Embodiment and the Metacrisis with Rafe Kelley
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 17 พ.ค. 2024
- John Vervaeke and Rafe Kelley join forces to explore the profound connection between movement, nature, and personal growth. Discover the transformative power of movement as it pushes physical boundaries, fosters environmental connection, and opens doors to personal evolution. Learn how Kelley integrates philosophy to build a wisdom practice that resonates not just in the mind, but deep within the body itself. Explore the challenges and rewards of connecting with nature through movement, and gain valuable insights into the future of movement culture and its potential to impact individuals and communities alike. This episode offers a thought-provoking journey for anyone seeking deeper meaning, leaving you eager to explore the transformative power of movement in your own life.
Rafe Kelley, founder of Evolve Move Play, pioneers a unique movement philosophy, merging parkour with martial arts and a deep connection to nature, fostering a holistic wisdom practice. With over two decades of teaching experience, he offers transformative retreats, workshops, and online courses worldwide. His work emphasizes the synergy between body, psyche, and environment, inviting exploration of personal potential and the sacred in movement.
Glossary of Terms
Ecology of Practices: A set of activities or habits that a group of people commit to doing together.
Parkour: A discipline focused on navigating obstacles efficiently and creatively.
Movement Culture: A broad approach to physical training that incorporates elements from various disciplines for holistic development.
John Vervaeke:
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Rafe Kelley
Website: www.evolvemoveplay.com/
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Courses: www.evolvemoveplay.com/courses
Workshops: www.evolvemoveplay.com/weeken...
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Awakening from the Meaning Crisis • Awakening from the Mea...
Related Links
Evolve Move Play
Retreats www.evolvemoveplay.com/retreat
Return to the Source www.evolvemoveplay.com/return...
Mere Christianity - C. S. Lewis www.amazon.com/Mere-Christian...
1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created - Charles C. Mann www.amazon.com/1493-Uncoverin...
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions to Shape Tomorrow's World - Charles C. Mann www.amazon.com/Wizard-Prophet...
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Happy St. Valentine's Day "Philosophy & Love" - • Happy St. Valentine's ...
CNN. (2024, January 12). Ancient city uncovered in the Amazon, shedding light on a complex civilization. CNN. Retrieved February 24, 2024 www.cnn.com/2024/01/12/americ...
Quotes
"Discipline ultimately means to follow, and you don't discipline punitively; you discipline something by getting it oriented to something that it wants to follow. That's an important idea." - [01:26:20] John Vervaeke
"If we want to solve the meaning crisis and the meta crisis, we have to fall more in love with being. That's not something we can do just through dialogue, it's something we have to embody." - [01:43:20] Rafe Kelley
Chapters
[00:00:00] - Introduction and Background of Rafe Kelley
[00:02:20] - Return to the Source Retreat Experience
[00:07:50] - Philosophical Dialogues and Wisdom Practices
[00:23:00] - Love and Reciprocal Realization
[00:33:10] - Navigating the Meaning Crisis through Derealization and Reconnection
[00:53:10] - Environmentalism and Human Interaction with Nature
[01:11:40] - Navigating Challenges and Exploring Paths Forward
[01:20:25] - Reevaluating Capitalism: A Call for Moral Revitalization
[01:25:00] - Love, Discipline, and the Sacred
[01:37:20] - Exploring Embodiment and the Sacred
I've known Rafe, since I was a kid, Aaron being my father. But when I went to return to the source, I was still a teenager, I hadn't discovered your work, and I don't think I had the framework to truly grasp, conceptually, the depth of the practices and experience. Even still, it was transformative. And now having been exposed to your work, I have the frame to truly appreciate, integrate, and share the practices I've been exposed to.
Thank you both, I hope to pay the gift of wisdom forward.
I am no great hunter myself, but Rafe is 100% right. Right from the first time that I went hunting, I was amazed at how much more in tune I became with the natural world while hunting. If you aren't hunting (or at least gathering) you are in some sense more of a tourist than an inhabitant.
Great discussion as always, thank you John and Rafe. Winding down this talk, I especially resonated with what Rafe goes into at 1:39:17. As someone who often finds themselves caught in concepts and over-analysis, I think the importance of embodiment practices cannot be overstated. I've been practicing jiu jitsu for the past year and have found it tremendously powerful as an access point to the flow state, building bodily awareness and fostering social intimacy. I jotted down a note as a reminder: "Keep philosophizing but remember that you have to move beyond concepts to live. Get into your body. Connect with nature."
Phenomenal conversation!!😮💨🙏 I recently started teaching high school environmental science and have been thinking a lot about permaculture in the context of Jordan Hall’s civium and related ideas. The only real future I can see for humanity is small intimate Dunbar communities living off the land sustainably and using technology wisely and only when necessary.
I am also a flow artist and been spinning poi for many years. I picked them up as I was listening and found myself in a beautiful flow state for most of the conversation😌
BIG THANKS to both of you! Your wisdom and virtue continues to enrich and inspire me. Rafe I’m very tempted to sign up for a retreat this summer now…
What I'm hearing is the fundamental idea behind Permaculture, using our technalogical skills to assist, fine tune for our advantage, and the planet's, the natural processes of nature itself. "The focus of permaculture, therefore, is not on individual elements, but rather on the relationships among them. The aim is for the whole to become greater than the sum of its parts, minimizing waste, human labour, and energy input, and to and maximize benefits through synergy."
That was such a sweet moment at the end where you're checking in with each other as friends to make sure you're still good with each other.
Wow, what an incredible collaboration between John Vervaeke and Rafe Kelley! This video beautifully explores the transformative power of movement, nature, and personal growth. If you're seeking inspiration and valuable insights into holistic wisdom practices, this is a must-watch. Share with your friends and let's spread the wisdom together!"
Thank you my HEIR Rafe for attending and visiting to comfort the COMFORTER!
I wonder if modern sports could also have a place here? For me, physical movement has always been one of my very few options to fall in love with being. Maybe this sounds funny because it is far away from common spiritual practices. But I like the state of my mind very much after playing soccer or kitesurfing. I have to use all my senses, focused on each moment. There is no space for thinking about the past or future. I need to react and decide very fast, otherwise it can get dangerous quickly. Nothing pulls me more in the current moment. I seldom feel more in contact with the forces of nature. It puts a lot into perspective, but still shows me that I can virtuously act in the arena. But while this sounds nice, oftentimes I'm sad because it's the only way I can establish this deep connection to myself and the world. And you can't do it all the time.
I think all sport can participate in the dynamics I describe in parkour, the all involve a deepened relationship to embodiement and environmental embeddedness. Something like kitesurfing is essentially parkour in water assisted by the board and kite. You are traversing an environment using its affordances and responding to its constraints. Learning to map it for the potential for self transformation even if just at the level of embodied physical skill.
@@RafeKelley I think there's something extra to be said for team sports as well. Especially contact sports like soccer, hockey, or basketball. The environment you are traversing includes opponents that you're actively working against both physically and mentally, and you have teammates with which you work together towards a very clear goal. A team can at times feel like an organism when it's intuitively in sync which is a feeling I haven't really experienced in other facets of life. Some of my deepest friendships have arisen out of sports, and I don't think those friendships would be as deep without the shared experience of playing together. I wish that some sports were more accessible to everyone and that the culture surrounding them were more welcoming to adult beginners because it can be the perfect environment to allow connection and friendships to grow.
@@martintore38 Thank you for this comment!
I was about to write something similar after Rafe’s first appearance on this channel.
Being myself an (ex) volleyball player I’ve experienced everything you shared and had a few more thoughts about it.
I think that when playing sports (but also in gaming) you can easily experience the nomological, narrative and normative orders. You know how things are structured, you know how you can improve yourself (“transcend”) and move to the next level and you clearly experience a sense of direction.
Sports with direct opposition to the adversary (all team sports + tennis/badminton etc.) allow a sort of “physical” or “embodied” socratic dialogos: when playing against someone, both players/teams reach “places” that they couldn’t have reached on their own. Adversaries reciprocally allow each other to participate in a meaningful experience and, also, become better players.
This is true also within teams: especially in sports with a high degree of interdependence (such as volleyball), athletes profoundly know that their actions and their performance depend on the ones of their teammates (to spike I need someone that sets, who needs someone that passes the ball). Moreover, team sports easily allow profound experiences such as collective flow.
Within sport, agent arena relationships are clear and both, athletes and staff, have the opportunity to learn how to appropriately inhabit different arenas.
I could go on and expand on these points but it’d be too much and maybe sound delusional 😅
Now, I know that by being an athlete I’m totally biased and that any element of JV framework could be applied to a multitude of life experiences.
Despite this, I think that sport has a wide and profound potential in terms of applicability of JV work and represents an easily accessible practice that can help in finding meaning in life.
p.s. I’m definitely not fluent in english, sorry for any mistakes!
Easily one of the best conversations that I have heard in a long time. I can't wait to hear you talk more about chivalry in the future.
Love this conversation, very rich and juicy. One thought that came up while listening to the conversation that I don't hear explictly highlighted (Still 17 mins when I paused to comment so maybe it will come up) is mentorship. I feel like mentorship, the passing of knowledge from old to young, apprenticeship, etc.. I think all those things used to be woven into the culture and have falling off in recent decades. I think the rise of technology has given the young generation a false sense of suppository to the older generation. I was always teaching my parents how to use computers, the future will be run by computers, therefore my parents can't help me with the future. This is simplistic, but I think it demonstrates the point.
Even if they can't help with technological tools the problems of being human haven't changed much thousands of years. I wonder if a pull back to mentorship in some non-nostalgic new way could be part of the answer. I guess Rafe is impling this with coach, but it would also be hard to scale. Wonder what people think of that?
49:00 I've heard about the Amazonian civilizations, but Rafe Kelley's argument really opens another dimension. Ultimately, all the civilizations originated in Eurasia started in an environment with an underlying scarcity, while the Amazon Rainforest provided some possibility of civilization built on abundance.
This video is another fascination for me too ^^ I always have thankful mind for people like appearing in this video. Thank you for pioneering the way for participatory prosper!
I am absolutely floored by how I see puzzle pieces falling into place in the external world, that synchronistically align with and reciprocally inform the pieces falling into place within myself. And to reflect on where we were at just four years ago, where we simply trying to figure out how to *talk* to one another and make some sort of sense out of things. This conversation in particular feels like a milestone in our collective journey towards wholeness. Yes.
Deep gratitude. Let's keep going.
For anyone interested, At 48:00 Rafe is actually referencing Mann’s book 1491 which is about pre-Columbian America. 1493 is the sequel about the Columbian Exchange. Both excellent books.
Great Conversation!!
Thank God for John Vervake. Protect this man at all cost. Idk how you all dealing with this. But I work by Google and it sucks.
Would be curious to hear more discussion around Sikhism. Yoga being an embodied practice, done in nature, in community, connected to spirituality. Seems like there's some good stuff there.
Just simply AMEN!!
1:09:00 Regarding the "scaling" problem, my first response is: how do you scale a rainforest? I have this vague feeling that John Vervaeke's framework puts him in a position of a gardener trying to cultivate a forest.
John, you might be interested in anthropologist Tim ingolds work. He has a collection of papers called “the perception of the environment” that explores hunter gatherer practices through the lense of Heidegger, ponty and Gibson. Especially Heideggers distinction between building and dwelling. It dove-tails nice with the latter half of the conversation. Thanks 4 vids !
If there is a crisis, why are all the doors shut and the walls dividing the subjects?
Every example of removing the doors and walls, has brought a new dimensional approach to the silo and its protectionism.
❤
Why hunt when nature walks up to us in curiosity?
The most wild thing on the planet is human fear without curiosity and the time of study.
Have you looked into the Greco-Buddhist kingdom of Bactria? It fits nicely with the silk road concept, connects the Occidental and Oriental at a time far earlier than most people realize, not to mention the theory put forth in 'Inglorious Columbus', that ascribes the discovery of the Americas to Buddhist monks from Afghanistan (Bactria)
I’m an agree that a movement practice is essential for well being. That said, isn’t all or almost all athletics a potential embodied and participatory practice? I’m a masters (age 55+) Olympic style weightlifter 🏋️. I love meeting other masters lifters, and it’s fair to say that all of them will tell you that “getting out of your head” is essential to making your lifts and keeping up with your training protocols.
Yes I agree all physical practices are on some level embodiment practices. Parkour also brings us into deep awareness of embeddedness in the environment, this is also true of surfing, skateboarding, skiing, snowboarding etc, but parkour is the ur-practice as it doesn't require specialized equipment to open the possibilities. It is the most primal expression of the basic locomotor play all children and almost all animals engage in.
allegedly, plato used to "refute" arguments by standing over his interlocutors and flexing his muscles.
based
fun, but there's no evidence for it anywhere
@@Matterful hold up, let me get my time machine and debook your deboonking.
falsificationism is for nerds.
Robert Redford nod of approval.
🌞
To do it “authentically” by stop “practicing”. To truly embody one needs act in the world with real sacrifices.
The human condition or conditions command?
Given a vision above understand
Goodness and gracious, faking the sacred
The age of persuade is baited with tasteless
The human condition or conditions command?
Many divisions span clan into klans
Pick a persona, paid for in plastic
Tap dance theatrics from practice to practice
The human condition or conditions command?
Fashion or function, branded or brand?
Labels and tags, act as if matters
Gathering stature for dapper cadavers
The human condition or conditions command?
On the shoulders of giants defiant of land
Head in the clouds, defeat on the ground
Idols renowned in the town of Just Sound
The human condition or conditions command?
Scores from before to shore up the sands
One like no other, afar starry knight
Brother against brother in blood archetype
The human condition or conditions command?
A sip from the spring, he thinks that he can
Learn but a little, a dangerous thing
Crowning the king gilds Titan a ring
The human condition or conditions command?
Scars from the start a-part of the plan
Carving an ark, embarked on a Mission
The human condition or is human conditioned?
Perhaps "finding a home" isn't the panacea it's made out to be. Maybe the meaning crisis is born of a subconscious collective recognition that social connection isn't an innate drive, that it has replaced the quest for intrinsic meaning with the quest for extrinsic validation as a substitute for meaning.
But this extrinsic thing we call social connection, these belongingness needs, have become so prevalent that knowledge of the path to intrinsic meaning has become lost to most. Rafe's efforts are specifically aimed at revealing the path to intrinsic meaning, through connecting with the natural world and learning how each entity there is benignly doing its own thing for the sake of that doing and contributing to the whole as a secondary function.
What if this supposedly innate social drive is really an adopted overlay on a more solitary behavior pattern? Most will scoff at this proposal, but I wonder if early hominids recognized the safety-in-numbers aspect of herd behavior and adapted it to form the first family groups that we find evidence of in remote caves, then further adapted it to villages, communities towns, etc.
And now we've become so excessively socially oriented that it's become toxic and addictive.
Levin's work with zenobots has shown that there are multiple layers of behavioral controls, from the single frog skin cell in a solution that swims around amoeba like, to collections of cells that become organized, to the cells that cooperate as the skin of the frog. And who knows what other behavior patterns are available to them.
Meaning comes from knowing who you are and not from knowing where you fit. Your place is a secondary feature.
Gratitude and Honor go find thy rightful place upon all my FEET resting upon the NEW Permanent Foundation no one can uproot nor shaken but here to stay for good! Now i heard! What is the goal?
i enjoyed the (1:36:30 --> listened around a minute, longer?
What Kelly said at 34.20.
Can you still start parkour at the age of 30?
For sure. You can start at any age. We have first-timers at 64 join our retreats
What novel approaches and ethical considerations should be prioritized in the development of cybernetic neural interfaces, such as Neuralink, to seamlessly integrate with movement practices like parkour and martial arts? How can these interfaces enhance physical capabilities, deepen mind-body connections, and foster greater environmental awareness within the context of movement culture? Additionally, how do we ensure that such advancements promote individual autonomy, respect privacy, and maintain the integrity of the human experience?
My tendency would be to simply avoid such technologies. I think we have better and less risky pathways to self transcendance. I think our drive to adopt these technologies comes from a urge towards a freedom that is ultimately unfufilling, a worship of techne as such.
@@RafeKelley do you know Terrence mckeanna his concept of transcendece is that of you ultimately become space and can create anything you want through language so thats the universal attractor in a factorial sence it's a good future for the species
@@user-nn8wz6ir2m I know of Terrence McKenna but have not dug into his work.
I find myself having really weird relationship to John's work. I'm certainly not a fan! That would be unworthy and inappropriate response. For some reason though, I find his conversations to have a similar influence as a good sermon would. They remind me what is most important and continually bring me back to follow a nobler path. Well... I suppose they discipline me.
We have now seen the failure of church and state theocracy, and separation of church and state, secularocracy
Rafe, I know that in the past you have spoken about your disappointment with the essential nihilism/cynicism of post-Tolkein fantasy. Have you read any Gene Wolfe? If not, you should read his Book of the New Sun, and then everything else.
I read book of the new sun many years ago, more recently I read the Latro series, I enjoyed it for a time but found ultimately it unsatisfying. I feel like I felt similarly about the book of the new sun though that was many years ago. Latro seemed mired to me in the same sense of meaninglessness I find in so many stories just of different flavor. What are the themes that you find in Wolfes work?
@RafeKelley I have read the first book of the Latro series, and have twice failed to finish the second. I haven't really been able to get into it. Book of the New Sun on the other hand, I have probably read about 6 times. Unless you are a super genius, you really need to re-read it at least once to really get it. There is a lot of time travel stuff going on that is a going on that you can't really understand until you have a map of the book from at least one reading. Reading the epilogue volume (which drags some in the beginning tbh) really helps you to understand what is going on. If BoTNS is still not your jam, I would still highly recommend the sequel series Book of the Long Sun, which is a great exploration of one way that this Silicon Sages business could turn out badly.
I have had to read a lot of commentary to understand it, but suffice it to say, Gene Wolfe was a genius level polymath who was a very sophisticated Catholic thinker. His world truly does have meaning, and Severian, despite his flaws is a sort of first draft Christ figure.
Ummm.... Mr John Vervake.... Why does Google Gemini know.... Your teachings/philosophy... Specifically "Combinatorial Explosion." It says it most likely has your lectures in its data set. (Which means it most assuredly does.) It's just a guess but it appears that a student of yours works at Gemini now. Probably in London. Where I found out there based out of. 😳
I am glad to learn that you have renamed your project from "a religion that is not a religion" to "a philosophical silk road", as the term religion carries too much heavy luggage and confusion. In the same spirit, the term "the sacred" stems from religion and carries its own distracting luggage. Isn't there a better word to describe the same thing? Maybe the untouchable? The valuable? Or simply the mystery?
Be kind to the mystery is an expression that makes a lot of sense to me and instantly restores my mind. Or, now it should be: LOVE the mystery.
Rafe if i say i so love THEE! Many RAFE like Thee! Should I shake the heaven and the earth for many Rafe! His BEAUTIFUL WILL SAY RATHER NOT TO STIR HIM UP! For HIS BRIDE ARE AWAKENING UPON HIS FOOTSTOOL! Offsprings preserve will say, is the Church made by men's hands thy Bride? Nor...all THY shared "i" AM and shared Feet resting upon Thy FOOTSTOOL? IS LIKE...I'll wait right Here!
... and that's why, kids, you shouldn't do drugs!
hello, i don't understand your point
Remember thy shared "i" AM and came with conversations given just for thee! Sincere conversations = sincere answers. Likewise remember can learn from many foolish conversations = foolish answers. Heirs and my Beautiful shared "i" AM. Who are ye ALL? Thy shared "i" AM! Who love with patience, mercy, and grace! Judgment and Justice is Thy THRONE. Gratitude and Honor!
Don't mind the Rat many wise of this world experimenting on. Not knowing...1 out of many! Many will wonder! Who is that? Who is that? Who is that? Flooding the Sea of Glass! Keep watch!
The syncretism should exist at the level of the soul, not the story. Buddha (if he exited Samsara), might very well have come back again into the world of the womb to help us all as Christ.
what do you think about Ayn Rand?
may not be any help but you rightly said there is not much evidence of this work in christianity. by work, I'm using your definition, Rafe, 'becoming the type of person who can play a positive sum game.' I'm not sure exactly what that is, but I think we're talking about the same thing. A kind of enlightenment, a kind of awakening, a kind of awareness that goes beyond the norms of the consensual reality. I just want to say from a Christian point of view that it may be a catastrophic failure of imagination to presume that the divine mind or whatever your name for that is , can't solve or hasn't already solved the meaning crisis and with exquisite ease. Is it possible, as Jesus Christ taught, that the solution to it is within each one of us. As GK Chesterton said "Christianity hasn't been tried and found wanting, Christianity has been tried and found too difficult" As Jordan Peterson points out, quoting Nietzsche, 'There has only been one Christian, and that was Jesus Christ ". It may well be that our lack of belief in our own truth is the reason it seems so difficult. I am not saying this is an easy step, embedded as we mostly are, in a low and base consciousness but as Jordan Peterson said, 'it is terrifying to think what might happen if someone actually believed 100%' He said it would be transfiguring. He said the only way to find out is by running the program. For myself, I think the understanding of the power of attention, the human mind, the sacred levels of reality, the primacy of consciousness over matter, the fact that the mind is not located in the brain and then you listen to teachings of people like Jesus Christ, - it all points in one direction . It is up to the individual to realise themselves completely; and possibly no one has done that. Inner condition determines the quality of our superpower: attention. This in turn generates the presence we have: which is potentially infinite and cosmic - transfiguring for the world about us, and then we don't need to upscale. We probably just need to wander about Place. The rest is automatic for the people. it's a hypothesis.
My Heir Rafe may I washed thy FEET! Can the Creator come to the Lowest SEAT LASTS? Yes, without shame but with boldness to snooping down to washed thy FEET! To bring to remembrance...ye once born, to crawling, to walking, and till now. All Thy HEIRS will say, MILEAGE FROM THY FEET IS RECOGNIZE! Remember thy SEAT thy name written will follow thee! As my pop John seat. SEATS WHO ARE ALL THY HEIRS SITTING UPON THE TRUE OWNER SEAT? Thy Seats Who love with patience, mercy, and grace! Likewise for all Rather not to stir up the SEAT and sitting WITH upon JUDGMENT AND JUSTICE! As a SON OF MAN="i" with the "AM"! WHO ARE YE ALL? COME FORTH! "i" AM THY....! Here I AM.
Don't bring murdering to abort upon the NEW Table! These same minds will bring forth! To test thee! To accept to tainted the NEW Table made for thee all! What is Republican nor Democrat?
Darwin machinery, what a strange idea, he insisted on ‘fitness’, a way of science and word to ‘fit in’, distorted to ‘outfit’.
Darwin demonstrated the social, we demonstrated individualism.
My beloved as ye know trust with confidence many has set underfoot! Reason hard to trust with confidence unto all my HEIRS shared "i" AM sitting upon the NEW Table made from a hand without blood stains upon HIS hand. Resting upon SUSTAINED! What is the goal? Offsprings preserve from Thee will say, How much are we truly worth unto all the old minds. Shared HIS "i" AM and shared Feet resting upon HIS FOOTSTOOL! Have nothing to do with all these "WHO AM I? Imagine vein things! Forgotten given to attend unto my Vineyards upon all dry grounds. Now...what is to "ATTEND"?
Something about these discussions doesn't sit right in my thinking. I don't get it... I've been watching/listening to Vervaekes podcasts/videos for a while now, and it seems to be getting stranger. More self-righteousness, more of a sense of group of idealists seeming they know what's best for everyone as a group rather than as individuals, almost as if they;re trying to form a groupthink or borderline cult like group.
I'm just going to stop and unsubscribe because maybe I am misunderstanding the intent, but these talks and self-promotions are going down a different path than where I'd like to head.
Yeah, I get the same feeling. I reckon he has high integrity, but I also think he’s caught by overreach and is trying to do too much. I agree there’s some sort of cultish vibe emerging. Seems to me it would be wise to stop and step back, let things percolate and see what comes of what he has already done.
Don’t push the river, as they say.
But who am I to say…?