"Self-study, self-exploration, self-empowerment -- these are the virtues of a great education."
-- Shimon Schocken
In this blog series, we've been exploring where we as a species have come from. We are imagining with the support of the sciences, the arts, business, medicine and nature where we might be headed as a world in this 21st century. We'll explore what we, as a collective, might be evolving into and how a global curriculum could support that evolution. This blog explores what might need to be included for the global heart and mind. It explores the bridges to expand and connect education B.I. (before internet) and A.I. (after internet).
It has been estimated that 65% of the professions in the 21st century have yet to be invented. If that theory is even half way close to being true then we better start looking at what kinds of curriculum are necessary in the 21st century. What would they contain? What kinds of curriculum can we imagine would/could be relevant?
This blog series calls upon (y)our visionary's view of what is necessary in the 21st century's education. How might education be experienced in order to facilitate a new world and new human? What might our educators look like?
THE VIEW FROM THE VISIONARY'S BOXSEATS
As we travel backwards through time, we see that much of what we thought was true was not and a lot of what we didn't understand we set aside. One reason could be that so many are taught not to question the unseen, unknown and unrecognized? History holds many examples of those who left the beaten path to explore the unknown and unseen. Many have not yet returned from "there" while those who have brought us maps of innate origins forgotten, unrecognized and unremembered.
Visionaries bring new worlds of thought, in-formation. They spend their entire lives deciphering the meaning and value of thought in-formation. Their messages drive them towards deciphering, molding and shaping the yet unrecognized forms of information. Like potters, throwing their clay, science, the arts, business, nature and humanity began to mold, visualize and imagine what this in-formation clay can become. They each touch, poke, shape, pull apart and put together its contents as they scrutinize the visionaries' messages.
The thoughts the visionary contains are put through the fire of refinement to become "usable" information. In this refining process, the visionaries themselves grapple with the part and purpose they play. They expect and push themselves to understand and speak new languages yet unwritten. They expect themselves to be able to carry the weight of the message as it is being re-calibrated; the weight Mother Nature uses volcanoes to carve mountain ranges and canyons out of. Those receiving the new worlds of thought from the visionary expect the visionary to understand the unknown and the yet unseen they contain. The visionaries are pushed and squeezed from both sides, the seen and unseen to translate the wholly formless into form. In the process, the visionary sometimes crumbles like pottery in the refiner's fire. As we remove the visionaries' chards from the oven of creation, those who live only with proof and form, toss aside the visionaries' shards and chalk it up to an imperfection, un-groundedness and the idealistic nature of the visionary. They are unaware that every discarded visionary is a loss to the world. And until the time when humanity is ready to "see" the messages of the visionary, not with its eyes but heart and mind, the visionaries' remain unseen and misunderstood as the masterpiece they are becoming and co-creating.
Many of our brilliant visionaries, Van Gogh, Steinbeck, Beethoven, Einstein, Galileo, Da' Vinci to name just a handful, lived on the brink of crumbling under the fire of creation as they worked in multi-dimensional worlds. Their minds and those they brought the in-formation to were being challenged and re-calibrated, being made ready to contain, interpret and utilize the wealth of understanding being unlocked in multi-dimensions and at lightening speeds. Not until centuries later, did humanity began to comprehend the wealth of information brought by these visionaries. Their search, their answers and new ideas sat, cooling and congealing until becoming seen and unlocked through the sciences, arts, medicine, technology and education many years later. Each era has had their army of visionaries marching to a seemingly different beat and intention.
ART. THE MAJORITY OF THE WORD SMART.
"I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world." -- Albert Einstein
One integral technology we continue to misinterpret is art and often the artists who bring its messages of understanding. We've set it aside, moved it out of the schools, minimized the integral and innate place it maintains as it moves us into the infinite worlds of multi-dimensional understanding.
Artists, designers, engineers and scientists are among the few that access art constantly and seemingly without thought. Accessing Fields of Thought, visionaries, artists, designers, engineers and scientists access art's constant messages bringing thought into ideas through the transformative: nothing to form, from the unseen to the seen. Where did the Theory of Relativity come from? Einstein was the messenger but from where did he receive it? Da Vinci, Jobs, I.M. Pei, Gates, Buffet, Branson, Oprah, Huffington and many, many more moved in directions that were not "seen" by most. Each seemed to contain an innate map to guide them through uncharted territories. Each brought with them new worlds, new inventions, new thought. From where do these visionaries receive their vision?
A STREAM OF THOUGHT
A fairly new acronym for education is STEM -- Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. This blog series would expand that acronym to include Art, Relating and of Thought. Science, Technology, Relating, Engineering, Art and Math of thought: STREAM of Thought. This new acronym connects each field of study we have separated through the ages, bringing them back into one field of study; One thought. It is inclusive of all seen and unseen. One STREAM of Thought crossing all boundaries globally and beyond, opens us up to the 21st century of experiential education.
This then becomes our point of reference for a global curriculum. How do we write curriculums for visionaries who are being raised in times of fast changing technology, shifting world powers, devolving and evolving of structures, exciting and disturbing new sciences being explored that could determine whether we utilize our learning to control our environment and people or to catapult us into new environments of existence as thriving new humans? What ingredients do we need to add to this global gumbo of curriculum in order to prepare the feast for humanity's buffet? How do we feed, not only physically but emotionally, mentally, and spiritually such a humanity?
THE ERA OF THE VISIONARY
Each era is moving us forward into the next, as we look in all directions to find answers, understanding, and new paths. Each era's messengers are sent, or go searching for, answers to what looks like their own heart's questions but often find they are connected to the heart of humanity and the metaverse. These current day messengers: autistic visionaries, artistic explorers and ageless youth are often misunderstood, yet they continue to choose a refiners fire for co-creating the space for a new human and humanity. These are the students and teachers in the 21st century. These that are being misunderstood are only the beginning of an army of visionaries. They are marching to the drum of Love, Peace, a world without poverty, and Oneness. Their numbers are gathering at speeds media is reporting on but not seeing. These visionaries are toppling governments, structures and ideas that haven't and don't support life, peace, freedom or joy. They are marching to release themselves and the world from poverty of thought towards new STREAM's of thought.
LOAVES AND THE FISHES - THE META MEAL
There have been numerous theories on how Jesus fed so many on so little. How did he feed so many with just the parable of the loaves and the fishes? If you hear the story and don't necessarily believe it is true, you nonetheless experience its impact and the impact it has had on the millions it has touched. It has fed many, many more than the multitudes that were present that day.
Can we utilize this story, true or not, and bring it to current day? Can we put aside our theories, beliefs and opinions that keep us separate and join with the proven impact this parable has had on millions for centuries? Are we living in its continuing wave of learning as we experience current technologies expanding a handful of resources, multiplying them exponentially through social media and the Internet and feeding millions instantaneously? The bible never specifically gives us what kind of fish he used and if the loaves were multi-grain or focaccia. It gives us the content of its purpose, its STREAM of Thought and the impact it has had on its guests: those that partook of this meal, in addition to (meta), the ages far beyond those that partook of this meal.
Jesus taught about the "technology" he used to expand the loaves and the fishes. He accessed an internal technology, something innate and immediately available. Again, whether you believe he actually did this feat of exponential magnitude, the impact of its telling is profound 2000+ years later. Was the power in the doing of it, the telling of it and/or the thought and belief of it?
Can we write curriculums with such timeless, vast and impactful content across the ages? Can we co-create such experiential curriculums that cross cultural boundaries throughout not only the ages but globally and dimensionally, yet remain personal and relational? Can we wonder and imagine such curriculums that have impact in all directions of time and space moving full STEAM ahead?
"AS YE SHALL GIVE SO SHALL YE RECEIVE." (Luke 6:38)
Whether you believe Jesus actually did this nutritional miracle, many of us believe the story based "soul-ly" on its content. Global curriculums are about feeding the multitudes. They need to expand and feed the soul in addition to the physical body as did many of the teachings given by the masters. The act of giving and the act of receiving are the same with global curriculums. The giver and the receiver experience the same, each are fed: their thought in-forming each other as they each experience what is most helpful. As the curriculums are given, they are received and grow in strength and reinforced by the giving. Could this be the miracle of the loaves and the fishes: As thought comes into awareness and awareness is seen, the previously unseen begins to take form. With each person's recognition, that which seemed impossible becomes possible and grows in strength. As each person receives the thought and its possibility, they give its possibility the form and many are fed.
The story of the loaves and the fishes weathers the test of time and is infinite in its reach some 2000+ years later. None of us is old enough to prove or disprove if it's true. All of us are enough to recognize its truth. These kinds of teachings contain timeless content that is global and infinite in its meaning. These kinds of teachings are the kinds of curriculums needed for the 21st century.
B.I. -- BEFORE INTERNET AND A.I. -- AFTER INTERNET
Time has been clocked according to A.D. and B.C. to denote the changing of specific eras. B.I. - before internet AND A.I. - after internet , may well be two more of those designations used to label eras of transformational change. This A. I. era of information, technology and universal connection has changed the world dramatically. Experiential education now includes reaching out into the world and finding the vast world within. It crosses all boundaries with little regard for culture, gender, age, education and background. There is less information that can be held back for the elite, well-learned, priests or shamans. With a click of a key, we can enter into vaults of wisdom. Global curriculums must hold up under such requirements. They must be given so each person is fed, nourished, strengthened and feels the joy and fullness to give in return wherever they are, go or are called to be.
THE BIRTH OF A GLOBAL CURRICULUM TOOL
Like most new parents with a new baby, the Internet's parents did not recognize the profoundness of what they were helping give birth to. They severely under estimated their baby's reach, vastness and impact on the all of humanity. The Internet was born and before it got comfortable with its training pants, crawling along and learning sounds to formulate language, it was up and running, speaking new languages and translating vast amounts of information, understandings and capabilities. Its appetite for acquiring information was veracious and has not ceased since birth. Generation X, Y and Millennial access its teachings constantly and consistently. Its capacity to access information instantly, connect humanity continuously, and handle and maintain data infinitely, has created a devoted following with staggering numbers far beyond any guru, religion and movement -- except God. With that kind of student body, how do we utilize this tool linked with global curriculums to integrate the fullness of humanity's capacities?
WHAT ARE WE ALL ENTANGLED IN?
Where does thought, imagination and co-creativity come from? Where is their zero point inception? Could it be part of the same field where Einstein and many visionaries received their "downloads" from. Could it be the same place Jesus taught from and used when he taught the parable of the loaves and the fishes: the connection to and expansion of one thought, brought through into form, as matter, In-forming?
Let's start with your ideas of God, Divine, Nature, Love, Peace: can they be extended, as a universal thought recalling a global experience that runs throughout the "All", including the Internet and social network? Will media become a preview of the connection and oneness possible that is now being recognized by scientist as entanglement? Could that "All" be making Itself available through the crumbling boundaries of space and time that the internet and social networks are pushing beyond while art pushes in all directions and dimensions of Self, seen and unseen? 21st century curriculums must participate in this entanglement by co-creating teachings that are entangled, timeless, vast and expansive.
CHARACTERISTICS OF GLOBAL CURRICULUMS
"I want to write so the reader in Des Moines, Iowa, in Kowloon China, Capetown Pretoria, South Africa, in Harlem, in Brooklyn, in Boston, can say, "You know, that's the truth." That's the truth, yeah. I wasn't there but that's the truth. That's human."
--Maya Angelou
For many teachers, the internet and its outcropping's are not in the daily syllabi's. Accordingly to Alex Wright, Director of User Experience @ The New York Times said, "The book was disruptive technology in its time around the end of the Roman Empire. Before that, it was on scrolls." The main tools used are books, stagnant in time, encyclopedias, stagnant in learning. The curriculums consist of experiences and information, histories of people and their struggles never met and never experienced except through the stories written by others. Today we are participants in history and experience those across the world with today's technologies. There are no strangers, no thems and theys. We can no longer remain separate from the world. Many experience the world as harsh, competitive, doomed and having little value or no future. They experience the world that prior generations, less traveled, only read about, theorized about, intellectualized and remained distant from.
Global curriculums contain teachings that cross all boundaries. They are curriculums that wake us up to our innate knowing and self-empowerment. They invite self-exploration and self-study as a piece of the whole. Global curriculums unite and stimulate collaboration, participation and co-creation connecting each individual as they recognize themselves in others utilizing their essence. Examples of a global curriculum are:
"I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world." -- Albert Einstein
As Einstein recognized for himself, our imaginations and wonders encircle the world. Each of us are enough of an artist to draw freely upon our imagination. Our artist within shifts the way we have viewed knowledge and learning. Curriculums can no longer teach from a distance and in separation. Testing can no longer question understanding from stagnant histories of people far away, unknown and impersonal. With our imagination, wonder and technology, we are participating in a shifting of humanity shifting the sciences, the arts, economy, business, medicine and nature.
IMAGINE ONENESS
"Imagine all the people living life in peace." -- John Lennon
We are the navigators heading towards a world in the next century. What might we as a collective be evolving into? We can now experientially explore how a global curriculum could support the global mind and heart.
You are a participant by virtue of being alive at this moment in time. Bring your thoughts based on what you have studied and then go beyond. Bring what you can imagine humanity evolving towards and in to. You are history's great thinkers, leaders and innovators in the 21st century. Participate as an author and architect for the next blueprint and design in human evolution.
Think: think big and think clearly. Think how we as a world can think together, come together and move forward into the 21st century? Imagine: imagine big and imagine clearly, for there is where we "encircle the world."