Written by Gabriel Kram. Narrated by Marie T. Russell.
In a world that often seems intent on destroying itself, I find myself curating beauty. Not the skin-deep beauty that graces magazine covers, but the roots of beauty—the kind of beauty that grabs us and shakes us out of the narcotic, dystopian alienation through which modernity slumbers and lumbers these days.
There’s so much beauty around us in forgotten, out-of-the-way places. There’s wild beauty breaking through cracks in the sidewalk if you’d only kneel down to look. It’s in the scatter of raindrops on a windshield catching fire in the afternoon sun, the electric dances of our children, the call to prayer over crackling loudspeakers, and the waft of cinnamon leaking out under the bakery door.
There is wild beauty everywhere. Yet we, as modern people, have made it mostly our business not to see it.
We’ve locked ourselves up with actuarial tables, earnings statements, and various forms of insurance. We mitigate against risk by pursuing higher education, working for companies that provide a stable paycheck, and sending our children to established schools. We lock ourselves into routines, mortgages, and predictability. We hedge our bets. We make 5-year plans.
And in so doing, we turn away from the wild beauty within: the originality with which each of us came here.
Many years ago, a study in England revealed that every 2-year-old is a genius. Every single one. And then we school that genius out of them. We extinguish their wild beauty...
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Restorative Practices of Wellbeing
by Natureza Gabriel Kram.In this pioneering volume, connection phenomenologist Gabriel Kram addresses two fundamental practical questions: how do we address the trauma and disconnection endemic to the modern world, and how do we turn on the Connection System? Marrying cutting-edge neurophysiology with awareness technologies from a wide variety of traditions and lineages, this book maps a novel approach to the creation of wellbeing informed by the most cutting-edge science, and the most ancient of awareness practices. It teaches over 300 restorative practices of wellbeing to connect with Self, Others, and the Living World.
For anyone who has faced a difficult childhood, grown up with a sense that there is something missing in the modern world, or yearns for deeper connection with Self, Others, or the Living World, this book provides a map to a (r)evolutionary approach to wellbeing so ancient it hasn't been invented yet.
For more info and/or to order this book, click here.
Natureza Gabriel Kram is a connection phenomenologist. Over the past 25 years, he’s undertaken advanced study and research in neurophysiology, applied mindfulness, social justice pedagogy, deep nature connection, cultural linguistics, and Indigenous lifeways with support from over 50 mentors in 25 disciplines of well-being from 20 cultures. He is convener of the Restorative Practices Alliance, founder and CEO of Applied Mindfulness, Inc., and co-founder of the Academy of Applied Social Medicine.
He is the author of several books, including Restorative Practices of Wellbeing, an interactive compendium of over 300 practices that restore wholeness and well-being.
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