End of 2014 letter

End of 2014 letter – George Clark (1949 – xxx)

I enjoy reading other people’s end of year letters so I thought to write one. But what might it be about? Knowing me it will probably be intellectual stuff linked to its underlying practicalities!

I am now retired from paid work in part because of my Parkinsons. But I still spend time studying and writing which is what I did when I was working.

The ‘writing’ comes in three forms and includes (a) the unedited scribbles which form my daily diary, (b) various bits for voluntary groups – especially articles for the local newspaper, and (c) edited blogposts for which the aspiration is one every other day; but so far there are only 124 for 2014 – there were 299 in 2013. (Note: I have made several themed compilations of blogposts which are freely available online.)

The blogposts are rooted in the concept of ‘changing minds’ which includes (a) education as part of enculturation, and (b) the role that mindfulness might play in altering personal and thus cultural world views. This is a long standing theme of mine but it has been seriously shook up by recent thinking about evolutionary psychology, neurology and Big History.

Initially the thinking about mindfulness was linked to Buddhism but it has now been Westernised (eg a la Jon Kabat-Zinn et al), and I do not sit with the Northern Lights Sangha as often as I used to – even although Thich Nhat Hahn has been absorbing much of the cutting edge scientific stuff.

We were thinking of shutting down the Caledonia Centre for Social Development but, after the Scottish referendum, the topic of land reform is back on the cultural agenda and the idea now is to renew support for the work of Andy Wightman – including popularisation. From my perspective there is a vague sense that mindfulness might be a useful part of the participatory politics that are emerging in Scotland. It adds an extra dimension to Hemmati’s work on Multi Stakeholder Processes (MSP). The flourishing of the grass roots.

I continue to be reclusive. There is no desire to travel or to meet new people. I can’t be bothered (CBB) with the mundane and pedantic. It is as if the unconscious is setting an agenda that prevents me from getting lost in busy-ness; it prompts the ‘witness’ to be aware of, and awake to, what passes through the attention centre ie to be mindful. The key task is to go beyond intellectual understanding such that the thing as it is in itself might be intuited.

By way of staying grounded in what passes for a cultural reality I belong to the ‘Portsoy past and present community group’ (PPaP), the ‘Northern Lights Sangha’ based in Findhorn, and a local Parkinson’s Disease Support Group. Most Wednesday mornings I hitch a ride to Inverurie with a pal (Anne) who goes for music lessons. While she plays a piano I experience shops bigger than the Coop in Portsoy and am receptive to the vibes of people taking coffee in restaurants.

Most Tuesday mornings in the far kitchen there is a music session with the Dutch lady (Paulina) from the antiques shop – she plays whistle and flute. We both write tunes and our immediate task is to make recordings that are good enough for better players to copy. The loss of fine motor control in my fingers means that I can no longer play guitar effectively. But I can still manage the one note accompaniment facility on the Yamaha keyboard. Eventually we will have quality soundtracks to put behind slideshows on the PPaP website.

2014 has been the year of much needed renovations and extensions to the house. Today Bertie the flooring man put the carpet in the new sun room and he will be back next week to put vinyl in the renovated kitchen and bathroom, and in the expanded utility room. The lighting changes the ambience during the course of the day and I am spending a lot of time on the kitchen sofa absorbing the heat from the wood burning stove. All the work was done by local, freelance tradesmen who provided an excellent service and were a joy to behold. It is an old house and there is still much to be done but I have called a halt till the Spring so that I can have peace to enjoy the fruits of the first phase.

The agency for the CBB mood remains a mystery. What drives and prioritizes the thoughts and feelings that turn up in the attention centre? Is it the meditation, the mentation, the medication, the Parkinson brain damage, or just the onset of old age? The agency will vary with the topic and several of them may be active at a given time.

But anyway, most often these days, the thoughts, feelings and moods are positive. The reading and writing is non-egoic – no self, no problem! There is also numinous appreciation of little things – the weather and the light – the ridiculously easy availability of food and fuel – the ‘miracles’ of emerging technology, especially ICT – the emergence of participatory democracy in the new Scotland – and the burgeoning of mindfulness.

Plans for 2015 involve little more than feeding the blog with largely subjective ideas about the process of changing minds – both personal and cultural.

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