Cost is $257.43 (double occupancy) | $332.16 (single occupancy)
Embodying Community: Our Big Spring Thing
Sweet siblings in Spirit, we are delighted to invite you to this year’s Gay Spirit Visions Spring Retreat that we are calling Embodying Community: Our Big Spring Thing!
From its inception, Gay Spirit Visions has woven together the voices, stories, and gifts of our brilliant, open-hearted community, and this year’s Spring Retreat hearkens back to the early days of GSV when all programming came from the vast pool of talent that is y’all.
We have always striven to make our events a nurturing, empowering setting for revealing our gifts to our community, to the world, and, sometimes, to ourselves, and this spring we are inviting you to share your talents, your passions, your hobbies, and your calling with your siblings in the tribe.
What do you know, or know how to do, that you can share with us? What fascination do you have that you might also kindle in a GSV sibling? Whether you’re sharing a skill you’ve been honing for decades or a hobby you took up last year, we would love the benefit of your enthusiasm and knowledge. Can you show us how to knit? Can you direct us in a play? Can you host a witty, erudite salon? Have you always wanted to convene a puppy pile?
If you have a clear sense of what you would like to present, please send a short description of what you have in mind to [email protected] along with a list of any supplies your workshop might require. Those who sign up in advance will get the better presentation spaces, but, as in years past, there will also be a sign-up sheet for those who get up to The Mountain and decide at the last minute that they would like to offer a workshop, give a presentation, or host a salon.
We look forward to seeing you, and learning from you, up on The Mountain!
Registration and pricing information will soon be available for the 2018 GSV Spring Retreat. Mark your calendars and plan to join us at The Mountain Retreat and Learning Center in Highlands North Carolina from April 13th to April 15th.
Our schedule for the Spring Retreat is coming together, here’s what we have.
Aric, Randy, David, Vic, & Dave
Eric Rohner and Randy Johnson will facilitate our Journeys With the Sacred Fool using meditation, sharing, and dreaming to encourage us on those journeys. David Chitara, Dave Cable, and Vic Mansfield have volunteered to share some personal stories to prime our pumps for the meditation and journey.
Teddy, David, Sugar, Mahan Kalpa, & Kraig
Mahan Kalpa Khalsa will lead the heartweaving on Friday evening and offer a workshop on Japanese Bondage which focuses on artistic, connective, and sensual pleasures.
David and Teddy Jones will reprise their always-popular Restorative Yoga accompanied by harp adding a “dress to your level of comfort” for this gathering.
Kraig Blackwell will share “The Wondrous and Sacred Mysteries of the 3 Sacred Trigrammatons.” It comes with laughter but should not to be mistaken for the Tetragrammaton, please! ;=}
David Chitara will offer a healing session that will likely include some gentle breathwork exercises (non-strenuous and suitable for all bodies), guided visualization, and/or intuitive healing work. Specifics will be tailored to the needs of those who attend.
Andy Foskey will lead a workshop/discussion exploring the nature of loneliness for men who love men.
Gary/Pleasure will bring tunes for movement/dance with an invitation to “Parade Your Peculiar.”
Andy & Gary co-conveners
On Saturday evening, we’ll have a time to share your poems, songs, and stories with each other. Bring something you wrote, or a favorite created by someone who art you admire followed by some short videos.
On Saturday afternoon and on Sunday morning we have built-in lots of optional free time if you wish.
Registration at The Mountain begins at 3pm Friday. Dinner on Friday evening begins at 6pm followed by our opening activities at 7:30 pm. Our Closing Circle begins after lunch on Sunday concluding by 2pm.
We’ll have the option to stay at The Mountain from Sunday afternoon to noon on Monday. We’ll be the only group there, but another group that will be using the lodge is arriving after lunch on Monday. You may sign up for the extra day when you register for the Spring Retreat. The price for the extra day includes meals. If fewer than 20 people sign up, you will receive a $20 refund and we’ll buy some groceries and prepare our own meals. This extra day is not sponsored or supported by GSV.
Please don’t forget the Spring Silent Auction that benefits GSV’s Financial Assistance Program. It’s really simple: You bring items that you value but no longer need and buy the treasures that speak to your spirit that were brought by others. All of the proceeds allow those with limited financial resources to join us.
“It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare.”
― Mark Twain
The Fool and his helpers in the image here have a different story than the one we know from tarot cards. The tarot Fool is happy to let us witness his courage as he steps off on a new journey, but he shows no interest in sharing how he developed that courage.
-Jean-Antoine Watteau
The Fools in this image are from commedia dell’arte. Unlike the tarot Fool, they encourage us to join them on their journey. They are experts in the art of laughing at themselves; their mission is to teach us this life enhancing skill. The Fool dressed in white is the sad clown; he invites us to project our sadness and fear on to him. With seductive glances, some of the other clowns offer humor to encourage and support us as we explore our sadness and fear. They rejoice when we find the courage to laugh at ourselves and host a bacchanal when we go forth and encourage others to do the same.
In his book, “The Spirituality of Comedy,” published in 1996, Conrad Hyers posits, “laughter is carbonated prayer.” He uses the phrase in speaking of how best to deal with the essentially tragic nature of the human condition. Twenty-one years later, the conditions of our humanity have more potential tragedy than ever and doubly so for those of us in minority communities who have long been oppressed by the majority.
“Prayer” can be a fraught word for those who were told that if we would just pray to God, and behave in a way that pleased Him, we would get an A on the math test tomorrow despite the fact that we had straight C’s so far. Alternatively, that if we counted enough beads as we prayed, mommy and daddy would stop fighting and we could find some peace. When, despite our prayers, we got a C and our parents got divorced, the folks who prescribed this kind of prayer shamed us by suggesting that we clearly had not counted enough beads or used words that their God could understand.
Please take a breath with us …
Blessedly there is now research indicating how and why prayer does and does not produce the results we desire. That has led to a new understanding of prayer as a way to open ourselves to healing rather than subordinate our strength to some “holy” being or image. This same research describes how meditation and breath are effective tools for finding peace.
The beneficial neurochemical changes that we experience from meditation/centering prayer are also present when we laugh. When we laugh at ourselves, we find synergies that enhance carbonization. When others laugh with us as we laugh at ourselves we create an encouraging and inspiring spiritual celebration.
We touched on this briefly at last fall’s conference in the context of bullying and snark. Queer folks have long used snark as a creative response to being bullied. In addition, we have long used snark within our own community since it is usually safer to bully those in our own tribe because it feels safer than speaking truth to power.
There is a sea of difference between laughing at others and laughing at ourselves while inviting others to join us.
Enter the Sacred Fool!
We already know that The Mountain rings with the sound of laughter when we are there. One of our goals this spring is to encourage laughter that offers a deeper understanding of our hearts and the hearts of others.
Do you already know how to laugh at yourself and encourage others to join you? Are you willing to share your experience at the Spring Retreat? If so, please email Pleasure ([email protected]) and we will explore how that might happen.
Registration for the retreat, begins at 3pm Friday. Following dinner, the Opening Circle begins at 7:30pm. Closing Circle begins after lunch on Sunday with a goal of finishing by 2pm.
We’ll have the option to stay at The Mountain from Sunday afternoon to noon on Monday. We’ll be the only group there, but there is another group that will be using the lodge arriving after lunch on Monday. You may sign up for the extra day when you register for the Spring Retreat. The price for the extra day includes meals. If fewer than 20 people sign up, you will receive a $20 refund and we’ll buy some groceries and prepare our own meals. This extra day is not sponsored or supported by GSV.
Please don’t forget the Spring Silent Auction that benefits GSV’s Financial Assistance Program. It’s really simple: You bring items that you value but no longer need and buy the treasures that speak to your spirit that were brought by others. All of the proceeds allow those with limited financial resources to join us.
We are happy that Aric Rohner has agreed to join us in creating the Spring Retreat. Since hierarchy holds no charm for any of us, we are giving “convener” a rest and referring to ourselves as “co-creators.” If that is not hip enough for you, please think of us as “co-makers.”
April 21 – 23 2017
The Mountain Retreat & Learning Center
Highlands, North Carolina
The Sacred Fool’s Journey
“Whoever travels without a guide, needs two hundred years
for a two-day journey.”
-Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī
Our life’s journey comprises innumerable smaller journeys which in turn create and append our larger life’s journey. Think of it as spirit’s spiral dance.
It is really easy to make decisions that direct our journey on autopilot; a consciousness based on the experience and knowledge of others. Autopilot keeps us safe on planes, but does little to enrich our spiritual lives that thrive on inquiry and openness. Unlike autopilot, spiritual journeys call us to be courageous as we choose our journeys and navigate their paths.
The Sacred Fool’s job is to be our guide; to buoy our courage and lift our spirits.
This Fool we will explore at the Spring Retreat, is not witless, fatuous or shortsighted.
Quite the opposite. Our Sacred Fool encourages us to embark on new journeys with our eyes, minds, and, most especially our hearts, open. This Fool is filled with curiosity and calls us to explore ever-greater aliveness, a greater consciousness and deeper union with spirit.
The Sacred Fool is the very definition of generosity of spirit, filled with cheer and skillfully using laughter in the service of morphing fear into trust. GSV’s Spring Retreat is traditionally the lightest and most ebullient of its three yearly gatherings. This retreat will be brimming with the pleasures and the rewards of connecting through play.
Come to explore your courage and ours. Courage acknowledges the presence of fear and willingly engages it, while bravery requires little thought or consciousness and thus knows nothing of fear.
This is the courage of the drag queens and sissies who ignited gay liberation in the ’60s. This is the courage of the communities that came together in the ‘80s to care for each other and demand that the political and medical establishments take action to halt the AIDS pandemic. This is the courage that is at the core of peaceful resistance and the guiding light of non-violence; the courage that it took for you to come out and to come to GSV. This is the courage that will allow us to challenge all who would silence spirit.
The schedule will similar to last spring allowing big blocks of free time and/or the option to participate in community-led workshops.
Registration for the retreat, begins at 3pm Friday. Following dinner, the Opening Circle begins at 7:30pm. Closing Circle begins after lunch on Sunday with a goal of finishing by 2pm.
We’ll have the option to stay at The Mountain from Sunday afternoon to noon on Monday. We’ll be the only group there, but there is another group that will be using the lodge arriving after lunch on Monday. You may sign up for the extra day when you register for the Spring Retreat. The price for the extra day includes meals. If fewer than 20 people sign up, you will receive a $20 refund and we’ll buy some groceries and prepare our own meals. This extra day is not sponsored or supported by GSV.
Finally, please don’t forget the Spring Silent Auction that benefits GSV’s Financial Assistance Program. It’s really simple: You bring items that you value but no longer need and buy the treasures that speak to your spirit that were brought by others. All of the proceeds allow those with limited financial resources to join us.
