Ralph White is the president of the freshly launched New Center for Holistic Learning NY.
He is also the author of the memoir, “The Jeweled Highway”: On the quest for a Life of Meaning. He was co-creator of the New York Open Center, America’s leading urban institution of Holistic learning from 1984 to 2022, where his vision and values guided the programs for over thirty years. The New Center NY, just like the Open Center before it, will present leading writers and speakers in the fields of wellness, social/ecological change, inner development, world spiritual traditions, art and creativity.
He "...is considered by those in the field of holistic learning one of the most knowledgeable people in America."
We will discuss topics such as spirituality and cultural transformation. Ralph can share his thoughts about alternative community, holistic centers, and the philosopher Rudolf Steiner.
Ralph White is worldly, articulate and a wonderful story-teller.
"A Walk on the Wild Side in Tibet: True Stores" is an exciting publication of his. I hope he will share some of this with us!
www.ralphwhite.net
www. newcenterny.org
www.esotericquest.org
www.artofdying.org
#HolisticLearning #LifeofMeaning #NewCenterNY #SpiritualTraditions
Tune in for this empowering conversation at TalkRadio.nyc
Music: https://meditationmusiclibrary.com/ The tune is "My Relaxing Piano."
In this opening segment of The A Train to Sedona, host Linda Marsanico welcomes author and holistic visionary Ralph White, tracing his early spiritual influences from the deserts of the American Southwest to the teachings of Carl Jung and Dane Rudhyar. Ralph shares how his awakening transformed him from a politically existential youth into a seeker committed to integrating intellect and spirit through community, nature, and service. Now a leader in holistic learning, Ralph speaks to the essential role of spirituality in cultivating inner coherence and societal transformation toward a more conscious, sustainable future.
In this next segment of The A Train to Sedona, Ralph White offers a rich definition of holistic learning as the integration of body, mind, spirit, and our relationship with the world, emphasizing the interconnectedness of all life. He reflects on launching the New York Center for Holistic Learning as a continuation of his decades of work at the Open Center—this time blending in-person warmth with modern hybrid formats and an intentional focus on engaging younger generations. Ralph also shares how holistic values—once considered fringe—have steadily permeated mainstream culture, and how programs like The Art of Dying and The Esoteric Quest continue to honor sacred topics that bridge ancient wisdom and contemporary consciousness.
In this moving segment of The A Train to Sedona, Ralph White shares the roots of his lifelong drive to explore the world—an innate urge born from post-war claustrophobia and a yearning to break free from the confines of industrial Northern England. He recounts a remarkable spiritual adventure from 1989, when he secretly carried sacred material into Eastern Tibet on behalf of the Nechung Monastery during a time of political upheaval and repression. Through this journey, which intersected with the Tiananmen Square massacre and led to deeper connections with Tibetan culture and China's emerging holistic movement, Ralph reveals a profound truth: the global hunger for spiritual awakening transcends borders and ideologies.
In this final segment of The A Train to Sedona, Ralph White reflects on the internal experience of carrying sacred Tibetan material through rugged borderlands, describing how physical endurance, spiritual alignment, and moments of meditative clarity helped him navigate both the terrain and the mission. He shares a powerful story of finding guidance when a path seemed to end—reminding us how stillness can reveal hidden openings. Ralph also discusses the deep influence of the Tibetan people, the transformative beauty of the Himalayas, and his lifelong commitment to creating a more holistic, conscious, and just society through initiatives like The Esoteric Quest and The Art of Dying.
00:00:53.100 --> 00:00:57.959 Linda Marsanico: Hello, everyone! Welcome to the A. Train to Sedona broadcast.
00:00:58.300 --> 00:01:06.149 Linda Marsanico: The A train to Sedona is also the name of a book. I wrote a memoir about my journey to love and compassion.
00:01:06.390 --> 00:01:10.090 Linda Marsanico: I wrote it to inspire your journey.
00:01:10.810 --> 00:01:16.120 Linda Marsanico: You can get a signed copy on lindamarzanigo.com
00:01:16.780 --> 00:01:22.240 Linda Marsanico: on by the book page also at retail bookstores.
00:01:22.780 --> 00:01:28.189 Linda Marsanico: If you want to read the 1st 7 pages for free, you can go on to amazon.com.
00:01:29.610 --> 00:01:32.009 Linda Marsanico: I also have a free gift for you.
00:01:32.180 --> 00:01:41.549 Linda Marsanico: I call it the cheat sheet for high vibration, living a series of 7 exercises designed to help you
00:01:41.760 --> 00:01:52.440 Linda Marsanico: bring your energy to a positive place to bring your thoughts to the present moment. And in this uncertain world it's wonderful to have this in your toolkit.
00:01:52.580 --> 00:01:57.689 Linda Marsanico: and you can download a free copy on my website@lindamarsenico.com.
00:01:59.010 --> 00:02:08.139 Linda Marsanico: I have 2 disclaimers, one, that this broadcast does not establish a professional relationship.
00:02:08.669 --> 00:02:09.539 Linda Marsanico: 2.
00:02:09.750 --> 00:02:16.879 Linda Marsanico: That the opinions expressed on this broadcast. Do not reflect Talkradio Dot, New York City.
00:02:18.380 --> 00:02:21.589 Linda Marsanico: Today. My guest is Ralph White.
00:02:23.370 --> 00:02:30.989 Linda Marsanico: Ralph White is the president of the freshly launched new center for for holistic Learning, new York.
00:02:32.050 --> 00:02:39.670 Linda Marsanico: He is also the author of the memoir, The Jeweled Highway on the Quest for a life of meaning.
00:02:40.380 --> 00:02:47.420 Linda Marsanico: He was co-creator of the New York Open Center, America's leading urban institution
00:02:47.560 --> 00:02:58.869 Linda Marsanico: of holistic learning from 1984 to 2022 where his vision and values guided the programs for over 30 years.
00:02:59.480 --> 00:03:18.019 Linda Marsanico: The New Center, New York, just like the open center before it will present leading writers and speakers in the fields of wellness, social, ecological change, inner development, world spiritual traditions, art and creativity.
00:03:19.050 --> 00:03:29.010 Linda Marsanico: Ralph White has presented internationally on such topics as contemporary spirituality, cultural transformation.
00:03:29.310 --> 00:03:31.909 Linda Marsanico: and the history of the Western tradition.
00:03:32.610 --> 00:03:40.370 Linda Marsanico: He was editor of Lapis Magazine, winner of the Alternative Press, award 2,000 from Utney, reader.
00:03:40.900 --> 00:03:47.789 Linda Marsanico: and taught the 1st fully accredited course, in holistic learning at New York University
00:03:48.650 --> 00:03:54.819 Linda Marsanico: he has contributed articles on topics such as Alternative Community.
00:03:55.170 --> 00:04:03.879 Linda Marsanico: the national network of holistic centers, the movement for legal renewal, and the philosopher, Rudolf Steiner
00:04:04.330 --> 00:04:11.630 Linda Marsanico: for dragonfly media. A network of magazines reaching an audience of 250,000.
00:04:12.700 --> 00:04:17.470 Linda Marsanico: Ralph White was born in Wales, spent his childhood there.
00:04:17.790 --> 00:04:20.810 Linda Marsanico: and his teenage years in the north of England.
00:04:21.600 --> 00:04:29.399 Linda Marsanico: After completing a degree in American studies at the University of Sussex, he came to the United States from Britain
00:04:29.640 --> 00:04:34.180 Linda Marsanico: in 2 in 1970. As a Fulbright scholar.
00:04:34.690 --> 00:04:40.949 Linda Marsanico: he was program director of Omega Institute for Holistic studies in Rhinebach.
00:04:41.200 --> 00:04:54.799 Linda Marsanico: and I must tell you, listeners, his biography has so much more that I this is a very shortened version, so I want to welcome you, Ralph White, to the A. Train to Sedona
00:04:55.190 --> 00:04:57.243 Ralph White: Thank you, Linda. Glad to be on board
00:04:58.610 --> 00:05:07.329 Linda Marsanico: I wanted to ask you what your early influences were that bring you to where you are personally and in your career.
00:05:09.040 --> 00:05:16.220 Ralph White: You mean my early influences going back to childhood or adolescence, or my early adulthood? What you would? Which
00:05:16.590 --> 00:05:18.349 Ralph White: would you like me to focus on
00:05:18.350 --> 00:05:26.120 Linda Marsanico: I think I'm thinking of adolescence, young adulthood, onward
00:05:27.170 --> 00:05:29.698 Ralph White: Yeah. Well, you know, I was at
00:05:30.460 --> 00:05:35.050 Ralph White: I didn't grow up in a religious and spiritual environment.
00:05:35.900 --> 00:05:48.770 Ralph White: And you know, I went to a very progressive university in England. It really took my personal spiritual awakening really happened after I'd come to America.
00:05:49.290 --> 00:06:09.030 Ralph White: and at the age of 21, as a graduate student and answered an ad for a co-driver down route 66 to la, you know. Of course, I was the 1st track of the Rolling stones, first, st albums in Route 66. So I always wanted to travel back, but I had my own spiritual awakening, should we say, in the desert.
00:06:09.330 --> 00:06:12.840 Ralph White: in the in the deserts of New Mexico and Arizona.
00:06:13.737 --> 00:06:20.889 Ralph White: You know, prior to that I was more politically and existentially oriented. But then those vast
00:06:21.350 --> 00:06:38.089 Ralph White: landscapes in the Southwest had a big impact on me, and that's what really opened me up to a deeper perception of spiritual perception of the world. The silence, the stars, the grandeur of the landscape, a big influence on me. Then, when I left graduate school to really pursue
00:06:38.290 --> 00:06:46.759 Ralph White: spiritual and esoteric matters, and to try to reconcile the intellectual and spiritual aspects of myself, was young Carl Jung.
00:06:46.910 --> 00:06:51.669 Ralph White: Cg. Young was a huge influence on me. In my early twenties I got more out of
00:06:52.310 --> 00:06:57.599 Ralph White: modern man in search of a soul than I did all of Freud and Marx put together frankly.
00:06:57.860 --> 00:07:01.600 Ralph White: So it was that, you know. Then another big influence on me and my
00:07:01.850 --> 00:07:16.700 Ralph White: early 20 S. Was Dane Rudyar. I don't know if he's been a figure. You've come across an extraordinary man, a real Renaissance man, originally French, came to America when he was young and was a he was a musician.
00:07:16.920 --> 00:07:43.489 Ralph White: he was a philosopher. He's known mostly as an astrologer today, if he's remembered at all. But he was a wonderful big picture thinker. One of my favorite books of his was, We can begin again together, subtitled a reevaluation of the basic concepts of Western civilization. Only Dane Rudyard would subtitle a book that, so I would say. Jung and Dane Rudyard in my early seventies were.
00:07:43.490 --> 00:07:54.600 Ralph White: were big influences on me, and you know what probably, if we leave aside the more intellectual element just growing up spending most of my childhood on the coast of Wales
00:07:54.990 --> 00:08:07.780 Ralph White: coast of Wales, which is very beautiful. We live not far from the Irish Sea. You could see the mountains of Snowdonia through the window just walking on those those beaches, any of our listeners or viewers who
00:08:08.340 --> 00:08:28.380 Ralph White: Noah Dion fortune, if that's a name. But she was a British writer on the esoteric in the early 20th century, but she and I both grew up around the same limestone massif a great headland in Wales that jutted out into the Irish Sea. So that was a wonderful place to have silent.
00:08:28.700 --> 00:08:35.519 Ralph White: Of course I knew nothing about mysticism at that time, but a silent sense of peaceful attunement to the beauty of nature.
00:08:35.840 --> 00:09:03.849 Ralph White: So I would say that. And you know I mean, I was living in the north of England in 1963 when the Beatles burst onto the scene. So of course, I grew up with the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the animals, all of those guys. I love them all. And of course that was a huge. It wasn't. It wasn't so much the spiritual thing, but it was true with life and vitality, and it was getting you out of the grim, grimy, Northern industrial world that I found myself in as a teenager. You know.
00:09:03.970 --> 00:09:06.900 Ralph White: a soot covered city that was
00:09:07.330 --> 00:09:12.410 Ralph White: had been one of the places where the Industrial Revolution began. So it was a very
00:09:12.610 --> 00:09:22.760 Ralph White: repressed working class environment in a very grimy one, with where you had the 60 chimneys merging with the fog and mist coming down from the
00:09:23.150 --> 00:09:29.410 Ralph White: or so you would remember, from Wuthering Heights, and that kind of thing. So that rock and roll was a huge
00:09:30.370 --> 00:09:37.489 Ralph White: injection of vitality and freedom into what was a grimy and
00:09:37.620 --> 00:09:42.899 Ralph White: not very happy world that I resolved. So I needed to get out of that which I did
00:09:43.120 --> 00:09:49.820 Ralph White: by getting to university, which was rare in those days in Britain, among kind of people I grew up in.
00:09:50.230 --> 00:09:58.140 Ralph White: and then on to America as a graduate student, because I did. I did American studies as my degree in England when that was a very rare thing to do.
00:09:58.530 --> 00:10:05.189 Ralph White: It was a lot more fun studying America in the late sixties than it was writing another paper on
00:10:05.310 --> 00:10:09.179 Ralph White: Chaucer or Milton or Shakespeare. We don't need another one of those.
00:10:09.450 --> 00:10:13.870 Ralph White: So yeah, that that does that give you a sense of some of the influences. Yeah.
00:10:13.870 --> 00:10:30.750 Linda Marsanico: Yes, of course, the British invasion was a wonderful invasion for us. They did bring such vitality, and I remember reading that the Beach boys from California said, Oh, my goodness! The Beatles are coming over. We're in competition. We have to produce some good music. So we
00:10:30.750 --> 00:10:32.730 Linda Marsanico: yeah, good music at that time
00:10:32.730 --> 00:10:40.970 Ralph White: Oh, wow, yeah, that that was the best thing about being a teenager or a young person in the sixties was the music. Yeah. And even on into the mid seventies, too. So
00:10:41.520 --> 00:10:42.550 Ralph White: yeah.
00:10:43.010 --> 00:10:49.590 Linda Marsanico: So what would you say? The role of spirituality is in your life currently and in your adulthood.
00:10:50.430 --> 00:11:08.829 Ralph White: Well, it's central, you know. I mean, I was a sort of alienated teenage existentialist personally, who didn't see a lot of meaning in the world. You know. My father was in the thick of the 1st World War, landed in Normandy, and my grandfather was in the thick of the 1st World War was mustard, Gaster.
00:11:08.830 --> 00:11:09.480 Linda Marsanico: Hmm.
00:11:09.480 --> 00:11:26.490 Ralph White: You know, I'd been aware of a lot of horror in the 20th century. And how could that possibly be some deeper level of spiritual reality in a world that permits this kind of tremendous violence. The notion of God that was brought up with didn't make any sense, and I'd sort of moved on from that. By the time I was 13 or 14
00:11:27.117 --> 00:11:33.910 Linda Marsanico: So it really was that awakening that I mentioned 1st of all in the in the southwestern deserts
00:11:34.070 --> 00:11:38.739 Ralph White: But you know, spirituality is what gives coherence and meaning and direction to your life.
00:11:39.470 --> 00:11:43.040 Ralph White: And once I had grasped that
00:11:43.680 --> 00:11:52.729 Ralph White: we're part of a larger reality, and that there are levels of consciousness beyond just the everyday banal level of interaction.
00:11:53.940 --> 00:12:04.640 Ralph White: that was a big insight for me. And then, you know. Of course, I was on my own spiritual path in my early twenties I hitchhiked to Machu Picchu from Canada when I was 23, and
00:12:04.740 --> 00:12:26.660 Ralph White: you know, I had many experiences down in the mountains in the Andes. So when I came back I really had the feeling that not only was the spirituality real on something I wanted to make central to my life. But then arises the question, How do you serve? What do you serve? Because once you wake up to a kind of spiritual view of the world. You want to contribute to society in some way.
00:12:27.050 --> 00:12:30.349 Ralph White: So for me, that involved
00:12:30.570 --> 00:12:50.248 Ralph White: 3. Well, actually there was 4 centers, you know. I I'd been living in South America then in California. But then I went back to Britain, to Scotland, to I spent 3 and a half years at Find Vaughn, the what is now an echo village spiritual community.
00:12:50.780 --> 00:12:56.880 Ralph White: holistic learning center up in the north of Scotland. So that was part of
00:12:58.080 --> 00:13:19.139 Ralph White: a big part of it. It gave me an arena to serve. It was a way to show. Spinthorn always saw itself as a center of demonstration. It was demonstrating that you could live, broadly speaking, in harmony with each other, and of course the main spiritual practice was attunement to nature. I was a lover of nature, even though I've now spent 40 years in New York City. But
00:13:19.140 --> 00:13:28.469 Ralph White: so yeah, so the spirituality is, it's central. It's core to my worldview. It's core to my meditative practice.
00:13:28.520 --> 00:13:30.660 Ralph White: And it's caught in my basic
00:13:31.570 --> 00:13:49.119 Ralph White: impulse to be of value and service to the world and to try to contribute to an awakening of consciousness that takes us to in a more holistic, ecological, and spiritual direction. Because that's been clear to me now for 45, 50 years that
00:13:49.120 --> 00:14:02.929 Ralph White: that that's the way we need to go. I had when I'd been up in the Andes for months and came down to hitchhiked down to sea level again in Peru and saw an industrial city. It wasn't a big one at Aquipa, but I saw an
00:14:02.950 --> 00:14:31.400 Ralph White: a Westernized industrial city after being in the mountains under the stars for months, and I just had one of those moments of intuitive clarity where I could see that Western industrial culture was both destroying the environment and our ecology, and was really wrecking our souls and Psyches as well, and that we needed to create something different. So ever since that point, and that's a long time ago. That was like 1973. My goodness.
00:14:31.710 --> 00:14:42.500 Ralph White: it really is a long time ago. It's been clear to me that we have to create something different rather than the consumerist materialist. You know whole world view that is wrecking the planet.
00:14:42.810 --> 00:14:59.150 Ralph White: So I've been, you know, pretty much dedicated since then to trying to bring in the kind of ideas and practices, etc. That can awaken us to that larger, spiritual, holistic, and ecological understanding of the world that we need for a sustainable future
00:15:00.000 --> 00:15:16.149 Linda Marsanico: Well said, we are taking a break right now. But coming back, I read that in the world of holistic learning you are considered the most knowledgeable person in the world. So I want to come back. Somebody wrote it on your website.
00:15:16.150 --> 00:15:17.130 Ralph White: We did.
00:15:17.130 --> 00:15:19.519 Ralph White: Yes, I thought, Whoa, this is
00:15:20.500 --> 00:15:24.760 Linda Marsanico: So when we come back, listeners, I want to ask Ralph about this
00:15:28.340 --> 00:15:31.290 Ralph White: And okay.
00:17:14.710 --> 00:17:24.699 Linda Marsanico: Hello, everyone! Welcome back to the A. Train to Sedona broadcast. I'm Linda Marcannico today with my guest, Ralph White. Now, Ralph.
00:17:24.880 --> 00:17:32.059 Linda Marsanico: for our listeners. Would you say something about what holistic learning can be defined as
00:17:33.150 --> 00:17:42.629 Ralph White: Well, you could say that you know the classic definition of holistic is the integration of body, mind, and spirit. But it goes more than that holistic learning also deals with
00:17:42.750 --> 00:17:48.879 Ralph White: becoming a whole person, integrating all those aspects of one's being, but also engaging with the world.
00:17:49.330 --> 00:18:01.670 Ralph White: And how do we live in a more holistic, conscious relationship with the world. So you know, an ecological worldview is just the other side of the same coin of a holistic worldview.
00:18:02.010 --> 00:18:07.199 Ralph White: and it exemplifies the interconnection of life.
00:18:07.630 --> 00:18:11.760 Ralph White: You know, ecology is that sort of classic holistic science that shows that when
00:18:11.940 --> 00:18:31.479 Ralph White: the moth eats something over there, it affects the frog over there, you know, everything is interrelated. That's 1 aspect of a holistic worldview. The more personal is the body, mind, spirit, aspect that I mentioned. So it's all to do with reaching our full potential as human beings and developing a healthy relationship with the natural world around us.
00:18:32.710 --> 00:18:35.719 Linda Marsanico: Thank you for that. It gives me a fuller understanding.
00:18:36.410 --> 00:18:42.970 Linda Marsanico: So now I want to know, what is it like to be at the heart of the
00:18:43.100 --> 00:19:02.740 Linda Marsanico: New York Center that you're starting. Of course it's in New York City one of the most, or, if not the most influential city in in the world. What is it like to be restarting away from the open center which you curated for many? What is it? 36 years
00:19:02.992 --> 00:19:06.787 Ralph White: Yes, 36, or was it 38 years? Yes, it was a long time.
00:19:07.170 --> 00:19:08.200 Ralph White: Yeah.
00:19:08.410 --> 00:19:18.509 Ralph White: Well, you know, it has its challenges. Of course I didn't expect to be 40 years after I started the open censor with my old friend, Walter Beebe.
00:19:19.087 --> 00:19:23.620 Ralph White: I didn't expect to be doing it again at this age.
00:19:25.390 --> 00:19:33.349 Ralph White: so. But it's a it's a different time, you know. We're not so much looking at the on the old model. The open center, had a big had a building, you know.
00:19:33.350 --> 00:19:34.000 Linda Marsanico: Yes.
00:19:34.000 --> 00:19:54.450 Ralph White: And then on 30th Street. We don't. We're not working. We're using different spaces now. We're not putting out a 80 88 page catalog and sending it out to 80,000 people every 4 months. We can have a lot of our meetings on Zoom online instead of in person.
00:19:54.720 --> 00:19:58.869 Ralph White: And there's the different formats, you know, purely online.
00:19:58.970 --> 00:20:20.039 Ralph White: purely in person and hybrid. You know where you actually have people there in person. But you can also beam it out all over the world. You know we learned during the last few years of the opus, and how big an audience there is. Of course, when you go hybrid, but you don't want to lose the intimacy of human interaction, especially after the pandemic. You know we're all
00:20:20.140 --> 00:20:26.600 Ralph White: in need of a bit more conviviality and social interaction and warmth, that social warmth.
00:20:27.140 --> 00:20:39.929 Ralph White: So it's challenging environment to be doing it at this age, because we've got a huge range of connections. We've got 40 40 odd years worth of contacts and experience. But it's a different environment.
00:20:40.050 --> 00:21:03.229 Ralph White: And you know, it's very important for us to bring in a younger generation. Now people in their twenties, or under 35 or so. So how to do that? And what are the different formats that are required? How is it different now for younger people? That's why I'm working now with a whole raft of younger colleagues who have that insight into what speaks to the younger constituency. Right now
00:21:03.230 --> 00:21:11.510 Ralph White: I can try to figure it out. But it's better to hear it straight from that. Yeah, that generation. So which so? And of course.
00:21:11.550 --> 00:21:22.870 Linda Marsanico: The whole holistic spiritual thing. It wasn't just, you know, affiliated with the baby boom. That may have been where it had its major breakthrough. But of course it's going on from generation to generation.
00:21:22.940 --> 00:21:28.269 Ralph White: And then I saw when I was teaching at Nyu, my students were totally into all of this.
00:21:28.400 --> 00:21:43.099 Ralph White: I mean, I was teaching the 1st accredited course in holistic learning at Nyu. But I saw then that this is sometimes presented as just, you know, some baby boom thing, and then it's just flakes, and so on. Who are into this. Now this is certainly not true. There's a lot of
00:21:43.350 --> 00:21:54.380 Ralph White: intelligent, aware people of all generations who realize there's got to be this profound shift in our consciousness, and you don't see it written about in the media a lot because it's been a subtle shift.
00:21:54.390 --> 00:22:17.440 Ralph White: you know you and I probably remember the days when Mom and health food stores were little mom and Pop operations and hole in the walls. And now, of course we had whole foods, and Amazon bought whole foods. I mean the way we used to look upon when I was at Fintonio building a windmill and organic agriculture. It was all considered wild and crazy stuff, and trying to put solar panels up in the north of Scotland.
00:22:17.530 --> 00:22:35.460 Ralph White: Of course that was years ahead of its time. So so many of these things. Alternative medicine, you know. The New York Times, 40 years ago, dismissed every form of alternative medicine as snake oil. And that's just a few examples. So it has. Holistic perspectives have permeated the culture in a subtle way, so that now
00:22:35.500 --> 00:22:48.330 Ralph White: the Times and the Guardian, you know, have have regular columns on wellness, because they like to present themselves as super sophisticated. Some of us have been doing this for 40 years, you know we're not all
00:22:48.700 --> 00:22:59.550 Ralph White: incapable of some healthy measure of discernment about what is real and what is substantial. Of course some of the mainstream media loves to be dismissive and poo-poo towards these
00:23:00.380 --> 00:23:12.829 Ralph White: these flaky people who've been interested in this alternative stuff. But the fact is, it's it's making its own way into society. And whether it's alternative or complementary or integrated medicine, I mean.
00:23:12.960 --> 00:23:20.239 Ralph White: how far has that come in the last 40, 45 years? Of course I think of John Cabot's Zinn, when I was at Omega.
00:23:20.400 --> 00:23:45.720 Ralph White: was doing his mindfulness work. And now he is, you know, the eminence of mindfulness on a worldwide basis. You wouldn't meet a nicer person. But you can just see so many. We could go on and on so many areas in which these holistic practices values ideas have permeated society, but it's been an evolution rather than a revolution. So it's not necessarily headline grabbing
00:23:46.430 --> 00:24:14.040 Ralph White: unless you're very attuned to it. But those of us who have been attuned to this. It's everywhere, you know, whether you get off an airplane in San Francisco airport, and the 1st thing you see is some place selling sustainable and green furniture, I mean, once you've got an eye for it. It's increasingly ubiquitous, but not as ubiquitous as it needs to be. But it's getting there. So it's reason for hope, despite the disturbing and crazy times that we live in
00:24:15.110 --> 00:24:24.129 Linda Marsanico: It is everywhere, and it's moving us in a very positive direction. It's being absorbed. And it's really for a lot of us mainstream.
00:24:25.360 --> 00:24:28.860 Linda Marsanico: It's mainstream, because in order to keep the earth
00:24:30.080 --> 00:24:33.890 Linda Marsanico: alive and sustainable, we need to take care of it.
00:24:34.250 --> 00:24:34.730 Ralph White: Yeah.
00:24:34.730 --> 00:24:37.649 Linda Marsanico: To take care of this beautiful planet that we live on
00:24:37.650 --> 00:24:38.430 Ralph White: Yeah.
00:24:38.980 --> 00:24:44.389 Linda Marsanico: So I wanted to say you said a little bit about this, but let me formally ask you.
00:24:44.970 --> 00:24:51.500 Linda Marsanico: how does the new center build on the open center
00:24:52.510 --> 00:24:57.169 Ralph White: Well, we have a lot of contacts, a lot of expertise.
00:24:57.320 --> 00:25:01.309 Ralph White: a lot of people who know how to how to do this.
00:25:01.580 --> 00:25:02.930 Ralph White: So
00:25:03.140 --> 00:25:14.510 Ralph White: I, for instance, have. And the other people in the programming field know a lot of the people who are already, who are who have been teaching. They said they taught at the open center for many years.
00:25:14.640 --> 00:25:30.550 Ralph White: and most of them are quite happy to come back and teach at the new center as well. I mean, they realize that you know the open center had to deal with its own internal issues. It came to an end after 38 years, and whatever 4 or 500,000 participants that came through.
00:25:30.730 --> 00:25:34.300 Ralph White: But the need for holistic learning hasn't gone away.
00:25:34.470 --> 00:25:40.720 Ralph White: there's still just as much need for that as ever. So we have to adapt it to a different time in a different format.
00:25:41.210 --> 00:26:08.950 Ralph White: But yes, if I was doing this entirely from scratch now, without 45, 50 years worth of experience at the open center. And then you know, before that I was program director of Omega and ran the programs for the 1st 2 summers up at the former Camp Boybury, because it used to be as it was when I stumbled across it in the early eighties, just an abandoned old summer camp. Now you wouldn't recognize that. That's what it's like today. But
00:26:09.170 --> 00:26:16.580 Ralph White: you know, I I you know I just have a lot of contacts, a lot of and not just me a lot of experience.
00:26:16.780 --> 00:26:27.599 Ralph White: And the challenge is to attune to, you know, the the specific consciousness. What is needed at this particular time with this dramatic moment that we are in in 2025.
00:26:29.280 --> 00:26:32.909 Ralph White: So I think it.
00:26:33.120 --> 00:26:37.789 Ralph White: It requires comparable comparable levels of vision and creativity.
00:26:37.900 --> 00:26:57.740 Ralph White: And we have many years of experience. We also have new people working with us. So it's great to have people in their twenties and early thirties who are filled with I mean, I was what 34 when I started the open set. Not quite that young anymore. But there's, you know, there's life in the old dog yet, as they say. So
00:26:58.140 --> 00:27:03.100 Ralph White: yeah, say, I would say, there's a lot of life with your wisdom, Ralph. You bring
00:27:03.570 --> 00:27:12.510 Linda Marsanico: Great wisdom and attracting young people allows you to benefit from what they can bring.
00:27:12.510 --> 00:27:25.310 Linda Marsanico: Yeah, yeah. But there needs to be a combination. So we're working on is developing a team where there's a really good blend of young, old and interesting different areas and skills and people learning skills. So
00:27:25.510 --> 00:27:26.860 Ralph White: That's what we're doing.
00:27:26.990 --> 00:27:30.110 Ralph White: But it, you know, it's kind of unprecedented. It hasn't been done before.
00:27:30.270 --> 00:27:32.840 Ralph White: So yeah.
00:27:34.360 --> 00:27:36.750 Linda Marsanico: And you also stated that
00:27:36.950 --> 00:27:50.690 Linda Marsanico: the setup is quite modern. You have in person for intimacy. You have zooms for those who want to sit in their living room, and you have hybrid to attract. You have a world audience.
00:27:51.200 --> 00:28:00.400 Ralph White: Yeah, that's right. I mean, we. I started something called the Art of Dying Programs 30 30 years ago.
00:28:00.550 --> 00:28:04.949 Ralph White: with Tibet House, our friends at Tibet House, Bob and Nano Thurman and others.
00:28:06.670 --> 00:28:10.909 Ralph White: And extraordinarily enough, that is still continuing to this day.
00:28:12.870 --> 00:28:32.690 Ralph White: so yeah, these things are of enduring. I also started something called The The Esoteric Quest. This series of conferences on the Western Esoteric tradition also at the same time, back in 1995, both the art of dying and the esoteric quest are celebrating their their 30th birthday this year.
00:28:33.060 --> 00:28:39.950 Ralph White: So you know, they have legs. These are serious topics. One is the rediscovery of the lost spiritual wisdom of the West.
00:28:40.240 --> 00:28:48.730 Ralph White: and the other, of course, is the deepest of all topics, death itself. How do we deal with it. How can we approach it in a more holistic way?
00:28:48.840 --> 00:28:53.450 Ralph White: And even you know, what? What do we know about near death, end of life.
00:28:53.610 --> 00:28:59.446 Ralph White: and what are the wisest perspectives from the Tibetans to
00:29:00.280 --> 00:29:22.380 Ralph White: Rudolph Steiner about the journey of the soul after death. And of course that's the good thing about being a free, independent organ, nonprofit organization. We don't have to kowtow to mainstream materialistic prejudices in academia or in hospitals, or wherever it may be, although, of course this stuff is making its way into those those spheres as well
00:29:24.120 --> 00:29:25.380 Ralph White: So, yeah.
00:29:26.530 --> 00:29:28.780 Linda Marsanico: Now it is time for a break
00:29:29.010 --> 00:29:35.570 Linda Marsanico: when we come back. I have a great interest in your stories, your true stories from Tibet.
00:29:35.570 --> 00:29:36.440 Linda Marsanico: Oh, okay.
00:29:36.440 --> 00:29:39.260 Linda Marsanico: Now you are a world traveler.
00:29:39.260 --> 00:29:39.860 Ralph White: Hmm.
00:29:39.860 --> 00:29:53.749 Linda Marsanico: I'm interested in knowing what you think spurred you to be such an adventurer coming to the United States, traveling to Tibet, this east to west. So when we come back, listeners, we're going to ask Ralph about that
00:29:54.090 --> 00:29:54.610 Ralph White: Okay.
00:29:54.610 --> 00:29:56.309 Linda Marsanico: It's time for a commercial now.
00:29:56.580 --> 00:29:57.280 Ralph White: Yeah.
00:31:34.470 --> 00:31:43.610 Linda Marsanico: Hello, everyone! Welcome back to the A. Train to Sedona. I'm Linda Marisanako with my guest, Ralph White. Ralph, please unmute yourself
00:31:46.000 --> 00:31:49.049 Linda Marsanico: now. Before we left for commercial.
00:31:49.530 --> 00:31:56.230 Linda Marsanico: I showed an interest in Ralph's being such a world traveler and adventurer, Ralph.
00:31:57.250 --> 00:32:02.239 Linda Marsanico: What influenced you to be this adventurer
00:32:03.400 --> 00:32:10.469 Ralph White: I'm just that kind of a guy. I've always wanted to see the world from a very early age, you know, and I did
00:32:11.230 --> 00:32:28.140 Ralph White: when I was young I felt extremely claustrophobic. You know I spent my 1st 4 years in these just working class row houses in Cardiff, which is the capital of Wales. It was very, very claustrophobic in those post-war years, with the bomb sites and
00:32:28.280 --> 00:32:54.399 Ralph White: the poverty in general. I just had an impulse to see the world. My nightmare was that, you know, when I was living in the north of England, in that industrial town, Huddersfield, in the sixties, I wanted to get out of there, and my nightmare was that I'd be stuck like in there like so many generations of people had been working in the factories, you know, that's where and the mills, the textile mills, you know. That's where the Industrial Revolution been going for 150 years.
00:32:54.570 --> 00:32:57.139 Ralph White: So I couldn't actually put my, it's just
00:32:57.420 --> 00:33:05.000 Ralph White: you know what it I had well, I would remember living in Vancouver in 72,
00:33:05.130 --> 00:33:24.459 Ralph White: and seeing a picture of Machu Picchu on somebody's television. And of course, nowadays everybody knows Machu Picchu. But although all those years ago I was like, what is that? You know? Here I am for my age, a relatively well educated person, but I never even heard of Machu Picchu. And I just thought, Wow, what is that? And I said, I've got to go there.
00:33:24.510 --> 00:33:37.310 Ralph White: So I just a friend, and I just decided to hitchhike there. We didn't have the money to to fly there. But yeah, we hitchhiked there. It took us 6 months, and then I ran out of money and lived in Colombia for a year.
00:33:37.380 --> 00:33:43.330 Ralph White: which was a quite a memorable experience. But also I've always had a fascination with Tibet.
00:33:43.760 --> 00:33:50.219 Ralph White: because when I was a you know, when I was a boy, Tibet was still the mysterious land of snows. You hadn't had the Chinese invasion.
00:33:51.020 --> 00:33:57.510 Ralph White: and I was always there was something there, just like there was something in those ancient
00:33:57.630 --> 00:34:13.810 Ralph White: in the the Pyramids in Teotihuacan, outside Mexico City. I didn't even know the largest pyramids in the world were in Mexico, not in Egypt, I mean all those pre-columbian cultures. And then Tibetan so old forgotten mysteries. I just had the sense that the
00:34:14.679 --> 00:34:27.900 Ralph White: modern materialistic worldview that was offered us through contemporary education didn't look deeply enough. There were all kinds of ancient civilizations that needed to be understood and respected.
00:34:28.320 --> 00:34:34.869 Ralph White: And so I think that was but more than anything, it's just a
00:34:35.219 --> 00:34:55.390 Ralph White: it's just an urge. You know it's an urge to embrace the world, you know. I remember meditating at the open center after the 1st 5 years, and it just came to me. I need to go around the world, and I always wanted to do that. So I took a sabbatical of the open center and went around the world for a year and absolutely loved it. That's where I had that adventure in Tibet.
00:34:56.216 --> 00:34:57.884 Ralph White: It's it's just
00:34:59.570 --> 00:35:04.670 Ralph White: I know what I think. Some people just have that itch, if you want to call it that, maybe, or that.
00:35:05.580 --> 00:35:08.450 Ralph White: you know impulse just to
00:35:08.690 --> 00:35:13.430 Ralph White: just to get out there and embrace the world and see it, and to live it as fully as possible.
00:35:13.790 --> 00:35:25.379 Ralph White: And also, you know, of course, I mean my sister's the exact opposite. She she spent her life back in. She's still in that town in the north of England that we went to when I was 9
00:35:26.360 --> 00:35:40.630 Ralph White: she married a French guy, so she does have a larger view of the world. She gets away to France quite often, but it's just me, I mean, it's not like it was something to do with our family. It's just my particular chemistry or my
00:35:41.630 --> 00:35:43.617 Ralph White: spiritual orientation. But
00:35:45.420 --> 00:35:51.780 Ralph White: It's just a an impulse to embrace the world and to live live life as fully as possible
00:35:53.050 --> 00:35:55.210 Linda Marsanico: That's inspiring.
00:35:55.340 --> 00:35:59.010 Linda Marsanico: Now I want to cite the story.
00:35:59.800 --> 00:36:06.210 Linda Marsanico: A walk on the wild side of Tibet, published in Tibet, true stories.
00:36:06.400 --> 00:36:11.679 Linda Marsanico: travelers, tales 2,003. So you published this in 2,003
00:36:11.680 --> 00:36:14.569 Ralph White: Right? So yes, I guess that was 2,003. Yeah.
00:36:14.760 --> 00:36:23.760 Linda Marsanico: And I would imagine your walk on the wild side happened a bit before then. Can you share that story? If you don't mind
00:36:24.290 --> 00:36:25.939 Ralph White: Yeah, sure.
00:36:26.060 --> 00:36:29.910 Ralph White: Well, it was actually 1989,
00:36:30.060 --> 00:36:34.479 Linda Marsanico: And I had taken that Sabbatical, and I was
00:36:34.840 --> 00:36:36.350 Ralph White: Traveling around the world.
00:36:36.700 --> 00:36:46.070 Ralph White: and I spent a month in the Necham monastery in Dharamsala, you know, which is where the Dalai Lama's government in exile is in Northwest India.
00:36:46.480 --> 00:36:50.170 Ralph White: So that's the real Tibetan center of Tibetan culture outside
00:36:51.770 --> 00:37:00.399 Ralph White: and outside the country. And so I had, thanks to a connection with a friend. I had spent a month in the Nechung monastery, the monastery of the State Oracle.
00:37:00.690 --> 00:37:07.160 Ralph White: really the only virtually the last surviving oracle in the world where the Nechung Chogam.
00:37:07.290 --> 00:37:14.059 Ralph White: the Nechung deity, the protective deity of Tibet and the Dalai Lama, actually speaks through a monk.
00:37:14.150 --> 00:37:39.319 Ralph White: and I happened to be there in my little room, and I'd wake up in the morning. I'd hear these deep chants and the blasts of the trumpets, and it turned out to be a 5 day ritual invoking the protective Deity, so I asked if I could go down there and meditate with them. So I just sat at the back while the monks, you know, it's a working monastery, with not virtually only one or 2 Westerners there
00:37:39.410 --> 00:37:46.769 Ralph White: while they did this ritual. And anyway, I obviously I didn't contribute. I just sat there and tuned into the vibe
00:37:47.240 --> 00:37:50.537 Ralph White: But then, later, I spent there a month.
00:37:51.520 --> 00:37:55.950 Ralph White: The head monk came to me and asked me if I would do something to
00:37:56.570 --> 00:38:01.890 Ralph White: they. They needed help getting something into Tibet.
00:38:02.040 --> 00:38:12.619 Ralph White: and it was impossible for Tibetan to do it. They were just examined too closely. He'd heard I was planning to take the 1st flight of the year. I think it was May 1st from
00:38:12.860 --> 00:38:23.270 Ralph White: Kathmandu to Lhasa, but it was 1959. So anyway, he, he asked me, would would I take this material into into Tibet for them?
00:38:23.480 --> 00:38:38.790 Ralph White: And he said they put me under the protection of the they put a Qatar scarf around my neck, and I said, Sure, I'll do it. I thought I'd just, you know, fly into the airport, and
00:38:39.820 --> 00:38:43.010 Ralph White: it'd be confiscated, or or whatever
00:38:43.010 --> 00:38:45.309 Linda Marsanico: Did you know what the material was?
00:38:45.310 --> 00:38:46.539 Ralph White: Yes, I did, but
00:38:46.540 --> 00:38:47.040 Linda Marsanico: Okay.
00:38:47.040 --> 00:38:47.993 Ralph White: Yeah, and
00:38:48.600 --> 00:38:59.250 Ralph White: But it was it was. It was all in Tibetan, so I couldn't read it so but I knew, only I knew the general thing. But I did, you know. Obviously I can't read a word of Tibet.
00:38:59.560 --> 00:39:12.730 Ralph White: So anyway, what happened was, it was 1959. So there were uprisings against the the Chinese, because it's the 30th anniversary of the Dalai Lama's flight in 1959 from Tibet.
00:39:13.060 --> 00:39:18.470 Ralph White: and just merely to demonstrate in favor of that, to hold up a
00:39:18.770 --> 00:39:28.900 Ralph White: a cardboard box with a Tibetan flag chopped on. It was enough for people to be killed, so there was a lot of repression going on in Lhasa, so
00:39:29.790 --> 00:39:34.139 Ralph White: All Westerners were thrown out of the country, so there'd be nobody to see it.
00:39:34.290 --> 00:39:37.800 Ralph White: and so it became impossible to fly into
00:39:38.040 --> 00:39:58.310 Ralph White: Lhasa for that. So then I so it looked like it would be impossible to do what I promised to do. But then I met somebody, a Chinese Canadian guy, actually, who was doing a book on trekking in Tibet. People had just been allowed to enter Tibet and to trek around Mount Kailash, and he told me about a route into Eastern Tibet last done in 1923,
00:39:58.590 --> 00:40:05.369 Ralph White: and there was an article about it in the National Geographic of 23, or 26. Something like that Joseph Rock.
00:40:05.560 --> 00:40:16.090 Ralph White: real explorer, had been to the land of the Alama through from Sichuan, so, to cut a long story short, that's what I wound up doing. I wound up.
00:40:16.780 --> 00:40:44.350 Ralph White: crossing into going up, going to Sichuan, Yunnan, Luku Lake, crossing the mountains over there into Eastern Tibet. You know. People think of Tibet as a flat plateau like World, with monks and monasteries, but Eastern Tibet is called the Land of 6 4 Rivers, 6 ranges, 4 of the great rivers, the water, the whole of Asia, all through a fairly narrow area. So it's got huge valleys, the deepest valleys I've ever seen.
00:40:45.010 --> 00:40:50.349 Ralph White: and it's and the guys the people live. There are the campers, KHAM. PAS.
00:40:50.500 --> 00:41:19.610 Ralph White: And they're the wild Tibetan cowboys and warriors. All the men have long hair. They all have a lot of jewelry, they wear cowboy hats, most of them have swords, and some of them are guns, have crack shots, and they're considered some of the finest horsemen in Asia. They protected the eastern borders of Tibet for a long time. So this was at the time forbidden territory. So anyway, so I had. I'm not going to go into the details of it. But essentially I went into, I was able to make that journey into that part of Tibet, and
00:41:19.720 --> 00:41:25.779 Ralph White: and and pass on the material to people who said they could get it to where it needed to go.
00:41:25.970 --> 00:41:26.620 Ralph White: So
00:41:27.640 --> 00:41:35.519 Ralph White: It wasn't possible to actually get to Lhasa, because that, you know, that was the whole of official Tibet was under martial law.
00:41:35.640 --> 00:41:40.270 Ralph White: But those borderlands there of Eastern Tibet calm, and
00:41:40.790 --> 00:41:49.970 Ralph White: which were basically they? They were Tibetans, considered that part of Tibetan and of China sort of appropriated it and announced that it was part of Sichuan instead.
00:41:50.180 --> 00:41:53.149 Ralph White: But yeah, that's so. That's what I did. And
00:41:53.440 --> 00:42:00.749 Ralph White: I managed to do it and get out in one piece, and but when I got back, when I had left to go into the mountains.
00:42:01.090 --> 00:42:30.700 Ralph White: the whole Tiananmen square thing was just brewing. I didn't know what would happen. It was only when I got back from the mountains into China a month later that I found that the Tiananmen Square massacre had taken place. I had no idea I was concerned. I was the last Western person left in China, because I couldn't see anybody else, but there were still a few left. But yeah, I saw the aftermath of Tiananmen Square and the the smashed windows and the burned out buildings of Communist Party headquarters, and so on.
00:42:30.840 --> 00:42:32.610 Ralph White: And of course that's all been.
00:42:32.720 --> 00:42:35.789 Ralph White: I would say in China, of course it's been covered up.
00:42:36.290 --> 00:42:55.100 Ralph White: But and China today is a very different place, you know, I actually was invited back to China some years ago before the pandemic, and to meet some of the holistic pioneers I gave the. I gave the opening talk at A, the 1st international holistic wellness Forum outside Beijing.
00:42:55.250 --> 00:42:59.380 Ralph White: you know. It was like an hour outside a half outside Beijing. It was
00:42:59.890 --> 00:43:10.360 Ralph White: a total recreation of 17th or 18th century Beijing, I mean, there were pagodas, there were lakes, there was even a functioning monastery there.
00:43:10.510 --> 00:43:25.660 Ralph White: It was an extraordinary experience to walk around there at dusk. You really felt like you were back in 17th century China, or something like that, anyway. So that was. And I met a lot of thanks to a Chinese friend of mine who took me around the country and introduced me to a lot of holistic pioneers.
00:43:25.690 --> 00:43:50.279 Ralph White: You know there's an awakening going on in China which we never see written about. You've got, you know, Maslow's hierarchy of human needs because you've got a couple of 100 million people in China lifted out of pure subsistence, and so they can engage with larger questions, education, self-actualization, and all that kind of thing. And so you've got now loads and loads of people, particularly young women in the cities
00:43:50.450 --> 00:43:55.960 Ralph White: who were educated. Some of them are traveled, and that, and they have the same spiritual interests that we do.
00:43:56.070 --> 00:44:03.490 Ralph White: You know, I mean, in all those years at the open center, I always wanted to be very multicultural and include all the cultures and the coherent spiritual paths.
00:44:03.962 --> 00:44:05.330 Ralph White: But you know, we
00:44:05.490 --> 00:44:14.950 Ralph White: even one tended to forget 22% of humanity. You know those Chinese. They're over there doing their thing. It's Communist spirituality is repressed.
00:44:15.170 --> 00:44:19.860 Ralph White: you know. You never. All they're interested in is military power. And
00:44:20.431 --> 00:44:24.238 Ralph White: you know, economic growth and producing more cars and all the rest of it.
00:44:24.850 --> 00:44:26.219 Ralph White: but it's not true.
00:44:26.360 --> 00:44:29.489 Ralph White: They're just like us, and
00:44:29.710 --> 00:44:50.200 Ralph White: there are a lot of wonderful people. So you know what made me feel ultimately I don't know how many generations it's going to take, but ultimately there is a spiritual awakening happening in China, and of course their heirs to a phenomenal heritage. I mean, the government is not being so oppressive about indigenous stuff like Taoism
00:44:50.730 --> 00:45:09.270 Ralph White: and Buddhism to some extent, and of course they love Confucianism because it supports hierarchy and all the rest of it. But that's 1 of my hopes, for the world is that China will eventually reawaken to its amazing spiritual heritage
00:45:09.940 --> 00:45:17.829 Linda Marsanico: Yes, thank you for that. Now we need to take a break when we come back. I'm interested in what
00:45:18.060 --> 00:45:29.729 Linda Marsanico: was your mood, your your feelings when you were trying to bring this material as you had promised
00:45:29.880 --> 00:45:49.990 Linda Marsanico: to, where it needed to be brought. You didn't get to lasso, but you did have this mission, and I'm wondering about the reflective Ralph. What was the experience like. But we do need to take a break, and when we come back listeners. We're going to hear a deeper, a reflective of Ralph White
00:47:26.460 --> 00:47:34.009 Linda Marsanico: Hello, everyone! Welcome back to the A. Train to Sedona. I'm Linda Marcannico with my guest, Ralph White.
00:47:34.950 --> 00:47:38.170 Linda Marsanico: So, Ralph, please unmute yourself
00:47:40.790 --> 00:47:41.170 Ralph White: Okay.
00:47:41.170 --> 00:47:44.429 Linda Marsanico: So I'm wondering, I think, that I would be
00:47:44.880 --> 00:48:00.729 Linda Marsanico: having to meditate and mantra myself during such a mission, to reduce my parasympathetic nerve to increase my parasympathetic nervous system's effect on the sympathetic nervous system. So what was your internal Ralph
00:48:01.600 --> 00:48:03.589 Linda Marsanico: experiencing on this mission
00:48:03.590 --> 00:48:07.830 Ralph White: Well, you know, of course, spending that month in the natural monastery.
00:48:08.090 --> 00:48:15.920 Ralph White: surrounded by one of their deepest spiritual, it definitely, deeply attuned me to the Tibetan spirit.
00:48:16.110 --> 00:48:30.070 Ralph White: and you know I can't. Couldn't say these things for sure. But you know, I suspect I actually was touched by the spirit of Paja Gyalpo something definitely. I would never have done that by myself, you know, if I hadn't been asked.
00:48:30.260 --> 00:48:37.548 Ralph White: So yeah, I mean, so that 1st of all, I had that sense of inspiration and
00:48:38.630 --> 00:48:52.179 Ralph White: and conviction that this was something worth doing, although I didn't. I thought I would just be flying in initially during the actual month or so that I was in the Himalayas. There, in eastern to the borderlands of Eastern Tibet and Yunnan
00:48:54.370 --> 00:49:08.370 Ralph White: there was no time, it was so exhausting. Physically, we were up at such high altitude. I was up at 1213, 14,000 feet a lot of the time, and there were no maps. I had an old 1919 map from the British Empire.
00:49:10.050 --> 00:49:16.850 Ralph White: So it was more a question of endurance.
00:49:17.864 --> 00:49:20.480 Ralph White: But it was also.
00:49:21.410 --> 00:49:32.350 Ralph White: even though I'm not sitting there meditating. I don't think any of the people I've traveled with along the way, including a young Sino-tibetan guide over these really remote mountains.
00:49:32.660 --> 00:49:43.239 Ralph White: Nobody was into spiritual practice except the monks and the monasteries. So it was just. It was more a question of just being surrounded by this stunning beauty.
00:49:44.270 --> 00:49:56.029 Ralph White: I mean. I remember being way up in this mountain ridge, and suddenly this gorgeous, perfect cone shaped snow. Cap Mountain appeared in the far, far distance to the east.
00:49:56.110 --> 00:50:18.769 Ralph White: and the Tibetans all sounded Gongashan, Gongashan, the holy Mountain, which was surrounded in mists. I don't know a huge percentage of the time, and it rarely revealed itself, and I had to be there so suddenly. I'm gazing in wonder at this gorgeous mountain I'd never even heard before. I mean, it looked like it was, you know, as high as Everest. Well, virtually
00:50:18.770 --> 00:50:27.430 Ralph White: it isn't, but but it rises up from a much lower level than Everest, so it's striking. So I was surrounded by that kind of beauty.
00:50:27.720 --> 00:50:34.880 Ralph White: And also, you know, the Tibetans I met were so charming they're so gracious, so helpful.
00:50:37.040 --> 00:50:39.220 Ralph White: So yeah, I didn't.
00:50:39.620 --> 00:50:46.490 Ralph White: God! I must have meditated a few. There were definitely a future. Oh, well, no. Actually there was a moment. Yes.
00:50:46.770 --> 00:51:05.340 Ralph White: now that I recall it. Yes, and that's that Tibetan story where I'd come. I'd come down into this village a very it was. It was felt like a pre criminal village that people there were really seedy. I wanted to get out of there as fast as possible. This is somewhat and still in the Chinese speaking world, and
00:51:05.950 --> 00:51:16.859 Ralph White: and I need to leave fast. Just get out. So I started hiking along this remote trail by the side of a river, and it seemed to come to an absolute dead end.
00:51:17.340 --> 00:51:23.180 Ralph White: and it looked like, well, what am I going to do? I can't go back to that village. This looks like a complete dead end.
00:51:23.530 --> 00:51:52.390 Ralph White: And so that was a moment where I did draw upon my years of meditating, and I did find it a comfortable rock to sit on and meditate, and just chill out and just relax calm. Just go forward. I walked another. Whatever quarter of a mile forward it was clear the river just took a 90 degree turn. It wasn't an absolute dead end. The river turned and the path by the river turned as well, and then, a few minutes later a young Tibetan on a horse white horse rode up.
00:51:52.580 --> 00:52:00.059 Ralph White: and you know, obviously we can only exchange a few words, but I told him what I was going. Dao Chang, he says, Dao Chang.
00:52:00.290 --> 00:52:10.550 Ralph White: So that was that was the one time I really remember drawing upon my meditative resources to get out of what felt like an extremely stressed and tight corner
00:52:11.470 --> 00:52:17.329 Linda Marsanico: Yes, interesting. How what seemed like a dead end was an opening.
00:52:18.300 --> 00:52:22.099 Linda Marsanico: Know what that reminds me of? I don't know whether you read Harry Potter. I read all
00:52:22.100 --> 00:52:23.310 Ralph White: Red, one
00:52:23.310 --> 00:52:31.629 Linda Marsanico: I was. I think there were 8 or 9 books, and in the early books Harry talks about the marauders map.
00:52:31.940 --> 00:52:35.459 Linda Marsanico: and it's a map you take, which is blank.
00:52:35.800 --> 00:52:41.399 Linda Marsanico: It doesn't show up until you make a decision, and then when you make a decision.
00:52:41.940 --> 00:52:49.419 Linda Marsanico: your path is shown. So when you see that what you think is a dead end, and it's an opening to a river, and then
00:52:49.700 --> 00:52:50.649 Linda Marsanico: I don't know
00:52:51.090 --> 00:52:58.209 Linda Marsanico: being a person. A man on a white horse shows you the way to your destination. It sounds magical to me
00:52:58.210 --> 00:53:08.300 Ralph White: It was just a huge relief to me at a time from high stress to major relief. I mean, I was still a long way from where I needed to be, but at least I was going in the right direction.
00:53:08.650 --> 00:53:11.299 Linda Marsanico: And did you have food with you and water
00:53:12.045 --> 00:53:25.790 Ralph White: Yeah. Well, or I, just, you know, got food from the villages that I passed through water because you couldn't. You had to have little, you know, purifying pills if you're drinking water out of streams. Unfortunately, I never got sick on that whole month
00:53:26.110 --> 00:53:30.330 Ralph White: because I was scrupulous about using water Purification Pills.
00:53:30.490 --> 00:53:44.117 Ralph White: I have some pretty awful food, though the people who live on those borderlands of China and Tibet live in such poverty. I mean, just there's nothing to eat in those villages except I mean, of course, this is 30 years ago or more. But
00:53:45.600 --> 00:54:00.599 Ralph White: They live, you know, just just white rice and luncheon meat, you know. Spam, I mean, just just you start fantasizing about just an egg. Can I just have an egg, you know. Then it's nothing there. So I feel a lot of compassion for those people. We're up in these remote
00:54:01.040 --> 00:54:24.669 Ralph White: villages, felling trees and in the in the mountains, and, you know, surviving on virtually nothing. And yeah, some of the young Tibetan guys I met were just sent there after they graduated. No choice. They just had to man, a remote outpost in Tibet, with nothing going on around them, nothing to do except the Ping Pong table. I mean. Sure by now they probably have the Internet, but all those
00:54:24.670 --> 00:54:25.620 Linda Marsanico: Cell phones.
00:54:25.620 --> 00:54:37.330 Ralph White: Yeah, it was a very isolating life. I have nothing, you know. The Chinese people I met were most of them were perfectly friendly and helpful, and I felt a lot of compassion actually for the the
00:54:37.570 --> 00:54:44.120 Ralph White: very limited lives that they were forced to leave, and only allowed to go back and see their families, even their wives, twice a year
00:54:45.050 --> 00:54:46.189 Linda Marsanico: From the remote areas
00:54:46.190 --> 00:54:52.330 Ralph White: From there from the post that they were sent to along the road between
00:54:52.830 --> 00:54:54.790 Ralph White: Li Tang and BA Tang, and
00:54:55.740 --> 00:55:00.150 Linda Marsanico: Fascinating all this, and what little we know and
00:55:00.150 --> 00:55:14.230 Ralph White: Yeah. Well, I really hope you know, one hopes, of course, the worst scenario for the 21st century would be a hot war between the Us. And China, and that's the last thing we want. So any kind of citizens diplomacy as it used to be, just any kind of
00:55:14.530 --> 00:55:20.549 Ralph White: interaction between us and the Chinese people. It's greatly to be supported in favor
00:55:20.550 --> 00:55:23.133 Linda Marsanico: I agree totally. I wanna
00:55:24.070 --> 00:55:27.790 Linda Marsanico: recite one of your quotes from your website.
00:55:28.380 --> 00:55:40.240 Linda Marsanico: you speak about quote creating a more holistic, ecological, conscious, and just society, and it sounds like your life has focused on that
00:55:41.180 --> 00:55:52.130 Ralph White: Well, yeah, I mean, what else is there to do? I mean, you want to have fun, of course, and you want to enjoy life as fully as you can. But yeah, I mean, that's really been the guiding
00:55:52.550 --> 00:56:01.770 Ralph White: impulse in my life since I had. You know that my own awakening in the deserts of New Mexico and in the Andes, and so on.
00:56:03.580 --> 00:56:07.667 Ralph White: So yeah, that's that's what it's all about. That's what I want to do. And
00:56:08.160 --> 00:56:38.150 Ralph White: I can't say it's been a vehicle to a great deal of material prosperity, but that's never been. One of my goals is to do what you just said there. So yeah, it's challenging. It ain't easy. I mean, you're going against the grain even now in 2025, let alone compared to 40, 45 years ago. We're still going against the grain in general of mainstream society, but it's more and more widespread, and there's more and more receptivity to it, and there are also plenty of contrary forces as well.
00:56:38.460 --> 00:56:47.730 Ralph White: to say the least. And but we're not going to give up, because we know that this is the way the world needs to go for for a viable and sustainable future.
00:56:47.730 --> 00:56:51.989 Linda Marsanico: Yes, indeed, Ralph, how can people find you
00:56:53.380 --> 00:56:59.410 Ralph White: Well, there's the new center's website, newcenterny.org.
00:57:00.050 --> 00:57:13.300 Ralph White: There's I'm going to be doing another. Actually, the 30th anniversary esoteric Quest Conference in Switzerland in September. It's an esoteric quest for the mountain of truth, Monte Verita.
00:57:13.440 --> 00:57:38.089 Ralph White: which is where the counterculture was born at the beginning of the 20, th 19 0, 1, it didn't start in California, as most people think in the sixties. It actually started on the shores of Lago majority in 19 0, 1. All the things that we associate with the counterculture were all being pioneered then, and we think of Pop, like many of us, have read Herman Hesse. At least, maybe it's just my generation. But we all loved Herman Hesser. But you know
00:57:38.090 --> 00:57:38.560 Ralph White: no.
00:57:38.560 --> 00:57:55.539 Ralph White: Asa, Isadora Duncan. All these amazing people were all there at this Monte Verita, the Mountain of Truth, and we're going to start off at the retreat center that Jung himself used many times Iranos, which is just on the shores of the lake, where a lot of the most brilliant minds
00:57:55.740 --> 00:58:16.590 Ralph White: before the sixties, before psychedelics in the mid the mid between the thirties and fifties, these extraordinary people would gather with Jung and the Uranus retreat there. To understand, you know the d the way archetypes, the collective, unconscious mythology, that deeper understanding than just
00:58:17.410 --> 00:58:23.060 Ralph White: mainstream academic philosophy and purely materialistic world conception.
00:58:23.190 --> 00:58:27.460 Ralph White: So yeah, so there's so there's esotericquest.org
00:58:27.909 --> 00:58:35.960 Ralph White: the art of dying where we're currently reimagining. We're going to relaunch the art of dying programs in September. But there's art of dying.org.
00:58:36.730 --> 00:58:56.550 Ralph White: And then there is. There's my own website, ralphwhite.net. And then I want to point people towards if there's any viewers or listeners out there who are involved with a holistic center of some sort. I've been attending this annual holistic centers gathering. It's amazing. It's 4 years now.
00:58:56.950 --> 00:59:03.340 Ralph White: But we're going to be doing it at a retreat center called the Guesthouse Retreat center in Connecticut.
00:59:03.690 --> 00:59:27.110 Ralph White: and that is taking place in mid May for 5 days. And it's really an opportunity for holistic centers around the country. And internationally, we're going to be joined by people doing this work because it's a mistake to think this is just in North America. There are centers in Europe, in Asia and South America, and it's it's a fine way to put your finger on the pulse of what's happening in the whole holistic movement for want of a better phrase.
00:59:27.110 --> 00:59:39.150 Ralph White: and it's a meeting of just very convivial, very relaxed, very candid. It's about speaking openly and honestly, and I'm you know we didn't do a gathering last year for different, because different things were happening. But
00:59:39.230 --> 00:59:47.199 Ralph White: I'm looking forward to just talking to peers again. What's going on? What works? What doesn't? What are you seeing
00:59:47.550 --> 00:59:55.900 Ralph White: Oh, what are your challenges? What are your successes? So I want to encourage. I don't think they have a website. If you go. I think Guest House
00:59:56.090 --> 01:00:02.139 Ralph White: must have its own retreat. It's its own website. But I know they have a Facebook page for the scent. So if you don't
01:00:02.140 --> 01:00:05.370 Linda Marsanico: Also, Ralph, they can reach out to you because you contact me. Yeah.
01:00:05.370 --> 01:00:10.690 Ralph White: Yeah, that's right. You could reach out to me through my website. And I can put you anybody in touch
01:00:10.950 --> 01:00:27.030 Ralph White: about the centers gathering in mid-may in Connecticut. But if if you're running a center, because many people, you know, when they start centers, they can feel very alone. And it's it's good for us all to be connected to the strength in numbers, especially at a disturbing time, like the one we're living in right now.
01:00:27.430 --> 01:00:32.390 Linda Marsanico: We do need to close. I wanted to thank you so much for being on the show
01:00:32.390 --> 01:00:33.739 Ralph White: Oh, my pleasure!
01:00:33.740 --> 01:00:46.049 Linda Marsanico: And I wanted to say, listeners, that next week I have as my guest Stephanie Mcauliffe, who writes about the energy of boundaries and the divine feminine. See you next time
01:00:47.170 --> 01:00:47.960 Ralph White: Alright!
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