In this frenzied, crazy world, Basicindia provides a quiet space to reflect on questions concerning our lives, our relationships and how to share the space and resources on this planet which has been gifted to us to live on.
Over the last couple of decades, we have been making room for a new conversation, centered around change and transformation. We have been supporting each other and each new person who has shown interest, in learning to think independently. Learning to think for ourselves we are also learning to deal with, and to go beyond the taboos that cripple our lives and relationships. We are finding out what is right and healthy for us as individuals, learning to listen increasingly to our inner wisdom which is a far more effective guide in life than the so-called “experts” we tend to perpetually rely on.
Our learning at Basicindia is not centered around political or economic thought. Rather, it is based on self knowledge, which includes a knowledge of human behavior and the environment in which we live, through self awareness. If we were to name any teachers it would be those like Lao Tse, J. Krishnamurti, the Yaqui shaman Don Juan of Carlos Castaneda’s writings. In BI we have also had the good fortune of being guided by our friend Samuel Widmer a psychiatrist and spiritual teacher who lived and worked largely in Switzerland, and for whom Krishnamurti was a leading light. However we believe that though books and theories may augment our understanding, our goal is to live in the moment - on developing a moment to moment awareness of the self and world in which we live. It has to do with caring for each other and for the environment, and on sensing and living out the mystery we call life. None of this can be really learned through books.
The knowledge we impart has to do with familiarizing people with their feelings and emotions, becoming aware of the changing currents within us, aware of how we relate to our own bodies, how we relate to each other, of the interaction between us as individuals and the world we live in.
Since it is we human beings, who have together created a world ruled by fear, selfishness and greed, it is we, who must take the steps necessary to change it, to go beyond the fear and step into the next phase of transformation which has not to do with faster or better technology but with re-learning simple skills we had as babies and small children: the ability to look, the ability to listen, to feel, to sense ourselves and each other.
It is only out of this new sensibility that we can hope to create a world in which we can live in balance and joy, with ourselves, with each other, and with nature and the environment that sustains us.
Uma