METHOD AGING and the Infinite Game

A new and expanded version of METHOD AGING and Improvisational Longevity entitled METHOD AGING and The Infinite Game is now available in paperback HERE and at AMAZON. It is also available on Kindle at Amazon, Nook at Barnes & Noble and at the Apple iBookstore. Other eBook formats are available HERE.

METHOD AGING and The Infinite Game

You are both very old and very young. Scientists say you are made of stardust, which makes you billions of years old. On the other hand, your emotional age in an unhappy state can be that of a screaming baby. Your functional age is defined as an interaction of the chronological, physiological, psychological, and emotional ages of "you". This is an approximation of your age based on what physical and mental activities you can usually perform on a daily basis. Your age is indeterminate…you are a verb not a noun…you have no fixed age. You can learn to think of your age as an improvisation…a spontaneous movement of your bodymind…not how many years you have been kicking around the planet.

The static "you" is a stubborn illusion. "You"… your self, persona, ego…who "you" are… is a dynamic assemblage that is formed by the interaction of genetics, imprinting, learning, culture, etc....a character description, similar in many ways to a character in a film or novel, a character description which can be changed once it is recognized as such. One significant part of your character description that can be effectively re-written and re-performed is your functional age. This is Method Aging - a Cinemorphic adaptation of method acting applied to daily life. Once you are successful at this and then ask yourself..."who is it that is reinventing this "me" I identify with?"...a new perspective may emerge, as well as a new perception of your relationship with time and your story. "You" are no longer a slave to your history. You may also see that "you" are not really playing what you now realize is the infinite game..."it" is playing you. And you both are a constantly whirling field of energy and potential...dancing with the Tao.

The TAO of AGING

The paperback version of The TAO of AGING is now available HERE and at AMAZON. The Kindle version is available HERE and on Amazon U.K. The Nook version is available HERE. The Apple iBookstore version is available HERE. All other eBook formats are available HERE.

The TAO of AGING

As The Tao of Aging opens, we encounter a strange old, sage-like Chinese philosopher and raconteur who claims to actually be Zhuangzi (ChuangTzu) - the second most important originator of Taoist thought after Lao Tzu.

Zhuangzi now lives in San Francisco and is known simply as "Z". As it turns out, over 2000 years after his exploits in ancient China, "Z" is still rambling about the world - trickster to the bone - tinkering with the way we look at what we call reality. He insists that he is not some mythical Taoist Immortal whose condition is due to an alchemical elixir but rather an ordinary man who pays attention to the Laws of Nature.
"I am not the Zhuangzi you have read about in books...wallowing in the mud all day. Stuck in the mud really, if you believe what you read, which you shouldn't. There are those who will say that the ideas I am telling you about now are not those of Zhuangzi - that they are different from Zhuangzi's teachings - contrary even. But if they were not freethinking - even heretical - they would not truly be Zhuangzi's - MY - ideas...
...And so you ask about some Tao of Aging? First, there is no Tao OF anything...just Tao. And Tao is not a noun, Tao is a verb. But even Taoing is not Tao because Tao has no name, even though I have just named it. Then, look for yourself. What you call your body may change in a way you call aging, but do 'you' age? Does your awareness get wet when it rains? Does your awareness turn into wearoutness over 'time'? I think not! Just think of yourself as a constantly changing field of energy and potential...swirling and twirling with the Tao..."

Is "Z" the real thing? Our conclusion by the end of our encounter with him...MAYBE...

ACTIVE AGING and Acting and Aging

The paperback version of METHOD AGING and Improvisational Longevity is now available HERE and at AMAZON. The Kindle version is available HERE, the Kindle, U.K. version is available HERE , the Nook version is available HERE and the Smashwords version (all other formats) is available HERE.

METHOD AGING...
YOU are a bodymind, not a body with a mind or vice versa. You are a verb, not a noun. You are fluid, constantly changing. The static you is a persistent illusion. You... your self, persona, ego...who you are... is a construct that is formed by the interaction of genetics, imprinting, and learning. You have little input into this process until after you have been thoroughly shaped by parents, peers and culture. Now consider that this you that you now seem to be is, actually, very much like a fictitious character that may appear in a novel, play or movie and may be re-written, re-produced and re-performed, using the techniques of those media. One part of your character description that can effectively be re-written, re-produced and re-performed is your functional age, which is defined as a combination and interaction of your chronological, physiological, psychological, and emotional ages. The Cinemorphic techniques discussed in METHOD AGING open the door to this transformation.

Cinemorphics At SAND

Cinemorphics was well received at the 2010 Science And Nonduality Conference in San Rafael, California on October 23rd. Please enjoy the video of the presentation below...

Who's Asking? Notes On Cinemorphics

WHO'S ASKING? Notes On Cinemorphics is now available online HERE.
If you are not familiar with Cinemorphics, I recommend checking out the "Doing Cinemorphics" post, below, before going to the Sourcebook...more entertaining that way...

DOING CINEMORPHICS

Go to the Archives of this blog and click on October 2005. Scroll all the way down to the first post, dated Saturday, October 15, 2005 and work backwards through the FAQ, observations, exercises and notes to the present. Skip around...pick and choose...go out and try it...

At first, doing Cinemorphics is a lot like learning to ride a bicycle...a matter of balance, habit and confidence. Once you get the hang of it the world's a different place...

(Photo at right is of ALFRED JARRY (1873-1907), fanatical cyclist, playwright, poet, artist and freelance scoundrel, whose work prefigured theater of the absurd, Dada, Surrealism, Futurism and Pop Art. Among his other diverse accomplishments, Jarry was also Pablo Picasso's weapon supplier and the father of 'PATAPHYSICS.)

STORY FIELDS

The STORY FIELD concept is very useful in thinking about the Cinemorphic manipulation of one's "reality"...the telling and re-telling of personal history...the creation of Tales of Power... An excerpt from a discussion of story fields is included below. This discussion itself as well as a very effective treatment of related ideas may be found HERE.



The Power of Story - The Story Paradigm

In the field of co-intelligence, stories are more than dramas people tell or read. Story, as a pattern, is a powerful way of organizing and sharing individual experience and exploring and co-creating shared realites. It forms one of the underlying structures of reality, comprehensible and responsive to those who possess what we call narrative intelligence. Our psyches and cultures are filled with narrative fields of influence, or story fields, which shape the awareness and behavior of the individuals and collectives associated with them.

Story-reality is the reality that we see when we recognize that every person, every being, every thing has a story and contains stories -- and, in fact, is a story -- and that all of these stories interconnect, that we are, in fact, surrounded by stories, embedded in stories and made of stories. When poet Murial Rukeyser tells us "the universe is made of stories, not atoms," she's describing story-reality. Ultimately, story-reality includes any and all actual events and realities, but experienced as stories, not as the more usual patterns -- objects-and-actions; matter, energy, space, time; patterns of probability; etc. Story-reality is made up of lived stories.

Lived stories are those real-life, actual stories that are happening in the real world all around us all the time. The actual unfolding events relating to any one actual entity or subject comprise that entity's or subject's lived story. Everything that exists has, embodies and participates in many lived stories. The way to co-intelligently engage in story-reality is to become sensitive to lived stories... to learn about the lived stories of people, places, things... to share our own lived stories... to discover how all these stories intersect, who or what is in the foreground and background of each other's lived stories. Ultimately, this provides the guidance we need to find our own most meaningful place in the universal story.

While analysis is good for control and prediction, story-sensibility is good for understanding meaning and role.

Narrative intelligence is the ability (or tendency) to perceive, know, think, feel, explain one's experience and influence reality through the use of stories and narrative forms.

Story fields are fields of influence or patterns of dynamic potential that permeate psycho-social space and influence the lives of those connected to them. They are made up of many mutually-reinforcing stories (myths, news, soap operas, lives, memories) and story-like phenomena (roles, metaphors, archetypes, images). A story field paints a particular picture of how life is or should be, and shapes the life within its range into its image.

The American Way of Life is a powerful story field, which includes everything from principles like freedom and the pursuit of happiness, to stories of cowboys and rags-to-riches heroes, to metaphors like the melting pot and the safety net, to images like the Statue of Liberty and the flag. It is communicated by movies, men in business suits, advertisements, college catalogues, and mall displays -- among many, many other things. It takes immense effort to resist or change it. Anyone or anything which doesn't live within this story-sea and move with its currents doesn't seem quite American.

Psychological, organizational or social transformation is usually preceded or accompanied by a change in the story field governing that system. It is therefore usually non-productive to try to change forms and habits without changing the story fields that hold them in place. Once the story field is changed, subsidiary patterns tend to realign rapidly. (This process is part of what has been called a paradigm shift.)