FROM THE NESKAYA BULLETIN BOARD

Margwenn raised her eyebrows as she went to the screen. It took no telepathic subtlety to follow her thought: At Neskaya they are likely to do anything.

Marion Zimmer Bradley, The Forbidden Tower, page 351

The Progression of Dancers
The late Dick Crum, one of the world's premier folk dancers and ethologists, wrote "It is our responsibility to be well informed about the material we are handling. The steps are only one dimension. It is vital we consider the dance within its cultural context."

He will be well remembered for his enumeration of the progression of dancers:

Beginning Dancer: Knows nothing.

Intermediate Dancer: Knows everything, but is too good to dance with beginners.

Hotshot Dancer: Too good to dance with anyone.

Advanced Dancer: Dances everything, especially with beginners.

I FEEL THAT the dormant goodwill in people needs to be stirred. People need to hear that it makes sense to behave decently or to help others, to place common interests above their own, to respect the elementary rules of human coexistence. They want to be told about this publicly....Goodwill longs to be recognized and cultivated. For it to develop and have an impact it must hear that the world does not redicule it.....I never try to give people practical advice about how to deal with the evil around them, nor could I even if I wanted to -- and yet people want to hear that decency and courage make sense, that something must be risked in the struggle against dirty tricks. They want to know that they are not alone, forgotten, written off.

Vaclav Havel, writer and nonth President of Czechoslovakia, from his book Summer Meditations

A WINNING STORY

They call some of these people "retarded"...
A few years ago, at the Seattle Special Olympics, nine contestants, all physically or mentally disabled, assembled at the starting line for the 100-yard dash.

At the gun, they all started out, not exactly in a dash, but with a relish to run the race to the finish and win. All, that is, except one little boy who stumbled on the asphalt, tumbled over a couple of times, and began to cry. The other eight heard the boy cry. They slowed down and looked back.

Then they all turned around and went back. Every one of them. One girl with Down's syndrome bent down and kissed him and said: "This will make it better." Then all nine linked arms and walked together to the finish line.

Everyone in the stadium stood, and the cheering went on for several minutes. People who were there are still telling the story. Why? Because deep down we know this one thing: What matters in this life is more than winning for ourselves. What matters in this life is helping others win, even if it means slowing down and changing our course. Pass it on... we need to change our hearts.

"Difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future. When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."

Martin Luther King JR.

If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution.
-Emma Goldman

Good morning, this is god talking : )

I will be taking care of your problems today.

I will not need your help, so relax and have a nice day.

To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.

What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places--and there are so many--where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of the world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don't have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.

--Howard Zinn
You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train

"...religion, medicine, mental health, art, and just plain fun are not separate activities..."

"It is remarkable to hear how these old shamans see everything is relationship. They see health in context with the rest of a person's life, the family, and the community. And people are seen in context with everything else in the world. This is not primitive thinking but a very sophisticated worldview."
Keeney acknowledges that most native people contend with harsh living conditions and are constantly under seige from corporations and governments that want control of their lands. Yet despite this hardship, they experience a level of exhilaration about being alive that is missing for many of us in the modern world, he says. Deprived of the comfort and excitement of technological civilization, as well as its stress and alienation, indigenous people keep in touch with some basic elements of being human that we neglect. For them, religion, medicine, mental health, art, and just plain fun are not separate activities, but one unified pursuit around which much of their community life is organized. This is the focus of Keeney's research - the healing powers, for both body and mind, of indigenous people's religion, rituals, music and dance.

Article on Bradford Keeney by Jay Walljasper
Utne Reader, July August 2003

"If logic tells you that life is a meaningless accident, don't give up on life.
Give up on logic."

Shira Millgrom

-Sufi saying

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world.
There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

Attributed to both Nelson Mandela and Marianne Williamson