Wanda Krause - Spiritual Activism: Keys to Personal and Political Success

First published in 2013 by

Turning Stone Press, an imprint of

Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC

With offices at:

665 Third Street, Suite 400

San Francisco, CA 94107

www.redwheelweiser.com

Copyright 2013 by Wanda Krause

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC. Reviewers may quote brief passages.

ISBN: 978-1-61852-067-8

Cover design by Jim Warner

Cover image: Kochneva Tetyana/Shutterstock

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

www.redwheelweiser.com

www.redwheelweiser.com/newsletter

For my parents,
Pam Herdes and Werner Krause

First I would like to thank all the spiritual activists who allowed me to interview them and expose their dreams and goals in this work. Sometimes I asked personal questions around motivation and the trials they endured. They all had the courage to go back and relive moments, allowing me to gain the deeper sense and power of experience. In this way I could grasp their choices to honor the purpose of their trials. I have so often walked away from meetings with these people truly flabbergasted at the expanse of their souls and the intensity of their wills. Yet, their notable feature was consistently humility in describing what they do. I hope I have conveyed how important their struggles are for all of us. Though, I will confirm, more personally, that I found myself reading their beautiful examples over and over towards the end of writing this book when one of my own dark nights of the soul hit. Their examples have carried me through and crucially provided the inspiration, spiritual learning, and faith I need too.

The ability to recognize the keys to success and the spiritual wisdoms has also been through a long journey of learning, starting well before formal study. Spiritual learning has been made possible through several souls. These firstly include my mother, who is religious, and my father, who shunned religion but finds his guidance through nature. Their principles and taking the family out into the wilderness for extended periods to appreciate and breathe All That Is has helped me embrace my own spirit and life direction. Of course, my parents are not perfect but because of that they have been ideal for the life lessons I have needed to grow. Thank you. I would never be the person I am without all you have done for me. A more expanded learning than mainstream academia has been through spiritual teachers who have given their time, authors I have never met, and many others, such as a few of the systems, integral, and political thinkers. My teachers include my children and wise friends.

Always having been my first reader, thanks to Jasser Auda for providing a critical eye and support. This endeavor may have never made it to print without all you've done. Thanks to Noreen Ayesha for believing in this work. Noreen, you are immensely appreciated for your coaching throughout the entire period of writing this book. Thanks to Maxwell Carey for his political insights and a few corrections. Thanks to my brothers for inspiring me to recognize lessons and choices that directly relate to the messages of this book. Thanks Daniel for critical feedback on the book. Finally, I extend my gratitude to the editorial team at Turning Stone Press for their diligence and for bringing this book to final form.

... have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.

Steve Jobs

On February 24, 1955 a baby boy was born to Syrian father Abdulfattah studying in the U.S. and American mother Joanne of German descent living in rural Wisconsin. Both were 23 years old and not married. Not intending to elope at that time, Joanne had seriously considered and weighed her options before the birth. Given that she came from a small Wisconsin Catholic community, she ultimately decided against abortion and instead gave her baby boy up for adoption. The adoptive parents were both high school dropoutsPaul, a mechanic, and Clara, a bookkeeper.

Psychologists and sociologists still define early childhood experiences, such as supposedly being unwanted, or neglected, abused, or from poor or uneducated backgrounds, as the predictors for having little success in life. By comparison, those individuals who grow up in well-adjusted and at least reasonably well-to-do households and who are raised by educated parents have the greatest chances for success. This view is also expressed in situational analysis theory. It developed from the personality traits theory that became popular in the 1930s. The personality traits theory viewed a likelihood of success and leadership as predetermined from birth. Biology and context, though dominating thoughts on success, have little explanatory power.

The baby boy who was chosen and adopted by Paul and Clara Jobs, Steve Jobs, became one of the greatest examples of success at the turn of our century. Yet, he does not fit some basic criteria.

A new theory was popularized in the 1970s that pointed out examples of self-made individuals who were, for example, born into poor families and rose to riches. Fortunately, for many of us who were not born into the right context or right biology, we are given examples of those who could still make itdespite agency or affiliation. At least we glimpse the fact that the door isn't shut. Yet, such a broad sweeping claim does not explain why or how these particular individuals rose to success beyond the mantra of hard work.

Hard work and discipline are important. But, sometimes, programs produce and uphold systems in which the hardest working people enable a certain order whereby those higher up in the power hierarchy derive benefits and well, then, don't need to work as hard. But the kind of hard work that has often been praised and subsumed under the American Dream is not going to help you achieve true success. According to the Economic Policy Institute, income growth for the top 1 percent of all U.S. income earners between 1979 and 2007 was 390 percent while, during that same time, the bottom 90 percent, only saw an increase of 5 percent.

That same gap is also expanding, on a grander scale, between rich and poor countries. All the while, statistics indicate that lower and middle class individuals are working harder than ever. People who achieve the highest forms of success do it differently.

Steve Jobs, co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple Inc., who oversaw the development of iMac, iTunes, iPod, and iPad, is widely known as the charismatic pioneer of the personal computer revolution. He received a number of honors for his influence in the technology and music industries and conferred many titles, such as the master evangelist of the digital age. As evident by Jobs' accolades, despite his humble beginnings, psychologists, sociologists, and others miss the mark in identifying what enables leaders to emerge or have the right ingredients for success.

There is a piece to the puzzle that most experts are not getting. None of the traditional approaches can offer any meaningful analysis of Jobs' (or those like him) ascension. So, you cannot walk away with any useful insights for your path to success. More significantly, such thinking does not help in explaining what success really is. And how can you explain how to reach success if you do not know success as anything but fame, riches, or being recognized as a leader? Successful leader in what? The whole history of these theories of what makes a leader grew with the analysis of Hitler. So, what insight can any of us gain from hindsight?