Anne Wilson Schaef Testimonial
I was like a block of ice before I met Anne Wilson Schaef and the work she brought into the world called Living in Process. The scope of what I felt, did, knew and was aware of was so narrow, I was practically frozen in time. When someone in the LIP network first asked me how I felt, I took a moment, searched the skinny area of awareness I had of myself and said, “My toes are cold.” That’s all of what I could feel when I got to LIP – that is, apart from utterly miserable and cut off from the rest of the world. I was aware of feeling that.
Shortly after coming into the Living in Process network I realized I was an addict. This was not a hard realization for me as I knew very well that I was totally obsessed with eating. I figured I was probably alcoholic, too, but my food compulsion was such that there was nothing else I wanted to do on a daily basis but eat!
In the model that Anne Wilson Schaef had been developing, recovery from addictions was paramount. Addictions keep us from feeling what we feel and knowing what we know. That was clear to me. I was completely out of it – couldn’t feel the mountains of Boulder, Colorado that were just a few feet away from my house! Anne recommended the 12-step programs as the best way she knew of to recover from addictions and so I started in Overeaters Anonymous. That was life-changing and eventually I uncovered a raft of other addictions including alcoholism, which turned out to be the one which I needed to address the most. Recovering from alcoholism is/was probably the biggest challenge on a daily basis for me and thanks to AA and Living in Process, I now knew what was wrong with me and could focus on a solution.
Another important discovery I made 20 years ago when I came to Anne and the LIP work was what she had named the Deep Process Work. This was/is not a technique. It was the natural unwinding of my deep feelings/process in the way these deep processes wanted and needed to unwind. I didn’t realize how much childhood grief I had. I never would have “thought” this through. Instead, I stretched out on a mat and stayed with my crying as it flowed through me and healed some of the grief I had been carrying for years. I didn’t know I had so much bundled and bungled up inside of me, these deep processes that have healed me and continue to do so. God only knows what needs to be healed, old childhood trauma, processes from last week, tangles and problems of my ancestors, all have been healed by surrendering to the deep process work. This was so peace-giving and serenity-filled for me. I loved the deep process work. It was what I had been looking for without even knowing I was looking.
When I arrived to my first intensive (workshop) with Anne Wilson Schaef, I had a spiritual experience. I had never been in a place that felt so much like home to me. Home, on a deep, deep level. The honesty was fantastic. The openness was touching and I felt a connection! I felt a deep connection to Anne and the other people there and had one of the most wonderful times of my whole life. The ice block was beginning to melt and after a very short time of participation in the Living in Process network and the 12-step network I had become a part of a large community. This was a community of real people, these were not drinking buddies, they were people who talked about real things, real feelings, and we were supportive of one another like I had never experienced. These were the happiest years of my adult life up to that point.
Anne Wilson SchaefAnne Wilson Schaef has a vision that sees far beyond that of most people, like the eagle that flies higher than all other birds. I remember how she saw things in people at the first intensive I went to. She was able to see into their lovely souls, past the pain, the garbage and the pollution which many people wear on their personalities. Anne could see who we were down deep and what we could become. She supported me to be me! As trite as that may seem, I hated myself! I was the last person I wanted to become. She told me I was at my best when I was me. She had so much faith in the greatness of humankind. Anne once told me that she believed we could do anything – accomplish anything. I had never known anybody that actually knew me that believed that I could do anything. I was used to believing that I was never good enough. And, she was not just giving a pep talk, she believed it about me and she believed it about almost everybody else she knew! She had the eagle-eye vision of what people could become if they got out of their own way and healed.
Later, I saw how she had the eagle eye view of situations, systems, communities, and the planet. So, many knotted situations was she able to un-tie with her little finger. So many people came to the intensives all muddled up and hurting and she was able to give them a perspective of their lives which they never saw. Everybody had to do their own work and deal with their own lives and Anne was able to give them some positive perspective. I love being with her and hearing what she sees in others.
She has led the Living in Process community down a path that is bigger and better than any of us could have imagined. We are participating in something that is much greater than we ever would have thought. As a community we have taken care of the 110-year old Boulder Hot Springs in Montana and the land around it. Anne said, “We cannot heal the people unless we heal the land and we cannot heal the land unless we heal the people.” We have been working on a plan to restore the wetlands there, and have learned to treat the animals, the land, the bugs, and all of nature as respectfully as we treat ourselves. We are participating in a healing that is much greater than just our own personal healing thanks to Anne Wilson Schaef.
Anne grew up in an atmosphere where her elders were constantly teaching her. Everyday she was taught in the Native American way. She has accepted this role of teacher and elder and is continuously teaching those around her in the LIP community and beyond who are eager to learn a different paradigm of living – one that is based on respect, love, healing and spirituality. Personally, I have dearly loved learning about the plethora of options that I have all the time. Anne has said, “Options are wealth,” and I have found this to be true. Today I have a much greater variety of friends than I ever had before I came into LIP. I don’t put shackles on myself like “I can’t have friends that are over
Anne Wilson Schaef follows a creed of “Do no harm,” and is always teaching about respecting and taking care of our elders. Our elders knew someone who knew someone who knew someone when the world was very different. They are our treasures. Anne has taught us how to treat elders and to notice how disrespected elders are in Western Culture. I am amazed how many people walk by an old person who has dropped her cane and how many people don’t give up their seat on a bus to an elder. I had never learned anything about valuing my elders. Anne Wilson Schaef has taught me to have the utmost respect for them, and I do. She is always teaching us to have the utmost respect for everybody, and to love.
I have come to believe that love is one of the most difficult things for people in Western Culture to deal with. There are so many rules and regulations in people’s heads about who they can love, how they can love, when they can love, what it means to love and be loved, that a lot of loving just gets completely blocked. Anne Wilson Schaef is fabulous at loving. She emulates love for all creatures and humans and she is sometimes crucified for it. She was once confronted at a public event by a journalist who noticed all the loving. The journalist said to Anne that she noticed that the people who had come to the event to support Anne seemed to love her. The writer also noticed that Anne loved the people that came to support her. Anne pointed out that the people who had come to support her also loved each other. The journalist then retorted, “Don’t you think there is something wrong with all that?”
Small minds can’t stand Anne Wilson Schaef. I have discovered that Western Culture people are encouraged to live like zombies – not dead and not alive – and zombies can’t tolerate people that are fully alive like Anne Wilson Schaef. People have trouble when somebody stands up for truth in the middle of a conference laden down with ego and illusions. People have trouble when someone is crying during a movie and they’re not (people have troubles with feelings in general). There are so few people who are fully alive these days, and so many people who mercilessly attack those who are. Our culture can’t stand aliveness and can’t stand community or cooperation. We were told when dealing with some legal issues with Boulder Hot Springs that the laws mitigate against community and cooperation. Amazing.
I am no longer frozen in an ice block. My life is much broader, what I feel, what I think, what I do, than before I met Anne Wilson Schaef and participated in the Living in Process work. I have learned about who I am. I have learned that nobody knows me or knows more about me than I do. Nobody can fix me and I do not need to go through anybody to live spiritually. I believe that somewhere deep down we all know that we have the answers to what we need inside of ourselves. I am so grateful to Anne and this work that I have come to re-connect with the Creator, the All That Is. I am grateful to have learned about so many different spiritualities and ways to be: the Native American ways that I have learned, the Australian Aboriginal ways that I have learned, the Maori ways, the Hawaiian ways, and even the Christian ways I have learned (I am Jewish and knew almost nothing about Christianity). I am grateful for what I have learned about nature and that I have an awareness that I am nature. I feel a part of the oneness of everything and I am no longer out for myself alone. Today I am part of a bigger whole and my life means something. I have deep gratitude for and appreciation for the Living in Process Network and especially Anne Wilson Schaef.
Pete S.
