A reflection on the seminar "The Will and the New Spirituality"
by Noël Norbron
The Will and the New Spirituality
This is the title of the weekend seminar which took place from 23rd - 24th of February in the Youth Section House and around the Goetheanum.
The Youth Section at the Goetheanum is finally becoming more of a seminar center again. The magnificent house that holds the physical focal point of the Youth Section is leaving behind the cozy aura of being primarily a place for conference guests, but is striving in a no less warm direction to be a lively place for discussions on a wide variety of topics, but always with a youthful energy. After last year's two seminars on the broad topic of meditation - led for example by the North American Christian Community priest Patrick Kennedy - the leader of the Youth Section, Nathaniel Williams, invited the former Waldorf teacher and Section leader Claus-Peter Röh to this third meeting.
"An introduction to inner work" was the subtitle of the seminar. And as someone who took part in it, I can confirm that it was quite a piece of work! We started with an observation, but not of many things. We didn't look into the distance but into the depths. Firstly into the depths of various objects, such as a braided rope. And then into our own depths, where we could observe and observe.
On Friday we started at seven in the evening, and on Saturday we finished at the same time with dinner in the beautiful common room. As short as it may have seemed, our own observations went deep within ourselves. As part of the work, we read a chapter from Steiner's "Threshold of the Spiritual World". This chapter is about Ego-Feeling and the Human Souls Capacity for Love. Perhaps we were only able to scratch the surface of what meditation is all about, but it was once again something special to be so deeply engaged with ourselves in our circle of nine people. In this occupation, we were once again connected with each other, which brought with it a strong power.
The interest is constantly awakened, even if we first have to cross other thresholds before we reach the one we are talking about.
Text by Noël Norbron - participant and Youth Section co-worker
Drawing by Nathaniel Williams