I was
with Werner
when he led an
est
Training
for a group of four hundred
people.
It was both
rigorous
and arduous, the processes meticulously detailed. It took place over
two weekends of eighteen hour days as well as two evening sessions. All
the conversations were in English. With rapt
interest,
I kept my eye on one of the
participants,
a
black-robed
Japanese
ZenBuddhist
monk. It was clear to me he didn't speak English so he wouldn't
understand any of
the training
or its processes or any of
the sharing.
Nonetheless he
committed
himself to being in
this intensive
program.
In the midst of
being trained
myself,
I wondered
from time to time how he or anyone else who doesn't speak any English
would get anything of value from it, or appreciate what's under
scrutiny.
Finally when the
training
reached its
inexorable
conclusion,
I watched
him walk over to
Werner
who was surrounded by elated, happy
graduates.
When the opportunity presented itself and
Werner
acknowledged him, he put his palms together, bowed to
Werner,
and in a thick, guttural Japanese accent, said "I ...
gaht ... it!".
Werner's
recognition of him and his recognition of
Werner
left me no doubt he really did - totally ... even though he didn't
speak the
language!
Transformation is that way. Though it's shared milieu is
language,
it doesn't matter which
"language"
it's spoken in. The same could said about culture and even about
religion.
It doesn't matter which culture(s) you embrace. Any culture is
transformed. It doesn't matter which
religion
you embrace. They too are all transformed (indeed it could be said that
the goal / end-point of allreligions
is transformation). And it certainly doesn't matter which country you
live in. Transformation fully gotten, embraces
the whole
wide
world.
As that
black-robed
Japanese
ZenBuddhist
monk would attest, translation is merely an option.
We distinguish the
language
spoken in
Werner's work
(in whatever
"language"
it's presented) as generativelanguage.
That's not just another
language
like French or Greek. We designate it as generative
language
because when it's spoken, something gets generated, created ie brought
forth from nothing. And what's generated, created, brought forth from
nothing, is the
authenticSelf
ie who we really are. In contradistinction, we have
descriptivelanguage
(when something is described) and commentativelanguage
(which expresses opinions and judgements). Notice that describing who
we really are, and holding an opinion / judgement about who we really
are, are different than being who we really are. Deploying
generative
language
is ontological. It's
transformative.
As for where the best locations are to
participate
in
Werner's work,
I'll first differentiate between
participatingin-person and
participatingonline. In-person
participation
is with a live group, typically in a hotel ballroom or an office
conference room. Online
participation
is with a virtual group via Zoom. There are subtly different
experiences to be had with each of these modalities. Online
participation
allows
participation
from anywhere on
our planet.
Yet we don't differentiate between in-person and online
participation
- like two distinct versions of
Werner's work.
There is only one (as the Highlander may have said).
And so that's how (and why)
Werner's work
works in any
language
in any location in the
whole
wide
world.
And yet
"WWW"
is not known as the acronym for
"Whole
Wide
World".
Many
people
also incorrectly assume it stands for
"World
Wide
Web".
No, look: what it actually stands for is
"World
Wide
Werner".