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Joseph DispenzaWITNE editor Teresa Callies recently discussed life and work issues with writer, teacher, workshop leader, and film historian Joseph Dispenza, author of The Way of the Traveler: Making Every Trip a Journey of Self-Discovery and eleven other books. He is the director of the Parcells Center for Personal Transformation in Santa Fe, N.M., and he is also one of the experts on the My Prime Time website. In addition, Mr. Dispenza will be a tour leader on an upcoming trip sponsored by the mindbodytravel.com website.
TC: Mr. Dispenza, how would you describe your career progression?
JD: Since I was eight, I have seen myself as a writer. Now I am beginning to understand that I was put here to be an observer of sorts -- always keeping myself slightly on the "outside" of things so I can see them more clearly. What I'm working on now is to try to know What or Whom I am here to observe for...maybe it's what Jung called "the Collective."
TC: Has your career always been tied to your spiritual life?
JD: When I was seventeen, I entered a monastery and lived a monastic life for eight years. So, my early life was quite tied to spirituality. Since leaving the monastery, I have tried to keep a monastic spirit inside me...my inner monastery where I can retire to in meditation.
TC: Who or what has influenced you the most in your life?
JD: There were big influences: Teilhard de Chardin, Greek and Roman history, Shakespeare, Gore Vidal, C. Jung, Joel Goldsmith...
TC: How and where do you find meaning in the work you are doing now?
JD: I find meaning in the work I'm doing now -- writing, lecturing, and, soon, the leader of a retreat experience. I am relocating to San Miguel de Allende to establish a retreat house. The program is called LifePath Retreats. It is for people who need help seeing, finding, reviewing, and getting back onto their life path. We go through the LifePath steps. They are the same as they are in "The Way of the Traveler" -- the dream, the preparation, the journey, the homecoming, recounting the tale of the journey.
TC: Would you describe the mission of your retreat house in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico? What are you trying to accomplish there?
JD: It has been my dream to offer others the splendid monastic experience I had when I was very young -- the silence, the turning inward, the peace of mind, the utter joy -- but without the religious junk. I am quite down on religion but quite dedicated to spirituality (which is supposed to be the content of religion, but often isn't). We must begin to question the idea of going to a PLACE to worship. It's so pagan and adolescent. Where we stand is holy ground. We've been told for at least two thousand years that "The Kingdom of God is within you," and we still don't get it. I am hoping that the retreat experience will help people with this...and with getting back on track in their spiritual lives.
TC: How do your many interests in film history, holistic health, travel and writing all tie together? For example, do you find a spiritual element to your work as a film historian?
JD: Honestly I don't know how all the threads tie together. Sometimes I look at my life and I think it's just a jumble...chaos. At other times, I sense that there is a logic to it, and that everything I've done has been preparation for the next thing. One thread has remained the same, I believe through it all I have tried to keep in direct contact with the Home Office, offering myself for duty (and continually getting "sealed orders"). I think I studied film history so that I could get in touch with the human story in all it's magnificent variety.
TC: The idea for your book, "The Way of The Traveler", came about because your business travels left you exhausted. Was there one incident or defining moment that gave you the idea for your book, or had you been "incubating" the idea for awhile? Did the works of Joseph Campbell inspire you, for example?
JD: Joseph Campbell has inspired everyone...including me. "Way" came together in a coffee shop in Santa Fe a few days before I was to take a trip. I was writing in my journal and these words appeared on the page: "All travel is inner travel..." That turned out to be the first sentence of "The Way of the Traveler."
TC: Where did you get the idea to create a travel shrine before embarking on a journey? How did you come up your other tips for spiritual travel?
JD: All of these just popped up in the writing. I wish I could feel more responsible for them -- I feel more like a conduit. I wrote the book in seven weeks.
TC: In March you will be leading a "Way of the Traveler" tour to Bali in Indonesia. Why did you pick that particular place?
JD: Bali -- a spiritually significant place...while all "places" are spiritual by virtue of our being present there, some places in the world are blessed by layers and layers of spiritual attention...such a place is Bali.
TC: Given the political strife in that region, will it be safe to travel there?
JD: It will be entirely safe...not only because Bali is a safe place in itself, but also because we will be bringing our own inner peace to the place, which will support the peace that is already there.
TC: What kind of transformational experiences are you anticipating for the participants of the Bali tour?
JD: We take travelers through the stages of travel, and thus through the stages of the journey of life (all travel is inner travel). Everyone has a LifePath. When they give themselves the time to examine it, miracles happen. People often change their lives radically. Sometimes they go back to the same life, but rededicated and with tremendous energy. We are all put here for a purpose. We have always known the purpose of our own lives here. On a retreat, we offer ourselves the opportunity to reconnect with that purpose.
TC: What advice would you have for those who can't or don't want to travel?
JD: If all travel is inner travel, one does not have to travel in the outer world to have the experience of travel as the journey of life.
TC: How can we find more meaning and/or balance in our busy lives on a day-to-day basis?
JD: To find more meaning in life, we have to ask for it -- that means prayer -- and quiet the mind. When our mind is quiet, we see that all things are as they should be. Everything is in place. Everything is, as it says in Genesis, "Good."
TC: How do you personally "recharge your own batteries" when you are tired or find the need for balance in your life?
JD: To recharge, mostly I go out into Nature. It is very calming, and very humbling. My own worries, concerns, preoccupations evaporate when I see the beauty of a mountaintop, a desert, a gentle rain.
TC: Are there any "new beginnings" kinds of rituals that you would recommend to set the tone for a positive year?
JD: A good ritual for the start of the new year is to burn something from the old year(s)...I mean this literally. Get rid of things, make room for the new. So many of us "welcome" in the new, but there is no room for anything new!
TC: Do you have any advice for us as we begin the New Year and the new century?
JD: My thoughts at the start of 2001are this: We are being called as a species to grow up, get straight, and get our body/mind/spirit act together. Get out of SELF (ego), and get busy healing the planet -- and, since we are the thinking/feeling layer of the planet, that means to heal ourselves.
January 2001
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