I am still not finished meeting the university requirements for my doctorate, so now what? Back when I researched and found critical pedagogy – Peter McLaren’s work – I thought, wow. Here are people who really understand what it’s like for people like me. This can really make a difference. And of course, when I came across Joe Kincheloe’s work, I just knew he was an author who could relate. Actually, I found him before I found his work and instantly recognized what a wonderful person he was. He really and truly wanted to make things better for people.

That was my dream, too, long before I found Joe, Peter, and Henry’s work. I just want the world to be a better place, that’s all. No fame. No fortune. Just a better world so that people do not have to live through the same hell I have lived through or the misery that so many people all over the world are having to live through. And from the sounds of what Joe writes about, his life relating to education was not happy. And it seems he never was able to get rid of the “hillbilly” label. I imagine that is why he included it in the index -- that is the clue, if you want to meet the challenge question relating to how many times he referred to himself as a hillbilly in his book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction. He actually included it in the Subject Index. Somehow I find that very, very sad. I know, he probably meant it to be humorous, but I still find it very sad. I think he probably did feel sad about that deep inside. I would have. Anyway, because of his background, I knew he related. I knew his wishes for a better future for the world were totally genuine. And he certainly did put forth an enormous effort toward achieving that through his writing. Then he passed away. I think my hopes and dreams have passed away, too. I am trying to keep them going with this site dedicated to Joe and the application of his work, but the cards are definitely stacked very high against me. They were from the beginning. It makes me cry. Not for myself, mind you, but for all who follow. Things never change.  Without Joe, they probably never can change.

That’s it today. If I have time, I will post the review to the Intro of Joe’s book, later today. Honestly, I have lost my desire.  I am sick of the treatment I have had my entire life, so maybe I will just go back into hiding and isolation and just let the world fall apart. Maybe I will be lucky and get some terminal disease or somthing soon and I can go join people who know what freedom, generosity, and equality are all about – and who know how to love. Fortunately, I do know that I do not have many more years to have to live on this wretched earth, so that is a good thing. It would have been nice, though, to work for a good, worthy purpose – promoting the application of Joe’s theory until then.

Maybe tomorrow things will look brighter. Maybe my enthusiasm for Joe’s theory which I believe can save so many people from this hellish existence, will be reinvigorated somehow. Maybe I will feel like sharing what a beautiful proposition it is, how magical it is and what great and amazing secrets hide in his work -- and how his theory can work to truly make heaven on earth just as is supposed to be happening. Maybe.

As Joe had put it, the River Styx is “the bridge to our escape from the hell of dominant cultural authoritarianism” (Thomas & Kincheloe, p. 138). Honestly, I am not sure what he meant, but here is the song. It is sad, pretty much how I am feeling at this moment.

References

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and critical pedagogy: An Introduction. Netherlands: Springer.

Thomas, P. L. & Kincheloe, J. L. (2006). Reading, writing, and thinking: Postformal basics. The Netherlands: Sense.

 

While it does take time to fully grasp the idea that fear is nonexistent because it often feels so real, the work that is involved in reaching this state of belief is well worth the effort. One does need to have a certain amount of patience – both with oneself and others who are working on this process – and it is a process because fear is rarely overcome overnight. And the work may very well never be completed because there are always those around us who work just as hard to program us for fear and one may discover yet another issue that needs to be deconstructed so that the fear associated with it can be released.

Gradually, if you work consciously on releasing all of this false energy, you will begin to experience a sense of great freedom. Suddenly, you will find yourself empowered to do the very things that previously had you paralyzed. As more and more of your false fears are released you experience greater and greater freedom until there is but a remnant of that false energy remaining, at which time you will even be able to cast that away.

Fear is rampant in our educational environments and it behooves us to extinguish it so that classrooms can be democratic, just, and safe. Where has all of this fear come from? Our consciousness has been molded and shaped by fear in many ways. Watching television and propaganda news programs will plant seeds of fear that continue to sprout. Taking standardized tests in the classroom that determine moving into the next grade or whether one will graduate instills fear. Not understanding the social milieu causes intense sensations of anxiety. The list of fear-inducing conditions and tactics is very large, but if we address just the fact that fear is not real, we can make some headway in alleviating this as a serious problem for our learners and ourselves. We need to protect minds from negativity, including the images presented through our televisions. We need to curtail things such as the "devil’s radio," as Joe Kincheloe (2008) has recommended. We need to dwell on the positive, joyful, and good things around us, while still keeping up with the happenings so that we know what and how we might change things to make them better. And then we need to engage in actions that DO make them better – by doing and creating positive, good, loving things. These actions are sure to spread, magnify, and return to you.

The reason F-E-A-R needs to be brought up is because it is a battle we have all struggled with in some form all of our lives. However, I do know that it is also a battle that can be won with work, effort, and a few maintenance efforts. We need to be successful with this if we are going to be successful with any revolutionary actions that can change and improve education. The fact is, until F-E-A-R is overcome, freedom cannot come to fruition, and we will continue to be controlled and manipulated by those who only have their own best interests in mind.

Think about it for just a moment. How many times have your heard “Feel the fear and do it anyway.” That was always my motto and little did I know that I was instilling fear into my consciousness, the exact opposite of what I really wished to do -- which was to release the fear. I was convincing myself that fear is something real when it is not. Joe would probably say that fear is socially constructed. It is as if our society believes that fear, anxiety, and stress are normal experiences, whether it is taking a test, speaking in public, fighting in a war. If we buy into that social construction then we react in ways that work to confirm there is something to fear. We create negativity in what was initially just a void that could have been filled with something more positive such as love, kindness, and joy. What amazing creations might emanate from these positive energies as compared to the ugly things that manifest from the negative and false energies of fear. Not only that, I am inclined to believe that we are all “scared to death,” that is, we are allowing fear to rob us of a long, healthy, happy life.  So, remember, fear is NOT normal; it is merely FALSE ENERGY APPEARING REAL and as educators we have a responsibility to work against the instillation of fear in our learners. That is when they will feel free to be the special, great, and brilliant people they were meant to be.

Peace & Love,

Vanessa

Tomorrow: Review of Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy, cont.

References

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction. Rotterdam: Springer.

We really don’t talk about FEAR much in education, if at all. If we do discuss it, I am certainly not conscious of when and where this happens with any great frequency or substance. Why are we not talking about it --  especially during our formal education when we as teachers learn about things like philosophy, theory, and praxis? We talk all around the issue, but we just don’t talk about fear directly and its true impact on people. We do know it has an impact and we do know it exists in our daily lives. Educators, teachers, and parents use fear in an attempt to control children. Professors use it to assert their own knowledge and authority over specific disciplinary domains and power over what knowledge should be important for all students, ”Fail this exam, and you’ll have to take this class again,” for example. When one thinks about it, this is so wrong. Not only can it be totally devastating to the student experiencing it, it is just plain wrong – and illogical on top of it.

Why in the world would we make a student take an entire course over again because they failed one test -- typically a test that involves what Joe calls "regurgitating factoids"? Do we not see the idiocy of that, not only in terms of failing to acknowledge what the student knows, but also in terms of assuming we know what is good and right for this student to learn? There is something drastically wrong with this picture. Of course, Joe went to very great lengths to explain why such attitudes and practices are wrong and where they derive from.  He explains in great detail how the positivist system he calls FIDUROD with its emphasis on knowledge as bits of information – often misinformation or even disinformation – serves to maintain the status quo. It keeps the masses in their places, including us! And so I ask, why do we want to kick someone while they are down? Why do we want to capitalize on the fear our students already must be feeling. What are WE afraid of as educators? Teachers and professors do have the power to change this up and we need to get with the program yesterday. I will be writing more about this in the future, of course, citing Joe’s work for inspiration, creativity, and practical guidance for how we might work in the in between spaces or what has been come to be referred to by McLaren and Jaramillo as the “Nepantla spaces.” In the meantime, we as educators, me included, need to be looking at how our expectations – and even demands in some cases – serve to instill fear or serve to control out of fear. We must change these practices!!! The classroom should be a safe, welcoming environment to learn in -- not a scary box.

It is bad enough that the Imperialists and our current corrupt government use fear to maintain power and control, as Joe had discussed in yesterday's blog.  Have you ever noticed that if not enough tragic things are happening, something is fabricated? Swine flu! Don’t eat pork, now. Put that mask on! As a society, we are kept off balance through a reportedly falling sky almost every day. Fear is rampant in our educational system to keep kids on their assigned tracks. If they slip off the track, there are only a few choices for them: the military, the slave job market, or prison. And in the schools, we have teachers who refuse to honor IEPs for increasing numbers of children who need them, we have zero tolerance across the board which has been shown to exacerbate greatly the conflicts in schools, and we have canned curriculums that are boring children to death and yet they are facing high stakes standardized tests that should they fail, their life course is altered for a long, long time, if not permanently.

How does this discussion of fear all relate to this mission we are embarking on, here? Before committing to a complex project that entails who knows what and that will extend for who knows how long – and it does appear it could very well be many years – I have discovered it is necessary to conquer fear – at least to the fullest extent possible. This is not easy.

It amazed me when I discovered how many things I seemed to experience fear over and these things were all implanted to control me for the benefit of someone else, and to my own detriment. So that means when I am afraid of something, it is not protecting me at all, it is harming me and that harm is beneficial to someone or something else in some way. A good and dear friend whom I have grown to love so much taught me that fear is not real – we create it, or if someone else creates it for us, we have bought into their false reality; thus, it is nothing more than a total fabrication. She says that all F-E-A-R  is FALSE ENERGY APPEARING REAL. We should omit the word fear, even from our vocabulary.  I think Joe would say that fear is “socially constructed.” although I will need to find if he discusses fear in his work. I am sure he does, and when I come across it, I will share what he has to say about it. So, F-E-A-R is False Energy. It does not exist. It is the deception among deceptions. Why torture ourselves or anyone else by pretending fear is something real. I know, for some of you reading this, it may be hard to wrap your mind around this concept, but for now, just believe it: fear is false energy appearing real.

Again, Joe’s theory has us questioning the deception of using fabricated fear and beginning to conceptualize the power we have readily accessible to use as a tool to change ourselves so that we do not experience fear. For example, in his book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction, he asks, “Does consciousness actually shape the physical universe? We know it shapes the social universe” and he goes on to explain, “I would not be spending the thousands of hours it takes to address these issues if I didn’t believe that a critical complex epistemology helped provide us a key to discern the multiple realities obscured by Western science that can help unlock the door to a new vision of humanness and human action” (pp. 233-234).

We have entered into an era of eternal war, where the empire refuses to engage in dialogue with anyone who doesn’t buy into all of our assumptions about the world. What is particularly sad is that, so far, the fear engendered by this ‘war ever after’ provides dominant power with an enhanced hegemonic ability to win the consent of voters. Right wing political leaders have used fear to trump the desire for a new way of seeing, the cognitive insurrection that would overthrow the power of patriarchal ego to dictate definitions of strength, maturity, intelligence, and strong leadership. As I put it in a recent rock song I wrote:

I see it in psychology

And all their silly tests

I see it in their labels

Of who they think is best

It’s bad, the world’s gone mad.

I see it in the brambles

I see it in the bush

I see it in the empire

And all that media mush

It’s bad, the world’s gone mad.

 

(Excerpt from Thomas & Kincheloe, 2006, p. 139).

Click on the link to read Vanessa's blog for today: Open Source

Tomorrow: Preparing for the Project: Lessons on False Energy Appearing Real. Don’t miss this!!!

Later in the week: More about the Roses and Enlightenment, Review of Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction – the Introduction. PLUS many hidden treasures and surprises. Something new every day.

References

Thomas, P. L. & Kincheloe, J. L. (2006). Reading, writing, and thinking: Postformal basics. The Netherlands: Sense.

Image courtesy of http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_AaJ5DgGprck/R7jI89BL6DI/AAAAAAAAAwc/Asgbai-NpFI/s320/The%2BBully%2BPulpit.jpg

What is a bully pulpit? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bully_pulpit

 

I had a dream

It were a bad dream, man

Sumptin’ ain’t right

And it his dream

There was Joe

And he says,

Look girl,

I need yer help

Can’t do this ‘lone

No way, babe

And  I says

Joe, ya know what I says

What Joe wants Joe gits

Ain’t you got this figured out yet?

And he says

Babe I knew you there

Listen to me close

When I was there

You know

All walkin’ ‘round and such

There was a few people

I didn’t like so much

They held up the gavel

And wanted to swing

They wanted to

Lots of big bad

trouble bring

I wanna show I care

As much as

When I was there

I need yer help

Cuz they need to know

Their game has no where

It can go

I talk to you

Listen up

you gotta  show

Once and fer all

No more hangin’

Things over the head

No more things get bad

Mad

Ain’t right

No more hangin’ things

Ever at all

And I says

Joe, love, you so good

You know, 100% pure

People be mean here

I cry at night

cuz it aint right

Please don’t worry

Ya know what I says

What Joe wants Joe gits

And Joe says

I knew I could count on you

Babe

And I just says ‘gain

What Joe wants

Joe gits.

References

Image of Tales from the Bully Pulpit courtesy of http://www.idleidiots.com/zach/Tales%20from%20the%20Bully%20Pulpit/Tales%20from%20the%20Bully%20Pulpit%20(2004)%20(05).jpg

 

I confess, even though I have read the entire book, Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction, of course I in no way remember it all or even comprehend it all, so I snuck up ahead just a little bit. I think the title of the book should have been Knowledge and Joe’s Critical Pedagogy, because he has a different way of doing critical pedagogy than I see a lot of people doing. But then, maybe there are other people who do it his way, too. I will need to research this some more, obviously. Of course, his critical pedagogy synthesizes complexity and chaos theory. In fact... omg, “Three Licks: Critical Knowledge and the Definition of Epistemology” (on page 15) and I wonder what the three licks means and why only three. I just love the titles Joe comes up with (Check out the Table of Contents and you will see what I mean).

Joe is the most creative academic writer I have ever seen, which makes reading his work so much fun. He always claimed there should be an element of “jouissance” with learning and I do believe that with his writing, he not only experienced that, but left it as a gift for readers to experience as well. I love reading his work. This particular section defines critical epistemology and is worth spending time on, which I will do when I review it. For now, back to the meaning of critical in critical pedagogy. He explains it, “In my work in critical theory and critical pedagogy I work to expand the origins of critical theory to diverse cultures, to move beyond the concept that it is simply a “Western thing” looking to Africa, India and other Asian locales, the Islamic world, and indigenous cultures around the planet” (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 59). He explains that critical theory, as he defines it, is essential to epistemological transformation and he relates the history of critical pedagogy, which today in the U.S. is dominated by Western influence and which he views as a detriment. He contends that 

to build a critical complex epistemology we use critical theory with indigenous and worldwide input as our foundation, add feminist theory, complexity and chaos theory, a significant sprinkle of cultural studies, and our own pedagogical and hermeneutic (the study of interpretation, meaning making) insights. In this context we think of producing knowledges that resist domination and oppression while engaging in activities involving freeing oneself and subjugated groups from regulation, helping to end human suffering, contriving new ways to undermine contemporary forms of colonialism, devising new forms of connectedness, and developing unprecedented ways of seeing the world that take us to new levels of reality (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 61).

He refers to this as a transgressive epistemology that seeks “new ways of researching and analyzing the construction of individual consciousness and identity and the role of power in the process." He says, “In this critical project we begin to understand the social location and some of the purposes of a critical complex epistemology” (Kincheloe, 2008, p. 61). I would also like to highlight that as Joe has defined critical pedagogy, it is necessarily idiosyncratic in practice. Again, from the above quotations, we also use “our own pedagogical and hermeneutic (the study of interpretation, meaning making) insights” (p. 61). This needs to be highlighted so that we do come to understand that Joe was well aware of and promoted uniqueness and individual creativity, and he did not in any way prescribe one set methodology for practice. My attempt here on this web site is to present just one example of a multilogical, multiperspectival, and multimethodological practice.

I think all of this provides a great framework for considering the rest of the Preface, which, as I had mentioned lays the foundation for his entire book. In fact, he states, and this is worthy of an extensive quote because it provides the very basis for which the information in this monumental book should be put to use, in my view:

A key dimension of this book is to provide the conceptual basis for the construction of critical knowledge networks that connect individuals from all geographic areas and social domains. Such networks move us away from the oppressive dimensions of the so-called information age where knowledge is produced and transferred via media and schools for the benefit and legitimation of transnational capital. In the critical knowledge networks that make use of the transformative understandings of knowledge, its production, certification, and deployment outlined in this book, such information is used to bring together a wide variety of oppressed peoples.

Workers in de-unionized free market workplaces, women, racially subjugated individuals, indigenous peoples, and many others can join in these critical knowledge networks in ways that contribute to their empowerment and emancipation.  (Kincheloe, 2008, p. ix).

Further, Joe pointed out that free access to information is critical, stating, that such projects should consist of “a global network of critical knowledge workers.” Just before his death, he was trying to build such a project, The Paulo and Nita International Project for Critical Pedagogy in which the goal was to “move critical pedagogy out of the Americas into various parts of the world....archiving and then digitizing an open, free access virtual database of key figures in critical pedagogy from around the world….One of the most important dimensions of the project,” according to Joe, involved “the archiving of subjugated, oppressed, indigenous knowledges with special respect and reverence for its producers. Here special emphasis is given to becoming allies with subjugated, oppressed, and indigenous peoples” (p. ix). Dr. Shirley Steinberg heads up the project today.

In conclusion of the review of the Preface, I think I would just like to point out and remind readers of how passionate Joe was about this work. He was so excited about the prospects of his future projects based on this book and the monumental knowledge it contains, that later in the book, he wrote, “The Conclusion Is Just the Beginning” (Chapter 10, p. 227) and he conveyed the importance of these  concepts, the development of new epistemologies, and their centrality for human survival. Sadly, he states that this book is only an introduction and I was truly looking forward to his next works, which he had conveyed he was working on: “I am already planning new books and articles that pick up where I leave off here” (p. 227). He believed, and I share his belief wholeheartedly, that the concepts and the complex theoretical formulation he has outlined in this book will have an enormous “impact on numerous dimensions in human life including the production of selfhood, power relations, the dynamics of colonialism, and ecological sustainability and implications for the planet’s future (p. 227).”

Indeed, as he claims, “The ways of seeing, the ways of being, and the affective dimensions (ways of feeling) developed in these subjugated contexts can change the world” (p. ix-x). And further, he states that “it is incumbent that progressive forces fighting for social justice develop new forms of critical knowledge work. Without the funds to match the neo-liberal, free marketers and their global knowledge machines, we must start in any way we can and hopefully gain momentum with our message of social justice, rigorous knowledge work, global commitments, environmental concerns, human dignity, and radical love (p. x).

I have been grotesquely criticized for the vast amounts of time and effort I put into promoting Joe’s work and even sabotaged. I have no explanation as to why I am so dedicated, devoted, and committed to his work. There is simply no explanation that would fit within our typical positivistic, capitalistic, empiricist, and Cartesian system of understanding. Sometimes I think we are just handed things to do that become our purpose in life and for me, that is what is happening here. I always viewed Joe’s work as a gift to the world and was not shy about telling him so – and so now, I have been handed this gift of tremendous desire to see that his work is taken out to the world. I know there are people who label me “crazy,” and once again, eventually, and probably soon, I will describe how Joe defined crazy and why he viewed scenes in which people take this position of labeling us crazy  as a humorous set of circumstances. I honestly and truly do not know myself why I am so driven to help put Joe’s work out there and I would just as likely label myself as crazy if I did not have the faith in my experience that allows it to go where it might. I do know that after working with Joe for seven months, reading his work, observing what a great master teacher and leader he was, and what a beautiful plan he has for making the world a better place for everyone, that there is no possible way I can not do this work. As I always told Joe when he was alive, “I never want to disappoint you.” And he has told me, like he has told so many of his students who love him, many great and beautiful things.

As I mentioned, I also do not know where all of this is heading; it is evolving in much the tradition that Joe’s theoretical formulations allow things to evolve. There is a sort of faith and humility one must keep in the face of the fact that human complexity, in alignment with theory, will self-regulate, evolve, and realign in ways that maximize benefits for all. This is an important component to Joe’s theory; we are all “critically evolving” (p. viii). And I only have as my goal to honor Joe and his work, so where that leads I have no preconceived thoughts at this moment, although I do have some clues. I would like to think that some day I can work with people all over the world to develop the global critical knowledge network Joe envisions and outlines in this book. Therefore, I hope by reviewing the book and providing others with greater insight into his work, I am also increasing my insight for my future doctoral research as well as provoking understandings that will culminate in future projects that Joe would be proud to see happening in the world. I need to have a full understanding of what he was conveying in his work, which even he admits, requires looking at “issues from numerous perspectives, in the process taking the reader into a world of knowledge production that is rarely discussed on the public stage” (p. 3). And as Joe pointed out, along with this humility, "we also need to maintain our confidence that with the help of diverse others, we can know better what we don’t now understand” (p. viii).

So, be prepared to see knowledge and knowledge production in a whole new light just from reading my reviews, even if you do not read the book – although I encourage everyone to read the book. Its message will have a much more powerful impact if you read Joe’s words.  It will literally alter your consciousness. As I had mentioned in a previous blog, setting up weekly book review clubs would be a great way to study this work. If I get enough interest, I will pay to set up a collaboratve discussion and review using Moodle – a free open source learning management system (although it costs for web hosting). For others who would wish to form online book groups, Ning.com also offers a viable format that is free and open source.

The blogs on this site are not written for the academic elite, nor are they not written for them. Somewhere along the way in my lifetime, I had adopted Joe’s views as conveyed here:

Spiritually, I became very interested in diverse religious traditions; intellectually, I wanted a curriculum that transcended the fragments of ‘safe’ and ‘conformity producing’ knowledge of school; ideologically I sought insights from ‘dangerous' sources such as the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory [for me, it was Peter McLaren, Joe Kincheloe, and Henry Giroux], and the writings of colonized and indigenous peoples around the world; ontologically, I wanted examples of being that transcended what I considered then and consider now the self-serving, low-affect, libidinally impoversished disingenuousness of many of those from the white upper-middle class. Obviously, there are people from this background who amazingly overcome this sweeping characterization and do glorious things in and for the world. From such great people I have learned so much. (p. 18-19).

And so I am not speaking to certain groups of people – namely the academic elite who are not among those who do “glorious things" and who are perfectly happy with the status quo and not wishing for things to change. I am speaking in my blogs to everyone else. Joe posed the question as to how we best accomplish this sort of speaking that can get attention. He writes,

How do we get the attention of teachers and students anesthetized by consumerism and hyperreality’s saturation of information and marketing iconography? I want to write for this audience in the style of a detective writer (epistemology noir?), a boy’s adventure writer, an author of girls’ romance novels, a beat poet, Lame Deer’s memoirs, or Stephen King penning a horror story all rolled into one. Anything to get them to think about these issues of knowledge and the ways they shape our lives and the everyday existence of people around the world (p. 20).

Joe has made the point clear; there is method to our “madness,” and as he puts it sometimes “we must be willing to sometimes be seen as the fools of the gods” (p. 19).

One last thing I would like to mention is that, like most of us entrapped on this deficient and decrepit earth plane, I am “under construction.” Joe has clearly pointed out that we need to fess up to our biases and shortcomings. In fact, he stated, “We must all kneel at the epistemological alter and confess our subjectivity, and idiosyncrasy of our perspective, the shortcomings of our knowledge” (p. 236). Yes, I am biased toward Joe’s work. I worked with him and I grew to love him in return for the love he sent my way. He knew a love and compassion I have not seen demonstrated by any other human on this planet. I am also still learning and with the complexity of Joe’s writing, a lifetime of learning is required to fully understand the depth of his message, and even a lifetime may not be enough time, which is why I spend inordinate amounts of unpaid time doing this work. I wish to point out also that I am still under construction, so please pardon my dust. Of course, mistakes will be made; we all make mistakes.

But one thing will always stand out -- and far above -- any mistake or misguided direction I may take: I love Joe, I will always love Joe, and I will always present his work in the most loving, positive, enlightening, uplifting, and hopeful aura humanly possible. And lest people accuse me of doing something Joe would not approve of, rest assured, Joe’s work guides me every step of the way. So, I hope you join us on this magical mystery tour  as Joe -- through his work -- and I create new mindspaces and show some creative possibilities for a whole new world. In this way, it is expected that many, many other people the world over will join together, in their own creative and unique ways, unleashing creativity and knowledge the likes of which the world has never witnessed. And as this "evolvingly" happens, watch the "perpetual revolution" begin (Kincheloe, 2008, pers. correspondence).

Next Review: Introduction to Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy: An Introduction --The Introduction.

In solidarity,
Vanessa

References

Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Knowledge and critical pedagogy: An Introduction. Netherlands: Springer.

Image courtesy of http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/07/Madrid_equality_graffiti_todos_somos_iguales.jpg