“There is a deep longing among people in the West to connect with something bigger — with community and spirit.”
One of the foremost voices in African Spirituality
Living Dialogues Podcast by Duncan Campbell (Episode 94): On the Road of “2012 NOW – Empowering the Transformation”
Listen to the podcast at personallifemedia.com.
[partial transcript]
This is the third in a seven-part series of “Pilgrimage Dialogues” forming part of and leading up to a Conference Gathering in Fort Collins, Colorado on May 29-30, 2009, entitled “2012 NOW – Empowering the Transformation”, for which I am serving as the Master of Ceremonies and opening presenter. Past Living Dialogues in this series have included dialogues with myself and Robert Sitler and with John Major Jenkins. Future Living Dialogues in the series will include other Conference presenters Stansilav Grof, Richard Tarnas, and Christine Page.
Duncan Campbell: 2012 Now: Empowering The Transformation, a uniquely innovative, interactive and affordable gathering in this time of global uncertainty, will take place Friday night and all day Saturday May 29 and 30 at the Lincoln Center for Performing Arts in Fort Collins, Colorado. Beyond just information, to practical tools for change and direct experience of participating in the ongoing transformation of our times. Now is the time and the opportunity to synchronize consciousness with the evolutionary pulse of the cosmos. Join world-renowned speakers in as we explore, co-create, and experience together the tranformative dynamics necessary for a successful transit from now through the year 2012 and beyond. More information available on the Conference website, www.unveiling2012.org. See you there.
The meaning of the Greek word “Apocalypse” is “lifting the veil” or “revelation”. Here are excerpts from this set of revelatory “shared stories” – contemporary 21st century versions of the medieval Canterbury Tales — on this pilgrimage Road to 2012 NOW.
Sobonfu Some’: Well I really believe that initiation is a necessity, you know, much like, you know, 2012 is saying “here is a big initiation”. It, initiation, is a necessity because we have to initiate in order to be able to move forward, to be able to tap into our essence, into our gift and so on. And, you know, in my African tradition the first initiation that we all go through is that of being born, because we are coming from being full of spirit to taking on this human tool that we call the body. And, you know, also, we’ll go through many, many initiations. And I think what we’re talking about in the Conference is that we’re going to get to the place where we are basically going to celebrate being able to give birth to our self and to whatever new vision is going to come out of this Conference Gathering — so that we can together welcome each other and celebrate together. And I think that is the icing on the cake, you know, that is awaiting us.
Duncan Campbell: I think absolutely that’s the case, and myself as Master of Ceremonies and yourself as the person who will be leading us in the concluding celebratory ritual are both involved in helping the entire gathering to activate, all of us together, a kind of transformational space — including not only the presenters who will be articulating on the stage, but all of the participants with their deep listening who are evoking the insights that are articulated coming out of the group energy field. And this opportunity for expression will also be something we can all look forward to at the extended lunch time on Saturday, when there’s going to be a large and deliberate space for people in very small groups to share stories, deep stories, with each other and evoke and integrate their experience. This is very essential to a true initiation — that is not just a one way transmission of information, but is actually a transformative initiation — where together we can evoke an experience that is both intimate and personal in our sense of shift, as well as a kind of collective amplification that allows all of us to celebrate, as Barack Obama suggested in his Inaugural Address, “our common humanity”. And that experience has a great carry over effect into our everyday lives and relationships.
Sobonfu Some’: Now how amazing is that, because, you know, a lot of people go into conferences and never really get to put in their voice; and, you know, in my Dagara people’s African tradition, when you go anywhere we are always trying to get our voice in, you know, to express yourself with and to others, because it’s like we are all making this huge cauldron and the stories that we bring, everything we share of our self, is part of what is going to make whatever we’re cooking really delicious. And for people to be able to have this opportunity as a gift, not only to themselves but a gift to the community, I really believe is amazing.
Duncan Campbell: That’s beautifully put. I love the image that you give here of together we’re collectively creating a crucible or a great cauldron, not only a crucible for the water of life, but a great cauldron in which to cook and use the fire of life to transform our experience, because these are transformative elements, all of the elements are: Eaarth is nurturing, Wind is empowering, a Fire literally is transforming, and Water is liquid and fluid and moves between the solid state of ice to the evaporated state of the clouds. And so every one of the elements will be involved here. We will be having time outdoors; we will be celebrating the natural world in a beautiful natural environment in Fort Collins, Colorado. And I think that these “pilgrimage dialogues” are pointing to that transformation as they are evolving here. In my first dialogue, with Robert Sitler, he emphasized the joy and the wisdom that is accessible in everyday life that he himself has experienced in the Mayan culture and which he shares so beautifully. Next has been John Major Jenkins, whose great research into the galactic alignment and embedding it and situating it in connection to the primordial tradition, sometimes called the perennial philosophy, has shown how we can bring all of this that 2012 is pointing to into the Now; that this “2012 phenomenon” is not an event that we’re waiting for, that we’re going to have to be acted upon at some time in the future, but it is an atmosphere of opportunity that is present right here, right now…And that energy field is present right now in helping germinate and evoke from you and I what we’re saying and inviting people to; so that in a sense you and I are acting here as inviters and embodiments of the kind of dialogue and transformation that we can anticipate will be happening among us all and amplified at that particular moment on May 29 and May 30 of the Gathering. But that’s only a moment in a continuum of many moments before and after, that we’re all already uncovering and witnessing being unveiled in people all over the world.
Sobonfu Some’: Yes, and, you know, as you speak and you share that it makes me think about today being this energy that renews itself time and again, which gets stronger every time, as the energy is being shared every time. So as people today listen to this dialogue, and share it with other people, it is renewed and it gets stronger and so on. That’s the image that came to me.
Duncan Campbell: Well, I have to say, Sobonfu, it’s been just a wonderful opportunity here for myself and our other deep listeners, and yourself for that matter, for us to have this chance and opportunity to engage in this dialogue together, and I have always so appreciated the great joy and cheerfulness that you embody and bring to any time that I’ve ever had the pleasure and privilege to encounter you. And so I’m very much looking forward to this conference, even as I’m deeply appreciating the present moment here, because the gift I think of this very dialogue is not only to inspire that more such moments can happen between us, but in one’s own life everyday, today for instance, and the moments that follow.
Sobonfu Some’: Yes, and I’m very grateful for you, for the gift of yourself to the world really and for having such a strong and powerful vision that you can not only share with the world, but that you can get other people be a part of the dance of that vision as well. And I think that is, that is a gift that not everybody has, and I thank you for holding that for all of us.
Duncan Campbell: Well thank you very much Sobonfu, and I want to thank our co-producers Larraine Tennison and John Major Jenkins and everyone involved with this project, all the presenters that are part of this pilgrimage series that is now leading us, as it were, like milestones toward the Conference Gathering on May 29 and 30. If people are wanting further information, they can go to www.unveiling2012.org. And we really extend an extraordinarily warm and intimate invitation for your continued participation. If you cannot physically put yourself in that Fort Collins environment, you’re very much invited to participate through your deep listening to not only these dialogues, but to the continuation of Living Dialogues after that, and also to honor the fact that really it is true — and we’re experiencing it with great gratitude for our listenership and their Website Contact emails from around the world — that as the world becomes smaller, “yes, we can” and do experience in greater depth and greater joy our own common humanity.
Duncan Campbell: Sobonfu, it’s been just a wonderful opportunity here for myself and our other deep listeners, and yourself for that matter, for us to have this chance and opportunity to engage in this dialogue together, and I have always so appreciated the great joy and cheerfulness that you embody and bring to any time that I’ve ever had the pleasure and privilege to encounter you. And so I’m very much looking forward to this conference, even as I’m deeply appreciating the present moment here, because the gift I think of this very dialogue is not only to inspire that more such moments can happen between us, but in one’s own life everyday, today for instance, and the moments that follow.
Sobonfu Some’: Yes, and I’m very grateful for you, for the gift of yourself to the world really and for having such a strong and powerful vision that you cannot only share with the world, but that you can get other people be a part of the dance of that vision as well. And I think that is, that is a gift that not everybody has, and I thank you for holding that for all of us.
Duncan Campbell: Well thank you very much Sobonfu, and I want to thank our co-producers Larraine Tenneson and John Major Jenkins and everyone involved with this project, all the presenters that are part of this series that is now leading us, as it were, like milestones toward the conference on May 29 and 30. If people are wanting further information, they can go to www.unveiling2012.org. And we really extend an extraordinarily warm and intimate invitation for your participation. If you cannot physically put yourself in that environment, you’re very much invited to participate through your deep listening to not only these dialogues, but to the continuation of Living Dialogues after that, and also to honor the fact that really it is true and we’re experiencing it with great gratitude for our listenership that as the world becomes smaller we do experience in greater depth and greater joy our own common humanity.
Duncan Campbell: Intro
Duncan Campbell: Welcome to Living Dialogues. I’m your host Duncan Campbell, and for this particular dialogue I am truly delighted to have my great friend as guest Sobonfu Some’. Sobonfu Some’ I would like to introduce as someone born and raised in Burkina Faso, the former upper Volta in Africa. And she is an initiated member of the Dagara Tribe of West Africa. Her voice was one of the first in very recent times to bring African spirituality to the west. She continually travels the world, conducting seminars and workshops that offer her perspective on birth, pregnancy, community, healing, intimacy, rituals, the sacred quality of everyday life and much more. She is the founder of Wisdom Spring Inc, and the co-founder with Susan Huff of The Walking For Water project, which preserves indigenous wisdom and brings the gift of water, the gift of life to places around the world, particularly in Africa where it is most needed. Her books include Welcoming Spirit Home, Ancient African Teachings to Celebrate Children in Community, The Spirit of Intimacy, Ancient Teachings and the Ways of Relationships and Falling Out Of Grace. She also is the author of a six CD set, available from Sounds True, entitled Women Wisdom From the Heart of Africa. So Sobonfu, literally, what a great joy and delight to be back together here on Living Dialogues.
Sobonfu Some’: Oh, it’s an honor to be back here.
Duncan Campbell: We’ve always had such wonderful dialogues together and great times when we’ve seen each other here and there at conferences and so on, and this particular opportunity is very special because we’re coming together as the third in a series of dialogues on the road to 2012 Now: Empowering the Transformation, a gathering that will take place May 29 and 30 in beautiful Fort Collins, Colorado, in the natural environs of the state of Colorado, the Rocky Mountains, and that might seem initially to be a far journey away from home where you grew up and you were born in Burkina Faso, but you’ve been for many years now in North America as your base. You’ve wonderfully woven your own consciousness into the Northern American culture, and as I can personally testify, have given great gifts of energy, illumination, joy and vision in a place where, as Alice Walker put it, much has been broken in our culture in western civilization, and you have found a way drawing on your own heritage to give a gift that helps put it all back together. And that really is our venture here together, it’s the venture that the Mayans had in mind when they originated their long count calendar, it’s the vision that the Vada’s had in mind, the Egyptians, the Greeks, the we could say all the great cultures in history from all the corners of the world have found ways to articulate this human journey of all of the stresses and strains and joys and sorrows as a way of the souls unfoldment. And so with that background I’d just like to invite you to talk from your own perspective of how you personally are envisioning this public fascination with the year 2012 and this event that is now getting more and more attention of the so called galactic alignment that will occur on December 21, 2012.
Sobonfu Some’: Well let me say that the myth of the Mayan people have become one of the greatest myths that is impacting the whole world, and that as I as an individual , you know, journey in this world because that’s what it’s all about, you know, we are born. It’s a journey that will come here to be on, not to just sit still, but to be on this journey. So as I look into this great cosmology and I bring it to my own cosmology and looking to see, you know, what does 2012 mean, and for the Dagara people it is a fire year, which means that it is a year, you know, to basically, you know, go back to the root, go back to the origin in order to, you know, be reborn with a new vision, to redress yourself in such a way that is appealing to life again, that you can stand up and wholeheartedly be able to say yes to life. And so this a very exciting conference because it is, you know, definitely taking us beyond limitation, beyond narrow mindedness, to a place where we have to become not only co-creative, but also be that thing that will be created by life, so that we can return into that place that can be needed, that can be manipulated and made into shape and forms that will create what the universe is calling or wanting from all of us at this time and space. And so this conference is about not only being able to be flexible, break away old patterns, but to also look at how they journey, as I look at it personally, you know, the journey that I have been on from the time even before I was born to the time I have been born to now. You know, what are some of those things that this big myth has been calling for me to do, you know, in terms of the need to be reborn, the need to be made anew again. And so we are going to have a lot of fun there.
Duncan Campbell: And I like it that you say a lot of fun, because that really is very much part of this, because we might say in the general culture there has been a really profound misunderstanding, even of the word ‘apocalypse’. When people talk in the ordinary culture of an apocalyptic moment or the apocalypse, many people feel that this means an era of destruction or catastrophe or the end of the world. People are fond of talking about the four horsemen of the apocalypse; pestilence, the Swine Flu, AIDS, the Sars, warfare, famine, and also natural disasters, that somehow we are entering a period of the end of the world, and the popular cinema we are told will have a film very much like that at the end of this year in December of 2009, and yet as we know and we have said on the website for this conference, which is www.unveiling2012.org, the actual etymological meaning of the word ‘apocalypse’ is unveiling, lifting the veil or revelation. And so one of the most interesting things you said in a prior conversation we had about this was that you feel that this conference is very timely from your own perspective and very appropriate because you see many of us in the contemporary world addicted to drama. Drama in conflict is something that we’ve come to accept, maybe even as a necessary part of life that we crank up on our 24 hour news, cable TV, if it’s not happening naturally, and that people are really kind of led to a certain fatalism that the only way out of any situation is basically death or the death of a relationship, the end of an era and that sort of thing, and when actually what we’re really being invited to do in these very intense times is whenever that stress builds up in us to the point of breaking that this is really like the egg breaking, there’s something happening here, and if we can stick together and find a way to communicate with our deeper selves and unveil, as Barack Obama put it in his inaugural address, our common humanity, then we can reach a state of joy and celebration together rather than depression and conflict.
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